Vigo, Joseph Maria Francesco
Vigo, Joseph Maria Francesco
VIGO, JOSEPH MARIA FRANCESCO. (1747–1836). Spanish officer, frontier merchant. Born in Mondovi, Italy, Vigo joined the Spanish army as a young man, being stationed in Cuba and then New Orleans in the 1760s. Leaving the military around 1770, he entered into the fur trade, working closely with Native Americans and French traders. In 1772 he settled in the new Spanish post of St. Louis, eventually establishing a partnership with the lieutenant governor of Louisiana, Fernando de Leyba. The latter secretly encouraged Vigo to assist Colonel George Rogers Clark in his 1778 campaign against British outposts in the Old Northwest. Vigo responded with financial aid, which proved essential since Clark had no other way of purchasing supplies from the Spanish or the French in Vincennes. After loaning Clark nearly ten thousand dollars, Vigo set out for Vincennes, which had just been captured by Henry Hamilton's British forces. Unaware of Spanish sympathy for the Americans, Hamilton let Vigo leave, the latter traveling to Kaskaskia, where Clark was stationed. Guided by Vigo's thorough intelligence on the British position, Clark launched his surprising and successful winter attack on Vincennes in February 1779. After the Revolution, Vigo moved to Vincennes, marrying an American woman, Elizabeth Shannon. He continued to be active in the fur trade and to supply American forces with goods. He also was an agent for the Miami Company. Named a colonel of militia in 1790, he acted on behalf of the United States in negotiations with various Indians nations over the next fifteen years. The decline of the fur trade in the early 1800s and his inability to obtain payment for the funds he had advanced to the Americans during the Revolution led to Vigo's economic failure. He died in Vincennes homeless and poor on 22 March 1836.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Roselli, Bruno. Vigo: A Forgotten Builder of the American Republic. Boston, Mass.: Stratford, 1933.
Vigo, Joseph. Joseph Maria Francesco Vigo Papers. Indiana Historical Society, Indianapolis.