Great Plains Studies, Center for
Date of this Version
Winter 2012
Citation
Great Plains Quarterly 32:1 (Winter 2012).
Abstract
In 1742 two sons of the explorer Pierre Gaultier de Varennes de La Verendrye met an indigenous nation they called the Gens de l'Arc somewhere along the middle Missouri River near present-day Pierre, South Dakota.1 Louis-Joseph and Francois were searching for the mythical Sea of the West, and the former asked the chief of the Gens de l'Arc if he "knew the white people of the seacoast." When the chief replied that "'[tlhe French who are on the seacoast are numerous'" and have "'many chiefs for the soldiers, and also many chiefs for prayer,'" Louis-Joseph believed he had at last found evidence of the Mer de l'Ouest and the people living on its shores. But his hopes were quickly dashed when the chief proceeded to speak a few words of the whites' language. As Louis-Joseph explained to Charles de la Boische Beauharnois, the governor of Canada, "I recognized that he was speaking Spanish, and what confirmed me in my opinion was the account he gave of the massacre of the Spanish who were going in search of the Missouri, a matter I had heard mentioned." He concluded, "All this considerably lessened my eagerness, concerning a sea already known" by the Spaniards.2
Comments
Copyright © 2012 Center for Great Plains Studies, University of Nebraska.