Fort Saint-Louis, Texas, was founded in 1685 by French explorer René-Robert Cavelier de La Salle and members of his expedition, including Jesuit missionary Zenobius Membre, on the banks of Garcitas Creek, a few kilometers inland from the mouth of the Lavaca River. La Salle had intended to establish the colony at the mouth of the Mississippi, but inaccurate charts and navigational errors led his ships more than six hundred kilometers (more than 372 miles) to the west, to the coast of Texas.
The colony's brief existence was fraught with difficulties, including the hostility of the natives, epidemics and harsh climatic conditions. Conscious of his original mission, La Salle led several expeditions to find the Mississippi, which led him to explore much of the Río Grande and eastern Texas. During one of his absences, in 1686, the colony's last ship was destroyed, prohibiting the colonists from obtaining supplies from French possessions in the Caribbean Sea. His last expedition took place on the Brazos River in early 1687. It was then that La Salle and five of his men were murdered, due to rivalries within the group he was leading.
Spain heard of La Salle's mission in 1686. Worried that a French colony might threaten their possessions in New Spain, the Spanish authorities launched several expeditions to discover and destroy it. A Spanish expedition led by Alonso de León finally came upon the remains of the fort in the spring of 1689, three or four months after the Karankawas people had killed most of the French, with the exception of five children whom they captured. Although it only existed for three years, this colony enabled France to claim possession of Texas, and later the United States to justify its claim to Spanish Texas, on the pretext that it was part of the territory involved in the Louisiana Purchase.
Context
By the end of the 17th century, much of North America was occupied by European countries. Spain possessed Florida, Mexico and most of the southwest of the continent (Spanish Texas). The North Atlantic coast was in British hands, and the French occupied New France, much of what is now Canada, as well as the Illinois Country. The French feared that their territory was vulnerable to the expansionist aims of their neighbors. In 1681, Robert de La Salle launched an expedition down the Mississippi, hoping to reach the Pacific Ocean, but in fact discovered a route leading to the Gulf of Mexico. Although Hernando de Soto had explored and taken possession of this region for Spain one hundred and forty years earlier, on April 9, 1682, La Salle claimed the Mississippi Valley on behalf of the King of France, Louis XIV, and named it Louisiana, in his honor.
Without the French presence at the mouth of the Mississippi, Spain would control the entire Gulf of Mexico and pose a threat to the southern borders of New France. La Salle considered the Mississippi to be close to the eastern tip of New Spain, and on his return to France in 1683, he proposed the creation of a colony at the river's mouth. This would provide a base for promoting Christianity among the native peoples, as well as an ideal bridgehead for attacking the Spanish province of Nueva Vizcaya and gaining control of its rich silver mines. He argued that a small number of Frenchmen could succeed in invading New Spain through an alliance with the native peoples, angry at being enslaved by the Spanish. After Spain declared war on France in October 1683, Louis XIV agreed to support La Salle's plan; his official duties from then on included "confirming the allegiance of the Indians to the crown of France, which would lead them to the true faith, and maintaining inter-tribal peace."
The expedition
La Salle's original plan was to sail to New France, then over the continental waterways to the Illinois Country and again descend the Mississippi to its mouth. However, Louis XIV instructed La Salle to sail across the Gulf of Mexico, which Spain considered its exclusive property. Although La Salle had requested only one ship, on July 24, 1684, he left La Rochelle with four vessels: the 36-gun man-of-war, Le Joly, the 300-ton supply ship, L'Aimable, the three-masted ship, La Belle, and the ketch, Saint-François. Although Louis XIV supplied Le Joly and La Belle, La Salle, who wanted more cargo space, leased L'Aimable and Saint-François to French merchants. The king also provided one hundred soldiers and the entire crews of the ships, as well as funds to hire skilled workers to join the expedition. However, La Salle was obliged to use his own funds to purchase goods for exchange with the Amerindians.
The ships carried nearly 300 people, including soldiers, craftsmen, six missionaries, eight merchants and more than a dozen women and children. Shortly after their departure, France and Spain ceased hostilities, and Louis XIV showed little interest in sending reinforcements to La Salle. Details of the voyage were kept secret, so that Spain was unaware of its purpose, and La Salle's naval officer, Sieur de Beaujeu, was furious at not having been informed of their destination until after their departure. Discord between them intensified when they arrived in Saint-Domingue and quarreled over where to anchor. Beaujeu set sail for another part of the island, allowing the Spanish privateers to seize the Saint-François, fully loaded with provisions and tools for the colony.
During the 58-day voyage, two people died of illness and one woman gave birth to a child. The journey to Santo Domingo took longer than expected, and provisions were rather limited, especially after the loss of the Saint-François. La Salle had little money to replenish supplies, but two of the merchants on board had sold some of their goods to the islanders, and lent their profits to La Salle. To fill the gaps left by the desertion of several men, La Salle recruited a few islanders to join the expedition.
