History of Louisiana United States of America

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Local History Notes:

LOUISIANA, one of the Southern States of the American confederacy, is bounded on the N. by Arkansas and Mississippi; E. by Mississippi, (from which it is separated by the Mississippi and Pearl rivers,) and the Gulf of Mexico; S. by the Gulf of Mexico, and W. by Texas, from which it is partly separated by the Sabine river. It lies between 29° and 33° N. lat., and 88° 50' and 94° 20' W. lon., having an extreme length from E. to W. of about 292, and a breadth of 250 miles, including an area of 46,481 square miles, or about 29,715,840 acres, of which only 1,500,025 were improved in 1850, or scarcely one-twentieth part of the entire surface of the state.

Population: Louisiana being originally colonized by France and Spain, has a larger admixture of the inhabitants of those countries (with their manners and customs) than any other state of the Union. There were in Louisiana in 1810, 76,556 inhabitants; 153,407 in 1820; 215,739 in 1830; 352,411 in 1840, and 517,753 in 1850; of whom 141,244 were white males; 114,248 females; 7479 free colored males; 9983 free colored females, and 125,874 male and 118,935 female slaves. Representative population, 419,824. This population was divided among 73,786 families, occupying 73,070 dwellings. Of the white population, 145,474 were born in the state; 60,447 in other states; 3550 in England; 24,266 in Ireland; 1244 in Scotland and Wales; 499 in British America; 17,507 in Germany; 11,552 in France; 7795 in other countries, and 620 whose places of birth were unknown, making nearly one-fourth of the free population of foreign birth. During the year ending June l, 1850, there occurred 11,948 deaths, or about 23 in every 1000 persons-the greatest proportion in any state of the Union. In the same period, 423 paupers, of whom 290 were foreigners, received aid, at an expense of about $40 to each person. The number of deaf and dumb in 1850 was 118, of whom 5 were free colored, and 34, slaves; blind, 218, of whom 25 were free colored, and 126, slaves; idiotic, 173, of whom 13 were free colored, and 56, slaves; and insane, 208, of whom 15 were free colored, and 43, slaves.

Parishes: Louisiana is divided into 48 parishes, viz. Ascension, Assumption, Avoyelles, Bienville, Bossier, Caddo, Calcasieu, Caldwell, Carroll, Cataboula, Claiborne, Concordia, De Soto, East Baton Rouge, East Feliciana, Franklin, Iberville, Jackson, Jefferson, Lafayette, Lafourche, Livingston, Madison, Morehouse, Natchitoches, Orleans. Plaquemines, Point Coupee, Rapides, Sabine, St. Bernard, St. Charles, St. Helena, St. James, St. John Baptist, St. Landry, St. Martin's, St. Mary. St. Tammany, Tensas, Terre Bonne, Union, Vermilion. Washita, Washington, West Baton Rouge, West Feliciana, and Winn, Capital, Baton Rouge.

Cities and Towns: New Orleans (population, 116,370) is the largest city in Louisiana, and the commercial metropolis of the South western States. The other towns are Lafayette, (a suburb of New Orleans,) population, 14,187, and Baton Rouge, 3905. The other principal towns are Donaldsonville, Iberville, Alexandria, and Shreveport.

Face of the Country: The surface of Louisiana nowhere attains an elevation of more than 200 feet above the level of the Gulf, while at Trinity, in Catahoula parish, it is only 68 feet, and much of the southern portion is so low as to be overflowed at high water. West of the basin of the Mississippi, and occupying the central and northern portion of the state, the country is hilly and broken. The N.W. part is intersected by several arms of the Red river, forming small lakes, and rendering the country for about 50 miles in length, and 6 in breadth, generally marshy. The bottoms on this river are from 1 to 10 miles wide. South of the central portion commences the low prairie lands, which terminate in the marshes of the coast. The elevation of this district varies from 10 to 50 feet. Below the mouth of the Red river, the Atchafalaya branches off from the Mississippi, and forms the western boundary of a great delta, occupying an area of several thousand square miles, which is elevated but 10 feet above low water, and at high water is often inundated. There is a belt of similar character on the W. bank of the Mississippi, above the Delta, which is protected by artificial embankments, that serve to deepen as well as confine the channel. That part of the state adjacent to the S. boundary of Mississippi, is similar in character to the district described in the N. W. Near the Gulf, a portion is salt marsh, mostly destitute of timber, and often overflowed in equinoctial gales. Darby states that 2700 square miles on the Mississippi, above the Red river, 2550 on the Red river, and 3200 on the Mississippi, below the Red river, are subject to inundations, though not all portions of it, annually.

