Butler had grown up in Lowell, Massachusetts the famous textile mill town. His mother was a poor widow who ran a boarding house for female textile mill working women. Growing up in this hard scrabble life he chose law for his profession. Not getting clients from the prominent white shoe attorneys, he had to do it his own way. He mastered the law to the point that he could pull a thread out of any case and make it fall to pieces.

He was making a princely income of $18K and had developed a political career as a state legislator, a leader in the Democratic Party and a candidate for governor in 1860. Having led a volunteer militia was his only qualification for an appointment as Major General by Lincoln. Butler had voted for Jefferson Davis as the party’s nominee and opposed Negroes being enrolled in the militia. His peers said he was less a major general than a politician. He was assigned to Fortress Monroe on the Chesapeake at the James River, a Federal installation deep in the Confederacy’s territory.

Within a day of his arrival at the Fortress three runaway slaves arrived at the facility seeking asylum. Shortly after, their owners came to retrieve them. The Fourth Amendment of the Constitution and the Fugitive Slave Act required their return to their owners. But, Butler reasoned, confiscating the property of Confederates, whether a rifle or a slave, was a necessary part of the conflict. He refused to release them. Within days the issue reached Lincoln. Newspapers deplored the idea of returning the slaves to the South.

Within a week the issue came to Lincoln’s desk. He issued no order to Butler. Meanwhile, “contraband” as they were called, by the hundreds arrived at the fort for freedom. Soon there were a thousand under his command. Butler took them in. He declared that when they reached the fort they became free. It would be fourteen months before Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, resolving the issue upon which Butler, with his keen legal mind, had taken a stand.

For the capture of New Orleans, Butler was sent out with Captain Farragut to take the city. He became the senior military official in charge of the surrendered city. Thousands of blacks streamed into city from the surrounding plantations. He was one of the first Union commanders to enlist Negro troops, which he did without authorization from the Lincoln Administration. They served in the bayou country and most honorably in the Union battle for the Mississippi River Confederate position at Port Gibson. He fought to secure equal treatment, including equal pay for black soldiers (at which he was unsuccessful) as well as to protect them from being re-enslaved. Butler’s legal background served him well in the issue of fugitive slaves.

After the war Butler reentered politics as a radical Republican. He was instrumental in passing the federal Civil Rights Act of 1875, which mandated equal treatment for blacks in the public accommodations, including restaurants, hotels and trains. The law was never enforced in the South, and the U.S. Supreme Court ruled it unconstitutional in 1883. Not until the 1960 were those right reinstated. 7/25/11

1632 – 1654 French colonists crossed the Atlantic to a Canadian colony operated by the Company of New France.  They were from 7 provinces in the west central region ofFrance, due south ofNormandy. La Rochellewas the port nearby.  Seeking to escape the religious Protestant/Catholic wars and the famines and epidemics that followed, they chose to immigrate.

 By 1755 the British in the French & Indian War were taking over Acadia, the region around Nova Scotia.  They imported English sympathizers, rounding up the French for deportation.  The men were told to appear at the fort.  Four hundred appeared and were arrested, to their surprise, then deported.  This began the deportations to the east coast of America, San Domingue and by 1765 192 Acadians had immigrated to Louisiana.  The first in 1764 settled on the AcadianCoastin St. James and St. Johnparishes.  Among them were carpenters, coopers, blacksmiths, fishermen, shipbuilders, trappers, and sealers, as well as farmers and herders.  They grew wheat, rye, corn, oats, peas, potatoes, cabbages, apples, flax and hemp.  Pigs, sheep and cattle were raised.  Welcomed and assisted by the Spanish, they established farms and vacheries (cattle ranches) along the MS River and bayous Lafourche, Teche and Vermillion, spreading west into the grassland prairies ofsouthwest LA.  Oysters, shrimp, crabs and many fish were part of the diet.  Waterfowl, alligators, turtles, frogs and crawfish were prized.  An old saying, “If it walks, crawls, swims or flies, it ends up in the Cajun’s pot!”  CC, p. 30.

 Concessions of land based on arpents (192’) were provided where they built and farmed along the streams.  Transport was by bayou in a pirogue, bateaux or sailboat. Later, horse drawn carriages and wagons were added as roads developed along the streams.

The culture that grew up involved the Acadian cabin with its garconniere, fenced farm, fais-do-do, Acadian music with the Balfour brothers with accordian, guitar, violin, and triangle, zydeco by Clifton Chenier,  la boucherie,  weddings, crawfishing, the Catholic Church, courier Mardi Gras, festivals, and its legendary cuisine made world famous by Paul Prudomme.

 CAJUN COUNTRY. BJ Ancelet, JD Edwards, & G Pitre.Jackson:University Press of Ms. 1991. pps 256.

 Evangeline by HenryWadsworth Longfellow. LB Semple, ed.London: Macmillian, 1905, 137 pps. The poem tells of the idyllic time inAcadia when Evangeline, beautiful daughter of wealthy farmer Benedict Bellafontaine was engaged to marry her love, Gabriel, the blacksmith’s son.  On the night of the wedding the British announced the deportation, burned thevillage ofGrande Pre, shipping the exiles to other shores.  Separated, the lovers search for each other, Evangeline traveling by boat down theMississippi to the Bayou Plaquemines,Atchafalaya and finally the Teche at St. Martinville.  There she learns from his father that her love has just left to go west, so they set out in search of him, always a few days behind him. She winters at a mission in the west, to no avail.  Rumors of Gabriel inMichigan send her to find an empty cabin.  Finally, she reachesPhiladelphia where she joins a cloister. There she ministers to the poor in almshouses.  Near death herself, she stares at a man, dying in an almshouse, her Gabriel.  They embrace later to be buried in graves together with stone tablets to tell their story.

