The sieur de Chaste was a soldier, a seaman, a chevalier, and knight-commander of the Order of Malta. He had faithfully served Catherine de Medici, led a military expedition to the Azores, and became governor of the town and fortress of Dieppe. In the wars of religion he played a major part. After the death of Henri III in 1589, de Chaste opened the gates of Dieppe to Henri IV and helped to bring moderate Catholic leaders to the support of the young king. Champlain described him as a “most honorable man, a good Catholic, a great servant of the king,” who “worthily and faithfully served his Majesty on many important occasions.” Others spoke of him in the same way.47
In 1602–03, de Chaste was near the end of his career. In the twilight of his life, he was deeply interested in founding a French colony in America, and he thought more of the future than of the past. He had a clear vision of New France as a place of harmony and prosperity, and also proposed to make it self-supporting, even a source of revenue for the Crown. Champlain wrote that “though his head was covered with as many grey hairs as years, he still wished to leave to posterity a charitable example by this project, and even to go there himself and devote the rest of his years to the service of God and his King.”
The king was happy to give him a commission as ruler of New France. De Chaste also received a charter that gave him a monopoly of trade and colonization (but not fishing) in America from the latitude of 46 degrees north (Cape Breton), to 40 degrees north (Philadelphia). De Chaste was everybody’s choice for the job and he brought many strengths to the American project. He was well connected at court and had the respect of Henri IV and his Council. He was a good Catholic, in high standing with leaders of the church.
In 1602–03, Dieppe became a center of effort for New France. Leadership passed to the very able Aymar de Chaste, governor of that walled seaport. Champlain went there to work with chandlers and merchants who had much experience of North America.
Most important were his close relations with merchants in the American trade. De Chaste put together a partnership of investors in northern France. Several noble families bought in. At the core of the group were leading merchants in the prosperous seaports of Normandy. They agreed to accept “certain conditions” that differed from other investments by these hard-headed businessmen. De Chaste persuaded them not only to fit out vessels for “the execution of a business enterprise” but also to “explore and colonize the country.”48
When Champlain learned of this new project, he was quick to approach de Chaste. The two men appear to have met before. Their paths may have crossed in the army during the war in Brittany. Probably they met in Dieppe when de Chaste was governor of that town, and Champlain was working with its ship chandlers. Champlain tells us that they met again at court in 1602, and thereafter he “went to see Commander de Chaste from time to time.”
Champlain probably gave de Chaste a manuscript of his Brief Discours on the West Indies and New Spain—in all likelihood the copy that found its way from Dieppe to the John Carter Brown Library in Providence, Rhode Island. De Chaste spoke of his project. As they talked together about America, they discovered many purposes in common. Both men shared a way of thinking about religion and politics, exploration and colonization, France and the world. In Champlain’s words, the commander “did me the favor of communicating something of his plans,” and “believing I could be of help with his design, he asked me if I would like to make the voyage, to see the country and what the entrepreneurs might accomplish there.”49
Champlain leaped at the invitation. “I told him that I was at his disposal,” he wrote. But there was a problem. As a pensioner of the king, Champlain was not at liberty to take another job without orders from His Majesty. He suggested that “if Commander de Chaste could speak with the king about it, and if it should be the king’s command,” then he would very much like to go.50 De Chaste had a word with the king, and all obstacles were removed. His Majesty not only approved, but commanded Champlain to make the voyage, and ordered that he make a “faithful report” directly to the king himself. The royal secretary, Louis Potier de Gesvres, gave Champlain a letter that was addressed to senior leaders of the expedition, ordering them in the king’s name “to receive Champlain aboard ship, and allow him to see and explore as much as possible of those places, and to assist in every possible way.”51
And so the elements came together. Aymar de Chaste, the forgotten founder, was a leader with a large spirit who won the respect and affection of all who knew him. Champlain was the junior partner, but with the ear of the king and his strong support. Henri IV was the royal patron who contributed his own broad vision, energy, and resolve. As a group, these men framed a great enterprise that combined exploration, trade, and settlement. The goal was to increase the power and prosperity of France, to spread the Christian faith, to learn more about the world, and to bring together its many people in a spirit of humanity.
