Skip to main content

Full text of "The great fortress : a chronicle of Louisbourg, 1720-1760"

See other formats 


u 


V 


"""'  ""«««£»»<  m,om 


CHRONICLES  OF  CANADA 

Edited  by  George  M.  Wrong  and  H.  H.  Langton 

In  thirty-two  volumes 


8 


THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 
BY  WILLIAM  WOOD 


Part  III 

The  English  Invasion 


WOLFF,  AT  LOUISBOURG,  1758 
F'lcini  a  colour  (IrawinLj  Fv  ( '.  ^V.  JcfreiAs 


THE 


GREAT   FORTRESS 

A  Chronicle  of  Louisbourg 
1720-1760 


BY 


WILLIAM  WOOD 


TORONTO 

GLASGOW,  BROOK  &  COMPANY 

1920 


HOLY  REDEEMER  LIBRARY.  Wl 


Copyright  in  all  Countries  subscribing  to 
the  Berne  Convention 


Pkbss  op  Thb  HoNTBB-Rosa  Co..  Limitsd.  Toronto 


TO 

GEORGE   MACKINNON  WRONG 

JUST  CRITIC 

GENEROUS  FRIEND 


o.f.  a  2 


PREFACE 

LouiSBOURG  was  no  mere  isolated  strong- 
hold which  could  be  lost  or  won  without 
affecting  the  wider  issues  of  oversea  dominion. 
On  the  contrary,  it  was  a  necessary  link  in 
the  chain  of  waterside  posts  which  connected 
France  with  America  by  way  of  the  Atlantic, 
the  St  Lawrence,  the  Great  Lakes,  and  the 
Mississippi.  But  since  the  chain  itself  and 
ail  its  other  links,  and  even  the  peculiar 
relation  of  Louisbourg  to  the  Acadians  and 
the  Conquest,  have  been  fully  described  else- 
where in  the  Chronicles  of  Canada,  the  present 
volume  only  tries  to  tell  the  purely  individual 
tale.  Strange  to  say,  this  tale  seems  never 
to  have  been  told  before ;  at  least,  not  as  one 
continuous  whole.  Of  course,  each  siege  has 
been  described,  over  and  over  again,  in  many 
special  monographs  as  well  as  in  countless 
books  about  Canadian  history.     But  nobody 


viii  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

seems  to  have  written  any  separate  work  on 
Louisbourg  showing  causes,  crises,  and  results, 
all  together,  in  the  light  of  the  complete  naval 
and  military  proof.  So  perhaps  the  following 
short  account  may  really  be  the  first  attempt 
to  tell  the  tale  of  Louisbourg  from  the  founda- 
tion to  the  fall. 

W.  W. 

59  Grande  All^e, 


M 


CONTENTS 


I.  THE  LAST  SEA  LINK  WITH  FRANCE,  1720-1744 
II.  THE  SEA  LINK  LOST,  1745 

III.  THE  LINK  RECOVERED,  1748. 

IV.  LOST  FOR  EVER,  1758     . 
V.  ANNIHILATION,  1760 

BIBLIOGRAPHICAL  NOTE 
INDEX 


Page 
zi 

I 

24 

74 
90 

134 
138 
140 


IX 


ILLUSTRATIONS 


WOLFE  AT  LOUISBOURG,  1758    . 

From  a  colour  drawing;  by  C.  W.  Jefferys. 

THE  SIEGE  OF  LOUISBOURG,  1758       . 
Map  by  Bartholomew. 

SIR  WILLIAM  PEPPERRELL 

From  the  original  painting  by  John  Smibert. 

EDWARD  BOSCAWEN 

From  the  painting  by  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds. 

JAMES  WOLFE  .... 

From  the  painting  by  Highmore. 


Frontispiece 


Facing  page  1 


30 


102 


,,  108 


XI 


CHAPTER  I 

THE  LAST  SEA   LINK  WITH   FRANCE 
I 720- I 744 

The  fortress  of  Louisbourg  arose  not  from 
victory  but  from  defeat ;  not  from  military- 
strength  but  from  naval  weakness  ;  not  from 
a  new,  adventurous  spirit  of  attack,  but  from 
a  half-despairing  hope  of  keeping  one  last 
foothold  by  the  sea.  It  was  not  begun  till 
after  the  fortunes  of  Louis  XIV  had  reached 
their  lowest  ebb  at  the  Treaty  of  Utrecht  in 
1713.  It  lived  a  precarious  life  of  only  forty 
years,  from  1720  to  1760.  And  nothing  but 
bare  ruins  were  left  to  mark  its  grave  when  it 
finally  passed,  unheeded  and  unnamed,  into 
the  vast  dominions  of  the  conquering  British 
at  the  Peace  of  Paris  in  1763. 

The  Treaty  of  Utrecht  narrowed  the  whole 
French  sea-coast  of  America  down  to  the 
single  island  of  Cape  Breton.  Here,  after 
seven  years  of  official  hesitation  and  maritime 
exhaustion,  Louisbourg  was  founded  to  guard 

G.F,  A 


2  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

the  only  harbour  the  French  thought  they  had 
a  chance  of  holding.  A  medal  was  struck  to 
celebrate  this  last  attempt  to  keep  the  one  re- 
maining seaway  open  between  Old  France  and 
New.  Its  legend  ran  thus  :  Ludovicoburgum 
Fundatum  et  Munitum,  M.DCC.XX  {'  Louis- 
bourg  Founded  and  Fortified,  1720 ').  Its 
obverse  bore  the  profile  of  the  young  Louis 
XV,  whose  statesmen  hoped  they  had  now 
established  a  French  Gibraltar  in  America, 
where  French  fleets  and  forts  would  command 
the  straits  leading  into  the  St  Lawrence  and 
threaten  the  coast  of  New  England,  in  much 
the  same  way  as  British  fleets  and  forts  com- 
manded the  entrance  to  the  Mediterranean  and 
threatened  the  coasts  of  France  and  Spain. 
This  hope  seemed  flattering  enough  in  time 
of  peace ;  but  it  vanished  at  each  recurrent 
shock  of  war,  because  the  Atlantic  then  be- 
came a  hostile  desert  for  the  French,  while  it 
still  remained  a  friendly  highway  for  the 
British. 

The  first  French  settlers  in  Louisbourg 
came  over  from  Newfoundland,  which  had 
been  given  up  to  the  British  by  the  treaty. 
The  fishermen  of  various  nations  had  fre- 
quented different  ports  all  round  these  shores 


THE  LAST  SEA  LINK  WITH  FRANCE     3 

for  centuries ;  and,  by  the  irony  of  fate, 
the  new  French  capital  of  Cape  Breton  was 
founded  at  the  entrance  to  the  bay  which  had 
long  been  known  as  English  Harbour.  Every- 
thing that  rechristening  could  do,  however, 
was  done  to  make  Cape  Breton  French.  Not 
only  was  English  Harbour  now  called  Louis- 
bourg,  but  St  Peter's  became  Port  Toulouse, 
St  Anne's  became  Port  Dauphin,  and  the 
whole  island  itself  was  solemnly  christened  He 
Royale. 

The  shores  of  the  St  Lawrence  up  to 
Quebec  and  Montreal  were  as  entirely  French 
as  the  islands  in  the  Gulf.  But  Acadia,  which 
used  to  form  the  connection  by  land  between 
Cape  Breton  and  Canada,  had  now  become  a 
British  possession  inhabited  by  the  so-called 
'  neutral  French.'  These  Acadians,  few  in 
numbers  and  quite  unorganized,  were  drawn 
in  opposite  directions,  on  the  one  hand  by  their 
French  proclivities,  on  the  other  by  their 
rooted  affection  for  their  own  farms.  Unlike 
the  French  Newfoundlanders,  who  came  in 
a  body  from  Plaisance  (now  Placentia),  the 
Acadians  preferred  to  stay  at  home.  In  1717 
an  effort  was  made  to  bring  some  of  them  into 
Louisbourg.  But  it  only  succeeded  in  attract- 
ing the  merest  handful.     On  the  whole,  the 


4  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

French  authorities  preferred  leaving  the  Aca- 
dians  as  they  were,  in  case  a  change  in  the 
fortunes  of  war  might  bring  them  once  more 
under  the  fleurs-de-lis,  when  the  connection 
by  land  between  Quebec  and  the  sea  would 
again  be  complete.  A  plan  for  promoting  the 
immigration  of  the  Irish  Roman  Catholics 
living  near  Cape  Breton  never  got  beyond 
the  stage  of  official  memoranda.  Thus  the 
population  of  the  new  capital  consisted  only 
of  government  employees,  French  fishermen 
from  Newfoundland  and  other  neighbouring 
places,  waifs  and  strays  from  points  farther 
off,  bounty-fed  engages  from  France,  and  a 
swarm  of  camp-following  traders.  The  regu- 
lar garrison  was  always  somewhat  of  a  class 
apart. 

The  French  in  Cape  Breton  needed  all  the 
artificial  aid  they  could  get  from  guns  and 
forts.  Even  in  Canada  there  was  only  a 
handful  of  French,  all  told,  at  the  time  of  the 
Treaty  of  Utrecht— twenty-five  thousand ; 
while  the  British  colonists  in  North  America 
numbered  fifteen  times  as  many.  The  re- 
spective populations  had  trebled  by  the  time 
of  the  Cession  of  Canada  to  the  British  fifty 
years  later,  but  with  a  tendency  for  the  vast 
British  preponderance  to  increase  still  more. 


THE  LAST  SEA  LINK  WITH  FRANCE     5 

Canada  naturally  had  neither  men  nor  money 
to  spare  for  Louisbourg  ;  so  the  whole  cost 
of  building  the  fortress,  thirty  million  livres, 
came  direct  from  France.  This  sum  was  then 
the  equivalent,  in  purchasing  pov/er,  of  at 
least  as  many  dollars  now,  though  the  old 
French  livre  was  only  rated  at  the  contem- 
porary value  of  twenty  cents.  But  the  ori- 
ginal plans  were  never  carried  out ;  more- 
over, not  half  the  money  that  actually  was 
spent  ever  reached  the  military  chest  at  all. 
There  were  too  many  thievish  fingers  by  the 
way. 

The  French  were  not  a  colonizing  people, 
their  governing  officials  hated  a  tour  of  duty 
oversea,  and  Louisbourg  was  the  most  un- 
popular of  all  the  stations  in  the  service. 
Those  Frenchmen  who  did  care  for  outlandish 
places  went  east  to  India  or  west  to  Canada. 
Nobody  wanted  to  go  to  a  small,  dull,  out-of- 
the-way  garrison  town  like  Louisbourg,  where 
there  was  no  social  life  whatever — nothing  but 
fishermen,  smugglers,  petty  traders,  a  discon- 
tented garrison,  generally  half  composed  of 
foreigners,  and  a  band  of  dishonest,  second- 
rate  officials,  whoce  one  idea  was  how  to  get 
rich  and  get  hornc.  The  inspectors  who  were 
sent  out  either  failed  in  their  duty  and  joined 


6  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

the  official  gang  of  thieves,  or  else  resigned  in 
disgust.  Worse  still,  because  this  taint  was 
at  the  very  source,  the  royal  government  in 
France  was  already  beset  with  that  entangle- 
ment of  weakness  and  corruption  which  lasted 
throughout  the  whole  century  between  the 
decline  of  Louis  XIV  and  the  meteoric  rise 
of  Napoleon. 

The  founders  of  Louisbourg  took  their  time 
to  build  it.  It  was  so  very  profitable  to  spin 
the  werk  out  as  long  as  possible.  The  plan 
of  the  fortress  was  good.  It  was  modelled 
after  the  plans  of  Vauban,  who  had  been  the 
greatest  engineer  in  the  greatest  European 
army  of  the  previous  generation.  But  the 
actual  execution  was  hampered,  at  every  turn, 
by  want  of  firmness  at  headquarters  and  want 
of  honest  labour  on  the  spot.  Sea  sand  was 
plentiful,  worthless,  and  cheap.  So  it  was 
used  for  the  mortar,  with  most  disastrous 
results.  The  stone  was  hewn  from  a  quarry 
of  porphyritic  trap  near  by  and  used  for  the 
walls  in  the  rough.  Cut  stone  and  good  bricks 
were  brought  out  from  France  as  ballast  by  the 
fishing  fleet.  Some  of  these  finer  materials  were 
built  into  the  governor's  and  the  intendant's 
quarters.  Others  were  sold  to  New  England 
traders  and  replaced  by  inferior  substitutes. 


THE  LAST  SEA  LINK  WITH  FRANCE     7 

Of  course,  direct  trade  between  the  opposing 
colonies  was  strictly  forbidden  by  both  the 
French  and  British  navigation  acts.  But  the 
Louisbourg  officials  winked  at  anything  that 
would  enrich  them  quickly,  while  the  New 
Englanders  pushed  in  eagerly  wherever  a 
profit  could  be  made  by  any  means  at  all. 
Louisbourg  was  intended  to  be  the  general 
rendezvous  of  the  transatlantic  French  fishing 
vessels  ;  a  great  port  of  call  between  France, 
Canada,  and  the  French  West  Indies  ;  and  a 
harbour  of  refuge  in  peace  and  war.  But  the 
New  England  shipping  was  doing  the  best 
trade  at  Louisbourg,  and  doing  it  in  double 
contraband,  within  five  years  of  the  founda- 
tion. Cod  caught  by  Frenchmen  from  Louis- 
bourg itself,  French  wines  and  brandy  brought 
out  from  France,  tobacco  and  sugar  brought 
north  from  the  French  West  Indies,  all  offered 
excellent  chances  to  enterprising  Yankees, 
who  came  in  with  foodstuffs  and  building 
materials  of  their  own.  One  vessel  sailed  for 
New  York  with  a  cargo  of  claret  and  brandy 
that  netted  her  owners  a  profit  of  a  hundred 
per  cent,  even  after  paying  the  usual  charges 
demanded  by  the  French  custom-house  officials 
for  what  really  was  a  smuggler's  licence. 

Fishing,  smuggling,  and  theft  were  the  three 


8  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

great  industries  of  Louisbourg.  The  traders 
shared  the  profits  of  the  smuggHng.  But  the 
intendant  and  his  officials  kept  most  of  the 
choice  thieving  for  themselves. 

The  genuine  settlers — and  a  starveling  crew 
they  were — wrested  their  debt-laden  livelihood 
from  the  local  fishing.  This  was  by  no  means 
bad  in  itself.  But,  like  other  fishermen  be- 
fore and  since,  they  were  in  perpetual  bondage 
to  the  traders,  who  took  good  care  not  to  let 
accounts  get  evened  up.  A  happier  class  of 
fishermen  made  up  the  engages,  who  were 
paid  by  government  to  *  play  settler  '  for  a 
term  of  years,  during  which  they  helped  to 
swell  the  official  census  of  uncongenial  Louis- 
bourg. The  regular  French  fishing  fleet  of 
course  returned  to  France  at  the  end  of  every 
season,  and  thus  enjoyed  a  full  spell  of  French 
delights  on  shore. 

The  Acadians  supplied  Louisbourg  with 
meat  and  vegetables.  These  were  brought  in 
by  sea ;  for  there  were  no  roads  worth  men- 
tioning ;  nor,  in  the  contemporary  state  of 
Cape  Breton,  was  there  any  need  for  roads. 
The  farmers  were  few,  widely  scattered,  and 
mostly  very  poor.  The  only  prosperous 
settlement  v^ithin  a  long  day's  march  was 
situated  on  the  beautiful  Mira  river.     James 


THE  LAST  SEA  LINK  WITH  FRANCE     9 

Gibson,  a  Boston  merchant  and  militiaman, 
who  served  against  Louisbourg  in  1745,  was 
much  taken  by  the  appearance  of  an  establish- 
ment '  at  the  mouth  of  a  large  salmon  fishery,' 
by  one  *  very  handsome  house,  with  two  large 
barns,  two  large  gardens,  and  fine  fields  of 
corn,'  and  by  another  with  *  six  rooms  on  a 
floor  and  well  furnished.'  He  adds  that  *  in 
one  of  the  barns  were  fifteen  loads  of  hay,  and 
room  sufficient  for  sixty  horses  and  cattle,' 
In  1753  the  intendant  sent  home  a  report 
about  a  proposed  *  German  '  settlement  near 
the  '  Grand  Lake  of  Mira.'  A  nev/  experiment 
was  then  being  tried,  the  importation  of 
settlers  from  Alsace-Lorraine.  But  five  years 
afterwards  Cape  Breton  had  been  lost  to 
France  for  ever. 

The  fact  is  that  the  French  never  really 
colonized  Cape  Breton  at  large,  and  Louis- 
bourg least  of  all.  They  knew  the  magnificent 
possibilities  of  Sydney  harbour,  but  its  mere 
extent  prevented  their  attempting  to  make  use 
of  it.  They  saw  that  the  whole  island  was  a 
maritime  paradise,  with  seaports  in  its  very 
heart  as  well  as  round  its  shores.  But  they 
were  a  race  of  gallant,  industrious  lands- 
men at  home,  with  neither  the  wish  nor  the 
aptitude   for   a   nautical    life    abroad.     They 


10  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

could  not  have  failed  to  see  that  there  was 
plenty  of  timber  in  some  parts  of  the  island, 
and  that  the  soil  was  fit  to  bear  good  crops  of 
grain  in  others.  A  little  prospecting  would 
also  have  shown  them  iron,  coal,  and  gypsum. 
But  their  official  parasites  did  not  want  to 
see  smuggling  and  peculation  replaced  by  in- 
dustry and  trade.  Nothing,  indeed,  better 
proves  how  little  they  thought  of  making  He 
Royale  a  genuine  colony  than  their  utter 
failure  to  exploit  any  one  of  its  teeming  natural 
resources  in  forest,  field,  or  mine. 

What  the  French  did  with  extraneous  re- 
sources and  artificial  aids  in  the  town  of 
Louisbourg  is  more  to  the  purpose  in  hand. 
The  problem  of  their  position,  and  of  its 
strength  and  weakness  in  the  coming  clash  of 
arms,  depended  on  six  naval,  military,  and 
governmental  factors,  each  one  of  which  must 
be  considered  before  the  whole  can  be  appreci- 
ated. These  six  factors  were — the  govern- 
ment, the  garrison,  the  militia,  the  Indians, 
the  navy,  and  the  fortress. 

Get  rich  and  go  home.  The  English-speaking 
peoples,  whose  ancestors  once  went  to  England 
as  oversea  emigrants,  and  two-thirds  of  whom 
are  now  themselves  the  scions  of  successive 


THE  LAST  SEA  LINK  WITH  FRANCE  ii 

migrations  across  the  Seven  Seas,  cannot 
understand  how  intensely  the  general  run  of 
French  officials  detested  colonial  service, 
especially  in  a  place  like  Louisbourg,  which 
was  everything  the  average  Frenchman  hated 
most.  This  British  failure  to  understand  a 
national  trait,  which  is  still  as  strongly  marked 
as  ever,  accounts  for  a  good  deal  of  the  ex- 
aggerated belief  in  the  strength  of  the  French 
position  in  America.  The  British  Americans 
who  tried  to  think  out  plans  of  conquest  were 
wont  to  under-estimate  their  own  unorganized 
resources  and  to  over-estimate  the  organized 
resources  of  the  French,  especially  when  they 
set  their  minds  on  Louisbourg. 

The  British  also  entertained  the  erroneous 
idea  that  *  the  whole  country  was  under  one 
command.'  This  was  the  very  thing  it  was 
not.  The  French  system  was  the  autocratic 
one  without  the  local  autocrat ;  for  the 
functions  of  the  governor  and  the  intendant 
overlapped  each  other,  and  all  disputes  had 
to  be  referred  to  Quebec,  where  the  functions 
of  another  governor  and  another  intendant  also 
overlapped  each  other.  If  no  decision  could 
be  reached  at  Quebec,  and  the  question  at 
issue  was  one  of  sufficient  importance,  the  now 
double  imbroglio  would  be  referred  to  the 


12  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

Supreme  Council  in  France,  which  would  write 
back  to  Quebec,  whence  the  decision  would 
be  forwarded  to  Louisbourg,  where  it  would 
arrive  months  after  many  other  troubles  had 
grown  out  of  the  original  dispute. 

The  system  was  false  from  the  start,  because 
the  overlapping  was  intentional.  The  idea 
was  to  prevent  any  one  man  from  becoming 
too  strong  and  too  independent.  The  result 
was  to  keep  governors  and  intendants  at  per- 
petual loggerheads  and  to  divide  every  station 
into  opposing  parties.  Did  the  governor  want 
money  and  material  for  the  fortifications  ? 
Then  the  intendant  was  sure  the  military 
chest,  which  was  in  his  own  charge,  could  not 
afford  it.  The  governor  might  sometimes 
gain  his  ends  by  giving  a  definite  emergency 
order  under  his  hand  and  seal.  But,  if  the 
emergency  could  not  be  proved,  this  laid  him 
open  to  great  risks  from  the  intendant's  sub- 
sequent recriminations  before  the  Superior 
Council  in  Quebec  or  the  Supreme  Council  in 
France.  The  only  way  such  a  system  could 
be  worked  at  all  was  either  by  corrupt  collusion 
or  by  superhuman  co-operation  between  the 
two  conflicting  parties,  or  by  appointing  a  man 
of  genius  who  could  make  every  other  official 
dischars^e    his    proper    duties    and    no   more. 


