Lusk's Ferry Road

Lusk's Ferry Road was an early road in Illinois that provided an overland connection between the main settlement, Fort Kaskaskia, on the Mississippi River, and Lusk's Ferry, an important crossing point on the Ohio River. The overland route afforded an alternative to the river route, which required a difficult trip upstream on the Mississippi.

Fort Massac is on the Ohio River, about 20 miles (overland) southwest of Lusk's Ferry. This was a French fort that was abandoned and burned in 1763, at the end of the French and Indian War, when control of the Illinois Country passed to the British. It is likely that the Lusk's Ferry road started as a French road that connected Fort Massac with Fort Kaskaskia. After Lusk's Ferry came into use, a road was built from the Ferry to the Fort Massac Road. With the Fort abandoned, the southern stretch of the road fell into disuse, and the road became the Lusk's Ferry Road.

In his conquest of Illinois in 1778 and 1789, George Rogers Clark, with the army of Virginia, crossed the Ohio River from Kentucky to Fort Massac. From there he headed north to the Lusk's Ferry Road, which he followed at least part of the way to Fort Kaskaskia, whose defenses were oriented toward repelling an assault coming up the Mississippi. Clark was able to take the Fort by surprise by approaching from the interior of Illinois.

The northwestern and southeastern segments of the Lusk's Ferry Road, close to Kaskaskia and Lusk's Ferry, were accurately mapped in the early surveys of Illinois, which were conducted around 1800. This survey was oriented toward marking out "Townships" that were six miles (10 km) square, subdivided into "Sections" that were one mile (1.6 km) square, pursuant to the Land Ordinance of 1785. Although the surveyors were not charged with mapping the roads, many did so. The locations of the roads were probably exact where they met the Section lines, about once every mile, and approximated between these points. The actual maps were drawn in the 1830s, but were based on the surveyors' notes from around 1800.

The Lusk Ferry Road was a very old road, at least by Illinois standards, being present before the original survey. It is, however, notable that, on its northwestern end, this was a carefully surveyed road. It ran east out of Kaskaskia mostly in segments that ran nearly due east, almost to modern DuQuoin, where it made a sharp turn to the southeast, running for miles on a very straight line directly toward Fort Massac and Lusk's Ferry. Although the road jogged to avoid obstacles, it did not follow the natural lay of the land like animal trails, Indian trails and most pioneer roads. This was an engineered road that was not equaled in Illinois until many decades after the original survey. This suggests that the road had its origin as a military road connecting Fort Kaskaskia with Fort Massac. The road may have been laid out by the French in the 1750s, or by the Americans after the reoccupation of Fort Massac in 1794.

The direction of the road was controlled by several factors. Out of Kaskaskia, the road went north toward the headwaters of Marys River, avoiding a river crossing. The road then headed east to cross the Big Muddy River as far upstream as possible consistent with a direct route to the southeast. After crossing the Big Muddy, the road seems to aim straight for the most direct pass over the Shawnee Hills.

The Big Muddy crossing was a major limitation on this road. Although bridges over the Big Muddy existed in the area in the early 19th century, there is no reference to a bridge on the Lusk's Ferry Road. Even if there was a bridge, the Big Muddy is notable for its broad, flat floodplain. A true all weather route would have required long causeways over the floodplain that would have been more than a mile long.

In wet weather, there were two options. One would be to go down the Mississippi and up the Ohio by boat. The other would have been to follow the Fort Vincennes road northeast to the Goshen Road, and then southeast to Old Shawneetown, Illinois. Although this would have been at least eighty miles farther, there were no river crossings.