Fort Rosalie
Encyclopedia
Fort Rosalie was a French
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

 fort built in 1716 in the territory of the Natchez
Natchez people
The Natchez are a Native American people who originally lived in the Natchez Bluffs area, near the present-day city of Natchez, Mississippi. They spoke a language isolate that has no known close relatives, although it may be very distantly related to the Muskogean languages of the Creek...

 Native Americans
Indigenous peoples of the Americas
The indigenous peoples of the Americas are the pre-Columbian inhabitants of North and South America, their descendants and other ethnic groups who are identified with those peoples. Indigenous peoples are known in Canada as Aboriginal peoples, and in the United States as Native Americans...

. The present-day city of Natchez, Mississippi
Natchez, Mississippi
Natchez is the county seat of Adams County, Mississippi, United States. With a total population of 18,464 , it is the largest community and the only incorporated municipality within Adams County...

 developed at this site. As part of the peace terms that ended the Natchez War of 1716, Jean-Baptiste Le Moyne, Sieur de Bienville
Jean-Baptiste Le Moyne, Sieur de Bienville
Jean-Baptiste Le Moyne de Bienvillepronounce] was a colonizer, born in Montreal, Quebec and an early, repeated governor of French Louisiana, appointed 4 separate times during 1701-1743. He was a younger brother of explorer Pierre Le Moyne d'Iberville...

 required the Natchez to build the fort by providing materials and labor. Sited close to the main Natchez settlement, called the Grand Village of the Natchez
Grand Village of the Natchez
Grand Village of the Natchez, also known as the Fatherland Site, is a site encompassing a prehistoric indigenous village and earthwork mounds in present-day south Natchez, Mississippi. The village complex was constructed starting about 1200 CE by members of the prehistoric Plaquemine culture....

, Fort Rosalie served as the primary French stronghold and trading post
Trading post
A trading post was a place or establishment in historic Northern America where the trading of goods took place. The preferred travel route to a trading post or between trading posts, was known as a trade route....

 among the Natchez.

French settlements and tobacco
Tobacco
Tobacco is an agricultural product processed from the leaves of plants in the genus Nicotiana. It can be consumed, used as a pesticide and, in the form of nicotine tartrate, used in some medicines...

 plantations were established in Natchez territory, with the fort serving as the local seat of colonial government. Growing tension between the French and the Natchez erupted into violence several times during the 1720s, culminating in a massive Natchez attack on November 28, 1729. They destroyed the entire French settlement, killing nearly all the males, and taking a total of hundreds of women and children captive. The Natchez seized and occupied Fort Rosalie.

Retaliation by the French and allied Choctaw forces in 1730 forced the Natchez to evacuate, leaving the fort in ruins. By 1731 the French with their more numerous Indian allies had killed, captured or dispersed most of the Natchez, and they ceased to exist as a tribe. The French sold surviving Natchez into slavery, many destined for French plantations in the Caribbean
Caribbean
The Caribbean is a crescent-shaped group of islands more than 2,000 miles long separating the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea, to the west and south, from the Atlantic Ocean, to the east and north...

. Some escaped and found refuge among the Chickasaw
Chickasaw
The Chickasaw are Native American people originally from the region that would become the Southeastern United States...

, Creek
Creek people
The Muscogee , also known as the Creek or Creeks, are a Native American people traditionally from the southeastern United States. Mvskoke is their name in traditional spelling. The modern Muscogee live primarily in Oklahoma, Alabama, Georgia, and Florida...

, and Cherokee
Cherokee
The Cherokee are a Native American people historically settled in the Southeastern United States . Linguistically, they are part of the Iroquoian language family...

 of the region.

The French rebuilt Fort Rosalie in the early 1730s. Following the Treaty of Paris
Treaty of Paris (1763)
The Treaty of Paris, often called the Peace of Paris, or the Treaty of 1763, was signed on 10 February 1763, by the kingdoms of Great Britain, France and Spain, with Portugal in agreement. It ended the French and Indian War/Seven Years' War...

 in 1763 after the British won the Seven Years' War
Seven Years' War
The Seven Years' War was a global military war between 1756 and 1763, involving most of the great powers of the time and affecting Europe, North America, Central America, the West African coast, India, and the Philippines...

, the French ceded the fort and Louisiana to British control. The British renamed it Fort Panmure. During the American Revolutionary War, Spain declared war against Great Britain and took control of the fort, holding it from 1779 to 1798. After 1798, the United States took over.

The US abandoned the fort in 1804. The city of Natchez traces its origin to the founding of Fort Rosalie in 1716. Today the site of the fort is part of Natchez National Historical Park
Natchez National Historical Park
Natchez National Historical Park commemorates the history of Natchez, Mississippi, and is managed by the National Park Service.The park consists of three distinct parts. Fort Rosalie is the site of a fortification from the 18th century, built by the French, and later controlled by the United...

.
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