THE  LAST  SEA  LINK  WITH  FRANCE   13 

Corrupt  collusion  was  not  very  common, 
bec':.use  the  governors  were  mostly  naval  or 
military  men,  and  the  naval  and  military  men 
were  generally  honest.  Co-operation  was  im- 
possible between  two  merely  average  men  ; 
and  no  genius  was  ever  sent  to  such  a  place 
as  Louisbourg.  The  ablest  man  in  either  of 
the  principal  posts  was  the  notorious  inten- 
dant  Bigot,  who  began  here  on  a  small  scale 
the  consummate  schemes  that  proved  so  disas- 
trously successful  at  Quebec.  Get  rich  and 
go  home. 

The  minor  governmental  life  of  Louisbourg 
was  of  a  piece  with  the  major.  There  were 
four  or  five  lesser  members  of  the  Superior 
Council,  which  also  had  jurisdiction  over  He 
St  Jean,  as  Prince  Edward  Island  was  then 
called.  The  lucrative  chances  of  the  custom- 
house were  at  the  mercy  of  four  under- 
paid officials  grandiloquently  called  a  Court 
of  Admiralty.  An  inferior  court  known  as 
the  bailiwick  tried  ordinary  civil  suits  and 
breaches  of  the  peace.  This  bailiwick  also 
offered  what  might  be  euphemistically  called 
'  business  opportunities  '  to  enterprising  mem- 
bers. True,  there  was  no  police  to  execute 
its  decrees  ;  and  at  one  time  a  punctilious 
resident    complained    that     *  there    was   not 


14  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

even  a  common  hangman,  nor  a  jail,  nor  even 
a  tormentor  to  rack  the  criminals  or  indict 
other  appropriate  tortures.'  But  appeals  took 
a  long  time  and  cost  much  money;  so  even 
the  officials  of  the  bailiwick  could  pick  up  a 
living  by  threats  of  the  law's  delay,  on  the 
one  hand,  and  promises  of  perverted  local 
justice,  on  the  other.  That  there  was  money 
to  be  made,  in  spite  of  the  meagre  salaries,  is 
proved  by  the  fact  that  the  best  journeyman 
wig-maker  in  Louisbourg  *  grew  extremely 
rich  in  different  branches  of  commerce,  especi- 
ally in  the  contraband,*  after  filling  the  dual 
position  of  judge  of  the  admiralty  and  judge 
of  the  bailiwick,  both  to  the  apparent  satis- 
faction of  his  friend  the  intendant. 

The  next  factor  was  the  garrison  of  regulars. 
This  was  under  the  direct  command  of  the 
king's  lieutenant,  who  took  his  orders  from 
the  governor.  The  troops  liked  Louisbourg 
no  better  than  the  officials  did.  True,  there 
were  taverns  in  plenty :  even  before  Louis- 
bourg was  officially  founded  they  had  become 
such  a  thriving  nuisance  that  orders  for  their 
better  control  had  been  sent  out  from  France. 
But  there  was  no  other  place  for  the  ordinary 
soldier  to  go  to  in  his  spare  time.  The  officers 
felt  the  want  of  a  larger  outlook  even  more 


THE  LAST  SEA  LINK  WITH  FRANCE  15 

than  the  men  did  ;  and  neither  man  nor 
officer  ever  went  to  Louisbourg  if  he  could  help 
it.  When  Montcalm,  the  greatest  Frenchman 
the  New  World  ever  saw,  came  out  to  Canada, 
there  was  eager  competition  among  the  troops 
at  home  to  join  his  army  in  the  field.  Officers 
paid  large  sums  for  the  honour  of  exchanging 
into  any  one  of  the  battalions  ordered  to  the 
front ;  and  when  volunteers  were  called  for 
from  the  ranks  every  single  man  stepped  for- 
ward. But  no  Montcalm  came  out  to  Louis- 
bourg, and  nothing  but  bounties  could  get  a 
volunteer.  There  were  only  between  five  and 
six  hundred  regulars  in  the  whole  garrison 
during  the  first  siege,  twenty-five  years  after 
the  foundation,  and  nearly  half  of  these  were 
foreigners,  mostly  '  pay-fighting  Swiss.' 

The  third  factor  was  the  militia.  Every 
able-bodied  man,  not  specially  exempt  for 
other  duties,  was  liable  for  service  in  time  of 
war  ;  and  the  whole  island  could  be  drawn 
upon  for  any  great  emergency  at  Lousbourg. 
Between  thirteen  and  fourteen  hundred  men 
were  got  under  arms  for  the  siege  of  1745. 
Those  who  lived  in  Louisbourg  had  the  ad- 
vantage of  a  little  slack  discipline  and  a  little 
slack  drill.  Those  in  the  country  had  some 
practice  in  the  handling  of  firearms.      But, 


i6  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

taken  all  round,  it  would  be  an  exaggeration 
to  call  them  even  quarter-trained  soldiers. 

The  fourth  factor  was  the  Indians.  They 
belonged  to  the  Micmac  tribe  of  the  great 
Algonquin  family,  and  probably  numbered  no 
more  than  about  four  thousand  throughout 
the  whole  French  sphere  of  influence  in  what 
are  now  the  Maritime  Provinces.  A  few  hun- 
dred braves  might  have  been  ready  to  take 
the  war-path  in  the  wilds  of  Cape  Breton ; 
but  sieges  were  not  at  all  in  their  line,  except 
when  they  could  hang  round  the  besiegers' 
inland  flanks,  on  the  chance  of  lifting  scalps 
from  careless  stragglers  or  ambushing  an  occa- 
sional small  party  gone  astray.  As  in  Canada, 
so  in  Cape  Breton,  the  Indians  natur- 
ally sided  with  the  French,  who  disturbed 
them  less  and  treated  them  better  than  the 
British  did.  The  British,  who  enjoyed  the 
inestimable  advantage  of  superior  sea-power, 
had  more  goods  to  exchange.  But  in  every 
other  lespect  the  French  were  very  much 
preferred.  The  handful  of  French  sent  out 
an  astonishingly  great  number  of  heroic 
and  sympathetic  missionaries  to  the  natives. 
The  many  British  sent  out  astonishingly  few. 
The  Puritan  clergy  did  shamefully  little  com- 
pared with  the  wonderful  Jesuits.     Moreover, 


THE  LAST  SEA  LINK  WITH  FRANCE  17 

while  the  French  in  general  made  the  Indian 
feel  he  was  at  all  events  a  fellow  human  being, 
the  average  British  colonist  simply  looked  on 
him  as  so  much  vermin,  to  be  destroyed 
together  with  the  obstructive  wilds  that  har- 
boured him. 

The  fifth  factor,  the  navy,  brings  us  into 
contact  with  world-wide  problems  of  sea- 
power  which  are  too  far-reaching  for  dis- 
cussion here.^  Suffice  it  to  say  that,  while 
Louisbourg  was  an  occasional  convenience,  it 
had  also  peculiar  dangers  for  a  squadron  from 
the  weaker  of  two  hostile  navies,  as  squadrons 
from  France  were  likely  to  be.  The  British 
could  make  for  a  dozen  different  harbours  on 
the  coast.  The  French  could  make  for  only 
this  one.  Therefore  the  British  had  only  to 
guard  against  this  one  stronghold  if  the  French 
were  in  superior  force ;  they  could  the  more 
easily  blockade  it  if  the  French  were  in  equal 
force ;  and  they  could  the  more  easily  anni- 
hilate it  if  it  was  defended  by  an  inferior 
force. 

The  last  factor  was  the  fortress  itself.  This 
so-called  '  Gibraltar  of  the  West,'  this  *  Quebec 
by  the  sea,'  this  *  Dunkirk  of  New  France,'  was 

*  See  in  this  Series  The  Winning  of  Canada  and  The  Passing  of 
New  France,  where  they  are  discussed. 

G.F.  B 


i8  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

certainly  first  of  its  kind.  But  it  was  first  only 
in  a  class  of  one  ;  while  the  class  itself  was  far 
from  being  a  first  among  classes.  The  natural 
position  was  vastly  inferior  to  that  of  Quebec 
or  Gibraltar  ;  while  the  fortifications  were  not 
to  be  compared  with  those  of  Dunkirk,  which, 
in  one  sense,  they  were  meant  to  replace. 
Dunkirk  had  been  sold  by  Charles  II  to 
Louis  XIV,  who  made  it  a  formidable  naval 
base  commanding  the  straits  of  Dover.  When 
the  Treaty  of  Utrecht  compelled  its  demolition, 
the  French  tried  to  redress  the  balance  a  little 
by  building  similar  works  in  America  on  a  very 
much  smaller  scale,  with  a  much  more  purely 
defensive  purpose,  and  as  an  altogether  sub- 
sidiary undertaking.  Dunkirk  was  *  a  pistol 
held  at  England's  head  '  because  it  was  an 
integral  part  of  France,  which  was  the  greatest 
military  country  in  the  world  and  second  to 
England  alone  on  the  sea.  Louisbourg  was 
no  American  Dunkirk  because  it  was  much 
weaker  in  itself,  because  it  was  more  purely 
defensive,  because  the  odds  of  population  and 
general  resources  as  between  the  two  colonies 
were  fifteen  to  one  in  favour  of  the  British, 
and  because  the  preponderance  of  British 
sea-power  was  even  greater  in  America  than 
it  was  in  Europe. 


THE  LAST  SEA  LINK  WITH  FRANCE  19 

The  harbour  of  Louisbourg  ran  about  two 
miles  north-east  and  south-west,  with  a  clear 
average  width  of  half  a  mile.  The  two  little 
peninsulas  on  either  side  of  the  entrance  were 
nearly  a  mile  apart.  But  the  actual  fairway 
of  the  entrance  was  narrowed  to  little  more 
than  a  clear  quarter  of  a  mile  by  the  reefs  and 
islands  running  out  from  the  south-western 
peninsula,  on  which  the  fortress  stood.  This 
low,  nubbly  tongue  of  land  was  roughly 
triangular.  It  measured  about  three-quarters 
of  a  mile  on  its  longest  side,  facing  the  harbour, 
over  half  a  mile  on  the  land  side,  facing  the 
enemy's  army,  and  a  good  deal  under  half  a 
mile  on  the  side  facing  the  sea.  It  had  little 
to  fear  from  naval  bombardment  so  long  as 
the  enemy's  fleet  remained  outside,  because 
fogs  and  storms  made  it  a  very  dangerous  lee 
shore,  and  because,  then  as  now,  ships  would 
not  pit  themselves  against  forts  unless  there 
was  no  rival  fleet  to  fight,  and  unless  other 
circumstances  were  unusually  propitious. 

The  entrance  was  defended  by  the  Island 
Battery,  which  flanked  the  approach  with 
thirty-nine  guns,  and  the  Royal  Battery, 
which  directly  faced  it  with  thirty  guns. 
Some  temporary  lines  with  a  few  more  guns 
were  prepared  in  time  of  danger  to  prevent 


20  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

the  enemy  from  landing  in  Gabarus  Bay, 
which  ran  for  miles  south-west  of  Louisbourg. 
But  the  garrison,  even  with  the  militia,  was 
never  strong  enough  to  keep  the  enemy  at 
arm's  length  from  any  one  of  these  positions. 
Moreover,  the  north  -  east  peninsula,  where 
the  lighthouse  stood,  commanded  the  Island 
Battery ;  and  the  land  side  of  Louisbourg  itself, 
was  commanded  by  a  range  of  low  hillocks 
less  than  half  a  mile  away. 

It  was  this  land  side,  containing  the  citadel 
and  other  works,  which  so  impressed  outsiders 
with  the  idea  of  impregnable  strength.  The 
glacis  was  perfect — not  an  inch  of  cover 
wherever  you  looked ;  and  the  approach  was 
mostly  across  a  slimy  bog.  The  ditch  was 
eighty  feet  wide.  The  walls  rose  over  thirty 
feet  above  the  ditch.  There  v/ere  embrasures 
for  one  hundred  and  forty-eight  guns  all 
round  ;  though  not  more  than  ninety  were 
ever  actually  mounted.  On  the  seaward  face 
Louisbourg  was  not  so  strongly  fortified ; 
but  in  the  centre  of  this  face  there  were  a 
deep  ditch  and  high  wall,  with  bastions  on 
each  immediate  flank,  and  lighter  defences 
connecting  these  with  the  landward  face.  A 
dozen  streets  were  laid  out,  so  as  to  divide  the 
whole   town   into   conveniently   square   little 


THE  LAST  SEA  LINK  WITH  FRANCE  21 

blocks.  The  area  of  the  town  itself  was  not 
much  more  than  a  hundred  acres  altogether 
— rather  close  quarters  for  several  thousand 
men,  women,  and  children  during  a  siege. 

If  reports  and  memoranda  could  defend  a 
fortress,  then  Louisbourg  ought  indeed  to  have 
been  impregnable.  Of  course  every  official 
trust  entails  endless  correspondence.  But, 
quite  apart  from  the  stated  returns  that  go 
through  *  the  usual  channel  of  communica- 
tion,' reams  and  reams  of  paper  were  filled 
with  special  reports,  inspections,  complaints, 
and  good  advice.  The  governor  wrote  home, 
most  elaborately,  in  1724,  about  the  progress 
of  the  works.  Ten  years  later  he  announced 
the  official  inauguration  of  the  lighthouse  on 
the  ist  of  April.  In  1736  the  chief  item  was 
the  engineer's  report  on  the  walls.  Next  year 
the  great  anxiety  was  about  a  dangerous 
famine,  with  all  its  attendant  distress  for  the 
many  and  its  shameless  profits  for  the  few. 
On  November  2;^,  1744,  reinforcements  and 
provisions  were  asked  for,  because  intelligence 
had  been  received  that  the  New  Englanders 
were  s^^oing  to  blockade  Louisbourg  the  follow- 
ing summer.  At  tne  same  time,  the  discontent 
of  the  garrison  had  come  to  a  head,  and  a 
mutiny   had   broken   out   because   the   extra 


22  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

working  pay  had  not  been  forthcoming.  After 
this  the  discipHne  became,  not  sterner,  but 
slacker  than  ever,  especially  among  the  hire- 
ling Swiss.  On  February  8,  1745,  within  three 
months  of  the  first  siege,  a  memorandum  was 
sent  in  to  explain  what  was  still  required 
to  finish  the  works  begun  twenty-five  years 
before. 

But,  after  all,  it  was  not  so  much  the  de- 
fective works  that  really  mattered  as  the 
defective  garrison  'behind  them.  English- 
speaking  civilians  who  have  written  about 
Louisbourg  have  sometimes  taken  partial 
account  of  the  ordinary  Frenchman's  repug- 
nance to  oversea  duty  in  time  of  peace  and 
of  the  little  worth  of  hireling  foreigners  in 
time  of  war.  But  they  have  always  ignored 
that  steady  drip,  drip,  drip  of  deterioration 
which  reduces  the  efficiency  of  every  garrison 
condemned  to  service  in  remote  and  thor- 
oughly uncongenial  countries.  Louisbourg 
was  remote,  weeks  away  from  exchanges  with 
Quebec,  months  from  exchanges  with  any 
part  of  France  or  Switzerland.  And  what 
other  foreign  station  could  have  been  more 
thoroughly  uncongenial,  except,  perhaps,  a 
convict  station  in  the  tropics  }  Bad  quarters 
were  endurable  in  Paris  or  even  in  the  pro- 


THE  LAST  SEA  LINK  WITH  FRANCE  23 

vinces,  where  five  minutes'  walk  would  take 
one  into  something  pleasanter.  Bad  fortifica- 
tions would  inspire  less  apprehension  any- 
where in  France,  where  there  was  at  least  an 
army  always  ready  to  take  the  field.  But 
cold,  cramped  quarters  in  foggy  little  Louis- 
bourg,  between  the  estranging  sea  and  an 
uncouth  land  of  rock,  bog,  sand,  and  scrubby 
vegetation,  made  all  the  world  of  difference 
in  the  soldier's  eyes.  Add  to  this  his  want  of 
faith  in  works  which  he  saw  being  scamped 
by  rascally  contractors,  and  we  can  begin  to 
understand  why  the  general  attitude  of  town 
and  garrison  alike  was  one  of  '  Here  to-day 
and  gone  to-morrow.' 


CHAPTER  II 

THE  SEA  LINK  LOST 
1745 

Rome  would  not  rest  till  she  had  ruined 
Carthage.  Britain  would  not  rest  till  she 
had  seen  Dunkirk  demolished.  New  England 
would  not  rest  till  she  had  taken  Louisbourg. 
Louisbourg  was  unique  in  all  America,  and 
that  was  its  undoing.  It  was  the  one  sen- 
tinel beside  the  gateway  to  New  France ; 
therefore  it  ought  to  be  taken  before  Quebec 
and  Canada  were  attacked.  It  was  the  one 
corsair  lying  in  perpetual  wait  beside  the 
British  lines  of  seaborne  trade  ;  therefore  it 
must  be  taken  before  British  shipping  could 
be  safe.  It  was  the  one  French  sea  link 
between  the  Old  World  and  the  New  ;  there- 
fore its  breaking  was  of  supreme  importance. 
It  was  the  one  real  fortress  ever  heard  of 
in  America,  and  it  was  in  absolutely  alien 
hands  ;  therefore,  so  ran  Nev/  England  logic,  it 
was  most  offensive  to  all  true  Britons,  New 


THE  SEA  LINK  LOST  25 

Englanders,  and  Puritans ;  to  all  rivals  in 
smuggling,  trade,  and  privateering  ;  and  to  all 
right-thinking  people  generally. 

The  weakness  of  Louisbourg  was  very 
welcome  news  to  energetic  Massachusetts. 
In  1744,  when  Frederick  the  Great  had  begun 
the  War  of  the  Austrian  Succession  and 
France  had  taken  arms  against  Great  Britain, 
du  Quesnel,  the  governor  of  Louisbourg,  who 
had  received  the  intelligence  of  these  events 
some  weeks  before  the  alert  Bostonians,  at 
once  decided  to  win  credit  by  striking  the  first 
blow.  He  was  much  disliked  in  Louisbourg. 
He  drank  hard,  cursed  his  subordinates  when 
in  his  cups,  and  set  the  whole  place  by  the 
ears.  Moreover,  many  of  those  under  him 
wished  to  avoid  giving  the  British  Americans 
any  provocation,  in  the  hope  that  the  war 
might  be  confined  to  Europe.  But  none  dared 
to  refuse  a  legal  and  positive  order.  So  in 
May  his  expedition  left  for  Canso,  where  there 
was  a  little  home-made  British  fort  on  the 
strait  between  Cape  Breton  and  the  mainland 
of  Nova  Scotia.  The  eighty  fishermen  in 
Canso  surrendered  to  du  Vivier,  the  French 
commander,  who  sent  them  on  to  Boston, 
after  burning  their  fort  to  the  ground.     Elated 


26  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

by  this  somewhat  absurd  success,  and  streng- 
thened by  nearly  a  hundred  regulars  and 
four  hundred  Indians,  who  raised  his  total 
force  to  at  least  a  thousand  men,  du  Vivier 
next  proceeded  against  Annapolis  on  the  west 
side  of  Nova  Scotia.  But  Mascarene,  the 
British  commander  there,  stood  fast  on  his 
defence,  though  his  men  were  few  and  his 
means  small.  The  Acadian  French  in  the 
vicinity  were  afraid  to  join  du  Vivier  openly. 
The  siege  dragged  on.  The  British  received 
a  slight  reinforcement.  The  French  did  not. 
And  in  September  du  Vivier  suddenly  retired 
without  attempting  an  assault. 

The  burning  of  Canso  and  the  attack  on 
Annapolis  stirred  up  the  wrath  of  New  Eng- 
land. A  wild  enthusiast,  William  Vaughan, 
urged  Governor  Shirley  of  Massachusetts  to 
make  an  immediate  counter-attack.  Shirley 
was  an  English  lawyer,  good  at  his  own 
work,  but  very  anxious  to  become  famous 
as  a  conqueror.  He  lent  a  willing  ear  to 
Vaughan,  and  astounded  the  General  Court 
of  Massachusetts  on  January  21,  1745,  by 
first  inducing  the  members  to  swear  secrecy 
and  then  asking  them  to  consider  a  plan 
for  a  colonial  expedition  against  Louisbourg. 
He    and    they    were    on    very    good    terms. 


THE  SEA  LINK  LOST  27 

But  they  were  provincial,  cautious,  and  natur- 
ally slow  when  it  came  to  planning  cam- 
paigns and  pledging  their  credit  for  what 
was  then  an  enormous  sum  of  money.  Nor 
could  they  be  blamed.  None  of  them  knew 
much  about  armies  and  navies  ;  most  thought 
Louisbourg  was  a  real  transatlantic  Dunkirk  ; 
and  all  knew  that  they  were  quite  insolvent 
already.  Their  joint  committee  of  the  two 
Houses  reported  against  the  scheme;  where- 
upon each  House  carried  a  secret  adverse 
vote  by  a  large  majority. 

