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1909 Champlain Tercentenary | |
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WELCOME TO ISLE LA MOTTE An address delivered at Isle La Motte, VT Senator HENRY W. HILL — Your Excellencies, Representative of the Republic of France, Ladies and Gentleman: I have been requested by the officials of this township to welcome you, on behalf of its people to this historic point. In their name, therefore, I bid you welcome to Isle La Motte, one of the beautiful islands of this charming lake, first described by Samuel Champlain and then famous in Indian legends as the common meeting place of the warring aborigines, whereof authentic historic record runneth not to the contrary. Its citizens are here to extend their greetings and to join with you in the closing exercises of the Tercentenary Celebration. This assemblage is an impressive one, comprising as it does, distinguished citizens of three great nations, including the Governors of two American States, the Naval Attaché of the French Embassy, eminent clergy of the United States and Canada, and prominent citizens of this and all the towns surrounding the north end of Lake Champlain, as well as a large delegation of representatives of the original tribes occupying this valley. The physical and atmospheric conditions are all that can be desired and everything has been done by the people of this town to make this one of the most enjoyable days of the celebration week. Nature has bountifully bestowed its charms upon this scene, which is one of the most picturesque ever witnessed on this island, noted for its fine apple orchards, large marble quarries and at one time, for its flourishing high schools. When it was proposed to include Isle La Motte as one of the five places where formal exercises were to be held, some question was raised as to the propriety of so doing, but in view of its historic significance, it was not to be left out, and people are assembled here from the towns of northeastern New York and from those of northwestern Vermont and from the Province of Quebec, all deeply interested in this celebration, to participate in the concluding exercises thereof. I cannot well refrain from calling your attention to some of the events that have transpired in this part of Champlain valley. Three hundred years ago, undoubtedly on this very Sandy Point, in an atmosphere as brilliant as this of today and under the stately trees, which we see still standing around us, Christianity and Civilization were first introduced into this territory in the person of the discoverer of this lake, Samuel Champlain. This was but two years after the settlement of Jamestown and eleven years before the Pilgrims sailed into Plymouth Bay. Isle La Motte therefore must rank, after St. Augustine and Jamestown, as the next place in this country where the white man blazed the way for the establishment of civil and religious liberty. The story is so thrilling from that time to the present that one need only read it to be enthused with its charm. Long before the advent of Champlain, however, this valley was the arena of cruel and deadly combats between the savage Iroquois, Algonquins and Hurons in their desperate struggle for supremacy and its control, and this Point is described in the Jesuit Relations as the common meeting-place of the Iroquois and Algonquins as late as 1646. From the same authority we learn that Father Jogues and other missionaries were here as early as 1642, that mass was celebrated here in 1666 and that during the same year Fort Ste. Anne was built under the direction of Sieur de La Motte with the aid of his six hundred veterans of the Carignan-Salières regiment stationed on this Point, whose position is strategic, projecting as it does into waters forming the boundary between two States and also intercepting the highway of trade and travel between the north and the south through the lake. It was the convenient stopping place for military and naval expeditions as well as a port for passenger steamers for many years running through the lake and has been visited by civil, military and naval officers of three nations and such distinguished personages as Peter Kalm in 1749 and quite likely by Charles Dickens in 1842 and later by President William McKinley and Col. Theodore Roosevelt while Vice-President, and many others. Viceroy de Tracy, M. de Chazy, Bishop de Laval and others were here at various times in the 17th century. Captain John Schuyler, on his return from his military expedition to Canada, spent here the night of August 24th, 1690. Major Peter Schuyler in his journal describes his trip through the lake with his flotilla of canoes manned by 266 whites and Indians in the year 1691 and his advance to “Fort La Motte several years deserted” on the 26th of August, where he remained over night. Captain John Schuyler stopped near this fort on his mission to Canada in September, 1698. This island was included in the grant by the Governor of Canada, M. de Beauharnois to Sieur Péan, major of the town and castle of Quebec, on April 10, 1733. It was also included in the French seignory granted to Sieur Bedou, Counsellor in the Superior Council of Quebec in 1752. Canadians were attacked on this Point by the savages in 1694 or 1695, and French settlers were put to death here in 1746 and others were taken prisoners by the Indians. We know not the extent of the martyrdom nor of the savage persecution that has been suffered on this soil which has been made sacred by the shedding of human blood. In 1775 General Philip Schuyler and Brigadier-General Richard Montgomery met here on their way to Quebec, where the brave Montgomery afterward lost his life. In 1776 Arnold’s fleet lay at anchor off this island, from August 8th to August 19th, from which he made an official report. Over at yonder Point au Fer, within view of this Point, was stationed in 1775, a large body of Americans, and that point was fortified by General Sullivan in 1776. It fell into the possession of General Burgoyne in 1777 and was occupied by the British until 1788, five years after the Treaty of Peace. Farther to the north may be seen Windmill Point, where was held an International Council in 1766, to consider the location of the boundary line between New York and Quebec and to hear the arguments of the French claimants to seignories on Lake Champlain. The boundary was fixed in 1768. There it was that Arnold on August 6, 1776, encountered Indians in the British service. Isle La Motte was settled in 1785 by Ebenezer Hyde, Enoch Hall and William Blanchard, and organized into a township in 