Grand Portage

“ From the Grand Portage, that is nine miles across, a continuation of the same toils takes place in bark canoes of an inferior size, through the chain of lakes and streams that run from the height of land westward to the Lake of the Woods, Lake Winnipeg, and onwards to more distant establishments of the company in the remote regions of the north-west country. The men are robust, hardy, and resolute, capable of enduring great extremes of fatigues and privation for a long time, with a patience almost inexhaustible. ”

“ John would be both considerably shorter and much easier than by the Nepisiguit–Tobique route.
"This portage is marked on Bouchette, 1815, Bonner, 1820, Lockwood, 1826, Wilkinson, 1859, and the Geological Survey Map. On Van Velden's original survey map of the Restigouche, 1786, a 'Carrying-place across the highlands' about nine miles is given, doubtless a portage directly from Wagan to Grand River. This route was taken by Plessis in 1812, (Journal, 267) , by Gordon (p. 23) , who fully describes it, and by many others. ”

“ The city is situated at the west end of the government ship canal connecting the Fox and Wisconsin rivers, and river steamboats ply during the open season between Portage and Green Bay and intermediate points in the Fox River Valley, Portage being the head of navigation on the Fox. Portage is in the midst of a fertile farming region, and has a trade in farm and dairy products and tobacco. Its manufactures include brick, tile, lumber, flour, pickles, knit goods, steel tanks and marine engines and launches, and there are several tobacco warehouses and grain elevators. ”

“ The location of Fort Laurens—the first American fort built west of the Ohio River—is pretty definitely known. It is fair to say that in a generation or two the spots, if left unmarked, will never be located correctly. A small stone, with a plain legend, costing a mere trifle, would insure the future against such a misfortune.
The subject of portage paths naturally suggests the matter of locating historic sites and marking them for the reason that so many such points were on these portages. ”

“ From thence is a rocky, stony passage of one mile, to Priarie Portage, which is very improperly named, as there is no ground about it that answers to that description, except a small spot at the embarking place at the West end: to the East is an entire bog; and it is with great difficulty that the lading can be landed upon stages, formed by driving piles into the mud, and spreading branches of trees over them. The portage rises on a stony ridge, over which the canoe and cargo must be carried for six hundred and eleven {lxxxviii} paces. ”

“ Old residents at such points as Rome, New York; Watertown, Pennsylvania; Akron, Ohio; Fort Wayne, Indiana remember vividly the pioneer day of the portages when barrels of salt and flour, every known implement of iron, mill stones, jugs and barrels of liquor, household goods, seeds, and saddles composed the heterogeneous loads that were dragged or rolled or hauled or "packed" over the portages of the West. Strenuous individuals have been known to roll a whiskey barrel halfway across a twenty-mile portage. ”

“ What else did Fort Defiance, Fort Venango, Fort Oswego, Fort Niagara, Fort Miami on the St. Joseph mean?
These portage routes should be presented to all local and State historical societies as important fields of study in the very im [Pg 191] mediate present if the many historic sites here are to be correctly marked. They are easy fields of investigation because as a rule a great amount of geographic lore is treasured up in a small compass; many a portage, like the Oneida portage at Rome, New York, was not over a mile in length ”

“ Well led, and officered by men who shared with them every thing, from the portage-strap to a roll of tobacco, there was complete confidence from the highest to the lowest. To be wet seemed to be the normal condition of man, and to carry a pork-barrel weighing 200 pounds over a rocky portage was but constitutional and exhilarating exercise--such were the men with whom, on the evening of the 8th of August, I once more reached the neighbourhood' of the Rat Portage. ”

“ The forts which guarded this historic route have been mentioned, and it is possible here only to hint of the remarkable story of the ebb and flow of the war tides which have made the "Grand Pass" perhaps the most alluring field of study in America. Under the specific title "Saratoga and the Northern War-path" an entertaining writer has sketched the place in history occupied by this water thoroughfare and its vital land connections. [5] The story beginning far back in the seventeenth century includes De Tracy's expedition to the Mohawk country in 1666 ”