But,  just  before  these  votes  were  taken,  a 
Puritan  member  from  a  country  district 
wrestled  in  what  he  thought  confidential 
prayer  with  such  loud  ejaculations  that  an 
eavesdropper  overheard  him  and  passed  the 
secret  on.  Of  course  the  momentous  news  at 
once  began  to  run  like  wildfire  through  the 
province.  Still,  the  *  Noes  had  it,'  both  in  the 
country  and  the  House.  Shirley  was  dejected 
and  in  doubt  what  to  do  next.  But  James 
Gibson,  the  merchant  militiaman,  suddenly 
hit  on  the  idea  of  getting  up  a  petition  among 
the  business  community.  The  result  sur- 
passed every  expectation.  All  the  mercharlts 
were  eager  for  attack.  Louisbourg  embodied 
everything  they  feared  and  hated  :    interfer- 


28  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

ence  with  seaborne  commerce,  rank  popery, 
French  domination,  trouble  with  Acadia,  and 
the  chance  of  being  themselves  attacked. 
When  the  petition  was  presented  to  both 
Houses,  the  whole  subject  was  again  debated. 
Provincial  insolvency  and  the  absence  of  either 
a  fleet  or  an  army  were  urged  by  the  Opposi- 
tion. But  the  fighting  party  put  forth  all  their 
strength  and  pleaded  that  delay  meant  rein- 
forcements for  Louisbourg  and  a  good  chance 
lost  for  ever.  The  vote  would  have  been  a  tie 
if  a  member  of  the  Opposition  had  not  slipped 
and  broken  his  leg  as  he  was  hurrying  down 
to  the  House.  Once  the  decision  had  been 
reached,  however,  all  did  their  best  to  ensure 
success. 

Shirley  wrote  to  his  brother  governors. 
Vaughan  galloped  off  post-haste  to  New  Hamp- 
shire with  the  first  official  letter.  Gibson  led 
the  merchants  in  local  military  zeal.  The 
result  was  that  Massachusetts,  which  then 
included  Maine,  raised  over  3000  men,  while 
New  Hampshire  and  Connecticut  raised  about 
500  each.  Rhode  Island  concurred,  but  un- 
graciously and  ineffectually  late.  She  nursed 
two  grudges  against  Massachusetts,  one  about 
the  undeniably  harsh  treatment  meted  out  to 
her  great  founder,  Roger  Williams,  the  other 


THE  SEA  LINK  LOST  29 

about  that  most  fruitful  source  of  inter- 
provincial  mischief-making,  a  disputed  boun- 
dary. New  York  lent  some  guns,  which 
proved  very  useful.  The  remaining  colonies 
did  nothing. 

Shirley's  choice  of  a  commander-in-chief 
wisely  fell  on  William  Pepperrell.  There 
was  no  military  leader  in  the  whole  of  New 
England,  So  the  next  most  suitable  man 
was  the  civilian  who  best  combined  the 
necessary  qualities  of  good  sense,  sound  know- 
ledge of  men  and  affairs,  firmness,  diplomacy, 
and  popularity.  Popularity  was  essential, 
because  all  the  men  were  volunteers.  Pep- 
perrell, who  answered  every  reasonable  test, 
went  through  the  campaign  with  flying  colours 
and  came  out  of  it  as  the  first  and  only 
baronet  of  Massachusetts.  He  was  commis- 
sioned as  major-general  by  all  three  con- 
tributing provinces,  since  none  of  them  re- 
cognized any  common  authority  except  that 
of  the  crown.  He  was  ably  seconded  by 
many  leading  men  who,  if  not  trained  soldiers, 
were  at  least  accustomed  to  the  organization 
of  public  life  ;  for  in  those  days  the  word 
politician  had  not  become  a  term  of  reproach 
in  America,  and  the  people  were  often  repre- 
sented by  men  of  the  highest  character. 


30  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

The  financial  difficulty  was  overcome  by 
issuing  letters  of  credit,  which  were  afterwards 
redeemed  by  the  Imperial  government,  at  a 
total  cost  of  nearly  a  quarter  of  a  million 
sterling.  There  was  no  time  and  there  were 
no  means  to  change  the  militia  into  an  army. 
But  many  compensating  advantages  helped 
to  make  up  for  its  deficiencies.  The  men 
volunteered  eagerly.  They  were  all  very 
keen  to  fight  the  French.  Most  of  them  under- 
stood the  individual  use  of  firearms.  Many 
of  them  had  been  to  sea  and  had  learned 
to  work  together  as  a  crew.  Nearly  all  of 
them  had  the  handiness  then  required  for  life 
in  a  new  country.  And,  what  with  con- 
viction and  what  with  prejudice,  they  were 
also  quite  disposed  to  look  upon  the  ex- 
pedition as  a  sort  of  crusade  against  idolatrous 
papists,  and  therefore  as  a  very  proper  climax 
to  the  Great  Awakening  which  had  recently 
roused  New  England  to  the  heights  of  religious 
zealotry  under  the  leadership  of  the  famous 
George  Whitefield  himself. 

Strangely  enough,  neither  Whitefield  nor 
his  friend  Pepperrell  was  at  ail  sure  that  the 
expedition  was  a  wise  or  even  a  godly  venture. 
Whitefield  warned  Pepperrell  that  he  would  be 
envied  if  he  succeeded  and  abused  if  he  failed. 


SIR  WILLIAM   PF.PPERRKLL 
Frnm  llic  orit^'inal  paintintr  !))•  John  Sniihcrt 


THE  SEA  LINK  LOST  31 

The  Reverend  Thomas  Prince  openly  re- 
gretted the  change  of  enemy.  *  The  Heavenly 
shower  is  over.  From  fighting  the  Devil  they 
needs  must  turn  to  fighting  the  French.' 
But  Parson  Moody,  most  truculent  of  Puritans, 
had  no  doubts  whatever.  The  French,  the 
pope,  and  the  Devil  were  all  one  to  him ;  and 
when  he  embarked  as  senior  chaplain  he  took 
a  hatchet  with  which  to  break  down  the 
graven  images  of  Louisbourg.  In  the  end 
Whitefield  warmed  up  enough  to  give  the  ex- 
pedition its  official  motto  :  Nil  desperandum 
Christo  Duce.  The  Never  Despair  heartened 
the  worldlings.  The  Christ  our  Commander 
appealed  to  the  '  Great  Awakened.'  And  the 
whole  saying  committed  him  to  nothing 
particular  concerning  the  issue  at  stake. 

The  three  militia  contingents  numbered 
4270  men.  The  three  naval  contingents  had 
13  vessels  mounting  216  guns.  In  addition 
to  both  these  forces  there  were  the  transports, 
which  had  considerable  crews.  But  all  these 
together,  if  caught  on  the  open  sea,  would  be 
no  match  for  a  few  regular  men-of-war. 
New  England  had  no  navy,  though  the  New 
Englanders  had  enjoyed  a  good  deal  of  ex- 
perience in  minor  privateering  against  the 
Spaniards  during  the  last  few  years,  as  well 


32  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

as  a  certain  amount  of  downright  piracy  in 
time  of  peace,  whenever  a  Frenchman  or  a 
Spaniard  could  be  safely  taken  at  a  dis- 
advantage. So  Shirley  asked  Commodore 
Warren,  commanding  the  North  American 
station,  to  lend  his  aid.  Warren  had  married 
an  American  and  was  very  well  disposed  to- 
wards the  colonists.  But,  having  no  orders, 
from  England,  he  at  first  felt  obliged  to  refuse. 
Within  a  short  time,  however,  he  was  given  a 
free  hand  by  the  Imperial  government,  which 
authorized  him  to  concert  measures  with 
Shirley  *  for  the  annoyance  of  the  enemy,  and 
for  his  Majesty's  Service  in  North  America.' 

Warren  immediately  sailed  for  Canso  with 
three  men-of-war  and  sent  for  another  to 
join  him.  His  wait  for  orders  made  him 
nearly  three  weeks  later  than  the  New  Eng- 
landers  in  arriving  at  the  rendezvous.  But 
this  delay,  due  to  no  fault  of  his  own,  was 
really  an  advantage  to  the  New  England 
militia,  who  thus  had  a  chance  of  learning  a 
little  more  drill  and  discipline.  His  four 
vessels  carried  i8o  guns  and  1150  men  at 
full  strength.  The  thirteen  Provincial  armed 
vessels  carried  more  than  1000  men.  No 
exact  returns  were  ever  made  out  for  the 
transports.     But   as   '  68   lay  at   anchor '   in 


THE  SEA  LINK  LOST  33 

Canso  harbour,  while  others  *  came  dropping 
in  from  day  to  day,'  as  there  were  4270 
militiamen  on  board,  in  addition  to  all  the 
stores,  and  as  the  French  counted  '  96  trans- 
ports '  making  for  Gabarus  Bay,  there  could 
not  have  been  less  than  100,  while  the  crews 
could  hardly  have  mustered  less  than  an 
average  of  20  men  each.  The  grand  total,  at 
the  beginning  of  the  expedition,  could  not, 
therefore,  have  been  less  than  8000  men,  of 
all  sorts  put  together — over  4000  American 
Provincial  militia,  over  1000  men  of  the  Royal 
Navy,  quite  1000  men  aboard  the  Provincial 
fighting  vessels,  and  at  least  2000  more  as 
crews  to  work  the  transports. 

May  I,  the  first  Sunday  the  Provincials 
spent  at  Canso,  was  a  day  of  great  and  multi- 
farious activity,  both  sacred  and  profane. 
Parson  Moody,  the  same  who  had  taken  the 
war-path  with  his  iconoclastic  hatchet,  de- 
livered a  tremendous  philippic  from  the  text, 
*  Thy  people  shall  be  willing  in  the  day  of  Thy 
power.'  Luckily  for  his  congregation  he  had 
the  voice  of  a  Stentor,  as  there  were  several 
mundane  competitors  in  an  adjoining  field, 
each  bawling  the  word  of  command  at  the  full 
pitch  of  his  lungs.  A  conscientious  diarist, 
though  full  of  Sabbatarian  zeal,  wa^  fain  to 

G.F,  C 


34  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

admit  that  '  Severall  sorts  of  Busnesses  was 
a-Going  on :  Sum  a- Exercising,  Sum  a- 
Hearing  o'  the  Preaching.' 

On  May  5  Warren  sailed  into  Canso.  The 
Provincials  thought  the  date  of  his  arrival 
a  very  happy  omen,  as  it  fell  on  what  was 
then,  according  to  the  Old  Style  calendar,  St 
George's  Day,  April  23.  After  a  conference' 
with  Pepperrell  he  hurried  off  to  begin  the 
blockade  of  Louisbourg.  A  week  later,  May 
21,  the  transports  joined  him  there,  and  landed 
their  militiamen  for  one  of  the  most  eccentric 
sieges  ever  known. 

While  the  British  had  been  spending  the 
first  four  months  of  1745  in  preparing  8000 
men,  the  French  authorities  in  Louisbourg, 
whose  force  was  less  than  2000,  had  been 
wasting  the  same  precious  time  in  ridiculous 
councils  of  war.  It  is  a  well-known  saying 
that  councils  of  war  never  fight.  But  these 
Louisbourg  councils  did  not  even  prepare  to 
fight.  The  news  from  Boston  was  not  heeded. 
Worse  yet,  no  attention  was  paid  to  the 
American  scouting  vessels,  which  had  been 
hovering  off  the  coast  for  more  than  a  month. 
The  bibulous  du  Quesnel  had  died  in  October. 
But  his  successor,  du  Chambon,  was  no  better 


THE  SEA  LINK  LOST  35 

as  a  commandant.  Perhaps  the  kindest  thing 
to  say  of  du  Chambon  is  that  he  was  the 
fooHsh  father  of  a  knavish  son — of  that  du 
Chambon  de  Vergor  who,  in  the  next  war, 
surrendered  Fort  Beausejour  without  a  siege 
and  left  one  sleepy  sentry  to  watch  Wolfe's 
Cove  the  night  before  the  Battle  of  the 
Plains. 

It  is  true  that  du  Chambon  had  succeeded 
to  a  thoroughly  bad  command.  He  had  no 
naval  force  whatever ;  and  the  military  force 
had  become  worse  instead  of  better.  The 
mutiny  in  December  had  left  the  560  regulars 
in  a  very  sullen  frame  of  mind.  They  knew 
that  acquisitive  government  officials  were 
cheating  them  out  of  their  proper  rations  of 
bacon  and  beans.  The  officials  knew  that  the 
soldiers  knew.  And  so  suspicion  and  resent- 
ment grew  strong  between  trfbm.  The  only 
other  force  was  the  militia,  which,  with  certain 
exceptions,  comprised  every  male  inhabitant 
of  Cape  Breton  who  could  stand  on  two  legs 
and  hold  a  musket  with  both  hands.  There 
were  boys  in  their  early  teens  and  old  men  in 
their  sixties.  Nearly  1800  ought  to  have  been 
available.  But  four  or  five  hundred  that 
might  have  been  brought  in  never  received 
their   marching    orders.     So    the   total   com- 


36  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

batants  only  amounted  to  some  1900,  of  whom 
1350  were  militia.  The  non-combatants  num- 
bered nearly  as  many.  The  cramped  hun- 
dred acres  of  imprisoned  Louisbourg  thus 
contained  almost  4000  people — mutineers  and 
militia,  women  and  children,  drones  and  other 
officials,  all  huddled  up  together. 

No  reinforcements  arrived  after  the  first' 
appearance  of  the  British  fleet.  Marin,  a 
well-known  guerilla  leader,  had  been  sent  down 
from  Quebec,  through  the  bush,  with  six  or 
seven  hundred  whites  and  Indians,  to  join  the 
two  thousand  men  whom  the  French  govern- 
ment had  promised  du  Vivier  for  a  second,  and 
this  time  a  general,  attack  on  Acadia.  But 
these  other  two  thousand  were  never  sent  ; 
and  Marin,  having  failed  to  take  Annapolis 
by  the  first  week  in  June,  was  too  late  and 
too  weak  to  help  Louisbourg  afterwards.  The 
same  ill  luck  pursued  the  French  by  sea. 
On  April  30  the  Renommeey  a  very  smart 
frigate  bringing  out  dispatches,  was  chased 
off  by  the  Provincial  cruisers ;  while  all  sub- 
sequent arrivals  from  the  outside  world  were 
intercepted  by  Warren. 

The  landing  effected  on  May  12  was  not 
managed   according  to   Shirley's  written  in- 


THE  SEA  LINK  LOST  37 

structions  ;  nor  was  the  siege.  Shirley  had 
been  playing  a  little  war  game  in  his  study, 
with  all  the  inconvenient  obstacles  left  out — 
the  wind,  the  weather,  the  crashing  surf  in 
Gabarus  Bay,  the  rocks  and  bogs  of  the  sur- 
rounding country,  the  difficulties  of  entering 
a  narrow-necked  harbour  under  a  combina- 
tion of  end-on  and  broadside  fire,  the  terrible 
lee  shore  off  the  islands,  reefs,  and  Lighthouse 
Point,  the  commonest  vigilance  of  the  most 
slovenly  garrison,  and  even  the  offensive 
power  of  the  guns  on  the  walls  of  Louisbourg 
itself.  Shirley's  plan  was  that  Pepperrell 
should  arrive  in  the  offing  too  late  to  be  seen, 
land  unobserved,  and  march  on  Louisbourg 
in  four  detachments  while  the  garrison  was 
wrapped  in  slumber.  Two  of  these  detach- 
ments were  to  march  within  striking  distance 
and  then  '  halt  and  keep  a  profound  silence.' 
The  third  was  to  march  *  under  cover  of  said 
hills  '  until  it  came  opposite  the  Royal 
Battery,  which  it  was  to  assault  on  a  given 
signal  ;  while  the  *  profound  silence  *  men 
rushed  the  western  gate.  The  fourth  detach- 
ment was  to  race  along  the  shore,  scale  a 
certain  spot  in  the  wall,  *  and  secure  the 
windows  of  the  Governor's  Apartments.'  All 
this  was  to  be  done  by  raw  militia,  on  ground 


38  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

they  had  never  reconnoitred,  and  in  the  dead 
of  night. 

Needless  to  say,  Pepperrell  tried  something 
quite  different.  At  daybreak  of  the  12th  the 
whole  fleet  stood  into  Gabarus  Bay,  a  large 
open  roadstead  running  west  from  the  little 
Louisbourg  peninsula.  The  Provincials  eyed 
the  fortress  eagerly.  It  looked  mean,  squat, 
and  shrunken  in  the  dim  grey  light  of  early 
dawn.  But  it  looked  hard  enough,  for  all 
that.  Its  alarm  bells  began  to  ring.  Its 
signal  cannon  fired.  And  all  the  people  who 
had  been  living  outside  hurried  in  behind  the 
walls. 

The  New  Englanders  were  so  keen  to  land 
that  they  ran  some  danger  of  falling  into 
complete  disorder.  But  Pepperrell  managed 
very  cleverly.  Seeing  that  some  French- 
men were  ready  to  resist  a  landing  on  Flat 
Point,  two  miles  south-west  of  Louisbourg, 
he  made  a  feint  against  it,  drew  their  fire, 
and  then  raced  his  boats  for  Freshwater  Cove, 
another  two  miles  beyond.  Having  com- 
pletely outdistanced  the  handful  of  panting 
Frenchmen,  he  landed  in  perfect  safety  and 
presently  scattered  them  with  a  wild  charge 
which  cost  them  about  twenty  in  killed, 
wounded,    and   prisoners.     Before   dark   two 


THE  SEA  LINK  LOST  39 

thousand  Provincials  were  ashore.  The  other 
two  thousand  landed  at  their  leisure  the  follow- 
ing day. 

The  next  event  in  this  extraordinary  siege 
is  one  of  the  curiosities  of  war.  On  May  14 
the  enthusiastic  Vaughan  took  several  hun- 
dreds of  these  newly  landed  men  to  the  top 
of  the  nearest  hillock  and  saluted  the  walls 
with  three  cheers.  He  then  circled  the  whole 
harbour,  keeping  well  inland,  till  he  reached 
the  undefended  storehouses  on  the  inner 
side  of  the  North-East  Harbour,  a  little  be- 
yond the  Royal  Battery.  These  he  at  once 
set  on  fire.  The  pitch,  tar,  wood,  and  other 
combustibles  made  a  blinding  smoke,  which 
drifted  over  the  Royal  Battery  and  spread 
a  stampeding  panic  among  its  garrison  of  four 
hundred  men.  Vaughan  then  retired  for  the 
night.  On  his  return  to  the  Royal  Battery 
in  the  morning,  with  only  thirteen  men,  he 
was  astounded  to  see  no  sign  of  life  there. 
Suspecting  a  ruse,  he  bribed  an  Indian  with  a 
flask  of  brandy  to  feign  being  drunk  and  reel 
up  to  the  walls.  The  Indian  reached  the  fort 
unchallenged,  climbed  into  an  embrasure,  and 
found  the  whole  place  deserted.  Vaughan 
followed  at  once  ;  and  a  young  volunteer, 
shinning  up  the  flag-pole,  made  his  own  red 


40  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

coat  fast  to  the  top.  This  defiance  was 
immediately  answered  by  a  random  salvo 
from  Louisbourg,  less  than  a  mile  across  the 
harbour. 

Vaughan's  next  move  was  to  write  a  dis- 
patch to  Pepperrell :  *  May  it  please  your 
Honour  to  be  informed  that  by  the  Grace  of 
God  and  the  courage  of  13  Men  I  entered  the 
Royal  Battery  about  9  o*  the  clock  and  am 
waiting  for  a  reinforcement  and  a  flag.'  He 
had  hardly  sent  this  off  before  he  was  attacked 
by  four  boats  from  Louisbourg.  Quite  un- 
daunted, however,  he  stood  out  on  the  open 
beach  with  his  thirteen  men  and  kept  them  all 
at  bay  till  the  reinforcement  and  the  flag 
arrived  with  Bradstreet,  who  was  afterwards 
to  win  distinction  as  the  captor  of  Fort 
Frontenac  during  the  great  campaign  of  1759. 

This  disgraceful  abandonment  and  this 
dramatic  capture  of  the  Royal  Battery  marked 
the  first  and  most  decisive  turning-point  in  the 
fortunes  of  the  siege.  The  French  were  dis- 
mayed, the  British  were  elated  ;  and  both 
the  dismay  and  the  elation  grew  as  time  wore 
on,  because  everything  seemed  to  conspire 
against  the  French  and  in  favour  of  the  British. 
Even  the  elements,  as  the  anonymous  Habitant 
de  Louisbourg  complains  in  his  wonderfully 


THE  SEA  LINK  LOST  41 

candid  diary,  seemed  to  have  taken  sides. 
There  had  never  been  so  fine  a  spring  for  naval 
operations.  But  this  was  the  one  thing  which 
was  entirely  independent  of  French  fault  or 
British  merit.  All  the  other  strokes  of  luck 
owed  something  to  human  causes.  Wise- 
acres had  shaken  their  heads  over  the  crazy 
idea  of  taking  British  cannon  balls  solely  to 
fit  French  cannon  that  were  to  be  taken  at  the 
beginning  of  the  siege :  it  was  too  much  like 
selling  the  pelt  before  the  trap  was  sprung. 
Yet  these  balls  actually  were  used  to  load  the 
forty-two  pounders  taken  with  the  Royal 
Battery  !  Moreover,  as  if  to  cap  the  climax, 
ten  other  cannon  were  found  buried  in  the 
North-East  Harbour  ;  and  again  spare  British 
balls  were  found  to  fit  exactly  !  The  fact  is 
that  what  we  should  now  call  the  Intelligence 
Department  had  been  doing  good  work  the 
year  before  by  spying  out  the  land  at  Louis- 
bourg  and  reporting  to  the  proper  men  in 
Bostdn. 

