Jacques Marquette

French-born colonial American explorer, priest, and missionary

• Born: June 1, 1637
• Birthplace: Laon, France
• Died: May 18, 1675
• Place of death: Near Ludington, Michigan

Father Marquette, a Jesuit priest, joined French explorer Louis Jolliet in the discovery and exploration of the Mississippi River. His remarkable journal is the only detailed record of that famous journey. After learning several Native American languages, Marquette acted as an interpreter and was instrumental in converting the Native Americans to Roman Catholicism.

Early Life

Jacques Marquette (zhok mahr-keht) was born into a family in north-central France that was well known for sending its members into civic, military, and religious service. He continued that tradition in 1654, when, at the age of seventeen, he joined the Society of Jesus, better known as the Jesuits. For the next twelve years, Marquette endured the rigorous training required of a Jesuit priest. He was ordained in 1666. Later that year, he was sent to labor in Native American missions in French Canada.

Marquette landed in Quebec, on the Saint Lawrence River, on September 20, 1666. On October 10, he was assigned to the mission at Three Rivers, between Quebec and Montreal, where Gabriel Druilletes was the director. Under Druilletes, Marquette began his study of Native American languages. After eighteen months, he was fluent in six dialects. His linguistic ability was to serve him well during the remaining years of his life.

In 1668, Marquette was sent to his first western mission. For the next eighteen months, he labored as a missionary to the Ottawa tribe at Sault Sainte Marie, between Lake Huron and Lake Superior. From there, he was sent, in September, 1669, to a Huron village at La Pointe, on the southwestern shore of Lake Superior. While at La Pointe, Marquette began to keep a journal. Also at La Pointe, Marquette was visited by members of the Illinois tribe, which lived much farther south. The Illinois described a river that ran through their territory, so mighty that they did not know its destination. From their descriptions, Marquette concluded that the river must flow into the Gulf of California, part of the Pacific Ocean. The Illinois asked Marquette to come and work in their villages. Enticed by the Illinois’ description of their river, the young missionary resolved to accept their invitation.

Life’s Work

In 1671, the Huron at La Pointe faced the threat of an attack by the Dakotas (Sioux) from the west. They were forced to abandon their village. Marquette followed the entire tribe to the Straits of Mackinac (Mackinaw), between Lake Huron and Lake Michigan. On the northwest shore of the straits, Marquette founded his own mission, which he named Saint Ignace, but he also began making plans to go to the land of the Illinois and to search for and explore their mighty river.

Father Claude-Jean Allouez, from the Mission of Saint Francis Xavier at Green Bay, on the west side of Lake Michigan, had also heard from the Chippawa tribe about the river they called Messipi, meaning “Father of Waters.” Allouez and Father Claude Dablon, a trained geographer, initiated the route that later led to the Mississippi River.

Word about this mighty river soon reached Quebec. Louis de Buade, count of Frontenac and Palluau, came to that city as governor of New France in April, 1672. He soon endorsed Marquette’s plan to search for the river. A French native of New France and a friend of Marquette, Louis Jolliet, was soon appointed to be part of the expedition. Jolliet was a fur trader and explorer who had been on several trips into the Great Lakes region. Jolliet left Quebec with orders from Marquette’s Jesuit superior, Father Dablon, for Marquette to join Jolliet in a voyage of discovery. Jolliet arrived at St. Ignace in December, 1672, with the much-anticipated news.

On May 17, 1673, Jolliet, Marquette, and five French woodsmen left St. Ignace in two birch bark canoes. Dried corn and smoked buffalo meat comprised the bulk of their food supply. They soon met the Folles-Avoines (“wild oats”), a friendly tribe of Canadian Indians already known to Father Marquette. The Folles-Avoines warned the explorers of danger ahead from hostile tribes, from monsters in the mighty river, and from heat so severe that it would cause death. Grateful for the warning, but not heeding it, the expedition skirted the northern end of Lake Michigan and soon entered Green Bay on the west side. They then pushed up the strong current of the Fox River into Lake Winnebago.

The Mascoutens (“fire nation”) tribe, who lived in the Lake Winnebago region, agreed to send two guides along with the explorers to lead them to the great river. On June 10, the expedition began the nearly impossible 2.5-mile (4-kilometer) portage to the Wisconsin River. Marquette gave full credit for the success of this march to the Mascouten guides, who even carried the canoes. At the Wisconsin River, a tributary of the Mississippi, Jolliet and Marquette entered a world about which they knew nothing.

