These victories not only insured to the French the command of the entire southern part of Hudson Bay, but put them in possession of a vast amount of stores. Indeed, so destructive to English interests were the campaigns of Iberville in 1687-88, that the Hudson Bay Company declared that their actual losses amounted to 108,520 pounds sterling, an enormous sum in the young colonies of that day. The consequential losses must havebeen very great, for we are told that the value of furs obtained in the trade of one year amounted to 400,000 livres (francs).
Iberville remained in charge of the country which his valor had recaptured, and in 1688, while the Iroquois were ravaging Canada, waged successful war in Hudson Bay. One of his lieutenants, capturing an English official, found on him an order from the London Company to proclaim English sovereignty over the whole bay. Later two ships, with twenty-eight cannon and eight swivels, appeared before St. Anne in order to expel the French. Eventually Iberville compelled the surrender of the English ships, and releasing the smaller vessel for the safe transport of such prisoners as he paroled, himself navigated the larger ship, with eleven Hudson Bay pilots held prisoners, to Quebec through Hudson Strait.
In 1690 Iberville volunteered, under his brother St. Helene, for the retaliatory expedition in mid-winter against Schenectady, wherein a large number of the inhabitants of that unhappy town were ruthlessly massacred by the French and their Indian allies. Iberville seems to have exerted his influence to restrain the savagery of the Indians, and saved the life of at least one Englishman.
It seems that the successes of the young Canadian had attracted attention in France, and when in 1691, through the efforts of the Northern Company, Louis XIV. had decided to recover Port Nelson, Hudson Bay, from the English, Du Tast came to Quebec with fourteen sail, it waswith express orders that Iberville should be entrusted with a share of the work and glory. Du Tast objected to such division of honor, and by plausible objections as to the lateness of the season, although it was only the 16th of July, succeeded in delaying the departure of the expedition for that year.
Iberville seemed determined to show the speciousness of the reasons, for he made a trip to the bay and brought back in 1691 two ships loaded with furs, much to the consolation of Frontenac. He immediately went to France to advance the expedition against Port Nelson, which he knew was much favored at court. Iberville found favor with the king, who gave him two ships for the reduction of Port Nelson, and orders to guard it after reduction.
Delays in France and contrary winds on the Atlantic brought Iberville to Quebec only in October, far too late for the safe navigation of Hudson Bay. To fill in his time he set forth to take Pemaquid, but did not make an attack, this being the only instance in his long career where he failed to show extreme daring, even against desperate odds. The delay of the vessels was unfortunate for France as far as Hudson Bay was concerned, for in 1693 three English vessels attacked and captured St. Anne, with fifty thousand peltries, and again the control of the bay passed from France.
In September, 1694, Iberville, with two ships, la Poli and la Charante, the former commanded by his brother, de Serigny, appeared before PortNelson, which he was six weeks in approaching owing to the heavy moving ice, which nearly destroyed his vessel. The fort had a double palisade, thirty-two cannon and swivels in the main body, and fourteen cannon in outer works, the whole manned by fifty-three men. Iberville landed without hesitation, invested the fort with forty Canadians, worked with his usual energy and skill, and in fourteen days he had his outworks established, his batteries placed and mortars in position. His final summons for surrender resulted in the capitulation of the fort, on condition that personal property should be spared and safe transport be given the garrison to England the coming year. His success was saddened for Iberville by the death of the elder Chateauguay, the third of his brothers to fall in the service of his king, who perished while gallantly repelling a sortie of the beleaguered garrison. The name of Port Nelson was changed to Fort Bourbon, and the river was rechristened St. Therese, because, says Jeremie, in hisRelation de la Baie de Hudson, the capitulation was made on October 14th, the day of that holy saint.
The victory did not prove to be cheap, for scurvy, then the dreaded scourge of the sailor, broke out during the long, dark, excessively cold winter, and caused the death of twenty men. Late the next summer, after waiting to the last moment for the English ships he counted on capturing, and leaving a garrison of sixty-seven at Fort Bourbon, Iberville sailed for Quebec; but the winds were so contrary and his crew sodebilitated by scurvy, that he turned his prows to France and fortunately arrived at Rochelle, October 9, 1695.
His victories in Hudson Bay so commended him to the king that Iberville was charged with the reduction and destruction of the strong fort which James II. of England had erected at Pemaquid, Maine. While on this cruise our Canadian fell in with three English ships near the mouth of the St. John. He unhesitatingly attacked them, dismasted, fired, and captured the flag-ship of the squadron, the Newport, a ship of eighty men and twenty-four guns.
Reinforced by several hundred Indians, as a land and besieging force, Iberville arrived at Pemaquid, August 13, 1696, and invested the fort the next day. He summoned the commander, Colonel Chubb, to capitulate, but that officer replied that, “if the sea was covered with French vessels and the land with Indians, he would not surrender until compelled to do so.” Iberville promptly landed, and used such expedition that within the short space of thirteen hours he established his batteries in position and opened fire, when the garrison surrendered on honorable terms. Iberville, doubtless mindful of his experiences at Schenectady, took the wise and humane precaution of quartering his prisoners under the guns of the royal ships, so as to secure them from the fury of his bloodthirsty allies, the Indians, who desired to supplement the entire destruction of the fort by the slaughter of the garrison.
In withdrawing from the demolished post, while doubling the island at the mouth of the Penobscot, he had an opportunity of justifying his reputation as the most skilful officer in the French service; for, falling in with an English squadron of seven sail, he successfully evaded them by bold seamanship along the very coast line of that dangerous and rock-bound shore.
His capacity as a military commander was now to be tested. Charged by the king to co-operate in the reduction of Newfoundland to French power, Iberville found himself viewed with jealousy by his colleague,Brouillan, governor of Placentia, who assumed entire command, interfered with Iberville’s contemplated movements, and declared that his own troops, the Canadians, should not accompany him on the opening campaign.
Iberville realizing the necessity of zealous and concerted action in an enterprise of such importance, decided to leave the field free to Brouillan, and so announced his intention of returning to France. Immediately the Canadians declared to a man that they were bound to him alone, that Frontenac’s orders recognized Iberville as commander, and finally, that they would return to Quebec sooner than accept another. Brouillan recognizing that Iberville was the idol of his Canadian countrymen, and unable to deny that the king had confided all the enterprises to be undertaken during the winter to Iberville, made such concessions as brought about reconciliation; nevertheless the campaign undertaken againstSt. John’s was marked by dissension. Iberville displayed his usual energy and gallantry in the advance and subsequent skirmishes which ultimately resulted in the surrender of St. John’s, which was abandoned and destroyed by fire. The campaign was pursued with such energy and success that at the end of two months the English had nothing left in Newfoundland except Bona Vista and Carbonniere Island. During these operations Iberville displayed marked ability in handling troops, both in the field and during siege operations. His eagerness to share every danger, and willingness to undergo every hardship in common with his troops, endeared him to all and contributed much to the enthusiasm with which his men followed him or obeyed his orders.
