|
an ACADIAN EXILE article
Cultures
of Acadiana |
Lafayette (LA) Daily Advertiser, March 30, 1999
Acadians Found Fellow Catholics in Maryland
French and Indian attacks caused paranoia among citizenry
by Jim Bradshaw
Following the Mississippi River through Iberville Parish, due south of Baton Rouge, a tortuous series of of bends and twists sends the river curling back and forth upon itself. The town of St. Gabriel sits on the east bank of the river at the center of the second bend. Here, next to the river levee, is the oldest church still standing in Louisiana, Saint Gabriel d'Iberville, built by Acadians in 1769. Some historians think it is the oldest church in the entire Mississippi River Valley.
The men who built it were named Allain, Babin, Blanchard, Breaux, Chaisson, Cloatre, Hebert, Landry, LeBlanc, Melanson, Richard, Rivet, Trahan. Most of them came to Louisiana from Maryland in 1768 after giving up hope of being repatriated to their farms in old Acadie.
In Maryland, these exiles had, at least, found fellow Catholics. But that is not to say that they were warmly received. In the first wave of deportations, 400 Acadians from the Grand Pré area were sent to Maryland aboard the ships Elizabeth and the Leopard. These two vessels were soon joined by the Dolphin and the Ranger, which carried 493 men, women and children from the Pisiquid area of old Acadie.
When the ships arrived in Maryland, the Acadians were not allowed to disembark at first because Gov. Horatio Sharpe was away from the colony, attending a convention of colonial executives in New York.
On Dec. 4, 1755, the Maryland Gazette reported, "Sunday last arrived here the two last vessels from Nova Scotia, with French neutrals for this Place, which makes four within this Fortnight who have brought upward of Nine Hundred of them. While they have been in this Port, the Town has been at considerable Charge in supporting them , as they appear very needy, and quite exhausted in Provisions; and as it cannot be expected that the charge or burden of maintaining such a Multitude, can be supported by the inhabitants of Annapolis (a small part of the public society when compared to the people of the whole Province, and who upon this occasion have been very liberal) it will be necessary soon to disperse them to different parts of the province. As the poor people have been deprived of their settlements, in Nova Scotia, and sent here (for some very political reason) bare and destitute, Christian Charity, nay common humanity, calls on every one according to there ability to lend their assistance and help to these objects of compassion. We are told that three of these vessels are to sail with the first wind (which we heartily wish soon to happen), one for Patuxent River, another for Choptank, and third to Wicomico, there to wait the orders of his excellency the Governor.
The call went largely unheeded because the Acadians arrived in a Maryland inflamed by fear of the French who had begun jockeying for supremacy in the Ohio River Valley in 1749. French dominance there threatened Maryland's security. The people of Maryland wanted Frenchmen out of the region, not new ones brought into it.
Animosity towards the French grew worse during a wave of paranoia that swept Maryland following Gen. Edward Braddock's defeat by outnumbered French forces at the Battle of the Wilderness on July 9, 1755, and by Indian raids on the British frontier following the defeat. The Acadians were exiled just as the paranoia peeked. Most of the people of Maryland shared the sentiment of Col. Edward Lloyd, a planter in Talbot County, that the French neutrals were actually prisoners of war, and that they should be treated as such.
The Choptank Contingent of 208 Acadians reached Oxford on Dec. 8, and was placed under the supervision of a merchant named Henry Callister. He did what he could, but apparently got little help. On Christmas Day, he wrote a friend in England that "Nobody knows what to do; and a few have charity for them." He also wrote to the governor, sending a list of expenses he had incurred in taking care of the Acadians in his charge.
Callister regarded the Acadians as British subjects, albeit unprofessed ones. Many of the Acadians regarded themselves as prisoners of war, and that attitude may have been a part of their problem. They claimed that they were political prisoners and, as such; should be taken care of by the state. In some instances they refused the little work that was made available to them, because that would undermine the argument that they were being held against the wills.
Some of the Acadians who landed in Maryland immediately fled into the nearby forests, hoping to make their way back to Canada. Most of these were never heard from again. Others were taken into private homes, then helped to build homes of their own in "French town" a suburb of Baltimore. Still others spread out into Newtown, Georgetown, Snowhill, Princess Ann, Portabaco, Lower and Upper Marlborough, Annapolis, Belisle, and Oxford. Some hired onto ships and headed for the French West Indies.
Four months passed before the Maryland legislature even discussed appropriating funds for the Acadians care. The governor apparently, was still concerned about the military threat these indigent Frenchmen might pose.
In a message to the Maryland Assembly, he advised that they, "prepare a bill for the preventing or deterring (the Acadians) from leaving the counties into which they have been, or may be, distributed and for punishing such of them as may presume to travel to, or be discovered near our Western Frontiers."
When no public aid materialized, the Acadians were forced to rely on the charity of their neighbors. Maryland's Catholic minority did what it could, but the exiles were at the mercy of the less friendly Protestant majority. There was more need than help. Some Acadians were able to find a bit of work and gradually improved their lot, but few of them rose out of poverty. Many of them debilitated by age, illness, and malnutrition, were driven to begging in the streets.
Writing to his son on January 19, 1759, Charles Carrol of Baltimore reported the exiles had been reduced to "a state of ... Misery, Poverty, and Rags."
When the French and Indian War ended in 1763, the Acadians in Maryland, as did those in other colonies, wanted to be sent back to Canada. The British government said they could go to any French colony they wanted, at their own expense. Most of the exiles could not scrape up enough money to go.
In 1781, nearly 20 years after the dispersion, a father Robin wrote of a flourishing Acadian community in Baltimore. "They still conserve the French language and remain very attached to all that belonged to the country of their ancestors, especially their religion," he wrote, "I could not help but congratulate them on their piety and recall the virtues of their ancestors. I thus reminded them of memories to dear to be mentioned, and as a result they broke into tears."
Some of the Acadians were able to leave Maryland for Louisiana, many of them traveling an overland route to the Tennessee River; then floating down the Mississippi River. One group went by sea, taking 78 days to sail from Baltimore to New Orleans.
A government document signed in New Orleans on July 27, 1767, gives a list of the Acadian arrivals. A note that "during the seventy-eight day voyage...from the Port of Baltimore...Armand Hebert, Head of Family, and Marie Landry died. Olivier Babin and Marguerite Hernandez were born."