Stephen Doutreleau (born in France, 11 October 1693; date of death uncertain, after 1747, in France) was a

French French may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to France ** French language, which originated in France ** French people, a nation and ethnic group ** French cuisine, cooking traditions and practices Arts and media * The French (band), ...

Jesuit The Society of Jesus (; abbreviation: S.J. or SJ), also known as the Jesuit Order or the Jesuits ( ; ), is a religious order (Catholic), religious order of clerics regular of pontifical right for men in the Catholic Church headquartered in Rom ...

missionary A missionary is a member of a Religious denomination, religious group who is sent into an area in order to promote its faith or provide services to people, such as education, literacy, social justice, health care, and economic development.Thoma ...

who ministered to Native Americans and colonists in present-day

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Mississippi Mississippi ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern and Deep South regions of the United States. It borders Tennessee to the north, Alabama to the east, the Gulf of Mexico to the south, Louisiana to the s ...

and

Louisiana Louisiana ( ; ; ) is a state in the Deep South and South Central regions of the United States. It borders Texas to the west, Arkansas to the north, and Mississippi to the east. Of the 50 U.S. states, it ranks 31st in area and 25 ...

for 20 years.

Life

He became a Jesuit

novice A novice is a person who has entered a religious order and is under probation, before taking vows. A ''novice'' can also refer to a person (or animal e.g. racehorse) who is entering a profession with no prior experience. Religion Buddhism ...

at the age of twenty-two and migrated in 1727 to

, with a group of

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. Soon after his arrival, he was sent to the

mission. In 1728 he was recorded at Post Vincennes, "the fort on the Wabash"

iver Iver is a civil parishes in England, civil parish in Buckinghamshire, England. In addition to the central nucleated village, clustered village, the parish includes the residential neighbourhoods of Iver Heath and Richings Park and the hamlets o ...

which was established about that time. On 1 January 1730, Doutreleau set out for

New Orleans New Orleans (commonly known as NOLA or The Big Easy among other nicknames) is a Consolidated city-county, consolidated city-parish located along the Mississippi River in the U.S. state of Louisiana. With a population of 383,997 at the 2020 ...

on business connected with the mission. In the previous two months, the

Natchez Indians ttps://archive.org/details/dcouverteett01marg The Internet Archive website The Natchez ( , ) are a Native American people who originally lived in the Natchez Bluffs area in the Lower Mississippi Valley, near the present-day city of Natchez, Mis ...

had

massacred A massacre is an event of killing people who are not engaged in hostilities or are defenseless. It is generally used to describe a targeted killing of civilians en masse by an armed group or person. The word is a loan of a French term for "b ...

all the inhabitants of the small French village of

Natchez Natchez may refer to: Places * Natchez, Alabama, United States * Natchez, Indiana, United States * Natchez, Louisiana, United States * Natchez, Mississippi, a city in southwestern Mississippi, United States ** Natchez slave market, Mississippi * ...

and the Yazoo, a neighboring Indian tribe, also attacked the French. Two Jesuit missionaries,

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(resident priest of

Arkansas Post The Arkansas Post (; ), officially the Arkansas Post National Memorial, was the first European colonization of the Americas, European settlement located along the Mississippi River, in the Mississippi Alluvial Plain, and in the present-day U. ...

who had been visiting Natchez)Donald A. Hawkins, "Pioneer Jesuits in the South: 1566-1763"
Jesuits of the New Orleans Province, accessed 3 May 2010 and

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, were killed in these uprisings. Ignorant of the hostilities and accompanied by four or five French ''

voyageurs Voyageurs (; ) were 18th- and 19th-century French and later French Canadians and others who transported furs by canoe at the peak of the North American fur trade. The emblematic meaning of the term applies to places (New France, including the ...

'', Doutreleau landed at the mouth of the

Yazoo River The Yazoo River is a river primarily in the U.S. state of Mississippi. It is considered by some to mark the southern boundary of what is called the Mississippi Delta, a broad floodplain that was cultivated for cotton plantations before the Ame ...

to offer up the

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. The Yazoo attacked the small party, killing one of the Frenchmen and wounding the missionary. Doutreleau escaped to his canoe with two of his companions; they fled down the Mississippi. When they reached the French camp at Tunica Bay, their wounds were dressed. After a night's rest, they continued and made it to New Orleans without attacks. They had accomplished a journey of four hundred

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s through a hostile country. Shortly after, Doutreleau became

chaplain A chaplain is, traditionally, a cleric (such as a minister, priest, pastor, rabbi, purohit, or imam), or a lay representative of a religious tradition, attached to a secular institution (such as a hospital, prison, military unit, intellige ...

of the French colonial troops in Louisiana. He accompanied them on one expedition. At his own request, he was sent back to the Illinois Indians, but how long he remained in the

Illinois Country The Illinois Country ( ; ; ), also referred to as Upper Louisiana ( ; ), was a vast region of New France claimed in the 1600s that later fell under Spanish and British control before becoming what is now part of the Midwestern United States. Whi ...

is uncertain. At one time Doutreleau was chaplain of the hospital at New Orleans. In 1747 he returned to France, after twenty years as a missionary in the Mississippi Valley.

References

;Attribution * {{DEFAULTSORT:Doutreleau, Stephen 1693 births 18th-century French Jesuits French Roman Catholic missionaries 18th-century French people Year of death unknown French military chaplains Jesuit missionaries in New France