Iberville lands; first French post on the Gulf1699–1702 · Fort Maurepas, Biloxi Bay (Ocean Springs, MS)Pierre Le Moyne d'Iberville builds Fort Maurepas, the first French post claimed by the Crown in 'Louisiane.' From here the French begin buying and taking captives from the nations around the lower Mississippi; Biloxi, Pascagoula and Moctobi are the first hosts. Nations: Biloxi; Pascagoula; Moctobi.Iberville's journal (McWilliams ed., 1981); Daniel Usner, Indians, Settlers, and Slaves in a Frontier Exchange Economy (1992), ch. 1; https://64parishes.org/entry/pierre-le-moyne-sieur-diberville
Iberville sees the red pole that names Baton Rouge1699 · Istrouma / the Red Stick, Scott's Bluff (Southern University, Baton Rouge)On March 17, 1699 Iberville's party records a tall pole stained red with fish and animal heads marking the hunting boundary between the Houma (upriver) and the Bayogoula (downriver) on the bluff now under Southern University's campus. The French name 'Baton Rouge' is a translation of the Houma-ChoctIberville journal, March 17, 1699; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Baton_Rouge,_Louisiana
The Houma town the French met in 16991699–1706 · Houma village on the Angola bluff (Louisiana State Penitentiary, Angola)Iberville visits the Houma town of about 140 cabins on the bluffs above the Mississippi, the site now inside the Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola. In 1706 the Tunica, displaced from the Yazoo, are taken in by the Houma and then attack them; the Houma move downriver. Nations: Houma; Tunica.Iberville journal 1699; John R. Swanton, Indian Tribes of the Lower Mississippi Valley (BAE Bulletin 43, 1911), pp. 285–291; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Houma_Nation
What South Baton Rouge was before 18031699–2026 · South Baton Rouge (Boosie's neighborhood)Torrence 'Boosie' Hatch is from South Baton Rouge, the historically Black neighborhood below downtown. The ground is the Bayogoula side of the 1699 red-stick boundary, river bottom between the Bayogoula town (near Bayou Goula, Iberville Parish) and the bluff; French concessions after 1718, then SpanIberville journal 1699; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baton_Rouge,_Louisiana
Houma and Acolapissa on the Bayou Road1700–1740 · Bayou St. John / Bayou Road, New OrleansBefore and during the city's founding, Acolapissa and Houma villages stand on Bayou St. John and the portage road; the 'Houmas' name survives on the Houmas House plantation (Ascension), where the nation sold land to Latil and Conway in 1774. Nations: Houma; Acolapissa; Chitimacha.Swanton (1911), pp. 285–291; https://64parishes.org/entry/houma
Apalachee and Chatot refugees and captives at Mobile1702–1763 · Mobile (then Louisiana)Apalachee and Chatot people fleeing the Carolina raids on Spanish Florida settle at Mobile under French protection after 1704, while Apalachee captives taken in those same raids are sold through Charleston and some reach Louisiana; the French keep both the refugees and the captives on the same riverUsner (1992), ch. 2; Alan Gallay, The Indian Slave Trade (2002), chs. 5–6
The Chitimacha war: twelve years of raids for captives1706–1718 · Chitimacha country, Bayou Lafourche and the TecheAfter a Chitimacha party kills the missionary Jean-François Buisson de St. Cosme in 1706, Bienville declares war and arms the Acolapissa, Houma, Biloxi and others to raid Chitimacha towns. Chitimacha women and children taken in these raids become the largest group of Indigenous captives held in earlUsner (1992), pp. 29–31, 57–59; Le Page du Pratz, Histoire de la Louisiane (1758), vol. 1; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Fran%C3%A7ois_Buisson_de_Saint-Cosme