“ Portage City, a town of twenty-five hundred inhabitants, occupies the southeastern bank for a mile down. Like Green Bay and Prairie du Chien, it was an outgrowth of the necessities of the early fur-trade. Upon the death of that trade it languished and for a generation 239 or two was utterly stagnant. As a rural trading centre it has since grown into a state of fair prosperity, although the presence of many of the old-time buildings of the Indian traders and transporters gives to much of the town a sadly decayed appearance. ”

“ Follow the road downhill from the church-town and along the coombe, and you come to a white-washed fishing haven, with a life-boat house and short sea-wall. The Porth is its only name. On the whole, if one has to live in Lansulyan parish the Porth is gayer than the church-town, where from the Vicarage windows you look through the trees southward upon ships moving up or down Channel in the blue distance and the white water girdling Menawhidden; northward upon downs where herds of ponies wander at will between the treeless farms, and a dun-coloured British earthwork tops the high sky-line. ”

“ The greater are worthy, each, of an exhaustive monograph, and even those of least prominence were of importance far beyond our ability to understand in these days. Of them all only three routes have received the attention they deserve; these are the Lake Erie–Lake Chautauqua portage, the Wabash route, and the St. Joseph–Kankakee portage. ”

“ So Céloron made for the first portage southward in order to strike the Ohio on its headwaters. This was the Chautauqua Lake portage from Chautauqua Creek—which the French knew as “Rivière aux Pommes”—six miles by land from the present Barcelona, New York, to Lake Chautauqua. From the seventeenth to the twenty-second of July was spent in making the difficult march over what has long been known as the “Old Portage Road.” Bon [Pg 62] nécamps, who accompanied Céloron, wrote: “The road is passably good. The wood through which it is cut resembles our forests in France.” ”

“ It is these portage paths for which we shall look as we proceed westward. As we pass, one by one, these slight roadways across the backbone of the continent, whether they be miles in length or only rods, they must speak to us as almost nothing else can, today, of the thousand dreams of conquest entertained by the first Europeans who traversed them, of the thousand hopes that were rising of a New France richer and more glorious than the old. ”

“ On the third day of June, after four Canoes had left us to go and join their families, we made a portage which occupied an entire day spent now in climbing mountains and now in piercing forests. Here we had much difficulty in making our way, for we were all laden as heavily as possible—one carrying the Canoe, another the provisions, and a third what we needed in our commercial transactions. I carried my Chapel and my little store of provisions; there was no one who was not laden and sweating from every pore. ”

“ Each one will try, at the portages, to carry some little thing, according to his strength; however little one carries, it greatly pleases the Savages, if it be only a kettle. . . Be careful not to annoy any one in the canoe with your hat; it would be better to take your nightcap. There is no impropriety among the Savages." [8]
With the foregoing introduction to the subject of portage paths and the nature of the journey over them, their historical importance is next to be noted. ”

“ When Céloron journeyed from Quebec to the Ohio Valley with his leaden plates, he paused at one of the portages to allow his Indian allies to jollify with certain comrades whom they met here. [15] There are cases where such meetings resulted more seriously than mere drunken sprees. [16]
The meeting-place was also the famous camping ground. To reach the portage path the tired paddler bent every energy as the red sun lay on the horizon. ”

“ Coming to an opening in the wood at the far end of the portage, they quickly tossed their burdens aside, and back again they ran. Nowhere could one see more willing workers. You heard no swearing or grumbling about the exceedingly hard task before them. On the contrary, every man vied with the rest as to which could carry the greatest load and most swiftly cross the portage. ”

“ Top-light and side-light come into general use. With the appearance of the square wooden house of three stories, soon after the Revolution, these historic doorways and porches may be said to reach almost their full development, the genius of Samuel McIntire carrying this on to its peak, the full fruition of his work being seen in the entrances to the red-brick mansions of the beginning of the nineteenth century, against whose mellow background the pure white classic forms of porch and doorway stand out in striking and delightful contrast. ”

