SECOND HUGUENOT SETTLEMENT UNDER LAUDONNÈRE.
Coligni and the Protestants had not forgotten the forsaken colony, nor
relinquished their intention of providing a refuge in America.
After two years Coligni succeeded in obtaining authority to send three
ships to the succor of the colony in Florida. A company equal to the
capacity of the ships quickly volunteered for the enterprise, of whom a
large number belonged to families of good blood.
Having been well equipped with arms, provisions, tools, and seeds for
agriculture, the fleet sailed under the command of Captain Renè
Laudonnère, who had accompanied Ribault on the former expedition.
It is greatly to be regretted that the astute Coligni had not assumed in
person the command of this expedition intended to establish in America a
New France, forty-three years before the first settlement of the English
at Jamestown, and sixty-six years before the Puritans on the _Mayflower_
landed at Plymouth. His counsels would doubtless have preserved the weak
colony who were so cruelly exterminated, and he himself would have
escaped his untimely end. Coligni was one of the first victims of the
horrid massacre of Paris on the eve of St. Bartholomew’s Day, in 1572,
being assassinated by one of the servants of the Duke of Guise.
Laudonnère came upon the coast at St. Augustine, but, stopping only for
a reconnoisance, he sailed to the site of the former colony and Fort
Charles, with the hope of relieving his countrymen. Finding the fort
deserted, and learning of the time that had elapsed since the departure
of the colony, he determined to return to the river May (now the St.
Johns), and found his settlement on its banks, where, as he says, the
“means of subsistence seemed to abound,” and the signs of gold and
silver observed on the former voyage had been very encouraging. These
signs must have been the possession by the Indians of some pieces of
quartz, which seems to have been very general, and to have led the
French like the Spaniards from tribe to tribe like a very ignis-fatuus.
Laudonnère’s account of his landing at the harbor of St. Augustine is
extremely interesting, and by his description the location is readily
recognized. He says: “We arrived on Thursday, the 22d of June (1564),
about three o’clock in the afternoon, and landed at a little river which
is thirty degrees distant from the equator. After we had struck sail and
cast anchor athwart the river, I determined to go on shore to discover
the same. Therefore, being accompanied by Mons. de Ottigni, with Mons.
d’Arlac, mine Ensign, and a certain number of gentlemen and soldiers, I
embarked myself about three or four o’clock in the evening, and being
arrived at the mouth of the river, I caused the channel to be sounded,
which was found to be very shallow, although that further within the
same the water was there found reasonably deep, which separateth itself
into two great arms, whereof one runneth toward the south, and the
other toward the north. Having thus searched the river, I went on land
to speak with the Indians, which waited for us upon the shore, which at
our coming on land came before us crying with a loud voice in their
Indian language ‘Antipola Bonassou,’ which is as much as to say,
brother, friend, or some such like thing. After they had made much of
us, they showed us their paracoussy, that is to say, their king or
governor, to whom I presented certain toys wherewith he was well pleased
and for mine own part I praised God continually for the great love I
found in these savages, which were sorry for nothing but that the night
approached and made us retire into our ships. Howbeit before my
departure I named the river the River of Dolphins, because at mine
arrival I saw there a great number of dolphins which were playing at the
mouth thereof.”[2] The dolphins or porpoises still continue to play in
the river and harbor at St. Augustine, especially during the summer
season. Throughout the greater part of the year rare sport could be
obtained by good shots who had the skill to lodge a rifle ball in the
head of the porpoise as he rises to “blow.”
The Indian town located on the present site of St. Augustine was Seloy,
and the same name seems to have been given to both of the rivers which
unite to form the harbor. From the narration it would seem probable that
the point where Laudonnère landed was upon Anastatia Island, the Indians
having come over from the mainland on seeing the French ships in the
offing.
Laudonnère having left Fort Charles, entered the river May, and
selecting a favorable site, about six leagues distant from the mouth,
built a small settlement, which he fortified with palisades and an
embankment of earth in the shape of a triangle, and named it Carolus,
still doing honor to the king who so little deserved esteem. With a
religious fervor characteristic of the age, and probably heightened by
their isolation, and proximity to the vast ocean which they had just
passed in safety, and solemnly impressed by their surroundings on a vast
and unexplored continent, the little band of strangers assembled and
dedicated their work and themselves to the glory of God and the
advancement of his holy faith.
The site of the Huguenot settlement is now known as St. John’s Bluff,
the first point of high land on the south after entering the St. Johns
River from the ocean. It is a sightly hill, probably formed by sand
dunes at an early period when the shore was far to the west of its
present coast line. The bluff rises some forty feet above the river, and
is covered with a thick growth of oaks and other hard woods. At the foot
of the hill on the east lay the broad marshes stretching for four or
five miles toward the sea, and reaching to the narrow ridge of sands and
woods adjoining the beach. The channel of the river here approaches the
southern bank, and the strong current sweeping in against the mobile
sands at each tide has greatly abraded the hill until probably the site
of Laudonnère’s fort has become the channel of the river. The site has
been fortified several times since. During the rebellion a considerable
earthwork was erected there by Florida troops, but the encroachments of
the river have already swept away the site.
Laudonnère had found the Indians very friendly, and this peaceable
disposition was by him assiduously cultivated. Trinkets and small
presents were exchanged for the provisions which they liberally
provided, and on several occasions the French lent their aid in making
war on the enemies of the friendly tribes about them.