Bill Norris, Ph.D.     6/14/2010

 1682    LaSalle claims the center of the continent for Louis XIV

1699    Iberville and Bienville arrive to start the French Colony

1718    Bienville founds New Orleans

 1719    Slaves begin arriving; 3,000 over the next twelve years

1722    Adrien de Pauger lays out the city, now the French Quarter

1727    Ursuline nuns arrive for education and improvement of the city

 1729    Natchez Indians revolt

1763    Louis XV gives LA to King Charles III of Spain in settling the Seven Years War

1769    General O’Reilly arrives with 2,000 soldiers to take over the colony

 1788    A fire burns down 850 buildings of 1,000 in French Quarter

1794    Etienne de Bore successfully granulates sugar

1795    Eli Whitney invents his cotton engine, hence the “cotton gin”

 1803    Louisiana Purchase: New Orleans & territory west of Ms River for $15 M

1812    First steamboat arrives; Nicholas Roosevelt & wife as the investors

            Louisiana statehood; 15 states in whole or part were carved out of LA

1815    Battle of New Orleans at Chalmette; Gen. Andrew Jackson, the hero

 1834    City of Lafayette (Garden District) founded by Samuel Peters

1861-65  Civil War; New Orleans surrenders in 1862; occupied by Union

1884    Cotton Centennial held on the site of Audubon Park

 1897    Plessy vs Ferguson decision by U.S. Supreme Court: “Separate but Equal”

1897 – 1917   Storyville, a red light district, flourished on lakeside of Basin Street

1936    The State est.Vieux Carre Commission after crusade by Elizabeth Werlein

 1954    Brown vs Board of Education decision

1964    Ruby Bridges integrates white city school    

Native Americans
French Colony
Ursulines
Madeliene Hachard
Spanish Colony
LA Purchase
Sugar/Cotton/Steam
Battle of NO
Garden District
NO-Carrollton RR
Architecture
Michaela Pontalba
John McDonogh
French Quarter
VCC – Eliz Werlein
City Park

John Jas Audubon
Wetlands
Katrina
MRGO
Coastal Erosion
Ms Riv levee system
Ead’s jetties
Diversion Canals
Lake Ponchartrain
Flood of 1927
Baldwin Woods
Creole/Cajun
Cuisine & chefs
Mardi Gras
Cultural Differences
billnorristours.com

This book presents the story of human origins over the past 6 million years, combining archaeological, artifact and genetic data to reveal the saga. It is a companion book with the exhibit of the same name at the National Museum of Natural History in Washington DC. Here is a list of human developments:

6 M years ago – Walking upright on short legs

5 M

4 M

3.6       Early human foot print trails

3 M

2.6       Tool making & eating meats from large animals; sharing tools & foods

2 M

1.8       Travel to new regions on longer legs

1.6       Hand axes made of stone served hominins for 1 M years

1 M     Beginning of a millennia of dramatic climate fluctuations that challenge survival

            800 K  Gathering at the hearths

            500 K  Rapid increase of brain size; longer childhood and adolescence corresponded with increased socialization and environmental changes between wet & dry and hot & cold

250 K Communicating with symbols

195 K  Homo sapiens first evolve

            100 K  Tools for capturing fast and dangerous prey

              90 K  Special fishing tools

              60 K  Homo sapiens begin worldwide dispersal out of Africa

              50 K  Lighter built bodies

              40 K  Creating paintings, figurines and cave art

  35 K  Music is created with flutes made of mammoth and swan bones

              17 K  The last of our hominin cousins dies out leaving only homo sapiens

  16 K  Domestication of dogs from the wolf; used in hunting

  10,500 Plant and animal domestication appears; goats first, then cattle

Cereal grains followed with wheat, barley, peas and lentils

                8,000  Using symbols to represent words and concepts

                7,000  Sumerians in Mesopotamia develop city-states and large scale societies

TODAY

H sapiens survived because of strategies of adaptation for climate, competition, foods, environments and conditions

One thousand years ago humans numbered about 10 million. Today we are 7 billion!

Upcoming Discovery Channel History Research Program

Born Dec. 29, 1779; son of John & Elizabeth Wilkins McDonogh; a Scotsman and Revolutionary War veteran who owned a brickyard is South Baltimore.  His parents raised him in strict Calvinistic principles. He apprenticed to a wealthy Baltimore merchant, William Taylor, at age 17; visited New Orleans as a young man; in 1800 Taylor sent JM to Liverpool to establish a branch of John & William Taylor. From there he was sent to NO as Taylor’s agent at 21 in September of 1800. By 1805 he had amassed a small fortune for himself and owned a full warehouse!

 How did he do it?  Based on 67 volumes of Wm Taylor’s business correspondence, 13 letters from Rezin D. Shepherd detailed JM’s activities. “Those remarkable letters portray McDonogh as a secretive, opportunistic, ungrateful, aggressive man who used his former employer as a stepping stone to success. While Taylor pleaded for cash remittances to avert financial disaster, McDonogh made heavy drafts, as much as $30,000 at a time, on Taylor’s firm and used this money to speculate in sugar which he shipped to New York and Philadelphia. He purchased fine quality, dry sugar for his own account and send bad sugar to Taylor. At the same time he speculated in lands and traded in Negro slaves.  Nor would  he allow Taylor to share in his successful ventures. Rather, he tried to keep his dealings secret” (Nuhrah,  p. 10).  Taylor severed relationship with McDonogh. And when Taylor suffered bankruptcy in 1815-1816, McDonogh invited the old man to make his home with McDonogh and he did so in 1817! (p. 11)

He began acquiring vast real estate holdings  in La. & Florida. He was elected Director of La. State Bank in 1806 at 27 yrs old; lived in his home at Chartres & Toulouse (dwn riv/lakeside) (Nuhrah said JM had an uptown house); volunteered with Beale’s Rifles in Battle of New Orleans. He remained a bachelor all his life.  Ciravolo wrote Bill Norris that JM was a founding member of Christ Episcopal Church in 1805.

