[1] Farrand, Basis of American History, 23.
[2] Ibid.
Proceeding up the St. Lawrence, the French colonists early gained the Great Lakes. Their advance rested here for a time, but in the last quarter of the seventeenth century, by a great outburst of exploring activity, the upper waters of the Mississippi were gained and eagerly followed to their outlet in the Gulf of Mexico. Thus New France found a second outlet to the sea, and thus, even before the English had crossed the Alleghenies, the French had fairly encircled them, and planted themselves in the heart of the continent. From the basin of the Great Lakes to that of the Mississippi they early made use of five principal highways.[3] On each, of course, occurred a portage at the point where the transfer from the head of the one system of navigation to the other occurred. One of these five highways led from the foot of Lake Michigan by way of the Chicago River and Portage to and down the Illinois. The Chicago Portage thus constituted one of the "keys of the continent," as Hulbert, the historian of the portage paths, has so aptly termed them.[4]
[3] Winsor, Narrative and Critical History of America, IV, 224.
[4] Hulbert, Portage Paths: The Keys of the Continent.
The comparatively undeveloped state of the field of American historical research is well illustrated by the fact that despite the historical importance of the Chicago Portage, no careful study of it has ever been made. The student will seek in vain for even an adequate description of the physical characteristics of the portage. Winsor's description, a paragraph in length, is perhaps the best and most authoritative one available.[5] Yet, aside from its brevity, neither of the two sources to which he makes specific reference can be regarded as reliable authorities upon the Chicago Portage. Moll, the cartographer, notable for his credulous temperament,[6] relied for his knowledge of the Great Lakes region upon the discredited maps of Lahontan.[7] James Logan, whose description of the portage is quoted,[8] was a reputable official of Pennsylvania, but, in common with the seaboard English colonists generally, his knowledge of the geography of the interior was extremely hazy. This is sufficiently shown by the fact that he located La Salle's Fort Miami, which had stood during the brief period of its existence at the mouth of the St. Joseph River, on the Chicago.
[5] "What Herman Moll, the English cartographer, called the 'land carriage of Chekakou' is described by James Logan, in a communication which he made in 1718 to the English Board of Trade, as running from the lake three leagues up the river, then a half a league of carriage, then a mile of water, next a small carry, then two miles to the Illinois, and then one hundred and thirty leagues to the Mississippi. But descriptions varied with the seasons. It was usually called a carriage of from four to nine miles, according to the stage of the water. In dry seasons it was even farther while in wet times it might not be more than a mile; and, indeed, when the intervening lands were 'drowned,' it was quite possible to pass in a canoe amid the sedges from Lake Michigan to the Des Plaines, and so to the Illinois and the Mississippi."—Winsor, Mississippi Basin, 24. For similar descriptions see Hulbert, Portage Paths, 181; Jesuit Relations, LIX, 313-14, note 41.
[6] Winsor, Mississippi Basin, 80, 104, 111, 163.
[7] Moll's map in his Atlas Minor is simply an English copy of Lahontan's map of 1703. For the latter see Lahontan, New Voyages to North America (Thwaites ed.), I, 156.
[8] For the substance of Logan's report see the British Board of Trade report of September 8, 1721, printed in O'Callaghan, Documents Relative to the Colonial History of the State of New York, V, 621. This will be cited henceforth as New York Colonial Documents.