Enter West Florida--Fine country--Don Juan O’Connor--A whimsical
egarement--Capt. Percy--Bayau Sarah--Doctor Flowers--Don Thomas
Estevan--Mr. Perrie’s--Thompson’s creek--Bad road--Beautiful
plain--Montesano.
A mile and a half farther, in a S. E. direction, the road crossed
the demarkation line, which divides {304} the Mississippi territory
from the Spanish province of West Florida, at the first house from
Pinckneyville, and the last subject to the United States. The line runs
along the parallel of the 31st degree of north latitude. It was cut
forty feet wide, but it is now scarcely perceptible, from the rapid
growth of trees and shrubs, in the short space of seven or eight years
since it was opened, under the direction of Mr. Ellicot, commissioner
on the part of the United States, and major Minor on the part of
Spain.[213]
I was now in the district of New Feliciana, in the Spanish province of
West Florida. A wagon road through a naturally fine country, with some
small plantations at distances from half a mile to a mile, brought me
in eight miles to Don Juan O’Connor’s. This respectable old gentleman,
to whom I carried a letter of introduction, has a fine estate, and
is building a very large and commodious house, which, when finished,
he intends for the residence of his family now in Philadelphia. He
is held in great estimation by the government, and throughout the
country, where he many years exercised the office of Alcalde, or
chief magistrate of the district; but resigning it on account of his
increasing age, he has been succeeded by his neighbour, Capt. Robert
Percy, formerly of the British navy, a gentleman perfectly well
qualified to execute the office with becoming dignity and propriety.
I remained three days with Mr. O’Connor, at his friendly solicitation,
visited by, and visiting the neighbouring gentry of this rich and
hospitable country, during which time a laughable incident happened.
Accompanying Mr. O’Connor to Capt. Percy’s, a distance of only two
miles, through the lands of the two gentlemen, Mr. O’C. conducted me
through the woods by a bridle path, instead of keeping the main road,
for the purpose of seeing some of his people, who were sawing timber.
After riding in different {305} directions for some time without
finding them, he at last gave up the attempt, saying we would now
take a path which would soon bring us into the road. The sun being
overcast, the old gentleman soon lost his direction in a labyrinth of
cattle paths, by which we got involved sometimes in a thick cane brake,
and sometimes in a copse of briars. I saw he was astray, but without
seeming to perceive it, I followed him, chattering on indifferent
subjects. At last despair of extricating us conquering his shame of
acknowledging himself lost in his own woods--he suddenly exclaimed,
“Where is your pocket compass?”--I answered that accompanying him so
short a distance on his own ground, I had not thought it necessary to
bring it. “You should always carry it in this country,” exclaimed he,
a little pettishly. “What course do you wish to go?” said I--“N. E.”
replied he, “ought to bring us into the main road.”--“Well,” said I,
“let us leave the mossy side of the trees on our left shoulder.”
Following my advice, we soon heard some one at a distance singing
loudly. We took the direction of the voice, and soon afterwards found
the wagon road, after wandering above two hours in search of it. Mr.
O’Connor’s relating the story good humouredly at Capt. Percy’s did
not prevent his being rallied a good deal about it, and it spreading,
became a standing subject of laugh against him, among his surrounding
friends. The day after this, as I was accompanying Mr. O’C. and some
of his neighbours to a militia muster, my horse took fright, at my
suddenly raising my umbrella during a shower, and plunging violently,
he threw me on my head, but without doing me any other injury than
dirtying me all over.
On Thursday, 1st September, I left Mr. O’Connor’s after breakfast, with
the intention of pursuing my journey, but calling at Capt. Percy’s, he
said it was his birth day, and that I must spend it with him, {306} and
that he had sent for Mr. O’C. for the same purpose.
This was truly an agreeable day to me, it being devoted to social
converse without ceremony, while the well regulated and liberal
domestick arrangements of the amiable and well informed lady of our
friendly host, recalled to my mind the elegant refinement I had so
often enjoyed in the society of her fair countrywomen, during my
residence in Scotland. To her engaging native manners, Mrs. Percy adds
the advantages of a long residence in London, where she seems to have
grafted on her native stock, such exotick knowledge only, as could
farther expand a mind, already adorned both by nature and art.
