By Ted Como
Some early maps that show Fort LaPresentation at the mouth of the Oswegatchie River are wildly inaccurate; you may find several here: http://ogdensburg.info/maps/maps.html . Most correct is a map called the 1751 Anonymous Plan and Elevation of Fort de la Presenetation. You may open it in a large format here: https://tinyurl.com/3mvrtkxw – keep clicking on it to enlarge. Later in this article we refer to this map as “Map 3.”
We can learn some new facts about the fort and surrounding area from this map of which there are at least three versions. This article includes links to what we refer to as Maps 1, 2 and 3.
The rendering of the fort is identical in all three and for the most part so are the geographic features except that in Map 1, the Oswegatchie River is portrayed to the length of its second bend, which may be seen in a Google satellite image opposite the end of the runway at the airport. Maps 2 and 3 abbreviate the length of the river; map 1 also has a legend which is missing from Maps 2 and 3. This leads us to believe that Map 1 is the original from which Maps 2 and 3 were copied.
Map 1: This version has a legend box at upper left and shows 12 longhouses next to the fort in four rows of three. It has no written information elsewhere on the map. The St. Lawrence is presented as Riviere de Catarakouy. The St. Lawrence County Historical Association in its publication of January, 1990 (https://tinyurl.com/mrsybdxk ) refers to this version as “The 1752 map and elevation of Fort de la Presentation by Paul de la Brosse. Courtesy of the National Archives of Paris, France, Paris.” It may be found here: http://ogdensburg.info/webphotos/1752map.jpg .
Map 2: This version removes the legend box. It shows 10 longhouses next to the fort in four rows of two, with two more standing alone to the south. It has written text throughout the map and shows the St. Lawrence River as Riviere Katarakoui. This map is offered by the Library and Archives of Canada and may be seen here: https://tinyurl.com/yc2x2sab .
Map 3: It also has no title box and shows 10 longhouses in five rows of two. As with Map 2 it has written text throughout which differs in placement from map 2 and is in a different hand. It also spells the St. Lawrence as Riviere de Katarakoui and at bottom right, shows: “Paul . Labrosser . Fecit.”
We have added a feature to our copy of Map 3. With the assistance of Michael Whittaker of Bishops Mills, Ontario, we have translated much of the handwriting from French to English. Whittaker is an avid historian who has written extensively on the fort and local history. He came to Ogdensburg as an 1812 reenactor and heritage interpreter and was one of the organizers of the War of 1812 Symposium here. Map 3 may be found here: https://tinyurl.com/r4h2t5du .
So who is Paul Labrosser as shown at bottom right on Map 3? His actual name was Paul Raymond Jourdain dit Labrosse (1697-1769) and he is identified in the Dictionary of Canadian Biography as an organ builder, wood carver and master carpenter but also as a cartographer. We found another map with his name on it here: https://tinyurl.com/dvsy6z8s – click on it to enlarge it. Curiously, this map of the St. Lawrence shows at LaPresentation 16 longhouses, four rows of four each. It also has the Oswegatchie to Black Lake.
But back to Map 3, there are things we can learn from it. The 3-foot drop in elevation of the Oswegatchie between Points F and G explains why Picquet located his dam there. The park along the east side of the Oswegatchie was created with fill from the area of the pumping station, north to the area of the former Ford Street Bridge. After the turn of the century there were a number of boat houses in this area near the former Ford Street Bridge but as the map indicates, originally the water lapped the bottom of the hill along Crescent Street with stronger rapids than today, driven by that drop in elevation.
Originally, you could walk from the point at the east side of the Oswegatchie out to the islet where the map shows the water depth at no more than four feet. The map shows the rise in elevation at both sides of the mouth of the Oswegatchie, no doubt a feature created during the last glacial period as ice melting from the north unleashed huge torrents which had to find their way south.
Just south of the fort is a square box with the word, “écurie.” It was the stable.
- Ted Como is a member of the board of the Fort La Presentation Association.
fort1749.org 