He was an unsuccessful candidate for Congress in 1818, withdrawing from society and moving to his plantation overlooking the city from the west bank  in 1818, called McDonoghville. He owned brick yards & plantations; made most of his money in real estate speculation, as a merchant and as a factor for other planters.  He pioneered farm machinery, flood control and “scientific” farming. He was regarded as a miser and an eccentric; criticized for renting his houses to prostitutes in city.

JM rarely stayed at home more than a few weeks at a time, making hundreds of trips to every part of the state, looking after property, visiting friends, advising lawyers and inspecting lands for sale. Some of his travels was purely social.  He delighted  in dining with Andrew Durnford FMC whose son, Thomas, was JM’s godchild. Thomas studied medicine and assisted JM in his real estate holdings, often staying at McDonogh’s house. (Nuhrah p.14)

JM’s brother William, “Billy,” came to stay with him, to JM’s delight.  Unfortunately, in 1832 Billy died of cholera, greatly affecting JM, strengthening his resolve to make himself useful to others. He was generous in many of his actions, but could demand a pound of flesh in other business dealings.

Rumors of him being a miser are misplaced.  He dined on a mahogany table set with imported porcelain on Irish linen, using heavy sterling silver tableware, while his liquor cabinet was abundant in fine imported liquors.  He preferred fine meats and excellent foods, as receipts have documented.  He subscribed to at least five newspapers, reading tax sales, auction notices and criticism hurled at him by contemporaries. He gave generously to charities and sent two slave children to Pennsylvania for educations. Walking was his exercise of choice for a sound body. (ibid, p. 13)

He had title to about 700,000 acres, for the most part, swamp lands around New Orleans.  He proposed the concept of the Bonne Carre Spillway 116 years before it was finally built.

McDonogh pursued the welfare of his slaves, their educational and moral training. His slaves were trained to be managers, leasing his property and collecting rents. He financed Andrew Durnford’s purchase of one of his plantations down river from New Orleans. He developed a profit sharing plan for his slaves whereby they could buy their freedom, assisting 300 slaves in obtaining freedom. He founded the NO chapter of American Colonization Society to aid slaves in returning to Africa. Two decades before Civil War he helped 80 of his slaves start anew in Africa with tools, skills, clothes and money.

He strongly advocated public schools for the children of the city.  He bought the Allard Plantation at auction and willed it to the city providing land for City Park. When he died on Oct. 26^th, 1850 he had accumulated 610,000 acres of land; he bequeathed $3,000,000 to Baltimore and New Orleans to be used for education. After a legal battle and extensive legal fees, his estate was settled, providing an orphan society & Am. Colonization Soc $100,000 each. Baltimore started McDonogh Institute for boys in 1873. New Orleans used funds to build public schools naming many of them after McDonogh

McDonogh’s old  home on Homer Street in Algiers slipped into the river. His tomb is in the Old McDonoghville Cemetery, but is empty. He was reinterred in Greenmount Cemetery in Baltimore in 1860 by his own request to lie with his parents. McDonogh’s statue is in Lafayette Sq. on St. Charles Ave. across from Gallier Hall.

In all 35 schools were built with all or part McDonogh funds until those funds were used up in 2002.  The City Government raided the McDonogh endowment for $500,000 to promote the Confederacy at the beginning of the Civil War.  McDonogh #15 is a magnet school for the Arts in the public school system located in 700 block of St. Philip Street. It has about 300 students. The site was formerly the St. Philip Theatre, site of early plays, operas and quadroon balls.

John McDonogh: His Life and Work Wm T Childs, Baltimore:1939

Dictionary of Louisiana Biography NO:La Hist Assoc., 1988

Life and Work of John McDonogh  (Pamphlet) 1983 reprint. See THNOC Williams Library

Legacy of John McDonogh, G. Leighton Ciravolo, Lafayette LA:Univ of LA, 2002. p. 70.

See also, La Hist Quarterly Vol 26, page 143-150 for additional articles; Vol. 33, No 1 Jan 1950 “John McDonogh:Man of Many Facets La Hist Qtrly, vol 33, No 1; Jan 1950. (this article goes into his business deals, source of capital, & his slaves).

NO City Guide WPA, pp 361-362.  Beautiful Crescent, pp 98, 203. .” 

Arthur G. Nuhrah, “John McDonogh: Man of Many Facets” (La Historical Quarterly, Vol. 33, No. 1, Jan 1950,  pps. 5-144)

LINCOLN IN NEW ORLEANS: The 1828-1831 Flatboat Voyages and Their Place in History, Richard Campanella, University of Louisiana at Lafayette Press, 2010, 381 pps.  BOOK NOTES by Bill Norris    1/1/11

 Allen Gentry and Abraham Lincoln poled out of Rockport, Indiana into the Ohio River on Friday or Saturday, April 18 or 19 of 1828 for the purpose of delivering a cargo to the New Orleans market. The flatboat, made of course cut timbers, measured about 15′ by 40′ had a flat bottom and canopy or roof over whole or part for protection of the crew and cargo. These boats were navigated by long paddles on each side often called “broad horns.” Owned by Gentry’s father, it carried a cargo of “barrel pork” often used to feed slaves. They planned to drift in the currents by day and tie up at night to get a early start before daylight the next day. Spring was the prime floating time for flatboats with the snow melt and spring rains raising the river waters and increasing the current flow. Their boat moved at about 5.5 miles per hour.

