PORTAGES TO THE MISSISSIPPI BASIN
The portage paths from the Great Lakes, or streams entering them, to the
tributaries of the Mississippi River were of great importance during the
era when that river was the goal of explorers, conquerors and pioneers.
So numerous were they, it is only possible to describe the most
important briefly in this catalogue. The greater are worthy, each, of an
exhaustive monograph, and even those of least prominence were of
importance far beyond our ability to understand in these days. Of them
all only three routes have received the attention they deserve; these
are the Lake Erie-Lake Chautauqua portage, the Wabash route, and the St.
Joseph-Kankakee portage. Several other important portages present as
interesting fields of study, if not more so, as these, and local
historians living near these paths will do well to interest themselves
in them, map their exact routes minutely, locate the old springs, licks,
forts, and traders' cabins, before all trace and recollection of them is
lost.
Passing westward from Niagara the first explorers of the West found the
shortest route from the lakes to the Ohio was by a portage from
Chautauqua Creek to Chautauqua Lake and from thence down the Conewango
to the Allegheny River. Whether or not this was the most practicable
route it was, at first, of major importance. The shortest route was all
too long for men on missions such as that of Céloron bearing his leaden
plates to the Ohio Valley in 1749.[57]
There was, undoubtedly, an Indian portage between Lake Erie and Lake
Chautauqua before Céloron's expedition, but it would seem that now the
first roadway was built here. Céloron reached Niagara River July 6,
1749. He departed on the fifteenth, and "on the 16th," wrote Father
Bonnècamps "we arrived early at the portage of Yjadakoin. It began at
the mouth of a little stream called Rivière aux pommes ["apple
River"],--the 3rd that is met after entering the lake, and thus it may
be easily recognized."[58]
On the seventeenth the party began the tedious portage and "made a good
league." On the day following "our people being fatigued, we shortened
the intervals between the stations, and we hardly made more than half a
league ... the 22nd, the portage was entirely accomplished."
Six days were thus spent in crossing the nine-mile path--a very good
indication of how difficult was the journey. And yet Bonnècamps affirms
"The road is passably good."[59] This road was opened by a detachment
under Villiers and Le Borgne sent out by Céloron on the
sixteenth--"nearly three-quarters of a league of road" being cleared
the first day.[60]
A detailed study of this path has been made by Dr. H. C. Taylor of
Brocton, New York.[61] From him we quote the following concerning the
"Old Portage Road," as the path is known locally:
"Its starting point was on the west side of Chautauqua creek at
Barcelona, within a few rods of the lake. Its course from this point was
southerly along the bank of the creek, passing the afterward location of
the first grist mill built in the county, by John McMahon, not far from
the mouth of the creek, in 1804 or 1805, reached and crossed the now
main road at the ancient cross roads, one mile west of the centre of the
village of Westfield, at the monument erected there a few years since by
Hon. E. T. Foote (1870). From this point by a south easterly course it
soon reached the steep bank of the creek Chautauqua, along which it ran
for a mile when it passed into a deep gorge of a hundred feet or more in
depth, through which the creek ran, by an extensive dugway still plainly
to be seen on the lands owned by Miss Elizabeth Stone, where it crossed
the creek and by another dugway on lands for many years owned by Wm.
Cummings, it reached the high banks a few rods from the present Glen
Mills. The passage of this gorge was a work of considerable magnitude.
The west bank was so very precipitous that the passage of teams would
seem nearly impossible, yet it is said that in later years, before the
road on the east side of the creek through the now village of Westfield
was opened, vast quantities of salt and merchandise were transported
over it from Lake Erie to Lake Chautauqua for Pittsburgh and other
points in the Ohio Valley.
"On the east side of the gorge the road was less precipitous and is now
a public highway. After reaching a point above Glen Mills on the south
side of the gorge through which the east branch of the Chautauqua creek
now runs, and where the Mayville road is now located at that point, to
avoid the rugged section over the hill it passed up the east branch for
some distance and continued to the east of the present thoroughfare to
Mayville, and reached Chautauqua lake at or near the present steamboat
landing."
By 1752--the year of Marin's expedition to the Ohio--the old road was
well overgrown. In the primeval forests it did not take long for a road
to become impassable if unused. Braddock's Road over the Alleghenies,
cut in 1755, was impassable in 1758. This road cut in 1749 was cut out
again in 1752.[62] In each case three years had elapsed. Marin reached
the portage (Barcelona) in April 1752, but, warned perhaps by Céloron,
was unfavorably impressed with the practicability of the route and
decided to push on and find another portage to the Allegheny. Of this
matter we have the testimony of Stephen Coffin, an eye-witness:
"They [Marin's vanguard] remained at the fort [Niagara] 15 days, and
then set out by water, it being April, and arrived at Chadakoin, on Lake
Erie [Barcelona], where they were ordered to fell timber and prepare it
for building a fort, according to the Governor's instructions, but Mons.
Morang [Marin] coming up the next day with 500 men and 20 Indians, put a
stop to the building of the fort, not liking the situation, the river
chadakoin [Chautauqua Creek] being too shallow to carry out any craft
with provisions, etc, to Belle Riviere.... The two commanders had a
sharp debate, the first insisting on building the fort there in
accordance with the instructions, but Morang gave him a writing to
satisfy the Governor on that point; and then Mons. Mercier, who was
commissary and engineer was directed to go along the lake and look for a
situation, which he found, and returned in a few days, it being fifteen
leagues to the southwest of chadakoin."[63]
The portage chosen by Marin in preference to this Chautauqua route was
that from Presque Isle (Erie, Pennsylvania) to Rivière aux Boeufs.
Marin did not accomplish the task of fort-building for which he was sent
in the time prescribed, and his failure was attributed by some to his
choice of route to the Allegheny. When returning to Niagara late in the
fall a detachment of French from Presque Isle again landed at the
Chautauqua portage. "On the 30th (October) they arrived," Coffin
testified, "at Chadakoin where they stayed four days, during which time
Mons. Peon [Pean] with 200 men, cut a wagon road over the carrying place
from Lake Erie to Lake chadakoin, viewed the situation which proved to
their liking, so set off Nov. 3d for Niagara."