The  Bostonians  had  always  intended  to 
take  the  Royal  Battery  at  the  earliest  possible 
moment.  But  nobody  had  thought  that  the 
French  would  abandon  it  without  a  blow  and 
leave  it  intact  for  their  enemy,  with  all  its 
armament  complete.     The  French  council  of 


42  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

war  apparently  shrank  from  hurting  the  feel- 
ings of  the  engineer  in  charge,  who  had  pleaded 
for  its  preservation  !  They  then  ran  away 
without  spiking  the  guns  properly,  and  with- 
out making  the  slightest  attempt  either  to 
burn  the  carriages  or  knock  the  trunnions  off. 
The  invaluable  stores  were  left  in  their  places. 
The  only  real  destruction  was  caused  by  a 
barrel  of  powder,  which  some  bunglers  blew 
up  by  mistake.  The  inevitable  consequence 
of  all  this  French  ineptitude  was  that  the 
Royal  Battery  roared  against  Louisbourg  the 
very  next  morning  with  tremendous  effect, 
smashing  the  works  most  exposed  to  its  fire, 
bringing  down  houses  about  the  inhabitants* 
ears,  and  sending  the  terrified  non-combatants 
scurrying  off  to  underground  cover. 

Meanwhile  the  bulk  of  the  New  Englanders 
were  establishing  their  camp  along  the  brook 
which  fell  into  Gabarus  Bay  beside  Flat  Point 
and  within  two  miles  of  Louisbourg.  Equip- 
ment of  all  kinds  was  very  scarce.  Tents 
were  so  few  and  bad  that  old  sails  stretched 
over  ridge-poles  had  to  be  used  instead.  When 
sails  ran  short,  brushwood  shelters  roofed  in 
with  overlapping  spruce  boughs  were  used  as 
substitutes. 


THE  SEA  LINK  LOST  43 

Landing  the  four  thousand  men  had  been 
comparatively  easy  work.  But  landing  the 
stores  was  very  hard  indeed  ;  while  landing 
the  guns  was  not  only  much  harder  still,  but 
full  of  danger  as  well.  Many  a  fiat-boat  was 
pounded  into  pulpwood  while  unloading  the 
stores,  though  the  men  waded  in  waist-deep 
and  carried  all  the  heavy  bundles  on  their 
heads  and  shoulders.  When  it  came  to  the 
artillery,  it  meant  a  boat  lost  for  every  single 
piece  of  ordnance  landed.  Nor  was  even  this 
the  worst ;  for,  strange  as  it  may  seem,  there 
was,  at  first,  more  risk  of  foundering  ashore 
than  afloat.  There  were  neither  roads  nor 
yet  the  means  to  make  them.  There  were  no 
horses,  oxen,  mules,  or  any  other  means  of 
transport,  except  the  brawny  men  themselves, 
who  literally  buckled  to  with  anchor-cable 
drag-ropes — a  hundred  pair  of  straining  men 
for  each  great,  lumbering  gun.  Over  the  sand 
they  went  at  a  romp.  Over  the  rocks  they  had 
to  take  care  ;  and  in  the  dense,  obstructing 
scrub  they  had  to  haul  through  by  main  force. 
But  this  was  child's  play  to  what  awaited  them 
in  the  slimy,  shifting,  and  boulder-strewn  bog 
they  had  to  pass  before  reaching  the  hillocks 
which  commanded  Louisbourg. 

The   first    attempts    here   were    disastrous. 


44  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

The  guns  sank  out  of  sight  in  the  engulfing 
bog ;  while  the  toiling  men  became  regular 
human  targets  for  shot  and  shell  from  Louis- 
bourg.  It  .was  quite  plain  that  the  British 
batteries  could  never  be  built  on  the  hillocks 
if  the  guns  had  nothing  to  keep  them  from 
a  boggy  grave,  and  if  the  men  had  no  pro- 
tection from  the  French  artillery.  But  a  ship- 
builder colonel,  Meserve  of  New  Hampshire, 
came  to  the  rescue  by  designing  a  gun-sleigh, 
sixteen  feet  in  length  and  five  in  the  beam. 
Then  the  crews  were  told  off  again,  two 
hundred  men  for  each  sleigh,  and  orders  were 
given  that  the  work  should  not  be  done  except 
at  night  or  under  cover  of  the  frequent  fogs. 
After  this,  things  went  much  better  than 
before.  But  the  labour  was  tremendous  still ; 
while  the  danger  from  random  shells  bursting 
among  the  boulders  was  not  to  be  despised. 
Four  hundred  struggling  feet,  four  hundred 
straining  arms — each  team  hove  on  its  long, 
taut  cable  through  fog,  rain,  and  the  black- 
ness of  the  night,  till  every  gun  had  been  towed 
into  one  of  the  batteries  before  the  walls. 
The  triumph  was  all  the  greater  because  the 
work  grew,  not  easier,  but  harder  as  it  pro- 
gressed. The  same  route  used  twice  became 
an  impassable  quagmire.     So,  when  the  last 


THE  SEA  LINK  LOST  45 

two  hundred  men  had  wallowed  through,  the 
whole  ensnaring  bog  was  seamed  with  a 
perfect  maze  of  decoying  death-trails  snaking 
in  and  out  of  the  forbidding  scrub  and 
boulders. 

Pepperrell's  dispatches  could  not  exaggerate 
these  *  almost  incredible  hardships.'  Afloat 
and  ashore,  awake  and  asleep,  the  men  were 
soaking  wet  for  days  together.  At  the  end 
of  the  longest  haul  they  had  nothing  but  a 
choice  of  evils.  They  could  either  lie  down 
where  they  were,  on  hard  rock  or  oozing  bog, 
exposed  to  the  enemy's  fire  the  moment  it  was 
light  enough  to  see  the  British  batteries,  or 
they  could  plough  their  way  back  to  camp. 
Here  they  v/ere  safe  enough  from  shot  and 
shell  ;  but,  in  other  respects,  no  better  off  than 
in  the  batteries.  Most  men's  kits  were  of  the 
very  scantiest.  Very  few  had  even  a  single 
change  of  clothing.  A  good  many  went  bare- 
foot. Nearly  all  were  in  rags  before  the  siege 
was  over. 

When  twenty-five  pieces  had  been  dragged 
up  to  Green  Hill  and  its  adjoining  hillocks, 
the  bombardment  at  last  began.  The  opening 
salvo  seemed  to  give  the  besiegers  new  life. 
No  sooner  was  their  first  rough  line  of  invest- 
ment formed  than  they  commenced  gaining 


46  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

ground,  with  a  disregard  for  cover  which  would 
have  cost  them  dear  if  the  French  practice 
had  not  been  quite  as  bad  as  their  own.  A 
really  wonderful  amount  of  ammunition  was 
fired  off  on  both  sides  without  hitting  anything 
in  particular.  Louisbourg  itself  was,  of  course, 
too  big  a  target  to  be  missed,  as  a  rule  ;  and 
the  besiegers  soon  got  so  close  that  they  simply 
had  to  be  hit  themselves  now  and  then.  But, 
generally  speaking ,  it  may  be  truthfully  said 
that  while,  in  an  ordinary  battle,  it  takes  a 
man's  own  weight  in  cartridges  to  kill  him,  in 
this  most  extraordinary  siege  it  took  at  least 
a  horse's  weight  as  well. 

The  approach  to  the  walls  defied  all  the 
usual  precautions  of  regular  war.  But  the 
circumstances  justified  its  boldness.  With 
only  four  thousand  men  at  the  start,  with 
nearly  half  of  this  total  on  the  sick  list  at  one 
rather  critical  juncture,  with  very  few  trained 
gunners,  and  without  any  corps  of  engineers 
at  all,  the  Provincials  adapted  themselves  to 
the  situation  so  defiantly  that  they  puzzled, 
shook,  and  overawed  the  French,  who  thought 
them  two  or  three  times  stronger  than  they 
really  were.  Recklessly  defiant  though  they 
were,  however,  they  did  provide  the  breach- 
ing batteries  with  enough  cover  for  the  pur- 


THE  SEA  LINK  LOST  47 

pose  in  hand.  This  is  amply  proved  both 
by  the  fewness  of  their  casualties  and  by 
the  evidence  of  Bastide,  the  British  engineer 
at  Annapolis,  who  inspected  the  lines  of  in- 
vestment on  his  arrival,  twelve  days  before 
the  surrender,  and  reported  them  sufficiently 
protected. 

Where  the  Provincials  showed  their  'pren- 
tice hands  to  genuine  disadvantage  was  in 
their  absurdly  solemn  and  utterly  futile  coun- 
cils of  war.  No  schoolboys'  debating  club 
could  well  have  done  worse  than  the  council 
held  to  consider  du  Chambon's  stereotyped 
answer  to  the  usual  summons  sent  in  at 
the  beginning  of  a  siege.  The  formula  that 
*  his  cannon  would  answer  for  him  '  provoked 
a  tremendous  storm  in  the  council's  teacup 
and  immediately  resulted  in  the  following 
resolution  :  *  Advised,  Unanimously,  that  the 
Towne  of  Louisbourg  be  Attacked  this  Night.' 
But,  confronted  with  '  a  great  Dissatysfaction 
in  many  of  the  officers  and  Souldiers  at  the 
designed  attack  of  the  towne  this  Night,'  it 
was  '  Advised,  Unanimously,'  by  a  second 
council,  called  in  great  haste,  '  that  the 
Said  Attack  be  deferred  for  the  Present.' 
This  *  Present  '  lasted  during  the  rest  of  the 
siege. 


48  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

Once  the  New  Englanders  had  settled  down, 
however,  they  wisely  began  to  increase  their 
weight  of  metal,  as  well  as  to  decrease  the 
range  at  which  they  used  it.  They  set  to 
work  with  a  will  to  make  a  breach  at  the 
North-West  Gate  of  Louisbourg,  near  where 
the  inner  angle  of  the  walls  abutted  on  the 
harbour  ;  and  they  certainly  needed  all  their 
indomitable  perseverance  when  it  came  to 
arming  their  new  *  North- Western '  or  *  Tit- 
comb's  Battery.'  The  twenty- two  pounders 
had  required  two  hundred  men  apiece.  The 
forty-two  pounders  took  three  hundred.  Two 
of  these  unwieldy  guns  were  hauled  a  couple 
of  miles  round  the  harbour,  in  the  dark,  from 
that  *  Royal  Battery  '  which  Vaughan  had 
taken  *  by  the  Grace  of  God  and  the  courage 
of  13  Men,'  and  then  successfully  mounted  at 
*  Titcomb's,'  just  where  they  could  do  the 
greatest  damage  to  their  former  owners,  the 
French. 

Well  -  trained  gunners  were  exceedingly 
scarce.  Pepperrell  could  find  only  six  among 
his  four  thousand  men.  But  Warren  lent  him 
three  more,  whom  he  could  ill  spare,  as  no  one 
knew  when  a  fleet  might  come  out  from  France. 
With  these  nine  instructors  to  direct  them 
Pepperreli's  men  closed  in  their  line  of  fire 


THE  SEA  LINK  LOST     -  49 

till  besieged  and  besiegers  came  within  such 
easy  musket-shot  of  one  another  that  taunting 
challenges  and  invitations  could  be  flung 
across  the  intervening  space. 

Each  side  claimed  advantages  and  ex- 
plained shortcomings  to  its  own  satisfaction. 
A  New  England  diarist  says  :  *  We  began  our 
fire  with  as  much  fury  as  possible,  and  the 
French  returned  it  as  warmly  with  Cannon, 
Mortars,  and  continual  showers  of  musket 
balls  ;  but  by  1 1  o'clock  we  had  beat  them  all 
from  their  guns.*  A  French  diarist  of  the 
same  day  says  that  the  fire  from  the  walls  was 
stopped  on  purpose,  chiefly  to  save  powder  ; 
while  the  same  reason  is  assigned  for  the 
British  order  to  cease  fire  exactly  one  hour 
later. 

The  practice  continued  to  be  exceedingly 
bad  on  both  sides ;  so  bad,  indeed,  that 
the  New  Englanders  suffered  more  from  the 
bursting  of  their  own  guns  than  from  the 
enemy's  fire.  The  nine  instructors  could  not 
be  everywhere  ;  and  all  their  good  advice 
could  not  prevent  the  eager  amateurs  from 
grossly  overloading  the  double-shotted  pieces. 
*  Another  42-pound  gun  burst  at  the  Grand 
Battery.'  *  Captain  Hale  is  dangerously  hurt 
by  the  bursting  of  another  gun.  He  was 
G.F.  n 


50  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

the  mainstay  of  our  gunnery  since  Captain 
Rhodes's  misfortune ' — a  misfortune  due  to 
the  same  cause.  But,  in  spite  of  all  such 
drawbacks  on  the  British  side,  Louisbourg 
got  much  the  worst  of  it.  The  French  had 
to  fire  from  the  centre  outwards,  at  a  semi- 
circle of  batteries  that  fired  back  converg- 
ingly  at  them.  Besides,  it  was  almost  as 
hard  to  hit  the  thin,  irregular  line  of  British 
batteries  as  it  was  to  miss  the  deep,  wide 
target  of  overcrowded  Louisbourg.  The  walls 
were  continually  being  smashed  from  without 
and  patched  up  from  within.  The  streets 
were  ploughed  from  end  to  end.  Many  houses 
were  laid  in  ruins  :  only  one  remained  intact 
when  the  siege  was  over.  The  non-combat- 
ants, who  nov/  exceeded  the  garrison  effectives, 
were  half  buried  in  the  smothering  casemates 
underground  ;  and  though  the  fighting  men 
had  light,  air,  and  food  enough,  and  though 
they  were  losing  very  few  in  killed  and 
wounded,  they  too  began  to  feel  that  Louis- 
bourg must  fall  if  it  was  not  soon  relieved 
from  outside. 

The  British,  on  the  contrary,  grew  more 
and  more  confident,  both  afloat  and  ashore, 
though  they  had  one  quite  alarming  scare 
ashore.     They  knev/  their  navy  outmatched 


THE  SEA  LINK  LOST  51 

the  French  ;  and  they  saw  that,  while  Warren 
was  being  strengthened,  du  Chambon  was 
being  left  as  devoid  of  naval  force  as  ever. 
But  their  still  greater  confidence  ashore  was, 
for  the  time  being,  very  rudely  shaken  when 
they  heard  that  Marin,  the  same  French 
guerilla  leader  who  had  been  sent  down  from 
Quebec  against  Annapolis  with  six  or  seven 
hundred  whites  and  Indians,  had  been  joined 
by  the  promised  reinforcements  from  France 
and  was  coming  to  take  the  camp  in  rear. 
The  truth  was  that  the  reinforcements  never 
arrived,  that  Marin  had  failed  to  take  Anna- 
polis, and  that  there  was  no  real  danger  from 
his  own  dwindling  force,  even  if  it  had  tried 
to  relieve  Louisbourg  in  June.  But  the 
rumour  ran  quickly  through  the  whole  camp, 
probably  not  without  Pepperrell's  own  en- 
couragement, and  at  once  produced,  not  a 
panic,  but  the  most  excellent  effect.  Disci- 
pline, never  good,  had  been  growing  worse. 
Punishments  were  unknown.  Officers  and 
men  were  petitioning  for  leave  to  go  home, 
quite  regardless  of  the  need  for  their  services 
at  the  front.  Demands  for  promotion,  for 
extra  allowances,  and  for  increased  pay  were 
becoming  a  standing  nuisance.  Then,  just 
as  the  leaders  were  at  their  wits'  ends  what  to 


52  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

do,  Marin's  threatened  attack  came  to  their 
aid  ;  and  their  brave  armed  mob  once  more 
began  to  wear  the  semblance  of  an  army. 
Sentries,  piquets,  and  outposts  appeared  as 
if  by  magic.  Officers  went  their  rounds  with 
zeal.  The  camp  suddenly  ceased  to  be  a  dis- 
orderly playground  for  every  one  off  duty. 
The  breaching  batteries  redoubled  their  efforts" 
against  the  walls. 

The  threat  of  danger  once  past,  however, 
the  men  soon  slipped  back  into  their  careless 
ways.  A  New  England  chronicler  records 
that  *  those  who  were  on  the  spot  have  fre- 
quently, in  my  hearing,  laughed  at  the  recital 
of  their  own  irregularities  and  expressed  their 
admiration  when  they  reflected  on  the  almost 
miraculous  preservation  of  the  army  from 
destruction.'  Men  off  duty  amused  them- 
selves with  free-and-easy  musketry,  which 
would  have  been  all  very  well  if  there  had 
not  been  such  a  dearth  of  powder  for  the 
real  thing.  Races,  wrestling,  and  quoits  were 
better ;  while  fishing  was  highly  commendable, 
both  in  the  way  of  diet  as  well  as  in  the 
way  of  sport.  Such  entries  as  *  Thritty  Lobb- 
sters  *  and  *  6  Troutts '  appear  in  several 
diaries. 

Nor  were  other  forms  of  gaiety  forgotten. 


THE  SEA  LINK  LOST  53 

Even  a  Massachusetts  Puritan  could  recom- 
mend a  sermon  for  general  distribution  in  the 
camp  because  *  It  will  please  your  whole 
army,  as  it  shows  them  the  way  to  gain  by 
their  gallantry  the  hearts  and  affections  of 
the  Ladys.'  And  even  a  city  of  the  *  Great 
Awakening,'  like  Boston,  could  produce  a 
letter  like  the  following  : 

I  hope  this  will  find  you  at  Louisbourg 
with  a  bowl  of  Punch,  a  Pipe,  and  a  Pack 
of  Cards,  and  whatever  else  you  desire. 
(I  had  forgot  to  mention  a  Pretty  French 
Madammoselle.)  Your  Friend  Luke  has 
lost  several  Beaver  Hatts  already  concern- 
ing the  Expedition.  He  is  so  very  zealous 
about  it  that  he  has  turned  poor  Boutier 
out  of  his  house  for  saying  he  believed 
you  wouldn't  take  the  Place.  Damn  his 
.  Blood,  says  Luke,  let  him  be  an  English- 
man or  a  Frenchman  and  not  pretend  to 
be  an  Englishman  when  he  is  a  French- 
man in  his  Heart.  If  Drinking  to  your 
Success  would  take  Cape  Britton  you 
must  be  in  possession  of  it  now,  for  it 's  a 
Standing  Toast. 

The  day  this  letter  was  written  in  Boston, 


54  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

May  6,  Warren  had  already  begun  the  regular 
blockade.  Only  a  single  ship  eluded  him, 
an  ably  handled  Basque,  which  stood  in  and 
rounded  to,  under  the  walls  of  Louisbourg, 
after  running  the  gauntlet  of  the  Royal 
Battery,  on  which  the  French  fired  with  all 
their  might  to  keep  its  own  fire  down.  A 
second  vessel  was  forced  aground.  Her  cap- 
tain fought  her  to  the  last ;  but  Warren's 
boat  crews  took  her.  Some  men  who  escaped 
from  her  brought  du  Chambon  the  news  that 
a  third  French  ship,  the  Vigilant,  was  coming 
to  the  relief  of  Louisbourg  with  ammunition 
and  other  stores.  This  ship  had  five  hundred 
and  sixty  men  aboard,  that  is,  as  many  as 
all  the  regulars  in  Louisbourg.  On  May  31 
the  garrison  heard  a  tremendous  cannonading 
out  at  sea.  It  grew  in  volume  as  Warren's 
squadron  was  seen  to  surround  the  stranger, 
who  was  evidently  making  a  gallant  fight 
against  long  odds.  Presently  it  ceased  ;  the 
clustered  vessels  parted  ;  spread  out ;  and 
took  up  their  stations  exactly  as  before,  except 
that  a  new  vessel  was  now  flying  the  British 
flag.  This  was  the  Vigilanty  which  had  been 
put  in  charge  of  a  prize  crew,  while  her  much- 
needed  stores  had  been  sent  in  to  the  Pro- 
vincial army. 


THE  SEA  LINK  LOST  55 

The  French  in  Louisbourg  were  naturally 
much  discouraged  to  see  one  of  their  best 
frigates  flying  the  Union  Jack.  But  they  still 
hoped  she  might  not  really  be  the  anxiously 
expected  Vigilant.  Warren,  knowing  their 
anxiety,  determined  to  take  advantage  of  it 
at  the  first  opportunity.  He  had  not  long  to 
wait.  A  party  of  New  Englanders,  wander- 
ing too  far  inland,  were  ambushed  by  the 
French  Indians,  who  promptly  scalped  all  the 
prisoners.  Warren  immediately  sent  in  a 
formal  protest  to  du  Chambon,  with  a  cover- 
ing letter  from  the  captain  of  the  Vigilant^ 
who  willingly  testified  to  the  good  treat- 
ment he  and  his  crew  were  receiving  on  board 
the  British  men-of-war.  Warren's  messenger 
spoke  French  perfectly,  but  he  concealed 
his  knowledge  by  communicating  with  du 
Chambon  through  an  interpreter.  This  put 
the  French  off  their  guard  and  induced  them 
to  express  their  dismay  without  reserve 
when  they  read  the  news  about  the  Vigilant. 
Everything  they  said  was  of  course  reported 
back  to  V/arren,  who  immediately  passed  it 
on  to  Pepperrell. 

