The first meeting between the people of Pemetic and the Europeans is a matter of conjecture. But it was a Frenchman, Samuel who made the first important contribution to the historical record of Mount Desert Island. He led the expedition that landed on Mt. Desert on September 5, 1604 and wrote in his journal, "The mountain summits are all bare and rocky.... I name it Isles des Monts Desert." Champlain's visit to Acadia 16 years before the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock destined this land to become known as New France before it became New England.
In 1613, French Jesuits, welcomed by Indians, established the first French mission in America on what is now Fernald Point, near the entrance to Somes Sound. They had just begun to build a fort, plant their corn, and baptize the natives when an English ship, commanded by Captain Samuel Argall, destroyed their mission.
The English victory at Fernald Point doomed Jesuit ambitions on Mount Desert Island, leaving the land in a state of limbo, lying between the French, firmly entrenched to the north and the British, whose settlements in Massachusetts and southward were becoming increasingly numerous. No one wished to settle in this contested territory and for the next 150 years, Mt. Desert Island's importance was primarily its use as a landmark for seamen.
There was a brief period when it seemed Mount Desert would again become a center of French activity. In 1688, Antoine Laumet, an ambitious young man who had immigrated to New France and bestowed upon himself the title Sieur de la Mothe Cadillac, asked for and received a hundred thousand acres of land along the Maine coast, including all of Mt. Desert. Cadillac's hopes of establishing a feudal estate in the New World, however, were short lived. Although he and his bride resided here for a time, they soon abandoned their enterprise. Cadillac later gained lasting recognition as the founder of Detroit.