We have one other glimpse of these impetuous Frenchmen widening this
first portage path from the Great Lakes toward the Ohio. Samuel Shattuck
was born in Deerfield, Massachusetts in 1741. In 1752 he went from his
native town on a ranging expedition and was at Fort Oswego when Marin's
party went down Lake Ontario. An officer and five soldiers--one of whom
was this eleven-year-old lad--were instantly sent out to watch the
French squadron of canoes. They followed them to Niagara and into Lake
Erie. An autobiographical story has been taken down by Dr. Taylor from
the lips of Shattuck's grandson. Soon after passing Niagara, the story
goes, the boats were lost to sight; "but we expected to overtake them
easily, and in fact did so sooner than was agreeable to us as we came
near discovering ourselves to the Indians that belonged to the
expedition scattered through the woods. They had landed at the mouth of
Chautauqua creek, as now called, and were already felling trees on the
west side of the Creek, apparently for some sort of fortification. We
were confident they had chosen this as a carrying place to some waterway
south of the highlands.... From some cause not apparent to us there was
a cessation of work, and after three or four days the whole of both
parties, with the exception of a few Indians, embarked in their boats
and moved westward." Young Shattuck went on with the party and remained
near Presque Isle spying on the French movements until September, when
his party returned to Oswego. In October--such was the anxiety of the
English concerning this fort and road-building--the same scouts were
sent back toward Presque Isle. In the meantime, as before stated, the
French had started back for Niagara; landing at the Chautauqua portage
to make a road. "On the seventh day out [from Oswego]," reads Shattuck's
autobiographical story, "or near October 30th, as near as I remember,
in the afternoon we came upon a party of nearly or quite a hundred
Frenchmen rolling logs into a ravine in the bottom of a deep gulf, and
digging into the steep sides of the gulf for a road, apparently, at a
point that I now (1826) know to have been on the south border of the
village of Westfield.... We came upon this party very suddenly and
unexpectedly, for we had supposed that the whole matter of a carrying
place had been transferred to Erie.... As it was we escaped and
witnessed the completion of the road from Lake Erie to Lake Chautauqua.
on the third or fourth day the whole party embarked in their boats and
moved eastward."[64]
Passing west of Presque Isle, the first stream offering another passage
way to the Ohio was the Cuyahoga River. Ascending this stream about
twenty-five miles, an eight-mile portage, almost within the city limits
of Akron, Ohio, offered the traveler a passage way to the Tuscarawas
branch of the Muskingum River, which in turn offered a clear course to
the Ohio at Marietta.
This portage is not of more than purely local interest save only that it
was the first western boundary of territory west of the Ohio to be
secured by the United States from the Indians. The treaties of Fort
McIntosh, Fort Harmar and Greenville designate this portage as the
western boundary line between white and red men. The path was surveyed
in July 1797--one year after the arrival of the Connecticut pioneers in
the Western Reserve--by Moses Warren Jr. Its total length was given as
eight miles, four chains, and fifty-five links.
The path was, undoubtedly, of great importance in the earliest days.
This route, if the rivers were passable, was certainly the most
practicable of all routes from Lake Erie to the lower Ohio. The portage
was comparatively easy and the Muskingum was a swift, clear river. The
Cuyahoga was probably almost impassable except at floodtide. The
Connecticut pioneers found it so in 1796. Pioneer settlers on the upper
Tuscarawas received much of their merchandise from the east by way of
Buffalo and the Cuyahoga-Tuscarawas portage.[65]
The Scioto and Miami rivers were not as large as the Muskingum but were
easily plied at most seasons by the light canoe. The Sandusky and
Auglaize (emptying into the Maumee) offered a waterway which, with
portages, took the traveler from Lake Erie to the Ohio by these routes.
That they were uncertain and difficult courses is shown by the records
of Croghan and Bonnécamps.[66]
The spot of ground at the head of the Great Miami (from the source of
Loramie Creek to the head of the St. Mary and Auglaize) was a more
important point than one would believe without considerable
investigation. Looking at the matter from the olden view-point it seems
that this was one of the strategic points in the West in the canoe age.
Here on Loramie Creek three routes focused--those of the St. Mary,
Auglaize, and Miami rivers. Here, near the mouth of Loramie Creek,
English traders erected a trading station almost contemporaneous with
Céloron's journey; from their point of vantage the French drove them
away, and here the earliest French store was built. This stood near the
mouth of the creek in Miami County (Ohio) while sixteen miles up the
creek at the beginning of the shortest portage was the location of famed
Loramie's Store of later date and known to half a continent for half a
century. The carrying place across to Girty's town (George not Simon
Girty) was five miles to what is now St. Marys, Shelby County on the St.
Mary River. Toward this point Harmar and Wayne both struck in 1790 and
1794, Wayne building Fort Loramie at that end of the portage path
mentioned. A stone raised near the mouth of Loramie Creek was one of the
corner stones of the old Indian treaty line mentioned in the treaties of
Fort Stanwix (1784), Fort McIntosh (1786), Fort Harmar (1789) and
Greenville (1795). Loramie Creek was known thereby as the "Standing
Stone fork of the Great Miami." One of the remarkable features of the
Loramie portage was the deadened trees to be seen here--indicative of
busy canoe-building.