Geology: According to Professor Forshey, the tertiary formation occupies two-fifths of the state, and lies N. of a waving line, commencing on the Sabine near the mouth of the river Neches, and extending 20 miles N. of Alexandria, to Harrisonburg: it contains coal, salt, iron, ochre, gypsum, and marl. A saline bed seems to underlie the tertiary. The rest of the state is alluvial and diluvial.

Minerals: Of the minerals mentioned above, iron is abundant in almost all the tertiary strata. The coal is inferior to that of Pittsburg, but the marl is rich, and the gypsum of the best quality. The alluvions of the Mississippi are bounded on the W. by precipitous hills of freestone, from 80 to 200 feet high. In the region around Harrisonburg, Dr. Holliday has collected very large quartz crystals, abundance of agates, jasper, sardonyx, cornelians, onyx, selenite, or crystallized gypsum, feldspar of a splendid quality, alumine in great abundance, chalcedony, lava, meteoric stones, amorphous iron ore, and fossils of various kinds.

Rivers, Bays, &c: Lake Borgne (properly a bay) and Black bay open into the Gulf of Mexico on the S. E.; and Bastien, Barataria, Atchafalaya, Cote Blanche, and Vermilion bays on the S.; and Sabine, Calcasieu, and Mermentau lakes on the S. W., are all expansions of rivers bearing the same names. Lakes Pontchartrain and Maurepas are expansions of the Amite river, near its entrance into Lake Borgne. Small lakes or sloughs are very numerous in the marshy regions in the southern part of the state and along the Mississippi river. Catahoula in the centre, and Bistineau, and Caddo in the N.W. are the principal lakes. The Mississippi river forms the east boundary of Louisiana to 31° N. lat., and passing through the south-eastern portion of the state, discharges its waters into the Gulf of Mexico by several mouths. The Red river enters the N. W. angle of Louisiana from Arkansas, and joins the Mississippi about the centre of the state. The Washita, coming S. from Arkansas, is the principal branch of the Red river. The Sabine, Calcasieu, and Mermentau drain the W. and S. W. parts of the state. The Pearl forms a part of the S. E. boundary. The Mississippi is navigable for the largest class steamboats far beyond the limits of Louisiana; and the Red river, since the removal of the obstruction called the Great Raft, near the N. W. boundary, is also navigable beyond the limits of the state. Of the different arms that part from the parent stream below 31° N. lat., the Atchafalaya, on the west, is the largest. Nine of these are navigable, according to Colonel Long's estimate, from 5 to 140 miles, making an aggregate of nearly 500 miles. The same authority estimates the Washita as navigable 375 miles, and its branches sum up a total of 715 miles of water, mostly within the state, navigable by steamers, to which the Red and its branches add several hundred more.

Objects of Interest to Tourists: Dr. Kilpatrick informs us that in the parish of Concordia there are numerous mounds, constructed by a race which he considers superior to the Indians of the present day. These mounds contain human bones, pottery, arrow-heads, stone hatchets, relics cut in the shape of a canoe or crescent, and in one instance, a gold ornament worth $7.50 was found. According to the same authority, these mounds form, in this country subject to overflow, good sites for gardens, orchards. &c. To the general inquirer, as well as to the geologist, the delta of the Mississippi affords a curious and most interesting subject for contemplation or research: See MISSISSIPPI, DELTA OF.

