The second expedition took place between April 22 1564 and August 1565
Cologny, a French admiral sends Laudonniere back to Florida. Also on the trip is Jacques Lemoyne de Mourgues, who would draw the flora/fauna. Three ships leave: the Elisabeth, Breton and Faucon. Elizabeth while being the largest in the fleet is a light- medium ship. The rest are even smaller. They leave april 22, reached Teneriff may 5, Martinique the 20th and Dominica the 21st.
On june 22nd they reach the US, close to a river which they named the Dolphin River. It’s about 10 lieue (20 miles) north of French Cap and 30 lieues (60 miles) south of River May. He travels north and reaches River May. He is welcomed by the Indians. The Indians show him the stones that Ribaud had erected on the previous expedition and yelling “ Ami, Ami” (friend in French). Laudonnieres finds flowers on the rocks.
Laudonniers becomes friend with an Indian chief named Satouriona. He asks Satouriona where the silver is. Satouriona replies that another tribe, the Thimogounas have it. But the two tribes are at war with each other. Laudonnieres says to Soutauriona that he is going to go to the Thimogounas. Soutauriona is delighted because he thinks Laudonnieres is going to go wipe out the other tribe. However, that’s exactly what Laudoniere does not want to do. He wants to remain neutral with all the tribes. Laudonieres then tell Soutauriona that he will meet the Satouriana later but that he first must go explore the region a bit more.
He sails back down the river May, and down the coastline. He recognizes the Seine river, 4 lieues (8 miles) from the River May and the Somme River, 6 lieues (12 miles) from the Seine river. It is on the Somme that he anchors. There again, he is recognized by the Indians and welcomed. On June 28th, Laudonieres calls his soldiers for a meeting. Should they go north where Charlesfort was or should they go back to River May. They elect to go back to River May and on June 29th, they reach the inlet. They decide to establish camp there. He finds the perfect place. A small triangular island in the river. He empties his three ships and sends back to France the Elisabeth.
Since this is Soutauriona territory, he asks for permission to erect a fort. On the west side, the island can be defended by erecting a earthen wall. On the southeast and Northwest, the river serves as a mot. He builds a few houses with wooden planks. Since the Indians had told them about the hurricanes, these houses were built almost underground. They also built an oven to bake bread. The ships’ cannons were removed and placed into the fort. He names the fort Caroline. After building the fort, Laudoniers is interested in getting touch with the Thimogounas who are supposed to have silver. But he doesn’t want Soutauriona to know about it.
So Laudonniers sends D’Ottigny to go explore the region. D’ottigny sails up the river about 20 lieues (40 miles) and found three Thimogounas ships. The local Indians at first are scared but come around and greet D’Ottigny. D’Ottigny asks if there is any gold or silver. The Indians reply that they don’t have any, but are willing to take one of the French soldiers to a man who knows where to get it. Off goes a French soldier with the Indians. The French soldier doesn’t come back and D’Ottigny decides to go up the river another 10 lieues (20 miles) to see if he can find him. Finally, the soldier comes back. The soldier states that 3 day walk from here, an indian named Mayra is willing to trade European goods for silver and gold which he has plenty of. The soldier asks if he can grab a few trinkets and go back to Mayra. D’Ottigny accepts. The soldier goes back to see Mayra, D’Ottigny goes back to fort Caroline.
15 days later (july 1564), Capt Vasseur, sergeant Lacaille, and a few soldiers go back to fetch the French soldier. After 2 days of navigation, they anchor the boat. There they meet an Indian by the name of Molona, friend of a very powerful Indian price called Outina. Vasseur meets back with the French soldier left by D’Ottingy. The soldier has only 5 or 6 pounds of silver. He tells of the very warm welcome he has received from the Indians and how beautiful the country is. Vasseur then asks about the politics of the region. The banks of river May is disputed by two strong Indian leaders: Satouriona and Olate Outina. But Outina had also other enemies: Potavou,Onatheaqua and Houstaqua. Outina promises large amounts of gold and silver if the French help him defeat Soutoutiona and others.
Vasseurs decides to take his men back to Fort Caroline. On the way back, the boat gets stuck due to the strong tidal current. They are forced to stay put. Other Indians appear. One is also named Molona, but he doesn’t belong to the Outina tribe, he belongs to the Soutauriona tribe instead. Seeing that the French just came back from Outina territory, Molona asks how the battle went. Vasseur lies and responds that the Outina tribe had been warned and ran away, but that he managed to kill a few. The Indians go wild and ask for the gory details. Finally the ship is freed and Vasseur heads back to Fort Caroline.
Vasseur tells Laudonnieres all the details of the exploration. Laudonnieres doesn’t know what to do. Does he sides with one tribe? Does he kill all the tribes, like the Spaniards and English do? Does he try to remain neutral? He decides that remaining neutral would give him the best chances in finding out who really has the gold and silver. But neutrality is not a concept that is understood by the Indians. They are either at war or at peace. He wanted to be friends with everybody. At the end he would be friends with no one.