Meskwaki (Fox) prisoners from the Great Lakes wars sent down the Mississippi1712–1740 · Fox captives sold at New OrleansDuring the Fox Wars (1712–1733), French commanders and allied nations in the Illinois Country send Meskwaki captives south to be sold in Louisiana; Rushforth documents Fox men, women and children in New Orleans and Mobile sale records and some sent on to the Caribbean. The Crown had banned Indian slBrett Rushforth, Bonds of Alliance: Indigenous and Atlantic Slaveries in New France (2012), chs. 5–6; R. David Edmunds and Joseph Peyser, The Fox Wars (1993)
St. Denis's post and the Red River captive trade1714–1803 · Natchitoches, Red RiverLouis Juchereau de St. Denis founds Natchitoches in 1714 as a trade post with the Caddo and Spanish Texas. Through it pass Lipan Apache, Caddo-held and Wichita-held captives sold to French households; the St. François des Natchitoches sacramental registers record them as 'sauvage' and 'sauvagesse' aElizabeth Shown Mills, Natchitoches Colonials (1981) and the St. François register abstracts; Brett Rushforth, Bonds of Alliance (2012), ch. 5; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Choctaw-Apache_Tribe_of_Ebarb
Adai Caddo1717–2026 · Adai Caddo community, Robeline (Natchitoches Parish)The Adai hosted the Spanish mission San Miguel de los Adaes (1717) and presidio Los Adaes, capital of Spanish Texas 1729–1770; after Los Adaes is abandoned the Adai stay on the Spanish Lake ground. State recognized 1993; about 500 members. Parish records of the 1800s list Adai families as 'free peophttps://www.adaicaddoindiannation.com/
Indigenous captives in New Orleans households1718–1769 · New Orleans (Vieux Carré)Census and notarial records of the French period list Indigenous people held in the city and on nearby concessions, most of them women and children taken in the Chitimacha, Natchez and Fox wars. Gwendolyn Midlo Hall's Louisiana Slave Database (1719–1820) carries ethnicity fields that record 'Indian,Gwendolyn Midlo Hall, Louisiana Slave Database, https://www.ibiblio.org/laslave/ (search ethnicity = Indian); Hall, Africans in Colonial Louisiana (1992), ch. 4; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_slavery_in_Louisiana
The 1724 Code Noir1724–1769 · Code Noir of Louisiana, promulgated at New OrleansBienville promulgates the Louisiana Code Noir in March 1724, the French law of captivity: it forbids marriage between whites and 'nègres,' makes the child follow the mother's condition, and is silent on Indian captives, who are held under custom and sale contracts rather than statute. Laussat restorCode Noir de la Louisiane (1724), Archives nationales d'outre-mer; https://64parishes.org/entry/code-noir-of-louisiana
The French count their Indigenous captives: 2291726 · New Orleans (1726 census)The 1726 census of Lower Louisiana registers 1,540 African and 229 Indigenous captives; by 1731 the African count passes 4,000 while the Indigenous count stays 'a few hundred.' Nearly two-thirds of the Indigenous captives recorded are women and children. France had banned Indigenous slavery in 1710;Kevin Harrell, 'Indigenous Slavery,' 64 Parishes (2023), https://64parishes.org/?p=37194
The Natchez rising and Périer's campaign1729–1731 · Fort Rosalie / Natchez (Natchez, MS)On Nov 29, 1729 the Natchez destroy Fort Rosalie after commandant Chépart demands the White Apple village for a plantation. Governor Étienne Périer answers with two campaigns; in January 1731 at the Natchez fort on the Black River the Great Sun, his mother Tattooed Arm, and about 450 Natchez surrendLe Page du Pratz, Histoire de la Louisiane (1758); Dumont de Montigny, Mémoires historiques (1753); https://64parishes.org/entry/natchez-revolt-of-1729-adaptation
Natchez prisoners held on the levee before shipment1731 · Natchez captives held in New OrleansThe surrendered Natchez, including the Great Sun and Tattooed Arm, are held in New Orleans in early 1731; Périer orders the women and children, and the Suns, sold off the colony to prevent any return. Those captives who are not shipped are sold into local households. Nations: Natchez. Taken in war: Périer to Maurepas, March 1731 (Archives nationales d'outre-mer, C13A 13); Usner (1992), pp. 65–76; https://64parishes.org/entry/natchez-revolt-of-1729-adaptation
