Track Natchez

The Piste Natchez ( Natchez Traces ) was a 708 km length track (440 miles) between Natchez in the the Mississippi and Nashville in the Tennessee connecting the rivers Cumberland, Tennessee and the river the Mississippi. It was intensely used by the Indiens of America and the European explorers white like through road at the end of the 17th century and at the beginning of 18th. Nowadays, the track is commemorated with the long Natchez Trace Parkway 277 km which follows its layout roughly. (see the image on TNGenWeb' S).

The Natchez track has long and rich history, filled of explorers full with bravery, the dreadful one out the law and daring colonists. Certain portions of the track are still accessible.

Origins

Well after the arrival of the Amerindian , the needs for hunting for the Bison, the stag or other species implied displacements more and more far until the way (relatively for this time) is traced well and accessible to riders in Indian file. The Spanish explorer celebrates Hernando de Soto has to traverse the track.

The first man of European origin to have reported in 1742 its course on the Natchez Track and its " miserable conditions " is unknown French. For the Europeans, little accustomed to the rigors of the itinérance, the help of Amerindians like the Cherokee, the Choctaw and the Chickasaw was vital. The former practice of the track by Europeans is besides the trade with the Indian Nations whose track crossed the territory.

Development and disappearance of the Natchez Track

It is only starting from 1801, when the armed forces of the the United States started to use the track like postal route, that work allowed the transit of the travellers. Treaties were signed with the nations Chickasaw and Choctaw and work started, initially realized by soldiers come from the Western Tennessee then by civilians under contract. In 1809, the track was entirely practicable out of harnessed carriage. Essential with the success of the track as commercial route was also the creation of Auberge S and commercial counters then called Stands . For the majority, those developed starting from the south in Nashville. Many first colonies of the Mississippi and Tennessee developed along the Natchez track. Most important were Washington, the old capital of the Mississippi, Greenville, where Andrew Jackson developed its trade of slaves and Port Gibson.

Towards 1816, the continuous development of Memphis and military road of Jackson, a hot line from Nashville towards La Nouvelle-Orléans in Louisiana made it possible simultaneously to deploy the trade towards the east and the west. The Track knew a regular decline then and as the author William C. Davis wrote it in his book a passage through the desert ( has Way Through the Wilderness ) " the Natchez track was victim of its own success ". It highlighted the advantages of the trade with the delta of the Mississippi but because of the facility improved of the trade by inland waterway, in particular by means of the paddle wheel of the Steamer, the track lost of its utility. In 1830, it was abandoned like official road and started to turn over to the desert from which it resulted.

In spite of its short lifespan, the Natchez Track fulfilled an essential function. It was the only fast and reliable bond to forward the goods of north to the commercial ports of the Louisiana. It drained people of very diverse origin such as for example of the itinerant preachers or the travelling tradesmen. Several preachers methodists spread themselves along the track dice 1800. In 1812 they asserted the conversion of 1.067 Europeans and 267 Afro-Américain S.

Highwaymen like John Murrell and Samuel Mason terrorized the travellers along the track and organized bands which are the first examples of Organized crime in the United States.

The mystery of Meriwether Lewis

Meriwether Lewis, which had taken part in the Expédition Lewis and Clark, died in a mysterious way on the Natchez track. It had stopped with the Grinder' S Stand close to the current city of Hohenwald in the Tennessee to be restored. Very depressed by the state of its finances (it was largely in debt), it saôula as it had already done on several occasions at the time of its voyage then it asked the tenancière powder with rifle, than she gave him, intimidated by her behavior. A few hours later, two shots resounded in the night: Lewis had apparently drawn a blow in the head and the other in the chest. He survived until the morning.

For a long time one thought of a suicide. But little by little from the details emerged which raised other assumptions: had one of its rivals, particularly Robert Grinder, owner of the inn it killed it then flown? Where was it about an political assassination against the governor of the territory of the Louisiana which was then Lewis?

In 1996 James E. Starr, professor with the " " George Washington University " , tried to obtain from the 160 descendants of Lewis an authorization of exhumation. The National Park Service, whose the site depends on the tomb with Hohenwald, refused the permission.

Random links: