Who built Fort Prudhomme?

La Salle
FORT PRUDHOMME SITE La Salle built Fort Prudhomme in 1682, on his first voyage down the Mississippi. One of the first forts or habitations of any kind built in the Tennessee country by Europeans, it was named after Pierre Prudhomme, armorer of the expedition.

What are the Memphis bluffs?

There are several bluffs along the Mississippi River near Memphis. Located 60 miles away from downtown Memphis is the High Bluff in Fort Pillow, Tennessee. Forty miles north of Memphis is the Chickasaw Bluff, a high ground rising 50 to 200 feet above the Mississippi River.

What country did La Salle represent?

René-Robert Cavelier, sieur de La Salle, (born November 22, 1643, Rouen, France—died March 19, 1687, near Brazos River [now in Texas, U.S.]), French explorer in North America who led an expedition down the Illinois and Mississippi rivers and claimed all the region watered by the Mississippi and its tributaries for …

Where are the Chickasaw Bluffs?

The Chickasaw Bluff is the high ground rising about 50 to 200 feet (20–60 m) above the Mississippi River flood plain between Fulton in Lauderdale County, Tennessee and Memphis in Shelby County, Tennessee. This elevation, shaped as four bluffs, is named for the Chickasaw people.

What is Memphis Tennessee’s nickname?

Bluff City
Memphis, Tennessee- Bluff City Not only is Memphis dubbed Home of the Blues, but it’s also known as the Birthplace of Rock ‘n Roll. A more recent nickname Memphis has adopted is Grind City, which is mostly attributed to the city’s NBA team, the Grizzlies.

How Memphis got its name?

The modern city was founded in 1819 and named Memphis. The name was chosen because of the ancient city of Memphis in Egypt. Memphis, Egypt was founded thousands of years before the United States even existed. But, like Memphis, Tennessee, it was also located on a great river: the Nile.

What route did Robert de La Salle take?

He was sent by King Louis the 14 to travel south from Canada and sail down the Mississippi River to the Gulf of Mexico. He was the first European to travel the length of the Mississippi River (1682).

Is Memphis built on a bluff?

The Chickasaw Bluff secured Memphis from river floods, while a rare shelf of sandstone below provided a secure boat landing, making this the “only site for a commercial mart” between the Ohio River and Vicksburg, Mississippi.

What is the significance of Fort Prudhomme?

Fort Prudhomme. Fort Prudhomme, or Prud’homme, was a simple stockade fortification, constructed in late Feb. 1682 on one of the Chickasaw Bluffs of the Mississippi River in West Tennessee by Cavelier de La Salle’s French canoe expedition of the Mississippi River Basin.

Where did La Salle build Fort Prudhomme?

Again other sources assume that “La Salle built Fort Prudhomme, possibly on the site of present-day Memphis”, on the fourth Chickasaw Bluff below the mouth of the Wolf River, in what would later become Shelby County.

What does Prudhomme stand for?

Fort Prudhomme, or Prud’homme, was a simple stockade fortification, constructed in late Feb. 1682 on one of the Chickasaw Bluffs of the Mississippi River in West Tennessee by Cavelier de La Salle’s French canoe expedition of the Mississippi River Basin.

Where is Fort Prudhomme on the Chickasaw Bluff?

The location on the fourth Chickasaw Bluff would put Fort Prudhomme at or near the site of the later French Fort Assumption which was used as a base against the Chickasaw in the abortive Campaign of 1739.