|
an ACADIAN EXILE article
Cultures
of Acadiana |
Lafayette (LA) Daily Advertiser, March 30, 1999
S. Carolina Huguenots didn't like 'papist' Acadians
by Jim Bradshaw
About 950 Acadian exiles were sent to South Carolina, a colony populated largely by descendants of Protestant Huguenots who had come to the New World to get away from 'papist' Frenchmen. They didn't like Catholics and were afraid that the exiles would incite attacks by Indians friendly to the French, or a rebellion by the South Carolina slave population, which outnumbered white people two to one.
The Acadians did nothing to endear themselves to the South Carolina population, insisting here, as elsewhere, that they were prisoners of war and continuing to refuse to take an oath of allegiance to the British throne.
An unidentified South Carolinian wrote, "They are insolent Rascals, (who) talk in a high strain, calling themselves Subjects of the French King, (and) own that they were Neutrals. ... They say they'll settle here, if we allow them such Privileges with their Priests. ... They will not even upon any terms take the Oaths of Allegiance - By this we may judge what a pernicious and dangerous Gang they were in Nova Scotia."
According to Carl Brasseaux who wrote, "Scattered to the Wind,' Dispersal and Wanderings of the Acadians," "Hundreds of Acadians were ...forced to remain abroad their overcrowded transports for nearly one months while reluctant hosts decided what to do with them. When health conditions became such that the colonial government was finally forced to allow the exiles to land, the exiles were herded together along the beaches, where they were evidently encouraged to leave the colony aboard merchant vessels bound for England. The government, meanwhile, demonstrated no determination to resolve the festering Acadian question, and, unwilling to endure any longer the uncertainty clouding their future, large groups of exiles attempted to escape into the North American interior on at least three occasions within two months of their arrival.
"Fearing that they would join hostile Indians there," Brasseaux continues, " the South Carolina government mobilized posses to pursue and return the first two bands of fugitives. Only thirty Acadians managed to escape; their fate is unknown. A third attempt was somewhat more successful. A small band of undetermined size escaped from its detention camp, made its way to the Santee River Valley where its members stole goods, arms, and ammunition from a local plantation, and set out in search for Ford Duquesne, the French stronghold in the Ohio Valley. Only two Acadians are known to have completed the trek."
The exiles who remained in South Carolina were distributed throughout the coastal communities. As often as not, families that were still together were divided, and young men were taken from them and placed into indenture.
According to Brasseaux, "In many instances, indentured Acadians had to be bound in irons and forcibly removed from their families."