Jim Bradshaw: Louisiana's role in revolution came later

When the Declaration of Independence was signed on July 4, 1776, hardly anyone in south Louisiana noticed -- mostly because there was hardly anyone in south Louisiana. Tiny settlements that began as the Poste des Opelousas and the Poste des Attakapas were just becoming big enough to support militia units that played a part in the Revolution, but that was about it.
By 1776, there weren’t even many Native Americans remaining in our little piece of the sprawling, sparsely settled Spanish colony that included all of what is now the middle of the United States.
France first claimed the territory in 1682 and established a few trading posts here and there, but there were no towns of any consequence other than New Orleans in what is now Louisiana when Spain took over in 1762, and the city was hardly overcrowded. It had fewer than 3,000 people.
The Poste des Attakapas (St. Martinville) was described as a remote outpost. It was the governing center for the Attakapas District, the area between the Atchafalaya and Mermentau rivers south of present St. Landry Parish.
The rest of south Louisiana was in the Opelousas District, overseen from the Poste des Opelousas. Its first census in 1777 lists 135 households. The first census of the Attakapas district lists 40. It’s probable that some people were missed, but that’s fewer than 200 households in the main settlements west of the Atchafalaya.
According to one biography, when André Masse, probably the first setter in the district, came to south Louisiana from France in 1746, he “chose to reject civilization and make a frontier home along the Teche … when no other white men are known to have lived … anywhere near the bayou.”
More settlers ventured across the Atchafalaya after Spain took over the colony.  Some soldiers took advantage of generous land grants offered by France in its final days of occupancy. Spain also offered grants that lured settlers as far west as the Calcasieu. Beausoleil Broussard and his fellow Acadian settlers came in 1765. They didn’t flood the region, but by 1776 there were enough people to support the soldiers who link us to the budding nation.
Spain never became a formal ally but did quietly help the American cause from the beginning of the war.
In late 1776, King Charles instructed Louisiana Gov. Bernardo de Galvez to quietly sell desperately needed gunpowder, muskets, uniforms and medicine to the colonies.
That was important because the British blocked the Atlantic ports, and the Mississippi River was practically the only way to get supplies to the revolutionary soldiers.
Spain finally joined the war on June 21, 1779, but still not as an ally.
The king thought an alliance would bring more trouble than Spain wanted. But he did see the war as an opportunity to realize some of his own goals, including safeguarding Spanish territory in North America.
Instead of allying with the Americans, he promised to help France, which was an active American ally.
As a result, the British moved quickly to seize New Orleans and blockade the Mississippi, but Galvez got word of their plans. The young governor was a well-trained military officer, and immediately assembled an army of 500 militiamen, including those from Opelousas and Attakapas.
That little army defeated the British in fights at Bayou Manchac, Baton Rouge, Natchez, Mobile, and Pensacola, keeping a southern supply route open to the Americans.
Markers in south Louisiana memorialize that campaign. One on the St. Martinville church square notes, “On this site lie buried officers of The Attakapas Militia serving … in the … capture of Baton Rouge and Manchac.”
It lists Commandant Alexandre-Chevalier de Clouet, Major Louis Du Crest, Corporal Jean Huval, Sergeant Pierre Broussard, Corporal Joseph Landry, and Corporal Michel Maux [sic]. Two other nearby plaques name Louis LePelletier De La Houssaye, Captain of Dragoons, and Firmin Breaux, Louis Charles DeBlanc, and Francisco Segura as “Patriots of the American Revolution.”
A marker in Washington, the Opelousas District settlement once known as Church Landing, reads, “Interned in this old Church Landing Cemetery are the known remains of eleven Revolutionary War Patriots of the Opelousas Post Militia of 1779.”
It lists Donato Bello, Michel Brignac, Laurent Dupre, Francois Lemelle, Pierre Primeaux, Maturin Tesson, Michel Cormier, Romain De la Fosse, Joseph Lamirande, Andre Mondon, and Pierre Savoie.
Congress made Gálvez an honorary citizen in 2014, citing him as a “hero of the Revolutionary War who risked his life for the freedom of the United States people.”
That is true and he deserves the honor, but our little markers attest to the fact that he didn’t do it all by himself.
You can contact Jim Bradshaw at jimbradshaw4321@gmail.com or P.O. Box 1121, Washington LA 70589.