“Fort Stoddert, March 11”

Date

5-25-1812

Newspaper

Louisiana Gazette

Page and Column

Page 2, Column 3 and 4

Newspaper Location

New Orleans, Louisiana

Serial Number

943

Abstract

Letter from Fort Stoddert describing the building of military roads in the area. Mentions possible sources for felt reports about the New Madrid earthquakes

Transcript

FORT STODDERT, March 11. On the 5th inst. capt. Wm Lawrence, of the 2d Regt. of Infantry, arrived at this place, with his own and capt. Campbell's company, who have been engaged cutting the Road towards Tennessee, which we understand is completely opened, except a few miles on this side of the Cotton Gin Port, that was so much inundated and so very boggy as to be rendered impassable. At this point capt. L. was met by the party who had cleared from the Muscle Shoals.-The captain falling short of provisions, found it necessary to build flat bottomed boats and descend the Tombigbee with all possible dispatch, to avoid starvation: for the water courses were so full, and the country so entirely inundated, that it would have been literally impossible to pass them at this season, with the few days provision which were on hand, and the only alternative was the one the captain judiciously chose. Too much applause cannot be bestoyed on those gentlemen to whose enterprize and exertion we are indebted for the several good roads to Georgia, Baton Rouge, and Tennessee: particularly to the latter place, with which we have more frequent and useful communication than either of the others; and we are now in hopes that government will aid to remove one of the most serious obstructions to the free navigation of the Tombigbee, which so intimately connects our commercial interest with that of the state of Tennessee; and by which means our market will be supplied direct from thence, not by the circuitous route of Orleans and Mobile, which obliges us to pay twenty five and thirty per cent more for articles of home manufacture than we otherwise should. The Aobstruction will allude to, is the arbitrary piratic power which the Creek Indians exercise towards navigators of the Tombigbee, and it would almost seem as if it was countenanced by government; for we believe no notice had been taken of the daring outrage committed by those Indians on a boat descending from Tennessee in the year 1809, and the violence offered to the persons of the crew, who were barely suffered to escape with their lives after beholding the plunder and destruction of valuable cargo of merchandize by this [unreadable] banditti. The plea urged by the [unreadable] was, that the boat was passing through some of their country without a permit from [unreadable] of the nation, although they had a [unreadable] port from the governor of Tennessee. To check such shocking scenes of [unreadable] are in hopes that a body of troops will [unreadable] at Old Fort Confederation, where Choctaw Factory is to be removed-and [unreadable] it certainly should be sent immediately [unreadable] present position can answer no good [unreadable] and draws large bodies of Indians to St. Stephens, who cannot avoid depredating [unreadable] property of the inhabitants, so inherent [unreadable] is a disposition to thievery or plunder.

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