REPORT GENERAL LAND OFFICE, April 26, 1850. ON THE SIR: I have the honor to communicate, herewith, a GEOLOGY AND TOPOGRAPHY report from Messrs. Foster and Whitney, United States OF A PORTION OF THE geologists, on the “copper lands” of the Lake Superior LAKE SUPERIOR LAND DISTRICT, land district, in Michigan, accompanied by a number of IN views of the principal features of that interesting region, THE STATE OF MICHIGAN with diagrams of the mines, &c., illustrating the work. BY There is, also, accompanying this report, a fac-simile of a map of Lake Superior and the adjacent regions, made J. W. FOSTER AND J. D. WHITNEY by the Jesuit missionaries in 1670 and 1671, and UNITED STATES GEOLOGISTS. published at Paris in 1672. This report contains a vast fund of valuable information, IN TWO PARTS. and the publication of it will be an important addition to the cause of science. It would have been communicated PART I. with my usual annual report, but the time since those COPPER LANDS gentlemen were appointed was too short to enable them to prepare it in season. It is now submitted as supplementary to that report, and I respectfully request that it may be so communicated to Congress. WASHINGTON: With much respect, your obedient servant, PRINTED FOR THE HOUSE OF REPS. J. BUTTERFIELD, Commissioner. Hon THOMAS EWING, 1850. Secretary of the Interior. 31st CONGRESS, [HO. OF REPS.] Ex. Doc. 1st Session No. 69 BOSTON, April 15, 1850 GEOLOGICAL REPORT ON THE COPPER LANDS OF LAKE SUPERIOR LAND DISTRICT, MICHIGAN SIR: We herewith present to you a report on the “copper lands” of the Lake Superior land district. When it is considered that this district embraces an area of more LETTER than sixteen thousand square miles; that nearly the FROM whole of that area is an unbroken wilderness; that we THE SECRETARY OF THE INTERIOR, were required to explore considerable portions of it with ENCLOSING sufficient minuteness to designate the character of each The geological report on the copper lands of Lake quarter section; and, that, in the accomplishment of this Superior land district, Michigan. object, our camp equipage and provisions, and even our canoes, were carried for long distances on the backs of men; and that the limited state of our supplies often MAY 16, 1850. compelled us to press on without regard to weather— Referred to the Committee on Public Lands, and ordered to be printed. under these circumstances, we trust we shall be pardoned if it be found that we have fallen into minor JUNE 14, 1850. errors, or hastily passed some points which were 10,000 copies extra ordered to be printed. deserving of a more minute examination. In the delineation of the main features of the region, we trust DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR, that this report will be found correct. Washington, April 29, 1850. With sincere thanks for the aid afforded us in the SIR: I have the honor to communicate, herewith, a letter prosecution of these researches by several of the from the Commissioner of the General Land Office, officers attached to the bureau over which you preside, transmitting the report of Messrs. Foster and Whitney, we subscribe ourselves, United States geologist, on the copper lands of the Lake Sir, with great respect, your most obedient servants, Superior land district, Michigan. J. W. FOSTER. J. D. WHINEY, I have the honor to be, very respectfully, your obedient United States Geologists. servant, TO HON. JUSTIN BUTTERFIELD, T. EWING, Secretary. Commissioner of the General Land Office. Hon. HOWELL COBB, Speaker of the House of Representatives. 31st Congress, 1st Session. -- Ex. Doc. No. 69. – Page 1 of 49 REPORT but covered with grassy plains, through which herds of ON THE buffalo and deer. GEOLOGY AND TOPOGRAPHY Here dwelt the Sioux or Nadouessi, a race at once OF A PORTION OF THE warlike and indomitable. At that day a feud existed LAKE SUPERIOR LAND DISTRICT, between the two tribes, which has been perpetuated to IN the present time. THE STATE OF MICHIGAN Late in the season Raymbault returned to Peritanguishene with the intention of revisiting the Saut in the succeeding spring, and establishing there a permanent mission; but consumption, brought on by INTRODUCTION. repeated exposures and privations, was fast hurrying Historical sketch.—Raymbault and Jogues’s voyage to him to the grave. The following year he returned with Saut. Ste. Marie.—René Mesnard visits Lake Jogues to Quebec, where he died October 22, 1642. Superior.—Alloüez follows.—Dablon and Marquette Father Jogues started to return, but in ascending the St. follow.—Grand Council.—Marquette proceeds to Green Lawrence was captured by the Mohawks, a predatory Bay.—Discovers the Mississippi.—His death.—Alloüez’s band infesting the shores and tributaries of Lake Erie. death.