In May, 1697, his brother Serigny arrived at Placentia with four vessels, destined for the command of Iberville in a proposed attempt to again reduce Hudson Bay. With these ships—le Pelican, fifty guns; le Palmier, forty guns; le Profond, le Vespe, and a brigantine—Iberville entered the mouth of Hudson Strait on August 3d, and was immediately beset with heavy ice. The floes were driven hither and thither with such violence by the currents that Iberville directed, as the best means of safety, that each vessel should moor itself to the largest attainable iceberg. This expedient saved four of the ships, but an unexpected movement of two large bergs crushed so completely the brigantine that she sank instantly, the crew barely escaping with their lives.
After a besetment of twenty-four days, Iberville succeeded in extricating his vessel from the ice and passed into the bay. He was alone and in utter ignorance of the fate of his consorts, which had been hidden from view by the ice for the past seventeen days. Iberville was not the man to turn back, nor indeed to delay in an expedition which demanded haste, so he pushed on alone and reached Port Nelson on September 4th.
The next morning he discovered three ships several leagues to the leeward, tacking to enter the harbor. He hoped that they were his consorts, and he at once made signals, which being unanswered showed that the ships were English. It was indeed an English squadron, consisting of the Hampshire, fifty-two guns and two hundred and thirty men; the Hudson Bay, thirty-two guns, and the Deringue, also of thirty-two guns, against which force Iberville had but one ship of fifty guns. It was with reason that, as Jeremie says, “they flattered themselves with the idea of capturing Iberville, seeing that they were three to one, and they were amazed at the boldness with which he attacked them.”
Indeed, almost any other officer in the French navy would have considered an attack as simply madness, but such desperate odds only served to stimulate to the highest degree the known courage and skill of Iberville. He cleared his decks for action, and instantly quitting the shelter and supposed advantage of the harbor, attacked the English squadron in the open sea, where Ibervilledoubtless counted that his skill in handling ship would inure to his benefit.
Charlevoix thus describes this desperate fight:
“The cannonade opened about half-past nine in the morning and was kept up incessantly till one with great vigor on both sides. Meanwhile the Pelican had only one man killed and seventeen wounded. Then Iberville, who had kept the weather-gauge, bore down straight on the two frigates, pouring in several broadsides at close quarters in order to disable them. At that moment he perceived the third, the Hampshire, coming on with twenty-six guns in battery on each side, with a crew of two hundred and thirty men.
“He at once proceeded to meet her, all his guns pointed to sink her, ran under her lee, yard-arm to yard-arm, and having brought his ship to, poured in his broadside. This was done so effectively that the Hampshire, after keeping on about her own length, went down. Iberville at once wore and turned on the Hudson Bay, the ship of the remaining two that could most easily enter St. Teresa River; but as he was on the point of boarding her, the commandant struck his flag and surrendered.
“Iberville then gave chase to the Deringue, the third, which was escaping to the northeast, and which was only a good cannon-shot off; but as that vessel was as good a sailor as his own ship he soon gave up the chase, not daring to crowd sail, having had much of his rigging cut, two pumps burst, his shrouds considerably injured, hull cut up by seven cannon-balls and pierced atthe water’s edge, with no way of stopping the leak. He accordingly veered and sent the Sieur de la Sale in his boat with twenty-five men to man the prize. He then proceeded to repair damage, and having done so with great expedition, he renewed the chase of the enemy, who was now three leagues off.
“He began to gain on him when, in the evening, the wind changed to the north, and a thick fog suddenly rising, he lost sight of the Deringue. This accident compelled him to rejoin the Hudson Bay, and he anchored near the Hampshire, now almost out of sight, and from which not a soul had been saved.”
In this fight with an enemy more than twice his superior in guns and men Iberville had sunk one ship, captured another, and put the third to flight; but this was followed by other experiences, which at the outset presented conditions apparently not less desperate and discouraging. Two days later, pending his siege operations against Port Nelson, a violent gale arose, in which, says Charlevoix, “In spite of all d’Iberville’s efforts to ride it out—and there was not, perhaps, in the French navy one more skilful in handling a ship—he was driven ashore with his vessel, the Pelican, and his prize, the Hudson Bay. The misfortune happened at night, the darkness increasing the horrors of the storm and preventing them from beaching the vessels at a favorable place and so saving them, and before the break of day they broke up and filled.”
Both vessels were crowded with woundedmen and prisoners, who endeavored as best they could to reach the shore in the storm and darkness. Twenty-three perished in the attempt, but fortunately the receding tide left such shallows that the rest reached shore, and most of the prisoners successfully sought the friendly shelter of Fort Nelson.
Iberville now found himself in most desperate plight—shipwrecked on a barren coast, with a hostile garrison on land, the return of the English ship at sea possible, and destitute of provisions. He turned to the wrecked vessels and found that it was possible to obtain from them cannon and other munitions of war, and, undismayed, he set his cold, wet, and hungry crew at this task, resolved to obtain food by carrying the English fort by assault. At this juncture his missing vessels, having extricated themselves from the ice of Hudson Strait, appeared, and the fort surrendered without putting Iberville to the last proof of his courage.
As might be expected, Iberville became the hero of the day on his return to France in 1697; but true to himself and his career, he sought the influence of friends at court only to obtain other difficult and dangerous service that might add to the glory of France. He was now to enter on a new career as an explorer, colonizer, and administrator, where, if he was to perform less brilliant deeds than in earlier life, he was destined to open up to settlement by his countrymen the fertile lands of Louisiana, and thus lay the foundations of its future greatness.
It was now twelve years since the tragic fate of La Salle’s colony on the coast of Texas had spread dismay and terror among all who had been especially interested in the scheme of French colonization on the Mississippi River. The sentiment seemed to be that the mouth of the great river could never be found and that further effort would only result in useless sacrifice of life and vessels. With the march of time, however, these impressions of doubt and disaster had faded out of mind, and as now the attention of the ministry was especially turned to that part of Louisiana which could be reached from the St. Lawrence, it appeared to Iberville to be a suitable season to revive the project of discovering the mouth of the Mississippi and of planting a colony.
A plan for the colonization of Louisiana was formally submitted to the French Government by M. de Remonville, while Iberville for his part pledged his reputation as a navigator both to find the mouth of the Mississippi and to successfully plant there a colony. The ministry were easily persuaded that the scheme was practicable and advantageous, their decision being doubtless affected by the knowledge that both Spain and England contemplated the early settlement of the northern coasts of the Gulf of Mexico. It was even reported, as afterward transpired to be the truth, that colonizing expeditions were already en route, and in order to insure protection should Iberville first reach the ground, Count Pontchartrain projected and arranged for the construction of a fort at the mouth of the Mississippi.
