1782.
The date of this letter--I hold it in one hand as I write, and for the
first time noticed that it has never in its hundred years been sealed or
folded, but only doubled once, lightly, and rolled in the hand, just as
the young Spanish officer might have carried it when he rode so hard to
bear it to its destination--its date is the last year but one of our
American Revolution. France, Spain, and the thirteen colonies were at war
with Great Britain, and the Indians were on both sides.
Galvez, the heroic young governor of Louisiana, had just been decorated by
his king and made a count for taking the forts at Manchac, Baton Rouge,
Natchez, and Mobile, and besieging and capturing the stronghold of
Pensacola, thus winning all west Florida, from the Mississippi to the
Appalachicola, for Spain. But this vast wilderness was not made safe; Fort
Panmure (Natchez) changed hands twice, and the land was full of Indians,
partly hireling friends and partly enemies. The waters about the Bahamas
and the Greater and Lesser Antilles were fields for the movements of
hostile fleets, corsairs, and privateers. Yet the writer of this letter
was tempted to run the gauntlet of these perils, expecting, if all went
well, to arrive in Louisiana in midsummer.
"How many times," says the memorandum of her brother's now aged
great-granddaughter,--"How many times during my childhood has been told me
the story of my aunt Louise. It was not until several years after the
death of my grandmother that, on examining the contents of the basket
which she had given me, I found at the bottom of a little black-silk bag
the letter written by my grand-aunt to her brother, my own ancestor.
Frankly, I doubt that my grandmother had intended to give it to me, so
highly did she prize it, though it was very difficult to read. The
orthography is perfect; the difficulty is all owing to the paper and,
moreover, to the situation of the poor wounded sufferer." It is in French:
_To my brother mister Pierre Bossier. In the parish[3] of St. James._
Fort Latourette, The 5 August, 1782.
My Good Dear Brother: Ah! how shall I tell you the frightful position in
which I am placed! I would that I were dead! I seem to be the prey of a
horrible nightmare! O Pierre! my brother! hasten with all speed to me.
When you left Germany, your little sister was a blooming girl, very
beautiful in your eyes, very happy! and to-day! ah! to-day, my brother,
come see for yourself.
After having received your letter, not only my husband and I decided to
leave our village and go to join you, but twelve of our friends united
with us, and on the 10 May, 1782, we quitted Strasbourg on the little
vessel North Star [Étoile du Nord],[4] which set sail for New Orleans,
where you had promised to come to meet us. Let me tell you the names of my
fellow-travelers. O brother! what courage I need to write this account:
first my husband, Leonard Cheval, and my son Pierre, poor little angel who
was not yet two years old! Fritz Newman, his wife Nina, and their three
children; Irwin Vizey; William Hugo, his wife, and their little daughter;
Jacques Lewis, his daughter, and their son Henry. We were full of hope: We
hoped to find fortune in this new country of which you spoke with so much
enthusiasm. How in that moment did I bless my parents and you my brother,
for the education you had procured me. You know how good a musician my
Leonard was, and our intention was on arriving to open a boarding-school
in New Orleans; in your last letter you encouraged the project--all of us,
movables with us, all our savings, everything we owned in this world.
This paper is very bad, brother, but the captain of the fort says it is
all he has; and I write lying down, I am so uncomfortable.
The earlier days of the voyage passed without accident, without
disturbance, but often Leonard spoke to me of his fears. The vessel was
old, small, and very poorly supplied. The captain was a drunkard [here the
writer attempted to turn the sheet and write on the back of it], who often
incapacitated himself with his first officers [word badly blotted]; and
then the management of the vessel fell to the mate, who was densely
ignorant. Moreover, we knew that the seas were infested with pirates. I
must stop, the paper is too bad.
The captain has brought me another sheet.
Our uneasiness was great. Often we emigrants assembled on deck and told
each other our anxieties. Living on the frontier of France, we spoke
German and French equally well; and when the sailors heard us, they, who
spoke only English, swore at us, accused us of plotting against them, and
called us Saurkrouts. At such times I pressed my child to my heart and
drew nearer to Leonard, more dead than alive. A whole month passed in this
constant anguish. At its close, fevers broke out among us, and we
discovered, to our horror, there was not a drop of medicine on board. We
had them lightly, some of us, but only a few; and [bad blot] Newman's son
and William Hugo's little daughter died, ... and the poor mother soon
followed her child. My God! but it was sad. And the provisions ran low,
and the captain refused to turn back to get more.
One evening, when the captain, his lieutenant, and two other officers
were shut in their cabin drinking, the mate, of whom I had always such
fear, presented himself before us surrounded by six sailors armed, like
himself, to the teeth, and ordered us to surrender all the money we had.
To resist would have been madness; we had to yield. They searched our
trunks and took away all that we possessed: they left us nothing,
absolutely nothing. Ah! why am I not dead? Profiting by the absence of
their chiefs they seized the [or some--the word is blotted] boats and
abandoned us to our fate. When, the next day, the captain appeared on deck
quite sober, and saw the cruelty of our plight, he told us, to console us,
that we were very near the mouth of the Mississippi, and that within two
days we should be at New Orleans. Alas! all that day passed without seeing
any land[5], but towards evening the vessel, after incredible efforts, had
just come to a stop--at what I supposed should be the mouth of the river.