At the end of November 1684, when La Salle had just recovered from a severe illness, the three ships set off in search of the Mississippi delta. Before they left Santo Domingo, local sailors warned them that the Gulf's powerful currents could push their ships back towards the Florida Straits, if they did not correct their course. On December 18, the expedition reached the Gulf of Mexico, entering territory that Spain claimed as its own. None of the members of the expedition had ever sailed the Gulf or known its coasts. Due to inaccurate charts, a miscalculation by La Salle in determining the latitude of the mouth of the Mississippi, and an exaggerated correction for currents, the expedition was unable to find the Mississippi. It landed in Matagorda Bay in early 1685, over six hundred kilometers west of the river.
Fort construction On February 20, the colonists disembarked for the first time since leaving Santo Domingo three months earlier. They set up a temporary camp on the site of today's Matagorda lighthouse. The expedition's chronicler, Henri Joutel, described his first impression of Texas as follows: "The country did not seem very favorable to me. It was flat and sandy, but nevertheless covered with grass. There were several small salt lakes. We didn't see much wild fowl, except for a few sandhill cranes and geese that weren't expecting us.
Against Beaujeu's advice, La Salle ordered La Belle and L'Aimable "to negotiate the narrow and shallow pass" to bring supplies closer to camp. To lighten L'Aimable's load, its eight cannons and a small part of its cargo were unloaded. After La Belle had successfully negotiated the pass, La Salle sent his pilot to L'Aimable to help with the navigation, but L'Aimable's captain refused.Henri Joutel (1713), . As L'Aimable set sail, a group of Karankawas Amerindians approached and kidnapped some of the colonists. La Salle took a small group of soldiers to rescue them.Henri Joutel (1713), . When he returned, L'Aimable was stranded on a sandbank. After learning that the captain had given the order to sail even though his ship had hit the shoal, La Salle was convinced that the captain had deliberately beached his ship.
For several days, the men tried to salvage tools and provisions from L'Aimable, but a storm prevented them from saving more than a few cannons, gunpowder, some food and goods before the ship sank on March 7. The Karankawas then plundered the remains of the shipwreck, which washed ashore. When French soldiers approached their village to take back their possessions, the natives went into hiding. Discovering the village deserted, the soldiers recovered the goods, but also stole some furs and two canoes. The furious Karankawas then attacked, killing two Frenchmen and wounding several others.
Beaujeu, having accomplished his mission of escorting the colonists across the Atlantic Ocean, returned to France aboard the Joly in mid-March 1685.Henri Joutel (1713), p. 94. Many of the colonists chose to leave with him, leaving only a group of 180. Although Beaujeu delivered a message from La Salle on his arrival requesting more provisions, the French authorities, now at peace with Spain, never responded. Among the remaining colonists, those suffering from dysentery and venereal disease gradually died. The healthy built wells and a temporary fort on the island of Matagorda.
On March 24, La Salle took 52 men in five canoes to find a less exposed site. They discovered Garcitas Creek, a fish-filled river with fertile banks. They named it Rivière aux Bœufs after the bison that grazed nearby. Fort Saint Louis was built on a promontory overlooking the river, a league and a half from its mouth. Two men died, one bitten by a rattlesnake and the other drowning while fishing. Sometimes at night, the Karankawas surrounded them and howled, but the soldiers managed to scare them off with a few shots.
In early June, La Salle led the remaining settlers to the newly discovered site. Seventy people embarked on an 80-kilometer overland journey on June 12. All provisions and goods were unloaded from La Belle, a back-breaking task that was completed by mid-July. The last load was taken away by the 30 men who had guarded the ship until then. Although trees were growing near the new site, they were not suitable for building a fort, and logs had to be transported several kilometers to the construction site. Some of the beams and planks salvaged from L'Aimable were also transported. By the end of July, half the settlers had died of exhaustion and starvation.
The survivors build a large two-storey building in the center of the site. The first floor was divided into three rooms, one for La Salle, one for the priests and one for the officers. The second floor featured a single room for storage. Surrounding the building were several other, smaller rooms housing the other members of the expedition. The eight cannons rescued from L'Aimable, each weighing between 318 and 514 kg, were positioned around the fort.
Explorations For several months, the colonists led short expeditions to explore the surroundings of their new domain. At the end of October 1685, La Salle decided to lead an expedition further afield with his only remaining ship, La Belle. He resupplied the ship and took on board 50 men in addition to La Belle's 27-man crew, leaving 34 men, women and children at the fort. The main body of the crew accompanied La Salle in canoes along the coast, while La Belle followed further out to sea. After a three-day voyage, they came upon a village of hostile Amerindians. Twenty Frenchmen attacked the native village, where they found various Spanish artefacts. Several men died from eating Barbary figs, and the Karankawas killed a small group camping on the beach, including La Belle's captain.