Appreciating this book best begins by reading Appendix A – Western River Commerce in the Early 1800′s and Appendix B – New Orleans in the 1820′s and 1830′s where Campanella presents an overview of those two dimensions of the culture that affected life in New Orleans. With the settings described the reader can better understand the account of Lincoln’s entrepreneurial voyages of 1828 and 1831. I have taken the liberty of rearranging it here. BN

RIVER COMMERCE – Campanella describes the types of commercial boats on the River in that period, specifically the raft, flatboat, keelboat and the steamboat. The raft was the earliest and cheapest, made of logs cobbled together to float on the surface became more sophisticated by 1780′s as carpentry evolved. The flatboat that evolved could be up to 20′ wide by 40′ to 80′ long with raised sides and a roof over the deck, manhandled with long paddles as it drifted in the current. The keelboat, used for other purposes, could be 15′ wide by 40′ long in the shape of a canoe with a center board made of a large beam forming a keel in the center at the bottom of the hull. It, too, would have a cover over the deck. Carrying 30 tons originally, they grew to ten times that in later versions. The keelboat was favored for a return trip up river, being pushed, paddled, and pulled upriver against the current with an occasional wind being caught by a single sail to help. New Orleans to St. Louis could take three months. Flatboats outnumbered keel boats by twenty-to-one. During Lincoln’s voyages, over one-thousand flatboats registered in New Orleans.

Then came steam. As early as 1786 John Fitch propelled a large skiff with steam on the Delaware River. Robert Fulton brought design skills in both the U.S. and France to improve boats and engines. Teaming up with Robert Livingston they were joined by Nicholas Roosevelt as investor in building the New Orleans in Pittsburgh to serve in a monopoly for transportation in the Louisiana section of the Mississippi River. The maiden voyage to New Orleans in 1811 was legendary. The New Orleans served for three years before a snag pierced its hull and it sank. By then it had proven its technology. Keelboats died with the advent of steamboats, but flatboats continued in use until the 1880′s though reduced in numbers.

Loads often included pork, flour, whiskey, tobacco, bagging and bale rope. Tennesseans carried cotton. Foodstuffs included corn, apples, cider, dried fruit, lard, beef, venison and whiskey. Others transported steers, chickens, turkeys cows and horses. Some provided shops for extended stays in river towns with tinners, blacksmiths, toolmakers and dry-goods stores. Thieves and bandits preyed at night on boats tied up on the shore.

NEW ORLEANS IN 1820s–1830s – New Orleans was characterized by opportunity in the early 19^th Century. Etienne de Bore’ with his process for granulating sugar, Eli Whitney with his cotton gin and Fulton’s steamboat combined to create a mega trend for opportunity at the lower end of the Mississippi River. The 1803 Louisiana Purchase followed in 1812 by statehood created a fertile environment for prosperity. A fortune could be created rapidly with certainty in the river city. Banks swarmed to the city. The creole populous of French, Spanish, and Germans were split between Catholics, Protestants and Jews with Catholics predominating. The financial heyday demanded a continual flow of slaves with auction houses selling them for an average of $500 each from pens above Canal St. and below Esplanade Ave. The largest population of free people of color in America resided in the city, often wealthy and slave owners. In the 1830′s railroads arrived with the Ponchartrain Railroad pulled by horses out Elysian Fields from the river to the lake followed by the New Orleans to Carrollton line that still runs on St. Charles Ave. Faubergs, or suburbs, grew above and below the old, creole French Quarter. The city teeming with energy was a magnet to thousands wanting a part of the American dream.

LINCOLN’S 1828 VOYAGE – Allen Gentry’s father hired Abe Lincoln to assist his son in getting the flatboat to New Orleans. Their cargo is best believed to have been “barrel pork” a product widely used to feed slaves. At the spring flow rate they drifted at about 5.5 miles an hour, very likely tying up at night for rest and to avoid night time hazards. Neither man left a journal of the voyage. Describing the trip requires reasoning from sources, including Lincoln’s own comments in later years, and studying similar experiences. Their trip took them down the Ohio River to its confluence with the Mississippi, then down river past numerous historic river towns. Memphis, Walnut Hills (Vicksburg), Rodney, Natchez, Fort Adams, Bayou Sara (St. Francisville), Baton Rouge, Donaldsonville, and Convent. The sugar plantations above New Orleans would have provided sights and stops. Abe was in the heart of the southern slave society based on cotton and sugar cane. Often boatmen marketed their wares to the plantations as they passed. Many other flatboats were working their ways down the river at the same time. Some provided special services to the river men such as banking, food, entertainers, innkeepers, and prostitutes. Tying up a night, often with groups of other boats for security, afforded them occasions for interaction with other flatboat river men. On shore were a veritable industry of vice on the riverside of sandbars with taverns, dance halls, grog shops, boarding houses and brothels, catering to flatboat men. Continually, steamboats going up and down the river dodged the flatboats drifting with the current while both struggled to avoid sandbars and snags.

One memorable experience was a raid on their vessel while tied up at night. Seven Blacks, probably runaways seeking provisions, jumped aboard and attacked the two boatmen. Evidence suggests the area of Convent LA in St. James Parish as the location of the battle. Gentry and Lincoln fought with the stick bearing men, Gentry calling to Lincoln to get the guns and shoot. With that the men fled, indicating they understood English, being American slaves imported from the east coast, rather than Creole French speaking natives slaves of south Louisiana. There were no guns aboard. Both men were injured in the struggle. They weighed anchor and floated downriver for safety.

After a 1276 mile journey from Rockport, Indiana Gentry and Lincoln arrived in the bustling port of New Orleans. Steamboats, flatboats and sailing vessels jammed the port on the east bank. The dates were likely May 14th or 17th for their arrival. They paid their $6 landing fee to the city. Vessels crowded the piers, levees and wharfs from the lower Garden District, passed the French Quarter to the Bywater downriver. Sailing vessels tied up from the French Quarter to the Bywater. Steamboat docked in a section above and below Canal Street. The flatboats moored in the Warehouse District. The first task was to market their goods. Many shipments arrived as consignments to certain brokers, traders and factors. Once unloaded the flatboats had about 48 hours to disassemble and sell the boards to builders, lumber yards, and the city. Demand for lumber was strong. Boards were often used to deck the waterfront over the mud. The shifting river added land to the east bank batture by means of alluvial deposition, extending hundreds of yards from the original levee. Where the boats tied up in 1828 is now located under Convention Blvd and Tchoupitoulas Street. One riverboat hull was found buried at a constructionsite on land.

