Notable New Orleanians: A Tricentennial Tribute

current, or against the wind, but not against both at the same time. It is for this reason that British Captain Louis Bond and a shipful
of would-be Huguenot colonists, ascending the river from its mouth with the aid of a southeast wind, had to stop and anchor at the
first reach of the Turn. There they had to wait for the wind to change to northeast to propel the corvette through the first reach of the
Turn. Bond would have known that there was no way he could maneuver upriver until the wind changed, and it was precisely then
that Bienville and his companions, in “two bark canoes” came paddling downriver from their explorations above the site of New
Orleans. An experienced sailor and naval captain, Bienville would have immediately recognized Bond’s predicament. His further
consideration was that he had encountered this same captain earlier at the Battle of Hudson’s Bay, where his brother Pierre d’Iberville
had captured him. As Bienville later wrote, “I knew this captain; I knew him to be timid.”
COURTESY OF THE NEWBERRY LIBRARY, CHICAGO, ILL. SCAN COURTESY HISTORIC NEW ORLEANS COLLECTION.
BIOGRAPHIES
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