At the head of the Maumee--the "Miami river of Lake Erie"--a portage
path led to the Wabash. It began on the left bank of the St. Mary River,
a short distance above its junction with the St. Joseph, and ran eight
miles to Little River, the first branch of the Wabash. This route from
the Lakes to the Mississippi, at first of least importance, became
finally the most important of the five great French passage ways
southwest. It was discovered to be the shortest route from the capital
of New France to the Mississippi and Illinois settlements and has been
appropriately called "the Indian Appian Way." The importance of this
route in the history of the Old Northwest has been effectively presented
by Elbert Jay Benton.[67]
The voyager's canoes followed the Ottawa river from Montreal, then by
portage to Lake Nipissing, and to Georgian bay, an eastern arm of Lake
Huron, and thence by the northern lakes to Green bay, the Fox, and by
portage to the Wisconsin and Mississippi rivers. It was the most natural
route because in every way it was the line of least resistance. It
avoided the near approaches to the Iroquois Indian limits and led
directly to the numerous Indian haunts around the greater lakes. As the
objective point for the westward expeditions was gradually moved farther
south into the Mississippi basin, shorter routes across the territory,
later known as the Old Northwest, were used. The Wisconsin portage soon
yielded in point of frequency of use to those at the South end of Lake
Michigan. The route up the Illinois river and by portage into the
Chicago river and Lake Michigan was followed by Joliet and Marquette on
their return from the discovery of the Mississippi. A few years later La
Salle followed the coast of Lake Michigan to the St. Joseph river and up
that stream, thence by a portage to the Kankakee, and so again to the
usual destination--points on the Illinois and the Mississippi.
"About this time, in the course of the evolution of new routes leading
to the Mississippi, occurred the first use of the Wabash river by white
explorers. This stream was occasionally reached in the earliest period
by leaving Lake Michigan on the St. Joseph river and then by a short
portage to the headwaters of a northern branch of the Wabash, but the
more important way to reach it was by the 'Miami river of Lake Erie' and
a short portage. Of the five great portage routes,[68] this was the last
one to come into general use by the whites.... Many have tried to trace
La Salle's voyage of 1670 by the Wabash river. Joliet's map of 1674,
which locates La Salle's route by way of Lake Erie and the Wabash, has
been used in support of this contention. But the route laid down is
clearly a later interpolation and adds nothing directly to the argument.
It is, however, most significant that within a few years La Salle had
become in some manner fully aware of this Wabash route and the
advantages it offered. During the years that he was in command at Ft.
Frontenac, he appears to have been evolving great schemes for appeasing
the Iroquois and for opening up an easy channel of trade to the
Mississippi Valley by the Maumee and Wabash; but by 1682 he seems to
have temporarily abandoned this plan, 'because,' he says, 'I could no
longer go to the Illinois but by the Lakes Huron and Illinois, as the
other routes which I have discovered by the head of Lake Erie and by the
southern coast of the same, have become too dangerous by frequent
encounters with the Iroquois who are always on that shore.' La Salle's
description of the territory between Lake Erie and Lake Michigan
indicates a familiarity with this region scarcely possible save from
personal observation. In a letter written November 9, 1680, he says,
'There is at the end of Lake Erie ten leagues below the strait a river
by which we could shorten the route to the Illinois very much. It is
navigable to canoes to within two leagues of the route now in
use.'[69]... his [La Salle's] representations were the first to direct
the attention of the French to the regions south and west of Lake
Erie."[70]
Perhaps the most historic campaign in which the Wabash route played a
part was Hamilton's journey across it in 1778 when he went to the
recapture of Vincennes.[71] From the standpoint of this present study
this campaign is of particular interest, as it was one of the
exceedingly few instances in which a military movement was made by water
on the lesser rivers of the West. It is remarkable that though the two
important posts west of the Alleghenies, Detroit and Pittsburg, were
through many years, in the possession of bitter enemies, neither one
ever conquered or hardly attempted to conquer the other. A hundred plans
for the capture of Detroit were conceived in Fort Pitt, and many a
commander of Fort Detroit was determined to subdue Fort Pitt.[72] Yet it
can almost be said that nothing of the kind was ever actually
attempted, unless McIntosh's campaign be considered such an attempt.
This was because the journey between them could be accomplished only by
a long, tedious land march over the Great Trail,[73] or by a desperate
journey over small inland streams and the portages between them.
Difficult as the land journey over the Indian trail would seem, it is
clear that it was considered preferable to any water route in
Revolutionary days.[74]
Thus Hamilton's campaign over the Wabash route upon Vincennes was an
exceptional feat, successfully accomplished after great hardships and
delays. Clark's marvelously intrepid recapture of this fort by wading
through the drowned lands of the Wabash has so far eclipsed all other
events of that campaign that the heroism of other actors has been
forgotten.
On October 28, 1778,[75] Hamilton left the Miamis' town, where he held
conferences with the Indians, and proceeded to Pied-froid, on the other
side of the river St. Joseph.
The day following the gun-boat was placed on the carriage with great
difficulty. Two officers were left to forward the boats from the
portage, and Hamilton walked to the further end of the carrying place,
three leagues, where the provisions were collected. He ordered two
officers with the six-pounder and ammunition to go down to carry in
pirogues. "This carry is one of the sources of the Wabash," Hamilton
wrote in his _Journal_, "and takes its rise on the level plain, which is
a height of land near the Miamis town. The carry is called 'petite
rivière.'[76] Where the pirogues were first launched, it is only wide
enough for one boat, and is much embarrassed with logs and stumps. About
four miles below is a beaver dam,[77] and to these animals the traders
are indebted for the conveniency of bringing their peltry by water from
the Indian posts on the waters of the Ouabache.[78] On my return met
Lieut. Du Vernet with seven pirogues loaded. Ordered him to proceed and
join Lieut. St. Cosme, who was below the dam with some men employed to
clear the chemin couvert, the narrow part of the carry, so narrow and
embarrassed with logs under water and boughs overhead that it required a
great deal of work to make it passable for our small craft."
On October 30, Hamilton sent Lieutenant De Quindre with seven pirogues
loaded with provisions, and fourteen men, to follow Lieut. Du Vernet. In
the evening he went to the dam which had been cut there to give a
passage for the pirogues; and by sinking a batteau in the gap, and
stopping the water with sods and paddles, he raised the water.
