History of Medina county and Ohio, Part 4

Author: Perrin, William Henry, d. 1892?; Battle, J. H; Goodspeed, Weston Arthur, 1852-1926; Baskin & Battey. Chicago. pub
Publication date: 1881
Publisher: Chicago : Baskin & Battey
Number of Pages: 1014

USA > Ohio > Medina County > History of Medina county and Ohio > Part 4

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Remaining here till the next day, they are escorted for cight or ten leagues to the village of Akansea. They are now at the limit of their voyage. The Indians speak a dialect unknown to them. The natives show furs and axcs of steel, the latter prov- ing they have traded witlı Europeans. The two travelers now learn that the Father of Wa- ters went neither to the Western sea nor to the Florida coast, but straighit south, and conclude not to encounter the burning heats of a tropical clime, but return and find the outlet again. They had done enough now, and must report their dis- covery.

On the 17th day of July, 1673, one hundred and thirty-two years after the disastrous journey of De Soto, which led to no permanent results, Marquette and Joliet left the village of Akansea on their way back. At the 38tli degree, they en- counter the waters of the Illinois which they had before noticed, and which the natives told them afforded a much shorter route to the lakes. Pad- dling up its limpid waters, they see a country un- surpassed in beauty. Broad prairies, beautiful up- lands, luxuriant groves, all mingled in excellent. harmony as they ascend the river. Near the head of the river, they pause at a great village of the Illinois, and across the river behold a rocky prom- ontory standing boldly out against the landscape. The Indians entreat the gentle missionary to re- main among them, and teach them the way of life. IIe cannot do this, but promises to return when he can and instruet them. The town was on a plain near the present village of Utica, in La Salle County, Ill., and the rock was Starved Rock, afterward noted in the annals of the Northwest. One of the chiefs and some young men conduct the party to the Chicago River, where the present mighty city is, from where, continuing their jour- ney along the western shores of the lake, they reach Green Bay early in September.

The great valley of the West was now open. The "Messippi" rolled its mighty flood to a south- ern sea, and must be sully explored. Marquette's health had keenly suffered by the voyage and he concluded to remain here and rest. Joliet basten- edl on to Quebec to report his discoveries. During the journey, each had preserved a description of the route they had passed over, as well as the country and its inhabitants. While on the way to Quebec, at the foot of the rapids near Montreal, by some means one of Joliet's canoes became cap- sized, and by it he lost his box of papers and two of his men. A greater calamity could have

HISTORY OF OHIO.

hardly happened him. In a letter to Gov. Frontenac, Joliet says:

"I had eseaped every peril from the Indians; I had passed forty-two rapids, and was on the point of disembarking, full of joy at the success of so long aud difficult an enterprise, when my eanoe capsized after all the danger seemed over. I lost my two men aud box of papers within sight of the French settlements, which I had left almost two years before. Nothing remains now to me but my life, and the ardent desire to employ it in any serviee you may please to direct."

When Joliet made known his discoveries, a Te Deum was chanted in the Cathedral at Quebec, and all Canada was filled with joy. The news erossed the ocean, and the French saw in the vista of coming years a vast dependency arise in the val- ley, partially explored, which was to extend her domain and enrich her treasury. Fearing En- gland might profit by the discovery and claim the country, she attempted as far as possible to prevent the news from becoming general. Joliet was re- warded by the gift of the Island of Anticosti, in the St. Lawrence, while Marquette, conscious of his service to his Master, was eontent with the salvation of souls.

Marquette, left at Green Bay, suffered long with his malady, and was not permitted, until the au- tumn of the following year (1674), to return and teach the Illinois Indians. With this purpose in view, he left Green Bay on the 25th of October with two Frenchmen and a number of Illinois and Pottawatomie Indians for the villages on the Chieago and Illinois Rivers. Entering Lake Michigan, they encountered adverse winds and waves and were more than a month on the way. Going some distance up the Chieago River, they found Marquette too weak to proceed farther, his malady having assumed a violent form, and land- ing, they erected two huts and prepared to pass the winter. The good missionary taught the na- tives here daily, in spite of his afflietions, while his companions supplied him and themselves with food by fishing and hunting. Thus the winter wore away, and Marquette, renewing his vows, pre- pared to go on to the village at the foot of the rocky citadel, where he had been two years before. On the 13th of March, 1675, they left their huts and, rowing on up the Chicago to the portage be- tween that and the Desplaines, embarked on their way. Amid the ineessant rains of spring, they were rapidly borne down that stream to the Illi- nois, on whose rushing flood they floated to the

