Fort Maurepas was named to honor the French Minister of the Marine (Navy), Jerome Phelypeaux de Maurepas, Comte (Earl) de Pontchartrain. Some French strategist feared that if the English controlled the mouth of the Mississippi River that their holdings and commercial enterprises, including the lucrative fur trade of interior North America were doomed.įrench soldiers led by Iberville in the service of King Louis XIV of France, commenced the construction of Fort Maurepas, at present day Ocean Springs, Mississippi, in early April.
Pierre Le Moyne (1661-1706), Sieur d'Iberville, French Canadian soldier of fortune, departed Brest, France aboard La Badine on October 24, 1698 to locate the mouth of the Mississippi River from the Mexican Gulf and establish a French presence on the Gulf Coast to discourage Spanish and English incursions into the area claimed by LaSalle for France.
La Salle called the Great River, Colbert, in honor of the French Minister of Marine. We know this territory as Louisiana, i.e. He claimed for France the vast area between the Rocky Mountains and the Alleghenies drained by the Mississippi and all of its tributaries. Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle (1643-1687) reconnoitered the Mississippi River from the Great Lakes locating its deltaic mouth on the Gulf of Mexico in April 1682.
