A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P R S T U V W X Z

History of Louisisana

L >> Le Page Du Pratz >> History of Louisisana



Produced by Stan Goodman and Distributed Proofreaders




THE HISTORY OF LOUISIANA,
OR OF THE WESTERN PARTS
OF VIRGINIA AND CAROLINA:

Containing a DESCRIPTION
of the Countries
that lie on both Sides
of the River Missisippi:

With an ACCOUNT of the
SETTLEMENTS,
INHABITANTS,
SOIL,
CLIMATE,
AND
PRODUCTS.

Translated from the FRENCH
Of M. LE PAGE Du PRATZ;

With some Notes and Observations
relating to our Colonies.




Foreword

Antoine Simon Le Page Du Pratz was a Dutchman, as his birth in Holland
about 1695 apparently proves. He died in 1775, just where available
records do not tell us, but the probabilities are that he died in
France, for it is said he entered the French Army, serving with the
Dragoons, and saw service in Germany. While there is some speculation
about all the foregoing, there can be no speculation about the
statement that on May 25, 1718 he left La Rochelle, France, in one of
three ships bound for a place called Louisiana.

For M. Le Page tells us about this in a three-volume work he wrote
called, Histoire de la Louisiane, recognized as the authority to be
consulted by all who have written on the early history of New Orleans
and the Louisiana province.

Le Page, who arrived in Louisiana August 25, 1718, three months after
leaving La Rochelle, spent four months at Dauphin Island before he and
his men made their way to Bayou St. John where he set up a plantation.
He had at last reached New Orleans, which he correctly states,
"existed only in name," and had to occupy an old lodge once used by an
Acolapissa Indian. The young settler, he was only about 23 at the
time, after arranging his shelter tells us: "A few days afterwards I
purchased from a neighbour a native female slave, so as to have a
woman to cook for us. My slave and I could not speak each other's
language; but I made myself understood by means of signs." This slave,
a girl of the Chitimacha tribe, remained with Le Page for years, and
one draws the inference that she was possessed of a vigorous
personality, and was not devoid of charm or bravery. Le Page writes
that when frightened by an alligator approaching his camp fire, he ran
to the lodge for his gun. However, the Indian girl calmly picked up a
stick and hammered the 'gator so lustily on its nose that it
retreated. As Le Page arrived with his gun, ready to shoot "the
monster," he tells us: "She began to smile, and said many things which
I did not comprehend, but she made me understand by signs, that there
was no occasion for a gun to kill such a beast."

It is unfortunate, for the purpose of sociological study, that this
Indian girl appears so infrequently in the many accounts Le Page has
left us in his highly interesting studies of early Louisiana and its
original inhabitants. He does not even tell us the Indian girl's name.

We are told that after living on the banks of Bayou St. John for about
two years, he left for the bluff lands of the Natchez country. His
Indian girl decided she would go with him, as she had relatives there.
Hearing of her plan, her old father offered to buy her back from Le
Page. The Chitimacha girl, however, refused to leave her master,
whereupon, the Indian father performed a rite of his tribe, which made
her the ward of the white man--a simple ceremony of joining hands.

Le Page spent eight years among the Natchez and what he wrote about
them--their lives, their customs, their ceremonials--has been
acknowledged to be the best and most accurate accounts we have of
these original inhabitants of Louisiana. He has left us, in his
splendid history, much information on the other Indian tribes of the
lower Mississippi River country.

Antoine Simon Le Page Du Pratz tells us he spent sixteen years in
Louisiana before returning to France in 1734. They were years well
spent--to judge by what he wrote.

As it was written and published in the French language, Le Page's
history proved in many instances to be a tantalizing casket of
historical treasure that could not be opened by those who had not
mastered French. The original edition, published in Paris in 1758, a
score of years after the author landed in New Orleans, was followed in
1763 by a two-volume edition in English, and eleven years later in
1774, by a one-volume edition in English, entitled: "The History of
Louisiana, or of the Western Parts of Virginia and Carolina." The
texts in the English editions are identical.

Fortunately, early historians who could not read the French edition,
were now able to read M. Le Page's accounts of his adventures in the
New World. Unfortunately, especially for present day historians, the
English editions have become increasingly rare--many libraries do not
have them on their shelves. Therefore, the present re-publication
fills a long-felt want.

The English translation, with its added matter, is reproduced exactly
as it was printed for T. Becket to be sold in his shop at the corner
of the Adelphi in the Strand, London, 1774. Errors of grammar and
spelling are not corrected. The only change is the modernizing of the
old _s_'s which look like _f_'s.

