PAGES 167-170  from Hamilton's COLONIAL MOBILE

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, palisaded 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 Dauphine, 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 [storehouses] 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 [ed. note: La Vigne Place is south of Bienville Boulevard, off of LaSalle Street].t

 Across the island at the Shell Banks [ed. note:Indian Mounds off of Cadillac Avenue]  not 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 American times. This high spot commands a fine view over the bay and Sound, and the Banks, crowned by cedars, must always have been prominent in the landscape and a favorite place of resort. The Shell Banks antedate the French, and from them are still dug Indian skeletons, ornaments and utensils.

The closing of the port on the southern side of Dauphine by the shifting bar changed the history of the island, and of Mobile, too, but it had been anticipated by Iberville long before. In 1721 we read that several families left for New Biloxi, and the Neptune was loaded with stores and families for the Mississippi settlement. Officers, soldiers, and magazines went, too, and the impression has prevailed that the French completely abandoned the island. This is not true. Danville's map, dating not earlier than 1732, shows the town, and it was there that Bienville and Chateaugue came, in 1724, to take passage on the Bellona for France, when the ship suddenly sank before their eyes. The church records also show the port in use.

An entry, in 1722, by Mathieu shows Paul Le Sueur still commandant for the king in Dauphine Island, "ditte Massacre." This was made during a visitation of that place. In fact, a number of inhabitants and their slaves, too, are mentioned from time to time. In 1727, for instance, we find Jean Arnauld, next year Mr. Renauld. Renauld is mentioned, curiously enough, as of Massacre in the Isle Dauphine, as if Massacre was the name of the town on the island. Arnauld occurs again in 1736 and 1742. We have the marriage of J. B. Baudrau, a creole of the island, besides mention of Nicolas Rousseau and wife, and the baptism by Mathias, vicar-general of Monseigneur de Quebec, of the daughter of Jacque Dupre, a Canadian inhabiting the "Baye de la Mobile." This probably means the island, as the sponsor is J. B. Alexandre, creole of the place, and there were Alexandres on Massacre. Later we find Pierre Paques, inhabitant "deLabbaye." In 1740, we again have Massacre named in the baptism of a son of Robert Ollivier, another resident. Both in 1728 and 1742 the island is mentioned as dependent on the Mobile parish.

No soldiers are given for a long time, but it would seem there was often or always a garrison. In 1742, there was, for we learn that according to report of officers and soldiers of Massacre one J. B. Lozier, a private, was drowned in the lagoon. He did not, however, give his name to this cove, possibly that on which lay the settlement, as Derbane had long before to the river (now Bayou La Batre") where he perished. Even as late as 1762 we find mention of the garrison of Massacre in the baptism of a child of Nicolas Bouvie, a soldier of that post.

What we now call Little Dauphine Island we find on French maps of 1732 as Isle a Guillori, and it was probably so called for a resident, for in 1740 we have the baptism of the daughter of Gregoire Guillory, described as both a native and inhabitant of Massacre. His wife was Jeanne La Casse, inhabitant of the same parish. Guillory was nine years later to lose a daughter Louise, a younger child, and at this last date he is mentioned as living at Fish River. But with the mention of Bouvie\in 1762, the record closes as to Massacre or Dauphine Island, although Point Chugae (Chateaugue? ), Graveline Bay, Pont Vendigarde, and other existing names, indicate that there was more French history than we now know. Bon Secours Bay, beyond Mobile Point, was no doubt named on account of its security in time of storm.

Across Mississippi Sound on what we now call Mon Louis Island, granted to him in 1710 as Grosse Pointe, long lived Nicolas Bodin. It was practically a part of the mainland. Miragouin, we learn from Penicaut, was established the year before. He bore this surname of Miragouin, — spelled differently at different times. It was regarded as his barony, so to speak, for Sieur de Miragouin is his common title and signature, too. The word seems to mean mosquito, and is not a strange origin for knighthood, — if sound plays any part.

It was this settlement which was attacked by the Spaniards, in 1719, to pillage the goods of concessionaires stored there, but on their second landing the invaders were beaten off by the Mobilians, Indians always friendly to the French. They killed thirty Spaniards and captured seventeen more, whom they took to Mobile. There they broke their heads and threw the bodies over into the river. It was the usual method of savage warfare, and Penicaut does not say that the French interfered to prevent this massacre of the prisoners.