One day, Soutauriona sends a group of 120 Indian warriors in full battle gear to Fort Caroline. This group is to announce the arrival of Soutauriona. Not knowing what to make out of it, Laudonniers refuses to receive them and asks that Soutauriona not to come in such force. Soutauriona, well on his way with another 7-800 warriors, stops and erects a makeshift tent. Soutauriana then sends for Laudonnieres. Laudonniers shows up with D’Ottingny and the translator, La Caille. Behind him are the small group of French soldiers. Satouriona is offended that there are so few Frenchmen but take solace when Laudonniers tells him that France is a large country and that the French King himself is thankful for Satouriona. Satouriana is than very pleased and says that he will send 80 of his strongest warriors to help the French. But that in return, Laudonniers must fight against the Thimogans (Outina) .
Soutaurina was very eager to go fight the Thimogans. Laudonnieres just wanted to know where silver and gold were and thought remaining neutral would allow him to receive more information. Several times Soutaurina had requested an “attack date”. Each time Laudonniers declined. To try to force the issue, Soutaurina sends 1500 warriors to Fort Caroline. To avoid answering, Laudonniere leaves the fort and puts La Caille (the translator) in charge. La Caille stops the Indian warriors from entering the fort and tells Soutaurina that he is the only one who is allowed in. Compared to typical Indian fortifications, fort Caroline was leading edge. Impregnable. Sensing Soutaurina’s awe, La Caille fires one of the cannon for good measure. That sends all of the Indians warriors, waiting outside the fort , running for the woods. Soutaurina is less than pleased and tells La Caille that he wants an attack date and leaves.
Laudonnieres comes back to the Fort and immediately send La Caille to tell Soutaurina that they are still building smaller ships to go up the river and that these are not ready.
Soutaurina finally realizes that Laudonniere is trying to determine which tribe will lead him to the gold and silver. Upon that realization, he decides to go attack the Thimogonas himself, to show how strong he is. Laudonniere realizes that if he wants any further help from Soutaurina, he needs to send a few French soldiers go fight. Which he does.
Soutaurina divides his own forces into 2 groups. One will go by the river, the other by land. They get to one of the Thimogan village, kill most of the Indians, burn it down to the ground and take a few prisoners. The prisoners are then taken back. Some are dismembered and scalped. Landonniere still trying to remain neutral asks Soutaurina to release some of the prisoners. Three times Soutaurina refuses. By the fourth time, he agrees.
Laudonnieres then takes the prisoners and sends D’Erlach, Vasseur and 11 soldiers with the prisoners to another Thimogan village. They go 80 lieues (160 miles) inland and meet with Outina who is very pleased. It also happens that Outina was in the middle of going to war with another enemy Potavou. Outina asks D’Erlach to join the fight. D’Erlarch sends Vasseur and 5 soldiers back to Fort Caroline. He and the other six soldiers would stay and fight.
Outina had only about 200 warriors so he asks that the French soldiers to take point. Only 25 lieues (50 miles) separated the two groups. They reached Patavou and his village. D’Elarch shoots and kills Patavou right off the bat. That sends the other Indians into the woods.
When Vasseur came back for D’Erlach and his men, Outina gave them some silver and gold, deerskins and musical instruments. Outina also pledged 300 warriors to Laudonniers should he need it. Immdiately, Outina wanted to go to war with another tribe in the Appalachians (term from the manuscript) . Laudonniers had heard so much about the gold in the Appalachians that he decided to send 30 of his soldiers as well as D’Ottigny and Lemoyne (the artist) . It’s from Lemoyne that we have all these drawing about the Indians during that period.
Outina made preparations which included conferring with the Shaman. The Shaman was said to be 120 years old. Shaman says that the victory will come only after a long fight. Outina then thought it would be better to go back and wait for another time. D’Ottingy and his men didn’t agree and wanted to fight. Outina didn’t want to appear weak, so they launched the attack. The battle lasted 3 hours. Outina had the advantage and didn’t want to pursue the enemy. Instead he ordered to stop. There was no gold or silver in the village. This enraged D’Ottingny and his men to the point that D’Ottigny left for Fort Caroline.
Meanwhile, back at Fort Caroline, all is not well. There is a lot of dissolution. Many of the French soldiers/craftsmen had come for the gold and silver. This is at a time when incredible riches are found by the Spaniards and stories abound. They also grow tired of fighting for little reward.
On Septembre 20th, Laudonniere becomes ill. Two soldiers tried to take advantage of it and tried to convince other members to poison him or outright blow him up by leaving a powder keg under his bed. While no one goes with the plan, the animosity remains.
A French ship arrives, captained by Bourdet. They brought some supplies but not much. Bourdet also leaves a few of his soldiers who are familiar with the Spanish and the Caribbean’s. However these soldiers, not much for doing labor around the camp, decide to steal one of the two small barges recently built. These soldiers along with 13 of Laudonniere’s own men sail away in plain daylight in their own pursuit of Spanish gold. Two carpenters seeing an opportunity also steal the other small barge and sail away. Laudonniere builds a raft in 24 hours but the two barges are too far ahead to be caught.
