Fort Prudhomme Fort Prudhomme , or Prud ' homme , was a simple stockade fortification , constructed on one of the Chickasaw Bluff s of the Mississippi River in West Tennessee by Cavelier de La Salle ' s French canoe expedition of the Mississippi River Basin in 1682 . The fortification was intended to provide shelter during the search for a member of the expedition who got lost at a stop while hunting , it was used by the expedition for only ten days . Fort Prudhomme was the first structure built by the French in Tennessee ; its exact location is not known . La Salle ' s expedition . René - Robert Cavelier , Sieur de La Salle ( 1643 – 1687 ) was a French explorer . In February 1682 , he started his 5th expedition . La Salle led a party of 54 on a canoe expedition from what is modern Peoria County , Illinois , located on the banks of the Illinois River , to the mouth of the Mississippi River in order to explore the Mississippi River basin . On their trip downriver , the expedition landed their canoes to hunt , when one of their members went missing . The armorer by the name of Pierre Prudhomme was assumed captured by Chickasaw Indians . La Salle decided to stay and search for the missing participant of the expedition . On top of the Mississippi River bluff s in Tennessee , La Salle ' s party constructed a stockade fortification . The fort was the first structure built by the French in Tennessee . La Salle named the fortification " " Fort Prudhomme " " , after their lost man . Ten days after his disappearance , the missing member of the expedition found his way back to the camp , unharmed but starving . Prudhomme had lost his way while hunting . The expedition resumed their trip downstream and La Salle reached the mouth of the Mississippi River on April 6 , 1682 . He claimed the entire Mississippi River valley for France , it remained French until 1762 . Location . The position of Fort Prudhomme is unknown and a documented controversy about the exact location of the fortification exists . Researchers agree that it was located on the Chickasaw Bluffs but it is disputed on which of the four bluffs the fortification was located . Some historians claim that Fort Prudhomme was built on the first Chickasaw Bluff , in modern day Lauderdale County , placing it at the location of Fort Pillow , a later Civil War fortification , or " somewhere near this place " . The " Tennessee Encyclopedia of History and Culture " suggests that Fort Prudhomme was built on the second Chickasaw Bluff , south of the Hatchie River , near modern day Randolph in Tipton County . Other research mentions the third Chickasaw Bluff as the location of Fort Prudhomme , which would place the fortification at the border of what is modern day Tipton and Shelby Counties , encompassed in part by modern Meeman - Shelby Forest State Park . Again other sources assume that " La Salle built Fort Prudhomme , possibly on the site of present - day Memphis " , on the fourth Chickasaw Bluff below the mouth of the Wolf River , in what would later become Shelby County . The location on the fourth Chickasaw Bluff would put Fort Prudhomme at or near the site of the later French Fort Assumption which was used as a base against the Chickasaw in the abortive Campaign of 1739 . The table below provides approximate coordinates for all four Chickasaw Bluffs , the possible locations of Fort Prudhomme , starting with the northernmost first Chickasaw Bluff above Fulton .