Climate, Soil, and Productions: Louisiana has very mild winters, but more severe than in the same parallel on the Atlantic coast. The long, hot summers acting on the extensive marshes of this state, cause a poisonous exhalation, which every autumn produces more or less yellow fever. The orange, lemon, lime, and other tropical fruits grow here, but the orange does not flourish above 30° N. lat., nor the sugar-cane above 31°. The apple thrives in the northern parts of the state. The best soil is on the river bottoms, which are exuberantly fertile, and productive in sugar-cane and rice. Two-thirds of the alluvial land is heavily timbered, and overrun with a thick undergrowth of cane. This district is easily drained, and when drained very productive. The prairie lands are often of no great fertility, and in some places barren. Cotton and sugar-cane are the great staples of the state, and of the latter, Louisiana produced nine-tenths of the whole amount raised in the Union in 1850. Indian corn, rice, peas, beans, Irish, and sweet potatoes, and butter are extensively produced; tobacco, wool, fruits, market products, hay, beeswax, and honey to considerable extent; and wheat, rye, buckwheat, wine, cheese, grass-seeds, hops, silk, and maple sugar, in very small quantities. Of fruits, the principal are oranges, figs, peaches, apples, and grapes. According to the census returns of 1850, there were in Louisiana 13,422 farms, occupying 1,590,025 acres of improved land, (nearly 120 acres to each plantation,) producing 10,226,373 bushels of Indian corn; 89,637 of oats; 161,732 of peas and beans; 95,632 of Irish potatoes; 6,428,453 of sweet potatoes; 3 of buckwheat; 2 of clover-seed; 97 of other grass-seeds; 4,425,349 pounds of rice; 26,878 of tobacco; 178,737 bales of cotton, of 400 pounds each; 109,897 pounds of wool; 683,069 of butter; 226,001,000 of cane sugar; 96,701 of beeswax and honey; 25,752 tons of hay; 10,931,177 gallons of molasses; value of orchard produce, $22,359; market goods, $148,329; and live stock, $11,152,275.

Forest Trees: Walnut, oak, sassafras, ash, mulberry, poplar, hickory, and magnolia are found in the central and northern parts, and on the more fertile uplands; buckeye, locust, papaw, cottonwood, and willow flourish in the bottom lands. Cypress swamps occupy certain basins, which having no outlet, retain the waters they receive at the flood season, till they either evaporate or sink into the earth. Pine and oak grow on the sandy uplands. Dr. Kilpatrick mentions among the timber of Concordia parish, (which is probably similar to many other river parishes,) the cottonwood, red elm, hackberry, maple, ash, pecan, hickory, honey locust, basket elm, dogwood, tupelo, 5 species of oak, box elder, cypress, prickly ash, black locust, mulberry, persimmon, willow, and wild cane, growing to the height of from 15 to 30 feet. The same authority says of fruits, in the same locality, the peach, quince, plum, and fig do well, but the apple and pear do not encourage culture.

Animals: Dr. Kilpatrick reports black bears, wolves, and panthers as occasionally found; besides which are wildcats, racoons, otters, polecats, opossums, squirrels, and moles; and among amphibia, huge alligators and various species of turtle. Among reptiles are the rattlesnake, viper, horned, and other snakes. Among birds are the bald and gray eagle, several species of hawks and owls, a few wild turkeys and pigeons, partridges, cranes, herons, water turkeys, wild geese, brant in abundance, and a great variety of smaller birds.

Manufactures: This state is not largely engaged in manufactures. In 1850 there were 1021 establishments, producing $500 and upwards annually, of which 8 were furnaces, employing $255,000 capital, and 347 male hands, consuming raw material worth $73,300, and producing 1570 tons of castings, valued at $308,500. Louisiana is largely engaged in the manufacture of the courser sugars and molasses; but the refining of these articles is mostly done in the Northern States. Of the 236,547 hogsheads produced in 1851-2, only 32,625 were refined in the state.

Internal Improvements: Louisiana has not the same necessity for railways and canals as many other states, having probably 2500 miles of navigable waters within her limits; still she has need of them for communication with other states, if she would maintain her commercial position. Railroads are projected and partly completed, connecting her commercial metropolis (New Orleans) with the great lakes at Chicago, and with the Ohio valley by way of Nashville, Tennessee. In January, 1853, there were 63 miles of railroad in operation, and 200 in course of construction, in this state, connecting Clinton and Port Hudson; New Orleans and Lake Pontchartrain: New Orleans and Proctorsville; and Woodville (Mississippi) and Bayou Sara, (Louisiana.) Besides these are the Carrollton, and the West Feliciana railroads, both short.