"Lay in the wood this night. Wolves very numerous hereabout.
October 31. Returned to the camp at the Portage.
November 1. Left landing with seven batteaus and three pirogues loaded
with provisions, and proceeded to the dam, which we opened and yet found
the water so scanty that it was with the greatest difficulty we passed
the chemin couvert. At the end of this narrow pass came to the swamp
called les Volets, from the water lilies in it.[79] The batteaus
frequently rested on the mud, and we labored hard up to the knees in
mud and entangled among the roots and rotten stumps of trees. At length
got to the channel formed by the meeting of the Petite Rivière and the
Rivière a Boête.[80] Here we encamped, having got but ten miles with
great fatigue.
November 2. Small party sent down the river to clear away the logs, etc.
The rest of the men employed in damming the water of the two little
rivers, to provide for our passage downwards. Heard from Lieut. Du
Vernet below that we could not proceed from the shallowness of the
water.
November 3. Work on the dam continued. A light canoe sent to the landing
for workmen and tools, which returned at half past twelve at night.
November 4. Water was raised three feet. At 8 P. M. Major Hay arrived
with the remainder of the boats, provisions, etc.
November 6. Major Hay proceeded down the river, the water being let off,
and made another dam a mile below Rivière à l'Anglais.[81]
November 7th. Broke up the dam and proceeded to the pays plat, where the
bed of the river being very broad with almost continuous ledges of rock
and large stones, found great difficulty. Men in the water from 10 A. M.
till after sunset, at which time only one batteau had got to the foot of
the rifts (Petit Rocher). Most of the boats damaged.
November 8. Continued to work in the water to forward the boats. Sent
down to Du Vernet, who was encamped at the fork of the Ouabache, for
seven light pirogues and twenty-two men to assist in lightening the
boats.
November 9. Set off from Petit Rocher. Arrived at the forks of the
Ouabache at 3 P. M.
November 10. Repairing the boats and airing the bales which had got
wet. Sent back to Petit Rocher for the provisions, which had been left
there to lighten the boats. After this the river began to rise on
account of the heavy rains, and snow and cold weather also came on,
which increased the difficulties of the journey."
From the returns of Henry Du Vernet, second Lieutenant of Artillery, the
number of perogues used by Hamilton was forty-two, and of batteaux ("and
a very large French one"), ten. Ten two-wheeled carts were employed at
the portage, two carriages "with 4 wheels for the Batteaus," and four
"with 2 wheels for the peroques."[82]
The St. Joseph River, emptying into Lake Michigan, was one of the
earlier important roundabout routes to the Mississippi. The eastern fork
headed with the Wabash, and with a short portage was the route La Salle
described as being "within two leagues" of the Miami of Lake Erie. This
St. Joseph-Wabash portage was extremely important, but was roundabout,
and was probably abandoned at a comparatively early date.
The southern branch of the St. Joseph heads near the northwest branch of
the Kankakee, a tributary of the Illinois, near South Bend, Indiana.
This historic path has been made the subject of a monograph by Secretary
George A. Baker of the Northern Indiana Historical Society.[83] The seal
of this Society is appropriately inscribed: "This region before the
advent of the white man was occupied by the Miamis and Pottawatomies. It
was made historic by the early explorers and missionaries who used the
Kankakee-St. Joseph River Portage." A few of Mr. Baker's paragraphs
should be included in this catalogue:
"Shortly after Easter Sunday, 1675, the sick and disheartened priest,
Father Jacques Marquette, left the Indian village of Kaskaskia to return
to his beloved St. Ignace by a new route, which many eminent authorities
believe to have been via the Kankakee River. In that case it is very
probable that he and his two faithful attendants, Pierre Porteret and
Jacques, made use of the portage between the Kankakee and St. Joseph
Rivers--a carrying place of between four and five miles. The portage
landing on the St. Joseph River is two and three-quarters miles
northwest of the court house, at South Bend, St. Joseph County, Indiana,
and the portage extends in a southwesterly course to three small ponds
which were the nearest sources of the Kankakee. The basins of these
ponds are still clearly defined.... The earliest mention of this
historic route is found in the writings of Father Louis Hennepin, Henry
de Tonty and Réné Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle, who first made use
of it ... in December, 1679. We are led to believe, however, that Louis
Jolliet, companion of Marquette and co-discoverer of the Mississippi,
knew of this portage as early as 1673.
"The portage landing ... is just to the east of the big red barn, on the
Miller property, south of the residence, and at the foot of a beautiful
ravine declining gently from the high ground. At the water's edge,
stretching back at least one hundred feet, is a low sandy terrace of
recent formation. The approach to this picturesque ravine is obscure
and hard to locate from the river; the view being obstructed by the
forest trees. Many of the original trees are still standing ... many
red-cedars, the latter evidently being the progeny of a grand old cedar,
a stately monarch of the portage landing, which reaches to the height of
over sixty feet, with a girth of more than eight feet at its base....