The present edition is really two works in one, for the English
translation did not include any of the original edition's many
illustrations. The London books did have two folding maps, one of the
Louisiana province, the other of the country about the mouths of the
Mississippi River. Not only are these maps reproduced in the present
work, but in addition, all the other illustrations, including the rare
map of New Orleans, appearing in the original French edition, are
included. These quaint engravings of the birds, the beasts, the
flowers, the shrubs, the trees, fish, the deer and buffalo hunts, and
the habits and customs of the Natchez Indians, add much to the value
of the present re-publication. I have captioned them with present-day
names of the flora and fauna.

STANLEY CLISBY ARTHUR.

(_Mr. Arthur is a naturalist, historian and writer, and
executive-director of the Louisiana State Museum.--J. S. W.
Harmanson, Publisher_.)




CONTENTS


Preface

BOOK I.
The Transactions of the French in Louisiana.

CHAP. I.
Of the first Discovery and Settlement of Louisiana

CHAP. II.
The Return of M. de St. Denis: His settling the Spaniards
at the Assinaïs. His second Journey to Mexico, and Return
from thence

CHAP. III.
Embarkation of eight hundred Men by the West-India Company
to Louisiana. Arrival and Stay at Cape François. Arrival
at the Isle Dauphine. Description of that Island

CHAP. IV.
The Author's Departure for his Grant. Description of the
Places he passed through, as far as New Orleans


CHAP. V.
The Author put in Possession of his Territory. His
Resolution to go and settle among the Natchez

CHAP. VI.
The Voyage of the Author to Biloxi. Description of that
Place. Settlement of Grants. The Author discovers two
Copper Mines. His Return to the Natchez

CHAP. VII.
First War with the Natchez. Cause of the War

CHAP. VIII.
The Governor surprized the Natchez with seven hundred
Men. Astonishing Cures performed by the Natives. The
Author sends upwards of three hundred Simples to the
Company

CHAP. IX.
French Settlements, or Posts. Post at Mobile. The Mouths
of the Missisippi. The Situation and Description of New
Orleans

CHAP. X.
The Voyages of the French to the Missouris, Canzas, and
Padoucas. The Settlements they in vain attempted to make
in those Countries; with a Description of an extraordinary
Phaenomenon

CHAP. XI.
The War with the Chitimachas. The Conspiracy of the Negroes
against the French. Their Execution

CHAP. XII.
The War of the Natchez. Massacre of the French in 1729.
Extirpation of the Natchez in 1730

CHAP. XIII.
The War with the Chicasaws. The first Expedition by the
River Mobile. The second by the River Missisippi. The War
with the Chactaws terminated by the Prudence of M. de
Vaudreuil

CHAP. XIV.
Reflections on what gives Occasion to Wars in Louisiana.
The Means of avoiding Wars in that Province, as also the
Manner of coming off with Advantage and little Expence in
them

CHAP. XV.
Pensacola taken by Surprize by the French. Retaken by the
Spaniards. Again retaken by the French, and demolished

BOOK II.
Of the Country and its Products.

CHAP. I.
Geographical Description of Louisiana. Its climate

Description of the Lower Louisiana, and the Mouths of the
Missisippi.

CHAP. II.
The Author's journey in Louisiana, from the Natchez to the
River St. Francis, and the Country of the Chicasaws

CHAP. III.
The Nature of the Lands of Louisiana. The Lands on the
Coast.

CHAP. IV.
Quality of the Lands above the Fork. A Quarry of Stone
for building. High Lands to the East: Their vast Fertility.
West Coast: West Lands: Saltpetre

CHAP. V.
Quality of the Lands of the Red River. Posts of
Nachitoches. A Silver Mine. Lands of the Black River

CHAP. VI.
A Brook of salt Water: Salt Lakes. Lands of the River
of the Arkansas. Red-veined Marble: Slate: Plaster.
Hunting the Buffalo. The dry Sand-banks in the Missisippi

CHAP. VII.
The Lands of the River St. Francis. Mine of Marameg, and
other Mines. A Lead Mine. A soft Stone, resembling
Porphyry. Lands of the Missouri. The Lands North of the
Wabache. The Lands of the Illinois. De La Mothe's Mine,
and other Mines

CHAP. VIII.
Of the Agriculture, or Manner of cultivating, ordering,
and manufacturing the Commodities that are proper
Articles of Commerce. Of the Culture of Maiz, Rice, and
other Fruits of the Country. Of the Silk Worm

CHAP. IX.
Of Indigo, Tobacco, Cotton, Wax, Hops, and Saffron

CHAP. X.
Of the Commerce that is, and may be carried on in
Louisiana. Of the Commodities which that Province
may furnish in Return for those of Europe. Of the
Commerce of Louisiana with the Isles

CHAP. XI.
Of the Commerce with the Spaniards. The Commodities
they bring to the Colony, if there is a Demand for
them. Of such as may be given in Return, and may suit
them. Reflections on the Commerce of this Province,
and the great Advantages which the State and
particular Persons may derive therefrom

Some Abstracts from the Historical Memoirs of Louisiana,
by M. Dumont.

