Portage Paths: The Keys of the ContinentHulbert, Archer Butler
History
Portage Paths: The Keys of the Continent
Hulbert, Archer Butler
Portages -- North America
There were other routes into New England, known of old, on which the
French had spread terror throughout the North Atlantic slope. They came
up the Chaudière and down the Kennebec into Massachusetts' "Province of
Main." Early in the French and Indian wars Massachusetts began another
series of campaigns, to secure again and once for all the Kennebec
Valley, building Forts Halifax (1754) and Western (1752) at the head of
navigation. At the northern end of the portage between the Kennebec and
"Rivière Puante," on the Morris map of 1749, here presented, we find the
Indian village Wanaucok still described as a nest of "Indians in the
French interest." These allies of the French around the highland
portages explain the need of English forts on the Kennebec. The forts of
the Connecticut River were largely necessitated by the routes of travel
between the heads of its tributaries and the "Rivière S^t. Francis" and
"Otter River." On the Morris map we read "Indians of S^t. Francis in
league with the French." The mouth of Otter Creek was near Fort
Ticonderoga, and it offered, with a portage to the Connecticut, another
route of French aggression. "From this Fort the French make their
excursions," reads the interesting Morris map, "and have this war [1745
_seq._] burnt and destroy'd two Forts (Saratoga and Fort Massachusets)
and broke up upwards of 30 Settlements."
[Illustration: THE MORRIS MAP OF 1749
[_Showing important portages between the St. Lawrence and New England
rivers_] (_From the original in the British Museum_)]
The Hudson-Lake George portage marked the most important course from
Canada to New York, but there was another route which was fought for
earnestly. The French could ascend the St. Lawrence to Lake Ontario and
gain access to the entire rear of New York, and by a dozen minor
waterways the Hudson again could be reached. The St. Lawrence had long
been an avenue of French exploration and missionary activity. "The
route thither (from Quebec up the St. Lawrence to Lake Ontario and Lake
Simcoe to Georgian Bay to the land of the Hurons) is very easy, there
being only two waterfalls where it is necessary to land and make a
portage--a short one at that; and there it would be easy to construct a
small redoubt for the purpose of maintaining free communication and of
making ourselves masters of this great lake."[20] Thus the Jesuits "had
anticipated by twenty years Frontenac's plan of building a fort for the
control of Lake Ontario."[21] Fort Frontenac (Kingston, Canada, 1673)
guarded the French end of Lake Ontario, while the English ascended the
Mohawk and descended the "Onnondaga" (Oswego) to its mouth (Oswego, New
York) where they erected Fort Oswego in 1722, which Montcalm captured in
1757.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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