[212] Or Quadrant, a name applied to the neighbouring creek by the French hunters, probably in commemoration of some observation made there by that instrument, to ascertain the latitude.—Nuttall.
[213] The Tuscaroras also wear masks at set times, for the purpose, as they pretend, of driving away evil spirits, and accompany these ceremonies by the sacrifice of two white dogs.—Nuttall.
[214] James Miller was born at Peterboro, New Hampshire, in 1776. After practicing law for several years, he entered the army as major in 1808, became lieutenant-colonel in 1810, and colonel in 1812—the latter, in recognition of gallantry at Brownstown. The incident alluded to in the text occurred at Lundy’s Lane, July 25, 1814. General Scott having asked Miller if he could take the British battery, he replied “I’ll try, sir,” and led a successful charge. For this deed he was given a gold medal and made a brigadier-general. Upon the erection of Arkansas Territory in March, 1819, Miller was appointed governor, but was never active in the affairs of the Territory. He resigned in 1825, and became collector at the port of Salem, dying in 1851.—Ed.
[215] This is said to be the first case of record ever tried in an Arkansas court. The name of the criminal was Thomas Dickinson, and that of his victim Sally Hall. Under the sentence of the court, Dickinson was to have received his punishment on February 15, but Governor Miller pardoned him.—Ed.
[216] The paper was called the Arkansas Gazette, and was the first to be published in the Territory. The Primacy of the Post in the matter of newspapers was short-lived, for the Gazette was taken to Little Rock in 1820, and no other succeeded it until 1862.—Ed.
[217] Point Chicot is opposite Greenville, Mississippi, forty-five miles, by the river, above the Arkansas boundary.—Ed.
[218] For a sketch of Walnut Hills (Vicksburg), see Cuming’s Tour, our volume iv, note 197.—Ed.
[219] Warrenton is the correct spelling. It was the seat of Warren County until 1836, being then supplanted by Vicksburg. Its population is still less than a hundred.—Ed.
[220] Big Black River forms the boundary between Warren and Claiborne counties, Mississippi. Grand Gulf is just below its mouth, where now stands a village of the same name. General Phineas Lyman’s Tory colony of 1775 was located on the Big Black. See our volume iv, note 198.—Ed.
[221] Petit Gulf is fifteen miles below Grand Gulf, adjacent to the village of Rodney, on the line between Claiborne and Jefferson counties.—Ed.
[222] Bayou Pierre is almost exactly midway between Grand Gulf and Petit Gulf. There were one or two plantations upon its banks as early as 1729, the year of the Natchez uprising against the French.—Ed.
[223] Now called Port Gibson. It is the seat of Claiborne County, and was founded (1803) on land granted by the Spanish authorities to Samuel Gibson, who came to Mississippi (1772) from South Carolina.—Ed.
[224] For a sketch of Natchez, see Cuming’s Tour, volume iv of our series, note 206.—Ed.
[225] By act of February 20, 1819, Congress donated thirty-six sections of public land to the legislature of Mississippi, in trust, to endow a “seminary of learning.” The lands were sold at auction, notes were taken in payment, half of them were never collected, and the proceeds of those which were paid were lost by the failure of the Planters’ Bank, in 1840.—Ed.
[226] Early in 1731, Périer, governor of Louisiana, attacked a fort which the Natchez had built near the confluence of Ouachita and Black rivers. A number of warriors eluded the French and escaped; but the remaining Indians, including the chief men of the tribe and several hundred women and children, were captured and sold as slaves in San Domingo. The remnant of the tribe retreated to the Chickasaw, who continued the war. See ante, note 147.—Ed.
[227] For a sketch of the Choctaw, see Cuming’s Tour, volume iv of our series, note 187.—Ed.
[228] For the migration legend of the Creek, see Brinton, “National Legend of the Chahta-Muskotee Tribes,” in Historical Magazine, February, 1870; also Gatschet, “A Migration Legend of the Creek Indians,” in Brinton’s Library of Aboriginal American Literature (Philadelphia, 1884), iv. See also Transactions of the Academy of Science at St. Louis, 1886–91, v. De Soto found the Creek in their historic abode in Georgia and Alabama.—Ed.
[229] This treaty was completed October 18, 1820. In exchange for the Choctaw lands in Mississippi it reserved for them the territory lying between Arkansas and Canadian rivers on the north, and Red River on the south, with a western boundary running due south from the source of the Canadian to the Red, and an eastern running from Point Remove on the Arkansas to a point three miles below the mouth of Little River. The portion of this tract lying within the limits of Arkansas was ceded to the United States January 20, 1825.—Ed.
[230] For a brief sketch of Fort Adams, see Cuming’s Tour, our volume iv, note 211—Ed.
[231] Some of this rock is an impure argillaceous limestone; but the principal part consists of an indurated and parti-coloured clay, subject to disintegration, in which state it resembles the pink-coloured clay heretofore noticed.—Nuttall.
