Radisson

Name: Pierre-Esprit Radisson

Achievements: The first explorer in northern America to discover the Mississippi river and reach the Upper Mississippi valley.

Born: c.1636; Paris, France

Died: c.1710; probably England (Aged about 54)

Field & Discipline: Business; Exploration; Trader

Language: French.

Father: Pierre Esprit Radisson

Mother: Madeline Henault

Siblings: Marguerite; Francoise

Spouse: Mary Kirke

Children: 4

Education: Unknown

Life & Times:

Pierre Radisson arrived in New France, Canada, in 1651,  when he was probably fifteen years old.  He lived in a French settlement at Three Rivers on the St Lawrence River.   In 1652, Radisson and two friends left the settlement to shoot duck.  On his way back alone, he came across the dead bodies of his comrades.   Ambushed by Iroquois, Radisson stood his ground, fired at the Indians and went on resisting until he was captured.  Because the Indians admired his bravery, he was adopted into the tribe.

A year later, he managed to escape and reach a Dutch settlement, where  he was given help to sail down the Hudson to New York and from there to Europe.  In January 1654, he landed in Amsterdam from where he took a boat to Rochelle.

Later that year, he returned to North America with the annual fishing fleet from France.  Back in Three Rivers, Radisson went on hunting and trading expeditions to the west with his brother-in-law,  Medard Chouart des Groseilliers, a prominent fur trader.

Every year, the Algonquin brought beaver pelts down the Ottawa river to Three Rivers  and it was from them that stories were heard of the Great Northwest, where beavers were numerous,  and tribes of wandering Cree spent their winters in a land bare of trees and their summers up on the unknown seas beyond the land.   In 1658, Radisson and Groseilliers, accompanied by Algonquin guides,  set out for Lake Nipissing, from where they had been told there were overland routes to the bay in the north where the beaver was so plentiful.

In the winter of 1659, leaving Groseilliers in camp above Lake Superior, Radisson went alone with a band of a hundred and fifty Cree to explore the Northwest and try to find what they called “the great salt sea” in the North.  After returning to pick up Groseilliers they reached Quebec, having passed through Long Sault days after the Iroquois had massacred the French force sent to stop them invading Montreal.

Radisson had wanted to keep secret the route to the northern bay, because he had not yet found it himself,  and knew only what the Cree had said.   Radisson and Groseilliers applied to the governor for a license to explore the area.  He agreed on condition they shared half the profits of their trip with him,  and take government officials along to audit the books.  Radisson and Groseilliers refused and the governor ordered them not to leave Three Rivers.

The penalties for exploration without a license were severe – imprisonment,  and death for a second offence.  Nevertheless Radisson and Groseilliers slipped out of the fort and set off for Lake Superior,  accompanied by about 400 Cree, whom they sent back to their families when winter set in.  They never got to the bay,  but found a great watershed running north from the Great Lakes, which gave them a clue to the large stretch of water that must lie behind it.

In spring 1663, when Radisson and Groseilliers returned to Montreal with their furs from Lake Nipissing, they had been away for two years.  However,  the governor of New France confiscated their furs and fined them because they had crossed the territory without a licence.  Groseilliers was briefly imprisoned and, when he was released, sailed for France to appeal, unsuccessfully, for justice.  While in  Europe, Groseilliers also tried to get French merchants to finance a voyage by sea to the bay, but failed and returned to North America.

With the last of their savings, Radisson and Groseilliers contracted with Boston ship-owners to take two ships to Hudson Bay in the spring of 1665, but one ship was wrecked.  The rest of their money went during  the subsequent legal wranglings about the value of the ship.

Meanwhile,  their adventures had caused a sensation in Boston.  Sir Robert Carr, a British

commissioner, urged Radisson and Groseilliers to give up their allegiance to France and go to England.  Accompanying  Sir George Cartwright when he sailed from Nantucket on August 1, 1665, they left for England,  arriving in 1666.

In London they got the financial backing they needed from London merchants and venturers including [backed by] Prince Rupert*, the king's cousin.   In 1669, Radisson and Prince Rupert organized the [backed by] Hudson’s Bay Company* which was granted a royal charter.  In 1671, three ships were sent from England, and Radisson founded the Moose Bay settlement a few miles south of James Bay.

Radisson didn’t get on with his English colleagues,  and went back into the service of the French.  As a consequence, the French minister, [debts paid by] Colbert*, paid his debts.   In Quebec, Radisson  and Groseilliers attended a meeting of traders to agree on the price of beaver.  The explorer [fellow-explorer was] La Salle* also attended and Radisson realised that others were now intending to push through to the bay.

So, in 1681, in defiance of the monopolists in the fur trade, he obtained backing for another trip to Hudson Bay.  Once there, they captured an English vessel and chased off poachers from New England, leaving the territory in French hands.  The English envoy to Paris protested strongly and as a result, Radisson and Groseilliers were summoned to Paris by Colbert to explain their actions, but when they arrived in January 1684, they found that Colbert had died.

At the same time, the English were pressing him to return to work for the Hudson’s Bay Company,  so he decided to go to England to join his wife and family and was received by [received by] Charles II* and his brother, the Duke of York.

Commissioned to go to Hudson Bay, he arranged a peace treaty between the Indians and the British,  and got safe conduct and employment for the French settlers, who had surrendered to him there.

In 1694 he filed a claim against the Hudson’s Bay Company for money due to him and won.  In 1700, he applied for the job of warehouseman at the Hudson’s Bay Company premises in London, but was turned down.

There are no records of his further movements, but it can be assumed that he died in England in 1710,  when the payment of his Company allowance stopped.

Assessment: Radisson’s discoveries brought about the founding of the Hudson’s Bay Company.

Oneliner: PE Radisson, who found the Mississippi

Bibliography:

• Laut, A C,  Pathfinders of the West,  William Briggs, Toronto, 1904.