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1805 |
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Hispanola: February 1805 Dessalines
decides to invade eastern Hispanola which is still under French command.
March 1805; Dessalines invades with two armies, 21,00 in south lay
siege to the city of Santo Domingo, but the invasion fails. Next Frederick Tudor builds a monopoly by selling ice in Caribbean and South American ports. |
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| North America:Lewis and Clark reach the Pacific Ocean. Michigan Territory is created from part of the Indiana territory. Lt. Zebulon Pike, searches for the source of the Mississippi River. | |||||||||||
| Europe: Spain and several German states align themselves behind Napoleon as Great Britain, Russia, Austria and Sweden prepare to stop his advances. Napoleon amasses his forces to invade the British Isles, but sends his navy south and turns his army toward Vienna where he is victorious. A treaty in December adds more of Italy to his Empire and removes Austria and Prussia from the opposition. Lord Nelson trounces a combined French and Spanish fleet before falling to a French sniper. Citrus has eliminated the threat of scurvy from British ships. Walter Scott and Beethoven compose. | |||||||||||
January 1805
City of New Orleans is incorporated. Its population stands at 3,551 whites, 1,556 free blacks and 3,105 slaves for a total of 8,212. This census figure is low and does not include Native Americans and military. In 1805 Graham replaces Brown as Secretary of the Territory while Sprigg and Mathews join Prevost as Supreme Court Justices. In January, 1805 the Legislative Council publishes its rules. Wicoff, Watkins and Mather form a committee to consider the division of the territory into districts. |
February 1805
February 17, 1805; The Legislative act creating the City of New Orleans sets the boundaries from Ludger Fortier’s Plantation (a protection levee upriver from the city) to the Canal des Pecheurs (Fisherman’s canal) which was located just downriver from present Jackson Barracks and in the rear all the way to Lake Pontchartrain. These boundaries hold until 1812. The first quadroon ball is held during Carnival season. |
March 1805
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April 1805
April 10, 1805 The legislature of the Territory of Orleans defines the 12 counties. The term county was used until 1845 when a new constitution designates parish as the official term for subdivisions of the state. |
May 1805
May 23, 1805; An early territorial Supreme Court decision does little to settle a dispute over batture land between the river and Tchoupitoulas Road between Jean Gravier, developer of Faubourg St. Mary, and the Mayor, Aldermen and the inhabitants of the city of New Orleans. Although the court’s judgement gives the disputed land to Jean Gravier, the dispute continues until a compromise is made on June 30, 1857. The Batture land is formed outside the levee by the river which is slowly moving its course by carving away at the west bank and depositing on the east bank land claimed by Gravier. |
June 1805
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July 1805
July 20 A decree by the City Council under Mayor James Pitot to demolish the earthworks and throw them into the ditches, claims the land for the city. Later in the year a letter from Governor Claiborne to Mayor John Watkins establishes the fortifications as federal property but agrees that all but Ft. St. Charles and Ft. St. Louis, those closest to the river should be demolished. In July of 1805 Juan Ventura Morales stops movement of goods through the port of Mobile, saying that the Treaty of San Lorenzo (Pinckney's Treaty) prohibits foreign commerce on the Mobile River. Claiborne sends his secretary John Graham to Mobile to negotiate and to see if the Spanish are increasing their garrisons there. |
August 1805
August 7 The City Council opens a street between the Dorsiere house and the ropewalk parallel to Chartres and Levee between Customhouse St. and Canal St. Eugene Dorsiere had purchased the site of the old powder magazine that blew up in the 1794 fire. |
September 1805
Under orders from Lt. Col. Constant Freeman, Lt. Enoch Humphries explores the Atchafalaya Basin, however his field notes and map do not survive. |
October 1805
October 15 Casa Calvo, in company with Juan Ventura Morales, leaves New Orleans for the old post of Adaise (or Los Adaes), near Natchitoches. Gov. William C. C. Claiborne, fearing it is the intention of the two Spanish officers to stir up dissension among the people in the western part of the territory, sends Captain Turner along with them to keep an eye on their movements. |
November 1805
November 17, 1805 Philander Chase reads the first protestant sermon in Louisiana at the old Spanish School at 919 Royal Street. An ad in the Louisiana Gazette brings together the group who voted to select a denomination: 45 for Episcopal, seven for Presbyterian and one for Methodist. Young Philander Chase of Poughkeepsie, N. Y. answered the call for the pioneer congregation. He is so anxious to begin his ministry that he walked the final fourteen miles up the river to New Orleans rather than waiting for the wind to change. The congregation moves from the Spanish School (U. S. Courthouse) to the Cabildo to the house of the former post commander and finally to an apartment over Pauldings Jewelry Store on Decatur. Christ Church Cathedral (Episcopal) is founded as the first Protestant group in Louisiana and the Mississippi valley. The cathedral was closed by General Benjamin Butler during union occupation because it omitted a prayer for the President of the United States. Under instructions from Bishop Leonidas Polk, then Bishop of Louisiana, a few moments of silent prayer had replaced it. M. Auguste Tessier has rented the St. Philip ballroom from J. B. Coquet and announces a new kind of ball for free women of color and white Creole gentlemen. Beginning Saturday November 23 these balls were the first true quadroon balls held every Saturday and Wednesday night. Tessier provided carriages at the door and rented rooms on the premises. The ballroom, renamed Salon Chinoise, will flourish for two years until Coquet moves back to the Vieux Carre. Coquet in the meantime holds similar balls at the Tivoli on Bayou St. John. William Kenner, John Watkins and Richard Relf are elected to the vestry. Madison orders the deportation of Casa Calvo and Juan Ventura Morales. |
December 1805
December 15 Lt. Humphries makes his report. He reports the existence of rafts much like those on the Red River. |
| The American government headed by William
C. C. Claiborne and the Creoles, who line up behind Daniel Clark,
begin to publically split in dealing with matters of the territory. Of
course Creole gentility reigned in the evenings at balls and at the theatre
when the American governor took his seat in the box reserved for him.
