The area now identified as Ouachita Parish had been occupied by
aborigines since pre-historic times. Early European explorers included
DeSoto (1542), La Salle (1682), and Bienville (1703). But it remained
for Don Juan Filhoil with a commission from the Spanish governor to
establish the first permanent settlement on the banks of the Ouachita.
When Filhoil arrived in 1783, he named the site for the outpost Prairie
des Canots for the Indian and trapper canoes gathered there. The
military post was later named Ft. Miro in honor of the Spanish governor
of Louisiana.
A colonization scheme formulated by the Spanish government enticed the
Marquis de Maison Rouge to establish a settlement further north near the
conflux of the Ouachita River and Bayou Bartholomew, the site of the
present town of Sterlington. But this settlement lost its position as a
rival for the seat of parish government after Filhoil laid out a plot in
1811 for a town on his plantation adjacent to Ft. Miro.
An exciting event occurred at the townsite in May, 1819, one which was
to have a two-fold effect on the 400 inhabitants of Ft. Miro. The event
was the docking of the _James Monroe_, the first steamboat to ply the
Ouachita to this northerly point.
The ensuing excitement effected a village name change to “Monroe.” And
for nearly a century the Ouachita River and steam powered boats combined
to form a great highway of commerce and transportation for the region.
Overland transportation systems developed throughout the territory
during the 1800’s. The earlier Indian trails often became bridle paths.
In 1839 a road was cut through from Monroe to Vicksburg, but it was
passable only in dry weather. Stage coach service was initiated in 1849.
During this era a road was established westward through the hills beyond
the river; another went northward toward Arkansas. These westerly roads
later became wagon roads bringing caravans of wagons from Jackson and
Claiborne Parishes to river trade centers such as the former town of
Trenton, two miles north of the present town of West Monroe. But it
would be the advent of the Vicksburg to Shreveport railroad in the
1880’s which would provide the communication link between the east and
west portions of the Ouachita Parish. In 1853 the state legislature
granted the first charter for the construction of the Vicksburg, Texas,
and the Pacific Railroad through North Louisiana. The first passenger
service from Vicksburg to Monroe was in 1860. The tracks were destroyed
by Union forces in the Civil War but were reconstructed and replaced in
service by 1870. In 1882 the railroad bridge spanning the Ouachita was
opened. It contained wood planking for vehicular and pedestrian
circulation. Rail passenger service from Monroe to Shreveport commenced
on July 10, 1884.
Ironically, the installation of the railroad service initiated the
demise of two regional institutions, the town of Trenton on the west
side of the river and the steamboat industry. Trenton, which had been
platted into town lots in 1851, declined with the location of the
railroad two miles south. Cottonport, a tiny community at the bridgehead
on the west side of the Ouachita, changed its name to West Monroe and
eventually developed into an important business and industrial
community.
Steamboat traffic on the Ouachita, which had begun in 1819, yielded to
the speed and flexibility of railroad service. The glamorous
steamboating era of nearly a century of luxurious but sometimes tragic
travel came to an end in the 1910’s.