When the Huguenots Settled Fort Charles
When the Huguenots Settled Fort Charles
South Carolina
Px of Fort Charles. Compliments of wikimapia.org.
When the controversy in France between the Huguenots and Catholics had become severe, Admiral Coligni of the Reformed Church turned his attention towards North America as a future asylum for a persecuted sect of Christians. In pursuit of that object, he despatched Captain Ribault with two ships and everything necessary for planting a colony. The vessels landed at Port Royal, now in South Carolina, where he built a place of defense before returning to France, leaving twenty or thirty men to keep possession of the country. The thirty men also returned to France the following year.
Coligni prevailed on the king in 1564 to fit out three other ships under the command of Capt—Laudonnier, who had formerly sailed with Ribault. The local Indians welcomed Laundonnier’s arrival.
Capt. Laudonnier went to work constructing Fort Charles and sent back the ships. He retained one hundred men in the colony, with whom he explored the country and began to plant. But his people, impatient of laboring, like all the first adventurers, discovered a gold mine and dug for the precious metal instead. When Capt. Laudonnier found that he could not govern a seditious colony; he prepared to leave the country on August 1, 1565, but was prevented by the arrival of Ribault, who brought troops and planters with their wives and children.
Ribault had been appointed governor of the colony. Still, his administration was short because the colony was composed of Huguenots, and King Philip II of Spain had resolved that a colony of heretics should not take root in America!
Thus, Don Pedro Melandes, a bigot not less cruel and intolerant than his master, was appointed as governor of Florida. This officer arrived on the coast with three hundred soldiers and twenty-six hundred planters. They seem to have been the first Spanish adventurers in that region who had any thoughts of agriculture. They first landed at an inlet a few miles southward of Fort Charles.
Meanwhile, in September, Ribault imprudently embarked on a voyage with his best troops to attack the Spanish ships. He was overtaken the next day by a storm that proved fatal to ships and men. A few days after that disaster, the Spaniards landed at the fort with sword in hand. Laudonnier made a gallant defense but was overpowered by numbers, and the fort was taken.
While the Spaniards were diverted by plunder, Laudonnier escaped with eighteen or twenty men in a small vessel in the harbor. The rest of the garrison, with all the women and children, were killed by the sword, except fifteen, who were hung on the nearest trees.
The following inscription was found near the bones of those unfortunate victims: " They were hung as Lutherans, not as Frenchmen."
In a petition to King Charles of France, by some of the widows and children of the men who fell on that occasion, the number massacred is said to have been nine hundred.
Guerges had formerly served with distinction in Italy against the Spaniards, by whom he was taken prisoner and compelled to work as a slave on board a galley.
In April of 1658, a private gentleman fitted out three ships at his own expense, sailed in quest of Melandes and his companions with one hundred and fifty soldiers and eighty seamen, and entered a small harbor fifteen leagues northward of Port Royal.
The Spaniards, after repairing Fort Charles, had erected two other forts on the same river at two or three miles distance; the old fort was garrisoned by one hundred and sixty men, and each of the new forts by seventy men.
Guerges was accompanied by a man who had served with Laudonnier and was a helpful interpreter. The Indians were taught the object of the expedition, and the Turks took the vessel he served and retaken by the knights of Malta, by whom he was set at liberty. From that time, he followed the sea and became an expert navigator.
They tendered their services with the utmost alacrity, for the Spaniards' cruelty had excited universal indignation.
Guerges surprised one of the small forts at the dawn of day and put all the garrison, except fifteen, to death. Pursuing his success while the panic was intense, he attacked the other small fort and took it by storm.
This garrison was also put to the sword, except fifteen, who were reserved for the gibbet. The old fort was strong and well-provided. To attack such a garrison as it contained, with an inferior number of regular troops, was a hazardous enterprise. The Indians were not ignorant of the danger. One of their chiefs told Guerges, as they advanced towards the fort, that he expected to fall in battle, but he confided that the captain would give his wife the presents intended for him. In that case, she would be enabled to celebrate his death, and he would be welcome in the world of spirits.
Fame and fear had magnified the number of French combatants. As they drew near the fort, the Spanish governor detached fifty men to reconnoiter. Their retreat was cut off by stratagem, and they were put to death. The troops in the fort, panic-struck by that execution, fled to the woods, but the woods were filled with hostile Indians. Death was inevitable. They returned and surrendered. Fifteen of this garrison were also reserved for the gibbet; the rest were put to the sword. Near the graves of the men thus retaliated on, there was set up an inscription to inform posterity that " They were hung as Traitors, Robbers and Murderers, not as Spaniards or mariners."
Having destroyed the fort, Guerges brought off the booty and arrived at Eochelle in June. If the courage of that Gascon had been tempered with humanity, his zeal and patriotism would have entitled him to lasting honors. But during this period, France and Spain had pretensions of possessing Carolina. Spain claimed the more significant part of America because an officer in the service of that government had discovered three or four islands and a small part of the continent. France claimed Carolina because two or three mariners in the service of that government had surveyed the coast and given names to some rivers and bays.
Both nations had attempted to form settlements in the country and were disappointed.
Source: The History of North Carolina, Vol. I by Hugh Williamson, M.D. LL.D. (1812).
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