The village of Bedous in the Aspe Valley was celebrating on August 4th. The flag of the city of Saint-Louis of Missouri floated on the town hall with the evening a concert of the group “South 61” in tribute to Pierre Laclede. This Béarnais, born in Bedous in 1729, left his name in history. He left for New Orleans, traded furs with the Indians and above all, he became one of the founders of the city of Saint-Louis on the Mississippi. Every year we are told that the city of Saint-Louis celebrates “Bedous Day” on August 4. A day in tribute to its founding father. But, is this really the case?
– Sophie Peyridieux
The case dates back to 2014. For the 250th anniversary of the creation of the city of Saint-Louis, an American delegation came to Bedous and made a promise. Mayor Henri Belgarde had received a “proclamation” which still sits in the council chamber in Bedous. She is signed by his counterpart American and proclaims the date of August 4 as “Bedous Day” in the City of Saint-Louis. Reine Nouqueret, the president of the Friends of Pierre Laclède in Bedous still remembers this moving moment. “They must put the flag of Bedous and we the flag of Saint Louis”, she explains. But for lack of never having been able to go to Saint-Louis, the president of the Aspoise association concedes “We’re happy to do it but we don’t know if anything is going on there.”
Could Bedous Day be an American bluff?
And indeed, nowhere is there any trace of a “Bedous Day” which would be celebrated by the Americans. Without fearing a diplomatic incident, we can affirm that the promise of the mayor of Saint-Louis does not seem to have been acted upon. No ceremony, no festivities. No reference to this event on the City’s website. Nothing in the Saint-Louis newspapers either. The inhabitants of the city on the banks of the Mississippi that we were able to reach do not know of “Bedous Day”.
We ended up asking the very renowned Missouri History Museum in Saint-Louis, who answered us in writing: “Our historians have never heard of a ‘Bedous Day’. We talk a lot about Pierre Laclède in our museum, many streets and businesses bear the name of Laclède but as far as we know, there is no Bedous Day” and to add to conclude: “Maybe we should start celebrating a ‘Bedous Day’ in the future.” The close link that Bedous dreamed of with Saint-Louis therefore remains to be built. In Béarn, we will not regret this opportunity to celebrate an ancestor who made himself known across the Atlantic, but the influence of Bedous is certainly not as international as we might have imagined.