We were so happy to have arrived that we begged Captain Andrieux to sail
all night. He replied that our men, who had worked all day in place of the
sailors, were tired and did not understand at all sufficiently the
handling of a vessel to sail by night. He wanted to get drunk again. As in
fact our men were worn out, we went, all of us, to bed. O great God! give
me strength to go on. All at once we were awakened by horrible cries, not
human sounds: we thought ourselves surrounded by ferocious beasts. We poor
women clasped our children to our breasts, while our husbands armed
themselves with whatever came to hand and dashed forward to meet the
danger. My God! my God! we saw ourselves hemmed in by a multitude of
savages yelling and lifting over us their horrible arms, grasping
hatchets, knives, and tomahawks. The first to fall was my husband, my dear
Leonard; all, except Irwin Vizey, who had the fortune to jump into the
water unseen, all were massacred by the monsters. One Indian tore my child
from me while another fastened my arms behind my back. In response to my
cries, to my prayers, the monster who held my son took him by one foot
and, swinging him several times around, shattered his head against the
wall. And I live to write these horrors!... I fainted, without doubt, for
on opening my eyes I found I was on land [blot], firmly fastened to a
stake. Nina Newman and Kate Lewis were fastened as I was: the latter was
covered with blood and appeared to be dangerously wounded. About daylight
three Indians came looking for them and took them God knows where! Alas! I
have never since heard of either of them or their children.
I remained fastened to the stake in a state of delirium, which saved me
doubtless from the horrors of my situation. I recall one thing: that is,
having seen those savages eat human flesh, the members of a child--at
least it seemed so. Ah! you see plainly I must have been mad to have seen
all that without dying! They had stripped me of my clothing and I remained
exposed, half naked, to a July sun and to clouds of mosquitoes. An Indian
who spoke French informed me that, as I was young and fat, they were
reserving me for the dinner of the chief, who was to arrive next day. In a
moment I was dead with terror; in that instant I lost all feeling. I had
become indifferent to all. I saw nothing, I heard nothing. Towards evening
one of the sub-chiefs approached and gave me some water in a gourd. I
drank without knowing what I did; thereupon he set himself to examine me
as the butcher examines the lamb that he is about to kill; he seemed to
find me worthy to be served on the table of the head-chief, but as he was
hungry and did not wish to wait [blot], he drew from its sheath the knife
that he carried at his belt and before I had had time to guess what he
intended to do [Enough to say, in place of literal translation, that the
savage, from the outside of her right thigh, flayed off a large piece of
her flesh.] It must be supposed that I again lost consciousness. When I
came to myself, I was lying some paces away from the stake of torture on a
heap of cloaks, and a soldier was kneeling beside me, while I was
surrounded by about a hundred others. The ground was strewed with dead
Indians. I learned later that Vizey had reached the woods and by chance
had stumbled into Fort Latourette, full of troops. Without loss of time,
the brave soldiers set out, and arrived just in time to save me. A
physician dressed my wound, they put me into an ambulance and brought me
away to Fort Latourette, where I still am. A fierce fever took possession
of me. My generous protectors did not know to whom to write; they watched
over me and showed every care imaginable.
Now that I am better, I write you, my brother, and close with these
words: I await you! make all haste! Your sister, Louisa Cheval.
[Illustration]
"My grandmother," resumes the memorandum of the Creole great-grandniece,
"had often read this letter, and had recounted to me the incidents that
followed its reception. She was then but three years old, but as her aunt
lived three years in her (_i.e._, the aunt's) brother's family, my
grandmother had known her, and described her to me as a young woman with
white hair and walking with a staff. It was with difficulty that she used
her right leg. My great-grandfather used to tell his children that his
sister Louise had been blooming and gay, and spoke especially of her
beautiful blonde hair. A few hours had sufficed to change it to snow, and
on the once charming countenance of the poor invalid to stamp an
expression of grief and despair.
"It was Lieutenant Rosello, a young Spaniard, who came on horseback from
Fort Latourette to carry to my great-grandfather his sister's letter....
Not to lose a moment, he [the brother] began, like Lieutenant Rosello,
the journey on horseback, procuring a large ambulance as he passed through
New Orleans.... He did all he could to lighten the despair of his poor
sister.... All the members of the family lavished upon her every possible
care and attention; but alas! the blow she had received was too terrible.
She lingered three years, and at the end of that time passed peaceably
away in the arms of her brother, the last words on her lips being
'Leonard!--my child!'"
So we make way for the bright and happy story of how Françoise made
Evangeline's journey through the dark wilds of Atchafalaya.
FOOTNOTES:
[3] County.
[4] If this was an English ship,--for her crew was English and her
master's name seems to have been Andrews,--she was probably not under
British colors.--TRANSLATOR.
[5] The treeless marshes of the Delta would be very slow coming into
view.--TRANSLATOR.