Rene-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle
La Salle's party lost no time in proceeding to Fort Frontenac.
Even though the winter was at hand, Hennepin was at once sent
forward to Niagara with instructions to build a post and to begin
the construction of a vessel so that the journey westward might be
begun with the opening of spring. Later in the winter La Salle and
Tonty joined the party at Niagara where the fort was completed.
Before spring arrived, a vessel of about forty-five tons, the
largest yet built for service on the lakes, had been constructed. On
its prow stood a carved griffin, from the armorial bearings of
Frontenac, and out of its portholes frowned several small cannon.
With the advent of summer La Salle and his followers went aboard;
the sails were spread, and in due course the expedition readied
Michilimackinac, where the Jesuits had already established their
most westerly mission.
The arrival of the "Griffin" brought Indians by the hundred to
marvel at the "floating fort" and to barter their furs for the
trinkets with which La Salle had provided himself. The little vessel
then sailed westward into Lake Michigan and finally dropped anchor
in Green Bay where an additional load of beaver skins was put on
deck. With the approach of autumn the return trip began. La Salle,
however, did not accompany his valuable cargo, having a mind to
spend the winter in. explorations along the Illinois. In September,
with many misgivings, he watched the "Griffin" set sail in charge of
a pilot. Then, with the rest of his followers he started southward
along the Wisconsin shore. Reaching the mouth of the St. Joseph, he
struck into the interior to the upper Kankakee. This stream the
voyageurs, who numbered about forty in all, descended until they
reached the Illinois, which they followed to the point where Peoria
now stands.
Here La Salle's troubles began in abundance. The Indians endeavored
to dissuade him from leading the expedition farther, and even the
explorer's own followers began to desert. Chagrinned at these
untoward circumstances and on his guard lest the Indians prove
openly hostile, La Salle proceeded to secure his position by the
erection of a fort to which he gave the name Crevecoeur. Here he
left Tonty with the majority of the party, while he himself started
with five men back to Niagara. His object was in part to get
supplies for building a vessel at Fort Crevecoeur, and in part to
learn what had become of the "Griffin", for since that vessel had
sailed homeward he had heard no word from her crew. Proceeding
across what is now southern Michigan, La Salle emerged on the shores
of the Detroit River. From this point he pushed across the neck of
land to Lake Erie, where he built a canoe which brought him to
Niagara at Eastertide, 1680. His fears for the fate of the "Griffin"
were now confirmed: the vessel had been lost, and with her a fortune
in furs. Nothing daunted, however, La Salle hurried on to Fort
Frontenac and thence with such speed to Montreal that he
accomplished the trip from the Illinois to the Ottawa in less than
three months--a feat hitherto unsurpassed in the annals of American
exploration.
At Montreal the explorer, who once more sought the favor of
Frontenac, was provided with equipment at the King's expense. Within
a few months he was again at Fort Frontenac and ready to rejoin
Tonty at Crevecoeur. Just as he was about to depart, however, word
came that the Crevecoeur garrison had mutinied and had destroyed the
post. La Salle's one hope now was that his faithful lieutenant had
held on doggedly and had saved the vessel he had been building. But
Tonty in the meantime had made his way with a few followers to Green
Bay, so that when La Salle reached the Illinois he found everyone
gone. Undismayed by this climax to his misfortunes, La Salle
nevertheless pushed on down the Illinois, and early in December
reached its confluence with the Mississippi.
To follow the course of this great stream with the small party which
accompanied him seemed, however, too hazardous an undertaking. La
Salle, therefore, retraced his steps once more and spent the next
winter at Fort Miami on the St. Joseph to the southeast of Lake
Michigan. In the spring word came to him that Tonty was at
Michilimackinac, and thither he hastened, to hear from Tonty's own
lips the long tale of disaster. "Any one else," wrote an eye-witness
of the meeting, "would have thrown up his hands and abandoned the
enterprise; but far from this, with, a firmness and constancy that
never had its equal, I saw him more resolved than ever to continue
his work and push forward his discovery."
