IAGenWeb, dedicated to providing free genealogy records.

 

 Iowa History

       An IAGenWeb Special Project

 

Join the IAGenWeb Team

 

     

Our Iowa, Its Beginning and Growth

Herbert L. Moeller and Hugh C. Mueller

New York, Newsom and Company

 1938
 

Transcribed by Debbie Gerischer & Kaylee Bopp

           

~~~~~*~~~~~

THE DISCOVERY OF IOWA

~~~~~*~~~~~

LOUIS JOLIET

Louis Joliet, the son of the wagon maker, was born in Quebec.  He was educated by the Jesuits for the priesthood but became a wanderer and sailed to France.  Later he returned home and traveled into the wilderness.  He learned to speak several Indians languages.  Like other Frenchmen, Joliet had heard of a great river and a beautiful land.  This land was farther west than any Frenchman had ever traveled.  He decided that he wanted to find it.

Early in the year 1673 the French governor of Canada decided to send someone to explorer this great river and this wonderful land.  He picked Joliet as the best man he could get for the task.  Usually a priest also went along on such trips.  The priests were sent as missionaries to the Indians.  They were educated men and could make maps and keep good records  of their trips.

FATHER MARQUETTE

Several priests wanted to go with Joliet.  Father Marquette was chosen.  He had heard that the Illinois tribe of indians were very smart.  Since he had learned to speak their language he was anxious to visit them.

Father Marquette was twelve years older than Joliet.  He was born in France and had gone to school there.  Soon after he came to Quebec in September,1666, he was sent to a mission church on the Great Lakes.  He was especially interested in Indians and learned to speak six of the Red Man's languages.  The Indians liked him because he was brave an friendly.

THE JOURNEY

Marquette and Joliet  took five French Canadian woodsman along to paddle the canoes and to help them with their work.  Only two canoes of the Canadian type were taken.  They were birch-bark canoes, built with cedar splints, ribs of spruce roots and covered with yellow-pine pitch.  They were light but very strong.  For food they took only Indian corn and some smoked meat.  They expected to get most of their food along the way.  They took guns, ammunition, gifts for the Indian tribes, and paper on which to keep records of the trip.

We learn of the trip through Marquette's written account of it and from what Joliet could remember about it.  Joliet on his way back to the French governor had the misfortune to upset his canoe and to lose all his records.

On May 17, 1673, mass was held in the little rude church at point St. Ignance, at the outlet of Lake Michigan.  After this the brave Frenchmen boldly set out on their trip.  The first part of it, over the waters of Lake Michigan, was easy.  

Soon they met the first Indian tribe.  It was a tribe of wild rice eaters.  They were friendly.  The white men got food and guides from them.  Father Marquette tells us in his journal that he liked the wild rice very much.  These Indians gave Marquette and Joliet warnings about the terrible tribes that they would meet farther west.  They said, too, that it was hard to travel on the rivers.

Father Marquette writes of many things that were new and of interest to the Frenchmen.  There were fish such as they had never seen before.  Marquette tells in his journal of a large one that nearly upset his canoes.  Occasionally the Frenchmen would would go on land to hunt.  They killed "Wild Cattle," as they called the buffalo, and other strange animals.  The explorers usually slept in their canoes, which were anchored near shore.  They did not camp on land for fear of an attack by unfriendly Indians.

IOWA LAND

The Frenchmen floated down the Wisconsin River for several days.  Suddenly, on June17, 1673, they came upon the great river.  There they gazed for the first time upon Iowa land.  It was across from where Prairie du Chien is now.  Marquette wrote, "We entered the Mississippi with a joy I cannot express."  It was the first time, in so far as we know for sure, that any white man had seen Iowa land or the upper Mississippi River.

Eight days went by on the Mississippi without seeing any signs of human beings.  Then, on June 25, one of the men saw footprints on the sand.  Quickly the canoes were brought to shore.  The footprints led to a path.  The Frenchmen did not know what to do.  They did not know how the Indians would treat them.  Finally, it was decided that Marquette and Joliet would go alone and unarmed.  If the Indians saw but two men and those without guns, they would know that the white men could do them no harm.  The five boatmen were left with the canoes and were told that if anything happened to their leaders they were to return home at once with the records.

Marquette and Joliet followed the path for several miles until they came to an Indian village.  We do not know just where the village was located, but it was in Southern Iowa, near the Mississippi.  As they came near the village.  Soon four chiefs carrying peace pipes came to meet the White men.  Marquette was glad when he found that the Indians were of the Illinois tribe.

The two Frenchmen smoked the pipe of peace with the Indians.  A great feast was held and presents were exchanged.  The next day, after learning all they could about the great river and the lands near it, the Frenchmen left.  They visited two more villages and soon left Iowa land, never to see it again.  They returned to Canada by way of the Illinois River.

Marquette and Joliet paid Iowa but a short visit.  Their trip however, became famous and important.  It caused other to follow them and France later claimed the great Mississippi Valley region, largely because of this trip.

 

back to History Index