The Natchez shipped to Ayiti1731–1791 · Cap-Français (Cap-Haïtien), AyitiIn 1731 Périer ships the Natchez captives, the Great Sun and Tattooed Arm among them, to Saint-Domingue, where they are sold at Le Cap. The Crown's own prohibition on Indian slavery in the islands means the Natchez are entered in plantation and parish records under other labels; the 2022 EthnohistorEthnohistory 69:3 (July 2022), 'The Obfuscation of Native American Presence in the French Atlantic: Natchez Indians in Saint Domingue, 1731–1791,' https://read.dukeupress.edu/ethnohistory/article-abstract/69/3/265/316298
The Natchez who were not taken1731–1800 · Natchez refuge among the Chickasaw and CreekSeveral hundred Natchez escape Périer's campaign and settle among the Chickasaw, then the Creek and Cherokee; the Natchez language is last spoken in Oklahoma in the 20th century. The nation the French declared destroyed in 1731 is still enrolled in the Muscogee and Cherokee nations today. Nations: NSwanton (1911), pp. 252–257; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natchez_people
Tunica-Biloxi1731–2026 · Tunica-Biloxi Reservation, Marksville (Avoyelles Parish)The Tunica settle near Marksville about 1780 after the Natchez war; the 'Tunica Treasure' (18th-century trade goods looted from their graves in the 1960s) is returned after a 20-year legal fight (1985). Federal recognition 1981. Tunica, Biloxi, Ofo and Avoyel families intermarried with Creole and Blhttps://www.tunicabiloxi.org/
Congo Square1740–1850 · Congo Square (Place des Nègres), New OrleansAn open ground on the Bayou Road, on the city's back edge, where Houma and other Indigenous people traded and held ceremonies before the city, and where held and free Africans and Indigenous people gather on Sundays to drum, dance and sell. The 1817 city ordinance confines such gatherings to this sqNew Orleans City Ordinance, Oct 15, 1817; Benjamin Latrobe, Journal, Feb 21, 1819; Freddi Williams Evans, Congo Square: African Roots in New Orleans (2011); https://64parishes.org/entry/congo-square
Coincoin and the Cane River registers1742–1850 · Isle Brevelle, Cane River (Melrose, Natchitoches Parish)Marie Thérèse Coincoin, born 1742 to captives of the St. Denis household, becomes the matriarch of the Cane River community; the St. François registers list her mother's generation beside 'sauvagesse' captives and her children as 'mulâtre' and 'quarteron.' Descendants are 'free persons of color' by Elizabeth Shown Mills, 'Marie Thérèse Coincoin' (2006); Gary Mills, The Forgotten People: Cane River's Creoles of Color (1977); St. François des Natchitoches registers. Disputed on the Indigenous line: the registers show it in the household, not in Coincoin's own baptism
Attakapas and Opelousas registers1760–1830 · Opelousas Post (St. Landry Parish)The St. Landry (Opelousas) and St. Martin (Attakapas) church registers record Ishak (Atakapa) and Opelousa people baptized as 'sauvage' in the 1760s–80s, then their children as 'mulâtre' or 'libre'; the 1810 and 1820 federal censuses carry no Indian column for them and list the same families as 'freRev. Donald Hebert, Southwest Louisiana Records, vols. 1–3; U.S. Census 1810/1820 St. Landry; Hiram F. Gregory, 'Survival and Maintenance Among Louisiana Tribes,' in Louisiana Folklife; https://www.louisianalineage.com/margarita.htm (Guillory line)
The Filipino village of Saint Malo1763–1915 · Saint Malo, Lake Borgne (St. Bernard Parish)Filipino sailors who left Spanish galleon service settle a stilt village on the marsh edge of Lake Borgne, by tradition in the 1760s, named for the maroon leader; Lafcadio Hearn visits in 1883 and describes it in Harper's Weekly. The village is destroyed by the 1915 hurricane. The 1763 date rests onLafcadio Hearn, 'Saint Malo: A Lacustrine Village in Louisiana,' Harper's Weekly, March 31, 1883; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint_Malo,_Louisiana