7.
TADOUSSAC
The Great Tabagie, 1603
The chance diplomatic meeting [at Tadoussac] was an historic event of high importance…. It established the foundation for the Amerindian policy of France in this region.
—Alain Beaulieu1
WITH THE KING’S LETTER in hand, Champlain left the court and made his way to the port of Honfleur, near the mouth of the River Seine. He walked along old stone quays through crowds of weather-beaten seamen, merchants, prostitutes, and all the teeming humanity who worked along the busy waterfront. He was looking for his ship, and at last he found her—a small storm-beaten navire with the happy name of Bonne-Renommée, “Good Renown.”2
Champlain also found her commander, Captain François Gravé, sieur du Pont. He was a fabulous character, much loved for his large spirit by men who sailed with him, and greatly feared by those who ran afoul of his temper. His shipmates called him Pont-Gravé, and so shall we. He loved good company, great food, and the fiery calvados of his beloved Brittany, which he was famed for drinking straight, and he suffered the consequences in a painful gout that troubled him for years. Pont-Gravé was a jolly giant of a man, a “loud, hearty, back-slapping fellow” with a deep booming voice that could be heard above a howling gale. He was a native son of Saint-Malo, born and raised in that rough-and-tumble seaport, baptized in its Cathedral-Church, and fiercely proud of his Breton heritage. At sea, when he met a fishing boat of familiar appearance, he would climb the rigging and shout Malouins! Then he would sing a joyous song of Brittany at the top of his lungs.3
One historian has called him the Falstaff of New France. In many a biography he has played that role, a Falstaff to Champlain’s Prince Hal. But Pont-Gravé was much more than that. His family was of wealth and eminence in Saint-Malo. The king was told that the leading homme de créance, or man of credit, in the town was Pont-Gravé’s cousin Thomas Gravé.4 Pont-Gravé was himself a courageous seaman and a major figure in the colonization of New France. In 1603, he was forty-three years old, about ten years older than Champlain, and a seaman of long experience in the North Atlantic. Recently he had commanded a ship in Chauvin’s ill-fated expedition and had warned against its errors, but nobody listened until it was too late. Champlain hoped to learn from him. He wrote that Pont-Gravé was a man “very skilled in sea voyages, having made many of them.”5
In 1603, little Honfleur at the mouth of the river Seine became the leading port of embarcation for New France. Some of its old streets around its inner basin are much the same as in Champlain’s time.
The two men met and Champlain presented the king’s letter, which made clear his role in the expedition. He was not to be in the chain of command. Champlain was to go along as an observer, but no ordinary observer. His assignment was to report directly to the king. This might have made trouble with many commanders, but Champlain was open and candid, Pont-Gravé was good-natured, and the two men took a liking to each other. They became shipmates and fast friends. Pont-Gravé was senior in age, rank, and service. He became a mentor to Champlain, and taught the young man the le
ssons of experience in the hard school of the North Atlantic. “As for the sieur du Pont,” Champlain wrote, “I was his friend, and his years would lead me to respect him as I would my father.”6
* * *
At Honfleur, Champlain also met two interesting people who would join the voyage. They were Montagnais Indians, “young men of rank in their own country” who were homeward bound after a year in Europe. Pont-Gravé, on his last voyage to Canada, had persuaded their elders to send them to France, so that they could see the country and learn the language. The hope was that they would return to America and work as interpreters or mediators between two cultures. Their stay in France had been a brilliant success. They were invited to court and met Henri IV, who was kind and welcoming. The great houses of France were open to them, and they were received as “Indian princes.” They formed a high respect for the people of France, and spoke warmly of their reception—a fact of much importance for the history of Canada, as we shall see.7
The sponsor and leader of this enterprise was Aymar de Chaste. He was very able and highly esteemed, but he was elderly and not in good health. He decided to remain in France so that he could attend to the tangled affairs of the company. De Chaste worked well with his investors. He pushed ahead with preparations and raised money enough for three ships of modest size. Bonne-Renommée, the flagship, was a vessel of 120 or 150 tons, and about ninety feet long overall, including her great poulaine, or prow, which projected forward under the bowsprit. She was said to be a sturdy seaboat, and was well equipped by the merchants of Honfleur. Sailing with her were two smaller vessels. La Françoise, 100 tons, was outfitted by the merchants of Rouen. A third vessel of unknown name and tonnage belonged to Jean Sarcel de Prévert of Saint-Malo.8