As was always the case, schemes of trade were interwoven with the policy of colonization and extension of the royal domain. The principal objects of the trade proved fanciful or chimerical, being, first, the idea of making bison wool an article of trade, a scheme fostered in France by La Salle, and, second, in the hope that valuable pearl fisheries might be found. In Iberville’s instructions we find that “one of the great objects proposed to the king, when he was urged to discover the mouth of the Mississippi, was to obtain wool from the cattle (buffalo) of that country, and for this purpose these animals must be tamed and parked and the calves sent to France.”
Iberville worked with his usual energy, and the expedition, consisting of two small frigates, the Badine, the Marin, and two Norman fishing-boats, sailed from Brest, October 4, 1698. It was Friday, but Iberville no more than Columbus minded the day, and in the reluctance of the other vessels, himself led in the Badine.
A storm off Madeira caused the disappearance of one of the fishing-boats, but after a short search Iberville tarried no more than he did in the Hudson Straits for his missing consort, but pushed on and reached San Domingo early in December. Here the governor, Ducasse, was so impressed with Iberville’s elucidation of his projects that he expressed to the home government his opinion that the views and genius of Iberville seemed to equal his valor in war.
English vessels had been cruising in the neighborhood of San Domingo, which led Iberville tobelieve that it was a colonizing expedition, so he worked day and night in completing his preparations, and on January 1, 1699, sailed for the Gulf of Mexico. On the afternoon of the twenty-third day, Iberville as usual leading, land was sighted in the northeast. It proved to be the harbor of Pensacola, where Iberville was chagrined to find himself preceded by a Spanish colony under command of Don Andres de la Riola. There were two frigates yet in the harbor, which four months before had brought up three hundred colonists from Vera Cruz. The half-finished fort, the dissatisfied garrison, and the uncertainty of the future explorations to the westward were so many inducements for Iberville to drive out the Spaniards and secure the harbor. Iberville made arrangements to enter the harbor, but was notified by the Spanish governor that he had formal orders from Spain to permit no foreign ships to enter the harbor. Under pretence that he feared heavy weather the French fleet sounded the entrance to the harbor and prepared to enter. The Spanish commander, however, begged that they would retire, and fortunately having been given information by the Spanish pilot, Iberville decided to sail to the west. Iberville, exploring the coast, anchored at the eastern point of the entrance to Mobile Bay, where violent gales nearly destroyed the squadron.
Reconnoitring boats giving such unsatisfactory reports of the depth of the channel, Iberville determined, with his usual energy, to survey it himself. Taking his younger brother Bienvilleand a crew of his faithful Canadians he started, despite approaching darkness, so as to begin work at day-light; the storm breaking with great violence, Iberville’s efforts to make headway over the billows were in vain. Finally, his rowers exhausted, the boat was turned to the nearest land, but the sea was so high and the wind so violent that unceasing efforts were needful to prevent the boat from swamping. It was due to Iberville’s great skill that the boat wasfinally beached in a favorable spot on the sandy beach, which the crew reached with difficulty, so exhausted were they with their struggles. Here they were weather-bound three days, and so had an opportunity to explore the island. It was with horror that they discovered in one place ghastly piles of human bones and skulls, mute witnesses of a scene of slaughter, which terrified many of the crew until they found the island to be uninhabited. The island, now known as Dauphin, was called Massacre by Iberville, who, undisturbed by the sight, visited the mainland with a few of his men and made every effort to discover the inhabitants, of whom he found recent traces.
Finally came good weather, and with it the continued voyage to the west brought the fleet to safe anchorage on a bright February morn off Ship Island. The live-stock landed, Iberville gave his freight consorts permission to return to France, while he explored the mainland that now lay fair and bright before him. The Indians were communicated with, after many failures, but, beyond the discovery of the Pascagoula and reports of a larger river to the west, which the Bayagoula Indians called Malbouchia, no valuable information was obtained. Iberville planned to reach the great river by one of its reported outlets, and, following the main channel down, thus learn the way for his vessel; but, the Indians giving him the slip, it only remained to search every foot of the coast until the river was gained. He was thus thrown on his own resources, whichhad never failed and were not to do so now. Iberville, with his brother Bienville and fifty picked men, largely Canadians, and twenty days’ provisions, started February 27th, on two Biscayennes or barges, for his difficult task, the discovery of the mouth of the Mississippi.
It is useless to detail this journey of Iberville through an apparently endless maze of islets, mud-banks, sand-banks, reefs, and marshy shoals, which go to make up the great level delta of the Mississippi. It would, even to-day, be a difficult search for most mariners without a chart, but then well-nigh impossible. Iberville’s skill and patience were tasked to the utmost, and, when he did find the mouth of the great river, it almost seemed to be by the intervention of Providence. On the eve of March 3, 1699, while struggling along the mainland, to which they persistently clung, the violence of an increasing gale threatened to swamp their barges, despite every effort, if they kept off shore, while every approach to watch the shore-line, and thus make certain of the river-mouth, incurred danger of beaching and destruction. Darkness came on and the gale increased, making certain, as it seemed to them, that they must choose death at sea or death on land. Suddenly Iberville put his barge before the wind, and into the face of death as his followers thought, but it shot between huge piles of interlaced drift-wood into a turbid stream of whitish water. Iberville put out his hand and tasted. The water was fresh, and the Mississippi was rediscovered.
The Spaniards had spoken of the river as La Palisada, which Iberville thought most appropriate when he saw the bristling barricades of huge jagged trees with outstretched limbs and contorted roots borne incessantly onward by the strong current.
Iberville camped that night at the edge of the dense rank sedge-growth, saying: “Stretched on the sedges and sheltered from the gale, our pleasure is so much the greater that we feel our escape from a great peril. It is a very lively business, this exploring the unknown shores of a sea in shallops too small to carry sail in the open sea, too tiny to anchor, and yet so large that they strand and ground half a league from land.”
The next morn was that of Mardi-Gras, when our devout explorers celebrated mass, sang joyfully the Te Deum and raised a commemorative cross before voyaging further.
Never in their wildest dreams could the hardy Canadian explorers from their marshy camp in the delta of the Mississippi ever have presaged, that in the coming time, from the many millions of future inhabitants in the Valley of the Mississippi should be gathered tens of thousands to celebrate the merry day of carnival in the metropolitan city that was to spring up from their memorable voyage.