—Early map of this region.—Effect of the After having been subjected to the most ignominious Missionary labors on the Indians.—Travels of Hennepin; treatment, himself scourged, and his Huron attendants Charlevoix; Henry; Mackenzie.—Expedition of General committed to the flames, he was ultimately ransomed by Cass; of Schoolcraft; of Maj. Long.—Dr. Houghton; his the Dutch in the vicinity of Albany. He revisited France, labors and death.—The treaties by which this district but soon returned to the scene of his labors with a spirit was ceded.—The several acts of government in unabated and a zeal unquenched. reference thereto.—The act authorizing the survey.—Its René Mesnard followed in the track of Raymbault. On organization. the 28th of August, 1660; he left Quebec, taking with him The first steps towards the exploration of the country a scanty stock of necessaries; "for I trust," said he, “in bordering on the great chain of North American lakes that Providence which feeds the little birds of the air, and were taken by the Jesuits of Canada, more than two clothes the wild flowers of the desert." He was past the centuries ago, under the auspices of Count Frontenac, meridian of life, but possessed all the zeal of youth. He then governor general of that region. went forth with the presentiment that he was performing his last journey, for, in writing back to a friend, he On the 7th of September; 1641, Charles Raymbault and remarked: "In three or four months you may add my Isaac Jogues, two missionaries of the order of Jesus— name to the memento of deaths." Having arrived at the an order whoso memorials are to be found in every Saut, he proceeded to coast along the southern shore in quarter of the habitable earth—accompanied by Hurons, a canoe, and on the 15th of October reached the head of left the bay of Pentanguishene in a bark canoe for Saut Keweenaw bay, which he named St. Theresa—the day Ste. Marie. At the head of this bay they had established of his arrival being the anniversary day of patron saint. a mission. It formed, at that time, the western terminus Here he remained until the following spring, when he left, of the travelled route between Montreal and Lake Huron, accompanied by a single Indian, for Chaquamegon bay, by way of the Ottawa river and Lake Simcoe, and for near the head of the lake. They took the route through years afterwards, while the power of France in the Portage lake; and while the voyageur was conveying the Northwest remained in the ascendant; constituted an canoe across the portage, the good Father wandered important link in a chain of posts extending for more than into the woods, and no trace of him was afterwards two thousand miles. obtained. This happened August 20, 1661. The world The route of Raymbault and Jogues lay through the applauds the heroism of Columbus who launched out Georgian bay, thence among the countless islands that upon a trackless ocean in search of a new world. The stud the channel of the St. Mary’s river. After a voyage humble missionary who, committing himself to the of seventeen days they arrived at the falls (Saut,) where guidance of savage attendants, voyaged for days with a they found an Indian village with a population of two boundless waste of waters on one side, and on the other thousand souls. The abundance of white fish, and the an unbroken wilderness, showed a degree of courage facilities for capturing them in the foaming rapids, have and enthusiasm which, has rarely been rivalled, and made this the chosen resort of the Chippewas for which ought to rescue his name from oblivion. centuries. The chiefs received them kindly and invited Claude Alloüez followed in his footsteps. On the 8th of them to dwell in their midst. "We will embrace you as August, 1666, he embarked at Three Rivers, brothers,” they said, “and profit by your words.” accompanied by four hundred Indians, who were on their They here learned of the existence of a lake still beyond, return from Quebec. In the beginning of September he called by the Kitchi-gummi, (Big lake,) surpassing in arrived at the Saut, and entered Lake Superior, "which," magnitude either Huron or Michigan, then called Illinois, said the good missionary, "shall henceforth boar the beyond whose western limits was a destitute of trees, name of M. de Tracy, in token of the obligations the 31st Congress, 1st Session. -- Ex. Doc. No. 69. – Page 2 of 49 people of this region are under to him;" and this is the his ardor, that in two days after his arrival he was on his name applied to it on the earliest map. way back to his forest home. "The savages,” he continues, "respect this lake as a *Charlevoix, in his Travels, has appropriated almost verbatim Alloüez's divinity, and offer sacrifices to it because of its size, for it description.