Commerce: Louisiana has no parallel on the hoe of our globe in the natural advantages which she enjoys for river trade with an interior, extending back directly north 2000 miles to St. Anthony's Falls; north-westward 3000 miles to the very base of the Rocky mountains; north-eastward through the entire extent of the Ohio Valley, 2500 miles, even into the State of New York; besides innumerable intermediate points in the great valleys of the Mississippi, Missouri, Ohio, Arkansas, Tennessee, Cumberland, Red river, and a multitude of tributary streams, which pour the products of fourteen states into her lap; while many more await but the advance of population to add new treasures from tracts now roamed over by the savage and the buffalo. Immense amounts of the products of the Western and Southwestern States, including cotton, pork, sugar, lead, flour, wheat, Indian corn, &c., are transhipped from New Orleans to various parts of our own and to foreign countries. The value of domestic produce received from the interior in 1850-51 amounted to $106,924,083, and to $108,051,708 in 1851-2, of which $81,216,925 were exported in the former year, and $76,344,569 in the latter. The articles from the interior received in the greatest amount are pork and bacon, beef, cotton, corn, flour, hides, lard, lead, molasses, sugar, tobacco, and whiskey, besides large quantities of apples, beans, baggings, bale rope, butter, cheese, candles, coal, furs, hemp, hay, leather, oats, linseed, castor and lard oil, potatoes, staves, and wheat; some beeswax, buffalo robes, cider, dried apples and peaches; feathers, flaxseed, iron, lime, onions, porter, ale, deer and bear skins, shot, soap, Spanish moss, tallow, twine, vinegar, window glass, and various other articles. The foreign imports for 1851-52 amounted to $12,057,724, and exports to $49,058,885; tonnage entered, 424,281; cleared, 544,482; tonnage owned in the different districts, 268,170 7/9 0/5; and number of vessels built, 16, with an aggregate tonnage of 1284 7/9 2/5. Of the entire tonnage owned, about 170,000 was in steam-vessels. About three-tenths of the foreign trade was carried on in foreign bottoms: See NEW ORLEANS.

Education: The constitution provides for a superintendent of public schools, to hold office for two years, and that free public schools shall be established throughout the state. An appropriation of $250,000 is made annually for the support of free schools, raised by taxation; and a fund is established, to be derived from the proceeds of public lands granted for the purpose, and from lands escheated to the state. This fund amounted on January 1, 1850, to $40,272.63. According to the census, the number of public schools in the state in 1850, was 675; teachers, 845, and pupils, 25,793; of academies there were 142; teachers, 355, and pupils, 5379; and of colleges, 8, professors and tutors, 47, and students, 725. In 1852 there were 1 law school, with 3 professors, and 1 medical, with 7 professors, and 188 students: See Table of Colleges, APPENDIX.

Religious Denominations: Of the 278 churches in Louisiana, in 1850, 72 were owned by the Baptists; 12 by the Episcopalians; 106 by the Methodists; 17 by the Presbyterians; and 55 by the Roman Catholics: the rest were owned by the Christians, the Free Church, French protestants, German Reformed, Jews, Temple of the Lord, Unionists, and Universalists-giving 1 church to every 1862 persons. Value of church property, $1,782,470: See Table of Religious Denominations, APPENDIX.

Public Institutions: The state penitentiary of Louisiana is located at Baton Rouge, and received 105 convicts in 1848, the receipts from whose labors exceeded the expenditures by about $6600. The charity hospital at New Orleans will be described under that heading. In 1850 there were six public libraries, with an aggregate of 30,000 volumes, and 13,000 in the different college libraries. The site for a deaf, dumb, and blind asylum has been located, and temporary buildings erected.

Government, Finances: The governor of Louisiana is elected for four years by the people, and receives $6000 per annum; the lieutenant-governor, who is ex-officio president of the senate, is elected for a like period, and receives $8 per diem when that body is in session. The senate consists of 32 members, and the house of representatives of 97, both elected by the people, the former for four, and the latter for two years. The judiciary consists: 1. Of a supreme court, composed of one chief and three associate judges; and 2. Of nine district courts. The judges of the supreme court are appointed for eight, and those of the district court for six years, jointly by the executive and legislature. The chief justice of the supreme court receives $6000, and his associates $5500 per annum. The judges of the district courts of New Orleans receive $3500 per annum. The new constitution, adopted in 1852, requires that the judiciary shall be elected by popular vote. Louisiana is entitled to 4 members in the national house of representatives, and to 6 electoral votes for president of the United States. The assessed value of property in Louisiana in 1850 was $220,165,172. Public debt in 1852, $11,492,566, of which $10,557,000 is contingent debt. Productive property, $2,416,938. Ordinary expenditures, exclusive of debt and schools, $515,000. In January, 1853, Louisiana had $10,934,130 of banking capital, a circulation of $4,409,271, and $5,946,990 in coin.

