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The largest of the vessels that went down lay in the sound between Deer Island and what is now Ocean Springs. The smallest lay near the mouth of Bayou Bosard on the east shore of the Bay., and the one from which these cannons were removed lay farther in, northeast from the Louisville and Nashville railroad bridge about sixteen hundred feet from shore in a fathom of water.
Salvage work had been attempted on the larger of the three which yielded some eight foot iron cannon, a small bronze cannon, pig lead and little else.
The smallest had long since disappeared and become only a memory among the older people. It had been made of mahogany and its valuable boards were gradually made use of.
Mr. Tiblier decided to investigate the remaining wreck. For nearly two hundred years she had lain unmolested, pointing an accusing bow in the direction from which the hurricane had come. He got together an outfit and proceeded to stake out her dimensions by soundings. She proved to be about sixty-five feet in length by twenty in width, and forty feet or so behind her lay a small lighter such as was used in those days.
With the equipment they had it was found impossible to do more than remove some objects from the deck of the vessel, namely these cannons, some cannon balls of three sizes, lead musket balls, musket barrels from which the stocks had fallen away, scab-
bards without swords, and some lVi.x3 inch iron bars, fourteen to twenty-five feet long.
For thirty years and more the salvaged cannons lay in Mr. Tiblier’s yard. He once fired one of them.
Now they are safely embedded in a concrete foundation looking toward the waters over which they came from France more than two hundred years ago to help in conquering an empire.
THE OLD HOUSE
There is a strange old house standing with its side toward Porter avenue just across the gully from Bienville’s headquarters site, in the area he had chosen for the settlement.
It is about five hundred feet back from the beach on the east side of the avenue.
Just how old it is nobody knows. It has brick foundations, hand sawed framing and plastered walls. For this reason some have thought it to be comparatively modern but this is not necessarily so. We know, from an inventory made by Nicolas la Salle for the home government in 1704 (1) that at that time there was “A hall to make brick****with a kiln adjoining it,” and Duclose reported to Pontch-artrain in 1713 that “All the commerce that the inhabitants carry on consists, almost entirely, of nothing but planks and skins.” Furthermore the early
(1) Mississippi Provincial Archives, Rowland, 2, pp. 19, 81.