I. Of Tobacco, with the Way of cultivating and curing it

II. Of the Way of making Indigo

III. Of Tar; the Way of making it; and of making it into
pitch

IV. Of the Mines of Louisiana

Extract from a late French Writer, concerning the Importance
of Louisiana to France

BOOK III.
The Natural History of Louisiana.

CHAP. I.
Of Corn and Pulse

CHAP. II.
Of the Fruit Trees of Louisiana

CHAP. III.
Of Forest Trees

CHAP. IV.
Of Shrubs and Excrescences

CHAP. V.
Of Creeping Plants

CHAP. VI.
Of the Quadrupedes

CHAP. VII.
Of Birds and flying Insects

CHAP. VIII.
Of Fishes and Shell-Fish

BOOK IV.
Of the Natives of Louisiana.

CHAP. I.
The Origin of the Americans

CHAP. II.
An Account of the several Nations of Louisiana


SECT. I.
Of the Nations inhabiting on the East of the Missisippi

SECT. II.
Of the Nations inhabiting on the West of the Missisippi

CHAP. III.
A Description of the Natives of Louisiana; of their
Manners and Customs, particularly those of the Natchez:
Of their Language, their Religion, Ceremonies, Rulers,
or Suns, Feasts, Marriages, &c

SECT. I.
A Description of the Natives; the different Employments
of the two Sexes; and their Manner of bringing up their
Children

SECT. II.
Of the Language, Government, Religion, Ceremonies, and
Feasts of the Natives

SECT. III.
Of their Marriages, and Distinction of Ranks

SECT. IV.
Of the Temples, Tombs, Burials, and other religious
Ceremonies of the People of Louisiana

SECT. V.
Of the Arts and Manufactures of the Natives

SECT. VI.
Of the Attire and Diversions of the Natives: Of their
Meals and Fastings

SECT. VII.
Of the Indian Art of War

CHAP. IV.
Of the Negroes of Louisiana

SECT. I.
Of the Choice of Negroes; of their Distempers, and the
Manner of curing them

SECT. II.
Of the Manner of governing the Negroes

INDEX

List of Illustrations

Indian in Summer Time
Indian in Winter Time
Indian Woman and Daughter
Plan of New Orleans, 1720
Beaver, Beaver lodge, Beaver dam
Indians of the North Leaving in the Winter with their
Families for a Hunt
Indigo
Cotton and Rice on the Stalk
Appalachean Beans. Sweet Potatoes
Watermelon
Pawpaw. Blue Whortle-berry
Sweet Gum or Liquid-Amber
Cypress
Magnolia
Sassafras
Myrtle Wax Tree. Vinegar Tree
Poplar ("Cotton Tree")
Black Oak
Linden or Bass Tree
Box Elder or Stink-wood Tree
Cassine or Yapon. Tooth-ache Tree or Prickly Ash
Passion Thorn or Honey Locust. Bearded Creeper
Palmetto
Bramble, Sarsaparilla
Rattlesnake Herb
Red Dye Plant. Flat Root
Panther or Catamount. Bison or Buffalo

Indian Deer Hunt
Wild Cat. Opossum. Skunk
Alligator. Rattle Snake. Green Snake
Pelican. Wood Stock
Flying Squirrel. Roseate Spoonbill. Snowy Heron
White Ibis. Tobacco Worm. Cock Roach
Cat Fish. Gar Fish. Spoonbill Catfish
Indian Buffalo Hunt on Foot
Dance of the Natchez Indians
Burial of the Stung Serpent
Bringing the Pipe of Peace
Torture of Prisoners. Plan of Fort




{i}

PREFACE

The History of Louisiana, which we here present to the public, was
wrote by a planter of sixteen years experience in that country, who
had likewise the advantage of being overseer or director of the public
plantations, both when they belonged to the company, and afterwards
when they fell to the crown; by which means he had the best
opportunities of knowing the nature of the soil and climate, and what
they produce, or what improvements they are likely to admit of; a
thing in which this nation is, without doubt, highly concerned and
interested. And when our author published this history in 1758, he had
likewise the advantage, not only of the accounts of F. Charlevoix, and
others, but of the Historical Memoirs of Louisiana, published at Paris
in 1753, by Mr. Dumont, an officer who resided two-and-twenty years in
the country, and was personally concerned and acquainted with many of
the transactions in it; from whom we have extracted some passages, to
render this account more complete.