From the start, this expedition had the double purpose of trade and exploration. Its leaders meant to make a profit in fishing and the fur trade, which was vital to the enterprise. Given the state of the royal treasury, Henri IV and his ministers had insisted that Champlain’s grand design for New France must pay its own way. De Chaste raised capital for the voyage among merchants and “gentilhommes” in Honfleur, Saint-Malo, Dieppe, Le Havre, and probably other towns. The commercial risk was thought to be very great. A measure of danger, in the judgment of hard-headed businessmen who had much experience of America, was the price of insurance: 35 percent. But de Chaste promised his investors a return on their investment, and they trusted his judgment.9
Trade was necessary to the voyage, but its primary purpose was to study the possibility of settlement in New France. The object was not to plant a colony, but to prepare for colonization in the near future. To that end, the instructions from Aymar de Chaste and the king were to establish good relations with the Indians, to explore the great rivers of Canada, to examine sites for a permanent colony, and to return in six months.10
For purposes of exploration, the ships also carried at least two vessels of middling size. Champlain called them moyenne barques, and reckoned their size at about 12 or 15 tons. Also aboard were small, open-hulled shallops of five or seven tons, which would be useful for exploring and making charts. They were prefabricated in sections for assembly in America.11
The ships got underway on March 15, 1603, the Ides of March, not the most propitious day to start a dangerous voyage, or the best season to brave the ocean sea. It was late winter on the North Atlantic, a time of cyclonic sou’westers on the coast of Europe, violent nor’easters in America, and floating icebergs in between. But Pont-Gravé and his officers were in a hurry to get away. In the tight little port of Honfleur they hoisted sail, left their moorings, and threaded their way through the shifting sand banks of the Seine toward the open sea.
As they left the mouth of the river, the wind turned against them, and they were forced to anchor in the roadstead of Le Havre on the north bank. The next day the winds were favorable, and they started again, steering southwest past the Channel Islands of Guernsey and Alderney. By the evening of March 19 they were off Ushant, the westernmost point of France. Europe was behind them and ahead lay the great western ocean—always a moment of exhilaration for a blue-water sailor.
Two days later the mood changed when they sighted a strange ship hull-down on the horizon. More ships hove into view, seven in all, steering toward them on the steady bearing that warns a wary seaman of a collision course. In that era, one never knew what to expect from strange ships off the coast of France. A constant menace were pirates, sea rovers, and freebooters who flew many flags or none at all. The ships drew closer and cleared for action. Champlain recognized them as Flemish vessels, homeward bound from a long trading voyage to the East Indies. The two squadrons passed in peace, to their mutual relief.12
Bonne-Renommée and her consorts continued on their way, and made good progress in a week of clear weather and steady sailing. Then the wind shifted, the sea began to rise and the sky turned dark. Suddenly they found themselves in a sou’wester of terrific violence, blowing directly into their faces. In deep green seas, Champlain’s ship rolled and pitched and yawed with such force that no fires were possible, and the crew had nothing warm to eat or drink. The storm continued for seventeen days and, as Champlain remembered, “we rather lost than gained ground.” Everyone was chilled to the bone, and many were filled with terror.13
At last, on the eighteenth day, “the weather began to improve, and the sea became more calm, to the contentment of all.” They continued on their course for two weeks. The water turned warm as they crossed the gulf stream, then cold again as they entered the Labrador current. On April 28, they met an iceberg that towered above their ship. The next day they passed an ice floe twenty miles long, and “an infinite number of smaller ones, which hindered our passage.” The pilot reckoned their latitude at 45 degrees, 40 minutes, north latitude, and they could not find a way through the ice.