The Mississippi was near its high stage, so that travel was tediously slow, mostly by oar. The land rose somewhat, the sedge gave way first to cane and willows, and later to richly foliaged trees with graceful festoons pleasing to the eyeand fruitful of promise in the coming autumn. The country, largely flooded, would have seemed uninhabited save for the Indian ferry-boats, bundles of cane pointed at both ends and fastened together by crossbars of wood, and an occasional column of smoke rising in the distant blue. The rapid current obliged the oarsmen to hug the bank closely, while diminishing food and increasing piles of drift-wood discouraged them; but the indomitable Iberville cheered on his Canadians, and on the fifth day, some thirty-five leagues from the river’s mouth, six pirogues, or canoes, full of Indians were seen. The savages fled, but one was captured, and through him communication and friendly overtures were established with the Annochys. Through these Indians Iberville was taken to the present site of New Orleans and was shown the portage over which the Indians travelled to Lake Pontchartrain, and thence to the bay where the ship was at anchor. Farther up the stream Iberville visited the village of the Bayougoulas, which consisted of about two hundred souls. The men, well made, with short hair and painted faces, stalked around most unconcernedly in a naked state. The women blackened their teeth, tied up their hair in a top-knot, tattooed their faces and breasts, and wore girdles woven of bark fibre, dyed red or bleached white, with pendulous fringes reaching to the knee. The ornaments of the women were metal bracelets and bangles and fancy articles made of feathers, while the young braves wore sashes of feathers, which, weighted with bits of metal,made merry sound as they danced. In short, they were an inoffensive folk, content with the simple fruits of the earth, which largely served as their sustenance.
Iberville visited one of their temples, a structure some thirty feet in diameter, which Charlevoix describes as follows: “In the centre were slowly burning logs (keeping up a perpetual fire), and at the end a platform on which lay skins of deer, buffalo, and bear, offerings to the Chouchouacha (the opossum), the god of the Bayougoulas, which animal was painted in red and black at various points in the temple. The roof was decorated with the figures of various animals, among which a red fox was conspicuous. On either side of the entrance were other animal figures, such as bears and wolves and also various birds, but above all the Chouchouacha (the opossum), an animal about the size and having the head of the sucking pig, the white and gray fur of the badger, the tail of the rat, the paws of an ape, and a sack under its stomach.”
The great discrepancies between the topography of the river and the descriptions given in the accounts of the journeys of La Salle and Tonti so impressed Iberville that he was really doubtful if he was on the Mississippi, and so his journey was pursued up the river to the Oumas, a short distance below the mouth of the Red River. Fortunately his brother, Bienville, obtained from an Indian chief a letter, which the savage had carried for thirteen years, given himby Tonti, who descended the river from Illinois in 1686 and left this letter addressed to La Salle, whose active and loyal assistant Tonti was.
Iberville was now over seven hundred miles distant from his ship, and his original stock of provisions was exhausted, so that the men were obliged to live on the corn of the Indians and such meat or game as could be bought or killed. Sending his men back by the delta with the barges, Iberville decided to try himself the route of portages to the Gulf. With an Indian guide he entered the Ascantia, a narrow, winding bayou, where with his four Canadians and twopirogues fifty portages over fallen trees and drift were made the first day in a distance of seven leagues. It is not surprising that the Indian guide, unaccustomed to such tremendous labor and fatigue, deserted the second day. Iberville none the less pushed on undauntedly, confident that he could reach his ship through this unknown country, guide or no guide. Next, one of his hardy Canadians fell sick, and Iberville took his place and oar, and in the portages carried his end of a pirogue. After eighty portages they passed into Lake Maurepas and next into Lake Pontchartrain, whence the way was easy to the ship, which was reached eight hours in advance of the barges from the delta.
In his absence of six weeks Iberville had found again the Mississippi, explored its shores almost to the Red River, made friends with all its native tribes, discovered the short route to the sea, travelled about fifteen hundred miles, and had returned to his ship with every man of his party. What volumes these few facts speak for the energy, tact, skill, and foresight of this wonderful Canadian!
Casting about for a convenient spot Iberville decided to build his fort at the head of Biloxi Bay, and in this unfortunate location, under the spurring supervision of the chief, Fort Biloxi soon rose, and there on Easter Sunday mass was celebrated, vespers sung, and a sermon preached. On May 2, 1700, Iberville sailed for France, leaving his lieutenant, Sauvole, as the first governor of the province of Louisiana and Bienville second in command.
The action of France and the desperate haste of Iberville in occupying the mouth of the Mississippi were most timely. The very month in which our Canadian sailed from Brest an expedition left England under the auspices of Mr. Cox, who sent out three vessels loaded with emigrants. They wintered in the Carolinas, where many settled, but in 1700 two ships continued their voyage to the Mississippi. One of these vessels was commanded by a Captain Banks, who once captured by Iberville in Hudson Bay now found himself worsted by his rival in the peaceful work of colonization. One of the English ships appeared in the lower Mississippi, into which Banks had found entrance, in September, 1700. Bienville, with five men and two pirogues, met the English vessel, and setting forth to the captain that France was in possession of all the surrounding country, succeeded either by argument or cajolery in persuading the captain to withdraw from the Mississippi.
Iberville was not long delayed by the delights and pleasures of the French court, but speedily returned to Biloxi, where he arrived on the eve of Twelfth Night with supplies, and more important of all, with sixty hardy and energetic Canadians, with whom he established a fort a short distance below the present site of New Orleans. The winter proved a very cold one, the drinking-water freezing in the cups, but it did not delay the rapid progress of the new fort. In the midst of this work Chevalier de Tonti arrived with twenty Canadians from their former settlement in Illinois.
Thus for the first time, with intercommunication established between the permanent settlement in Illinois, Tonti’s fort on the Arkansas, and the new colony at the mouth of the Mississippi, Iberville felt that France had indeed entered into actual possession of its great province of Louisiana. He realized, however, the necessity of permanently connecting these settlements, many hundred miles apart, and of facilitating intercommunication through the establishment of intermediate posts.
Iberville contemplated an exploration of the Red River, thinking it might afford access to the gold and silver mines of New Spain, but abandoned the project owing to the representations of the Indians that the river was unnavigable from the interlaced drift-wood, later known as rafts. He turned his attention to the main river, the Mississippi, and visited the Natchez, a brave and powerful tribe of Indians, whose country delighted his heart as resembling France, and where he planned a city to be called Rosalie (now Natchez), which, however, it was not his fate to ever see take definite form, as it was only built long after his death, in 1714, by his brother Bienville. It was at this time that Le Sueur, sent up the Mississippi by Iberville, discovered the St. Peter River, in Minnesota, and attempting mining operations, later brought back a worthless cargo of green earth. To Iberville’s credit, it may be said, he viewed this and many other similar schemes of development with a sceptical and practical eye.
Later he sent his brother Bienville across country to explore the Red River, which was done with good success. His priest Montigny was also active in extending the faith, both among the Natchez Indians and in the basin of the Tensas River. Indeed, every effort was made under Iberville’s sagacious direction to obtain a knowledge of the possibilities of the country, so that its resources might be properly developed.
Iberville returned to France ill with fever, but despite his disease, he displayed extraordinary energy in personally advancing the practical affairs of his new colony. Moreover, he prepared a memoir urging the cession of Pensacola by Spain to France, which nation was to establish forts and arm the Indians along the Mississippi River, whereby the interior of America from the Gulf of Mexico to Canada would be under French domination, save the narrow strip along the Atlantic coast already occupied by England. It was a sagacious scheme which if it had been properly supported by France would have entirely changed the future of America. It received, however, but a perfunctory support, and only resulted in exciting the jealousy of Spain.