But whatever opportunities our author had of gaining a knowledge of
his subject, it must be owned, that he made his accounts of it very
perplexed. By endeavoring to take in every thing, he descends to many
trifles; and by dwelling too long on a subject, he comes to render it
obscure, by being prolix in things which hardly relate to what he
treats of. He interrupts the thread of his discourse with private
anecdotes, long harangues, and tedious narrations, which have little
or no relation to the subject, and are of much less consequence to the
reader. The want of method and order throughout the whole work is
still more apparent; and that, joined to these digressions, renders
his accounts, however just and interesting, so tedious and irksome to
read, and at the same time so indistinct, that few seem to have reaped
the benefit of them. For these reasons it was necessary to methodize
the whole work; to abridge some parts of it; and to leave out many
things that appear to be trifling. This we have endeavored to do in
the translation, by reducing the whole work to four general heads or
books; and {ii} by bringing the several subjects treated of, the
accounts of which lie scattered up and down in different parts of the
original, under these their proper heads; so that the connection
between them, and the accounts of any one subject, may more easily
appear.

This, it is presumed, will appear to be a subject of no small
consequence and importance to this nation, especially at this time.
The countries here treated of, have not only by right always belonged
to Great-Britain, but part of them is now acknowledged to it by the
former usurpers: and it is to be hoped, that the nation may now reap
some advantages from those countries, on which it has expended so many
millions; which there is no more likely way to do, than by making them
better known in the first place, and by learning from the experience
of others, what they do or are likely to produce, that may turn to
account to the nation.

It has been generally suspected, that this nation has suffered much,
from the want of a due knowledge of her dominions in America, which we
should endeavor to prevent for the future. If that may be said of any
part of America, it certainly may of those countries, which have been
called by the French Louisiana. They have not only included under that
name all the western parts of Virginia and Carolina; and thereby
imagined, that they had, from this nominal title, a just right to
those antient dominions of the crown of Britain: but what is of worse
consequence perhaps, they have equally deceived and imposed upon many,
by the extravagant hopes and unreasonable expectations they had formed
to themselves, of the vast advantages they were to reap from those
countries, as soon as they had usurped them; which when they came to
be disappointed in, they ran from one extreme to another, and
condemned the country as good for nothing, because it did not answer
the extravagant hopes they had conceived of it; and we seem to be
misled by their prejudices, and to be drawn into mistakes by their
artifice or folly. Because the Missisippi scheme failed in 1719, every
other reasonable scheme of improving that country, and of reaping any
advantage from it, must do the same. It is to wipe off these
prejudices, that the following account of these countries, which
appears to be both {iii} just and reasonable, and agreeable to every
thing we know of America, may be the more necessary.

We have been long ago told by F. Charlevoix, from whence it is, that
many people have formed a contemptible opinion of this country that
lies on and about the Missisippi. They are misled, says he, by the
relations of some seafaring people, and others, who are no manner of
judges of such things, and have never seen any part of the country but
the coast side, about Mobile, and the mouths of the Mississippi; which
our author here tells us is as dismal to appearance, the only thing
those people are capable of judging of, as the interior parts of the
country, which they never saw, are delightful, fruitful, and inviting.
They tell us, besides, that the country is unhealthful; because there
happens to be a marsh at the mouth of the Missisippi, (and what river
is there without one?) which they imagine must be unhealthful, rather
than that they know it to be so; not considering, that all the coast
both of North and South America is the same; and not knowing, that the
whole continent, above this single part on the coast, is the most
likely, from its situation, and has been found by all the experience
that has been had of it, to be the most healthy part of all North
America in the same climates, as will abundantly appear from the
following and all other accounts.

To give a general view of those countries, we should consider them as
they are naturally divided into four parts; 1. The sea coast; 2. The
Lower Louisiana, or western part of Carolina; 3. The Upper Louisiana,
or western part of Virginia; and 4, the river Missisippi.

