conditions of pioneer life on its western plains. Of some of the ups and
downs of this strange colony something will be said in the next article.
LIFE IN THE FRENCH COLONY
One may easily infer from that already said about these peculiar
colonists, who settled in the early years of the nineteenth century, at
the confluence of the Tombigbee and Black Warrior Rivers, that life under
such conditions must have been strikingly novel throughout. It was an
attempt to graft an exceptional European civilization, with all its
traditional peculiarities of many centuries, into the raw wilderness
conditions of western civilization, and to preserve intact, the customs of
the gay Gallic capital of Europe, on the prairies of black mud in Alabama.
The log huts which lined the streets of primitive Demopolis, were made as
nearly palaces as they well could be, and the streets themselves were
lighted at night, in imitation of the French capital. It was a play doll
performance, as pathetic as it was patriotic and loyal.
The French founded and named Demopolis "the city of the people," seeking
thus to blend a miniature Paris with democratic sentiment. In vain did
these people seek to grow the olive and the vine in an unfriendly soil,
and the attempt was gradually abandoned, and by every possible makeshift
they eked out a bare subsistence. In a fertile soil, vegetables and corn
were easily grown, and with these and with such supplies as they could get
from the game of the woods, they struggled on against odds. They were not
without annoyance from the Indians, and more from the American settlers
who were now beginning to come into that quarter of the Alabama
territory. These latter would entrench on the lands of the French which
gave rise to much friction, and an agent had to go to Washington to sue
for protection against such invasions. This occasioned opposition to the
"furreners," as the French came to be popularly called, in the neighboring
log cabins of the American squatters.
As an indication of the extremity to which the French were reduced,
Colonel Raoul, a large, handsome and dignified cavalry officer in the
Napoleonic army, had to establish a ferry on the river to convey travelers
from one side to the other, while his beautiful queenly wife sold
gingerbread and persimmon beer on the bank, at the ferry. With her
delicate jeweled fingers she would manufacture these crude refreshments,
and with much grace serve them to the rude pioneers.
Years afterward, when Raoul had been restored to the confidence of the
French government, and was occupying a lucrative position in Paris, after
serving for some time in the Mexican army, he was visited by John Hurtel,
who was also one of the French colonists, but now a prosperous merchant in
Mobile. Intimate and even affectionate as friends, Colonel Raoul gave a
dinner to his Mobile friend, and invited to the banquet many of his
distinguished Parisian friends. To a group, Raoul was relating his pioneer
experiences as a ferryman, which all laughingly doubted, when Raoul called
to Hurtel, in another part of the room to join them. He then asked Hurtel
what he (Raoul) did at Demopolis. He replied that he kept a ferry. "And
what did the madame do?" asked Raoul. "Sold ginger cakes and simmon
beer," said Hurtel, all of which was greeted with roars of laughter.
As an expression of devotion to his imperial sovereign, General Desnoettes
built a shanty near his log cabin, which shanty he called his "sanctuary."
In the center of this humble museum stood a bronze statue of Napoleon,
encircled by relics of war captured by Desnoettes--swords, pistols,
spears, spurs and saddles--while in graceful folds about the walls hung
the captured banners. The customs of the people were often as grotesque as
they were pathetic. After days of struggle and labor, the evenings would
be spent in music and dancing in the log cabins, or else along the narrow
grassy streets of the village would resound, till a late hour of the
night, the notes of musical instruments. The great generals of a hundred
battles preserved their military dignity and conventionalities while
working with might and main in their laboring garbs, with their
broad-brimmed hats flapping about their heads. Every stranger would be
greeted with the military salute, no matter who he was.
In compliance with the requirements of the territorial laws, every male
citizen of a given age, had to meet statedly at some point named by the
commanding militia officer, to drill. From this the French were not
exempt, and these experts in military science were compelled to join in
the ranks of the rough and tumble yeomanry on the muster ground, and go
through with the rude evolutions known to them from the days of their
cadetship.
These were the days of the country grocery, and of the crossroads grocery,
which were inseparable from the muster ground and the rural drill, and
their presence meant fisticuff fights, gouged eyes, broken noses, and
dislocated teeth. There was not the best feeling toward the "furrener," at
any rate, and there was a disposition in this region especially, to
provoke him to difficulty. It is related that on one occasion a bully
under the sway of liquor, sought a difficulty with one of the French,
which ended in the Frenchman being knocked down and jumped on by the rough
militiaman. The poor fellow knew not a word of English, and he cried in
his extremity for "enough" the French word "bravo," which he knew had
something to do with fighting. He repeatedly yelled "bravo" with the hope
that some one would pull off his assailant, but the assailant interpreted
it to mean an expression of defiance, and was brutally pommeling the Gaul.
Some of the by-standers properly construed the meaning of the Frenchman,
from the tone of his appeal, and pulled the ruffian off.