O'Reilly bans the Indian captive trade1769–1803 · Cabildo, New Orleans (O'Reilly's decree)Governor Alejandro O'Reilly, taking Louisiana for Spain, issues a decree in December 1769 forbidding the enslavement of Indians and the sale of Indian captives, citing Spanish law and the raiding the trade caused. Those already held are not freed; the decree is republished by Miró in 1787 with a rigDecree of Dec 7, 1769, Spanish Judicial Records, Louisiana Historical Center; https://64parishes.org/entry/slavery-in-spanish-colonial-louisiana
The Indigenous captives disappear from the Spanish paper1769–1803 · Spanish-period records, colony-wide (the vanishing)Blackbird's 2023 study finds that 'French records frequently enumerated enslaved Indigenous people, but their presence is conspicuously absent from Spanish period records,' because after the 1769 ban the same people are re-entered as 'negro,' 'mulato' or 'grifo' so the holding stands. The title quotBlackbird, WMQ 80:3 (2023), 525–58; Blackbird, 'Entwined Threads of Red and Black' (M.A. thesis, UNO, 2018), https://scholarworks.uno.edu/td/2559
Choctaw-Apache of Ebarb1770–2026 · Choctaw-Apache community, Ebarb and Zwolle (Sabine Parish)Descended from Lipan Apache captives sold at Natchitoches and freed after 1769, and Choctaw families who settled near Los Adaes in the early 1800s; state recognized 1978 (HCR 2); letter of intent to BIA March 22, 1978, no active federal petition as of 2023. About 2,300 local members. The community'shttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Choctaw-Apache_Tribe_of_Ebarb
The ancestor in the Phipps file1770 · Opelousas (Margarita, 1770)Margarita, the woman the state traced Phipps to, appears in the 1770 Opelousas records as a captive of Gregoire Guillory; the family's genealogists read the registers as showing Indigenous as well as African origin, and the Guillory line's later entries move from 'sauvage' and 'mulâtre' to 'free perhttps://www.louisianalineage.com/margarita.htm
Baton Rouge was not in the Louisiana Purchase1779–1810 · Baton Rouge (Spanish West Florida)Gálvez takes the British fort at Baton Rouge in Sept 1779; the town stays Spanish West Florida through the 1803 Purchase, and is not part of 'Louisiana' until settlers seize it in the 1810 West Florida rebellion and Madison annexes it. Before any of this it is Houma and Bayogoula ground; the Houma ahttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Baton_Rouge,_Louisiana
San Malo's maroons1780–1784 · Bas du Fleuve / Terre Gaillarde (St. Bernard Parish marsh)Juan San Malo leads maroon camps in the cypress swamps below New Orleans (Bas du Fleuve, Terre Gaillarde, toward Lake Borgne), trading with Indigenous people and raiding plantations. Governor Miró sends repeated expeditions; in 1784 the camp is taken, and San Malo is hanged in the Plaza de Armas (Jahttps://64parishes.org/entry/juan-san-malo
United Houma Nation1780–2026 · United Houma Nation, lower bayous (Terrebonne and Lafourche)More than 19,000 members along Bayou Terrebonne, Grand Caillou, Dulac, Pointe-aux-Chenes and Bayou Lafourche. State recognized 1977; federal petition 1985; 1994 BIA proposed finding denies on three criteria while admitting 'verifiable Native American ancestry'; petition remains active under the 2015https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Houma_Nation
Hanging of San Malo1784 · Plaza de Armas (Jackson Square), New OrleansAfter a six-day trial San Malo and three companions are hanged in the square on June 19, 1784. The Creole song 'Dirge of St. Malo' survives in Cable's 1886 transcription. Nations: (maroons).George Washington Cable, 'Creole Slave Songs,' Century Magazine (1886); https://64parishes.org/entry/juan-san-malo
