This story of adventure began with a young French nobleman named Chavet
who lived in the period of the French exploration of the New World,
and who was said to be a kinsman of the King of France. He asked the
king for permission to explore a part of the Louisiana Territory, and for
a grant to whatever part of it he might find to his liking. The King agreed to his request.
Chavet was engaged to be married to a young girl in Paris who, when told of his plans, asked that they be married before he left France so that she might accompany him. Thinking of the hardship and danger that would probably be encountered, Chavet refused the girl's request and told her that on his return, if he found the country good, they would be married and go to the New World to spend their lives. The girl, however, refused to accept his denial. She disguised herself as a boy and applied to the captain of Chavet's ship when it was being outfitted for the trip for a place as a cabin boy, calling herself Jean.
The girl must have been incredibly clever in disguise, for it is said that not even Chavet recognized her or suspected that she was not a boy. The sailors called her Petit Jean.
The ocean was crossed in early spring, the vessel ascended the Mississippi, and then the Arkansas River to the foot of this Mountain, which must have looked to the voyagers as they approached it like the prow of a great ship.
The Indians who lived on the Mountain, seeing a ship for the first time, came down to the river and gave Chavet and his sailors a friendly and hospitable greeting. They invited the sailors to the top of the mountain. The invitation was accepted and Chevet and his men, including the cabin boy, found life with the Indians so pleasant that the entire summer was spent there.
Petit Jean fished the streams and hunted the forests of the region with Chevet, the sailors and the Indians until fall approached, when Chevet began preparations for the voyage back to France. When the ship was ready, supplied with food from the forest and water from the springs of the Mountain, and everything needed for the trip, Chavet, his sailors and Petit Jean went aboard on the evening before the day set for the start down the river. Chevet told the Indians that he would return the next year.
That night, Petit Jean became ill with a malady that was strange to Chevet and his sailors. It was marked with fever, convulsions, delirium, and finally coma. The condition of the patient was so grave at daylight that the departure was postponed. During her delirium and coma, Petit Jean's identity was, of course, discovered.
After two days, during which her strength ebbed fast, there was a lucid interval. The girl confessed her deception to Chavet and begged his forgiveness. She told him that she knew she could not live to reach France, and asked that she be carried back to the mountaintop to spend her last days.
The Indians made a stretcher of deer skins and bore her up the trail near the point of the mountain to their camp on the brow overlooking the mountains and the valley to the south. At sundown that day, she died.
Many years later, a low mound of earth was found in a cove on the east point of the Mountain, with rocks that fitted so perfectly that they could not have been there by accident. It was agreed that the grave was very old. This is believed be the grave of Petit Jean.
Legend has it that the spirit of Petit Jean hovers over the Mountain, giving it an air of strange enchantment.
From the writings of the late Dr. T. W. Hardison, long-time resident of the Mountain, founder of Petit Jean State Park and the Arkansas State Park System.