When the produce was sold and the boat disassembled it was time for vituals, drink, entertainment and shelter. The scene was one of chaos in the streets with boatmen, steamboat crews, sailors, immigrants, slaves, free-people-of-color, French, Spanish, German, and the Irish overwhelming the city, plus hoards of Americans flocking to the waiting pots of gold. Inns, bars, taverns, coffee houses, oyster houses, cafe’s and restaurants invited passerby to join the fun, food and beverages. They may have visited the Chalmette battlefield, celebrating its 13th anniversary in 1828. Years later Lincoln sponsored a bill in the Illinois legislature to honor Andrew Jackson and the American victory at New Orleans over the British.

Slavery was everywhere in this city, the largest slave market in America. Brought there by steamboats, flatboats and coffles, walking overland from the east coast. The slaves were sold by advertisements, direct sales and auction house. The grim scenes of slavery were everywhere. Auctions placed families up to be sold individually to distant parts of the South as the victims wept. Northern observers could not believe the hardness of those handling the auctions. Slaves were lined up to be examined by prospective buyers for condition of teeth, feet, hands, limbs and joints. A slave with whelps from beatings or scars from branding was a warning of a trouble maker. Later, in 1841 Lincoln commented on his past observations of slavery, indicating his appalling awareness of the inhumanity of slavery, and to his amazement, the slaves resolve to tolerate the system with music, dancing, joking, and card playing. He said of slaves he had seen in chains, “The site was a continual torment to me.”

The return trip to Rockport by steamboat must have intrigued Lincoln, especially while making a swift trip upriver, to see all the flatboat men struggling in the current to get to New Orleans. If they left June 8th, they would have reached Natchez by June 11 and Vicksburg the next day. They would have made the 1276 mile return trip to Rockport by June 21, a thirteen day to two week trip, compared to their four week trip downstream. On return Lincoln’s earning were probably given to his father for family expenses and the lanky river man returned to work on the family farm much more knowledgeable of the world about him.

His family was induced to sell their farm in Indiana and move 200 miles to a site on the Sangamon River in Ohio, ten miles west of Decatur. There the Lincolns constructed a log cabin and began a new life. Shortly after, a political candidate came to town, making a bad speech, so a friend turned a box on its side, ushering Abe up to make a better speech re navigating the Sangamon River. Some credit this as his first political speech, nevertheless it was his first public audience for a speech on public issues.

LINCOLN’S 1831 VOYAGE -

On March 1, 1831 Lincoln and John Hanks set off to meet Denton Offutt in Springfield to take Denton’s flatboat with loaded cargo down river to New Orleans. When they got there Denton was having drinks at his favorite watering hole. No preparations had been made, neither boat construction nor cargo. They met John D. Johnston, the third crew member. Offutt offered to pay them fair wages to build a flatboat, felling trees, sizing logs, floatings them down river to a water powered saw mill for cutting into lumber, sawing lumber, designing and building the vessel. Measuring 18′ by 50′, it was considerably larger than the 1828 vessel. On April 19 the crew with Offutt poled out into the Sangamon River loaded with Offutt’s sacks of corn, sides of bacon, barrels of pork and some live hogs. More hogs were picked up downstream. The boat became stuck while passing by a mill dam threatening the venture. Abe came up with the solution, using another boat to unload the cargo which lightened the vessel, allowing the men to push it loose. Then it was reloaded. The voyage was saved from disaster.

The boat cruised in the slower current at about 4.75 mph or 66.5 miles per day. They entered the more turbulent Missouri River. At St. Louis, John Hanks returned to his home. Capt. Henry Shreve’s engineering work was succeeding in removing snags and sawyers, making the trip faster and safer. On this trip there is no indication that they stopped for sales to plantations, rather they delivered the cargo directly to New Orleans. They arrived May 12, 1831 after 1627 miles from New Salem. There were about 400 vessels in the harbor…tall ships, steamboats, flatboats, schooners, sloops and brigs. They completed the sales, unloading and disassembling in three weeks. Then they were free to see the city.

They were immersed in a sea of slavery seen from the pier to the streets to the auction houses. Hewett’s Exchange on the downriver lakeside of the intersection of Chartres and St. Louis streets sold seven per day, six days a week. Slave pens and brokers sold others. The abhorrence he felt regarding slavery never left him.

Coinciding with their visit the Ponchartrain R.R. had completed tracks (now Elysian Fields Blvd.) and held an Inaugural horse-drawn excursion from the French Quarter to Lake Ponchartrain. There lots were for sale in a new subdivision, named Milneburg for its founder, Alexander Milne. Lincoln very likely took in this new mode of transportation as well as a display of a steam train engine that showed off its potential for future steam powered transportation. Lincoln would later become a railroad attorney. Lincoln, Offutt and Johnston returned to New Salem by late June. Lincoln continued captaining flatboats to St. Louis in 1834-1835.

In Campanella’s lengthy conclusion the essence of his perspective is – Geographically, environmentally, culturally, racially, religiously, linguistically and economically, Lincoln’s trip to New Orleans informed and expanded his world view. p. 233

BOOK NOTES by Bill Norris

1/1/11 

    The Le Moyne brothers were two of twelve sons and two daughters born to Charles and Catherine Le Moyne in Canada. The father who distinguished himself in the service of France was an early settler in Montreal, gaining great wealth and a noble title. The sons grew up in a world of French and Native American languages and government services. The older son, Iberville, established himself in military service, exploration and founding of Louisiana. Twelve years younger, Bienville, joined Iberville in his adventure to Louisiana in 1699, becoming elevated to commandant and governor by the age of 22 with his older brother’s untimely death. Jean-Baptiste Le Moyne was baptised as an infant in 1680. The title of de Bienville came to him ten years later from a brother who was killed in a skirmish with Iroquois.

