Los Adaes State Historic Site

Before the presidio there was a mission among the Adai. Spain founded San Miguel de Linares de los Adaes in 1717 for a people of the Caddo Confederacy whose name comes from the Caddo word hadai, brushwood; the state-recognized Adai Caddo Indian Nation is based in nearby Robeline. French forces attacked the mission in 1719. In 1721 the Marqués de Aguayo returned and built the presidio, Nuestra Señora del Pilar de los Adaes, a hexagonal stockade. From 1729 to 1770 it was the capital of the Spanish province of Texas, some 15 miles from the French fort at Natchitoches.

Supplies came from 800 miles away, and crop failures and rain kept the garrison short of food. Spain forbade trade with the French, yet an illicit trade with Natchitoches grew because, Louisiana State Parks says, the people of Los Adaes would otherwise have starved. Archaeologists recovered more than thirty thousand fragments of Native American pottery, French pottery as numerous as Mexican-made ware, and mostly French gunflints. The capital moved to San Antonio in 1770 and Los Adaes was abandoned in 1773. Descendants, called Adaeseños, live in Texas and Louisiana today.

Los Adaes also lay on a road to freedom. The National Park Service lists it in the Network to Freedom, noting that at least 30 enslaved people who left Cane River plantations in the 1804 insurrection crossed Magnolia land on their way here, seeking freedom in Spanish Texas. The site is at 6354 Highway 485 in Robeline.