The French in Michigan Notes

The French in Michigan

France's Initial Focus

  • France was a wealthy and populous nation in Europe.
  • Before Columbus, France focused on internal consolidation, capturing territory from the British and along the Mediterranean Sea.
  • The French Kings struggled to unite the country due to internal and external threats, including warring nobles.

France's Shift to Exploration

  • Around 1520, France recognized the potential of exploration, discovery, land, and wealth, inspired by Spain's success in the New World.
  • The French aimed to find a passage to the Orient and frequently explored the New World, hoping to reach China.

Differences from British Colonization

  1. Access to the Interior:
    • The French had access to the interior because they were not restricted by the Appalachian Mountains.
    • This allowed them to explore westward, hoping to reach the Pacific Ocean and China via the Northwest Passage.
  2. Motives for Colonization:
    • The British sent people to occupy new lands for profit and religious freedom.
    • The French had less desire to "people" the New World; only around 10,000 French migrated to stay (though perhaps 50,000 to 100,000 came).
    • Only about 1,500 French lived in Michigan.

Michigan as Part of New France

  • Michigan was part of New France from 1600 to 1760.
  • The British took over the region after victories in the French and Indian War (1754-1763).

Conflicting Visions

  • Paris officials wanted to consolidate power in New France with key trade posts near Quebec and Montreal, focusing on industry and agriculture.
  • Local governors envisioned a larger empire with settlements throughout the west, emphasizing diffusion.
  • Many locals saw the fur trade as more expansive than officials in France did.

Reasons for French Arrival

  1. Exploration
  2. Riches
  3. Religion
  4. Empire
  5. Adventure

Exploration

Jacques Cartier
  • Led three expeditions aimed at finding the Northwest Passage to the Orient in the 1530s.
  • Established a fort at Quebec City.
  • Received greater support from Francis I in the 1540s.
  • The King wanted a permanent presence in the New World but was technically prohibited by Pope Alexander IV, who had divided the New World between Spain and Portugal.
  • The religious argument used was that North Americans needed conversion to Catholicism.
  • Early efforts failed, upsetting natives, and the French became preoccupied with internal religious wars between Protestants and Catholics for 60 years.
Etienne Brule
  • Sent by Samuel De Champlain to live with native people to learn their language, customs, and the land's resources, and to facilitate trade.
  • Also hoped to learn about the western area and a water passage to China.
  • He and a companion were the first Europeans to see Michigan, arriving in the Upper Peninsula in 1622.
  • At this time, the British had only two small settlements in North America: Jamestown and Plymouth, both on the coast.
  • Brule reached as far west as Lake Superior.
Father Marquette
  • Born in 1637 and initially planned to be a missionary to the Orient but was sent to Canada in 1668.
  • Spent the first two years at Sault St. Marie, then went to Illinois.
  • Heard of a great river flowing north and south and hoped to locate it; also interested in the people in the region for future missionary activity.
  • Teamed up with Jesuit turned fur trader Louis Jolliet.
  • Set out in May 1673, reached Green Bay, and eventually the Mississippi one month later.
  • Explored south but never found a link to the Orient.
  • Realized that areas south of the Arkansas River were controlled by Spain.
  • Returned to Green Bay, then set out south again, but Marquette became ill and decided to return to St. Ignace but died in 1675 somewhere along the west coast of Michigan, likely near present-day Ludington.
  • Jolliet created maps of the explored regions, lost them, and then recreated them from memory. They were published and the lake they traveled, Lake Illinois became Lake Michigami in 1681.
Robert La Salle
  • Born in 1643; his brother was a monk whose order held large tracts of land in the New World, leading to La Salle possessing a huge estate 8 miles from Montreal.
  • Grew bored with farming and became interested in adventure.
  • Tales of Indians and lands to the west, as well as the elusive NW passage, caused him to sell land and head west.
  • Abandoned the passage to the Orient and focused on establishing French control at the southern end of the Mississippi River.
  • Supported by Count Frontenac, who also wanted an extensive empire and widespread fur trade.
  • Frontenac established posts and forts in the western areas.
  • La Salle commanded forts and explored the Great Lakes region, frequently violating trade agreements and trading in illegal furs.
  • Navigated the Great Lakes from Lake Ontario to Lake Huron, crossed the interior of Michigan to St. Joseph, and sailed down the Mississippi, claiming its mouth for France but was assassinated by his own men.