In the geographical names of that region--Arcola, Agleville (Eagleville),
Linden (Hohenlinden), and Marengo, not to mention Demopolis--one finds the
evidence of the past occupation of the French. During the first year or
two, a number of other French came from France and joined the colony, but
the object which they had in view, failing, that of raising grapes and
olives, the colony gradually dissipated, the emigrants going in different
directions, and in Mobile and New Orleans, as elsewhere, may be found the
descendants of some of these original colonists, still bearing the names
of their ancestors of almost a century ago. Long after the occupied
domain had been abandoned, there could be seen in the waxy mud in the
region of Demopolis the imprints of the delicate shoes of those Parisian
women.
PRIMITIVE HARDSHIPS
Few are aware of the extremes to which the earliest settlers of Alabama
were reduced in their migration from the old colonies to this region,
while it was yet a territory. It may be said that the original stock of
Alabama settlers was generally of the best type of Anglo-Saxon manhood and
womanhood. Inherently, they had no superiors on the continent. They are
not to be thought of as adventurers, restlessly migrating to a new region
with a dissatisfaction which sought relief in the mere act of moving, for
adventurers would never have undergone that which was experienced by these
fathers, in pitching their homes in a wilderness infested by savages and
wild beasts. The fact that they did that which was done, labels the type
of character of these original commonwealth builders.
Back of their migration from Virginia and the Carolinas, from which most
of the original settlers of Alabama came, lay a fact which largely
influenced their removal. The new republic was still in course of
construction. The revolution had left a chaotic condition in the older
colonies, and men of sturdiness conceived the idea of going far westward,
where they could create new conditions, and build for the future. They
were not unprepared for the privation that was to be encountered, nor
altogether unapprised of it, but in the face of these suspended
difficulties, they were nerved by genuine Caucasian grit. A number of
solid and substantial folk would get together and agree to removing to the
west, with a common understanding of general sharers in a common
interest, thereby procuring a sense of sympathetic protection, traverse
the wide distance, occupy a given community in a fresh territory, and rear
their fortunes together.
The most ordinary conveniences were scarce, utensils and tools hardly to
be had, shoes and clothing scant, methods of conveyance rude, and thus to
the utmost extremity were these original founders of Alabama reduced. The
dependence for transportation was a few horses and oxen, which were
employed in common by a body of hardy colonists. On the horses were placed
the women and children, on the oxen the scanty household effects; the
stock was grouped in a common herd, cattle, swine and sheep, to be driven
on foot by the men and boys, each of whom was supplied with a gun or an
implement, and thus would they begin their march to a region of which they
knew nothing, save that it was without population, densely wooded and with
no other denizens than those of Indians and of ferocious beasts.
Even where roads and bridges were encountered on the way, they were crude,
and west of the confines of Georgia, the wilderness was untraversed save
by the wild savage, whose slender paths wound the forests through. So far
as these pathways were available, they were used, but oftener than
otherwise these plucky pioneersmen would have to hack their way through
the forests, opening paths as they slowly went. Regarded from this point
of time, there was a ludicrousness in these primitive shifts, but men and
women were never more serious than were these old-fashioned mothers and
fathers. They were the rough germs from which sprang a civilization
unsurpassed in its elements in history. Wives, mothers, and daughters,
bare-headed or wearing the old fly bonnet, were mounted on poor horses,
with children on their laps, or clinging on from behind, while dangling on
either side of the burdened beast were packages which contained the most
of that which they possessed in this world. In advance, men with axes
would rapidly hew away the underbrush for a bare passage, while the
bleating herd would follow, driven mostly by the larger boys. The smaller
streams were waded, while in order to cross the larger streams, rafts were
constructed, the timbers of which were held together by the native vines,
while such of the animals as could swim were forced to do so.
There was a flow of cheer and jocularity which served as a condiment to
hard conditions, and when the camp fires were lighted, the stock fed on
the native grasses, and supper was eaten, men chatted and smoked, sang and
told jokes, while the industrious wives and daughters would ply their
knitting needles. By turns the camp was guarded against possible
contingencies for the night, and the next morning the same arduous march
would be resumed.
The destination finally reached, the struggles against difficulties would
begin in earnest. Boundaries of chosen land would be indicated by cutting
belts about the trees with a peculiar, personal mark, and then await the
future for full legal possession. In the construction of temporary homes,
colonists would vie with each other in the ingenuity displayed. The
method most common was to select trees as corners of the dwelling, and
then wattle saplings among those intervening from corner to corner, while
the roof was made of bark and the skins of wild animals. The cooking was
done without, in one or two small utensils. The grounds about were cleared
of the underbrush sufficiently to be planted, which was commonly done with
wedge-shaped rods being thrust stroke by stroke into the rich soil, the
seed dropped, and covered with the foot. As for meat, there was slight
difficulty, as deer, turkeys and squirrels were abundant. Shoes and
clothing would soon become matters of grave concern, but the deficiency
would be met by the appropriation of the hides of animals, from which
grotesque garments would be made, while the feet would be wrapped about
with strips of just sufficient size to cover them, the fur being turned
inward, and held by strings tied about each foot. The fortunate possession
of a pair of good shoes was an object of neighborhood envy. Objects so
valued and prized as were real shoes, were worn only on special occasions.