    Bienville became a Navy cadet at age twelve. At age sixteen he joined Iverville in his campaign to expell the British from the eastern coast of Newfoundland. The 1696 venture was successful, at least in the destruction and looting of fishing villages along the coast. Iberville was ordered with five ships to recover Port Nelson from the British in Hudson Bay. Bienville joined him in the lead ship, participating in a pitched battle with British ships, The French patriots won the day, Bienville receiving a wound that troubled him for the rest of his life. Ibervile then sailed to France taking his younger brother. It was the last time they ever saw Canada. While in France the Minister of Marine, Jerome Phelypeaux de Maurepas , compe de Ponchartrain, commissioned Iberville to establish a French presence in the lower Mississippi valley where Robert Rene Cavalier de la Salle had claimed the territory for France in 1682. The brothers set out on their venture in 1699.

    Their arrival and exploration of the Gulf Coast is best described in a separate publication entitled Iberville’s Journals. After arriving near Biloxi Bay they set out with Biloxi Indians in two small coastal boats with twenty men each. They succeeded in finding the north pass of the Mississippi River, beginning their exploration of Louisiana. On return to the coast they built Fort Maurepas near present day Ocean Springs MS on the eastern end of Biloxi Bay. Iberville set out to return to France, while Bienville, second in command, explored the surrounding country, lakes and native tribes. He faced down the English Captain Bond on their meeting in the Mississippi River. From a canoe he ordered Bond to exit the French territory With a parting shot and vow to return, he departed at English Turn.

    Bienville set out in 1700 accompanied by Juchereau de St. Denis, twenty Canadians, six Tensas guides and one Wichita, to the region of present day north Louisiana. They waded through swamps, fed on wild life and negotiated with Indians for food. On one occasion they learned that the Spanish had been in the area on horses to buy corn. Bienville queried them about Spanish mines. To illustrate he took out gold coins. The Indians said the only time they had seen such was when the Spanish used them with playing cards which they swore and tore up the cards when they lost!

    An establishment named Fort Mississippi was build on a bit of stable ground some thirty miles below present day New Orleans. The effort was a failure as food was used up, fresh water unavailable, and the men became sick. Iberville ordered the building of a harbor on the east end of Dauphine Island and a fort on high ground  on the Mobile river. He negotiated with  Chickasaw chiefs a treaty promising to establish a trading post in their country  if they would be at peace. He sent a young man, Petit Michel, to live with them and learn the language of the nation as a sign of his confidence.

    BIENVILLE’S FIRST ADMINSTRATION (1702-1713) OF LOUISIANA BEGINS -Appointing Bienville in command until his return, Iberville set sail for France, not knowing he would never see Louisiana again. While in France the French and Spanish faced a coalition of European countries. Iberville was sent with twelve ships to harass enemy ships in the West Indies. Before the conflict ended he contracted yellow fever and died in Havana. Bienville in 1703 at age twenty-two took command.

    Because of war France was desperate for money, ships and supplies. Few vessels arrived in Louisiana with supplies for the colony such as guns, amunition, tools, wine, food, clothes, uniforms, trade goods for the Indians and the other items necessary for a French Colonial life in Louisiana. By means of his skills with the natives he kept peace and maintained resources for survival in the colony. Carolinians, composed of Englishmen and Native Americans from the British colony, came into Choctaw country to capture Indian slaves. Seeking them out Bienville made a costly raid into the eastern Indian lands, to little avail. The Choctaws reported that the Chickasaws had killed Petit Michel. The Chickasaws denied it. Bienville sent runners to bring back the young man. When they didn’t arrive in the anticipated time, he killed five Chickasaw hostages. Later, Petit Michel arrived in Mobile.

    One resource in short supply was women for the French men. In the native culture young women were allowed to bestow their favors on men of their choosing. These laisons with native women were denounced by the priests. Finally Ponchatrain sent 20 women who shortly after arriving found themselves mates. Father La Vente was sent out in 1704 to Bienville’s dismay. He preferred Jesuits. A personal vendetta began between the governor and the priest  with letters streaming back to France denouncing each other. Ponchartrain appointed De Muy former commander of forces in Quebec as Governor of Louisiana with orders to investigate charges against  Bienville and if found guilty to send him to France. As things went, De Muy died in transit to Louisiana and Bienville was exhoniratred by witnesses in a French investigation. Father La Vente set sail from Louisiana. Bienville remain in control with the threat of 600 Carolinians amassing for an attack on Pensacola. But at this time there were only 24 families in the colony with only four dedicated to farming. Few Frenchmen desired to leave France for the wilds of the Louisiana colony. Slavery was considered and discussed with the idea of trading two Indian slaves for one Black in the West Indies. Bienville firmly put an end to those discussions.

    Things got so bad in the summer of 1710 that Bienville asked Indian chiefs to quarter 35 soldiers, leaving him with only 30 for protection. In the hardship he moved Fort Louis from its site up the Alabama River to the site of Mobile AL. Antoine de La Mothe Cadillac, commandant of Detroit was appointed Governor of Louisiana. He dilly dallied before departure, then when he sailed he headed for France. The king entered into a fifteen year contract with Antoine Crozat to have rights to the gold, silver, pearls and minerals of LA in order to develop the colony. Cadillac in France helped convince Crozat of the potential of the new El Dorado with its phantom riches!