1790, a year before Vermont was admitted into the Union and while it was an independent republic. This island was occupied by the British in the War of 1812: and Captain Pring erected a battery of three long eighteen-pounders on the west shore on September 4, 1814, “to cover the landing of the supplies for the troops.” On September 8th, Captain Downie arrived with the rest of his fleet and on September 11th proceeded to Cumberland Bay, where he met defeat. Commodore Macdonough’s fleet lay off the north end of this island far several weeks prior to his victory in Cumberland Bay, during which time my great-grandfather, Caleb Hill, who had been commissioned by the Governor and had raised a company of local militia for the defense of the town, was surprised at night in his own house and was shot, it is believed, by one of the marines from the fleet. Amid such historic associations as these and with the evidences of its early fortifications still visible, the successive generations of its inhabitants have learned something of the sacrifices that have been made in the building up of our civil and religious institutions, and when the call to duty came, they failed not to respond and many of them shed their blood on the fields of battle to preserve this republic from dismemberment. This town sent to the Civil War more soldiers than it had voters. Hardly a family was there that did not have one or more of its members in the Northern armies. Among them were some of the “noblest and bravest warriors that ever buckled sword.” When an appeal was made to the voters of this town to make suitable appropriation for this celebration, they responded by voting a dollar for every inhabitant of the town to insure the success of this Tercentenary Celebration. It is well, therefore, that we assemble on these historic shores to continue the exercises in commemoration of the discovery made by Samuel Champlain, the intrepid navigator, the colonizer, the humanitarian, who was the first white man to set foot on this soil and to bring into this valley the light of civilization. It is fitting that we call attention to his many virtues as has been done by the prelates and others who have spoken today and on the other days of this celebration, because his was a mission of peace and of good will even to the aborigines of this new country. His was a pure and noble life and his virtues worthy of emulation. As we near the close of this celebration, I think it proper that I should express to those who have given it their intelligent and cordial support the sentiments of the members of the two Commissions. The idea of the Tercentenary Celebration was first suggested to me in the fall of 1906 by Governor Fletcher D. Proctor of Vermont, who requested that I present the matter to the Governor and Legislature of New York with a view of securing their endorsement of the project and cooperation in its execution. This was done and in due course of time the Vermont and the New York Commissions were cooperating in friendly accord in formulating plans for this Tercentenary Celebration. Too much praise cannot be bestowed on your esteemed Governor, George H. Prouty, who has been resourceful in suggestion and intelligent in directing such plans and enthusiastic in their execution. No less praise should be bestowed upon our esteemed Governor, Charles Evans Hughes, for his cordial and intelligent support of the project from its inception. He wields the strong arm of the Empire State not only for good government but for a proper recognition of the forces and factors in the evolution of our progressive and complex civilization. His support has made the celebration a success. When Vermont and New York made their appeal to Congress it responded as liberally as could be expected in view of the extraordinary demands then being made for governmental purposes upon the treasury and we are grateful to the President and Congress of the United States for their support and cooperation The pageants presented here and elsewhere by L.O. Armstrong and his company of one hundred and fifty descendants of the original tribes, occupying this valley, the naval exhibition and military parades, the high order of historical addresses and poems delivered during these Tercentenary exercises and the distinguished representatives of the three great nations participating in the celebration, have all contributed to make it a success and worthy the dignity of the national and international characters and events it was designed to commemorate. The United States has been represented by the President, the Republic of France by its brilliant Ambassador, M. Jusserand, the Kingdom of Great Britain by its distinguished Ambassador, Mr. Bryce, the Dominion of Canada by its gifted Post- master-General. M. Lemieux, and the Province of Quebec by its talented Premier, Sir Lomer Gouin. All these official representatives and many others have contributed to the success of this celebration and to all of them the people of this valley are under lasting obligation. Its benefits, however, are not confined to the people of this valley, nor to the present generation. They will extend to other peoples and other generations. Its contribution to international amity between the United States, France and Great Britain, including the Dominion of Canada, is worth all the efforts put forth to make it a success. It will also awaken a deeper interest in the history of our country and in some measure stimulate the youth of our land to emulate the patriotic deeds of the men who heroically represented their respective governments in the fierce conflicts that have been waged in this valley for its permanent possession and sovereign control. On this beautiful island, set in the blue expanse of softly moving waters, beneath an overarching vault of blue sky, dappled here and there by the play of light and shade and fleecy drifting clouds, and in the presence of representatives of the aboriginal tribes and of the three great powers, that have successively occupied it, now happily in friendly accord, altogether forming one of the impressive scenes of the celebration, the formal Tercentenary exercises are to conclude today. To the citizens of this, my native town, to the people of Vermont and New York and to all others, who have given the Tercentenary celebration their support, we are grateful. We are also grateful to the all-wise Creator, that on this and the other days of this week, we have been favored with good weather and that the exercises from Ticonderoga on the south to Isle La Motte on the north have been fully carried out without mishap or accident. |