object of their destination. At the great town the missionary was received as a heavenly messenger, and as he preached to them of heaven and hell, of angels and demons, of good and bad deeds, they regarded him as divine and besought him to remain among them. The town then contained an immense eoncourse of natives, drawn hither by the reports they heard, and assembling them before him on the plain near their village, where now are pros- perous farms, he held before their astonished gaze four large pictures of the Holy Virgin, and daily harangued them on the duties of Christianity and the necessity of conforming their eonduet to the words they heard. His strength was fast declining and warned him he could not long remain. Find- ing he must go, the Indians furnished him an escort as far as the lake, on whose turbulent waters he embarked with his two faithful attendants. They turned their canoes for the Mackinaw Mis- sion, which the afflieted missionary hoped to reach before death came. As they coasted along the eastern shores of the lake, the vernal hue of May began to eover the hillsides with robes of green, now dimmed to the eye of the departing Father, who became too weak to view them. By the 19th of the month, he could go no farther, and requested his men to land and build him a hut in which he might pass away. That done, he gave, with great composure, directions eoneerning his burial, and thanked God that he was permitted to die in the wilderness in the midst of his work, an unshaken believer in the faith he had so earnestly preached. As twilight eame on, he told his weary attendants to rest, promising that when death should come he would eall them. At an early hour, on the morn- ing of the 20th of May, 1675, they heard a feeble voiee, and hastening to his side found that the gen- tle spirit of the good missionary had gone to heav- en. His hand grasped the erueifix, and his lips bore as their last sound the name of the Virgin. They dug a grave near the banks of the stream and buried him as he had requested. There in a lonely wilderness the peaceful soul of Marquette had at last found a rest, and his weary labors elosed. His companions went on to the mission, where the news of his death eaused great sorrow, for he was one beloved by all.

Three years after his burial, the Ottawas, hunting in the vicinity of his grave, determined to carry his bones to the mission at their home, in aecor- danee with an ancient custom of their tribe. Hav- ing opened the grave, at whose head a eross had been planted, they carefully removed the bones and

HISTORY OF OHIO.

eleaning them, a funeral procession of thirty canocs bore them to the Mackinaw Mission, singing the songs he had taught them. At the shores of the mission the bones were received by the priests, and, with great ceremony, buried under the floor of the rude chapel.

While Marquette and Joliet were exploring the head-waters of the "Great River," another man, fearless in purpose, pious in heart, and loyal to his country, was living in Canada and watching the operations of his fellow countrymen with keen eyes. When the Freuch first saw the in- hospitable shores of the St. Lawrence, in 1535, under the lead of Jacques Cartier, and had opened a new country to their crown, men were not lacking to further extend the discovery. In 1608, Champlain came, and at the foot of a cliff on that river founded Quebec. Seven years after, he brought four Recollet monks; and through them and the Jesuits the discoveries already narrated occurred. Champlain died in 1635, one hundred years after Cartier's first visit, but not until he had explored the northern lakes as far as Lake Huron, on whose rocky shores he, as the progenitor of a mighty race to follow, set his feet. He, with others, held to the idea that somewhere across the country, a river highway extended to the Western ocean. The reports from the missions whose history has been given aided this belief; and not until Marquette and Joliet returned was the delu- sion in any way dispelled. Before this was done, however, the man to whom reference has been made, Robert Cavalier, better known as La Salle, had endeavored to solve the mystery, and, while living on his grant of land eight miles above Montreal, had indeed effected important discoveries.

La Salle, the next actor in the field of explor- ation after Champlaiu, was born in 1643. His father's family was among the old and wealthy burghers of Rouen, France, and its members were frequently entrusted with important govern- mental positions. He early exhibited such traits of character as to mark him among his associates. Coming from a wealthy family, he enjoyed all the advantages of his day, and received, for the times, an excellent cducation. He was a Catholic, though his subsequeut life does not prove him to have been a religious enthusiast. From some cause, he joined the Order of Loyola, but the cir- cumscribed sphere of action set for him in the order illy concurred with his independent dis- position, and led to his separation from it. This was effected, however, in a good spirit, as they