The trunk ... has been covered by the sand and soil washed from above,
to a depth of between seven and eight feet.... Recently, June, 1897, the
soil around the old cedar was removed and the measurements as stated
were made. As the trunk was laid bare ... three great blaze-marks [were
found], forming a rude cross, made by a wide-bladed axe, such as were in
common use in the French colonies. Here was what we had suspected, one
of the witness trees marked no doubt in early days to locate the
portage."[84]
Fort St. Joseph was located on the opposite side of the river from a
Pottawatomie village, which was on the portage trail. The location of
this fort and Indian settlement is never unanimously estimated to have
been less than about sixty miles from the mouth of the St. Joseph River;
Father Marest wrote Father German from "Cascaskias" November 9, 1712:
"... we ascended the river Saint Joseph, in order to make a portage at
30 [20?] leagues from its mouth."[85]
This important route from Illinois to Detroit was first fortified by the
building of the earliest "Fort Miami," near the mouth of the St. Josephs
of Lake Michigan, by La Salle in 1679. "But this fort," Mr. Reuben Gold
Thwaites writes, "was destroyed by La Salle's men in 1680. Father Jean
Mermet, then at the river [St. Joseph] mouth, writes La Mathe Cadillac,
April 19, 1702, that he proposes to establish a mission 'three
journeys,' or about sixty miles up river, 'near a stream [Illinois]
which is the source of the Ouabache,' where there is a portage of half a
league (_Margry_, v, p. 219). In 1711, Father Chardon had his mission
sixty miles above the mouth. By 1712, there appears to have been a
French military post at this mission. Charlevoix, in a letter dated
'River St. Joseph, Aug. 16, 1721,' writes, describing his approach to
the fort from Lake Michigan: 'You afterward sail up twenty leagues in it
[up the St. Josephs River] before you reach the fort, which navigation
requires great precaution.'... The evidence is ample, that the fort on
the St. Josephs, from about 1712 to its final destruction during the
Revolutionary war, guarded the portage between the river of that name
and the Kankakee, on the east bank of the St. Josephs, in Indiana, a
short distance below the present city of South Bend."[86]
The Kankakee-St. Joseph route was a favorite one for travelers returning
from Illinois to the Great Lakes and Canada. The favorite early
"outward" route was from the western shore of Lake Michigan into the
Illinois River. Here were two courses: by way of either the Calumet or
the Chicago River to the Des Plaines branch of the Illinois. The latter
portage was best known and most used. Perhaps no one of the western
portages varied more than this in length, as on the best authority it is
asserted that sometimes no portage was necessary, and at others a
portage of nine miles was necessary: "The Chicago--Des Plaines route
involved a 'carry' of from four to nine miles, according to the season
of the year; in a rainy spring season, it might not be over a mile; and
during a freshet, a canoe might be paddled over the entire route,
without any portage."[87] When Marquette reached the Des Plaines, known
as "Portage River" because it offered a pathway to the Illinois, he was
compelled to make a portage of only "half a league."[88] The course of
this portage is practically the present route of the famous Drainage
Canal which joins the Chicago River with the Des Plaines at Elgin,
Illinois.
The most westernly portage from the Great Lakes to the Mississippi was
of the greatest importance in the earliest years of white man's
exploration. The French were the first explorers, and they were at first
barred from Lakes Ontario and Erie--which offered the shortest courses
to the Mississippi, via the Ohio--by the ferocious Iroquois; whose
hostility Champlain had quickly incurred, toward himself and his people.
Driven around, as has been shown,[89] by way of the Ottawa to Georgian
Bay, the longest route to the Mississippi became one of the shortest.
From Georgian Bay it is a straight course to Green Bay, and so the
portage between the Fox and the Wisconsin Rivers became one of the
earliest as well as one of the most important in America. By this route
the discoverers of the Mississippi were destined to come--for there were
many who found and lost this river. First in the line came Radissou and
Groseilliers, at the end of that fifth shadowy decade of the seventeenth
century. These daring men, possessed of the desire "to travell and see
countreys" and "to be knowne w^{th} the remotest people," found the
Fox-Wisconsin portage and passed down the Wisconsin to the Mississippi,
probably in the spring or early summer of 1659[90]--arriving on that
river eleven years before La Salle, and fourteen years before Joliet and
Marquette, to whom the discovery of the Mississippi is usually ascribed.
But though these men passed over this route to the discovery of the
Mississippi, they were not the first white men to traverse it. Jean
Nicolet, the first of Europeans, came over this course in 1634, but did
not descend the Wisconsin.[91]
Two score years later the bold missionaries, Joliet and Marquette,
entered the Fox River and came to Maskoutens, "the fire Nation."
"Here," wrote Marquette, "is the limit of the discoveries which the
french have made, for they have not yet gone any farther." Of Radissou
and Groseilliers no memory was left among the savages, and of them
Marquette had never heard. "No sooner had we arrived," Marquette wrote
in his _Journal_, "than we, Monsieur Jollyet and I assembled the elders
together; and he told them that he was sent by Monsieur Our Governor to
discover New countries, while I was sent by God to Illumine them with
the light of the holy Gospel. He told them that, moreover, the sovereign
Master of our lives wished to be known by all the Nations; and that in
obeying his will I feared not the death to which I exposed myself in
voyages so perilous. He informed them that we needed two guides to show
us the way; and We gave them a present, by it asking them to grant us
the guides. To this they very Civilly consented; and they also spoke to
us by means of a present, consisting of a Mat to serve us as a bed
during the whole of our voyage. On the following day, the tenth of June
two Miamis who were given us as guides embarked with us.... We knew
that, at three leagues from Maskoutens, was a River which discharged
into Mississippi. We knew also that the direction we were to follow in
order to reach it was west-southwesterly. But the road is broken by so
many swamps and small lakes that it is easy to lose one's way,
especially as the River leading thither is so full of wild oats that it
is difficult to find the Channel. For this reason we greatly needed our
two guides, who safely Conducted us to a portage of 2,700 paces, and
helped us to transport our Canoes to enter That river; ... Thus we left
the Waters flowing to Quebeq, 4 or 500 Leagues from here, to float on
Those that would thenceforward Take us through strange lands."[92]
By the feet of such undaunted heroes the Fox-Wisconsin portage path was
made hallowed ground. But the importance of this route, in the days when
Georgian Bay was the entering point of the French into the Great Lakes,
did not rapidly diminish; through all pioneer history, when Mackinac and
Detroit were the key of the Lakes, this route to the Mississippi was
important. For instance, in the fur trade of the West and of Wisconsin
in particular, this portage was of utmost moment.[93] In the preceding
pages this matter of the fur trade on portages has not been sufficiently
suggested; it is, however, a subject on which important and exhaustive
histories should be written. The portages were, in numerous instances,
the keys of the fur trade.