Laudonnieres is forced to build two new barges because he wants to explore further up the rivers. If the soldiers build them, it is only with the hope to steal them once finished. Up to 60 of Landonnieres men made the pact go rejoin their fellow deserters to become pirates. Once completed, the men overpower Laudonnieres, D’Ottigny and D’Erlach. De Caille, the translator, had been forewarned by Lemoyne and took off for the woods.
The mutineers than sailed for Cuba and took up piracy. It wasn’t long before they were captured. Still, as many as 26 of them escaped with a tiny boat. Somehow, these 26 mutineers came back to Fort Caroline. While Laudonniers was ready to forgive them, La Caille on the other hand wasn’t. A military tribunal was set up. The ones directly responsible were shot while the one who were deemed as accomplices were spared.
Landonnieres became focused on establishing more friendly relations with other Indian tribes. In doing so, he heard that two Europeans were living with Indians.
One called the “Hairy One” lived with Onachaquara and another one, without a name, lived with Mathiaca. Landonnieres reasoned that these two men may know where the silver and gold were since they had been around for some time. He offered a reward to any Indians who would bring these Europeans back to the fort alive. Soon enough, the two men were brought in.
They were Spanish and had lived with the Indians for the past 15 years. They had shipwrecked on a reef, on the southern point of the presqu’ile of Florida. They had been rescued by an Indian Chief called Calos. Calos took prisoners 3 or 4 Spanish nobles that were also on the shipwreck. Calos also took the gold and silver. During festivities, Calos’ women would parade around the campfire with gold ingots tied to their belt. These ingots were heavy and as large as “dining plates”. Calos kept a large gold and silver cache, as deep as a man and as wide as a barrel. The two Spaniards tried to convince Laudonieres to go after the gold, but Laudonniers wasn’t ready to go on such an expedition.
Laudonnier sent several soldiers to do some reconnaissance. One of them was Laroche-Ferriere. Laroche went to Outina territory and found out about 2 other Indian kings: Onatheaqua and Oustaca. Both were enemies of Outina. Laroche decided to head for the mountains to go visit these two kings.
Both chief welcomed and showered Laroche with gifts: gold and silver shields, gold powder, silver ingots, emeralds and sapphires. Outina, hearing about Laroche’s dealings become so angry he planned on torturing Laroche . Laroche didn’t care. Oustaca had promised 4000 of his warriors if Laroche could provide 100 French soldiers. These 100 French soldiers would be used to take over the Appalachians and control the gold and silver mines there. Laroche dispatches one of his soldiers, Poitevin Grotauld back to Fort Caroline. Upon Poitevin’s return to the fort, Laudoniere decided that he couldn’t spare the 100 men. Poitevin also mentioned that he had witnessed Indians taking gold and copper nuggets out of a stream. This really excited all the French soldiers but still Laudoniere refused to send men.
Another Frenchman , Pierre Gambye went alone to explore the area. Ganbye went far into the territory, met many Indians, even married the daughter of a a chief. That gave him a lot of pwer within the that tribe. Gambye has amassed some gold and silver but was killed on his trip back to the fort.
Another Frenchman was sent by the name of Lescarbot. He also went far into the territory. He came across a lake so large big, he couldn’t see the other side.
Just as in the previous attempt at establishing a colony, food supply constantly ran dry. This forced the French to start trading everything they had for food. Sensing the dire need the French had for food, the Indians start demanding more items for less food. Famine became such a problem that Laudonieres orders the only ship left: The Breton, to be repaired so that they can return to France.
A few of the French soldiers left the fort to go raid the field the Indian had cultivated. They were killed by the Indians. Laudoniere again doesn’t take action, but realizes that once the ship is ready he will need food supply for the crossing.
The Indians are getting bolder and do not wish to trade with the French anymore. Laudonniers has no choice but to go to war with the Indians. He raids and captures Outina who is thought to be the toughest opponent. He brings back Outina to the Fort Caroline.
Outina, while being an hostage, is kept in good health and even allowed to have have friends and family come over. Satouriona, the mortal enemy of Outina begs for Laudoniere to kill Outina. To try to convince Laudoniere, Satouriona sends loads of food the French desperately need. Since Laudonniere still does not kill Outina, Satouriona cuts off all food supplies going to the French.
Once again famine takes place in the fort.
Outina promises Laudonniers loads of food if he is released. Laudonnieres agrees and sends Outina with D’Ottigny and 30 soldiers back to Outina’s tribe. Upon arriving there, Outina’s tribe reluctantly gave bags of grain to the French soldiers. As soon as the French left the tribe, they are attacked by 400 warriors. From 9 am until late in the afternoon, the fight raged on until the Indians ran out of arrows. D’ottigny, Lemoyne, and twenty other Frenchmen had been wounded. Two had been killed. Still, they brought back some of the bags of grain.
The Breton (ship) was finally seaworthy and Laudoniere orders to have Fort Caroline demolish. As they ready to set sail, they see ships on the horizon. It happened to be English ships, captained by Hawkins. The English not only give plenty of food to the French, but they also sell them one of their own boat for a bargain price. Laudonniere accepts despite thinking that the English are going to declare this area as England’s. Laudonniere has all the supplies transferred to the new ship and get ready to set sail when he sees another set of sailboats. This time, they are French. Ribaut has returned..
very detailed