I. The sea coast is the same with all the rest of the coast of North
America to the southward of New York, and indeed from thence to Mexico,
as far as we are acquainted with it. It is all a low flat sandy beach,
and the soil for some twenty or thirty miles distance from the shore,
more or less, is all a _pine barren_, as it is called, or a sandy
desart; with few or no good ports or harbours on the coast, especially
in all those southern parts of America, from Chesapeak bay to Mexico.
But however barren this coast is in other respects, it is entirely
covered with tall pines, which afford great store of pitch, tar, and
turpentine. {iv} These pines likewise make good masts for ships; which I
have known to last for twenty odd years, when it is well known, that our
common masts of New England white pine will often decay in three or four
years. These masts were of that kind that is called the pitch pine, and
lightwood pine; of which I knew a ship built that ran for sixteen years,
when her planks of this pine were as sound and rather harder than at
first, although her oak timbers were rotten. The cypress, of which there
is such plenty in the swamps on this coast, is reckoned to be equally
serviceable, if not more so, both for masts (of which it would afford
the largest of any tree that we know), and for ship building. And ships
might be built of both these timbers for half the price perhaps of any
others, both on account of the vast plenty of them, and of their being
so easily worked.

In most parts of these coasts likewise, especially about the
Missisippi, there is great plenty of cedars and ever-green oaks; which
make the best ships of any that are built in North America. And we
suspect it is of these cedars and the American cypress, that the
Spaniards build their ships of war at the Havanna. Of these there is
the greatest plenty, immediately; to the westward of the mouth of the
Missisippi where "large vessels can go to the lake of the Chetimachas,
and nothing hinders them to go and cut the finest oaks in the world,
with which all that coast is covered;" [Footnote: _Charlevoix_ Hist. N.
France, Tom. III. p. 444.] which, moreover, is a sure sign of a very
good, instead of a bad soil; and accordingly we see the French have
settled their tobacco plantations thereabouts. It is not without
reason then, that our author tells us, the largest navies might be
built in that country at a very small expence.

From this it appears, that even the sea coast, barren as it is, from
which the whole country has been so much depreciated, is not without
its advantages, and those peculiarly adapted to a trading and maritime
nation. Had these sandy desarts indeed been in such a climate as
Canada, they would have been of as little value, as many would make
them here. It might be difficult indeed to settle colonies merely for
these or any other {v} productions of those poor lands: but to the
westward of the Missisippi, the coast is much more fruitful all along
the bay of Mexico; being watered with a great number of rivers, the
banks of which are very fertile, and are covered with forests of the
tallest oaks, &c. as far as to New Mexico, a thing not to be seen any
where else on these coasts. The coast alone will supply all the
products of North America, and is as convenient to navigation as any
part of it, without going nigh the Missisippi; so that it is with good
reason our author says, "That country promises great riches to such as
shall inhabit it, from the excellent quality of its lands," [Footnote:
See p. 163.] in such a climate.

These are the productions of the dry (we cannot call them high)
grounds: the swamps, with which this coast abounds, are still more
fruitful, and abundantly compensate the avidity and barrenness of the
soil around them. They bear rice in such plenty, especially the marsh
about New Orleans, "That the inhabitants reap the greatest advantage
from it, and reckon it the manna of the land." [Footnote: _Dumont_,
I. 15.] It was such marshes on the Nile, in the same climate, that were
the granary of the Roman empire. And from a few such marshes in
Carolina, not to be compared to those on the Missisippi, either in
extent or fertility, Britain receives at least two or three hundred
thousand pounds a year, and might vend twice that value of their
products.

But however barren or noxious these low lands on the sea coast may be,
they extend but a little way about the Missisippi, not above thirty or
forty miles in a straight line, on the east side of that river, and
about twice as far on the west side; in which last, the lands are, in
recompence, much more fruitful. To follow the course of the river
indeed, which runs very obliquely south-east and north-west, as well
as crooked, they reckon it eighty-two leagues from the mouth of the
river to the Cut-Point, where the high lands begin.

II. By the Lower Louisiana, our author means only the Delta of the
Missisippi, or the drowned lands made by the overflowing of the river.
But we may more properly give {vi} that appellation to the whole
country, from the low and flat sea coast above described, to the
mountains, which begin about the latitude 35°, a little above the
river St. Francis; that is, five degrees of latitude, or three hundred
and fifty statute miles from the coast; which they reckon to be six
hundred and sixty miles up the Missisippi. About that latitude a
continued ridge of mountains runs westward from the Apalachean
mountains nigh to the banks of the Missisippi, which are thereabouts
very high, at what we have called the Chicasaw Cliffs. Opposite to
these on the west side of the Missisippi, the country is mountainous,
and continues to be so here and there, as far as we have any accounts
of it, westward to the mountains of New Mexico; which run in a chain
of continued ridges from north to south, and are reckoned to divide
that country from Louisiana, about 900 miles west from the Missisippi.

Copyright (c) 2007. famouswriterz.com. All rights reserved.