Buffers, Bridges, and Bastards: French Missourian’s Approaches to living in an Occupied Territory

Summary

After France lost its North American territories in 1763, many Francophone citizens living west of the Mississippi River found themselves suddenly living in Spanish owned lands. They also found themselves staring into the face of an encroaching and overreaching Anglo population to the east. This paper explores a few ways Francophones in Missouri adjusted to the changing political and territorial situation within the region in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. Starting with the presence of a small portion of restricted materials in an outbuilding associated with enslaved individuals on the Janis property in Ste. Genevieve, Missouri, I posit that such materials may have been a response of the property’s inhabitants toward buffering an Anglo influence within the territory. With material and archival remains, I examine the often-overlooked ethnic politics and intergroup relationships during a moment of intense transition and negotiation for many groups living in the Illinois Country.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• The Archaeology of the French in the New World   •
• Society for Historical Archaeology 2018

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Contact(s): Society for Historical Archaeology

Record Identifiers

PaperId(s): 890