Michilimackinac ( ) is derived from an
Ottawa Ojibwe
The Ojibwe, Ojibwa, Chippewa, or Saulteaux are an Anishinaabe people in what is currently southern Canada, the northern Midwestern United States, and Northern Plains.
According to the U.S. census, in the United States Ojibwe people are one of ...
name for present-day
Mackinac Island and the region around the
Straits of Mackinac between
Lake Huron and
Lake Michigan.
[.] Early settlers of North America applied the term to the entire region along Lakes Huron, Michigan, and
Superior. Today it is considered to be mostly within the boundaries of
Michigan
Michigan () is a U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest, upper Midwestern United States. With a population of nearly 10.12 million and an area of nearly , Michigan is the List of U.S. states and ...
, in the United States. Michilimackinac was the original name for present day
Mackinac Island and
Mackinac County
Mackinac County ( ) is a county in the Upper Peninsula of the U.S. state of Michigan. As of the 2020 Census, the population was 10,834. The county seat is St. Ignace. Formerly known as Michilimackinac County, in 1818 it was one of the first ...
.
History
Woodland Period (1000 BCE–1650 CE)
Pottery first appears during this period in the style of the
Laurel complex. The people of the area engaged in long-distance trade, likely as part of the
Hopewell tradition
The Hopewell tradition, also called the Hopewell culture and Hopewellian exchange, describes a network of precontact Native American cultures that flourished in settlements along rivers in the northeastern and midwestern Eastern Woodlands from ...
.
The Anishinaabe and the French (1612–1763)
The
Straits of Mackinac linking Lakes Michigan and Huron was a strategic area controlling movement between the two lakes and much of the
pays d'en haut
The ''Pays d'en Haut'' (; ''Upper Country'') was a territory of New France covering the regions of North America located west of Montreal. The vast territory included most of the Great Lakes region, expanding west and south over time into the ...
. It was controlled by
Algonquian Anishinaabe
The Anishinaabeg (adjectival: Anishinaabe) are a group of culturally related Indigenous peoples present in the Great Lakes region of Canada and the United States. They include the Ojibwe (including Saulteaux and Oji-Cree), Odawa, Potawat ...
nations including the
Ojibwa (called Chippewa in the United States) and the
Odawa. The area was known to the Odawa as ''Michilimackinac'', meaning "Big Turtle".
For these people, "Michilimackinac is literally the birthplace and centre of the world" and is where the
Three Fires Confederacy took place.
The Anishinaabe had good relations with the
Iroquoian
The Iroquoian languages are a language family of indigenous peoples of North America. They are known for their general lack of labial consonants. The Iroquoian languages are polysynthetic and head-marking.
As of 2020, all surviving Iroquoian ...
-speaking
Wyandot
Wyandot may refer to:
Native American ethnography
* Wyandot people, also known as the Huron
* Wyandot language
Wyandot (sometimes spelled Wandat) is the Iroquoian language traditionally spoken by the people known variously as Wyandot or Wya ...
, who were the first group to establish relations with the
French after
Champlain's arrival in 1608. The Anishinaabe used these relations to trade indirectly with the French.
After the fall of
Huronia in the
Beaver Wars, The Anishinaabe began to trade directly with the French, and started inviting French settlers to Michilimackinac.
The
French were the first
Europeans to explore the area, beginning in 1612.
[.] They established trading posts and
Jesuit Catholic
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...
missions. One of the oldest missions,
St. Ignace Mission
The St. Ignace Mission (french: Mission Saint-Ignace) is located in a municipal park known as Marquette Mission Park. It was the site of a mission established by Jesuit priest, Father Jacques Marquette, and the site of his grave in 1677. A seco ...
, was located on the north side of the strait at
Point Iroquois
Point Iroquois Light is a lighthouse on a Chippewa County bluff in the U.S. state of Michigan. Point Iroquois and its light mark the division line between Whitefish Bay and the western end of the St. Marys River, the connection between Lake ...
, near present-day
St. Ignace, Michigan
St. Ignace is a city in the U.S. state of Michigan and the county seat of Mackinac County. The city had a population of 2,452 at the 2010 census. St. Ignace Township is located just to the north of the city, but the two are administered autono ...
. This mission was established in 1671 by the
Jesuit Father
Jacques Marquette
Jacques Marquette S.J. (June 1, 1637 – May 18, 1675), sometimes known as Père Marquette or James Marquette, was a French Jesuit missionary who founded Michigan's first European settlement, Sault Sainte Marie, and later founded Saint Ign ...