In the Revolutionary War, the Fox-Wisconsin portage bore a more or less
important part in British plans of gaining the alliance of the Indians
of the upper Mississippi Basin.[94] The awakening in the Northwest is
evidenced by the increasing importance of this pathway in the War of
1812.[95] This was the route of British trade with the Mississippi
Indians until the very last.[96] The commercial and economic history of
this route, the establishment of Fort Winnebago, the question of
government ownership of land, the improvement of the Fox and Wisconsin
Rivers, the Military Road across the portage, the days of the Durhams
boats, and the building of the canal make this route more interesting
than any other west of Niagara.[97]
It would be a serious omission not to include in this catalogue at least
a mention of the portages which completed the line of communication
along the chain of the Great Lakes--or from the St. Lawrence across to
the extremity of Lake Superior. The importance of the portage from the
Ottawa to Lake Nipissing and French River has been fully suggested, in
our emphasis of the use of the Ottawa route, by which the French avoided
the Iroquois and gained the western lakes. The historic and economic
phase of the Niagara River offers a magnificent untouched field for
historic study. The series of forts and their varying flags which
defended this key of the Lakes; the struggle for their possession; the
portage routes here that were of such vital importance to all the West;
the earliest systems of transportation around Niagara Falls; the
supplementary roundabout routes, such as up Grand River; and finally,
the building of the Welland Canal, offer a splendid topic for study and
field work. At the extremity of Lake Superior was the Grand Portage,
which joined the Great Lakes with Hudson Bay, by way of Pigeon River
and the Lake of the Woods. It was first found by Radissou and
Groseilliers in 1662, fortified in 1737, and at the beginning of the
nineteenth century was "the Headquarters or General Rendezvous, for all
who trade in this part of the world."[98]
In concluding this review of portage paths the author finds a final
opportunity to offer a plea for the wide study of historic sites and for
placing there monuments of some kind for the purposes of identification
before it be all too late.
We cannot realize in the slightest degree the great interest that will
be felt in our historical beginnings one, two, and three centuries from
now, as our nation grows richer and hundreds give themselves up to the
study of the past where ten can do so today. It is fair to believe that
we cannot realize how precious every relic and every accurate piece of
information--every monument and tablet--will seem when at last the days
of Braddock and Johnson, Washington and Clark and Wayne are lost in
three hundred years of change and evolution. Therefore we cannot fully
realize the precious duty that falls upon the present generation--and
upon us particularly.
The reason is evident: within a generation there will not be left in our
land a single son of one of the genuine pioneers of, for instance, New
York or Ohio. Even those of the second generation remember with really
little distinctness and accuracy the days of which their fathers told;
often their stories are entirely unreliable. This very fact is in itself
alarming, and is it not then the duty of all interested persons to
secure immediately every item of information from such of that second
generation as are found to be accurate and clear? In every State there
are a hundred historic sites for which, in time, people generally will
be inquiring. We speak easily of Fort Necessity and Fort Bull and Fort
Laurens--but where are they? The sites of these historic embankments are
known today, but of the New York and Pennsylvania sites doubts are
beginning to pass current. The location of Fort Laurens--the first
American fort built west of the Ohio River--is pretty definitely known.
It is fair to say that in a generation or two the spots, if left
unmarked, will never be located correctly. A small stone, with a plain
legend, costing a mere trifle, would insure the future against such a
misfortune.
The subject of portage paths naturally suggests the matter of locating
historic sites and marking them for the reason that so many such points
were on these portages. A mere catalogue of the forts mentioned in
preceding pages prove this conclusively. Add to these the mission
houses, trading stations and treaty houses here erected and we have a
sum total of vitally important historic sites which could be equalled
only by looking to the river valleys. And very frequently indeed the
real significance of many a fort at a river's mouth lay in the fact that
at that river's head lay a strategic carrying place. What else did Fort
Defiance, Fort Venango, Fort Oswego, Fort Niagara, Fort Miami on the St.
Joseph mean?
These portage routes should be presented to all local and State
historical societies as important fields of study in the very immediate
present if the many historic sites here are to be correctly marked. They
are easy fields of investigation because as a rule a great amount of
geographic lore is treasured up in a small compass; many a portage, like
the Oneida portage at Rome, New York, was not over a mile in length; yet
here are the sites of at least half a dozen forts, some of them of
world-wide renown. Take the famous portage at Fort Wayne, Indiana, from
the Maumee (St. Mary) to the Wabash (Little River); the field here is of
great importance yet the ground to be covered is exceedingly limited. A
few dollars invested in slight monuments could now establish markers
along this route with some degree of accuracy and conscientious
satisfaction. Later on this will not be possible. Each year lessens the
probability of accuracy, takes from the neighborhood one and another of
the aged men who would be of assistance, changes more and more the face
of the landscape--in short tends to rob all future students of something
of real value that we might confer upon them.
It may be due to a lack of antiquarian enthusiasm on the part of the
present writer, but he is strongly of the opinion that our historical
societies are losing an invaluable amount of information and data by not
seizing the advantage of the advice of pioneers' sons who are now living
concerning the location of historic sites; not a little money is being
expended here and there on archæological research which would produce
exactly as fruitful returns a generation from now as it does today. The
stone pipes and hammers will be found in as good condition in 1925 as
1903 but there are a hundred important sites that can never be marked
correctly after a score of men now over seventy years of age have passed
away. At a recent centennial celebration on the site of one of the most
important forts in the entire West the old fortress was reconstructed
with life-like accuracy under scholarly direction. It was necessary,
however, because of inundations of the neighboring river, to draw in one
of the bastions. It will not be many years before the entire topography
of that site will be altered by the same destructive force, unless it is
stayed, and when the second centennial of the day when Mad Anthony
Wayne unfurled his flag in the face of the British from the walls of
Fort Defiance is celebrated, there is a question whether the site of
that fort will be above or below the river's tide.