Now that he had caught his first glimpse of the Mississippi, La
Salle was determined to persist until he had followed its course to
the outlet. Returning with Tonty to Fort Frontenac, he replenished
his supplies. In this same autumn of 1681, with a larger number of
followers, the explorer was again on his way to the Illinois. By
February the party had reached the Mississippi. Passing the Missouri
and the Ohio, La Salle and his followers kept steadily on their way
and early in April reached the spot where the Father of Waters
debouches through three channels into the Gulf. Here at the outlet
they set up a column with the insignia of France, and, as they took
possession of the land in the name of their King, they chanted in
solemn tones the "Exaudiat", and in the name of God they set up
their banners.
But the French were short of supplies and could not stay long after
the symbols of sovereignty had been raised aloft. Paddling slowly
against the current. La Salle and his party reached the Illinois
only in August. Here La Salle and Tonty built their Fort St. Louis
and here they spent the winter. During the next summer (1683) the
indefatigable explorer journeyed down to Quebec, and on the last
ship of the year took passage for France. In the meantime,
Frontenac, always his firm friend and supporter, had been recalled,
and La Barre, the new governor, was unfriendly. A direct appeal to
the home authorities for backing seemed the only way of securing
funds for further explorations.
Accordingly, early in 1684 La Salle appeared at the French court
with elaborate plans for founding a colony in the valley of the
lower Mississippi. This time the expedition was to proceed by sea.
To this project the King gave his assent, and commanded the royal
officers to furnish the supplies. By midsummer four ships were ready
to set sail for the Gulf. Once more, however, troubles beset La
Salle on every hand. Disease broke out on the vessels; the officers
quarreled among themselves; the expedition was attacked by the
Spaniards, and one ship was lost. Not until the end of December was
a landing made, and then not at the Mississippi's mouth but at a
spot far to the west of it, on the sands of Matagorda Bay.
Finding that he had missed his reckonings, La Salle directed a part
of his company to follow the shore. After many days of fruitless
search, they established a permanent camp and sent the largest
vessel back to France. Their repeated efforts to reach the
Mississippi overland were in vain. Finally, in the winter of 1687,
La Salle with a score of his strongest followers struck out
northward, determined to make their way to the Lakes, where they
might find succor. To follow the detail of their dreary march would
be tedious. The hardships of the journey, without adequate equipment
or provisions, and the incessant danger of attack by the Indians
increased petty jealousies into open mutiny. On the 19th of March,
1687, the courageous and indefatigable La Salle was treacherously
assassinated by one of his own party. Here in the fastnesses of the
Southwest died at the age of forty-four the intrepid explorer of New
France, whom Tonty called--perhaps not untruthfully--"one of the
greatest men of this age."
"Thus," writes a later historian with all the perspective of the
intervening years, "was cut short the career of a man whose
personality is impressed in some respects more strongly than that of
any other upon the history of New France. His schemes were too
far-reaching to succeed. They required the strength and resources of
a half-dozen nations like the France of Louis XIV. Nevertheless the
lines upon which New France continued to develop were substantially
those which La Salle had in mind, and the fabric of a wilderness
empire, of which he laid the foundations, grew with the general
growth of colonization, and in the next century became truly
formidable. It was not until Wolfe climbed the Heights of Abraham
that the great ideal of La Salle was finally overthrown."
It would be difficult, indeed, to find among the whole array of
explorers which history can offer in all ages a perseverance more
dogged in the face of abounding difficulties. Phoenix-like, he rose
time after time from the ashes of adversity. Neither fatigue nor
famine, disappointment nor even disaster, availed to swerve him from
his purpose. To him, more than to any one else of his time, the
French could justly attribute their early hold upon the great
regions of the West. Other explorers and voyageurs of his generation
there were in plenty, and their service was not inconsiderable. But
in courage and persistence, as well as in the scope of his
achievements, La Salle, the pathfinder of Rouen, towered above them
all. He had, what so many of the others lacked, a clear vision of
what the great plains and valleys of the Middle West could yield
towards the enrichment of a nation in years to come. "America," as
Parkman has aptly said, "owes him an enduring memory; for in this
masculine figure she sees the pioneer who guided her to the
possession of her richest heritage."
Back to: French Exploration of America