It was a custom long after the original settlement of Alabama, for many to
take their shoes under their arms, in going to church, and just before
reaching the place of worship, to put them on. Shoes that creaked were
specially prized, as they would attract attention.
Small water mills came to be erected, and it was not unusual for one to
take his corn on his back the distance of twenty miles in order to have it
ground. This meant an absence from home of three or four days at a time.
From the earliest years of the century just gone, these conditions
continued in parts of the interior of Alabama till 1815 and even later.
The battle of New Orleans meant much for what was then known as the
southwest, of which Alabama was a part. Not a few of the future
distinguished families in the history of the state, emerged from
conditions such as here have been described. From straits of poverty, they
came to be among the most wealthy of the state.
LAFAYETTE'S VISIT
In April, 1825, when LaFayette visited Alabama, the state was about six
years old. Conditions were still very crude, there being but few roads,
and they bad enough in a wet season; but few villages existed; the country
was sparsely settled; the Indian was still in the land, but was now
subdued and peaceable, and a few boats plied the waters of the rivers.
Israel Pickens was then governor, and it was through his patriotic
enterprise as a wideawake governor, that LaFayette was induced to turn
aside from Augusta, Ga., and make the overland trip to Cahaba, the new
capital of Alabama, instead of going to Charleston to take a boat to New
Orleans.
LaFayette was now about sixty-eight years old, but he was still vigorous
and active, and so far from a tour through a region largely wilderness,
deterring him, he was really anxious to take it. As he came westward from
Augusta, conditions grew cruder, but every possible provision was made for
his comfort. For months together, he had been in the country as its guest,
and the character of the receptions varied in every respect save one--the
cordiality of the people which was unbounded.
The American congress had extended to him a formal invitation to return to
America on a visit, the invitation being impelled by a double motive, that
of showing the revolutionists of his own land, to whose vengeance
LaFayette had fallen a victim, because of his democratic principles, that
America was his loyal friend, and that of enabling a new generation of
Americans to express their gratitude to a patriot of France, who had spilt
his blood in behalf of the independence that they enjoyed. From the moment
that he landed on our soil, throughout, his tour was a triumphal journey,
and he was hailed with a universal tumult of honor and praise. He was
comparatively a poor man because of principle. Though the possessor of
vast estates in France, they were forfeited, or in plainer language, were
confiscated by the government of France, because of his republican
principles. The American congress voted him $200,000 in gold, and a
township of land. He was deeply moved by the gratitude and love of the
young nation, and often in speaking in response to welcomes accorded, his
voice would tremble with emotion. It may be said, in passing, that at the
one hundredth anniversary of the battle of Yorktown, in 1881, in which
battle LaFayette shared, a representative of his family was present as the
guest of the nation.
When LaFayette reached Washington, in 1825, there was accorded him an
ovation that was almost overwhelming. From long distances the common
people had traveled, some coming on foot, others on horseback, in ox
carts, wagons, carriages and every way, men, women and children, to catch
a glimpse of the great ally of Washington, and patriot of the revolution,
and all about the city on the outside were their braying mules, neighing
horses, and lowing oxen in the midst of an unbroken encampment formed by
the country folk. In crushing multitudes they thronged about LaFayette, in
genuine democratic style, seeking to grasp his hand, a demonstration that
was as much enjoyed by LaFayette as by themselves. Henry Clay was then
speaker of the house, and his speech of welcome to LaFayette is one of the
most splendid bursts of oratory that ever came from his musical lips. The
reply of the distinguished Frenchman did him great honor. It is a pity
that these great deliverances are buried in old and musty books of which
but little is known. Wherever LaFayette appeared in Washington, the
unrestrained multitudes would rush frantically toward him as though they
would devour him.
From Washington he planned his trip southward and westward, or toward the
great Southwest, as Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana were then called.
In making his dates, in advance, he knew practically nothing of the nature
of the country, nothing of the difficulty of travel, so that by the time
he reached the eastern border of Alabama he was several days behind time.
