Lafayette County, Arkansas
1843-1848

The land has always defined America's story- maybe more in the past than it does today.  In the 1840s, the idea of Manifest Destiny filled the imagination.  Americans would rule the land between the Atlantic and Pacific.  The Southwest corner of Arkansas, the county of Lafayette, particularly the bite of land between the Red River and the Texas border, was unsettled territory.

The Red River Valley was fertile land to raise the principal cash crop of the South- cotton.  Since the 1820s, settlers broke ground on its southern banks in Louisiana.  It wasn't until the 1830s, when General Shreve cleared the river for travel north into Arkansas, that Lafayette County received its share of settlers.  Richard Blande and Roderick Dunne embody the first planters to begin their cotton empires west of the Red River in Arkansas.  

West of Arkansas, Texas was the main attraction for America's dreams of Manifest Destiny.  Travelers crossed the Red River deeper into land once occupied by Native Americans.  Conflicts arose between the settlers and tribes such as the Kichai and Comanche.  Further north, Federal troops monitored the activities of the tribes inhabiting Indian Territory.

The population of Lafayette County in the mid 1840s was around 2,500.  This means there was plenty of room for a man to make a name for himself.  The seat of government was Lafayette Courthouse-a log structure built along a main road before there were towns, and a town never developed to possess it.  The road north from there was the settlement of Lost Prairie.  Here were the grand plantations built in the richest lands of the Red River Valley- this was the real seat of power in the county. The closest Arkansas could offer as a town for its southwest corner was Fulton in Hempstead County.  It was little more than a church, a schoolhouse, and a river boat launch.  

The growing county would need city centers and this is the backdrop for much of the conflict in the final chapters of Purchase.  Blande established a general store to compliment the traffic that was attracted by his ferry crossing.  A growing town center under the umbrella of his plantation would secure his influence, consolidate his power.  His experience politicking in Lost Prairie, namely falling on the losing side in the trial to prosecute the murderer of his friend Judge Hightower, taught him he wasn't ready to go toe-to-toe with the powerful men of Lost Prairie.  But he was the king west of the Red- he would just need to keep it that way.  But a new town center was springing-up ten miles west of Blande's Mercantile.  The Trapper family had arrived to the area with large ambitions.  And others, including Blande's brother-in-law and partner, Roderick Dunne, had plans of exerting their influence in the new town of Bright Star.  

But the rivers are what defined the land at the time.  They made the soil rich, water the cotton, and provided a means to ship it downriver for profit.  Blande built his plantation near the confluence of the Red and Sulfur Rivers. The Red was the larger of the two and its gentle banks provided a more conducive home for plantation farming.  The Sulfur River was more wild in that its bottoms flooded into swampland that the farmer wouldn't break.  Since White man wouldn't touch the Sulfur River Bottoms, this made it the land of opportunity for a slave.  It was where a good meal might be caught or a path to freedom may be taken.