Massacre Island we have seen explored by Iberville on his first voyage. Later Sauvole made some examination, and it was on his report that Iberville, in 1701, sounded to the east and found a good harbor, made by the intersection of Pelican Island. It was large enough for thirty vessels. Commissary La Salle describes it as having twenty to twenty -one feet of water at its entrance. He said it was better than Pensacola, and one of the best ports on the coast. La Salle thought it should have a fort, and Iberville, during the removal from Biloxi, did build magazines for merchandise and barracks for soldiers there,1 which were probably more than temporary structures. The port was always in use. There, and not in Mobile Bay proper, did the French vessels come, and, instead of directly sailing up to the river, ships all unloaded at the island, and cargoes were transferred to boats of smaller draught, like a traversier or a lighter, and taken up to town. It was indeed a dark time for Mobile, when, as sometimes happened, there was no regular communication with the island. On one such occasion, when the government finances were low, the officers of the garrison managed to buy a stray brigantine, which wasOn one such occasion, when the government finances were low, the officers of the garrison managed to buy a stray brigantine, which was put up for sale at Mobile, and thus reestablished intercourse with their port. Du Pratz rather poetically calls Mobile the birthplace of the colony and Dauphine Island its cradle, but he was strictly correct in declaring that the two really made up but one place.2 By 1707, several families had moved there from Mobile, and we learn from the devout Penicaut that in this year Chateaugue"
rescued the survivors of St. Maurice's ship St. Antoine, whose impious sailors had thrown a figure of that patron saint over board into the sea. It was in 1709 that La Vigne Voisin, a captain from St. Malo, who some years later was to try to trade with the Span iards, obtained permission to improve the place, and to him, says Penicaut, was due its fort to defend the harbor and the very beautiful church (fort belle eglise) facing the water, which attracted people even from near Mobile. This fort seems to have fallen into decay, or been ill located. At all events, L'Epinay was in 1717 to build another at half a gunshot from the sea.1 By 1710, all free persons from the ships settled on the island, and by two years later Cadillac found it necessary to build houses for the increasing population.2 About this time it was that, during the long war between England and France, a pirate ship from British Jamaica, in 1711, raided Dauphine Island and the crew ruthlessly destroyed everything possible. The loss was estimated at fifty thousand livres.3Huve" was acting as priest at the time, and was himself all but killed.4 This, however, was the only English attack, and the island soon recovered. The port of Mobile was there, in the harbor formed by Pelican Island and the east end of Dauphine, and the many ships made the place prosperous. Colonists dissat isfied with the interior also drifted there, and the port now saw its palmiest days. When Cadillac was recalled, the chiefs of twenty -four Indian tribes went to Dauphine Island to wel come his successor, L'Epinay. Among them, according to Penicaut, were the Chactas, Touachas, Apalaches, Tinssas, Mobiliens, Tomes, gens des Fourches (Naniabas?), Capinans, Colapissas, Bayogoulas, Oumas, Tonicas, Chaouachas, Natchez, Chicachas, Xassitoches, Yataces, Alibamons, and Canapouces. The calumet-smoking lasted two months, as they could not arrange to come all at one time. The governor received them well, and sent them away with presents.5The first church mention, for the Mobile priest visited it, seems to be the baptism on condition, in 1709, of a son of Jean Croix and Angelique Brouin his wife, inhabitants of Massacre. The second is when Le Maire next year at the island baptizes a number of people, when we learn that Bodin was a trader (marchand) there and that Roy was master cannoneer. Other names are mentioned also, besides slaves. Arnauld, Poudrier, L'Allemand, also a trader, and Grimauld seem to be among the inhabitants of Massacre, and D'Artaguette, commissary of the marine, at least had a slave who lived there. In 1710, before the piratical attack La Vente says there were twenty houses at Port Dauphin. There comes in the church notices an interval of several years following the pirate attack from Jamaica, broken only by the baptism, in 1717, of Marie Marguerite, daughter of Jean Colon and Marguerite Prau his wife, inhabitants of "Lisle Daufine." This was the fatal year in which the Peacock en tered in twenty-seven feet of water and was barred in, having to unload and go out by the Grand Goziers in ten feet.1 Then again is a skip until 1721, when a daughter is baptized of the well-known soldier Pierre Danty and Marie Chatelier his wife,well-known soldier Pierre Danty and Marie Chatelier his wife, of Massacre, with the Alexandres as godparents. For Mathieu returns to the old name despite the change, in 1711, to Dau- phine, and like the others seldom uses the word "island." In 1719 came the Pensacola war, and it was in that year that occurred the Spanish counter-attack on Dauphine Island so vigorously resisted by Bienville and St. Denis with soldiers, savages, and concessionaires. The investment lasted twelve days, but the French were successful.2 Possibly no more interesting paper has come down to us from French times than a "Veue de l'lsle Dauphine" shortly subsequent to 1717. In a clearing on the south side of the island rises from the beach the settlement, in two divisions. To the west, facing the open sea, high on the shores we see the bastioned, pali saded fort, in whose barracks lodge the troops. About it are sundry one-story houses, of which one within a fence is the powder-house, and behind a little embankment by the water's edge are cannon to defend the outer harbor.Further east, beyond the fatal bar which in 1717 closed up the entrance and joined Spanish (Pelican) island to Isle Dau- phine, is the town (bourg). This is on a little cove and over looks the inner harbor, where ride, with full sail, the two- masted Paon and the Paix, under the mouths of cannon mounted on the strand. This settlement is a straight line of some eighteen houses, almost all one-story, and generally in square, picketed lots. The commandant's house is there, facing the cove, and has a sentry-box in front. Two long houses are magasins of the company, and adjoining is the guard house (corps de garde), while near the inner end of the line is the magasin of the king. There is also a second but shorter row of buildings behind, among which is the house which serves for a church, — one of the few with two doors shown on this plan. It may be the gift of La Vigne Voisin. Across the island at the Shell Banks on the bay are still found shell cement walls, not unlike those of the Spaniards about St. Augustine, which some think the work of the French after storms had injured the other settlement. It may be there was a fort there once, but these particular walls are said by old residents to be part of the kilns of De Vauxbercy in early