Nautical Research Journal 151


1. Lithograph of the painting by Felix Achille Saint-Aulaire, “Barge remontant le Mississippi largue vue par le travers” of 1832. Courtesy of the Library of Congress.


Bergantins and barges By David Purdy


T e fi rst Europeans to settle in the Mississippi valley were French. T ey came from two diff erent directions and settled in two diff erent areas. Both groups came in the early 1700s.


One group came directly from France and established plantations along the lower Mississippi River in the vicinity of New Orleans. T e other group came down from Canada and established farms in what is now south-western Illinois and the adjacent area west of the Mississippi. T e two settlement areas were oſt en designated as Lower Louisiana and Upper Louisiana. (Miller-Surrey 1916, de Finiels 1803) T e areas were connected by the Mississippi River, a wide, twisting, turbulent and unstable stream. T ere were no settlements between Natchez on the lower Mississippi and the southern edge of Upper


Louisiana. All commerce between the two Louisianas and most of the commerce within them was carried by boats, since there were virtually no roads.


In the eighteenth century, there was also some boat commerce in other parts of the Mississippi Valley. T ere were occasional trips up the Mississippi as high as Prairie du Chien, where a portage to the Great Lakes started. T ere was traffi c on the Ohio River with an eventual goal of Montreal. From 1754 to 1763, there were supply trips up the Ohio to Fort Duquesne (now Pittsburgh).


T e initial impulse of the French in selecting types of boats to be used on the Mississippi was to use those with which they already were familiar in France. T is meant bergantins and feluccas, both used in commerce at the time. (Figure 2) Bergantins seem to have been favored by the colonial government. (Miller Surrey 1916) Feluccas were also used. One


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