History: Louisiana was visited and the mouth of the Mississippi discovered by La Salle, as early as 1691; and though Iberville attempted a settlement in 1699, no permanent colony was established at that time. In 1712 the king of Prance granted to M. Crozart a charter which included the whole of the territory of Louisiana. The celebrated John Law, so notorious for the financial commotion and subsequent disasters caused by him in France, became in 1717 the head of a company which purchased Louisiana; but after the deplorable failure of his schemes, Louisiana came again into the possession of the crown, which transferred it, in 1762, to Spain. Retroceded to France in 1800, Louisiana including all the the territory west of the Mississippi, (excepting Texas and New Mexico, and the territory west of the Rocky mountains,) was purchased by President Jefferson in 1803, for the sum of $11,250,000, beside the assumption on the part of the United States of some claims of our citizens against the government of France. Previous to this purchase the inhabitants of the Western States and Territories had been in a state of great excitement lest they should lose the control of the mouth of the Mississippi, so essential as an outlet for their products; and the satisfaction of that portion of the country was proportionately great on its peaceful acquisition. That part of the Louisiana territory now known as the State of Louisiana became an independent member of the confederacy in 1812, and was, two years afterward, the scene of a conflict between the British and American troops, in which General Jackson repulsed the former with great loss, January 8th, 1815.

Biographies:

Francis Tillou Nicholls, governor of Louisiana, was born in Donaldsonville, La., Aug. 20, 1834 son of Thomas Clarke and Louisa H. (Drake) Nicholls, and grandson of Edward Church and Wilhelmina (Hamilton) Nicholls. His father was a member of the general assembly of Louisiana; judge of the district court and senior judge of the court of errors and appeals, and his mother was a sister of Joseph Rodman Drake . Francis was graduated from the U.S. Military academy and assigned to the 2d U.S. artillery, July 1, 1855, and served in Florida and at Fort Yuma, Cal., 1855-56. He was promoted 2d lieutenant in the 3d artillery, Oct. 19, 1855; resigned his commission, Oct. 1, 1856, and removed to Louisiana, where he was married in April, 1860, to Caroline Z. Guion of Lafourche parish. He practised law at Napoleonville, 1856-61. He was commissioned captain in the 8th Louisiana volunteer regiment early in 1861, becoming lieutenant-colonel on the organization of the regiment in the C.S.A; was promoted colonel of the 15th Louisiana regiment in 1862,and shortly after brigadier-general in command of the 2d Louisiana brigade. He led his brigade in the battle of Winchester, Va.,where he lost his left arm, and at Chancellorsville, where he lost his left foot. He was superintendent of the conscript bureau, trans-Mississippi department, 1864-65, and after the close of the war returned to Louisiana and practised law, 1865-76. He was Democratic governor of Louisiana, 1877-80 and 1888-92, and after the expiration of his first term as governor, practised law in New Orleans. He was a member and president of the board of visitors to the U.S. Military academy in 1886, and after the expiration of his second term as governor, he was appointed chief justice of the supreme court of Louisiana for a term of twelve years, 1892-1904.

From: Twentieth Century Biographical Dictionary of Notable Americans, Johnson, Rossiter, editor

Peter Derbigny, governor of Louisiana, was born in France and received the baptismal names, Pierre Auguste Charles Bourisgay. He fled during the revolution of 1789 to San Domingo and thence to the United States, living first at Pittsburgh, Pa., where he was married to a sister of Chevalier de Lozier; then in Missouri, afterward in Florida, and finally in Louisiana. He was secretary to Mayor Bors?e of New Orleans in 1803, and the same year became interpreter of languages for Governor Claiborne. In June, 1805, he was one of the three delegates to petition the U.S. government for the admission of Louisiana as a state of the Federal union, and when in March of the same year the act was passed providing for the government of the territory of Orleans, he, with the other agents, protested against the act as unjust to the inhabitants of Louisiana. In 1820, with Livingston and Moreau, he revised the laws of the state. He represented General Lafayette in New Orleans under a power of attorney transferred to his son, Charles Derbigny, in 1829. In 1828 he succeeded to the gubernatorial chair of the state and officially welcomed General Jackson to that city Jan. 8, 1829. He died in New Orleans, La., Oct. 6, 1829.

