Fifty-eight years after Champlain’s voyage up the Saguenay, two Jesuit missionaries, Claude Dablon and Gabriel Druillettes, set forth from Tadoussac with a large party of Indians in forty canoes. Their object was to meet the northern Indians at Lake Nekouba, near the height of land, and if possible push on to Hudson Bay. It is clear from their narrative that French traders or missionaries had already ascended the Saguenay as far as Lake St. John, but beyond that Dablon and Druillettes entered upon a country which was hitherto unknown to the French. After suffering great hardships, the party at last arrived at Lake Nekouba, where they found a large gathering of Indians, representing many of the surrounding tribes. But while the missionaries were addressing the Indians, word came that a war party of Mohawks had penetrated even to these remote fastnesses. So overpowering was the dread which these redoubtable warriors had inspired among all the tribes of North-eastern America, that the gathering broke up in confusion. Every man made off to his own home, hoping that he might not meet an Iroquois at the portage; and as the Indians of Father Dablon’s party were as fear-stricken as the rest, all idea of continuing the journey to Hudson Bay had to be abandoned, and the missionaries were obliged to retrace their steps to Tadoussac.
A decade later, another missionary, Father Albanel, with a Colonial officer, Denys de Saint Simon, were more fortunate. Following Dablon’s route to the height of land, they pushed on to Lake Mistassini, and descended Rupert’s River to Hudson Bay, where they found a small vessel flying the English flag, and two houses, but the English themselves were apparently away on some trading expedition.
The Jesuit missionaries seemed to have discovered at an early date the advantages of Lake St. John as the site of one of their missions. In 1808 the ruins of their settlement were still visible on the south side of the lake. James McKenzie, of the North-West Company, who visited the "King’s Posts" in that year, says that "the plum and apple trees of their garden, grown wild through want of care, yet bear fruit in abundance. The foundation of their church and other buildings, as well as the churchyard, are still visible. The bell of their church, two iron spades, a horseshoe, a scythe and a bar of iron two feet in length, have lately been dug out of the ruins of this apparently once flourishing spot, and, adjoining, is an extensive plain or meadow on which much timothy hay grows." Elsewhere Mr. McKenzie mentions that the Fathers had mills on Lake St. John, some of the materials used in their construction having been found there by officers of the North-West Company. He adds that an island in the lake, not far from where the mission formerly stood, swarms with snakes, which a local tradition credited to the power of the worthy Jesuits. The Fathers found them inconveniently numerous about their settlement, and conjured them on to the island.