Iberville’s last voyage to Louisiana was made in 1701, when his health, undermined by the climate, was impaired by the formation of an abscess which confined him to his bed for two months. His mind worked incessantly, and his activity through other hands was wonderful. He planned the royal magazines on DauphineIsland, located the new post on Mobile River, told off the relief of workmen for the various enterprises, planned flat-boats for lighters, extended relief to the Spaniards at Vera Cruz, and sent Tonti as an agent to make peace with the Choctaws and Chickasaws and secure them as allies. His sailor’s eye was particularly pleased with the magnificent forests of Mobile Bay, where the oaks and pines presented the finest timber for ship-building he had ever seen.
With Mobile commenced, the royal storehouses erected, and the alliance of the Choctaws and Chickasaws secured, Iberville felt that the colony of Louisiana was on a secure foundation, and on March 31st he sailed from Dauphine Island, then the headquarters of that colony for which he had done so much, and which he was destined never again to see.
The domain of Louisiana, obtained by so much heroic endeavor and individual suffering on the part of Joliet, Marquette, La Salle, Tonti, Iberville, and their associates, passed at once, by an edict of Louis XIV., into a monopoly and under the control of a courtier, Anton Crozat, for trading purposes, by the decree of September 14, 1712. In this decree the limits of Louisiana were for the first time defined, including “all the territories by us (France) possessed, and bounded by New Mexico and by those of the English in Carolina.... The river St. Louis, formerly called the Mississippi, from the sea-shore to the Illinois, together with the rivers St. Phillipe, formerly called the Missouries, and the St. Jerome,formerly called the Wabash (the Ohio), with all the countries, territories, lakes in the land, and the rivers emptying directly or indirectly into that part of the river St. Louis. All the said territories, countries, rivers, streams, and islands we will to be and remain comprised under the name of the government of Louisiana.”
There was another and blacker page to the decree, whereby Crozat was further authorized to introduce African slavery: “If the aforesaid Sieur Crozat considers it advisable to have negroes in the said country of Louisiana, for agriculture or other use on plantations, he can send a ship each year to trade directly with the Guinea coast, ... and is further authorized to sell negroes to the settlers of Louisiana.”
But prior to this condition of affairs the great Canadian naval commander had passed to his final reward, having died of yellow fever at Havana, July 9, 1706. The last leaf in his history was, however, an effort, through his personal bravery and skill, to secure French domination in America by driving out of the Antilles the determined English seamen whose successful raids so often militated against the interests of France. Despite his health, undermined by fevers, Iberville left France with a fleet with which he hoped to carry out this great plan. Intending to make a descent upon Barbadoes, he learned that the English, warned of his plans, were prepared for him. He therefore seized on the islands of Nevis and St. Christopher, where his fleet captured an enormous amount of bootyof all kinds. He decided next to ravage the English colonies in the Carolinas, but stopping at Havana for reinforcements he lost his own life by the epidemic which destroyed eight hundred others of his fleet.
Among the qualities of this great Canadian all must admire his intrepidity in war, his skill as a navigator, and his capacity as an explorer; but beyond these were the astonishing administrative ability and political sagacity which he displayed in such an eminent degree in the planning, founding, and fostering of the great province of Louisiana.
III.
JONATHAN CARVER,
The Explorer of Minnesota.
Throughoutthe bloody series of French and Indian wars which ravaged the frontier settlements of America during the first half of the eighteenth century, France maintained secure possession of the regions of the great lakes and the basin of the upper Mississippi. The successful campaign of the gallant Wolfe against the no less gallant Montcalm ultimately resulted in the termination of French supremacy in these sections, and under the treaty of Paris, in 1763, Canada with all other dominions of France east of the Mississippi passed under the control of Great Britain.
To this time the English colonists had confined their operations almost entirely to the region of the Atlantic Coast, so when Great Britain acquired her immense war-inheritance the country to the west of the Appalachian Mountain range was practically an unknown region to its new masters. The extension of English settlements toward the interior of the continent was determined on by the English Government, and the more accessible of the French trading-posts in the northwest were immediatelyoccupied. Maps were few and inaccurate, information as to the Indians vague and exaggerated, while nothing was known as to the resources of the country except that furs were obtainable in large numbers.
Scarcely were the terms of the treaty promulgated than the enterprising pioneers moved westward and gradually pressed back the Indians nearest the English settlements. A few other men, however, undertook to penetrate the valley of the Mississippi to the very frontier of Louisiana, which remained a French possession.
Among these hardy and adventurous Americans the most enterprising was Captain Jonathan Carver, who was born in Stillwater, N. Y., in 1732. He was the grandson of William Joseph Carver, one of the earliest of the royal appointments in Connecticut, and his first public service was at the age of eighteen, when he secured an ensigncy in a Connecticut regiment. In 1757, when Colonel Oliver Partridge raised a battalion of infantry in Massachusetts to serve against Canada, Carver was made a lieutenant therein. Later he served as captain under Colonel Whitcomb, in 1760, and under Colonel Saltonstall, in 1762, and participated in the taking of Crown Point and other operations in northern New York.
Doubtless his association with scouts and camp-followers, largely consisting of fur-traders and frontiersmen, induced a lively interest in their accounts of the western country held by their enemies, the Indian and the Frenchman.Certain it is that Carver acquired such ideas of the extent, fertility, natural wealth, and possibilities of the great and unknown West as fired his adventurous spirit with a firm determination to solve the important geographical problems connected therewith.
His objects, he states, were to gain knowledge concerning the Indian tribes to the west of the Mississippi, to ascertain the natural resources of the country, and to cross the American continent between the forty-third and forty-sixth degrees of north latitude. Ultimately he contemplated the establishment of a trading-post at some suitable point on the Pacific Coast.
Carver was not ignorant of the great danger involved in such an undertaking, where he was obliged to intrust his life to the mercy of unknown Indians for a prolonged time. Indeed, considering his experiences at the massacre of Englishmen and provincials at Fort Henry, it seems surprising that he would ever trust a savage or a Frenchman. In the campaign of 1757, Carver volunteered to accompany the detachment of fifteen hundred men which General Webb sent forward to reinforce the garrison at Fort Henry, then anticipating an attack from Montcalm. The garrison, commanded by the gallant Monro, who resisted until his guns burst and his ammunition was nearly exhausted, surrendered to the combined force of Indians and French under Montcalm, who promised safe conduct and private property. As the English force moved out the next morning the Indians, inflamed by liquor,song, and dance, butchered the sick and wounded and then fell upon the helpless captives, of whom there were, according to French accounts, about sixty killed and four hundred robbed and maltreated. Montcalm and Levi, to their credit, though too late, made heroic personal efforts which mitigated the horrors of the situation.
