Before the bateaux could leave for New Orleans, a bill of lading* had to be completed at the village docks. By examining bills of lading from Kaskaskia, Fort de Chartres, Ste. Genevieve, and St. Louis, historians know that the main products being shipped to New Orleans during the French period were corn, wheat, flour, tobacco, salted meats (mainly pork), lead, hides, furs, and occasionally butter and cheese.

"In February of 1772, Daniel Fagot, merchant of the Illinois Country and sometime resident of Ste. Genevieve, loaded his chaland* at the Old Town docks for a trip to New Orleans. Fagot's cargo was typical for that time: fifty sheets of lead, thirty one barrels of flour, nine bundles of beaver skins, four bundles of buckskins with the hair on, eleven bundles of buckskins with the hair removed, fifteen doeskins, and eighty-five buffalo robes."

*A bill of lading is a record of all the trade goods on board a boat.

*A chaland was a smaller variety of bateau.

© Illinois State Museum 31-Dec-96