Congress allows a lower house to be elected in the territory. Lt. Col. Constant Freeman is commander of American forces in New Orleans, but he was not held in high esteem by Gov. Claiborne or fellow officers. |
In 1805 Municipal government orders fences, banquettes and contre-banquets, with gutters to be built. Banquettes are to be five feet wide of cypress a foot square, fixed with a pavement of bricks and masonry. Mr. Mansuy Pelletier, city engineer. In 1805 a Union Fire Co. meets monthly at the engine house on Royal. Fines are levied: $1 for non-appearance and $5 for appearance without uniform. The first city directory is published by Matthew Flannery, Claiborne lives at the corner of Levee (Decatur) and Toulouse. The Corner of Dumaine and Levee is an arsenal and Navy yard. The five old forts, four ravelins and ramparts and are barely recognizable, having mostly sunk back into the ground. Bernard Marigny asks permission to subdivide his plantation. An initial plan is drawn up by Nicolas de Finiels and the streets are laid out by Barthelemy Lafon. Both of these men had been architects and engineers under the Spanish administration. |
In 1805 A $200 reward is offered for information on the robbery of the mail portmanteau. A villain robbed the coach within nine leagues of the city, ripped it open and threw it into the river. In 1805 the slave trade is forbidden by federal statute, but it continues through New Orleans. The territorial council charters the New Orleans Navigation Company to make the Carondelet Canal more serviceable and collect tolls. It will be widened again in 1835. Around 1805 Dr. John Sibley is appointed an Indian agent in the Natchitoches area of northwest Orleans Territory. He kept meticulous records of trade with native cultures but the Natchitoches are not mentioned. |
Juan Ventura
Morales is now the Intendant of Spanish West Florida. Vincente Folch
is the Governor and Carlos DeHault de Lassus is commandant at Baton Rouge. Former Louisiana governorCasa Calvo, is now the Spanish Commissioner to determine the Western Boundary of Louisiana. These Spanish officials have continued to live in New Orleans after the transfer with a detachment of 50 Spanish Regulars. Morales is encouraging land speculation in West Florida, enriching himself on land that is claimed by the United States. Casa Calvo is spreading rumors that land west of the Mississippi will be traded for the Floridas. The marques, through traveling with the Intendent, finds him to be a disgusting and worrisome character. James Monroe and C. C. Pinckney are in Spain trying to work out the territorial disputes. At this time many Spanish subjects in Louisiana are asking to be relocated in Texas, but the Spanish authorities are cautious that these emigrants may be tainted by American institutions and traditions. |
In 1805 The de la Ronde house is built by Pierre Denis de la Ronde III (uncle of the Baroness Pontalba) on Versailles Plantation located in 1860>St. Bernard Parish down river from New Orleans. The house has spacious galleries, huge windows and colonnades, and fine European details. Pierre envisions a whole city on his land that would rival Versailles and outgrow New Orleans, but his plans are deterred by events beyond his control, perhaps raising his nine beautiful daughters. They are popularly known as the nine muses and his one son is known as Apollo. The house is sold upon his death. It is used as a hospital by the British under Sir Edward Pakenham during the Battle of New Orleans in January 1815. It is destroyed by fire in 1876. |
Alexandria
is first surveyed as a town in 1805.
Isaac Johnson |
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