considered him fit for a different field of action than any presented by the order. Having a brother in Canada, a member of the order of St. Sulpice, he determined to join him. By his connection with the Jesuits he had lost his share of his father's estate, but, by some means, on his death, which occurred about this time, he was given a small share; and with this, in 1666, he arrived in Montreal. All Canada was alive with the news of the explorations; and La Salle's mind, actively grasping the ideas he afterward carried out, began to mature plans for their perfection. At Montreal he found a semi- nary of priests of the St. Sulpice Order who were encouraging settlers by grants of land on easy terms, hoping to establish a barrier of settlements between themselves and the Indians, made ene- mies to the French by Champlain's actions when founding Quebec. The Superior of the seminary, learning of LaSalle's arrival, gratuitously offered him a grant of land on the St. Lawrence, eight miles above Montreal. The grant, though danger- ously near the hostile Indians, was accepted, and La Salle soon enjoyed an excellent trade in furs. While employed in developing his elaim, he learned of the great unknown route, and burned with a desire to solve its existence. He applied himself closely to the study of Indian dialeets, and in three years is said to have made great progress in their language. While on his farm his thoughts often turned to the unknown land away to the west, and, like all men of his day, he desired to explore the route to the Western sea, and thence obtain an easy trade with China and Japan. The "Great River, which flowed to the sea," must, thought they, find an outlet in the Gulf of California. While musing on these things, Marquette and Joliet were preparing to descend the Wisconsin; and La Salle himself learned from a wandering band of Senecas that a river, called the Ohio, arose in their country and flowed to the sea, but at such a distance that it would require eight months to reach its mouth. This must be the Great River, or a part of it: for all geographicrs of the day considered the Mississippi and its tributary as one stream. Plae- ing great confidence on this hypothesis, La Salle repaired to Quebec to obtain the sanetion of Gov. Courcelles. His plausible statements soon won him the Governor and M. Talon, and letters patent were issued granting the exploration. No pecuniary aid was offered, and La Salle, hav- ing expended all his means in improving his

IHISTORY OF OHIO.

estate, was obliged to sell it to procure the necessary outfit. The Superior of the seminary being favorably disposed toward him, purchased the greater part of his improvement, and realiz- ing 2,800 livres, he purchased four canoes and the necessary supplies for the expedition. The semi- nary was, at the same time, preparing for a similar exploration. The priests of this order, emulating the Jesuits, had established missious on the north- ern shore of Lake Ontario. Hearing of populous tribes still further west, they resolved to attempt their conversion, and deputized two of their number for the purpose. On going to Quebec to procure the necessary supplies, they were advised of La Salle's expedition down the Ohio, and resolved to unite themselves with it. La Salle did not alto- gether favor their attempt, as he believed the Jesuits already had the field, and would not care to have any aid from a rival order. His dispo- sition also would not well brook the part they assumed, of asking him to be a co-laborer rather than a leader. However, the expeditions, merged into one body, left the mission on the St. Law- rence on the 6th of July, 1669, in seven canoes. The party numbered twenty-four persons, who were accompanied by two canoes filled with Indians who had visited La Salle, and who now acted as guides. Their guides led them up the St. Lawrence, over the expanse of Lake Ontario, to their village on the banks of the Genesec, where they expected to find guides to lead them on to the Ohio. As La Salle only partially under- stood their language, he was compelled to confer with them by means of a Jesuit stationed at the village. The Indians refused to furnish him the expected aid, and even burned before his eyes a prisoner, the only one who could give him any knowledge he desired. He surmised the Jesuits were at the bottom of the matter, fearful lest the disciples of St. Sulpice should gain a foothold in the west. He lingered here a month, with the hope of accomplishing his object, when, by chance, there came by an Iroquois Indian, who assured them that at his colony, near the head of the lake, they could find guides; and offered to conduct them thither. Coming along the southern shore of the lake, they passed, at its western extremity, the mouth of the Niagara River, where they heard for the first time the thunder of the mighty cata- ract between the two lakes. At the village of the Iroquois they met a friendly reception, and were informed by a Shawanese prisoner that they could reach the Ohio in six weeks' time, and that he

would guide them there. While preparing to commence the journey, they heard of the missions to the northwest, and the priests resolved to go there and convert the natives, and find the river by that route. It appears that Louis Joliet met them here, on his return from visiting the copper mines of Lake Superior, under command of M. Talon. He gave the priests a map of the country, and informed them that the Indians of those regions were in great need of spiritual advisers. This strengthened their intention, though warned by La Salle, that the Jesuits were undoubtedly there. The authority for Joliet's visit to them here is not clearly given, and may not be true, but the same letter which gives the account of the discovery of the Ohio at this time by La Salle, states it as a fact, and it is hence inserted. The missionaries and La Salle separated, the former to find, as he had predicted, the followers of Loyola already in the field, and not wanting their aid. Hence they return front a fruitless tour.