Warren  now  thought  the  time  had  come 
to  make  a  bold,  decisive  stroke.  He  had  just 
been  reinforced  by  two  more  frigates  out  from 


56  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

England.  Titcomb's  famous  brace  of  forty- 
two's  had  just  begun  to  hammer  in  the  North- 
West  Gate  of  Louisbourg.  PepperrelPs  lines 
of  investment  were  quite  complete.  The 
chance  was  too  tempting  to  let  slip,  especially 
as  it  was  safe  strategy  to  get  into  Louisbourg 
before  the  French  could  be  relieved  either 
by  land  or  sea.  Still,  there  was  the  Island 
Battery  to  reckon  with.  It  was  full  of  fight, 
and  it  flanked  the  narrow  entrance  in  the  most 
threatening  way.  Warren  paused  to  con- 
sider the  strength  of  this  last  outpost  of  the 
French  defences  and  called  a  council  of  war 
to  help  him.  For  once  a  council  favoured 
extreme  measures  ;  whereupon  Warren  sent 
in  word  to  Pepperrell,  asking  for  1500  Pro- 
vincials, and  proposing  a  combined  assault 
immediately.  The  plan  was  that  Warren 
should  sail  in,  past  the  Island  Battery,  and 
attack  the  harbour  face  of  Louisbourg  with 
every  soldier,  sailor,  and  ship's  gun  at  his 
disposal  ;  while  Pepperrell  carried  the  land- 
ward face  by  assault.  This  plan  might  have 
stacceeded,  though  at  considerable  loss,  if 
Pepperrell's  whole  4000  had  been  effective. 
But  as  he  then  had  1900  sick  and  wounded, 
and  600  guarding  his  rear  against  the 
rumoured  advance  of  Marin  from  Annapolis, 


THE  SEA  LINK  LOST  57 

it  was  quite  evident  that  if  he  gave  Warren 
another  1500  he  would  have  to  assault  the 
landward  face  alone.  Under  these  circum- 
stances he  very  sensibly  declined  to  co-operate 
in  the  way  Warren  had  suggested.  But  he 
offered  600  men,  both  from  his  army  and  the 
transports,  for  the  Vigilant,  whose  prize  crew 
would  thus  be  released  for  duty  aboard  their 
own  vessels.  Warren,  who  was  just  over 
forty,  replied  with  some  heat.  But  Pepperrell, 
who  was  just  under  fifty,  kept  his  temper 
admirably  and  carried  the  day. 

Warren,  however,  still  urged  Pepperrell  to 
take  some  decisive  step.  Both  fleet  and  army 
agreed  that  a  night  attack  on  the  Island 
Battery  was  the  best  alternative  to  Warren's 
impracticable  plan.  Vaughan  jumped  at  the 
idea,  hoping  to  repeat  in  another  way  his 
success  against  the  Royal  Battery.  He  pro- 
mised that,  if  he  was  given  a  free  hand,  he 
would  send  Pepperrell  the  French  flag  within 
forty-eight  hours.  But  Vaughan  was  not  to 
lead.  The  whole  attack  was  entrusted  to 
men  who  specially  volunteered  for  it,  and 
who  were  allowed  to  choose  their  own  officers. 
A  man  called  Brooks  happened  to  be  on  the 
crest  of  the  wave  of  camp  popularity  at  the 
moment ;    so  he  was  elected  colonel  for  this 


58  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

great  occasion.  The  volunteers  soon  began 
to  assemble  at  the  Royal  Battery.  But  they 
came  in  by  driblets,  and  most  of  them  were 
drunk.  The  commandant  of  the  battery 
felt  far  from  easy.  '  I  doubt  whether  strag- 
gling fellows,  three,  four,  or  seven  out  of  a 
company,  ought  to  go  on  such  service.  They 
seem  to  be  impatient  for  action.  If  there 
were  a  more  regular  appearance,  it  would 
give  me  greater  sattysf action.'  His  misgiv- 
ings were  amply  justified ;  for  the  men 
whom  Pepperrell  was  just  beginning  to  form 
into  bodies  with  some  kind  of  cohesion  were 
once  more  being  allowed  to  dissolve  into  the 
original  armed  mob. 

The  night  of  June  7  was  dark  and  calm.  A 
little  before  twelve  three  hundred  men,  wisely 
discarding  oars,  paddled  out  from  the  Royal 
Battery  and  met  another  hundred  who  came 
from  Lighthouse  Point.  The  paddles  took 
them  along  in  silence  while  they  circled  the 
island,  looking  for  the  narrow  landing-place, 
where  only  three  boats  could  go  abreast 
between  the  destroying  rocks  on  which  the 
surf  was  breaking.  Presently  they  found  the 
tiny  cove,  and  a  hundred  and  fifty  men  landed 
without  being  discovered.  But  then,  with  in- 
credible folly,  they  suddenly  announced  their 


THE  SEA  LINK  LOST       ,       59 

presence  by  giving  three  cheers.  The  French 
commandant  had  cautioned  his  garrison  to  be 
alert,  on  account  of  the  unusual  darkness ; 
and,  at  this  very  moment,  he  happened  him- 
self to  be  pacing  up  and  down  the  rampart 
overlooking  the  spot  where  the  volunteers 
were  expressing  their  satisfaction  at  having 
surprised  him  so  well. 

His  answer  was  instantaneous  and  effective. 
The  battery  *  blazed  with  cannon,  swivels, 
and  small-arms,'  which  fired  point-blank  at 
the  men  ashore  and  with  true  aim  at  the  boats 
crowded  together  round  the  narrow  landing- 
place.  Undaunted  though  undisciplined,  the 
men  ashore  rushed  at  the  walls  with  their 
scaling-ladders  and  began  the  assault.  The 
attempt  was  vain.  The  first  men  up  the 
rungs  were  shot,  stabbed,  or  cut  down.  The 
ladders  were  smashed  or  thrown  aside.  Not 
one  attacker  really  got  home.  Meanwhile  the 
leading  boats  in  the  little  cove  were  being 
knocked  into  splinters  by  the  storm  of  shot. 
The  rest  sheered  off.  None  but  the  hundred 
and  fifty  men  ashore  were  left  to  keep  up  the 
fight  with  the  garrison.  For  once  the  odds 
were  entirely  with  the  French,  who  fired  from 
under  perfect  cover,  while  the  unfortunate 
Provincials  fired  back  from  the  open  rocks. 


6o  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

This  exchange  of  shots  went  on  till  daylight, 
when  one  hundred  and  nineteen  Provincials 
surrendered  at  discretion.  Their  total  loss 
was  one  hundred  and  eighty-nine,  nearly  half 
the  force  employed. 

Despairing  Louisbourg  naturally  made  the 
most  of  this  complete  success.  The  bells  were 
rung  and  the  cannon  were  fired  to  show  the 
public  joy  and  to  put  the  best  face  on  the 
general  situation.  Du  Chambon  surpassed  him- 
self in  gross  exaggerations.  He  magnified  the 
hundred  and  fifty  men  ashore  into  a  thousand, 
and  the  two  hundred  and  fifty  afloat  into  eight 
hundred  ;  while  he  bettered  both  these  state- 
ments by  reportingthat  the  whole  eighteen  hun- 
dred had  been  destroyed  except  the  hundred 
and  nineteen  who  had  been  taken  prisoners. 

Du  Chambon 's  triumph  was  short-lived. 
The  indefatigable  Provincials  began  a  battery 
at  Lighthouse  Point,  which  commanded  the 
island  at  less  than  half  a  mile.  They  had 
seized  this  position  some  time  before  and 
called  it  Gorham's  Post,  after  the  colonel 
whose  regiment  held  it.  Fourteen  years  later 
there  was  another  and  more  famous  Gorham's 
Post,  on  the  south  shore  of  the  St  Lawrence 
near  Quebec,  opposite  Wolfe's  Cove.  The 
arming  of  this  battery  was  a  stupendous  piece 


V 


THE  SEA  LINK  LOST  6i 

of  work.  The  guns  had  to  be  taken  round  by 
sea,  out  of  range  of  the  Island  Battery,  hauled 
up  low  but  very  dangerous  cliffs,  and  then 
dragged  back  overland  another  mile  and  a 
quarter.  The  directing  officer  was  Colonel 
Gridley,  who  drew  the  official  British  maps 
and  plans  of  Louisbourg  in  1745,  and  who, 
thirty  years  later,  traced  the  American  de- 
fences on  the  slopes  of  Bunker's  Hill.  Du 
Chambon  had  attempted  to  make  an  attack 
on  Gorham's  Post  as  soon  as  it  was  estab- 
lished. His  idea  was  that  his  men  should 
follow  the  same  route  as  the  British  guns  had 
followed — that  is,  that  they  should  run  the 
gauntlet  between  the  British  fleet  and  army, 
land  well  north  of  Gorham's  Post,  and  take  it 
by  surprise  from  the  rear.  But  his  detach- 
ment, which  was  wholly  inadequate,  failed 
to  strike  its  blow,  and  was  itself  very  nearly 
cut  off  by  Warren's  guard-boats  on  its  crest- 
fallen return  to  Louisbourg. 

Gridley's  Lighthouse  Battery  soon  over- 
matched the  Island  Battery,  where  powder 
was  getting  dangerously  scarce.  Many  of 
the  French  guns  were  knocked  off  their 
mountings,  while  the  walls  were  breached. 
Finally,  the  British  bombardment  became  so 
effective  that  Frenchmen  were  seen  running 


62  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

into  the  water  to  escape  the  bursting  shells. 
It  was  now  past  the  middle  of  June,  and  the 
siege  had  lasted  more  than  a  month.  The 
circle  of  fire  was  closing  in  on  the  beleaguered 
garrison.  Their  total  effectives  had  sunk  to 
only  a  thousand  men.  This  thousand  lab- 
oured harder  in  its  losing  cause  than  might 
have  been  expected.  Perhaps  the  mutineers 
hoped  to  be  pardoned  if  they  made  a  firm 
defence.  Perhaps  the  militia  thought  they 
ought  not  to  be  outdone  by  mutineers  and 
hireling  foreigners.  But,  whatever  the  reason, 
great  efforts  were  certainly  made  to  build  up 
by  night  what  the  British  knocked  down  by 
day.  Two  could  play  at  that  game,  however, 
and  the  British  had  the  men  and  means  to 
win.  Their  western  batteries  from  the  land 
were  smashing  the  walls  into  ruins.  Their 
Royal  Battery  wrecked  the  whole  inner  water- 
front of  Louisbourg.  Breaches  were  yawning 
elsewhere.  British  fascines  were  visible  in 
large  quantities,  ready  to  fill  up  the  ditch, 
which  was  already  half  full  of  debris.  The 
French  scouts  reported  hundreds  of  scaling- 
ladders  on  the  reverse  slopes  of  the  nearest 
hillocks.  Warren's  squadron  had  just  been 
again  reinforced,  and  now  numbered  eleven 
sail,  carrying  554  guns  and  3000  men.     There 


THE  SEA  LINK  LOST  63 

was  no  sign  of  help,  by  land  or  sea,  for 
shrunken,  battered,  and  despairing  Louis- 
bourg.  Food,  ammunition,  stores  were  all 
running  out.  Moreover,  the  British  were  evi- 
dently preparing  a  joint  attack,  which  would 
result  in  putting  the  whole  garrison  to  the 
sword  if  a  formal  surrender  should  not  be 
made  in  time. 

Now  that  the  Island  Battery  had  been 
silenced  there  was  no  reason  why  Warren's 
plan  should  not  be  crowned  with  complete 
success.  Accordingly  he  arranged  with  Pep- 
perrell  to  run  in  with  the  first  fair  wind, 
at  the  head  of  the  whole  fleet,  which,  with 
the  Provincial  armed  vessels,  now  numbered 
twenty-four  sail,  carried  770  guns,  and  was 
manned  by  4000  sailors.  Half  these  men 
could  be  landed  to  attack  the  inner  water- 
front, while  Pepperrell  could  send  another 
2000  against  the  walls.  The  total  odds  against 
Louisbourg  would  thus  be  about  four  to  one 
in  men  and  over  eight  to  one  in  guns  actually 
engaged. 

But  this  threatened  assault  was  never  made. 
In  the  early  morning  of  June  27  the  non- 
combatants  in  Louisbourg  unanimously  peti- 
tioned du  Chambon  to  surrender  forthwith. 
They  crept  out  of  their  underground  dungeons 


64  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

and  gazed  with  mortal  apprehension  at  the 
overwhelming  forces  that  stood  arrayed 
against  their  crumbling  walls  and  dwindling 
garrison.  Noon  came,  and  their  worst  fears 
seemed  about  to  be  realized.  But  when  the 
drums  began  beating,  it  was  to  a  parley,  not 
to  arms.  A  sigh  of  ineffable  relief  went  up 
from  the  whole  of  Louisbourg,  and  every  eye 
followed  the  little  white  flutter  of  the  flag  of 
truce  as  it  neared  that  terrible  breaching 
battery  opposite  the  West  Gate.  A  Provin- 
cial officer  came  out  to  meet  it.  The  French 
officer  and  he  saluted.  Then  both  moved 
into  the  British  lines  and  beyond,  to  where 
Warren  and  Pepperrell  were  making  their  last 
arrangements  on  Green  Hill. 

After  a  short  consultation  the  British  leaders 
sent  in  a  joint  reply  to  say  that  du  Chambon 
could  have  till  eight  the  next  morning  to  make 
his  proposals.  These  proved  to  be  so  un- 
acceptable that  Pepperrell  refused  to  consider 
them,  and  at  once  sent  counter-proposals  of 
his  own.  Du  Chambon  had  now  no  choice 
between  annihilation  and  acceptance,  so  he 
agreed  to  surrender  Louisbourg  the  following 
day.  He  was  obliged  to  guarantee  that  none 
of  the  garrison  should  bear  arms  against  the 
British,  in  any  part  of  the  world,  for  a  whole 


THE  SEA  LINK  LOST  65 

year.  Every  one  in  Louisbourg  was  of  course 
promised  full  protection  for  both  property 
and  person.  Du  Chambon's  one  successful 
stipulation  was  that  his  troops  should  march 
out  with  the  honours  of  war,  drums  beating, 
bayonets  fixed,  and  colours  flying.  Warren 
and  Pepperrell  willingly  accorded  this  on  the 
28th  ;  and  the  formal  transfer  took  place  next 
day,  exactly  seven  weeks  since  the  first  eager 
New  Englanders  had  waded  ashore  through 
the  thundering  surf  of  Gabarus  Bay. 

The  total  losses  in  killed  and  wounded  were 
never  precisely  determined.  Each  side  mini- 
mized its  own  and  maximized  the  enemy's. 
But  as  du  Chambon  admitted  a  loss  of  one 
hundred  and  forty-five,  and  as  the  Provincials 
claimed  to  have  put  three  hundred  out  of 
action,  the  true  number  is  probably  about 
two  hundred,  or  just  over  ten  per  cent  of  the 
whole  garrison.  The  Provincials  reported 
their  own  killed,  quite  correctly,  at  a  hundred. 
The  remaining  deaths,  on  both  sides,  were  due 
to  disease.  The  Provincial  wounded  were 
never  grouped  together  in  any  official  returns. 
They  amounted  to  about  three  hundred. 
This  brings  the  total  casualties  in  Pepperrell's 
army  up  to  four  hundred  and  gives  the  same 
percentage  as  the  French.     The  highest  pro- 

G.F.  E 


66  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

portion  of  casualties  among  all  the  different 
forces  was  the  fifteen  per  cent  lost  by  the 
French  on  board  the  Vigilant  in  less  than  five 
hours'  fighting.  The  lowest  was  in  Warren's 
squadron  and  the  Provincial  Marine — about 
five  in  each.  The  loss  of  material  suffered  by 
the  French  was,  of  course,  on  quite  a  different 
scale.  Every  fortification  and  other  building 
in  Louisbourg,  with  the  remarkable  excep- 
tion of  a  single  house,  was  at  least  partly 
demolished  by  the  nine  thousand  cannon  balls 
and  six  hundred  shells  that  hit  the  target  of  a 
hundred  acres  peopled  by  four  thousand  souls. 

On  the  29th  the  French  marched  out  with 
the  honours  of  war,  laid  down  their  arms,  and 
were  put  under  guard  as  prisoners,  pending 
their  transport  to  France.  Du  Chambon 
handed  the  keys  to  Pepperrell  at  the  South 
Gate.  The  victorious  but  disgusted  Provin- 
cials marched  in  by  the  West  Gate,  and  found 
themselves  set  to  protect  the  very  houses 
that  they  had  hoped  to  plunder.  Was  it  not 
high  time  to  recoup  themselves  for  serving  as 
soldiers  at  sixpence  a  day  ?  Great  Babylon 
had  fallen,  and  ought  to  be  destroyed — of 
course,  with  due  profit  to  the  destroyers. 
There  was  a  regular  Louisbourg  legend,  current 


THE  SEA  LINK  LOST  67 

in  New  England,  that  stores  of  goods  and 
money  were  to  be  found  in  the  strong  rooms 
of  every  house.  So  we  can  understand  the 
indignation  of  men  whose  ideas  were  coloured 
by  personal  contact  with  smuggling  and 
privateering,  and  sometimes  with  downright 
piracy,  when  they  were  actually  told  off  as 
sentries  over  these  mythical  hoards  of  wealth. 
One  diarist  made  the  following  entry  immedi- 
ately after  he  had  heard  the  news :  '  Sabbath 
Day,  y^  16th  June  [Old  Style]  they  came  to 
Termes  for  us  to  enter  y^  Sitty  to  morrow,  and 
Poore  Termes  they  Bee  too.'  Another  added 
that  there  was  '  a  great  Noys  and  hubbub  a 
mongst  y^  Solders  a  bout  y^  Plunder  :  Som 
a  Cursing,  Som  a  Swarein.'  Five  days  later 
a  third  indignant  Provincial  wrote :  *  Y® 
French  keep  possession  yet,  and  we  are  forsed 
to  stand  at  their  Dores  to  gard  them.'  Another 
sympathetic  chronicler,  after  pouring  out 
the  vials  of  his  wrath  on  the  clause  which 
guaranteed  the  protection  of  French  private 
property,  lamented  that  *  by  these  means  the 
poor  souldiers  lost  all  their  hopes  and  just 
demerit  [sic]  of  plunder  promised  them.' 

While  Parson  Moody  was  preaching  a  great 
thanksgiving  sermon,  and  all  the  senior 
officers  were   among   his  congregation,   there 


68  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

was  what  responsible  officials  called  '  excessive 
stealing  in  every  part  of  the  Towne.'  Had 
this  stealing  really  been  very  *  excessive  '  no 
doubt  it  would  have  allayed  the  grumbling  in 
the  camp.  But,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  there  was 
so  little  to  steal  that  the  looters  began  to 
suspect  collusion  between  their  leaders  and 
the  French.  Another  fancied  wrong  exasper- 
ated the  Provincials  at  this  critical  time.  A 
rumour  ran  through  the  camp  that  Warren 
had  forestalled  Pepperrell  by  receiving  the 
keys  himself.  Warren  was  cursed,  Pepperrell 
blamed  ;  and  a  mutinous  spirit  arose.  Then 
it  was  suddenly  discovered  that  Pepperrell 
had  put  the  keys  in  his  pocket. 

Meanwhile  the  fleet  was  making  haul  after 
haul.  When  Pepperrell  marched  through  the 
battered  West  Gate,  at  the  head  of  his  motley 
army,  Warren  had  led  his  squadron  into  the 
harbour  ;  and  both  commanders  had  saluted 
the  raising  of  the  Union  Jack  which  marked 
the  change  of  ownership.  But  no  sooner  had 
the  sound  of  guns  and  cheering  died  away 
than  the  Union  Jack  was  lowered  and  the 
French  flag  was  raised  again,  both  over  the 
citadel  of  Louisbourg  and  over  the  Island 
Battery.  This  stratagem  succeeded  beyond 
Warren's  utmost  expectations.    Several  French 


THE  SEA  LINK  LOST  69 

vessels  were  lured  into  Louisbourg  and  cap- 
tured with  stores  and  men  enough  to  have 
kept  the  British  out  for  some  weeks  longer. 
Their  cargoes  were  worth  about  a  million 
dollars.  Then,  just  as  the  naval  men  were 
wondering  whether  their  harvest  was  over 
or  not,  a  fine  French  frigate  made  for  the 
harbour  quite  unsuspectingly,  and  only  dis- 
covered her  fatal  mistake  too  late  to  turn 
back.  By  the  irony  of  circumstances  she 
happened  to  be  called  Notre-Dame  de  la 
Delivrance.  Among  her  passengers  was  the 
distinguished  man  of  science,  Don  Antonio  de 
Ulloa,  on  his  way  to  Paris,  with  all  the  results 
of  those  explorations  in  South  America  which 
he  afterwards  embodied  in  a  famous  book  of 
travel.  Warren  treated  him  with  the  greatest 
courtesy  and  promised  that  all  his  collec- 
tions should  be  duly  forwarded  to  the  Royal 
Academy  of  Sciences.  Once  this  exchange 
of  international  amenities  had  been  ended, 
however,  the  usual  systematic  search  began. 
The  visible  cargo  was  all  cocoa.  But  hidden 
underneath  were  layers  and  layers  of  shining 
silver  dollars  from  Peru ;  and,  underneath 
this  double  million,  another  two  million  dollars* 
worth  of  ingots  of  silver  and  ingots  of  gold. 
The  contrast  between  the  poverty  of  Louis- 


70  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

bourg,  where  so  much  had  been  expected,  and 
the  rich  hauls  of  prize-money  made  by  the 
fleet,  was  gall  and  wormwood  to  the  Pro- 
vincials. But  their  resentment  was  some- 
what tempered  by  Warren's  genial  manner 
towards  them.  Warren  was  at  home  with 
all  sorts  and  conditions  of  men.  His  own 
brother-officers,  statesmen  and  courtiers,  dis- 
tinguished strangers  like  Ulloa,  and  colonial 
merchants  like  Pepperrell,  were  equally  loud 
in  his  praise.  With  the  lesser  and  much  more 
easily  offended  class  of  New  Englanders  found 
in  the  ranks  he  was  no  less  popular.  A  rousing 
speech,  in  which  he  praised  the  magnificently 
stubborn  work  accomplished  by  *  my  wife's 
fellow-countrymen,'  a  hearty  generosity  all 
round,  and  a  special  hogshead  of  the  best 
Jamaica  rum  for  the  garrison  of  the  Royal 
Battery,  won  him  a  great  deal  of  goodwill, 
in  spite  of  the  fact  that  his  *  Admiral's  eighth  * 
of  the  naval  prize-money  amounted  to  some 
sixty  thousand  pounds,  while  Pepperrell  found 
himself  ten  thousand  pounds  out  of  pocket 
at  the  end  of  the  siege. 