Next day, Friday, 2d September, my worthy host and hostess, after
exacting a promise from me, that I should make their house my family’s
home, until fully provided in one myself, should I choose that part
of the country for my future place of residence, accompanied me on
my way, fording Bayau Sarah, which is about thirty yards wide, to
the plantation of Mr. Sweezey, a mile distant, where a child being
dangerously ill of a fever, Mrs. Percy had for several days before, and
even nights, aided the disconsolate mother in the duties of nursing,
while her humane and friendly husband prescribed and dispensed the
necessary medicine in the absence of the physician--none living nearer
than six or eight miles. Indeed he adds the gratuitous practice of
physician and apothecary to the office of chief magistrate, and he is
equally useful in each department to the surrounding country, while his
amiable lady performs the part of a real Lady Bountiful, with judgement
and true benevolence.
Capt. Percy rode with me about five miles farther, to shew me a tract
of land he had in his disposal, on which he wished me to settle, and
another, the property of Mr. Cochran of Bayau Pierre, which had {307}
been offered for sale. He then bade me adieu, and I went on alone,
passing Mr. Sterling’s and doctor Bruin’s, and proceeding to the
southward four miles farther, I arrived and stopped at doctor Flowers’s.
The doctor was absent, but Mrs. Flowers did the honours of her house
to me, with the most pleasing attention, and he returning home in the
evening confirmed the kind welcome I had received, and to which I was
in no other way entitled than, in addition to my being a stranger
(which about Bayau Sarah seems to be a general passport to hospitality)
I had a letter of introduction from my valuable and respected friend,
judge Bruin, whose name, where he is known, opens every door.
The next two days were spent chiefly at doctor Flowers’s, and in riding
about the neighbouring country, during which I visited Mr. William
Barrow, who has a very handsome house, a noble plantation of about
four hundred acres of cotton all in one field, and a hundred and fifty
negroes. I also accompanied the doctor to pay my compliments to Don
Thomas Estevan, lately appointed commandant of New Feliciana, with full
powers to act for the governour. He received me very politely, and
appeared to be a man of pleasing manners, and good general information,
although I was informed that he had risen from the rank of a private
in the army, to his present situation. That, however, is a very common
thing in the Spanish service, where merit is sure of being rewarded,
without the aid of money or great connexions, notwithstanding the
character for pride which that nation is taxed with.[214]
On Monday, the 5th September, I proceeded on my tour, crossing
Alexander’s creek, an inconsiderable stream, and having a good road
to the eastward, through a forest abounding with that beautiful and
majestick evergreen, the magnolia or American laurel, six or seven
miles to Mr. Perrie’s. He was {308} absent until supper time, previous
to which I amused myself with walking about his fine plantation, and
the best garden I had yet seen in this country. A letter from doctor
Flowers insured me a friendly reception, and I passed the night here.
Mr. Perrie is a native of Fifeshire in Scotland, was a millwright, by
which profession, aided by an advantageous matrimonial connexion, he
now possesses a hundred negroes, and is alcalde of the quarter--yet
he would gladly remove to the land of his nativity, if he could do it
conveniently.
Tuesday 6th, a good road through open woods brought me in six miles to
Doyle’s, from whence, fording Thompson’s creek, (a fine little river
sixty yards wide) I stopped at Horton’s tavern, on the opposite side.
Mr. Murdoch, the proprietor, from whom Horton rents the house and
adjoining plantation, but who reserves a room for himself, having seen
me at Mr. O’Connor’s, politely asked me to stay breakfast, after which
I proceeded.
All the tract of country from Pinckneyville to near Thompson’s creek,
being watered by Bayau Sarah, or some of its tributary streams, is
most generally known by the name of the Bayau Sarah settlements, and
is part in the United States and part in the Spanish territory. It is
esteemed as the finest soil, the best cultivated, and inhabited by the
most wealthy settlers, of any part of the Mississippi territory or West
Florida, but the land appeared to be liable to have its soil washed
away, so as to lose it entirely in a few years after clearing it, on
all the declivities. It is on the whole however, a charming country.
My road now led through a thick wood, much impeded by copse and briers,
and it being a dead flat, the whole of it was a complete slough, in
some places deep enough to mire my horse to the saddle skirts for
several hundred yards together, so that I made slow progress, for the
first six miles, in an easterly {309} direction, which had been the
course of the road from doctor Flowers’s.
I met a man on foot, of a very suspicious appearance, labouring through
the mire. He was a stout active fellow, very ragged, and his face
disfigured by a large scar across his mouth. I passed him however
peaceably, and soon after leaving a Mr. Carter’s plantation on the
right, I entered the most beautiful plain I had seen in this country.
It was a savanna or prairie, about six miles long, and from half a mile
to a mile wide, skirted by woods, and a few plantations, and abounding
with clumps of oak, ash, mulberry, poplar and other indigenous trees,
affording between them beautiful vistas of various character, while
large herds of cattle and horses appeared here and there, to enliven
the scene, which had additional interest from two men galloping after
and noosing some wild horses.
