Nicolas Denys had fishing posts under Razilly
at Port Rossignol and La Have. Though kicked out by d’Aulnay in 1635, he
worked in the area for 30 odd more years. He established a post at
Miscou in the 1640s, though d’Aulnay soon seized it. Within a year
or two after d’Aulnay’s death, he had posts at St. Ann and St. Peters ...
though LaTour’s new wife (d’Aulnay’s widow) soon kicked him out.
He was ousted at St. Peters and at Nipisiguit by LeBorgne and taken to
Port Royal as a prisoner. He was released when Sedgewick took Port
Royal in 1654. Denys returned to France and secured control of the
area of Cape Breton, perhaps Ile St. Jean, and the coast west to Gaspe.
He was at Nipisiguit and St. Peters till the winter of 1668/69. Sieur
de La Giraudiere burned him out of St. Peters in 1668 and he moved to Nipisiguit.
He soon returned to France, where he wrote a book on his expericences (Description
geographique des cotes de l'Amerique Septentriolane) and later
died in 1688. [Clark, p. 94] In his book, Denys
reflected on Port Royal as a prisoner in 1653.
 |
“There are numbers of meadows on both shores, and two islands which possess
meadows, and which are 3 or 4 leagues from the fort in ascending.
There is a great extent of meadows which the sea used to cover, and which
the Sieur d’Aulnay had drained. It bears now fine and good wheat,
and since the English have been masters of the country, the residents who
were lodged near the fort have for the most part abandoned there houses
and have gone to settle on the upper part of the river. They have
made their clearings below and above this great meadow, which belongs at
present to Madame de La Tour. There they have again drained other
lands which bear wheat in much greater abundance than those which they
cultivated round the fort, good though those were. All the inhabitants
there are the ones whome Monsieur le Commandeur deRazilly had brought from
France to La Have; since that time they have multiplied much at Port Royal,
where they have a great number of cattle and swine."
[Denys, Description, p. 123-124]
The complete book, Description
geographique des cotes de l'Amerique Septentriolane, is available
online as GIF images (though it's in old French). |
Also, Denys' work, Histoire
naturelle des peuples, des animaux, des arbres & plantes de l'Amerique
septentrionale & de ses divers climats: avec une description exacte
de la pêche des moluës, tant sur le Grand-Banc qu'à la
coste, et de tout ce qui s'y pratique de plus particulier, is online
as well. |
Copyright © 1997-99 Tim Hebert