Pepperrell,  however,  was  a  very  rich  man, 
for  those  colonial  days  ;  and  he  could  well 
afford  to  celebrate  the  fall  of  Louisbourg  by 
giving  the  chief  naval  and  military  officers  a 


THE  SEA  LINK  LOST  71 

dinner,  the  fame  of  which  will  never  fade 
away  from  some  New  England  memories. 
Everything  went  off  without  a  hitch.  But, 
as  the  hour  approached,  there  was  a  growing 
anxiety,  on  the  part  of  both  host  and  guests, 
as  to  whether  or  not  the  redoubtable  Parson 
Moody  would  keep  them  listening  to  his  grace 
till  all  the  meats  got  cold.  He  was  well  known 
for  the  length,  as  well  as  for  the  strength,  of  his 
discourses.  He  had  once  denounced  the  Devil 
in  a  grace  of  forty  minutes.  So  what  was  the 
surprised  delight  of  his  fellow-revellers  when 
he  hardly  kept  them  standing  longer  than  as 
many  seconds.  *  Good  Lord  ! '  he  said,  *  we 
have  so  much  to  thank  Thee  for,  that  Time 
will  be  too  short.  Therefore  we  must  leave 
it  for  Eternity.  Bless  our  food  and  fellowship 
on  this  joyful  occasion,  for  the  sake  of  Christ 
our  Lord.     Amen  !  ' 

News  of  the  victory  was  sent  at  once  to 
Boston.  The  vessel  bearing  it  arrived  in  the 
middle  of  the  night.  But  long  before  the 
summer  sun  was  up  the  streets  were  filled 
with  shouts  of  triumph,  while  the  church  bells 
rang  in  peals  of  exultation,  and  all  the  guns 
and  muskets  in  the  place  were  fired  as  fast  as 
men  could  load  them. 

The    mother    country's    joy  was   less  ex- 


72  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

uberant.  There  were  so  many  other  things 
to  think  of  nearer  home  ;  among  them  the 
British  defeat  at  Fontenoy  and  the  landing  of 
the  Young  Pretender.  Nor  was  the  actual 
victory  without  alloy  ;  for  prescient  people 
feared  that  a  practically  independent  colsonial 
army  had  been  encouraged  to  become  more 
independent  still.  And  who  can  say  the  fear 
was  groundless  ?  Louisbourg  really  did  serve " 
to  blood  New  Englanders  for  Bunker's  Hill. 
But,  in  spite  of  this  one  drawback,  the  news 
was  welcomed,  partly  because  any  victory  was 
welcome  at  such  a  time,  and  partly  because 
the  fall  of  Louisbourg  was  a  signal  asser- 
tion of  British  sea-power  on  both  sides  of  the 
Atlantic. 

London  naturally  made  overmuch  of 
Warren's  share,  just  as  Boston  made  over- 
much of  Pepperreirs.  But  the  Imperial 
government  itself  perfectly  understood  that 
the  fleet  and  the  army  were  each  an  indis- 
pensable half  of  one  co-operating  whole. 
Warren  was  promoted  rear-admiral  of  the 
blue,  the  least  that  could  be  given  him. 
Pepperrell  received  much  higher  honours. 
He  was  made  a  baronet  and,  like  Shirley,  was 
given  the  colonelcy  of  a  regiment  which  was 
to  bear  his  name.     Such  *  colonelcies  '  do  not 


THE  SEA  LINK  LOST  73 

imply  the  actual  command  of  men,  but  are 
honorary  distinctions  of  which  even  kings 
and  conquerors  are  proud.  Nor  was  the 
Provincial  Marine  forgotten.  Rous,  of  the 
Shirley,  was  sent  to  England  with  dispatches, 
and  was  there  made  a  post-captain  in  the 
Royal  Navy  for  his  gallantry  in  action  against 
the  Vigilant.  He  afterwards  enjoyed  a  dis- 
tinguished career  and  died  an  admiral.  It 
was  in  his  ship,  the  Sutherland,  that  Wolfe 
wrote  the  final  orders  for  the  Battle  of  the 
Plains  fourteen  years  after  this  first  siege  of 
Louisbourg. 


CHAPTER  III 

THE  LINK  RECOVERED 
1748 

LouiSBOURG  was  the  most  thoroughly  hated 
place  in  all  America.  The  French  govern- 
ment hated  it  as  Napoleon  hated  the  Peninsula, 
because  it  was  a  drain  on  their  resources. 
The  British  government  hated  it  because  it 
cut  into  their  oversea  communications.  The 
American  colonists  hated  it  because  it  was  a 
standing  menace  to  their  ambitious  future. 
And  every  one  who  had  to  live  in  it — no 
matter  whether  he  was  French  or  British, 
European  or  American,  naval  or  military, 
private  or  official — hated  it  as  only  exiles 
can. 

But  perhaps  even  exiled  Frenchmen  de- 
tested it  less  heartily  than  the  disgusted 
Provincials  who  formed  its  garrison  from  the 
summer  of  1745  to  the  spring  of  the  following 

year.     Warren  and  Pepperrell  were  obliged  to 

74 


THE  LINK  RECOVERED  75 

spend  half  their  time  in  seeing  court-martial 
justice  done.  The  bluejackets  fretted  for 
some  home  port  in  which  to  enjoy  their 
plentiful  prize-money.  The  Provincials  fretted 
for  home  at  any  cost.  They  were  angry  at 
being  kept  on  duty  at  sixpence  a  day  after 
the  siege  was  over.  They  chafed  against  the 
rules  about  looting,  as  well  as  against  what 
they  thought  the  unjust  difference  between 
the  million  sterling  that  had  been  captured 
at  sea,  under  full  official  sanction,  and  the 
ridiculous  collection  of  odds  and  ends  that 
could  be  stolen  on  land,  at  the  risk  of  pains 
and  penalties.  Imagine  the  rage  of  the  sullen 
Puritan,  even  if  he  had  a  sense  of  humour, 
when,  after  hearing  a  bluejacket  discussing 
plans  for  spending  a  hundred  golden  guineas, 
he  had  to  make  such  entries  in  his  diary  as 
these  of  Private  Benjamin  Crafts  :  *  Saturday, 
Rec*^  a  half-pint  of  Rum  to  Drinke  y=  King's 
Health.  The  Lord  look  upon  Us  and  prepare 
us  for  His  Holy  Day.  Sunday.  Blessed  be 
the  Lord  that  has  given  us  to  enjoy  another 
Sabath.  Monday.  Last  Night  I  was  taken 
j  verry  Bad.  The  Lord  be  pleased  to  strengthen 
my  Inner  Man.  May  we  all  be  Prepared  for 
his  Holy  Will.  Rec'^  part  of  Plunder— 9  Small 
tooth  combs.* 


76  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

No  wonder  there  was  trouble  in  plenty. 
The  routine  of  a  small  and  uncongenial 
station  is  part  of  a  regular's  second  nature, 
though  a  very  disagreeable  part.  But  it 
maddens  militiamen  when  the  stir  of  active 
service  is  past  and  they  think  they  are  being 
kept  on  such  duty  overtime.  The  Massa- 
chusetts men  had  the  worst  pay  and  the  best 
ringleaders,  so  they  were  the  first  to  break 
out  openly.  One  morning  they  fell  in  with- 
out their  officers,  marched  on  to  the  general 
parade,  and  threw  their  muskets  down. 
This  was  a  dramatic  but  ineffectual  form  of 
protest,  because  nearly  all  the  muskets  were 
the  private  property  of  the  men  themselves, 
who  soon  came  back  to  take  their  favourite 
weapons  up  again.  One  of  their  most  zealous 
chaplains,  however,  was  able  to  enter  in  his 
diary,  perhaps  not  without  a  qualm,  but 
certainly  not  without  a  proper  pride  in  New 
England  spirit,  the  remark  of  a  naval  officer 
*  that  he  had  thought  the  New  England  men 
were  cowards — But  that  Now  he  thought  that 
if  they  had  a  Pick  ax  and  Spade  they  would 
digg  y®  way  to  Hell  and  storm  it.' 

The  only  relief  from  the  deadly  monotony 
and  loneliness  of  Louisbourg  v/as  to  be  found 
in  the  bad  bargains  and  worse  entertainment 


THE  LINK  RECOVERED  77 

offered  by  the  camp-followers,  who  quickly 
gathered,  like  a  flock  of  vultures,  to  pick  the 
carcass  to  the  bone.  There  were  few  pickings 
to  be  had,  but  these  human  parasites  held 
on  until  the  bones  were  bare.  Of  course, 
they  gave  an  inordinate  amount  of  trouble. 
They  always  do.  But  well-organized  armies 
keep  them  in  their  place ;  while  militiamen 
can  not. 

Between  the  camp-followers  and  the  men 
Pepperrell  was  almost  driven  mad.  He  im- 
plored Shirley  to  come  and  see  things  for  him- 
self. Shirley  came.  He  arrived  at  the  end 
of  August  accompanied  both  by  his  own  wife 
and  by  Warren's.  He  delivered  a  patriotic 
speech,  in  which  he  did  not  stint  his  praise 
of  what  had  really  been  a  great  and  not- 
able achievement.  His  peroration  called  forth 
some  genuine  enthusiasm.  It  began  with  a 
promise  to  raise  the  pay  of  the  Massachusetts 
contingent  by  fifteen  shillings  a  month,  and 
ended  with  free  rum  all  round  and  three 
cheers  for  the  king.  The  prospect  thereupon 
brightened  a  little.  The  mutineers  kept  quiet 
for  several  days,  and  a  few  men  even  agreed 
to  re-enlist  until  the  following  June.  Shirley 
was  very  much  pleased  with  the  immediate 
result,  and  still  more  pleased  with  himself. 


78  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

Kis  next  dispatch  assured  the  Duke  of 
Newcastle  that  nobody  else  could  have 
quelled  the  incipient  mutiny  so  well.  Nor 
was  the  boast,  in  one  sense,  vain,  since 
nobody  else  had  the  authority  to  raise  the 
men's  pay. 

But  discontent  again  became  rife  when  it 
began  to  dawn  on  the  Provincials  that  they 
would  have  to  garrison  Louisbourg  till  the 
next  open  season.  The  unwelcome  truth  was 
that,  except  for  a  few  raw  recruits,  no  reliefs 
were  forthcoming  from  any  quarter.  The 
promised  regulars  had  left  Gibraltar  so  late 
that  they  had  to  be  sent  to  Virginia  for  the 
winter,  lest  the  sudden  change  to  cold  and 
clammy  Louisbourg  should  put  them  on  the 
sick  list.  The  two  new  regiments,  Shirley's 
and  Pepperrell's,  which  were  to  be  recruited 
in  the  American  colonies  and  form  part  of  the 
Imperial  Army,  could  not  be  raised  in  time. 
There  even  seemed  to  be  some  doubt  as  to 
whether  they  could  be  raised  at  all.  The 
absence  of  Pepperrell  from  New  England,  the 
hatred  of  garrison  duty  in  Louisbourg,  and 
resentment  at  seeing  some  Englishmen  com- 
missioned to  command  Americans,  were  three 
great  obstacles  in  the  way.  The  only  other 
resource    was    the    colonial     militia,    whose 


THE  LINK  RECOVERED  79 

waifs  and  strays  alone  could  be  induced  to 
enlist. 

Thus,  once  the  ice  began  to  form,  the  de- 
spairing Provincial  garrison  saw  there  could 
be  no  escape.  The  only  discharge  was  death. 
What  were  then  known  as  camp  fevers  had 
already  broken  out  in  August.  As  many  as 
twenty-seven  funerals  in  a  single  day  passed 
by  the  old  lime-kiln  on  the  desola,te  point 
beyond  the  seaward  walls  of  Louisbourg. 
'  After  we  got  into  the  Towne,  a  sordid  in- 
dolence or  Sloth,  for  want  of  Discipline,  in- 
duced putrid  fevers  and  dyssentrys,  which  at 
length  became  contagious,  and  the  people  died 
like  rotten  sheep.'  Medical  men  were  ignorant 
and  few.  Proper  attendance  was  wholly  lack- 
ing. But  the  devotion  of  the  Puritan  chap- 
lains, rivalling  that  of  the  early  Jesuits,  ran 
through  those  awful  horrors  like  a  thread  of 
gold.  Here  is  a  typical  entry  of  one  day's 
pastoral  care:  *  Prayed  at  Hospital.  Prayed 
at  Citadel.  Preached  at  Grand  Batery. 
Visited  [a  long  list  of  names]  all  verry  Sick. 
[More  names]  Dy'd.  Am  but  poorly  myself, 
but  able  to  keep  about.' 

No  survivor  ever  forgot  the  miseries  of  that 
dire  winter  in  cold  and  clammy  Louisbourg. 
When  April  brought  the  Gibraltar  regiments 


8o  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

from  Virginia,  Pepperrell  sent  in  to  Shirley 
his  general  report  on  the  three  thousand  men 
with  whom  he  had  begun  the  autumn.  Barely 
one  thousand  were  fit  for  duty.  Eleven 
hundred  lay  sick  and  suffering  in  the  ghastly 
hospital.  Eight  hundred  and  ninety  lay 
buried  out  on  the  dreary  tongue  of  land 
between  the  lime-pit  and  the  fog-bound,  ice- 
encumbered  sea. 

Warren  took  over  the  command  of  all  the 
forces,  as  he  had  been  appointed  governor  of 
Louisbourg  by  the  king's  commission.  Shirley 
had  meanwhile  been  revolving  new  plans,  this 
time  for  the  complete  extirpation  of  the  French 
in  Canada  during  the  present  summer  of  1746. 
He  suggested  that  Warren  should  be  the  naval 
joint  commander,  and  Warren,  of  course,  was 
nothing  loth. 

Massachusetts  again  rose  grandly  to  the 
situation.  She  voted  3500  men,  with  a  four 
pound  sterling  bounty  to  each  one  of  them. 
New  Hampshire,  Connecticut,  and  Rhode 
Island  followed  well.  New  York  and  New 
Jersey  did  less  in  proportion.  Maryland  did 
less  still.  Virginia  would  only  pass  a  luke- 
warm vote  for  a  single  hundred  men.  Pennsyl- 
vania, as  usual,  refused  to  do  anything  at  all. 


THE  LINK  RECOVERED  8i 

The  legislature  was  under  the  control  of  the 
Quakers,  who,  when  it  came  to  war,  were  no 
better  than  parasites  upon  the  body  politic. 
They  never  objected  to  enjoying  the  com- 
mercial benefits  of  conquest ;  any  more  than 
they  objected  to  living  on  land  which  could 
never  have  been  either  won  or  held  without 
the  arms  they  reprobated.  But  their  prin- 
ciples forbade  them  to  face  either  the  danger 
or  expense  of  war.  The  honour  of  the  other 
Pennsylvanians  was,  however,  nobly  saved 
by  a  contingent  of  four  hundred,  raised  as  a 
purely  private  venture.  Altogether,  the  new 
Provincial  army  amounted  to  over  8000 
men. 

The  French  in  Canada  were  thoroughly 
alarmed.  Rumour  had  magnified  the  invad- 
ing fleet  and  army  till,  in  July,  the  Acadians 
reported  the  combined  forces,  British  regulars 
included,  at  somewhere  between  forty  and 
fifty  thousand.  But  the  alarm  proved  ground- 
less. The  regulars  were  sent  on  an  abortive 
expedition  against  the  coast  of  France,  while 
the  Duke  of  Newcastle  ordered  Shirley  to 
discharge  the  *  very  expensive  *  Provincials, 
who  were  now  in  Imperial  pay,  *  as  cheap 
as  possible.'  This  was  then  done,  to  the 
intense    disgust   of    the    colonies   concerned. 

G.F.  F 


82  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

New  York  and  Massachusetts,  however,  were 
so  loth  to  give  up  without  striking  a  single 
blow  that  they  raised  a  small  force,  on  their 
own  account,  to  take  Crown  Point  and  gain 
control  of  Lake  Champlain.^ 

Before  October  came  the  whole  of  the 
colonies  were  preparing  for  a  quiet  winter, 
except  that  it  was  to  be  preceded  by  the  little 
raid  on  Crown  Point,  when,  quite  suddenly,- 
astounding  news  arrived  from  sea.  This  was 
that  the  French  had  sent  out  a  regular  armada 
to  retake  Louisbourg  and  harry  the  coast  to 
the  south.  Every  ship  brought  in  further 
and  still  more  alarming  particulars.  The 
usual  exaggerations  gained  the  usual  credence. 
But  the  real  force,  if  properly  handled  and 
combined,  was  dangerous  enough.  It  con- 
sisted of  fourteen  sail  of  the  line  and  twenty- 
one  frigates,  with  transports  carrying  over 
three  thousand  veteran  troops  ;  altogether, 
about  17,000  men,  or  more  than  twice  as 
many  as  those  in  the  contingents  lately  raised 
for  taking  Canada. 

New  York  and  Massachusetts  at  once  re- 
called their  Crown  Point  expeditions.  Boston 
was  garrisoned  by  8000  men.     All  the  pro- 

^  An  account  of  this  expedition  will  be  found  in  chapter  ii  of 
The  War  Chief  of  the  Six  Nations  in  this  Series. 


THE  LINK  RECOVERED  83 

vinces  did  their  well-scared  best.  There  was 
no  danger  except  along  the  coast ;  for  there 
were  enough  armed  men  to  have  simply 
mobbed  to  death  any  three  thousand  French- 
men who  marched  into  the  hostile  continent, 
which  would  engulf  them  if  they  lost  touch 
with  the  fleet,  and  wear  them  out  if  they  kept 
communications  open.  Those  who  knew  any- 
thing of  war  knew  this  perfectly  well ;  and 
they  more  than  half  suspected  that  the  French 
force  had  been  doubled  or  trebled  by  the  panic- 
mongers.  But  the  panic  spread,  and  spread 
inland,  for  all  that.  No  British  country  had 
ever  been  so  thoroughly  alarmed  since  England 
had  watched  the  Great  Armada  sailing  up  the 
Channel. 

The  poets  and  preachers  quickly  changed 
their  tune.  Ames's  Almanac  for  1746  had 
recently  edified  Bostonians  with  a  song  of 
triumph  over  fallen  Louisbourg  : 

Bright  Hesperus,  the  Harbinger  of  Day, 
Smiled  gently  down  on  Shirley's  prosperous  sway, 
The  Prince  of  Light  rode  in  his  burning  car, 
To  see  the  overtures  of  Peace  and  War 
Around  the  world,  and  bade  his  charioteer. 
Who  marks  the  periods  of  each  month  and  year. 
Rein  in  his  steeds,  and  rest  upon  High  Noon 
To  view  our  Victory  over  Cape  Brittoon. 

But  now  the  Reverend  Thomas  Prince's  litany, 


84  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

rliyined  by  ;i  \n\ri  b.-iid,  suninu'd  up  tJic  gist 
of  all  the  supplications  that  ascended  ironi  the 
Puritans  : 

O  I-oifl !  Wr  woiilfl  not  advise  ; 
itiit  \l,  III  Tliy  I 'lovKtriirt", 
A   I  ♦•iiipcst  blioiild  aiirtc, 
'!'«)  (iiivf  tlif  I'ii-ikIi  (IciI  Ik'hcc, 
And  HI wiili-i  il  (ni  and  wtilf, 
Or  HJnlc  il  ill  tlic  fica, 

'VJv  •illoiiM  l)f  -wil  I'ifiril, 
And   1  Jnni-  tin-  Gloiy  \>r.. 