La Salle, now left to himself and just recovering from a violent fever, went on his journey. From the paper from which these statements are taken, it appears he went on to Onondaga, where he pro- cured guides to a tributary of the Ohio, down which he proceeded to the principal stream, on whose bosom he continued his way till he came to the falls at the present city of Louisville, Ky. It has been asserted that he went on down to its mouth, but that is not well authenticated and is hardly true. The statement that he went as far as the falls is, doubtless, correct. He states, in a letter to Count Frontenac in 1677, that he discovered the Ohio, and that he desceuded it to the falls. Moreover, Joliet, in a measure his rival, for he was now preparing to go to the northern lakes and from them search the river, made two maps repre- senting the lakes and the Mississippi, ou both of which he states that La Salle had discovered the Ohio. Of its course beyond the falls, La Salle does not seem to have learned anything definite, hence his discovery did not in any way settle the great question, and clicited but little comment. Still, it stimulated La Salle to more effort, and while musing on liis plans, Joliet and Marquette push on from Green Bay, and discover the river and ascertain the general course of its outlet. On Joliet's return in 1673, he seems to drop from further notice. Other and more venturesome souls were ready to finish the work begun by himself and the zealous Marquette, who, left among the far-away nations, laid down his life. The spirit of

HISTORY OF OHIO.

29.

La Salle was equal to the enterprise, and as he now had returned from one voyage of discovery, lie stood ready to solve the mystery, and gain the country for his King. Before this could be ac- complished, however, he saw other things must be done, aud made preparations on a scale, for the time, truly marvelous.

Count Frontenac, the new Governor, had no sooner established himself in power thau he gave a searching glance over the new realm to sce if any undeveloped resources lay yet unnoticed, and what country yet remained opeu. He learned from the exploits of La Salle ou the Ohio, and from Joliet, now returned from the West, of that immense country, and resolving in his mind on some plan whereby it could be formally taken, entered heartily into the plans of La Salle, who, anxious to solve the mystery concerning the outlet of the Great River, gave him the outline of a plan, saga- cious in its conception and grand in its compre- hension. La Salle had also informed him of the endeavors of the English on the Atlantic coast to divert the trade with the Indiaus, and partly to counteract this, were the plans of La Salle adopted. They were, briefly, to build a chain of forts from Canada, or New France, along the lakes to the Mississippi, and on down that river, thereby hold- ing the country by power as well as by discovery. A fort was to be built on the Ohio as soon as the means could be obtained, and thereby hold that country by the same policy. Thus to La Salle alone may be ascribed the bold plan of gaining the whole West, a plan only thwarted by the force of arms. Through the aid of Frontenac, he . was given a proprietary and the rank of nobility, and on his proprietary was erected a fort, which he, in honor of his Governor, ealled Fort Frontenac. It stood on the site of the present city of Kingston, Canada. Through it he obtained the trade of the Five Nations, and his fortune was so far assured. He next repaired to France, to perfect his arrange- ments, secure his title and obtain means.

On his return he built the fort alluded to, and prepared to go on in the prosceutiou of his plan. A eivil discord arose, however, which for three years prevailed, and seriously threatened his projects. As soon as he could extricate himself, he again repaired to France, receiving additional encouragement in money, grants, and the exclusive privilege of a trade in buffalo skins, then consid- ered a source of great wealth. On his return, he was accompanied by Henry Tonti, son of an illus- trious Italian nobleman, who had fled from his

