Pierre Laclede Liguest
1724 - 1778

His prophecy on the founding of Saint Louis:

"I have found a site on which to form my settlement which might hereafter become one of the finest cities in America."

Pierre Laclede, who sometimes added the family name "Liguest" at the end of his signature to identify him from other relations, was born in 1724 in Bedous, France. He served in the army and arrived in New Orleans in 1755 as a "gentleman traveling for pleasure." He was well educated and known for his skill in fencing. He fell in love with Marie Therese Chouteau, a woman whose husband had abandoned her in New Orleans with a young son (see Block 33). Laclede made the boy, Auguste Chouteau, his ward and a clerk in his office. Because French and Spanish law - and the Catholic Church -forbade divorce, Laclede and Madame Chouteau maintained a discreet relationship, but she became his common-law wife and they had four children together. Laclede became interested in the fur trade, and in 1762 received, along with Antoine Maxent, the exclusive right to trade with the Indians of the Mississippi and Missouri Rivers. By 1764 Laclede had founded the settlement of St. Louis, which he named. In 1769 Antoine Maxent dissolved his partnership with Laclede, who then made Auguste Chouteau and Sylvestre Labbadie his partners. Laclede fell deeply into debt and was in poor health by 1777 when he traveled to New Orleans to try to straighten out his fortunes. While traveling back to St. Louis on May 27, 1778, Pierre Laclede died on a boat anchored just two leagues below Arkansas Post on the Mississippi, and was buried in an unmarked grave.