Spanish Missions: The French Challenge Wayne Davidson M. Ed Da Vinci School for Science and the Arts

La Salle’s Expedition Spain no longer the only European power in North America The French & British had a presence.

La Salle’s Expedition 1682: René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle expanded the French Empire René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle

Claimed all land drained by the Mississippi River for France. La Salle’s Expedition Claimed all land drained by the Mississippi River for France.

La Salle’s Expedition La Salle returns to France. He asks for permission to establish a colony at the mouth of the Mississippi River.

La Salle’s Expedition King Louis XIV of France supported the La Salle expedition. The plan to build a settlement had to be kept a secret from the Spanish who would be angered at a French site so near Texas. Louis XIV of France (“Louis the Great”)

La Salle’s Expedition Summer 1684: La Salle leaves France with four ships and 300 soldiers and settlers. Troubles along the way. February 1685: Poor navigation causes them to miss the mouth of the Mississippi River, and they land at Matagorda Bay in Texas.

Fort St. Louis Fort St. Louis- Settlement built by members of the La Salle Expedition. Settlement consisted of several simple houses and a five room fort; eight cannons placed around the walls for protection.

Cannons excavated at the site of Ft. St. Louis

Fort St. Louis La Salle leads an expedition westward towards the Rio Grande. It is only when he finds the Rio Grande that he realizes he has missed the mouth of the Mississippi River. He is gone from October 1685 to March 1686. In his absence, the colony falls into crisis.

Fort St. Louis Hunger and disease begin to kill the colonists. Fort came under repeated attack from the Karankawa Indians. By July, 1685: Over ½ of the colonists are now dead.

Fort St. Louis La Salle returns to Fort St. Louis to find desperate conditions. He decides that he will take 17 men to the east, find the Mississippi River, and sail north to Canada for help.

Fort St. Louis He made two easterly marches, to the Hasinai, or Tejas, Indians, hoping to find the river and proceed to his Fort St. Louis of the Illinois. On the second of these he was slain in an ambush by a disenchanted follower, Pierre Duhaut, six leagues from one of the Hasinai villages, on March 19, 1687. The bloodletting, already begun in a hunting camp, claimed the lives of seven others. Six of the seventeen who had left the settlement site with La Salle continued to Canada and, eventually, France. Among them were La Salle's brother, Abbé Jean Cavelier, Anastase Douay, and Henri Joutel, each of whom later wrote of the expedition. Six other Frenchmen, including two deserters who had reappeared, remained among the East Texas Indians.

Fort St. Louis At his settlement site La Salle had left hardly more than twenty persons, with the crippled Gabriel Minime, Sieur de Barbier, in charge. They consisted of women and children, the physically handicapped, and those who for one reason or another had incurred La Salle's disfavor. Jean Baptiste Talon, who provides the only eyewitness account, relates that after La Salle's departure peace was made with the Karankawas, whose enmity the leader had incurred at the outset. The Indians, learning of La Salle's death and the disunity among the French, attacked the settlement by surprise around Christmas 1688, sparing only the children. Madame Barbier and her babe at breast—the first white child of record born in Texas—were saved temporarily by the Indian women, only to be slain when the men returned from the massacre. The women succeeded in saving four Talon children and Eustace Bréman, the paymaster's son, who were adopted into the tribe.

Fort St. Louis France’s claim to Louisiana was made possible by La Salle’s exploration of the Mississippi.

The Spanish Search for Fort St. Louis The Spaniards, having learned of the French intrusion from captured pirates who turned out to be defectors from La Salle, sought the French colony with five sea voyages and six land marches. On April 4, 1687, pilots of the voyage of Martín de Rivas and Pedro de Iriarte came upon the wreckage of the bark Belle on Matagorda Peninsula. Fragments of the storeship Aimable were found in Cavallo Pass, where she had grounded, and along the coast. The ruined settlement site was discovered on April 22, 1689, by Alonso De León, who had led a march from San Francisco de Coahuila, now Monclova. Two Frenchmen living among the Hasinais, Jean l'Archevêque and Jacques Grollet, gave themselves up.

Spanish Missions in Texas Spain worries that the French might gain control if there is no Spanish settlement in the area. San Fransisco de los Tejas- mission built by the Spanish in East Texas that ended in failure. Replica of the San Francisco de los Tejas mission Mission Tejas State Park, Grapeland, TX