[232] St. Francisville dates from the period of Spanish dominion in Louisiana. When Feliciana Parish was divided in 1824, St. Francisville was made seat of justice of West Feliciana. It has since been practically absorbed by Bayou Sara, which was originally merely the river landing of the older town.—Ed.
[233] This point derived its name from the fact that Iberville, on his ascent of the river in 1699, cut down a number of trees which obstructed one of the channels, thus changing the course of the river so as eventually to cut off the point. The name means cut-off point.
Pointe Coupée gives its name to one of the most fertile parishes in Louisiana. The parish also has an interesting history. The mouth of Red River, in the northern end of the parish, is the spot where De Soto is thought to have died. Frenchmen from Canada, Illinois, and Vincennes settled at Pointe Coupée prior to 1712—before the founding of New Orleans. Slaves were introduced in 1719, and attempts made at cotton culture as early as 1785. Efforts to introduce sugar cane began in 1776, but for a number of years met with small success.—Ed.
[234] Julien Poydras was Louisiana Territory’s delegate in Congress (1809–10), president of the state constitutional convention (1812), first president of the senate, and one of the first presidential electors. One of the principal streets of New Orleans bears his name. He was also known in the state as a philanthropist. See post, note 238.—Ed.
[235] Thompson’s Creek forms the boundary between East and West Feliciana parishes. It joins the Mississippi at Port Hudson, ten miles below Bayou Sara.—Ed.
[236] For a sketch of Baton Rouge, see Cuming’s Tour, our volume iv, note 216.—Ed.
[237] This famous South Carolinian was born in 1754. He served under Marion and Sumter during the Revolution; was in Congress 1795–97, 1803–05; entered the army as colonel in 1808; was promoted to a brigadier-generalship in 1809 and stationed at New Orleans, where he was superseded by General James Wilkinson (1812); served on the northern frontier in 1813, and resigned his commission in 1814. When he died, in 1835, he was reckoned the wealthiest planter in the South. Several of his descendants bore the same christian name.—Ed.
[238] Mons. P. has, I understand, endowed a place in New Orleans for the education of female orphans.—Nuttall.
Comment by Ed. The institution was on Julia Street, west of Carondelet, and was built in 1814. In addition to Poydras’s gift, it received $4,000 from the state. This was not Poydras’s only philanthropic deed. A college “for indigent females” was established at Pointe Coupée in 1829, on an endowment of $20,000, bequeathed by him.
[239] West of the river, around the present parish of St. Landry.—Ed.
[240] Point Houmas is just below Donaldsonville. The Houmas numbered only about sixty souls at the beginning of the nineteenth century. On the Chetimachas, see ante, note 147. Bayou La Fourche enters the Mississippi at Donaldsonville, and must not be confounded with another stream of the same name in La Fourche Parish. The mouth of Bayou Plaquemine, is at the town of Plaquemine, in Iberville Parish.—Ed.
[241] Peter Stephen Duponceau was a Frenchman who served on Baron Steuben’s staff during the Revolutionary War, and afterwards (1781), became a citizen of the United States. He was well-known as an author of legal essays and a student of Indian philology. He died in Philadelphia in 1844.—Ed.
[242] Thirty miles above the mouth of the river.—Ed.
[243] The arpent of Paris is less than the English and United States statute acre, as 512 is to 605. The arpent is used in Louisiana, and other places in America inhabited by the French, as a measure of length; each arpent is equal to 29.1 Gunter’s chain, very nearly; consequently, 40 arpents amounts to 1164 Gunter, or 2660.8 yards.—Note by Mr. Darby.—Nuttall.
[244] The outbreak occurred in January, 1811, in the parish of St. John the Baptist. See account in Martin, History of Louisiana (New Orleans, 1827), ii, p. 300; also Gayarré, History of Louisiana (New Orleans, 1903), iv, p. 266. An earlier uprising took place in 1795 on the Poydras plantation (see ante, note 234), during the owner’s absence in the United States. See Gayarré, iii, p. 354.—Ed.
[245] The headquarters of the French colony in Louisiana were first established (1699) at Biloxi, now within the limits of the state of Mississippi. In 1701 they were removed to Mobile, there remaining until the site of New Orleans was chosen by Bienville, acting governor under Law’s Mississippi Company.—Ed.
[246] The recurrent yellow fever epidemics at New Orleans were due in no small degree to the former unsanitary condition of the city. Throughout the nineteenth century, her sewage was poured into open gutters, and not until 1899 were active steps taken to construct a sewerage system conforming to the principles of modern sanitary science. The low level of the city made the drainage problem a difficult one from the engineering point of view.—Ed.
[247] The first Protestant congregation in New Orleans was the Christ Protestant Episcopal Church. It was organized in the autumn of 1805, but did not erect a building until 1816. No other Protestant organization existed in the city until the efforts of Rev. Elias Cornelius, of Connecticut, led to the formation (1818) of a Presbyterian congregation under the pastorate of Rev. Sylvester Larned, a graduate of Princeton Theological Seminary. The building referred to in the text was erected by his congregation and its friends in 1819, on St. Charles Street, between Gravier and Union streets. It was destroyed by fire in 1851.—Ed.