Among the unfortunates was Carver, who, robbed and stripped by the savages, appealed to a French sentry for protection only to be repelled with abuse. Realizing finally that to remain quiet was to meet certain death, Carver and a few others attempted to escape by breaking unarmed through the surrounding lines of Indian fiends. In this desperate effort for life Carver was twice wounded, badly beaten, seized by two Indians, and led away to death, which he escaped by the appearance of a British officer in full uniform, who was such a prize that his captors left Carver to secure a more valuable victim. Profiting by the respite Carver fled to the nearest woods, where, exhausted and nearly naked, he concealed himself in a thicket until night. For three days he wandered through thedensest part of the forest, suffering tortures from travel under such conditions, often in danger of recapture, and without food until he reached, in a nearly exhausted condition, the English settlements.
An attempt at transcontinental exploration was then looked on as foolhardy and visionary in the extreme, even to those friends of Carver who never deserted him. One of these, Dr. Lettsom, wrote in the third edition of Carver’s travels, fifteen years after the journey, as follows: “He suggested an attempt by land across the northwest parts of America, and actually drew a chart of his proposed route for effecting his project, which, however visionary it may now be deemed, affords at least a proof of the enterprising spirit of Carver.”
Unmoved by the sneers of his critics, and undeterred by recollections of Indian cruelty and perfidy, Carver arranged the details of his journey at his private expense, and in June, 1766, he quitted Boston, and travelling by the way of Albany and Niagara reached his headquarters, Michillimackinac, now known as Mackinac. Here he made definite arrangements for his serious work of exploration. At this time English traders extended their journeys to Prairie-du-Chien for the purpose of purchasing furs from Indians rendezvousing there, and with one of these parties Carver was to travel, relying on the Governor of Mackinaw to forward supplies to St. Anthony. Leaving the Fort, September 3d, and travelling by canoe, he reached the islandsof the Grand Traverse, and there spent one night. One of the chiefs, to whom a present was given, made, on Carver’s departure, the following prayer, which is worthy of reproduction as a specimen of Indian eloquence: “May the Great Spirit favor you with a prosperous voyage; may He give you an unclouded sky and smooth waters by day, and may you lay down by night on a beaver blanket to uninterrupted sleep and pleasant dreams, and may you find continual protection under the calumet of peace.”
Carver followed the route of Joliet and Marquette through Green Bay and up Fox River to the great town of the Winnebagoes, where he found the Indians presided over by a queen instead of a sachem. Carver speaks of the extreme richness of soil and abundance of cultivated products and wild game, mentioning grapes, plums, Indian corn, beans, pumpkins, squashes, watermelons, and tobacco from cultivation; fish from the lake; wild fowl so abundant that frequently the sun would be obscured by them for some minutes together, while deer, bears, and beavers were very numerous. The usual portage was made by him from the Fox to the Wisconsin River, into which his canoes were launched on the 8th of October. Seven days carried him to Prairie-du-Chien, at the junction of the Wisconsin and Mississippi, which was at that time a town of some three hundred families and had become a great trading mart for the adjacent tribes, who assembled in great numbers annually in the latter part of May.
At Prairie-du-Chien Carver parted with the traders, who were to winter at that point, and obtaining a Canadian as interpreter and a Mohawk Indian as a servant, he purchased a canoe, and on October 19th, proceeding up the Mississippi, he fell in with a straggling band of Indians which barely failed of plundering him. November 1st brought him to Lake Pepin, near which he discovered what appeared to be the remains of extended intrenchments, centuries old, as he thought, but which are now known to be Indian mounds, probably erected as sites for their wigwams, so as to keep them above the annual overflow and inundation.
The coming of winter and the forming of river ice obliged him to quit his canoe opposite the mouth of the St. Peter, or Minnesota River, whence by land he reached the Falls of St. Anthony on November 17, 1766, probably the first white American to visit them.
The noise and appearance of the Falls of St. Anthony impressed Carver very strongly, and his account of them is worthy of reproduction in view of the changes that have taken place within the past one hundred and thirty years:
“This amazing body of waters, which are above 250 yards over, form a most pleasing cataract; they fall perpendicularly about thirty feet, and the rapids below, in the space of 300 yards more, render the descent considerably greater; so that when viewed at a distance, they appear to be much higher than they really are.
“In the middle of the Falls stands a small islandabout forty feet broad and somewhat longer, on which grow a few cragged hemlock and spruce trees; and about half way between this island and the eastern shore is a rock lying at the very edge of the Fall, in an oblique position, that appears to be about five or six feet broad and thirty or forty long.”
Leaving the falls, Carver proceeded up the Mississippi to the mouth of the St. Francis, the farthest of Hennepin in 1680, discovering on the way Rum and Goose Rivers. Warned by the severity of the cold that winter was fast coming on, Carver returned to his canoe at the mouth of the Minnesota River and decided to explore that stream, of which only the lower portion had ever been visited—by Le Sueur in 1700.
Following the Minnesota about two hundred miles he reached, on December 7th, the winter camp of a large tribe of Indians, about one thousand in number, who were designated by Carver as the Naudowessie (Santees). Advancing boldly, with his calumet of peace fastened to the prow of his canoe, he was received in a friendly manner. After the usual smoking of the pipe of peace, during which he says the tent was nearly broken down by the crowd of savages, who, as a rule, had never seen a white man, he was treated with great respect.
Among these Indians Carver passed the winter, filling in his five months’ stay by hunting and other Indian amusements. From the Indians he learned that the St. Lawrence, the Mississippi, and the Bourbon (the Red River of the North) hadtheir sources within thirty miles of each other. This led to the natural but erroneous opinion that Carver had reached the highest land of North America, when in reality he was at an elevation of only twelve hundred feet.
Carver also spoke of “the Oregon, or the River of the West,” as having its sources somewhat farther to the west. This is the first time that the word Oregon appears in literature, and Carver gives no account of its meaning.
The Indians had traditions as to the extreme plentifulness of gold to the west of the “Shining Mountains,” of which our explorer says, on the strength of Indian reports:
“The mountains that lie to the west of St. Peter are called the Shining Mountains, from an infinite number of crystal stones of an amazing size with which they are covered and which,when the sun shines full upon them, sparkle so as to be seen at a very great distance.”
Carver’s enthusiasm and interest in the West led him to make the following striking prediction, which time has fully justified. He says:
“This extraordinary range of mountains is calculated to be more than three thousand miles in length, without any very considerable intervals, which, I believe, surpasses anything of the kind in the other quarters of the globe. Probably, in future ages, they may be found to contain more riches in their bowels than those of Hindostan and Malabar, or than are produced on the golden coast of Guinea, nor will I except even the Peruvian mines. To the west of these mountains, when explored by future Columbuses or Raleighs, may be found other lakes, rivers, and countries, full fraught with all the necessaries or luxuries of life, and where future generations may find an asylum, whether driven from their country by the ravages of lawless tyrants, or by religious persecutions, or reluctantly leaving it to remedy the inconveniences arising from a superabundant increase of inhabitants; whether, I say, impelled by these or allured by hopes of commercial advantages, there is little doubt but their expectations will be fully gratified in these rich and unexhausted climes.”
