Adventurism and Empire: The Struggle for Mastery in the Louisiana-Florida Borderlands, 1762–1803 by David Narrett (review)

In this impressive book, David Narrett tackles the notoriously complex struggle that took place in the southeastern borderlands from the Seven Years’ War to the Louisiana Purchase. The task requires extraordinary narrative dexterity, as the overlapping contests involved the French, Spanish, and British empires; the emerging United States (and its cantankerous western dominions); disputatious officials; diverse subjects and citizens of said powers; and a variety of indigenous groups who actually controlled much of the region for much of the period—the Choctaws, the Chickasaws, the Upper and Lower Creeks, and many smaller nations. The research demands are also daunting, requiring work in European and American archives and broad reading in a substantial secondary literature in areas not always brought into conversation with one another. Narrett admirably succeeds in these endeavors and makes a valuable contribution to an exciting and growing field of study.

The diplomacy and politics of the era are confusing enough. In 1762 France secretly conveyed Louisiana (which encompassed much of the present-day U.S. Midwest) to Spain, who ceded East and West Florida to the British the following year. Two decades later, by the end of the American Revolution, Spain had recovered the Floridas (while keeping Louisiana) but now confronted the United States, sharing a poorly defined and highly contentious border with restless neighbors of frontier folk and wary indigenous peoples who retained legitimate claims to the interior. Navigational rights to the Mississippi River were especially nettlesome. The French Revolution and ensuing European wars further complicated the picture, with the 1795 treaty between the United States and Spain setting the boundary at the thirty-first parallel and thus leaving many indigenous peoples to their fates at the hands of the United States. The retrocession of Louisiana to the French in 1800 (and French misadventures in Saint Domingue) paved the way for the Louisiana Purchase in 1803. At the end of the period a tottering Spanish empire stood alone in the Floridas against the expansionist United States. One perhaps unfair question is why the author does not carry the narrative forward until 1821 or so, when Florida fell into U.S. hands.

Shifting politics and impermanent boundaries offered an inviting field for all manner of intrigues and adventurers. “Colonial adventurism,” the author explains, “came to the fore when individuals acting in a private capacity attempted to exploit uncertain borderland conditions to their own emolument and power” (p. 3). James Wilkinson and William Augustus Bowles are perhaps just the most famous (or infamous) of the many colorful characters who paraded across the southeastern borderlands with grandiose dreams and improbable schemes in these years, and Narrett carefully addresses even the most minor plans and conspiracies.

The book is gracefully written and judiciously argued. Analysis is embedded in the narrative with insightful comments peppering the text throughout, rather than standing alone. The book is light on theory (or is at least subtle in incorporating it). On the whole the author does an excellent job providing historical context to the many episodes he relates. The book would benefit, however, from maps indicating the many places named and the constantly shifting borders.