“ And yet Bonnècamps affirms "The road is passably good." [3] This road was opened by a detachment under Villiers and Le Borgne sent out by Céloron on the sixteenth—"nearly three-quarters of a league of road" being cleared the first day. [4]
A detailed study of this path has been made by Dr. H. C. Taylor of Brocton, New York. [5] From him we quote the following concerning the "Old Portage Road," as the path is known locally:
"Its starting point was on the west side of Chautauqua creek at Barcelona, within a few rods of the lake. ”

“ The comparatively undeveloped state of the field of American historical research is well illustrated by the fact that despite the historical importance of the Chicago Portage, no careful study of it has ever been made. The student will seek in vain for even an adequate description of the physical characteristics of the portage. Winsor's description, a paragraph in length, is perhaps the best and most authoritative one available. ”

“ The place where the goods alone are carried, is called a Decharge, and that where goods and canoes are both transported overland, is denominated a Portage.
[4] In the year 1668, when the first missionaries visited the South of this lake, they found the country full of inhabitants. ”

“ The average exhibition of architectural casts consists of dry fragments, interesting only to the expert; here we have a harmonious whole that gives delight to the veriest tyro.
There is a perfect illusion. We are suddenly transported, as if by some magic carpet, to France, and stand in the porch before the abbey church of Saint-Gilles, in the Department of Gard—not a fragment, but the entire porch itself, with its heavy doors swung open so that we may mount the worn step and cross its threshold. ”

“ It demands but little imagination to carry the visitor of to-day back through long-past centuries, from the moment we enter the picturesque yet gloomy passage cut through the rock, covered with ivy, lichens, and wild flowers in rich abundance, and pass under the portcullis that yet frowns above the porter’s lodge: the whole seems so little changed by time, that one might wait for the king-maker and his mighty host to issue through the gateway, and watch the red rose or the white rose on the helmets of attendant knights ”

“ Hudson–Lake Champlain. Hudson–Lake George. The "Grand Pass" from the Hudson Valley toward Canada. Followed by Dieskau, Johnson, Montcalm, Abercrombie and Burgoyne. Same. Hudson–Wood Creek–Lake George. ”

“ It stands to-day almost alone in its picturesque antiquity, its huge central chimney, tiny window-panes, plain front door, guiltless of porch, with iron knocker, steep-pitched roof with lean-to at the back nearly sweeping the ground,—all betokening its age. ”

“ And the said Indian tribes will allow to the people of the United States, a free passage by land and by water, as one and the other shall be found convenient, through their country, along the chain of posts hereinbefore mentioned; that is to say, from the commencement of the portage aforesaid, at or near Loramie’s store, thence, along said portage to the St. Mary’s, and down the same to fort Wayne, and then down the Miami to lake Erie; again, from the commencement of the portage at or near Loramie’s store, along the portage ”

“ The location of this fort and Indian settle [Pg 179] ment is never unanimously estimated to have been less than about sixty miles from the mouth of the St. Joseph River; Father Marest wrote Father German from “Cascaskias” November 9, 1712: “... we ascended the river Saint Joseph, in order to make a portage at 30 [20?] leagues from its mouth.” [85]
This important route from Illinois to Detroit was first fortified by the building of the earliest “Fort Miami,” near the mouth of the St. Josephs of Lake Michigan, by La Salle in 1679. “But this fort,” Mr. ”

“ But you will stay longest before the porch, the most daring and most completely successful that exists.
The entrance is beneath a flattened arch, through a panelled door with a beautiful forged-iron knocker and alms-box; all protected by a glorious three-gabled hood, crocketed and pinnacled, and built into the main wall, from which it projects without visible support. The pendants have angels, bearing shields, with the arms of Nicholas Rolin and his wife. The hood is slated in grey, as is the roof, and the blue vault beneath is starred with golden stars, symbolizing the little heaven within. ”

“ The story of Céloron’s climb up from Lake Erie to Lake Chautauqua, Hamilton’s struggle through the beaver dams and shoals of Petite Rivière on the Maumee-Wabash portage route, Arnold’s desperate invasion of Canada over “The Terrible Carrying Place” on the Kennebec-Chaudière route, and the history of the difficulties of the Oneida portage at Rome, New York, present to us pictures of the portages of America that can never fade from our eyes. ”