Carver described the valley of the Minnesota as a most delightful country, abounding with all the necessities of life, which grow spontaneously. Fruit, vegetables, and nuts were represented asbeing particularly abundant, and the sugar-maple grew in amazing numbers.
In April, 1767, the Santees descended the Minnesota in order, among other things, to bury their dead near a remarkable cave on Lake Pepin, known to the Indians as the “dwelling of the Great Spirit.”
Finding that supplies had not been sent to the Falls of St. Anthony, Carver returned to Prairie-du-Chien in order to get sufficient stores to enable him to reach Lake Superior, whence he hoped to be able to cross the continent from Grand Portage. Obtaining such supplies, he proceeded up the Mississippi to the Chippeway River, and, after ascending to its head, made portages to the St. Croix, and reached Lake Superior, possibly by the river now known as the Bois Brule.
From this point Carver, in his canoe, skirted the coast of Lake Superior to the Grand Portage, where he awaited the arrival of the Hudson Bay or northern traders, from whom he anxiously hoped to obtain supplies that would enable him to journey west; but he was destined to disappointment, as nothing could be obtained from them. Carver coasted around the north and east borders of Lake Superior, and arrived at the Falls of Ste. Marie the beginning of October, having skirted nearly twelve hundred miles of the shores of Lake Superior in a birch canoe.
The Sault Ste. Marie was then the resort of the Algonquin Indians, who frequented the falls on account of the great numbers of whitefish thatfilled the waters, particularly in the autumn, when that fish leaves the lakes in order to spawn in shallow running waters.
In November, 1767, Carver arrived at Mackinac, having, as he says, “been sixteen months on this extensive tour, travelled nearly four thousand miles, and visited twelve nations of Indians living to the west and north. His picture of Detroit on his return, in 1768, is of retrospective interest.
“The town of Detroit contains upward of one hundred houses. The streets are somewhat regular, and have a range of very convenient and handsome barracks with a spacious parade at the south end. On the west side lies the King’s Garden, belonging to the Governor, which is very well laid out, and kept in good order. The fortifications of the town consist of a strong stockade, made of round piles, fixed firmly in the ground, and lined with palisades. These are defended by some small bastions, on which are mounted a few indifferent cannon of an inconsiderable size, just sufficient for its defence against the Indians or an enemy not provided with artillery. The garrison in time of peace consists of two hundred men, commanded by a field-officer, who acts as chief magistrate under the Governor of Canada.
“In the year 1762, in the month of July, it rained on this town and the parts adjacent a sulphurous water of the color and consistency of ink, some of which being collected in bottles, and wrote with, appeared perfectly intelligibleon the paper, and answered every purpose for that useful liquid. Soon after, the Indian wars already spoken of broke out in these parts. I mean not to say that this incident was ominous of them, notwithstanding it is well known that innumerable well-attested instances of extraordinary phenomena, happening before extraordinary events, have been recorded in almost every age by historians of veracity; I only relate the circumstance as a fact, of which I was informed by many persons of undoubted probity, and leave my readers, as I have heretofore done, to draw their own conclusions from it.”
It is beyond question that certain chapters of Carver’s work, supplementary to his account of his personal explorations, and especially devoted to Indians and to the natural history of the Northwest, are practically translations of the accounts of Charlevoix, Hennepin, and particularly of Lahontan. It does not appear from the first part of the work that Carver was a man endowed with those powers of observation and assimilation which are essential traits for the successful traveller and author.
When the brief recital of his personal travels is examined, it seems difficult to determine on what grounds his truthfulness has been questioned by a few hostile critics. His story is simple and straightforward, devoid of boastfulness, free from any exaggeration as to his personal prowess, and the statement that he passed a winter of five months in the valley of the Upper Minnesota is, in my opinion, worthy of entire credence.
Fortunately, however, evidence of the most convincing character exists as to Carver’s residence among the Naudowessies or Santees. The exhaustive bibliography of the Siouan languages, by Mr. James C. Pilling, indicates that Carver is the first author who ever published a vocabulary of the Santee tongue, and its length, eight pages, renders it evident that it was an original compilation which must have required considerable time and patience.
The importance of Carver’s charts and journals at that time was evident to the Lords Commissioners of Trade and Plantations in England to whom Carver was referred when praying for reimbursement of his expenses. Carver appeared before the Board and, after an examination, was granted authority to publish his papers.Later, after Carver had, as he says, disposed of them and they were nearly ready for the press, an order was issued from the Council Board requiring him to immediately turn in all the originals of his charts, journals, and other papers relative to his discoveries.
Meanwhile interest in the extension of English influence into the interior of North America was waning steadily with the growing conviction that the colonies would establish their independence, and the Government had no mind to reimburse an enterprising American, even though he remained loyal. Carver was reduced gradually to the greatest straits, was compelled to sell his book for a pittance, and finally, his end hastened by lack of proper food and suitable attendance, died in the direst poverty in London, January 13, 1780.
His own generation could best judge as to the timeliness and importance of Carver’s exploration, and as to the value of the information set forth in his book of travels. Suffice it to say that no less than twenty-three editions of this book have appeared, in four languages. This, too, at a time when the war of independence naturally destroyed current interest in the extension of English settlements in the interior of North America.
Explorations, however, are wisely esteemed by posterity according to the results which flow therefrom in the shape of definite additions to the knowledge of the world or in the more important direction of disclosing lands suitable forcolonization. In this latter manner the exploration of Jonathan Carver and the accounts of his travels had an important influence. They first brought into popular and accessible form information and ideas concerning the interior parts of North America which before had been practically inaccessible to the general public of England and America.
Twenty-five years after this journey toward the “Shining Mountains” and “Oregon, the River of the West,” the ultimate scheme of Carver found its justification in the success of Alexander Mackenzie, a young Scotchman, who was the first white man to cross the continent of America to the north of Mexico; and yet ten years later Lewis and Clark were despatched on their famous expedition which explored the valley of the Columbia, where in 1810, under the energetic management of John Jacob Astor, arose the trading-post of Astoria, thus turning into reality the dreams and aspirations of Jonathan Carver, the soldier and explorer.
IV.
CAPTAIN ROBERT GRAY,
The Discoverer of the Columbia River.
Withinthe past century no American explorer has contributed more materially to the welfare of the United States and to its maritime glory than Captain Robert Gray, the discoverer of the Columbia River and the first circumnavigator who carried the flag of the United States around the world.
Robert Gray was born at Tiverton, R. I., in May, 1757, and in early youth, inspired with the spirit of independence which dominated the American Colonies, entered the naval service during the war of the Revolution, wherein he served with credit as an officer.