    The era of Cadillac was one of feuds between Bienville and the new Govenor. They complained simultaneously to Ponchatrain. In the effort to produce wealth Cadillac deprived the colonists of supplies, forced them to trade at the company stores, and sent ships fruitlessly to trade at Spanish ports. Colonists became adept at smuggling their produce to Pensacola for better prices and cash. Inspite of the Cadillac’s harassment, Bienville maintained influence with the Choctaws, Chickasaws and other smaller tribes. He succeeded in keeping them smoking the peace pipes. Carolinians made other pushes to establish trading posts to the Mississippi River and beyond, but Bienville’s charismatic influence with Indians sent them back to the east coast with no Mississippi trading posts. The natives preferred their French friends over the English interlopers. Bienville’s negotiating skills turned potential disasters into positive alliances repeatedly. When the Natchez threatened to go on the war path, Bienville’s skills gained the agreement to build a fort in the heart of the Natchez country. Named Fort Rosalie for Ponchartrain’s wife, the French held a strategic advantage.

    BIENVILLE’S SECOND ADMINISTRATION (1718-1723) BEGINS – Crozat folded his cards and turned in his contract in 1717 before it depleted his wealth. The Regent, duc d’Orleans, holding the crown until Louis XV could accede to the throne, gave financier John Law the Louisiana contract.  Law was a entrepreneur, financial wizard, dreamer and promoter. Surely, now the riches of Louisiana could be accessed. Cadillac was removed with Bienville being named Comandant General. With it came a good salary, plus the prestigeous Cross of St. Louis. His labors had finally been recognized and honored

    In 1717 the decision was made by the Company of the West to build a site for the capital of the colony on the Mississippi. Much controversy followed, but in May of 1718 Bienville selected the site in a fine crescent on the east bank and started a crew cutting trees and building cabins. Even then the controversy continued. One proposal favored the Natchez area, another near Bayou Manchac, and another on the shores of Lake Ponchartrain. But Nouvelle Orleans survived the controversy. Bienville himself laid out a few streets parallel with the river. Plans were discussed for a canal to Bayou St.. John. Four houses were reported underway in 1719. Consessions of lands in the vicinity and lots in the town were made, including to Bienville himself. The French and Spanish parried with each other over Pensacola, Natchitoches and east Texas to Matagora Bay to little or no consequence. Adventurers were sent up the Red River and Missouri River to treaty with tribes and explore the regions.

    The woes of Bienville were unending. By 1722 John Laws bubble burst, the financial markets in France collapsed with the Company of the West being taken over and merged with other French world ventures, renamed the Company of the Indies. That meant new appointees, organization and issues.  Bienville retained the title of Comandant General. But other appointees with no clue to managing LA were sent with orders to get the business of the colony straightened out and deal harshly with any persons that had taken advantage of the system. Bienville survived the investergation and criticisms.   

    The slack immigrant delivery system reached a new low with thugs, call bandoliers, given authority to seize slouches, vagabonds, debtors, prisoners, prostitutes and near-do-wells for export on a one way trip to Louisiana. Their net caught innocent bystanders. Louisiana became a penal colony with returns to France prohibited. Only about 1300 of the scrabble of society arrived, many having excaped into the woods.With runaways, returners to France, and deaths, the population was about 3500. The sand bars at the mouth of the river blocked ships from entering. Bienville arranged for an engineer named Perrier to come from France to oversee dredging a channel. He died in transit and nothing came of the dredging.

    Food resources were scarce with shortages due to the inept population, unable to produce  vegetables, meats, game or fish.  Flour was rare, forcing the people to eat corn bread and rice bread while hungering for French bread! The slaves that had suffered the fetid slaveships starved on land. They were at the bottom of the food chain. Prices on everything rose. Scarcity abounded. Few churches with priest existed. The degraded moral climate resulted in many neer-do-wells, libertines, rogues and quacks preying off the population. With the shortages of supplies, the Choctaws and Chickasaws threatened to go over to the English Carolinians. The Natchez tribe remained restless resulting in Indian  raids and French retaliations On top of all the woes came the 1722 September hurricane that raked the village and flooded the capital.

    Bienville remained steadfast in developing the colony and negotiating with the Native Americans for trade, peace and the very existence of  French Colonial Louisiana. He received two grants of land on each side of the river at Nouvelle Orleans, from the French Quarter to Carrollton Ave. and in Algiers. Germans continued arriving, producing foodstuffs for the colony.Engineer de Pauger sounded the river passes and found a deeper channel, opening the new capital of the colony to shipping.

    BEINVILLE RETURNS TO FRANCE – In 1724 Bienville was recalled to France in disgrace. On arrival the duc d’Orleans, Regent, had died. His bureaucratic appointees had been dismissed and a new political scene was awaiting the commandant. Bienville was castigated for his mismanagement of Louisiana. In 1726 Perrier was appointed acting governor. Bienville received a handsome stipend that provided comfortable living. For seven years he awaited some type of appointment in French foreign service. He was considered for a position in Montreal.

    When Perier took over governorship of Louisiana he instituted reforms in accounting, records, drinking, debauchery, loose women and the general demeanor of the Colony. But he lacked understanding of the natives. His policies and appointees drove the Choctaws into trading with the English Carolinians. His appointee for the Natchez district, Captain Detcheparre, understood less about the natives. At the Corn Feast in November of 1729 tensions between the French and Natchez reach a pitch. The commandant of Fort Rosalie had offended the Natchez by demanding they move from their Apple Village, lest he destroy it. The natives had had enough. They resolved to strike back. At the feast they infiltrated Fort Rosalie as preparing to go on a hunt. They asked to borrow guns for the hunt. At a given signal they turned the guns on the French and attacked. In short order 200 colonists lay dead  and  the rest of the men, women and children, plus 150 slaves were captives. Then the plunder began, razing the fort and capturing a recently arrived ship loaded with foodstuffs. Then the Natches took the war to the Yazoo area some 75 miles up river with the French there suffering the same fate. All out war was declared. Perier organized a counterattack that suffered from the incompetence of the French leadership. Finally, the war ended with the Natchez being scattered in roaming bands, some joining Chickasaws and others captured and sold into slavery in Cuba. The Company of the Indies ceded Louisiana back to the king of France.

