Chicago Portage

It was the spring of 1673. Father Marquette, Louis Jolliet and five French voyageurs pushed their Birch bark canoes away from the misty shore of what is now the Upper Peninsula of Michigan and dipped their paddles into the frigid water. Their goal was to find and explore the mighty river the Native Americans had been describing.

They paddled down the western shore of Lake Michigan into Green Bay and took the Wisconsin River to the Mississippi River. This small group of Frenchmen explored the Mississippi River as far south as Arkansas, stopping at Native American villages along the way to exchange gifts, gather information and speak of trade.

On their return trip, the Frenchmen were told of a shorter route home up the Illinois River, the Des Plaines River and Portage Creek thru Mud Lake to the Chicago River, which emptied into Lake Michigan. Taking this route, the Frenchmen swiftly returned home. Incredibly, the entire round trip had taken just five months.

For eons, countless Native Americans had traveled route. For 150 years after Marquette and Jolliet, the Chicago Portage was used by thousands of French explorers, British traders and American pioneers traveling to other parts of the country.

When the water was high, it was possible to paddle the entire way. If the water was low, Mud Lake became a large, mosquito-infested swamp and the travelers had to drag their canoes and goods through waist-deep muck. If the weather was very dry, the travelers might be required to carry their canoes and baggage on the Long Portage Trail for up to 95 miles!

Incredibly, a section of this important portage remains in its' natural state.

Fort Michillimackinac

In the late sixteen hundreds, the top of Lake Michigan and the straits which connected Lake Superior to the other Great Lakes was of strategic importance. Here, a fortified trading post controlled the fur trade. Native Americans and Canadian Voyageurs traveled here from the West and the North to trade beaver and other furs for products manufactured as far away as France. The furs were then transported by canoe to Montreal and on to France where most of them became fashionable (and very expensive) felt hats.

Fort St Louis at Starved Rock, IL

Starved Rock State Park is located on the Illinois River, about 80 miles southwest of Chicago,IL. Here, glacial melt cut deeply through sandstone bluffs creating a deep, narrow canyons.

In May 1673, Louis Jolliet, Father Marquette and five more Frenchmen were the first Europeans to travel through the area. They were returning to St.Ignace (in the upper peninsula of Michigan) from an exploration of the upper Mississippi River. Their trip increased knowledge of North American geography and spread French influence among the American Indian tribes of the upper Mississippi Valley.

In 1675, Father Marquette returned to Starved Rock to build a Mission in the Kaskaskia Indian village located on the Illinois River.

Eventually, the French claimed the entire Mississippi Valley and the Great Lakes. To hold their claim, they built a fort at the Straits of Mackinac where Lake Huron, Lake Michigan and Lake Superior join. As a southern defense, the French built Fort St. Louis atop Starved Rock in the winter of 1682-83. The site was chosen because of its commanding strategic position high above the last rapids on the Illinois River.

In February 1684, the new fort was attacked by 500 Iroquois warriors. Sharing command of the fort where explorer Henri Tonti and a French army officer, Chevalier Baugy. They commanded a small force of twenty-two French soldiers, traders, trappers and craftsmen. In addition, twenty-four Shawnee, Miami and Loup warriors and their families were protected by the forts’ sturdy walls.

Perched 170 feet above the river, Fort St Louis could not be taken by direct assault. The Iroquois tried and were driven off. The invaders had no choice but to besiege the place. The French were short of food and gunpowder. . . but so were the Iroquois who had traveled a great distance on foot. With their food supplies mostly consumed, the Iroquois were soon depleting the local game. For eight days the Iroquois hung on, sniping and probing the forts’ defenses. Failing to gain a foothold, the Iroquois realized they had no other choice but to withdraw.

The French abandoned Fort St Louis in the early 1700s and built Fort Pimitoui in Peoria. Fort St. Louis became a haven for traders and trappers for a dozen years or so. By 1720 all remains of the fort were gone.

The diorama pictured was researched and built by the History/Social Science Department and students of the Illinois Mathematics and Science Academy in Aurora, Illinois. This reconstruction is based on descriptions of the fort by LaSalle, Henri Joutel, property deeds and business and French army documents. These sources describe the fort of 1684 as upright logs and earthworks of about 600 feet in circumference which protected housing for between eleven and fifty men, contained seven bastions, a storehouse, forge, officers’ quarters, a chapel and at least three traders’ log cabins.

Pea Soupers

Canoe Manned by Voyageurs Passing a Waterfall (Ontario), 1869, by Frances Anne Hopkins.

Frenchmen in the Old Northwest (lands around the Great Lakes) had little opportunity to prepare a hot meal. Yet, men paddling and portaging canoes, hauling bales of furs and supplies from dawn to dusk needed nutritious food. Here is one early recipe for a hot, satisfying stew that was enjoyed by the voyageurs.
The tin kettle in which we cooked our food, a trader wrote, would hold eight to ten gallons. At the end of a long day paddling our canoes, the cook hung our kettle over the fire, nearly full of water. Nine quarts of dried peas- one quart per man, the daily allowance - were added to the heating water. When the peas had all burst, two or three pounds of salt pork, cut into strips, where added for seasoning, and the kettle was allowed to simmer all night. At daybreak, the cook added four biscuits, broken up, to the mess, and invited all hands to breakfast.
The swelling of the peas and biscuits filled the kettle to the brim and was so thick that a stick would stand upright in the stew. The hungry Voyageurs squatted in a circle around the kettle. Each man used his wooden spoon to ladle the hot meal from the kettle to his mouth, with lightning speed, and soon filled their belly.
Pea Souper, a nickname for French-Canadians, originated because of this daily breakfast repast.