🏰 Fort Orleans

Fort Orleans, sometimes referred to as Fort D'Orleans, was a French frontier outpost in colonial North America, and the first fort built by European forces on the Missouri River. It was reportedly located near the mouth of the Grand River near present-day Brunswick, Missouri. Intended to be the linchpin in the vast New France empire stretching from Montreal to New Mexico, the fort was occupied from 1723 to 1726. It was the first multi-year European settlement in what is today the U.S. state of Missouri.