Riches: Fur Trade

  • Fur was the main product of New France.
  • Furs were light, storable, desired, and valuable.
  • The Great Lakes Region was perfect because the colder climate made for thicker furs, native people had experience trapping, and rivers and lakes provided easier transport.
  • The fur trade was a monopoly of companies chartered by the Government.
  • Most hunting was done by natives; very few French participated in the trade, except:
    1. Coureurs de bois (wood-rangers):
      • Went into the country, hunted, trapped, and lived with the Indians.
      • Lived a rough life in the woods in the winters, frequently trading furs illegally.
    2. Voyageurs (boatmen):
      • Transported furs by canoe; only about 200 in 1650.
      • Loaded and unloaded cargo several times, carrying 100-pound bundles.
  • The fur trade made only a few wealthy, with profits as high as 1000%.
  • For this reason, the French could not succeed at colonization; the possibility of profit drew young men into the trade, depleting the number of farmers who might have lent stability, had families, and grown food.
  • Instead, they lived among the natives.
  • The fur trade would lead to war and conflict, so the source of success was also the cause of downfall.
  • The fur trade had a major impact on Natives:
    1. French introduced a market economy based on accumulating raw materials that could be exchanged for other goods or profit, but they were usually underpaid or ripped off.
    2. Natives spent more time hunting and trapping, disrupting their old patterns and depleting furs, forcing them into greater dependency.
    3. The exchange often involved advanced tech that altered life with weapons and textiles.
    4. Involved them in later international wars.
    5. Health issues, like exposure to disease and alcohol.
Farming
  • Provided a limited livelihood, mostly subsistence farming, as there were no markets to sell goods to and very little surplus.
  • Only potential customers were voyaguers and soldiers, and there weren't many of them.
  • In 1750, only 500 people and 33 Indian slaves lived on 75 farms near Detroit; they grew only 1070 acres of wheat, oats, and corn and had 150 horses, 210 oxen, 470 cows, 250 hogs, and 2200 chickens.
  • There was never a demand for Michigan grain during the French period; products would not be sold out of state until the 1830s-40s.
  • Michigan's location was a problem for selling because ice and cold blocked travel.

Religion

  • French involvement in Michigan coincided with the Catholic Counter-Reformation, an aggressive effort by the Catholic Church to undo the Protestant Reformation and re-convert people to Catholicism.
  • Jesuits were a group of highly educated and dedicated monastic order that rejected solitude, believing that participation in the world was needed, they were also educated to counter complaints that clergy were uneducated and superstitious.
  • The first effort was among the Ottawa and Wyandot in 1641- Father Charles Raymbaut and Isaac Jogues celebrated the first mass in Michigan for about 2000 Indians.
  • These two groups were driven South by the Iroquois - The Jesuits follow them- Father Jacques Marquette was especially important; He ministered to the Hurons and Ojibwa in the Mackinac area in 1671 and in 1673 set out to find the Mississippi river in hope that it would lead to China.
  • Missionary activity declined by the end of the 18th century. By 1760, there were only 2 priests in Michigan
  • Missionary activity in the New World coincided with increased conflict between Michigan's tribes and groups from the East (Iroquois) and West (Sioux).
  • Michigan's Indians feared both warrior groups and were constantly on the move, making Christianizing difficult because Catholic missionaries were used to setting up a mission as a central location for converting.
  • Efforts in Michigan accomplished little. Only the Wyandot (Huron) were interested; most groups cared little for European religion.
  • Religious leaders in tribes (medicine men) viewed Jesuits as competitors; if they failed to prove that their gods were stronger than the Christian God, they would lose influence.
  • European spread disease made the medicine man's task easier; they could persuade others that accepting Jesuits would cause death.
  • Native people were attached to a way of life that had existed, created order and certainty, and explained the world around them.
  • This was not true of all regions in North America, where a shear number of Europeans resulted in significant conversions in other regions.
  • One important role played by Jesuits was that they recorded what they found in Michigan.
  • Reports were edited and published as the Jesuit Relations - observations and maps of the place and people they met.

Empire

French Government
  • Governor - supervised military and head of relations with Indians
  • Intendant - dealt with Justice, finance, and TAX COLLECTION
  • The government's main focus was on controlling the fur trade by:
    1. Restricting the number of locations where trade took place, usually limited to Detroit and Michilimackinac
    2. Restricting the number of traders by licensing only a certain lucky few - of course- this process creates potential for great corruption -favoritism, bribery, use of power - who controls the handout of licenses and what will people do to get them?
  • Limiting the number of traders has benefits by reducing possible tensions by eliminating probability of unscrupulous traders taking advantage of natives or starting conflicts that might lead to war.
  • Many French ignored licensing requirements and other regulations, frequently engaged in trade as middlemen between the Indians and the British and Dutch.
  • The potential for profit makes illegal trade worthwhile.
  • The British, having tasted this trade, established the HUDSON BAY CO. in 1670, leading to intense competition.
Upper Peninsula v. Lower Peninsula
  • Much of what happened early on involved the Upper Peninsula.
Cadillac and Detroit
  • The period between La Salle's voyages and 1700 witnessed renewed war in Europe (War of the League of Augsburg and King William's War in New World).
  • The Treaty of 1701 - Years of warfare took a toll to the point that the Iroquois, French, and other tribes were ready to enter a peace treaty to end conflict.
  • The Treaty brought a new era of French expansion.
  • Antoine Cadillac had been a privateer, soldier, and commander of Fort Michilimackinac.
  • During his time there, he had made a small fortune in the fur trade and angered the Jesuits because he supplied Indians with Brandy.
  • In part, these earlier actions had resulted in a return to the concentration policy.
  • By 1699, however, Cadillac had convinced Count Pontchartrain (King's main minister) that concentration and abandonment of the west were dangerous.
  • The War of the League of Augsburg led to a desire to create a new fort at a strategic location between Lake Erie and Lake Huron along the Detroit River.
  • French officials conceded for military reasons, and Cadillac was sent to establish the fort.
  • He envisioned more than a temporary fort of soldiers, traders, and missionaries; he wanted civilians and families who would stay permanently and require long-term support.
  • Native people would flock to the post and would eventually take on French culture and religion.
  • Cadillac would become a lord, a feudal landlord.
  • He took 50 soldiers and 50 workers and selected the site of present-day Detroit because the river was narrow and cannon could command the whole river.
  • He landed on July 24, 1701, and built Fort Pontchatrain at the site of Detroit's Civic Center.
  • The fort was 200 feet square and had walls 12 feet high.
  • Also constructed a Church St. Anne's - a parish that still exists.
  • Cadillac brought his wife and other French women to demonstrate permanency and also encouraged settlement by granting plots of land - 68 in the fort and 754 outside. Farms fronted the river - called ribbon farms because they were very thin, 200 feet wide, but long, hoping to give every farmer access to water.
  • The earliest farmers were Beaubien, St. Aubin, Chene, Dequindre. Streets bear these names because the streets are the boundaries of the original farms.
  • These farmers had to pay fees and grind their grain at a cost in his mill; they also agreed to work his land for a certain number of days each year.
  • Cadillac stayed at Detroit for 10 years until appointed to the Governorship of Louisiana.
  • Detroit didn't grow very rapidly- 1708 - only 63 permanent residents and only a few hundred acres cultivated.
  • By the end of the French Empire, 1689-1748, the English and French had been at war 3 times, but these wars had not directly impacted Michigan until the French and Indian War of 1754-63.
  • The fur trade was one reason for the spillover, but differences in the style of colonization mattered; there were 50,000 French versus 1.5 million British in 13 colonies who were eager to expand, though prohibited by King Geo III.
  • The French were defeated and deserted the area, heading for New Orleans.
  • The French had not altered the landscape, though the lives of the people already here, the Indians, were altered.
Middle Ground
  • Typically, historians of this period of American or Michigan History examine the story of Indian-European relations as ones of conquest and assimilation or of cultural persistence - All or nothing approach.
  • "Middle Ground" is a newer assessment that finds accommodation and bi-cultural change.
  • Thus, they created a "Middle Ground" between their races and cultures in a region that was between their races or cultures, that is, the Great Lakes, and specifically Michigan.
  • This new world was not ideal, with frequent conflict and tension.
  • This middle ground is not about one or the other dominating; older worlds for both are mixed and merged and overlapped, and the result is a New world and a new system for understanding History.