NARKATIVE OF THE EXPEDITION". 45 



French town in 1805, not a building of wliich, witliin tlie walls, 

 was saved. Its main street, Jeiferson Avenue, is elevated about 

 forty feet above the river. The town consists of about two hun- 

 dred and fifty houses of all descriptions, public and private, and 

 has a population of fourteen hundred and fifty,* exclusive of the 

 garrison. 



To the historian it is a point of great interest. It was the site 

 of an Indian village called Teuchsagondie in 1620, the date of the 

 landing of the Pilgrims at Plymouth-. Quebec was founded in 

 1608 ; Albany in 1611. But no regular settlement or occupancy 

 took place here, till the close of the seventeenth century. In 

 June, 1687, the French took formal possession of the straits by 

 erecting the arms of France. On the 21:th of July, 1701, M. 

 Cadillac established the first military post. Charlevoix, who 

 landed here in 1721, found it the site of Fort Pontchartrain. 



In 1768 the garrison, being then under British colors, sustained 

 a notable siege from the confederate Indians under Pontiac. It 

 remained under English rule till the close of the American Eevolu- 

 tion, and was not finally surrendered to the United States until 

 1790, the year followiug Wayne's treaty at Greenville. Surrendered 

 by Hull in 1812, it was reoccupied by General Harrison in Octo- 

 ber, 1813. It received a city charter 24th October, 1815. Indeed, 

 the prominent civil and military events of which Detroit has been 

 the theatre, confer on it a just celebrity, and it is gratifying to 

 behold that to these events it adds the charm' of a beautiful local 

 site and fertile surrounding country. A cursory view of the map 

 of the United States, will indicate its importance as a central, 

 military and commercial position. Situated on the great chain 

 of lakes, connecting with the waters of the Ohio, Mississippi, St. 

 Lawrence, Hudson, and Eed Kiver of the North, and communi- 

 cating with the Atlantic at so many points, and with a harbor 

 free of entrance at all times, its business capacities and means of 

 expansion are very great. And when the natural channels of com- 

 munication of the great lake chain shall be improved, it will 

 afford a choice of markets between the most distant points of 

 the Atlantic seaboard. It is thus destined to be to the regions 

 of the north-west, what St. Louis is rapidly becoming to the south- 



• The census of Detroit in 1850 gives it 21,019. 



