Page:New Brunswick Magazine Issue 1.djvu/33

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WHERE STOOD FORT LATOUR?
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west side at the "old fort", and other local historians, including I believe the late Mr. Lawrence, have thought that it stood on the site of Fort Dufferin. Some years ago in examining ancient maps of New Brunswick I was struck by the fact that most of the earlier ones placed it on the east side; and, led thereby to investigate the entire subject from the beginning, I was forced to the conclusion that the fort stood upon the east side, and probably on the knoll at the head of Rankin's wharf at Portland Point. The full evidence for this belief was given, along with reproductions of the old maps, in the Transactions of the Royal Society of Canada for 1891, but as that work is not readily accessible, and as the subject is of some popular interest, I shall give here a synopsis of two of its most important lines of evidence, along with one or two points which have come to light since then.

The only direct reference to the site of Fort LaTour in any original document known to any of our historians is contained in Nicolas Denys' "Description geographique de l'Amerique septentrionale", published at Paris in 1672. All writers agree on Denys' truthfulness. He knew intimately both LaTour and Charnisay, had visited the St. John River, and after LaTour's ruin had employed some of his men. His authority on this question must be of the highest. And here is a literal translation of what he writes of St. John Harbor.

This entrance is narrow, because of a little island which is to larboard or on the left side, which being passed the river is much larger. On the same side as the island there are large marshes or flats which are covered at high tide; the beach is of muddy sand which makes a point, which passed, there is a cove (or creek) which makes into the said marshes, of which the entrance is narrow, and there the late Sieur Monsieur de la Tour has caused to be made a weir, in which were caught a great number of those Gaspereaux which were salted for winter, [here follows an account of the fish caught]. A little farther on, beyond the said weir, there is a little knoll where d'Aunay built his fort, which I have not found well placed according to my idea, for it is commanded by an island which is very
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