The Quarterly of the Texas State Historical Association, Volume 6, July 1902 - April, 1903 Page: 11
401 p. : ill. ; 23 cm.View a full description of this periodical.
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Louis Juchereau de Saint-D67is.
Nachitoches. Here they built two store-houses1 wherein to bestow
their merchandise; and, leaving a guard of ten men to protect the
new post, with an additional contingent of thirty Nachitoches, they
proceeded to the village of the Asinais, where the Spanish had for-
merely had a mission. Here among the Tejas the journey seems to
have been suspended, though the intention of prosecuting it far-
ther was not entirely abandoned. They found among these Indians
an abundant supply of horses and cattle,2 so that, for the first pur-
pose of the expedition, they had no need to proceed farther. For
six months or more they seem to have carried on an active
exchange with the Indians of French guns, beads, knives, and cloth
for beasts and buffalo hides.3 Of this traffic the post lately estab-
lished on the Red River was naturally the center. Saint-Denis,
during this time, returned to the Natchez on the Mississippi to
give an account of his journey to the Governor, after which he took
more goods and repaired again to the country of the Asinais.4
The Frenchmen found that notwithstanding it had been more
than five years since a Spaniard had been among the Asinais, some
IPgnicaut, Margry, V 498.
2'Declaracion de Saint-Denis, Texas MSS., 124.
'Carta del Capitan Domingo Rcamon, Texas MSS., 134 vuelta.
'La Harpe, Margry, VI 193.
The fact that Saint-Denis's journey was not continuous from the time
of his departure from Mobile to his arrival in Mexico has not, I think,
been noticed by modern historians. Pnicaut's account makes the expedi-
tion continuous, but he may be thinking of only one phase of it. The
Declaraci6n takes no account of long stops, nor on the other hand does it
account for the year and nine months on the road. The evidence on which
I have based the statement above is as follows: Captain Ramon in a
letter to the viceroy, written in July, 1716, commends Saint-Denis for the
assistance he had given the Spaniards through his knowledge of the Indian
language, saying: "For he once lived in this province six months on two
occasions. He has given the Tejas eighteen or twenty French arquebuses,
many beads, bugles, knives, ribbons, some clasp-knives, small pieces of blue
and red cloth, and some coats; all of which the French have traded for
some beasts the times they have entered this province." Velasco, Dietamen
Fiscal, Texas MSS., 192, calls attention to the inconsistency of these
facts as given by Ramon and the statement of Saint-Denis in his Declara-
ci6n, and states further that the governor of Pensacola had given notice,
under date of October 20, 1715, "of what the French were publishing in
Mobile: that they had reached the province of Coahuila and carried away
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Texas State Historical Association. The Quarterly of the Texas State Historical Association, Volume 6, July 1902 - April, 1903, periodical, 1903; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth101028/m1/15/?rotate=90: accessed April 25, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.