The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 48, July 1944 - April, 1945 Page: 239
617 p. : ill., maps, ports. ; 24 cm.View a full description of this periodical.
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Lawrie's Trip to Northeast Texas, 1854-1855
Sava'rdan's Un Naufrage au Texas" identifies Dr. Roger as
a young Belgian medical student and proteg6 of Considbrant.
It mentions the departure of Cantagrel from Europe in Oc-
tober and his arrival in New York "au commencement de
novembre"8 and throws some light on his activities after he
left New York. Savardan writes that on his trip southwest
Cantagrel stopped at Cincinnati to engage some American
pioneers, to buy the implements which would be needed most
by the new colony, and to establish an agency for the colonization
company; that he was joined at Patriot, Indiana, by John
Allen; and that he later in Texas began preparations for the
immigrants "aide du precieux concours de M. John Allen, de
M. Bourgeois and de quelque salaries americaines, trbs-
heureusement choisis."
A fragmentary account of Arthur Lawrie's exploring trip
to Texas in 1854-1855 recorded in one of his two extant, un-
published journals shows him to have been one of the "salaries
americaines" secured as members of Cantagrel's party and to
have joined Cantagrel, along with John Allen, at Patriot.
Though Lawrie himself does not tell why and how he---a
farmer on a northern Indiana farm-came to be selected, and
how contact had been secured between him and the agents
of the colonization company, he may have learned of the plans
of the colony from a friend or friends in New York City-
his home before he emigrated to Indiana-through the offices
of whom he had been engaged to accompany Cantagrel to Texas.o
5Published in Paris in 1858. Savardan came to Reunion on June 15, 1855,
and departed about the middle of August, 1857, after the colony had
been officially dissolved. His book is undoubtedly the most complete history
of the colony that has been written.
lbid., 21.
7lbid., 21.
sIbid., 29. Actually, as already stated, the date of arrival was October 27.
9"bid., 29.
'oHe or his family may have known Brisbane in New York, where
Brisbane was the agent of the colonization company. There are other
possible explanations: he may have been induced to join the party by
John Allen, who, we know, boarded a boat with him at Patriot to join
Cantagrel; or in some way he might have learned of the projected colony
and the recruiting of helpers through the French and Swiss settlers
of Indiana's Switzerland County (an Ohio River county), in which Patriot
is located. (Patriot seems to have been a kind of rallying point for the
immigrants who went from France to Texas by way of New York; Con-
sid6rant in The Great West, 5, wrote: "We [he and Brisbane in 1853]
took leave at Patriot, Indiana, of the last friends we were to meet on
our route.") In fact, so many explanations are possible that it would
be futile to try to explore them all.239
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Texas State Historical Association. The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 48, July 1944 - April, 1945, periodical, 1945; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth146055/m1/257/: accessed May 4, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.