A pig-sty at Fort Recovery, Ohio, marks the Fort Recovery angle of the
famous Greenville Treaty line. Underneath the pen lies the stone which
marks the angle and the site of that historic fort and, consequently,
St. Clair's battle-ground. The line runs twenty-one miles westward to
the pillar raised on Loramie Creek, the historic site of the old French
trading post in 40° 16['] north latitude 7° 15[''] west longitude; at
the other angle on the Muskingum River the site of Fort Laurens is also
a matter of record. In this way, it is true, many points of interest
have a definite location but this is true in only a few cases. The
writer, recently returning from a tour through Illinois on George Rogers
Clark's old route to the conquest of Vincennes took his notes at once to
Madison, Wisconsin to revise them from the correspondence carried on by
Lyman C. Draper, a generation ago, with the oldest residents of
Illinois concerning Clark's route. The remarkable contrast between
testimony obtainable now and that secured a generation ago could not
have been more strikingly impressive. Indecision, indefiniteness,
inaccuracy grow more and more pronounced as the days draw by and an
actual experience such as this compels one interested in our country's
development to cry out against permitting more time to be lost.
Pennsylvania has set a good example in forwarding a minute study of her
frontier forts, two large volumes having been published by that state on
the subject. There are signs that there is an awakening interest in
definitely locating and marking historic sites. It need not be an
expensive work. It is certainly an important one. And the courses of the
important carrying places should be early considered.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] For an account of the portages in the dry season on the Scioto see
_Historic Highways of America_, vol. ii, pp. 55-60.
[2] _The Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents_, vol. xxxvii, pp.
211-213.
[3] _Id._, pp. 65-67.
[4] _Id._, vol. xlix, pp. 47-49.
[5] _Id._, pp. 261-263.
[6] _Id._, vol. viii, pp. 75-77.
[7] _Id._, vol. xxxix, pp. 47-49.
[8] _Id._, vol. xii, pp. 117-121.
[9] As outlined in _Historic Highways of America_, vol. iii, ch. iii.
This route of the French to the greater lakes took them away from the
Ohio River and long delayed their occupation of the Allegheny and Ohio
valleys.
[10] Hinsdale's _Old Northwest_, pp. 34-35.
[11] _Id._, p. 36.
[12] Céloron on his journey to the Ohio in 1749 did not cross Lake
Ontario by the same route pursued by his Indian retinue (Céloron's
Journal, in Darlington's _Fort Pitt_, p. 11).
[13] William E. Dodge's _Old New York_, p. 36.
[14] For a touching instance, see _Jesuit Relations ana Allied
Documents_, vol. lxvi, p. 281.
[15] _The Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents_, vol. lxix, p. 159.
[16] _Documentary History of New York_, vol. ii, p. 868.
[17] Sylvester's_ Northern New York_, p. 289; Céloron's Journal in
Darlington's _Fort Pitt_, p. 12.
[18] Sir William Johnson's _Journal_, October 1, 1761; cf. Severance's
_Old Trails of the Niagara Frontier_, p. 40.
[19] These names were copied from Nolin's "Carte du Canada" (1756) and
Bellin's "Partie Occidentale de la Nouvelle France" (1755), both in the
Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris.
[20] _Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents_, vol. xl, p. 219. The St.
Lawrence proved less easily navigated when it became better known.
[21] _Id._, note 10 (page 257).
[22] _Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents_, vol. lxix, p. 161.
[23] Described in _Historic Highways of America_, vol. iii, pp. 74-78.
[24] Sparks's _Writings of Washington_, vol. ii, p. 21.
[25] Royal Orders to Braddock, _Historic Highways of America_, vol. iv,
pp. 47, 48.
[26] Dunn's _Indiana_, p. 50.
[27] _American State Papers_, vol. iv, p. 525.
[28] _Id._, pp. 526-527.
[29] _Id._, p. 562.
[30] Sylvester's _Northern New York_, p. 279.
[31] Hinsdale's _Old Northwest_, p. 48; Benton's _The Wabash Trade
Route_, p. 15.
[32] Dunn's _Indiana_, p. 47.
[33] _United States Statutes at Large_, vol. ii, p. 173.
[34] _Historic Highways of America_, vol. iii, ch. vi.
[35] _A Monograph of Historic Sites in the Province of New Brunswick_,
Transactions of the Royal Society of Canada, vol. v, sec. ii, pp.
213-357.
[36] _A Monograph of Historic Sites in the Province of New Brunswick_,
pp. 233-239.
[37] _The History of the District of Maine_, p. 32.
[38] _Crown MSS._, cxix, 25.
[39] _Board of Trade Maps_, vol. 24, no. 45.
[40] _Add. MSS._, 21, 686, pp. 47-54.
[41] _The Century Magazine_, vol. lxv, no. 4 (February, 1903).
[42] Belknap: _History of New Hampshire_, vol. ii, p. 290.
[43] _Id._, p. 291.
[44] _Id._, p. 294.
[45] _Id._, p. 303.
[46] _Id._, p. 305.
[47] _Id._, p. 305, note.
[48] _Board of Trade Maps_, vol. 24, no. 51.
[49] _Crown Maps_ (British Museum), vol. cxxi, no. 18.
[50] _Board of Trade Maps_, case 11, no. 29.
[51] _Crown Maps_ (British Museum), vol. cxxi, no. 11
[52] _Board of Trade Maps_, case 11, no. 28.
[53] _Crown Maps_ (British Museum), vol. cxxi, no. 16.
[54] Sylvester's _Northern New York_, ch. xxxiii.
[55] _Northern New York_, pp. 275-281.
[56] _A Review of the Military Operations in North America_ (London,
1757), pp. 42-43.
[57] See _Historic Highways of America_, vol. iii, pp. 71-73.
[58] _Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents_, vol. lxix, p. 159.
[59] _Id._, p. 161.
[60] Céloron's Journal in Darlington's _Fort Pitt_, p. 12.
