The Quarterly of the Texas State Historical Association, Volume 1, July 1897 - April, 1898 Page: 267
334 p. : ill., ports., maps ; 23 cm.View a full description of this periodical.
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The Real Saint-Denis. 267
The first mention which I have been able to find of Saint-Denis
occurs in the Historical Journal of the Establishment of the French
in Louisiana,* which is one of our chief sources of information
relative to the early history of that province. The entry in the
Journal, referring to March, 1700, reads as follows: "On the 22d
M. de Bienville set out with M. de Saint-Denys and twenty Cana-
dians and Indians to visit the Yatase nation, on the Red river,
and watch the Spaniards." t This journey of reconnoissance seems
to have been a short one, as Bienville was again at Biloxi within a
month. Two months later, May 29, 1700, Saint-Denis was once
more sent out "to explore the country in the Red river, and to
watch the Spaniards."I From 1700 to 1705, he is mentioned three
times by the Journal as acting in various capacities.ll
From P6nicaut's Relation we learn further that Saint-Denis
* The authorship of the Journal historique de l'6tablissement des
Francais a la Louisiane is not known; Winsor's Narrative and Crit-
ical History of America, vol. V, p. 63, says that it "is founded largely
upon the journals of Le Sueur and La Harpe, though it is evident that
the author had other sources of information. Within its pages may be
found a record of all the expeditions dispatched by the colony to the Red
River region and to the coast of Texas. The work of compilation was
done by a clear-headed methodical man. " A translation into English
of a part of the work may be found in B. F. French's Historical Collec-
tions of Louisiana, vol. III. My references are all to this translation.
The Journal is also published in full in vol. IV of Pierre Margry's
D6couvertes et 6tablissements.
t Historical Journal, in B. F. French's Historical Collections of Louis-
iana, vol. III, p. 18.
$ Ibid., p. 19.
II Ibid., pp. 28; 30, 31; 32, 33.
P~nicaut was at the fort on the Mississippi where Saint-Denis com-
manded when orders came to abandon it; he was also one of the party
who accompanied Saint-Denis on his first trip to Mexico. His Relation
must be used with caution, as he was fond of embellishing it with a
good story; dates, and such facts as he acquired at second-hand can not
be trusted. The work has been published in volume V of Pierre Mar-
gry's D6couvertes et 6tablissements. Part of it has also been translated
into English by B. F. French in his Historical Collections of Louisiana,
second series; my references are to the original in Margry.
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Texas State Historical Association. The Quarterly of the Texas State Historical Association, Volume 1, July 1897 - April, 1898, periodical, 1897/1898; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth101009/m1/293/?rotate=90: accessed March 28, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.