The tignon law1786–1803 · Cabildo, New Orleans (Miró's bando, June 2, 1786)Governor Esteban Miró's bando de buen gobierno of June 2, 1786 orders that free women of color wear a headwrap (tignon) and that 'the Negras, Mulatas, y quarteronas can no longer have feathers nor jewelry in their hair,' so that free women of color are marked on sight as belonging with the held. TheMiró, bando de buen gobierno, June 2, 1786, Cabildo records; Jessica Marie Johnson, Wicked Flesh (2020), p. 198; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tignon_law
Indigenous captives sue for freedom under Miró's republication1787–1795 · Natchitoches freedom suitsAfter Miró republishes O'Reilly's ban in 1787, people held as 'india' or 'mestiza' in Natchitoches and Pointe Coupée petition the governor for freedom; several win, and the records show holders arguing the petitioners are 'mulata' not 'india,' the first documented use of the relabel to defeat a claiSpanish Judicial Records, Louisiana Historical Center, New Orleans; Webre (1984); https://64parishes.org/entry/slavery-in-spanish-colonial-louisiana
Thirteen petitions: 'I am Indian, not negro'1790–1794 · Governor's court, New Orleans (freedom petitions)At least thirteen petitions for freedom from people claiming Indigenous ancestry are heard in the governor's court between 1790 and 1794; several win. Holders answer by calling the petitioners 'mulato' or 'negro.' Governor Carondelet then issues a moratorium on further challenges to Indigenous captiHarrell, 64 Parishes (2023); Leila K. Blackbird, 'It Has Always Been Customary to Make Slaves of Savages: The Problem of Indian Slavery in Spanish Louisiana Revisited, 1769–1803,' William and Mary Quarterly 80:3 (July 2023), 525–58, https://oieahc.wm.edu/wp-content/uploads/Blackbird.pdf
Coushatta (Koasati)1795–2026 · Coushatta Reservation, Elton (Allen Parish)Koasati families move from the Alabama River to the Red and then Calcasieu rivers in the 1790s to escape the Creek wars and U.S. expansion; the federal relationship, dropped in 1953, is restored in 1973. About 900 enrolled; the language is still spoken. Nations: Coushatta (Koasati); Alabama.https://www.coushatta.org/
The Pointe Coupée conspiracy1795 · Pointe Coupée (New Roads)A planned rising of held people at Pointe Coupée is uncovered in April 1795; 23 are hanged along the river road and their heads posted on poles from Pointe Coupée to New Orleans. The trial record names Indigenous and mixed households among the accused and informants; Carondelet uses it to tighten thGwendolyn Midlo Hall, Africans in Colonial Louisiana (1992), ch. 11; trial records, Pointe Coupée Parish; https://64parishes.org/entry/pointe-coupee-slave-conspiracy-of-1795
Atakapa-Ishak of Grand Bayou1800–2026 · Grand Bayou Village (Plaquemines Parish)A water-access-only village of Atakapa-Ishak and Chawasha descendants on Grand Bayou; state recognition sought since 2005 and not granted; the village is outside federal levees and lost most of its land after Katrina (2005) and the BP spill (2010). Members were listed 'colored' in Plaquemines recordGrand Bayou Village oral histories, Louisiana Sea Grant; https://www.lsu.edu/ (Sea Grant Grand Bayou reports); Louisiana Legislature, state-recognition resolutions 2005–2019. Open: recognition status; settle with the Governor's Office of Indian Affairs list
Houma, the town named for the nation1800–2026 · Houma, Terrebonne Parish (Webbie's birthplace)Webster 'Webbie' Gradney was born in Houma and raised in Baton Rouge. The town, laid out 1834, carries the name of the Houma Nation, whose families had moved down Bayou Terrebonne and Bayou Lafourche after leaving Ascension in the late 1700s. The United Houma Nation's headquarters are in the town. Nhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Houma_Nation