Strange  to  say,  this  pious  snp:p:oRl:ion  had 
been  mostly  nn  5;  wo  rod  before  it  h.id  been 
made.  Disaster  aitei  disaster  fell  upon  the 
doomed  French  fleet  from  the  vcjy  d.iy  it 
sailed.  The  admiral  was  the  Due  d'Anville, 
one  of  the  illnsfiions  La  Rochefoucaulds, 
whose  family  ii.ime  is  known  wherever  French 
is  read.  He  w.f.  noi  wantinj^  either  in  courage 
or  good  sense;  hiil,  like  his  fleet,  he  had  liltle 
experioiK  «  .il  mm.  I  Ik-  l-rench  ships,  as  usual, 
wero  1)1  ll«  I  than  the  British.  Ihit  the  French 
tlioms«*lvo'.  w«i<'  .1  ii.ilion  of  landsmen.  Tlu'y 
had  no  k'*  •"'  *  ^'^^^  oi  seamen  to  draw  upon  .it 
will,  a  I.K  I  wliii  11  iii.MJr  .III  avoia^'c  I'loiioh 
crew  inirijoi  to  an  avoi.ifM-  Ihilish  one.  1  his 
was  bad  enough.  Ihit  the  most  important 
poinl  of  all  was  lliat  their  fleets  were  still 
worse   than   their   single   ships.     The   British 


'WW:    IfNI-:    kl.r,f)VI-.RJiI> 


«s 


ui  '  oiMl)in«-fl  iri.i (IT 1 1 vf  <■•..  I  lir  I'irn'li  IijhI 
n'>l   ;     /iii'l,    in     i.\<  c    <>\     ffir     I'ntl^.h    r  onini;itirl 

«jf  fllf-  -if;!,  fliry  foiiM  tif»f  li.ivr  Hirjji.  'Mm 
f'irri'l)  li.ii  hoill  •.  VJfJf  waf'hf'l  •;<>  i  \n^r\\f 
Ul.if  f(l<  I'fffl'll  firrf-;  wrjf-  offrti  ;lfhl»hrfl 
iinf)     »|rfc-.ifrf|     f>rff»fr-    lljry    |i.i<|     |)r(.M|fi     ff»     Ir.irjJ 

h'»w    J'>    w')ih     f 'if-'/Mif-f  .       (  otr.t 'I  I  K-nf  ly ,     Mit-y 

(')ilti'l      if      •Jill      li.ir'I't       \<>      linifr      \vju     'llffrirjit 

Jlrrl;^  .if.^.ijn';f  \\\fn  .ilin'i-.f  ii(>i'|  iiif  riii*;  rnrniy. 
I  >'An  villf-'*.  (»r ')f>lff  fi  vji\r;  unoliifilf  fioni  tlir; 
htiiil.  roui  );i;f.^«-  Mit  ri  '»f  y/.ii  froni  Jfir  \Nf";\: 
lli'll*";  y/rtr  fo  jf>jn  Jiirri  .if  (  hlfiiir  fo  fliiy,  HOW 
1  (if  fi.irf*»)iif  of  Flitlif.i;-,  iitJ'lf-r  A'linir;il  (.r)n- 
fl.itr.,  Mif  •..itri«-  y/(i')  y/.r.  »|<ff.ift'l  [>y  M.'iwhf!- 
Ill  Oiii(>t-f'>n  I'.iy  t}iiiff-n  yt-.ir-;  l.ifrf^  f>n  ffir; 
v«-r  y    '1.1  y    th.'if    V/olff-    y/.r;    f<iin<-'l  f.i'fi    'oii- 

trif>iif')ry  p.irf  iA  \\\r-  yj<-.\\  f'r«n'(i  ti.iVii) 
pi. in  f.iiN'l  1/1  fhr  •//')!  1'.  inj-^  <)ilt.  I  >' A  n  Vlllr '^: 
foinin.m'l  y/.r.  .i  <<A\'-<\\<t\\  u\  -.fiip^^  nof  .i  '.<>- 
*(i 'hri.i  f  f'l     fl«  <  f  I  he-     f'rrri'fi     A<  >'  U '/ .\i  A'.    Ii.i'i 

bmi    n»-f.^l«'  f»'l   \      \'t    -jinit-     ')f     ftif'    *;})j|)'.    y/rrq 

l;lf<-,       y/fll'   ll       tri.i'lf       it        Hf  I  [(')•.•;!  |>)f-       f'J       [>f.i'fr;f! 

ffi.tfi'r  iivr  f;  \tf\>nr  -..i  ih  r  if.;  f'li  tli«-  fi'int  I  litfi, 
in  ^  \\f  [  >i  I  n  f.^  1 1  n  f-^  1 1 1 1  r  r  y  '  >  f  f  i  M  i  n  l'  ' )  i  i  f  ^  f  ( i  <-  }  1 1 1 1 1  -; 
nf  '.'-v-r.tl  vf •-.*.«■  ]■.  vjtt'  Nft  fnitl,  y/fii'  fi  in.i'l'' 
Uirni  flnJI  -..nlf-r-.  ;  v/}iilf  n«-.irly  .ill  ffir.  }i<,M-, 
wcic   l':ft   uij%' oii/f fj^   wliicji,  oi  '.oll;^.r:,   iiclped 


86  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

to  propagate  the  fevers,  scurvy,  plague,  and 
pestilence  brought  on  by  bad  food  badly 
stowed.  Nor  was  this  all.  Officers  who  had 
put  in  so  little  sea  time  with  working  fleets 
were  naturally  slack  and  inclined  to  be  dis- 
contented. The  fact  that  they  were  under 
sealed  orders,  which  had  been  communicated 
only  to  d'Anville,  roused  their  suspicions ; 
while  his  weakness  in  telling  them  they  were 
bound  for  Louisbourg  almost  produced  a 
mutiny. 

The  fleet  left  France  at  midsummer,  had  a 
very  rough  passage  through  the  Bay  of 
Biscay,  and  ran  into  a  long,  dead  calm  off 
the  Azores.  This  ended  in  a  storm,  during 
which  several  vessels  were  struck  by  light- 
ning, which,  in  one  case,  caused  a  magazine 
explosion  that  killed  and  wounded  over 
thirty  men.  It  was  not  till  the  last  week 
of  September  that  d'Anville  made  the  excel- 
lently safe  harbour  of  Halifax.  The  four 
ships  under  Conflans  were  nowhere  to  be 
seen.  They  had  reached  the  rendezvous  at 
the  beginning  of  the  month,  had  cruised  about 
for  a  couple  of  weeks,  and  had  then  gone 
home.  D'Anville  was  now  in  no  position  to 
attack  Louisbourg,  much  less  New  England. 
Some    of    his   vessels   were    quite  unservice- 


THE  LINK  RECOVERED  87 

able.  There  was  no  friendly  port  nearer  than 
Quebec.  All  his  crews  were  sickly ;  and  the 
five  months'  incessant  and  ever-increasing 
strain  had  changed  him  into  a  broken-hearted 
man.  He  died  very  suddenly,  in  the  middle 
of  the  night  ;  some  said  from  a  stroke  of 
apoplexy,  while  others  whispered  suicide. 

His  successor,  d'Estournel,  summoned  a 
council  of  war,  which  overruled  the  plan  for 
an  immediate  return  to  France.  Presently  a 
thud,  followed  by  groans  of  mortal  agony,  was 
heard  in  the  new  commander's  cabin.  The 
door  was  burst  open,  and  he  was  found  dying 
from  the  thrust  of  his  own  sword.  La  Jon- 
quiere,  afterwards  governor-general  of  Canada, 
thereupon  succeeded  d'Estournel.  This  com- 
mander, the  third  within  three  days,  was  an 
excellent  naval  officer  and  a  man  of  strong 
character.  He  at  once  set  to  work  to  re- 
organize the  fleet.  But  reorganization  was 
now  impossible.  Storms  wrecked  the  vessels. 
The  plague  killed  off  the  men :  nearly  three 
thousand  had  died  already.  Only  a  single 
thousand,  one-tenth  of  the  survivors,  were 
really  fit  for  duty.  Yet  La  Jonquiere  still 
persisted  in  sailing  for  Annapolis.  One  vessel 
was  burned,  while  four  others  were  turned  into 
hospital  ships,  which  trailed  astern,  dropping 


88  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

their  dead  overside,  hour  after  hour,  as  they 
went. 

But  Annapolis  was  never  attacked.  The 
dying  fleet  turned  back  and  at  last  reached 
Port  Louis,  on  the  coast  of  Brittany.  There 
it  found  La  Palme,  a  frigate  long  since  given 
up  for  lost,  lying  at  anchor,  after  a  series  of 
adventures  that  seem  wellnigh  impossible. 
First  her  crew's  rations  had  been  cut  down 
to  three  ounces  a  day.  Then  the  starving 
men  had  eaten  all  the  rats  in  her  filthy  hold  ; 
and  when  rats  failed  they  had  proposed  to 
eat  their  five  British  prisoners.  The  captain 
did  his  best  to  prevent  this  crowning  horror. 
But  the  men,  who  were  now  ungovernable, 
had  already  gone  below  to  cut  up  one  prisoner 
into  three  -  ounce  rations,  when  they  were 
brought  on  deck  again,  just  in  time,  by  the 
welcome  cry  of  sail-ho !  The  Portuguese 
stranger  fortunately  proved  to  have  some 
sheep,  which  were  instantly  killed  and  eaten 
raw. 

News  of  these  disasters  to  the  French  arms 
at  length  reached  the  anxious  British  colonies. 
The  militia  were  soon  discharged.  The  danger 
seemed  past.  And  the  whole  population  spent 
a  merrier  Christmas  than  any  one  of  them  had 
dared  to  hope  for. 


THE  LINK  RECOVERED  89 

In  May  of  the  next  year,  1747,  La  Jonquiere 
again  sailed  for  Louisbourg.  But  when  he 
was  only  four  days  out  he  was  overtaken  off 
Cape  Finisterre  by  a  superior  British  fleet, 
under  Anson  and  Warren,  and  was  totally 
defeated,  after  a  brave  resistance. 

In  1748  the  Treaty  of  Aix-la-Chapelle  gave 
Louisbourg  back  to  the  French.  The  British 
colonies  were  furious.  New  England  par- 
ticularly so.  But  the  war  at  large  had  not 
gone  severely  enough  against  the  French  to 
force  them  to  abandon  a  stronghold  en  which 
they  had  set  their  hearts,  and  for  which  they 
were  ready  to  give  up  any  fair  equivalent. 
The  contemporary  colonial  sneer,  often  re- 
peated since,  and  quite  commonly  believed, 
was  that  '  the  important  island  of  Cape  Breton 
was  exchanged  for  a  petty  factory  in  India.' 
This  was  not  the  case.  Every  power  was 
weary  of  the  war.  But  France  was  ready  to 
go  on  with  it  rather  than  give  up  her  last  sea 
link  with  Canada.  Unless  this  one  point  was 
conceded  the  whole  British  Empire  would 
have  been  involved  in  another  vast,  and 
perhaps  quite  barren,  campaign.  The  only 
choice  the  British  negotiators  could  apparently 
make  was  a  choice  between  two  evils.  And 
of  the  two  they  chose  the  less. 


CHAPTER  IV 

LOST  FOR   EVER 
1758 

The  ten  years  of  the  second  French  regime 
in  Louisbourg  were  divided  into  very  differ- 
ent halves.  During  the  first  five  years,  from 
1749  to  1753,  the  mighty  rivals  were  as  much 
at  peace,  all  over  their  conflicting  frontiers, 
as  they  ever  had  been  in  the  past.  But  from 
1754  to  1758  a  great  and,  this  time,  a  decisive 
war  kept  drawing  continually  nearer,  until  its 
strangling  coils  at  last  crushed  Louisbourg  to 
death. 

Three  significant  events  marked  1749,  the 
first  of  the  five  peaceful  years.  Louisbourg 
was  handed  over  to  its  new  French  garrison ; 
the  British  founded  Halifax  ;  and  the  Imperial 
government  indemnified  New  England  in  full 
for  the  siege  of  1745.  Halifax  was  intended 
partly  as  a  counterpoise  to  Louisbourg,  and 
partly  as  a  place-d' armes  for  one  of  the  two 
local   footholds   of   British   sea-power,    Nova 

90 


LOST  FOR  EVER  91 

cotia  and  Newfoundland,  which,  between 
lem,  narrowed  the  French  Hne  of  communi- 
ition  with  Canada  into  a  single  precarious 
;rait.  The  New  England  indemnity  was 
leant,  in  the  first  instance,  to  be  a  payment 
)r  service  done.  But  it  was  also  intended 
)  soften  colonial  resentment  at  the  giving 
p  of  Louisbourg.  A  specially  gracious  royal 
lessage  was  sent  to  *  The  Council  and  Assem- 
ly '  of  Massachusetts,  assuring  them,  *  in 
[is  Majesty's  name,  that  their  conduct  will 
Iways  entitle  them,  in  a  particular  manner, 
)  his  Royal  favour  and  protection.'  This 
lessage,  however,  did  not  reconcile  the  Pro- 
incial  army  to  the  disappointment  of  their 
svn  expectations.  Nor  did  it  dispose  the 
Dlonies  in  general  to  be  any  the  more  amen- 
ble  to  government  from  London.  They 
mply  regarded  the  indemnity  as  the  skinflint 
ayment  of  an  overdue  debt,  and  the  message 
3  no  more  than  the  thanks  they  had  well 
eserved.  But  the  money  was  extremely 
elcome  to  people  who  would  have  been 
ankrupt  without  it.  Nearly  a  quarter  of  a 
lillion  sterling  was  sent  out  in  217  cases  of 
panish  dollars  and  100  barrels  of  coppers, 
hich  were  driven  through  the  streets  of 
oston  in  27  trucks. 


92  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

The  next  three  years  in  Louisbourg  were 
completely  uneventful.  The  town  resumed 
its  former  life,  but  in  a  still  more  makeshift 
fashion.  Nobody  knew  how  long  the  truce 
would  last ;  and  nobody  wanted  to  take  root 
commercially  in  a  place  that  might  experience 
another  violent  change  at  any  time.  Never- 
theless, smuggling  flourished  as  vigorously  as 
before.  British  shipping  did  most  of  it. 
Many  vessels  came  from  England,  many  from 
Boston,  some,  and  very  active  ones,  from  Hali- 
fax. Joshua  Mauger  smuggled  from  France 
to  Louisbourg,  from  Louisbourg  to  *  Mauger's 
Beach  '  near  Halifax,  and  from  Halifax  all 
over  Acadia  and  the  adjacent  colonies.  He 
also  supplied  the  Micmacs  with  scalping-knives 
and  tomahawks  for  use  against  his  own 
countrymen.  He  died,  a  very  rich  man,  in 
England,  leaving  his  fortune  to  his  daughter, 
who,  with  her  spendthrift  husband,  the  Due 
de  Bouillon,  was  guillotined  during  the  French 
Revolution. 

The  officials  were  naturally  affected  by  the 
same  uncertainty,  which  made  them  more  than 
ever  determined  to  get  rich  and  go  home. 
The  intendant  Bigot  was  promoted  to  Quebec, 
there  to  assist  his  country's  enemies  by  the 
worst  corruption  ever  known  in  Canada.     But 


LOST  FOR  EVER  93 

he  new  intendant,  Prevost,  though  a  man  of 
ery  inferior  talent,  did  his  best  to  follow 
Jigot's  lead. 

French  regulars  still  regarded  the  Louis- 
ourg  routine  as  their  most  disgusting  duty. 
Jut  it  became  more  tolerable  with  the  increase 
f  the  garrison.  The  fortifications  were  exam- 
led,  reported  on,  repaired,  and  extended, 
'he  engineers,  like  all  the  other  Frenchmen 
onnected  with  unhappy  Louisbourg,  Bigot 
lone  excepted,  were  second-  and  third-rate 
len  ;  and  the  actual  work  was  done  as  badly 
s  before.  But,  on  the  whole,  the  place  was 
trengthened,  especially  by  a  battery  near 
he  lighthouse.  With  this  and  the  island 
{attery,  one  on  either  side  of  the  narrow 
ntrance,  which  the  Royal  Battery  faced 
irectly,  almost  a  hundred  guns  could  be 
rought  to  bear  on  any  vessels  trying  to  force 
heir  way  in. 

The  end  of  the  five  years'  truce  was  marked 
y  voluminous  reports  and  elaborate  argu- 
lents  to  prove  how  well  Louisbourg  was 
eing  governed,  how  admirably  the  fortifica- 
ions  had  been  attended  to  (with  the  inade- 
uate  means  at  the  intendant's  disposal),  and 
ow  desirable  it  was,  from  every  point  of  view, 
or  the  king  to  spend  a  great  deal  more  money 


94  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

all  round  in  the  immediate  future.  Fisheries, 
shipbuilding,  fortification,  Indians,  trade,  re- 
ligion, the  naval  and  military  situation,  were 
all  represented  as  only  needing  more  money 
to  become  quite  perfect.  Louisbourg  was 
correctly  enough  described  as  an  indispensable 
link  between  France  and  the  long  chain  of 
French  posts  in  the  valleys  of  the  Mississippi 
and  the  St  Lawrence.  But  less  well  explained 
in  America  and  less  well  understood  in  Europe 
was  the  fact  that  the  separate  military  chains 
in  Old  France  and  New  could  never  hold  an 
oversea  dominion  unless  a  naval  chain  united 
them.  Some  few  Frenchmen  understood  this 
thoroughly.  But  most  did  not.  And  France, 
as  a  whole,  hoped  that  a  vigorous  offensive 
on  land  would  more  than  counterbalance 
whatever  she  might  lose  by  an  enforced  defen- 
sive on  the  sea. 

In  1754  Washington's  first  shot  beyond  the 
Alleghanies  broke  the  hollow  truce  between 
the  French  and  British  colonies,  whose  lines 
of  expansion  had  once  more  inevitably  crossed 
each  other's  path.  This  proved  to  be  the 
beginning  of  the  last '  French  and  Indian  War  ' 
in  American  history,  of  that  *  British  Con- 
quest of  Canada  '  which  formed  part  of  what 


LOST  FOR  EVER  95 

contemporary  Englishmen  called  the  *  Mari- 
time War,'  and  of  that  great  military  struggle 
which  continental  Europe  called  the  *  Seven 
Years'  War.' 

The  year  1755  saw  Braddock's  Defeat  in 
the  west,  the  battle  of  Lake  George  in  the 
centre,  and  two  pregnant  events  in  the  east, 
one  on  either  side  of  Louisbourg — the  expul- 
sion of  the  Acadians,  and  the  capture  by 
Boscawen  of  two  French  men-of-war  with 
several  hundred  soldiers  who  were  to  reinforce 
the  army  that  was  soon  to  be  commanded  by 
Montcalm. 

The  next  year,  1756,  saw  the  formal  declara- 
tion of  war  in  Europe,  its  continued  prosecu- 
tion in  America,  and  the  taking  of  Oswego, 
which  was  the  first  of  Montcalm's  four  victories 
against  the  overwhelming  British.  But  Louis- 
bourg still  remained  untouched. 

Not  till  1757  was  the  first  attempt  made  to 
break  this  last  sea  link  with  France.  There 
was  a  very  natural  anxiety,  among  the  British 
on  both  sides  of  the  Atlantic,  to  do  conspicu- 
ously well  against  Louisbourg.  Fort  Neces- 
sity, Braddock's  Defeat,  and  Montcalm's 
daring  capture  of  Oswego,  coming  with  cumu- 
lative effect,  in  three  successive  campaigns, 


96  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

had  created  a  feeling  of  bitter  disappointment 
in  America  ;  while  the  Black  Hole  of  Calcutta, 
the  loss  of  Minorca,  and,  worse  still,  Byng's 
failure  to  bring  a  British  fleet  into  decisive 
action,  had  wounded  the  national  pride  in 
England. 

But  1757  turned  out  to  be  no  better  than 
its  disconcerting  predecessors.  True,  Eng- 
land's ally,  Frederick  the  Great,  won  consum- 
mate victories  at  Rossbach  and  at  Leuthen, 
But  that  was  at  the  end  of  a  very  desperate 
campaign.  True,  also,  that  Clive  won  Plassey 
and  took  Chandernagore.  But  those  were  far 
away  from  English-speaking  homes ;  while 
heavy  reverses  close  at  hand  brought  down 
the  adverse  balance.  Pitt,  the  greatest  of  all 
civilian  ministers  of  War,  was  dismissed  from 
office  and  not  reinstated  till  the  British 
Empire  had  been  without  a  cabinet  for  eleven 
weeks.  The  French  overran  the  whole  of 
Hanover  and  rounded  up  the  Duke  of  Cumber- 
land at  Kloster-Seven.  Mordaunt  and  his 
pettifogging  councils  of  war  turned  the  joint 
expedition  against  Rochefort  into  a  complete 
fiasco  ;  while  Montcalm  again  defeated  the 
British  in  America  by  taking  Fort  William 
Henry. 

The  taking  of  Louisbourg  would  have  been 


LOST  FOR  EVER  97 

a  very  welcome  victory  in  the  midst  of  so 
much  gloom.  But  the  British  were  engaged 
in  party  strife  at  home.  They  were  disunited 
in  America.  And  neither  the  naval  nor  the 
military  leader  of  the  joint  expedition  against 
Louisbourg  was  the  proper  man  to  act  either 
alone  or  with  his  colleague.  Speed  was  of 
prime  importance.  Yet  Admiral  Holbourne 
did  not  sail  from  England  for  Halifax  till  May. 
General  the  Earl  of  Loudoun  was  slower  yet. 
He  drew  in  the  troops  from  the  northern  fron- 
tier, concentrated  them  in  New  York,  and 
laid  an  embargo  on  shipping  to  keep  a  secret 
which  was  already  out.  Finally,  he  and  Sir 
Charles  Hardy  sailed  for  Halifax  to  keep 
their  rendezvous  with  Holbourne,  from  whom 
no  news  had  come.  They  arrived  there  before 
him  ;  but  his  fleet  came  limping  in  during 
the  next  ten  days,  after  a  bad  buffeting  on  its 
transatlantic  voyage. 