The chief or cacique of the tribe which inhabited the country between
the mouth of the St. Johns River and St. Augustine was named Satourioua,
or Satouriva, and in his intercourse with the French and Spanish he
exhibited a remarkable sagacity and fidelity, as well as a dignity
unlooked for in a savage.
Laudonnère describes his first meeting with this chief in these words:
“We found the Paracoussy Satourioua under an arbor, accompanied by
fourscore Indians at the least, and appareled at that time after the
Indian fashion, to wit: with a great hart’s skin, dressed like chamois
and painted with devices of strange and divers colors, but of so lively
a portraiture and representing antiquity with rules so justly compassed
that there is no painter so exquisite that could find fault therewith.
The natural disposition of this strange people is so perfect and so well
guided that without any aid and favor of arts they are able by the help
of nature only, to content the eye of artisans; yet even of those which
by their industry are able to aspire unto things most absolute.
“The paracoussy now brought us to his father’s lodging, one of the
oldest men that lived upon the earth. Our men regarding his age began to
make much of him, using this speech, Ami--ami--that is to say friend,
whereat the old sire showed himself very glad. Afterwards they
questioned with him concerning the course of his age; whereunto he made
answer showing that he was the first living original from whence five
generations were descended. M. de Ottigni having seen so strange a thing
turned to the man praying him to vouchsafe to answer him to that which
he demanded touching his age. Then the old man called a company of
Indians, and striking twice upon his thigh, and laying his hand upon
two of them, he showed him by signs that these two were his sons; again,
smiting upon their thighs, he showed him others not so old who were the
children of the first two; which he continued in the same manner until
the fifth generation. But this old man had his father alive, more old
than himself, and this man, which seemed to be rather a dead carcass
than a live body, for his sinews, his veins, his arteries, his bones and
other parts appeared so clearly that a man might easily tell them and
discern them one from another, and both of them did wear their hair very
long, and as white as possible, yet it was told us that they might yet
live thirty or forty years more by the course of nature, although the
younger of them both was not less than two hundred and fifty years
old.”[3]
Laudonnère employed the Indians to assist him in finding gold, and sent
various boat expeditions to the head-waters of the St. Johns River. It
is reported, though unlikely, that one of his officers penetrated the
interior as far as the Mississippi.
Some of his men appear to have been dissatisfied with the position
assumed by their leader. They accused him of setting up a regal state,
and also of having obtained a knowledge of the location of gold which he
concealed from the rest of the company. Through the influence of these
disaffected ones a conspiracy was organized to depose Laudonnère. He got
rid of several of the disaffected ones, however, by sending them back to
France in a vessel which was returned for supplies at this period.
Subsequently the discontent increased, and Laudonnère was confined for
fifteen days upon one of the vessels in the river, while the mutineers
set about equipping two small vessels which he had built for
exploration. After rifling the fort of such supplies as they needed,
they set sail in these two ships on a piratical expedition. One of these
vessels, having been separated by a gale from its consort, captured a
Spanish ship, and after various adventures was finally captured and the
crew destroyed. The other, after having exhausted its supplies, returned
to the colony, and four of the leaders were tried and shot for mutiny.
Hearing that there were white captives among the Indians who resided
further south, Laudonnère sent word that he would pay a considerable
ransom for their delivery. Soon after there appeared two Spaniards who
had been wrecked fifteen years before. They had adopted the costume of
the natives--long hair, _et preteria nihil_. They reported that there
had also been saved several women who had married and consented to live
among the Indians.
The vessel sent to France for supplies not having returned, the garrison
were threatened with an exhaustion of their stores. During all this time
the French seem to have made no effort to cultivate the ground,
expecting either that they would be supplied from home or that the
Indians would furnish all that was required for subsistence. Their store
of presents having become exhausted, however, the Indians became very
niggardly and exacting, and finally declared that they were unable to
supply any sort of provisions. At this Laudonnère seized a chief of one
of the tribes inhabiting the territory to the south, and demanded of the
Indians a large amount of provisions as a ransom. This he did not
succeed in securing, and only engendered in the Indians an unfriendly
spirit, which prompted them later to give to Menendez information of the
location and condition of the French forces. He finally obtained
supplies from some of the tribes to the north, among which was one
inhabiting the sea islands, whose ruler was a beautiful queen. Finding
themselves in danger of starvation, the French set about constructing a
vessel to return home. They were diligently pushing on the work of
construction when there appeared off the coast an English fleet under
the command of Sir John Hawkins, who put into May River for water.
Laudonnère entertained the English with the best he had, even killing
sheep and poultry that he had been saving to stock the country. This
hospitality was reciprocated by Sir John, who, seeing their desperate
condition, offered to transport the whole company to France. Though he
pledged his word to land them on the shores of France before touching
England, Laudonnère refused his offer, fearing, as he said, “least he
should attempt somewhat in Florida in the name of his mistress.”
Sir John Hawkins, however, with a generous humanity, consented to sell
to the French one of his vessels, and suffered them to assess its value.
With the vessel the English admiral delivered to them a thousand rounds
of ammunition, twenty barrels of flour, five barrels of beans, a
hogshead of salt, with wax for candles, and, as he saw the Frenchmen
were barefooted, fifty pairs of shoes. Having delivered these things to
the French, Sir John sailed away bearing with him the blessings of these
forsaken Frenchmen. Alas! their enjoyment of the fruits of the
Englishman’s humanity was destined to be short-lived.