June 17 was to be a climactic day for Marquette’s voyage. Exactly one month after leaving St. Ignace, near Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin, the explorers floated into the broad, swift, and peaceful waters of the upper Mississippi River. Marquette vividly described the moment in his journal, and drew a map showing their route and the topography of the land.

Their first human contact along the Mississippi River came on June 25, after the expedition had observed a path coming down to the river from the west. They followed the path to a village of the Illinois on the banks of the Des Moines River, in present-day Iowa. It had been members of this tribe who had first told Marquette about the river that ran through their land. When the explorers left the Illinois after a short rest, the tribe gave them a calumet, a feathered peace pipe, to protect them from hostile tribes to the south.

Resuming their journey, the expedition passed the mouth of the Illinois River from the east, which the Illinois told them would be a shortcut for their return trip. Next they came to the muddy Missouri River from the west, where they the saw the “monsters” about which they had been warned by the Folles-Avoines. They were painted on high rocks above the east bank of the Mississippi. After passing the mouth of the Ohio River from the east, they saw the Arkansas River coming from the west.

At the Arkansas River, Jolliet and Marquette faced their first danger from a Native American tribe. The Quapaw were deterred from massacring the seven men only when the recognized the calumet from the Illinois. From the Quapaw, they learned that the Mississippi River ran south to the Gulf of Mexico rather than west to the Gulf of California. They also learned that farther south they would be in great danger from the Spanish and their Native American allies. Marquette wrote in his journal that, after considering the possibility of losing all that they had accomplished, the expedition members decided to turn around and return to Quebec.

Their return voyage began on July 17. They ascended the Illinois River, portaged to the Chicago River to Lake Michigan, and returned to Saint Francis Xavier Mission on Green Bay in late September. They had traveled twenty-five hundred miles in four months. While Jolliet returned to Quebec with the results of the journey, Marquette remained at Green Bay. He sent his journal back to his superior, Father Dablon.

Kaskaskia, a large village of the Illinois, had asked Father Marquette to return and minister to them. On October 25, 1674, he left Green Bay to fulfill that request, but his health forced him to stop and spend the winter in a small hut, the first known dwelling place to be erected in what is now Chicago. Marquette set out again in March and reached Kaskaskia on April 8, 1675. After converting several thousand natives to the Roman Catholic Church, Marquette felt his strength ebbing away. He left after three weeks, wanting to spend his last earthly days at St. Ignace. On the eastern shore of Lake Michigan, however, he was carried ashore by his two companions. He died there on May 18, at the age of thirty-seven. Two years later, Native Americans took his bones to St. Ignace.

Significance

Two centuries after his death, the state of Wisconsin placed a statue of Marquette, created by a Native American, in the United States capital in Washington, D.C. In addition to this statue, Marquette’s lasting legacy is the journal he kept of his exploration of the Mississippi River. That journal provides detailed descriptions of tribal customs, the flora and fauna, and the future commercial value of the rivers and streams encountered by the expedition. Scientific information in the journal, such as his explanation of lake tides, is still accepted as accurate. Without the information in this journal, later exploration of the area would have been significantly more difficult.

Bibliography

Kupperman, Karen Ordahl, ed. America in European Consciousness, 1493-1775. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1995. The chapter by Luca Codignpla discusses Roman Catholic missions to the native tribes along the Mississippi during the time of Marquette. It does not mention Marquette by name, but it includes the map that Father Dablon made in 1671, very likely used by Jolliet and Marquette on their voyage.

Shea, John Gilmary. The Discovery and Exploration of the Mississippi. New York: Redfield, 1852. Includes the original journal of Marquette and the original narratives by Allouez, Dablon, and others. Also provides a facsimile of Marquette’s map of the route of the journey and of the Mississippi River as far as Jolliet and Marquette were able to go.

Volo, James, and Dorothy Denneen Volo. Daily Life on the Old Colonial Frontier. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 2002. Discusses the information provided by Marquette on trade with the Native American tribes. Examines how Marquette convinced many of the tribes to trade only with the French and the advantages they would have by doing so. Also covers the establishment of the French fort at Mackinac near Marquette’s St. Ignace mission.