Louisiana Cultural Vistas - Fall 2008 - (Page 54)

NEW ORLEANS MUSEUM OF ART Louisiana Indians Walking Along a Bayou (1847) by Alfred Boisseau. Once an integral part of F Colonial culture, rench the tribe’s status changed in the mid 1700s due to European immigration. 54 LOUISIANA ENDOWMENT FOR THE HUMANITIES\Fall 2008 1770, reminding the Houma and the Spanish Crown that tribes were no longer as necessary as they had been, either as military allies or as food suppliers. Moreover, the Houma quickly faced conflict with the new arrivals. Past history determines what we expect from life, and Acadians, or Cajuns, had much reason to worry about their future. In less than a decade, they had been driven from their maritime settlements, endured an appallingly high death rate, and been deported to a Spanish colony where they endured perpetual cultural conflict with Creoles and Germans along the Mississippi, conflicts which underscored for Acadians their uncertain existence in the Lower Mississippi Valley. Though Cajuns had generally enjoyed good relations with Indians in Acadie, natives along the Mississippi made them very nervous and they seem to have lived in constant dread concerning raids. Apprehensive habitants interpreted the 1772 Chitimacha fortification of their village as a step toward attack on At the same time Houma importance was faltering and conflict with Acadians was increasing, native importance as a bulwark against invasion was winnowed further by the settlement of Canary Islanders (Isleños) near the Houma in May 1779. Spanish placement of Isleños just down Bayou Lafourche from its junction with the Mississippi was no accident, and it reveals much about the area’s importance that this was one of the few places the Iberians attempted colonization in Louisiana. On August 15, 1777, the Crown ordered the governor of the Canary Islands to recruit as many soldiers as possible for transport to the new colony. They could bring their families, but with the understanding that their responsibility was to garrison the colony and pave the way for future Iberian settlers. By the end of 1779 the Canary Islanders had established four garrison settlements which, in conjunction with swamps and waterways COMPETITION FROM NEWCOMERS nearby settlements. Actually, fortification was to prevent raids from traditional enemies of the Chitimacha, but Acadians did not wait for an explanation. At about the same time, the Houma fortified their village to protect against Talapousa raids and this sent local settlers into such a frenzy that nine Acadian families fled the area and more than 200 threatened to charter a vessel and leave the colony altogether. During the 1770s a wave of what can only be described as hysteria concerning Indian raids swept the Lafourche region, panic which heightened tensions between Acadian and Houma.

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Louisiana Cultural Vistas - Fall 2008

Louisiana Cultural Vistas - Fall 2008 Contents Friends Editor’s Column Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities New Orleans Immortelle The Historic New Orleans Collection Highland-Fairfield: The Historic Heart of Shreveport The Ogden Museum of Southern Art Perils of the Mississippi River Louisiana Foodways Harvest of Life King Oliver: The Forgotten King of Jazz Louisiana Architecture Jazz Notes Louisiana State Museum Eye of the Storm Louisiana Association of Museums Soul Resin Bookstand Sound Advice Forum

Louisiana Cultural Vistas - Fall 2008

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