Spanning from the West African coast to the Canadian prairies and south to Louisiana, the Caribbean, and Guiana, France’s Atlantic empire was one of the largest political entities in the Western
Founded by French military entrepreneur Antoine Laumet de Lamothe Cadillac in 1701, colonial Detroit was occupied by thousands of French settlers who established deep roots on both sides of the river.
The St Lawrence valley, connecting the Great Lakes to the Atlantic, was a crucible of community in the seventeenth century. While the details of how this region emerged as the heartland of French colo