From: Twentieth Century Biographical Dictionary of Notable Americans, Johnson, Rossiter, editor

Meriwether Lewis, governor of Louisiana, was born near Charlottesville, Va., Aug. 18, 1774; the youngest son of Capt. William and Lucy (Meriwether) Lewis; grandson of Col. Robert and Jane (Meriwether) Lewis, and of Thomas Meriwether; great grandson of William Meriwether; great2 grandson of Nicholas Meriwether of Wales; and grand nephew of John Lewis, a member of the King's council before the Revolution, and of Fielding Lewis , and nephew of Col. Nicholas Lewis, who commanded a regiment of Virginia militia in the successful expedition against the Cherokee Indians in 1776, and who on the death of Meriwether's father became his guardian. Meriwether attended a Latin school, 1787-92; conducted his mother's farm, 1792-94; enlisted in the state militia called out by President Washington in 1794 to suppress the opposition to the excise taxes in western Pennsylvania, and then joined the regular service as lieutenant in the line. He was promoted captain in 1797, and became paymaster of the 1st U.S. infantry. In 1797 the American Philosophical society, through the suggestion of Thomas Jefferson, undertook to secure some competent person to ascend the Missouri river, cross the Stony mountains, and descend the nearest river to the Pacific. Captain Lewis, being then stationed at Charlottesville on recruiting duty, solicited Mr. Jefferson to he allowed to make the journey, but Andr? Michaux, the botanist, was appointed and proceeded as far as Kentucky, when he was recalled by the French minister, then in Philadelphia, and the attempt was abandoned. Captain Lewis served as private secretary to President Jefferson, 1801-03, and when congress voted the money to carry out the President's project of crossing the continent to the Pacific, he was entrusted with the command of the enterprise with Capt. William Clark, as second in command. He pursued a course in the natural sciences and astronomical observations at Philadelphia and at Lancaster, Pa., preparatory to the undertaking. The instructions, signed by President Jefferson, Jan. 20, 1803, detailed the scientific, geographical, commercial and diplomatic purposes of the expedition and provided for all contingencies likely to arise. The treaty of Paris, April 13, 1803, had meantime transferred the Territory of Louisiana to the United States, and the information reached Washington about the first day of July. On July 5, 1803, Captain Lewis left Washington for Pittsburg, where he was to select his stores, outfit and men. Delays in preparation retarded the journey down the Ohio and the expedition could not enter the Missouri until,the ice had broken up in the spring of 1804. They ascended the Missouri to its sources, crossed to Rocky Mountains, struck the headwaters of the Columbia river, floated down that river to its mouth and explored much of the Oregon country. Their explorations covered nearly all the section south of the 49th parallel. They started for the east, March 23, 1806, and reached Washington, Feb. 14, 1807. Congress granted to the two chiefs and their followers the donation of lands which had been promised as a reward for their toil and dangers. Captain Lewis was soon after appointed governor of Louisiana and Captain' Clark commissioned a general in the militia and made agent of the United Slates for Indian affairs in the territory of Louisiana. On reaching St. Louis, the capital of the territory, Governor Lewis found much confusion in public affairs, and in September, 1809, set out to Washington to carry valuable vouchers of accounts and his journal of the expedition to and from the Pacific. His party was joined at Chickasaw Bluffs by Mr. Neiley, U.S. agent to the Chickasaw Indians, and his party and they proceeded together. While at the home of a Mr. Gruider in Kentucky, in a fit of hypochondria, Governor Lewis killed himself. In the selection of names for the Hall of Fame for Great Americans, New York university, in October, 1900, his was one of the twenty-one names in "Class E, Missionaries and Explorers" and received thirteen votes, standing eighth in the class. He died Oct. 8, 1809.

From: Twentieth Century Biographical Dictionary of Notable Americans, Johnson, Rossiter, editor

Benjamin Howard, governor of Louisiana Territory, was born in Virginia about 1760. He tenroved to Kentucky when a young man and was a representative in the 10th and 11th congresses, resigning his seat in 1810 to accept from President Madison the appointment as governor of Louisiana Territory, which included the section west of the Mississippi river above the territory of Orleans with the seat of government at St. Louis. In March, 1813, President Madison appointed him a brigadier-general and he commanded the territory west of the Mississippi river. He died in St. Louis, Mo., Sept. 18, 1814.

From: Twentieth Century Biographical Dictionary of Notable Americans, Johnson, Rossiter, editor

History of Louisiana

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