So far from delay cooling the ardor of the people, it had just the
opposite effect. The interest deepened, widened and seethed meantime, and
his announced coming into a given region absorbed all things else. Even
the Indians of Georgia and of Alabama were seized by the contagion of
enthusiasm, and while knowing little or nothing of LaFayette or of his
career, they learned that he was the friend of Washington, and a great
warrior, and so joined with native ardor into the excitement of his
reception. A body of painted warriors with varied and gay plumage, and
with bodies stained in divers colors, and wearing red and striped
blankets, insisted on becoming a part of his escort through Georgia, and
cherished the privilege of serving him with the most minute servility.
There is a good side to humanity always, if we only reach it. To the
Indians it was a special delight to shoot down an occasional buck on the
way, and to present it to the polite Frenchman between whose cultured
conventionality and the rude but touchingly sincere kindness of the
Indian, there was an amusing difference.
With great effort and sacrifice, Governor Pickens had made every
arrangement possible for as august demonstration as the young state could
give to the eminent guest of the nation. His plans were perfect in every
detail, for he was an executive master, as is shown by the correspondence
in the possession of the present writer, between him and the militia
commanders, as well as with the civil authorities and prominent citizens.
The chief difficulty seems to have been to raise a fund sufficient for a
demonstration worthy of the great French patriot, for money was
exceedingly scarce in those infant days of struggle, but Pickens was
indefatigable, and he had a way of accomplishing whatever he set his hands
to. Fortunate for Governor Pickens was the delay of LaFayette, as this
enabled him to execute more to his satisfaction the vast and difficult
plans relating to the series of receptions along the triumphal march of
LaFayette through Alabama. For days together, LaFayette was lost to the
public eye as traversing the wilderness he was lost in its depths, making
his way as best he could from the Savannah to the Chattahoochee under the
protection of the Georgia escort of militia and painted Indian warriors.
The correspondence shows that he could not be heard of for days together,
but on the banks of the Chattahoochee the provided escort waited, day
after day, till he should appear. He at last came within sight and the
demonstration began, and novel enough it was. Of this we shall learn more
in the article next succeeding.
LAFAYETTE'S RECEPTION
Large barges were in readiness to convey the party across the
Chattahoochee to the Alabama side, where was gathered a multitude of
distinguished citizens, a troop of Alabama militia under General Taylor,
and a body of Indian warriors in their native attire, who seemed more
enthusiastic than the others. As the barges glided toward the bank, the
Indians raised yell after yell, and rushed to the edge of the water to
receive them. They were under the command of Chilly Mackintosh, or Little
Prince. So soon as the barges were arranged for landing, the Indians
dashed on board, unhitched the horse from the sulky that bore LaFayette,
each vying with every other to render the promptest service, and drew the
vehicle to the top of the steep bank with every indication of delight.
When all was over, speeches of welcome and the response were in order.
Here LaFayette met a former aide of his, who had served him during the
Revolution, as a young man, but now somewhat advanced in life--Rev. Isaac
Smith, a Methodist missionary to the Indians. LaFayette recognized him,
and gave a warm and affectionate greeting. In the exuberance of his zeal,
the missionary begged that they bow in prayer. There under the tall trees
of the river's bank the party bowed in solemn prayer, LaFayette and the
Indians joining, and with uplifted voice, Mr. Smith prayed the blessings
of heaven on the great patriot. The Indians intent on showing their
interest proposed to have a game of ball for the entertainment of
LaFayette, after which Mr. Smith invited him to his humble home, where
they recounted to each other the scenes of their lives since they parted
at the disorganization of the army, about forty-three years before.
After a season of rest, LaFayette started with the cavalcade along a road
which led through an uninhabited region for almost a hundred miles, he
riding in a fine carriage drawn by four beautiful grays, and attended by
the uniformed state soldiery and the Indians, who proposed to see him
safely through their own territory. So complete were the arrangements made
by Governor Pickens, that at proper intervals, along the dreary and
monotonous way, there were the amplest provisions for refreshments, of
food, shelter, and rest.
At Line Creek, twenty miles from the village of Montgomery, the limit of
the territory of the Indians was reached, and here they took formal leave
of LaFayette. Their chief, the Little Prince, made a stirring speech to
LaFayette in his native tongue, not a word of which did LaFayette
understand, and guided solely by the gesticulation and facial expression
of the chief, the old patriot replied in English, not a word of which did
the Indians comprehend. With much ceremony they shook hands with
LaFayette, and quietly turned on their march to their homes in the woods.
At Line Creek, the ranks of the cavalcade were largely reinforced by the
addition of a fresh installment of troops and of many distinguished
citizens, who had made their way across the country from different
directions, in order to share in the demonstration. Once within the
confines of civilization the journey to Montgomery and beyond was relieved
by the cultivated fields of the white man, now in the bloom of young and
promising crops, and the homes of refinement dotting the country over.
This was a great relief to LaFayette, who had been buried for almost a
week in the depths of an uncultivated wilderness. The improved roads
enabled the procession to make greater speed as it moved toward the
village of Montgomery.