. In 1654, a large
Iroquois
The Iroquois ( or ), officially the Haudenosaunee ( meaning "people of the longhouse"), are an Iroquoian-speaking confederacy of First Nations peoples in northeast North America/ Turtle Island. They were known during the colonial years to ...
force was attacked by the Odawa and Ojibwe from as they tried to cross the straits near Michilimackinac. In 1658, the Iroquois attacked again, but were again defeated by the Anishinaabe.
In 1683, under pressure from the Odawa, the French established a presence on the North side of the straits at the St. Ignace Mission in an alliance with the Anishinaabe against the Iroquois.
Between 1670 and 1700, Michilimackinac flourished and became one of the central sites of the fur trade. Soon, French visitors reported vast summer markets taking place along the shorelines each year. Both natives and newcomers flocked to take advantage. Hundreds of Native Americans from around Lakes Michigan and Superior would make the voyage to the straits to meet French traders coming up from the St. Lawrence. In the words of a later French traveler, Michilimackinac became "the landing place and refuge of all the savages who trade their peltries." Consequently, Michilimackinac rapidly became the "general meeting-place for all the French who go to trade with stranger tribes."
In 1715, the French established a fort and settlement on the south side of the strait. It was called
Fort Michilimackinac
Fort Michilimackinac was an 18th-century French, and later British, fort and trading post at the Straits of Mackinac; it was built on the northern tip of the lower peninsula of the present-day state of Michigan in the United States. Built aroun ...
. The fort became a major trading post, attracting Native Americans from throughout the northern
Great Lakes
The Great Lakes, also called the Great Lakes of North America, are a series of large interconnected freshwater lakes in the mid-east region of North America that connect to the Atlantic Ocean via the Saint Lawrence River. There are five lak ...
. After
Great Britain
Great Britain is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean off the northwest coast of continental Europe. With an area of , it is the largest of the British Isles, the largest European island and the ninth-largest island in the world. It i ...
defeated France in the
Seven Years' War
The Seven Years' War (1756–1763) was a global conflict that involved most of the European Great Powers, and was fought primarily in Europe, the Americas, and Asia-Pacific. Other concurrent conflicts include the French and Indian War (175 ...
(
French and Indian War
The French and Indian War (1754–1763) was a theater of the Seven Years' War, which pitted the North American colonies of the British Empire against those of the French, each side being supported by various Native American tribes. At the ...
), their colonial forces took over the fort and territory.
[.]
Fort Michilimackinac fell to an Ojibwa attack during the Native American uprising of 1763, sometimes called
Pontiac's War
Pontiac's War (also known as Pontiac's Conspiracy or Pontiac's Rebellion) was launched in 1763 by a loose confederation of Native Americans dissatisfied with British rule in the Great Lakes region following the French and Indian War (1754–176 ...
.
It was reoccupied by the British in September 1764. In 1780, during the
American Revolution
The American Revolution was an ideological and political revolution that occurred in British America between 1765 and 1791. The Americans in the Thirteen Colonies formed independent states that defeated the British in the American Revoluti ...
, British commandant
Patrick Sinclair Patrick may refer to:
*Patrick (given name), list of people and fictional characters with this name
*Patrick (surname), list of people with this name
People
*Saint Patrick (c. 385–c. 461), Christian saint
*Gilla Pátraic (died 1084), Patrick or ...
moved the British trading and military post to
Mackinac Island, which was held by the British for some time, and abandoned Fort Michilimackinac after the move. After the rebel Americans gained independence in the Revolutionary War, this site became part of a territory of the United States. The fort saw its only military action 17 July 1812 when Lieutenant Porter Hanks bloodlessly surrendered it to the British during the war of 1812.
Today, Fort Michilimackinac is preserved as a tourist site. Re-enactors portray the historic activities of the French and English. An
archeological dig
In archaeology, excavation is the exposure, processing and recording of archaeological remains. An excavation site or "dig" is the area being studied. These locations range from one to several areas at a time during a project and can be condu ...
at the site is open for viewing.
European presence in the Michilimackinac area
Notes
References
*
*
*
*
Further reading
*
*
*
*{{cite book , last= McDonnell , first= Michael , title= Masters of Empire , orig-year= 2016 , url= https://www.google.com/books/edition/Masters_of_Empire/IzepCQAAQBAJ?hl=en , access-date= Apr 9, 2022 , year= 2016 , publisher= Hill and Wang , location= New York City
External links
1839 tourist map of Michigan showing extent of Michilimackinac area
Pre-statehood history of Michigan
French North America