The 1811 rising1811 · German Coast (St. John the Baptist and St. Charles)Charles Deslondes leads 200–500 held people from the Andry plantation toward New Orleans on Jan 8–10, 1811, the largest rising of held people in U.S. history; militia and U.S. troops kill about 95, and heads are posted along the river road. Trial records name men listed as 'mulâtre' and 'griffe' (thDaniel Rasmussen, American Uprising (2011); St. Charles Parish trial records, Jan 1811; https://64parishes.org/entry/german-coast-uprising
Pointe-au-Chien Indian Tribe1830–2026 · Pointe-aux-Chenes (Terrebonne/Lafourche line)About 800 members on Bayou Pointe-aux-Chenes; split from the UHN petition in 1995; state recognized 2004; federal petition pending. The community lost most of its land to erosion, canals and the 2010s levee alignment that left it outside the Morganza-to-the-Gulf protection line. Tribal members were https://pactribe.com/
The first federally funded climate resettlement1830–2022 · Isle de Jean Charles (Terrebonne Parish)Settled about 1830 by Jean Marie Naquin and Pauline Verdin and their Biloxi-Chitimacha-Choctaw kin; the island shrinks from about 22,000 acres to 320 by 2016. HUD grants Louisiana $48.3 million in 2016 to move residents to 'The New Isle' near Schriever; the tribe says the state cut it out of the plaHUD National Disaster Resilience Competition award, Jan 2016; https://www.isledejeancharles.com/
Chitimacha: the only Louisiana nation never removed1916–2026 · Chitimacha Reservation, Charenton (St. Mary Parish)The Chitimacha keep a remnant of their homeland on Bayou Teche; a 1916 purchase by Sarah Avery McIlhenny and federal trust in 1917 make them Louisiana's first federally recognized tribe. About 1,700 enrolled today; the language, lost in 1940, is being revived from Swadesh's recordings. Chitimacha fahttps://www.chitimacha.gov/
The marsh under the nations1930–2026 · Bayou Lafourche (Lafourche Parish) land lossLouisiana has lost about 2,000 square miles of coast since 1932, most of it in the parishes where the Houma, Pointe-au-Chien and Isle de Jean Charles communities live; oil and gas canals and levees that cut off the river's sediment are the main documented causes. Nations: Houma; Pointe-au-Chien; BilUSGS, 'Land Area Change in Coastal Louisiana (1932 to 2016),' Scientific Investigations Map 3381; Louisiana Coastal Master Plan 2023
Three school systems: white, 'colored,' and 'Indian'1930–1966 · Dulac Indian School, Dulac (Terrebonne Parish)Terrebonne runs a separate Methodist-run school for Houma children from 1953 (earlier mission schools from 1930), teaching only to eighth grade; families refused the parish's first offered school in 1930 fearing it would be designated 'colored.' Houma children enter white high schools only after a 1https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Houma_Nation
Susie Guillory Phipps and the 1/32 law1934–1983 · Jefferson Parish (Phipps's birth certificate)Phipps, born 1934 in Acadia Parish and living in Jefferson, finds her birth certificate marked 'colored' in 1977. Louisiana's Act 46 of 1970 defined as 'Negro' anyone with more than 1/32 'Negro blood'; the state traces her to Margarita, a captive held by Gregoire Guillory in 1770. She loses in OrleaDoe v. State, 479 So.2d 369 (La. App. 4 Cir. 1985), https://www.leagle.com/decision/1985848479so2d3692774
The last racial-classification statute in the United States1970–1983 · Louisiana State Capitol (Act 46 of 1970)Act 46 (1970) replaces the 'any traceable amount' rule with 1/32; it is the only such statute on the books in any state when Phipps challenges it. Repealed June 1983 by a unanimous Senate; replaced by a rule letting parents declare race, with the Office of Vital Statistics keeping its 'preponderanceLa. R.S. 42:267 (1970), repealed by Acts 1983 No. 441; https://mixedracestudies.org/?p=31520