They turned south, and at 44 degrees “found passage” to the west, which brought them to “the bank” as they called it, the Grand Bank south of Newfoundland. They sailed west and ran into thick fog. In the dark silence of a foggy night they began to hear a distant sound, which suddenly they recognized as the crash of waves breaking on a coast. The alarm was given and the crew rushed on deck. Topmen raced up the shrouds. As the sound of the surf grew louder, the pilot threw over the helm. Eager hands hauled on braces, and slowly the ship came about, canvas beating in the wind. At last the sails began to fill again, and they sailed away from the surf in the nick of time. Next morning the fog lifted, and they found that they were just off the rocky cliffs of Cape St. Mary’s, jutting south from Newfoundland’s Avalon Peninsula. They had come to the edge of disaster—a lesson that Champlain would long remember.14
After that first landfall, they still had a long passage ahead of them through the coastal waters of North America. They were ten days getting past Newfoundland and were “overtaken” by another hard gale, a classic American nor’easter by Champlain’s account. At last they reached Cabot Strait, sixty miles wide, between Newfoundland and Cape Breton Island. Little Bonne-Renommée sailed through that huge passage and entered the Gulf of St. Lawrence, an inland sea of enormous size. The pilot gave orders to come right and they set a course west-northwest across the gulf, dodging more ice floes. Champlain was astonished by the magnitude of this new world. Even by comparison with the Caribbean and the Spanish Main, the coast of North America was on an immense scale.
At last they entered the “River of Canada” as Champlain called it, today’s St. Lawrence. It too was large beyond imagining. The mouth of the river was a hundred miles wide. It was divided by the great tongue of Anticosti Island, 122 miles long, the home of huge white polar bears of legendary ferocity who attacked humans on sight. European seamen and American Indians alike gave Anticosti Island a wide berth. Onward they sailed along the south bank of the estuary, past the great sea-carved stone arches of “Île Percée” that made it an important seamark. They passed the Gaspé Peninsula with its mountains that surprised Champlain by their height, fo
ur thousand feet above the sea.
They were another week sailing up the great St. Lawrence River. In the last week of May, they reached the mouth of the Saguenay River and dropped anchor in the tight little harbor of Tadoussac. The date was May 26, 1603. It had been a crossing of ten weeks, with many desperate moments. But by comparison with others, Champlain remembered it as a “happy voyage.” Perhaps it was Pont-Gravé and the Montagnais princes who helped to make it so.15
In Tadoussac harbor Champlain and Pont-Gravé thought about contacting the Indians. The next day, an opportunity presented itself entirely by chance. Just before the French arrived, many Indians had gathered on the other side of the Saguenay River, only a few miles from Tadoussac. They built a summer camp of bark lodges at St. Matthew’s Point, today’s Pointe aux Alouettes.16
It was a huge assembly. Champlain counted more than two hundred large canoes and reckoned that a thousand Indians were there. They were of many nations. Among them were several groups of Montagnais, who call themselves Innu today (not to be confused with the Inuit to the north). The hosts were the Tadoussac Montagnais, who lived nearby. The Bersiamite Montagnais came up from the lower St. Lawrence, and the Attikamègue Montagnais journeyed down the river from Quebec. The Porc-épic were from the Saguenay Valley.17 Also present were Algonquin nations from the Ottawa River to the far northwest and Etchemin from as far south as the Penobscot River, in what is now the state of Maine. They had come together to celebrate a victory over their common enemy, the Iroquois.18
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