17 and 45.

Letter of James Colbert, a half-breed in the British interest, resident at that time among the Chickasaws, May 25, 1779, etc.] Flat-boats from the Illinois went down to New Orleans, and keel-boats returned from that city with arms and munitions, or were sent up to Pittsburg [Footnote: The history of the early navigation of the Ohio and Mississippi begins many years before the birth of any of our western pioneers, when the French went up and down them.

Long before the Revolutionary war occasional hunters, in dug-outs, or settlers going to Natchez in flat-boats, descended these rivers, and from Pittsburg craft were sent to New Orleans to open negotiations with the Spaniards as soon as hostilities broke out; and ammunition was procured from New Orleans as soon as Independence was declared.]; and the following spring Clark built a fort on the east bank of the Mississippi below the Ohio.
[Footnote: In lat.

36 deg.

30'; it was named Fort Jefferson.