I stopped and dined at the house of Richard Dewal, esq. on the plain.
Mr. Dewal is an Englishman, and alcalde of the quarter. He was absent,
but Mrs. Dewal received me with politeness and hospitality.
Leaving the plain, the road soon became as bad as possible, to be
capable of being travelled. Three and a half miles of it brought me to
Droghen’s plantation in a wretched solitude, from whence I had five
miles farther of equally bad road, without an inhabitant to Fridges, a
Scotchman. In the next three miles I passed three plantations, and then
came to the bank of the Mississippi at Mrs. O’Brien’s very pleasantly
situated farm, from whence is a view down the river past Montesano to
Baton Rouge.
A mile farther, parallel to the river bank, brought me to Montesano.
This has been lately laid out for a town by Mr. Wm. Herreis from
London, who is the proprietor, but I do not think he will succeed
in his plan, as the country around is not sufficiently inhabited to
support a town, and besides it is too near {310} to Baton Rouge, the
seat of government, of the western division of West Florida. There is
some prospect of his succeeding better in a saw and grist mill he is
erecting, which is to be wrought by steam. It is on a large scale, and
a vast deal of money has already been laid out on it (I have been
informed, upwards of thirty thousand dollars) yet it does not seem to
be in great forwardness.[215]
It is called only four miles from hence to Baton Rouge, but the badness
of the road made me think it eight, perhaps six may be the true
distance. I passed some small neglected French plantations on the left
on the summit of a range of low hills, which extend from Montesano,
while on the right I had a swamp, out of which the cypress has been
cut, between me and the river, the road being very bad, through a
natural savanna of coarse grass, intersected by deep ravines, and miry
sloughs.
FOOTNOTES:
[213] Andrew Ellicott was an American engineer of note. Born in
Pennsylvania (1754) of Quaker ancestry, he passed his early life
in Maryland, devoting himself especially to mathematical studies.
In Baltimore and Philadelphia he became a friend of Washington and
Franklin; and at their suggestion was employed to define the boundary
between Virginia and Pennsylvania, and later that between New York
and Pennsylvania. In 1792, he was appointed surveyor-general of the
United States. He also assisted in laying out the national capital.
While acting as commissioner for adjusting the southern boundary
of the United States with Spain, according to the treaty of 1795,
Ellicott encountered serious diplomatic difficulties, and alienated a
party of the English inhabitants of the Natchez district. Claiborne’s
animadversions, however, in his _Mississippi_, seem hardly borne
out by the facts. In 1808, Ellicott was appointed secretary of
the Pennsylvania land-office; and four years later, professor of
mathematics at West Point, where he died in 1820. His journal during
his employment in the Southwest, is valuable as a record of conditions
in that region.
Stephen Minor was a Pennsylvanian by birth, educated at Princeton,
and early came west to explore the new country. At St. Louis he
was persuaded to convey some dispatches to the governor-general of
Louisiana at New Orleans, who, fancying the frank but politic young
American, offered him a position in the Spanish army. Minor served
the Spaniards with address and fidelity. Taking no advantage of his
position, he remained loyal to Spain, at the same time becoming popular
with the English-speaking inhabitants of the Natchez district, where he
was stationed. He was finally promoted to the governorship of Natchez,
which he retained until its surrender to the United States (1798), when
he became an American citizen, and died at Concord, Mississippi.--ED.
[214] The province of West Florida was settled during the British
occupation (1764-83), and its population was of the same character as
that of Mississippi, to the north of it--chiefly American colonists
with an admixture of English, Irish, and Scotch emigrants. Feliciana
was not erected into a Louisiana parish until 1811, but under the
Spanish régime was made a district subordinate to the Baton Rouge
province. In 1810 the inhabitants threw off the yoke of Spain, and
declared themselves annexed to Louisiana.
William Barrow came to West Florida about 1795, entered land under a
Spanish grant, and developed a fine plantation. His descendants have
been prominent citizens of the district.--ED.
[215] It may be observed here that the steam power used by Mr. Herreis
(as I am informed) is on the English principle, which is said to
cost much more than the improved steam power by Oliver Evans, of
Philadelphia which costs for a thirty horse power about three thousand
dollars. It is said that a Mr. Cohoon, of the state of New York, has
even simplified Mr. Evans’s steam principle, so much that a thirty
horse power will not cost more than twelve hundred dollars for its
complete erection.--CRAMER.