Pelican girls.jpg
An artistas concept of The Pelican Girls who came from France to Dauphin Island in 1707 to help civilize the French Colony. (Submitted photo)
Ask anyone today about "The Pelican Girls and you might get the answer they are cheerleaders for a sports team.
Many people along the Gulf Coast are most likely descendants of these girls who came from France in 1704 to help settle the colonies in Louisiana. They landed on Dauphin Island in Mobile.
In Peter J. Hamilton's "Colonial Mobile," first published in 1910 and revised in 1976, we learn that the initial occupation of Louisiana, begun by Pierre Le Moyne, sieur d'Iberville, between 1698 and 1702, was "slow and difficult and the early colony was predominantly male." In fact the 1699 and 1700 censuses of the Biloxi colony listed only men.
Hamilton wrote that 23 women accompanied by two families were sent to Louisiana on the Pelican, departing from the port of La Rochelle, France. They were sent in response to the many requests of Louisiana's Colonial leaders.
Volume I of "The French Experience in Louisiana," edited by Glenn R. Howard and published in 1995, named the Pelican girls. They were: Francois Marie Anne de Boisrenaud, Jeanne Catherine de Beranhard, Jeane Elisabeth Le Pinteux, Marie Noel de Mesnil, Gabrielle Savarit, Genevieve Burel, Marguerite Burel, Marie Therese Brochon, Angelique Brouyn, Marie Briard, Marguerite Tavernier, Elisabeth Deshays, Catherine Christophle, Catherine Tournant, Marie Phillippe, Louise Marguerite Housseau, Marie Magdeleine Duanet, Marie Dufresne, Marguerite Guichard, Renee Gilbert, Louise Francoise Lefevre, Gabrielle Bonet and Marie Jeanne Marbe. Also on the 1704 ship manifest were two families, 100 men of the Companies of Volezard and Chateaugue and three missionaries.
In Jo Myrtle Kennedy's "Dauphin Island AL: French Possession 1699-1763," we learn more about the Pelican girls.
"Besides desperately needed cargo, the passenger list created much excitement," she wrote. "In order to discourage the Frenchmen from chasing through the woods in pursuit of Indian mistresses, King Louis XIV had sent 23 women in the care of a priest who was instructed to marry them to Frenchmen as quickly as possible."
This was the first importation of females into Louisiana for the sole purpose of marriage. Things did not go all that smoothly. The French women refused to like eating Indian corn, the chief source of food at the time. According to Kennedy, they accused the authorities of tricking them into what had been pictured as a paradise. Quarreling, famine, sickness and general discontent were prevalent.
However in an article written for "Yahoo Contributor Network" by Monica Bullock, we learn that many of the girls did make good matches and "went on to marry men that presumably loved and cared for them as the birth records show."
(A few years later a group of young ladies were sent from France to New Orleans. They became known as The Cassette Girls, because they brought their belongings in small cases called "cassettes." They came under the auspices of the Ursuline nuns. Before Hurricane Katrina, a Mississippi Department of Archives and History marker honored The Cassette Girls and their contributions to Colonial settlement.)
Bullock said the Pelican girls "should be remembered for their bravery and courage."
Correspondent Joanne Anderson may be reached at joandy42@cableone.net.