    HIS THIRD ADMINISTRATION (1732-1743) BEGINS – After nursing his wounded pride for years, the new King, Louis XV, summoned Bienville from forced retirement as the man with the best qualifications to manage the situation in Louisiana. In 1732 he was appointed Governor. On his return he was received with “unparalleled expressions of joy.” He was shocked by loss of colonists due to the  Natchez War and the departure in large numbers of others that had been in the employ of the Company. He first began to repair relationships with the Choctaws, succeeding in launching a large Choctaw army with only 30 French soldiers in an attack on the Chickasaws. Having to manage the Colony, he began to repair tattered buildings in Nouvelle Orleans, adding new barracks and a magazine. Jean Louis, a boat builder, died leaving his estate for a new chairty hospital that was constructed.

    The condition of French Indian relations was appalling with the Chickasaws firmly in the hands of the English, Alabamans and Illinois wavering and some of the Choctaws having gone over to the English. Bienville’s solution was an attack on the Chickasaws. Thus, began the First Chickasaw War with French attacks on colonaded forts. The natives routed the French forces with blame being placed on Bienville’s bungling and irresolution. For the Second War Bienville requested cannons and mortars,  400 seasoned troops and 250 recruits. In 1738 Maurepas shipped men and weapons to Louisiana with scattered arrivals, forcing Bienville to wait out the summer resulting in a winter attach, the worst for moving troops and munitions. Finally, with an army of 1200 plus twice that number of Choctaws the march to Chickasaw country began. Before an attack could be mounted, the Chickasaws sued for peace. A mediocre peace was cobbled together, ending the Second War with a vague promise of peace from the Chickasaws. At least the French could breath easier.

    RETIREMENT TO FRANCE – In 1740 Bienville wrote Maurepas, requesting his retirement and return to France. In 1743 the Marquis de Vaudrieul, former governor in Canada, arrived to  relieve Bienville. In 1767 Bienville died in France after a comfortable retirement in Paris accomodated by the assets he had accumulated in Louisiana. He had tried to facilitate meetings for Louisiana’s representatives who went to Paris to avert the transfer of the colony to Spain in 1763, to no avail.

    On looking back over his life’s work in the colony, his major asset was his skill in Indian diplomacy. He accomplished much to keep peace, through his strong friendship with the Choctaws. New Orleans was never attacked by Native Americans. His work was not without blemishes due to his failed wars and continual antagonism of his peers who heaped criticisms on him with the government administrators in France.

    One of the books weaknesses is the lack of treatment of Bienville’s role and involvement in slavery. The author never mentioned Jorge and Marie, slaves Bienville brought from Havana in 1708, nor his freeing of two slaves, presumably Jorge and Marie, on his departure to France. During his second tenure some 3,000 slaves arrived in the colony. What was Bienville’s involvement?   WCN

Based on the Letters of Marie-Madeleine Hachard

Bill Norris

12/12/10

Marie-Madeleine Hachard, a young nun in the order of the Ursulines, set out from Paris to French Colonial Louisiana in 1727. This group of young women were the “Peace Corps” of their day, undertaking to provide education for French, Native American, and African young women in the colony. With New Orleans as their objective, she wrote letters to her father in Rouen, France describing her experiences. Unbeknown to her, he published them. In 1728, well ensconced in the growing colony, she wrote about the foods. This is the first known documentation of the cuisine of New Orleans.

The nuns had their own vegetable garden though she did not reveal what was in the garden. Watermelons and French melons were options in the summer. Sweet potatoes, harvested in the Fall, were cooked on coals like chestnuts. They were noted as very sweet. She described their most common food as rice with milk. They had small wild beans. She stated that because their day school services were free to the young women they taught, the people and plantations smothered them with gifts.

Animals donated for their barn yard included two cows with their calves, a sow with little ones, some chickens, turkeys, geese and Muscovey ducks. “During Lent we eat meat four days a week as allowed by the Church” and at all other times they fast only on Fridays. In the summer animals were slaughtered only twice a week and were not easily preserved. Winter hunting produced wild oxen, presumably buffalo, and deer. Wild ducks were very cheap. Teals, water-hens, geese and other fowl were common, but not purchased because the nuns did not want to indulge in delicacies. Fish were plentyful and delicious. Oysters and fish were regular dishes. She noted that there were plenty of other meats and vegetables available, but she rendered no opinion because she had not tasted them.

Fruits were popular and available.The oranges of Louisiana were sweet and delicious. Preserves and jellies were made of figs, peaches and blackberries. Sour oranges were preserved.

For drinks at the convent she said, “We drink beer.”  On her voyage to the city when the ship ran aground, she recorded that the ship floated again only after the captain dumped sixty-one barrels of French brandy overboard that were bound for New Orleans!

A list of foods -

            Watermelons, French melons

            Rice, wild beans, plus a garden

            Meats – beef, buffalo, pork

            Chicken & turkey

            Water fowl, ducks, geese

            Fish, oysters

            Fruits – oranges, figs, blackberries, peaches

            Preserves and jellies

            Milk, butter, cottage cheese

            Beer & brandy

She did not mention corn or pumpkins, which were ubiquitous foods of the Native Americans and well known to the immigrants.

Shannon Lee Dawdy in Building the Devil’s Empire says, “New Orleans served as the central agriculture market where local farmers sold or bartered rice, greens, figs, sweet potatoes, eggs and hams in exchange of sugar, coffee, wine, clothing and furnishings.” p. 104  Wheat would not grow in Louisiana, so rice and hence rice bread were substituted. 

From these clues it would be fun to create “heritage plates” from yesteryear, menus and dishes from the French Colonial period of Louisiana.