Jean Nicollet de Belleborne

Jean Nicollet de Belleborne, interpreter, explorer (b at Cherbourg, France c 1598; d at Sillery, Qué 27 Oct 1642).

Jean Nicollet de Belleborne, interpreter, explorer (b at Cherbourg, France c 1598; d at Sillery, Qué 27 Oct 1642). Like Brûlé he lived among the Indians to learn their languages, spending 2 years on Allumette Island with the Algonquin and later staying with the Nipissing, 1620-29. He was the first European to explore the American Northwest on a fruitless search for the Mer de l'Ouest which took him to Green Bay and the Fox and Illinois rivers. He finally settled at Trois-Rivières, Québec, where he continued to act as an interpreter. On a mission to save an Iroquois prisoner, his shallop was overturned and he drowned. His "memories" recounting life among the Nipissing have come down to us in the Jesuit Relations.