own country during one of its political revolutions. Coming to France, he made himself famous as the founder of Tontine Life Insurance. Henry Tonti possessed an indomitable will, and though he had suffered the loss of one of his hands by the ex- plosion of a grenade in one of the Sicilian wars, his courage was undaunted, and his ardor un- dimmed. La Salle also brought recruits, mechanics, sailors, cordage and sails for rigging a ship, and merchandise for traffie with the natives. At Montreal, he secured the services of M. La Motte, a person of much euergy and integrity of character. He also secured several missionaries before he reached Fort Frontenac. Among them were Louis Hennepin, Gabriel Ribourde and Zenabe Membre. All these were Flemings, all Recollets. Hennepin, of all of them, proved the best assist- ant. They arrived at the fort early in the autumn of 1678, and preparations were at once made to erect a vessel in which to navigate the lakes, and a fort at the mouth of the Niagara River. The Senecas were rather adverse to the latter proposals when La Motte and Hennepin came, but by the eloquence of the latter, they were pacified and rendered friendly. After a number of vexa- tious delays, the vessel, the Griffin, the first on the lakes, was built, and on the 7th of August, a year after La Salle came here, it was launched, passed over the waters of the northern lakes, and, after a tempestuous voyage, landed at Green Bay. It was soon after stored with furs and sent back, while La Salle and his men awaited its return. It was never afterward heard of. La Salle, becoming impatient, creeted a fort, pushed on with a part of his men, leaving part at the fort, and passed over the St. Joseph and Kankakee Rivers, and thence to the Illinois, down whose flood they proceeded to Peoria Lake, where he was obliged to halt, and return to Canada for more men and supplies. He left Tonti and several men to complete a fort, ealled Fort " Crevecoeur "- broken-hearted. The Indians drove the French away, the men mutinied, and Tonti was obliged to flee. When La Salle returned, he found no one there, and going down as far as the mouth of the Illinois, he retraeed his steps, to find some trace of his garrison. Tonti was found safe among the Pottawatomies at Green Bay, and Hennepin and his two followers, sent to explore the head-waters of the Mississippi, were again home, after a captivity among the Sioux.

La Salle renewed his force of men, and the third time set out for the outlet of the Great River.

HISTORY OF ONIIO.

He left Canada early in December, 1681, and by February 6, 1682, reached the majestic flood of the mighty stream. On the 24th, they ascended the Chickasaw Bhffs, and, while waiting to find a sailor who had strayed away, crected Fort Prud- homme. They passed several Indian villages fur- ther down the river, in some of which they met with no little opposition. Proceeding onward, ere- long they encountered the tide of the sea, and April 6, they emerged on the broad bosom of the Gulf, "tossing its restless billows, limitless, voice- less and lonely as when born of chaos, without a sign of life.'

Coasting about a short time on the shores of the Gulf, the party returned until a sufficiently dry place was reached to effect a landing. Here another cross was raised, also a column, on which was inscribed these words:

" LOUIS LE GRAND, ROI DE FRANCE ET DE NAVARRE, REGNE; LE NEUVIEME, AVRIL, 1682."

"The whole party," says a "proces verbal," in the archives of France, "chanted the Te Deum, the Exaudiat and the Domine salvum fue Regem, and then after a salute of fire-arms and eries of Vive le Roi, La Salle, standing near the column, said in a lond voice in French :

" In the name of the most high, mighty, invin- cible and victorious Prince, Louis the Great, by the grace of God, King of France and of Navarre, Fourteenth of that name, this ninth day of April, one thousand six hundred and eighty two, I, in virtue of the commission of His Majesty, which I hold in my hand, and which may be seen by all whom it may eoneern, have taken, and do now take, in the name of His Majesty and of his suc- cessors to the crown, possession of this country of Louisiana, the seas, harbor, ports, bays, adjacent straights, and all the nations, people, provinces, cities, towns, villages, mines, minerals, fisheries, streams and rivers, comprised in the extent of said Louisiana, from the north of the great river St. Louis, other- wise called the Ohio, Alighin, Sipore or Chnkago- na, and this with the consent of the Chavunons, Chiekachaws, and other people dwelling therein, with whom we have made alliance; as also along the river Colbert or Mississippi, and rivers which discharge themselves therein from its source beyond the Kious or Nadouessious, and this with their consent, and with the consent of the Illinois, Mes- igameas, Natchez, Koroas, which are the most con- siderable nations dwelling therein, with whom also

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History of Medina county and Ohio, Part 4

Author: Perrin, William Henry, d. 1892?; Battle, J. H; Goodspeed, Weston Arthur, 1852-1926; Baskin & Battey. Chicago. pub Publication date: 1881 Publisher: Chicago : Baskin & Battey Number of Pages: 1014

Author: Perrin, William Henry, d. 1892?; Battle, J. H; Goodspeed, Weston Arthur, 1852-1926; Baskin & Battey. Chicago. pub
Publication date: 1881
Publisher: Chicago : Baskin & Battey
Number of Pages: 1014