[61] _The Old Portage Road_; published in the Fredonia (N. Y.) _Censor_,
January, 1891.
[62] See _Historic Highways of America_, vol. iii, pp. 74-79.
[63] Affidavit of Stephen Coffin, _Colonial Records State of New York_,
vol. vi, p. 834.
[64] Taylor's _The Old Portage Road_, Fredonia _Censor_, January, 1891.
[65] For a map of this portage see Hulbert's _Red-Men's Roads_, p. 33.
[66] Croghan's Journal, _Historic Highways of America_, vol. ii., pp.
55-62; Bonnécamp's Journal, _Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents_,
vol. lxix, pp. 183-191.
[67] "The Wabash Trade Route in the Development of the Old Northwest,"
_Johns Hopkins University Studies_, series xxi, nos. 1-2
(January-February, 1903).
[68] Fox-Wisconsin, Chicago-Illinois, St. Joseph-Kankakee, St.
Joseph-Wabash and Maumee-Wabash portage routes.
[69] Margry: _Découvertes des français dans L'Amérique Septentrionale_,
vol. ii, p. 296.
[70] _Id._, vol. i, pp. 377-78; Fiske's _Discovery of America_, vol. ii,
p. 534.
[71] _Historic Highways of America_, vol. vi, p. 164.
[72] For references to proposed routes by land and water against Fort
Detroit and Fort Pitt see Butterfield's _Washington-Irvine
Correspondence_, pp. 92, 110, 118, 121, 140 (note), 354-55; _Wisconsin
Historical Collections_, vol. xi, pp. 128, 130; _Irvine Papers_ (MSS.),
Wisconsin Historical Society, vol. ii, A A. pp. 66, 67; Washington MS.
_Journal_, September 1784 (State Department).
[73] _Historic Highways of America_, vol. ii, p. 107.
[74] Irvine-Washington, February 7, 1782 (_Washington-Irvine
Correspondence_, p. 92).
[75] The following are notes on and extracts from Hamilton's _Journal_
preserved at Harvard University.
[76] Little River.
[77] "The Beaver are never molested at this place by the Traders or
Indians, and soon repair their dam, which is a most serviceable work
upon this difficult communication."--Account of the Expedition of
Lieut.-Gov. Hamilton, _Michigan Pioneer Collections_, vol. ix, p. 493.
"The Beavers had worked hard for us, but we were obliged to break down
their dam to let the boats pass...."--Hamilton to Haldimand, November 1,
_Wisconsin Historical Collections_, vol. xi, p. 181.
[78] Wabash.
[79] Under this date Hamilton wrote to Haldimand from "Camp at Petite
Riviere," concerning the portage path from the Maumee to Little River,
as follows: "This carrying place is free from any obstructions, but what
the carelessness & ignorance of the French have left, & would leave from
Generation to Generation. An intelligent person at a small expense might
make it as fine a road as any within 20 miles of London. The Woods are
beautiful, Oak, Ash, Beech, Nutwood, very clear & of a great growth ...
in a ridge near the road I found a sea fossil, to find Marine
productions on this hauteur des terres is to my mind more curious than
their being found in the Alps--there are no mountains in view from
Detroit to this place so that these appearances cannot readily be
accounted for from volcanoes of which there is no trace to be
observed."--_Wisconsin Historical Collections_, vol. xi, p. 179.
[80] Aboite River, Allen County, Indiana.
[81] One of the most curious of errors. This river was called by the
Indians Eel River, and is the name translated by the French, _Rivière
l'Anguille_. Hamilton mistook this for _l'Anglais_, which name he used.
Cf. Imlay's _America_, p. 402, where the name is spelled _Longuille_;
_American State Papers_, vol. iv, p. 132; Gamelin's _Journal_, _Id._, p.
93.
[82] _Michigan Pioneer Collections_, vol. ix, p. 409.
[83] _The St. Joseph-Kankakee Portage_, Northern Indiana Historical
Publications, no. 1.
[84] _Id._
[85] _Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents_, vol. lxvi, p. 285; cf.
_Wisconsin Historical Collections_, vol. xi, p. 179.
[86] _Wisconsin Historical Collections_, vol. xi, pp. 178-79; cf.
_Michigan Pioneer Collections_, vol. ix, p. 368; _Magazine of Western
History_, vol. iii, p. 447.
[87] _Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents_, vol. lix, note 41.
[88] _Id._, p. 161.
[89] _Historic Highways of America_, vol. iii, ch. iii.
[90] Butterfield, in _Magazine of Western History_, v, pp. 51, 721-24;
_Wisconsin Historical Collections_, vol. xi, p. 66, note.
[91] Butterfield's _Discovery of the Northwest_, p. 67, ff.
[92] _Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents_, vol. lix, pp. 105, 107.
[93] _Wisconsin Historical Collections_, vol. xi, pp. 223, 387; Turner's
_Indian Trade of Wisconsin_.
[94] _Wisconsin Historical Collections_, vol. xi, pp. 148, 164.
[95] _Id._, pp. 262, 292, 300, 302, 312, 323, 328.
[96] _Id._, p. 337.
[97] _Id._, vol. vii, p. 371; vol. x, p. 222; vol. xi, pp. 183, 361,
399, 403, 404, 409-15; vol. xii, pp. 331, 400.
[98] Harmon's _Journal_ (Andover, 1820) p. 41.
* * * * *
Transcriber's Notes:
1. Passages in italics are surrounded by _underscores_.
2. Obvious errors in spelling and punctuation have been corrected except
for narratives and letters included in this text.
3. Footnotes have been moved to the end of the main text body.
4. Images have been moved from the middle of a paragraph to the closest
paragraph break.
5. Certain words use an oe ligature in the original.
6. Carat character (^) followed by a single letter or a set of letters
in curly brackets is indicative of subscript in the original book.
7. For longtitude and latitude, the minutes and seconds are placed as
single quotes within brackets. For example: 38° 47['] 20[''].