At the termination of the war it is probable that he continued his natural or acquired vocation as a seaman. At all events, we find him first and foremost among that band of American citizens whose courage, energy, and nautical skill enabled them to attain unsurpassed success as whalers and sealers in the Antarctic Ocean, as traders dealing direct with China, or as explorers and fur dealers on the unsurveyed and dangerous coast of northwest America.
In 1787, J. Barrell, S. Brown, C. Bulfinch, J. Darby, C. Hatch, and J, M. Pintard, merchants of Boston, associated for the purpose of combining the fur traffic of the northwest coast of America with the silk and tea trade of China. For this purpose they sent, under the command of Captain John Kendrick, in 1787, the ship Columbia and the sloop Washington with cargoes of blankets, knives, iron bars, and other articles suitable for the northwest trade. They were provided with sea letters issued according to a resolution of Congress, with passports from the State of Massachusetts, and with commendatory letters from the Spanish minister plenipotentiary to the United States.
Captain Kendrick, who commanded the Columbia, was a man of marked ability and great energy, who withal had most enthusiastic opinions as to the future of the Pacific Coast region, which he believed would in a few years utterly dwarf the growing importance of the Atlantic seaboard. Gray was the master of the Washington, and his professional standing in the eyes of the merchants of Boston was shown by his designation as the most desirable officer to assume command in case of death or injury to Captain Kendrick.
Many aspersions have been cast by English writers on the policy pursued and methods followed by Americans engaged in trading with the Indians of the northwest coast of America. Doubtless such reflections were justified in individual cases of Americans, as of traders of othernationality; but the instructions given by the merchants of Boston to Kendrick and Gray show that fair, honest, and peaceful methods were regarded as the true means of establishing a permanent and profitable trade. Among other injunctions were the following:
“If you make any fort or any improvement of land on the coast, be sure you purchase the soil of the natives.... Let the instrument of conveyance bear every authentic mark that circumstances will admit.... We cannot forbear to impress on your mind our will and expectation that the most inviolable harmony and friendship may subsist between you and the natives, and that no advantage may be taken of them in trading, but that you endeavor by honest conduct to impress on their minds a friendship for Americans.” While enjoining peace, it was not to be a peace on any terms, for thus runs the instructions: “The sea letters from Congress and this State you will show on every proper occasion, and although we expect you will treat all nations with respect and civility, yet we depend you will suffer insult and injury from none without showing that spirit which becomes a free and independent American.”
The vessels sailed from Boston September 30, 1787, via the Cape Verde and Faulkland Islands, and in January doubled Cape Horn, when they thought the perils of storm were past. In latitude 59° S., however, a violent gale arose, which not only separated them, but also seriously damaged the Columbia. The storm over, Kendrickfound himself in a sad plight, his consort gone, perhaps lost, his ship in an unseaworthy condition, and the nearest spot for repairs a thousand miles distant. This port, that of the island of Juan Fernandez, if now famous and delightful to the adventurous mind through its associations with the fascinating tale of Robinson Crusoe, was then most objectionable from the fact that it was under Spanish rule and so was to be avoided by Kendrick, whose instructions ran as follows:
“You are strictly enjoined not to touch at any port of the Spanish dominion on the western continent of America, unless driven there by unavoidable accident, in which case you are to give no offence to any of the subjects of his Catholic Majesty.”
Kendrick, to his surprise, was received with great kindness and aided in repairing his injured vessel by Don Blas Gonzales, the humane commandant of the Spanish garrison of Juan Fernandez.
Spain at this time claimed the right of exclusive jurisdiction over the entire western continent of America by virtue of the papal concession, 1493, and by right of discovery. It had failed to colonize the northwest coast of America, but it prohibited other nations from entering in possession. It now illustrated its narrow and jealous policy in its treatment of a subordinate who had ventured to assist a vessel in distress and provided with letters from the accredited minister of Spain to the United States. Ambrose O’Higgins,then captain-general of Chili, under whom Gonzales was serving, on hearing of this act recalled him and put him in arrest, pending definite orders from his own superior, Teodor Lacroix, viceroy of Peru. After due consideration of the case the unfortunate commandant, Gonzales, was cashiered for his remissness in allowing a strange ship to leave Juan Fernandez instead of seizing her and her crew. The viceroy set forth to the captain-general of Chili the legal opinion that by the royal ordinance of November, 1692, every foreign vessel found in those seas without a license from the court of Spain was to be treated as an enemy, even though belonging to a friend or ally of the king, “seeing that no other nation had, or ought to have, any territories, to reach which its vessels should pass around Cape Horn or through Magellan’s Straits.” The viceroy therefore sent a ship from Callao to track or intercept the Columbia; the authorities on the coasts of Peru and Chili were especially enjoined to be vigilant, and in case any foreign vessel should appear in the country to seize her.
Under Gray’s skilful handling the Washington escaped unharmed from the hurricane, and continuing his course toward King George Sound, the concerted rendezvous, he made the American coast, about 46° N., in August, 1788. Here he barely escaped loss of his vessel in trying to cross the bar of an unknown river, probably the Columbia, when his ship grounded. He, however, visited shore, and found that the sea was perchance the less inhospitable of the two,for he was so savagely and violently attacked by swarms of Indians that he was very glad to escape therefrom with one seaman dead and the mate wounded.
Quitting this unfortunate place he sailed north and entered Nootka Sound, Vancouver Island, September 17, 1788, where he found two English vessels, the Felice and Iphigenia, sailing under the Portuguese flag and commanded by Captains Meares and Douglass. There were no signs of the Columbia, but her arrival a few days later relieved Gray from further anxiety in this respect.
Douglass’s vessel, the Iphigenia, was in serious need of supplies and assistance, which Gray generously furnished. Later he not only made to the northward a successful trading trip, but in the following year, in June, 1789, explored the whole east coast of Queen Charlotte Islands, to which he gave the name of Washington Islands, in honor of General Washington, then President of the United States. In another trading excursion from Nootka Sound, Vancouver Island, Gray entered the broad opening southeast of the island and sailed to the east-southeast fifty miles,where he found the passage still five leagues wide. This opening was the Straits of Fuca, and the first authentic exploration of the strait is the account of Gray. The credit of first passing through the entire length of the Straits of Fuca is due to Kendrick, who made the passage in the sloop Washington, after the departure of Gray to China on the Columbia.
The account of the passage of the Washington through the Straits of Fuca was especially called to Vancouver’s attention by the British Admiralty on the occasion of his surveying voyage of 1791, when he was particularly to “examine the supposed Strait of Juan de Fuca, said to be situated between the forty-eighth and forty-ninth north latitude, and to lead to an opening through which the sloop Washington was reported to have passed in 1789, and to have come out again to the northward of Nootka.” Vancouver later denied to Americans the credit of first sailing entirely through the Straits of Fuca, resting his opinion on Gray’s statement that he sailed only fifty miles within it, which was true; the credit belonging to Kendrick in his voyage with the Washington after Gray’s departure from the coast in 1789.