Claude Jean Allouez

Background

Claude Jean Allouez was born on June 6, 1622 in Saint-Didier-en-Velay, Auvergne, France.

Education

Allouez graduated in his seventeenth year from the college at Le Puy, where one of his masters was the famous missionary Francois Regis, from whom he acquired his own missionary zeal. In 1639 he entered the Jesuit novitiate at Toulouse, pursuing his clerical studies in the same city and later at Billom and Rodez.

Career

Allouez was ordained priest in 1655, and in 1658 went to Canada with the newly appointed governor of New France, Pierre d'Argenson. After three years of labor among Indian tribes along the St. Lawrence, he became superior at Three Rivers. Whilst there July 21, 1663, he was appointed vicar general for all the natives and traders of the northwest. This office required him to visit the tribes in that territory, to obtain missionaries, to regulate the relations of the traders with the natives, and to open new missions. He set out for Lake Superior in 1664, but missing the canoe flotilla for that year, he was obliged to wait until August 8, 1665. The Indians, who did not want his company, thrice abandoned him, and finally only consented to his presence on his doing his share of the paddling and portages.

He arrived on September 2 at Lake Superior, or, as he named it, Lac de Tracy, and on October 1 at Chequamegon (Ashland) Bay, where, at La Pointe on Madeline Island, he found a large village with a force of 800 warriors, the aggregation of seven different tribes.

On May 6, 1667, he left for Lake Nipigon, a distance, allowing for detours, of about 1, 500 miles. At that place he found many Christian Indians, particularly the Nipissiriniens, who had taken refuge there after the slaughter by the Iroquois of the various tribes in the Ontario country. After two weeks, Allouez returned to his people at La Pointe. There he persuaded the "Queues Coupées" (the Kiskakon clan of Ottawas) to renounce their superstitions and polygamy. To satisfy the need thus created for new missionaries, he carried the news to Quebec, where the superiors, not having heard from him for over two years, had given him up for dead. After remaining for only two days, he returned to his western missions.

In 1669 he was back in Quebec with a number of Iroquois captives whom he had ransomed. After a brief stay he again returned to the west, this time to the Potawatomi, near Green Bay, then the Baie des Puants, with whom he spent the winter. On April 16, 1670, he left them in order to go to the Outagamies. His diary of this journey contains observations on natural history, and an account of the eclipse of the sun which occurred on April 19. On that day he reached Lake Winnebago, which he called St. Francis Xavier. The next day, Sunday, he celebrated mass on the site of the present city of Oshkosh. On April 25 he established St. Mark's Mission (location uncertain).

He left St. Mark's on April 27 and two days later came among the Miamis and the Mascoutens, and founded the mission of St. James. He next spent some months at Sault Ste. Marie, leaving there with Father Dablon in September, for the Green Bay missions. On June 4, 1671, he was the orator of the day at the Sault when the northwest territory was solemnly declared to be subject to the King of France by M. de Saint Lusson, delegated for that purpose by the Governor at Quebec. The same year, when Marquette and Joliet started on the search for the Mississippi, Allouez returned to Green Bay to establish the Mission of Rapides des Pères, now De Pere (Wisconsin), on Fox River, where the State Historical Society of Wisconsin has built a monument to him near the site of the house and chapel which he occupied. In 1674 there were over 2, 000 Christian Indians at this mission.

A fine monstrance presented to the mission by Nicholas Perrot in 1686 was plowed up at the site in 1802. When news came of Marquette's death, May 18, 1675, Allouez was ordered to continue Marquette's work among the Illinois. He started in October 1676, but owing to the severity of the winter could not reach his mission until the following March. On the way, on the eve of St. Joseph's Day, March 18 he reached Lake Michigan, which he called St. Joseph. He canoed over seventy-six leagues to the Illinois country, where he was well received and conducted to the wigwam at Kaskaskia.

After prospecting for a central mission station, he came back to Green Bay, but returned in 1678 to the Illinois, where he passed the rest of his life, eleven years, until his death among the Miamis, near the site of Niles, Michigan.

Achievements

• Claude Jean Allouez was considered a founder of Catholicism in the W. He established and maintained a number of notable missions in this region, including St. Francis Xavier Mission, St. Mark's Mission, and Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan. He is said to have baptized fully 10, 000 Indians and to have preached to about 100, 000.

Works

More photos

• book

  • Facsimile of Père Marquette's Illinois Prayer Book

    ( This work has been selected by scholars as being cultur...)

  • Discovery And Exploration Of The Mississippi Valley

    (This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. T...)

  • Relation of the voyages, discoveries, and death, of Father James Marquette, and the subsequent voyages of Father Claudius Allouez

    (This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. T...)

Religion

Allouez entered the Society of Jesus about 1655.

Connections

Allouez never married.