Loudoun  now  had  nearly  12,000  men,  whom 
he  landed  and  drilled  throughout  July.  His 
preparations  were  so  meticulously  careful 
that  they  even  included  a  vegetable  garden, 
which,  though  an  excellent  precaution  in  its 
own  way,  ought  to  have  been  left  to  the  com- 
mandant of  the  base.  So  thought  Sir  Charles 
Hay,  who  was  put  under  arrest  for  saying 


G.F. 


98  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

that  all  the  money  was  being  spent  in  fighting 
sham  battles  and  planting  out  cabbages. 
However,  a  reconnaissance  of  Louisbourg  had 
been  made  by  Gorham  of  the  Rangers,  whose 
very  imperfect  report  induced  Holbourne  and 
Loudoun  to  get  ready  to  sail.  But,  just  as 
they  were  preparing  to  begin,  too  late,  a  New- 
foundland vessel  came  in  with  captured  French 
dispatches  which  showed  that  Admiral  La 
Motte  had  united  his  three  squadrons  in  Louis- 
bourg harbour,  where  he  was  at  anchor  with 
twenty-two  ships  of  the  line  and  several 
frigates,  the  whole  carrying  1360  guns.  This 
was  correct.  But  the  garrison  was  exagger- 
ated by  at  least  a  third  in  the  same  dispatch, 
which  estimated  it  as  numbering  over  7000 
men. 

The  lateness  of  the  season,  the  strength 
of  the  French,  and  the  practical  certainty  of 
failing  to  take  Louisbourg  by  forcing  the 
attack  home  at  any  cost,  were  very  sensibly 
held,  under  existing  circumstances,  to  be 
sufficient  cause  for  withdrawing  the  army. 
The  fleet,  however,  sailed  north,  in  the  hope 
of  inducing  La  Motte  to  come  out  for  a  battle 
in  the  open.  But,  at  that  particular  junc- 
ture, La  Motte  was  right  not  to  risk  decisive 
action.     A  week  later  he  was  equally  wrong 


LOST  FOR  EVER  99 

to  refuse  it.  Holbourne's  fleet  had  been  dis- 
persed by  a  September  hurricane  of  extra- 
ordinary violence.  One  ship  became  a  total 
Arreck.  Nine  were  dismasted.  Several  had 
:o  throw  their  guns  overboard.  None  was 
it  for  immediate  service.  But  La  Motte  did 
lot  even  reconnoitre,  much  less  annihilate, 
lis  helpless  enemy. 

Pitt  returned  to  power  at  the  end  of  June 
^757>  in  time  to  plan  a  world-wide  campaign 
or  1758,  though  not  in  time  to  choose  the  best 
;ommanders  and  to  change  the  whole  course 
)f  the  war.  This  became  possible  only  in  the 
impire  Year  of  1759.  The  English-speaking 
)eoples  have  nearly  always  begun  their  great 
vars  badly,  and  have  gradually  worked  up  to 
L  climax  of  victory  after  being  stung  into 
)roper  leadership  and  organization  by  several 
xasperating  failures  ;  and  though  now  in  the 
hird  year  of  their  most  momentous  struggle 
or  oversea  dominion,  they  were  not  even  yet 
Itogether  prepared. 

Nevertheless,  Pitt  wielded  the  amphibious 
[light  of  Britain  with  a  master  hand.  Sea- 
lower,  mercantile  and  naval,  enabled  him  to 
command  the  riches  of  the  world '  and 
lecome    the   paymaster    of    many    thousand 


100  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

Prussians  under  Frederick  the  Great  and 
Ferdinand  of  Brunswick.  He  also  sent  a 
small  British  army  to  the  Continent.  But 
he  devoted  his  chief  attention  to  working  out 
a  phase  of  the  '  Maritime  War  '  which  in- 
cluded India  on  one  flank  and  the  Canadian 
frontiers  on  the  other.  Sometimes  with,  and 
sometimes  without,  a  contingent  from  the 
Army,  the  British  Navy  checkmated,  isolated, 
or  defeated  the  French  in  Europe,  Asia,  Africa, 
and  America. 

The  preliminary  isolation  of  Louisbourg  was 
a  particularly  effective  stroke  of  naval  strategy. 
Even  before  1758  began  the  first  French  fleet 
that  left  for  Louisbourg  had  been  shadowed 
from  Toulon  and  had  been  shut  up  in  Car- 
tagena. A  second  French  fleet  was  then 
sent  to  help  the  first  one  out.  But  it  was 
attacked  on  the  way  and  totally  defeated.  In 
April  the  first  fleet  made  another  attempt  to 
sail ;  but  it  was  chased  into  Rochefort  by 
Hawke  and  put  out  of  action  for  the  rest  of 
the  campaign.  The  third  French  fleet  did 
manage  to  reach  Louisbourg.  But  its  admiral, 
du  Chaffault,  rightly  fearing  annihilation  in 
the  harbour  there,  and  wishing  to  keep  some 
touch  between  Old  France  and  New,  sailed  for^ 
Quebec  with  most  of  his  best  ships. 


LOST  FOR  EVER  loi 

Quebec  and  the  rest  of  Canada  were  them- 
selves on  the  defensive  ;  for  Abercromby  was 
leading  15,000  men — the  largest  single  army 
America  had  ever  seen — straight  up  the  line 
3f  Lake  Champlain.  Montcalm  defeated  him 
it  Ticonderoga  in  July.  But  that  gave  no 
relief  to  Louisbourg  ;  because  the  total  British 
iorces  threatening  the  Canadian  inland  fron- 
tier were  still  quite  strong  enough  to  keep  the 
French  on  the  strict  defensive. 

Thus  Louisbourg  was  completely  isolated, 
DOth  by  land  and  sea.  It  was  stronger  and 
Tiore  extensive  than  during  the  first  siege, 
[t  had  a  better  governor,  Drucour,  a  better 
md  a  larger  garrison,  more  food  and  ammuni- 
:ion,  and,  what  it  formerly  lacked  altogether, 
:he  support  of  a  considerable  fleet.  Drucour 
Nas  a  gallant  soldier.  His  garrison  numbered 
learly  3000  effective  regulars,  with  about 
[000  militiamen  and  some  500  Indians.  Seven- 
teen mortars  and  over  two  hundred  cannon 
jvere  mounted  on  the  walls,  as  well  as  on  the 
Dutworks  at  the  Royal,  Island,  and  Light- 
bouse  Batteries.  There  were  thirteen  vessels 
in  the  fleet,  mounting  590  guns,  and  carrying 
3ver  3500  men.  This  made  the  French  grand 
total  about  800  guns  and  8000  men.     But  not 


102  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

all  these  were  really  effective.  Ships  at 
anchor  lose  a  good  deal  of  their  fighting  value. 
Crews  are  less  efficient  when  ashore  than  when 
they  are  afloat ;  and  the  French  ships  were 
mostly  fought  at  anchor,  while  the  crews 
were  gradually  landed  for  the  defence  of  the 
crowded  little  town.  Then,  the  Indians  were 
comparatively  useless  in  a  fort.  The  militia 
were  not  good  soldiers  anywhere.  Moreover, 
the  three  kinds  of  regulars — French,  Canadian, 
and  foreign — did  not  get  on  very  well  to- 
gether ;  while  the  fleet,  as  a  whole,  got  on  no 
better  with  the  army  as  a  whole. 

The  British  amphibious  force  presented  a 
striking  contrast  to  this.  Its  naval  and 
military  parts  worked  together  like  the  two 
branches  of  one  United  Service.  The  Army 
and  Navy  naturally  understood  each  other 
better  than  the  two  services  of  less  amphibious 
countries  ;  and  when  a  statesman  like  Pitt 
and  a  first  lord  of  the  Admiralty  like  Anson 
were  together  at  headquarters  there  was  no 
excuse  for  misunderstandings  at  the  front. 
Boscawen  and  Amherst,  both  distinguished 
members  of  distinguished  Service  families, 
were  the  best  of  colleagues.  Boscawen  had 
somewhat  over,  Amherst  a  little  under,  12,000 
men.     Boscawen's    fleet    comprised    39  sail, 


EDWARD  BOSCAWEN 
From  the  paiiitins;  \,y  Sir  Joshua  Rcvnolds 


LOST  FOR  EVER  103 

from  a  90-gun  ship  of  the  line  down  to  a 
i2-gun  sloop.  The  British  grand  total  there- 
fore exceeded  Drucour's  by  over  three  to  one, 
counting  mere  numbers  alone.  If  expert  effi- 
ciency be  taken,  for  the  sake  of  a  more  exact 
comparison,  it  is  not  too  much  to  say  that  the 
odds  in  favour  of  the  British  personnel  and 
armament  were  really  four  to  one. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  French  had  the  walls 
of  Louisbourg  to  redress  the  balance  in  their 
favour.  These  walls  were  the  crucial  factor  in 
the  problem.  Both  sides  knew  they  were  far 
from  being  impregnable.  But  how  long  could 
they  withstand  a  regular  siege  ?  If  for  only 
one  month,  then  they  were  useless  as  a  pro- 
tection to  Quebec.  If  for  two  months,  then 
Quebec  and  New  France  were  safe  until  the 
following  year. 

Boscawen  left  England  in  February.  Am- 
herst followed  separately.  One  of  the  three 
brigadier  -  generals  in  Amherst's  army  was 
Wolfe,  of  whom  we  shall  hear  more  pre- 
sently. The  rendezvous  was  Halifax,  where 
boat  work  and  landing  exercises  were  sedu- 
lously carried  out  by  the  troops.  Towards 
the  end  of  May  Boscawen  sailed  out  of  Halifax, 
though  Amherst  had  not  yet  arrived.     They 


104  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

met  at  sea.  The  Dublin^  which  had  brought 
Amherst  across  so  slowly,  then  *  went  very- 
sickly  into  Halifax,'  while  Amherst  joined 
Boscawen,  and  the  whole  fleet  and  convoy 
bore  away  for  Louisbourg.  The  French  had 
been  expecting  them  for  at  least  a  month ; 
as  scouts  kept  appearing  almost  every  day, 
while  Hardy's  squadron  of  nine  sail  had  been 
maintaining  a  sort  of  open  blockade. 

On  the  night  of  June  i  the  French  look-outs 
in  Gabarus  Bay  saw  more  lights  than  usual 
to  the  southward.  Next  morning  Louisbourg 
was  early  astir,  anxiously  eager  to  catch  the 
first  glimpse  of  this  great  destroying  armada, 
which  for  several  expectant  hours  lay  in- 
visible and  dread  behind  a  curtain  of  dense 
fog.  Then  a  light  sea  breeze  came  in  from 
the  Atlantic.  The  curtain  drew  back  at  its 
touch.  And  there,  in  one  white,  enormous 
crescent,  all  round  the  deep-blue  offing,  stood 
the  mighty  fleet,  closing  in  for  the  final  death- 
grip  on  its  prey. 

Nearly  a  whole  week  went  by  before  the 
British  landed.  Each  day  the  scouting  boats 
and  vessels  stood  in  as  close  as  possible  along 
the  shore.  But  they  always  found  the  smash- 
ing surf  too  high.     At  last,  on  the  8th,  the 


LOST  FOR  EVER  105 

whole  army  put  off  in  three  brigades  of  boats, 
supported  by  the  frigates,  which  fired  at  the 
French  defences.  All  three  landing-places 
were  threatened  simultaneously,  White  Point, 
Flat  Point,  and  Kennington  Cove.  These 
landing-places  were,  respectively,  one,  two, 
and  four  miles  west  of  Louisbourg.  The  in- 
tervening ground  mostly  hid  them  from  the 
ramparts,  and  they  had  to  depend  upon  their 
own  defences.  Drucour  had  sent  out  two- 
thirds  of  his  garrison  to  oppose  the  landing. 
Each  point  was  protected  by  artillery  and  en- 
trenchments. Eight  guns  were  mounted  and 
a  thousand  men  stood  guard  over  the  quarter- 
mile  of  beach  which  lay  between  the  two 
little  surf-lashed  promontories  of  Kennington 
Cove.  But  Wolfe's  brigade  made  straight 
for  shore.  The  French  held  their  fire  until 
the  leading  boats  were  well  within  short 
musket-shot.  Then  they  began  so  furiously 
that  Wolfe,  whose  tall,  lank  figure  was  most 
conspicuous  as  he  stood  up  in  the  stern- 
sheets,  waved  his  cane  to  make  the  boats 
sheer  off. 

It  looked  as  if  the  first  successful  landing 
would  have  to  be  made  elsewhere,  a  bitter 
disappointment  to  this  young  and  ardent 
brigadier,  whose  command  included  the  pick 


io6  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

of  the  grenadiers,  light  infantry,  and  High- 
landers. But  three  boatloads  of  light  in- 
fantry pushed  on  against  the  inner  point  of 
the  cove.  Perhaps  their  officers  turned  their 
blind  eye  on  Wolfe's  signal,  as  Nelson  did  on 
Parker's  recall  at  Copenhagen.  But,  what- 
ever the  reason,  these  three  boats  went  in 
smash  against  the  rocks  and  put  their  men 
ashore,  drenched  to  the  skin.  Major  Scott; 
commanding  the  light  infantry  and  rangers, 
followed  them  at  once.  Then  Wolfe,  seeing 
they  had  gained  a  foothold  where  the  point 
afforded  them  a  little  cover,  signalled  the 
whole  brigade  to  land  there  in  succession. 
He  pushed  his  own  boat  through,  jumped  in 
waist-deep,  and  waded  ashore. 

This  sudden  change,  quite  unexpected  by 
either  friend  or  foe,  greatly  disconcerted  the 
French.  They  attacked  Major  Scott,  who 
withstood  them  with  a  handful  of  men  till 
reinforcements  came  clambering  up  the  rocks 
behind  him.  With  these  reinforcements  came 
Wolfe,  who  formed  the  men  into  line  and 
carried  the  nearest  battery  with  the  bayonet. 
The  remaining  French,  seeing  that  Wolfe  had 
effected  a  lodgment  on  their  inner  flank,  were 
so  afraid  of  being  cut  off  from  Louisbourg 
that  they  ran  back  and  round  towards  the 


LOST  FOR  EVER  107 

next  position  at  Flat  Point.  But  before  they 
reached  it  they  saw  its  own  defenders  running 
back,  because  the  British  were  also  landing  at 
White  Point.  Here  too  the  defences  were 
abandoned  as  soon  as  the  little  garrison  found 
itself  faced  by  greatly  superior  numbers  afloat 
and  deserted  by  its  fellow-garrisons  ashore. 
The  retreating  French  kept  up  a  sort  of  run- 
ning fight  till  they  got  under  the  covering 
fire  of  Louisbourg,  when  the  pursuing  British 
immediately  drew  off. 

Considering  the  number  of  boats  that  were 
stove  and  the  intensity  of  the  first  French 
fire,  the  British  loss  was  remarkably  small, 
only  one  hundred  and  nine  killed,  wounded, 
and  drowned.  The  French  loss  was  still 
less  ;  but,  in  view  of  the  difference  between 
the  respective  grand  totals,  it  was  a  good  deal 
heavier  in  proportion. 

That  night  the  glare  of  a  big  fire  inside  the 
harbour  showed  that  Drucour  felt  too  weak 
to  hold  the  Royal  Battery.  Unlike  his  in- 
competent predecessor,  however,  he  took  away 
everything  movable  that  could  be  turned  to 
good  account  in  Louisbourg  ;  and  he  left  the 
works  a  useless  ruin.  The  following  day  he 
destroyed  and  abandoned  the  battery  at  Light- 
house   Point.     Thus   two   fortifications   were 


io8  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

given  up,  one  of  them  for  the  second  time, 
before  a  single  shot  had  been  fired  either  from 
or  against  them.  Time,  labour,  and  expense 
had  all  gone  for  worse  than  nothing,  as  the 
positions  were  at  once  used  by  the  enemy  on 
each  occasion.  The  wasted  expense  was  of 
the  usual  kind — one  half  spent  on  inferior 
construction,  the  other  pocketed  by  the  Louis- 
bourg  officials.  Drucour  himself  was  not  at 
all  to  blame,  either  for  the  way  the  works 
were  built  or  the  way  in  which  they  had  to  be 
abandoned.  With  odds  of  more  than  three 
to  one  against  him,  he  had  no  men  to  spare  for 
trying  to  keep  the  British  at  arm's  length. 

Amherst  pitched  his  camp  in  a  crescent  two 
miles  long,  facing  Louisbourg  two  miles  off. 
His  left  overlooked  the  French  squadron  in 
the  south-west  harbour  next  to  Louisbourg 
at  the  distance  of  a  mile.  His  right  rested  on 
Flat  Point.  Thus  Louisbourg  itself  was  en- 
tirely surrounded  both  by  land  and  sea  ;  for 
the  gaps  left  at  the  Royal  Battery  and  Light- 
house Point  were  immediately  seized  by  the 
British.  Wolfe  marched  round  the  harbour 
on  the  1 2th  with  1300  infantry  and  a  strong 
detachment  of  artillery.  The  guns  for  the 
Royal  Battery  and  other  points  inside  the 
harbour  were  hauled  into  place  by  teams  of 


■ 

■P 

^^^K' '';f!s^H 

H 

%  Jl^l 

H 

B 

^^^^^^BL'w^  '**' 

^^M 

^^p^ 

^^^jj^^^^^^H 

^H 

^^^H 

^^■b^^^H 

^^^H 

H 

^^^^^^^^^^^B^^^a  fl^^HK^^I 

^^^^^V  -  '•/,  "T^^^H 

^H 

'-.tffrl^^^HB 

H 

Bk^L^'^'^H 

-J;^ 

^H|| 

^^^^^HDP^O^ff!?!i^ 

'^^^^HbkX            V  ^^^1 

Pfl^^H 

^^^^^^^^^Bi^- 

Ki 

JAMKS  WOLFK 
I'Voni  tin*  painting  by  Iliglimore 


LOST  FOR  EVER  109 

about  a  hundred  men  each.  Those  for  Light- 
house Point  were  sent  round  by  sea,  landed, 
with  immense  difficulty,  more  than  a  mile 
distant  on  the  rock-bound  shore,  hauled  up 
the  cliff,  and  then  dragged  back  over  the 
roughest  of  ground  to  the  battery.  It  was, 
in  fact,  a  repetition  of  what  the  American 
militiamen  had  done  in  1745.  Wolfe  worked 
incessantly,  directing  and  encouraging  his  toil- 
ing men.  The  bluejackets  seconded  his  efforts 
by  doing  even  harder  work.  Their  boats  were 
often  stove,  and  a  catamaran  was  wrecked 
with  a  brass  twenty-four  pounder  on  board. 
But  nothing  could  stop  the  perfect  co-opera- 
tion between  the  two  halves  of  the  single 
United  Service.  *  The  Admiral  and  General,' 
wrote  Wolfe,  '  have  carried  on  the  public 
service  with  great  harmony,  industry,  and 
union.  Mr  Boscawen  has  given  all,  and  even 
more  than  we  could  ask  of  him.  He  has 
furnished  arms  and  ammunition,  pioneers, 
sappers,  miners,  gunners,  carpenters,  and 
boats.' 

While  Wolfe  was  doing  his  eight  days'  work 
of  preparation  at  the  Lighthouse  Battery, 
between  the  12th  and  the  20th,  Amherst, 
whose  favourite  precept  was  *  slow  and  sure,' 
was  performing  an  even  more  arduous  task 


no  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

by  building  a  road  from  Flat  Point  to  where 
he  intended  to  make  his  trenches.  This  road 
meandered  over  the  least  bad  line  that  could 
be  found  in  that  country  of  alternate  rock, 
bog,  sand,  scrub,  bush,  and  marshy  ponds. 
The  working  party  was  always  a  thousand 
strong,  and  shifts,  of  course,  were  constant. 
Boscawen  landed  marines  to  man  the  works 
along  the  shore,  and  bluejackets  for  any  handy- 
man's job  required.  This  proved  of  great 
advantage  to  the  army,  which  had  so  many 
more  men  set  free  for  other  duties.  The  land- 
ing of  stores  went  on  from  sunrise  to  sunset, 
whenever  the  pounding  surf  calmed  down 
enough.  Landing  the  guns  was,  of  course, 
much  harder  still.  It  accounted  for  most  of 
the  hundred  boats  that  were  dashed  to  pieces 
against  that  devouring  shore. 

Thorough  and  persistent  as  this  work  was, 
however,  it  gave  the  garrison  of  Louisbourg 
little  outward  sign  of  what  was  happening  just 
beyond  the  knolls  and  hillocks.  Besides,  just 
at  this  time,  when  there  was  a  lull  before  the 
storm  that  was  soon  to  burst  from  Wolfe  and 
Amherst,  both  sides  had  more  dramatic  things 
to  catch  the  general  eye.  First,  there  was  the 
worthy  namesake  of  *  the  saucy  Arethusa  '  in 


LOST  FOR  EVER  iii 

the  rival  British  Navy,  the  Arethuse,  whose 
daring  and  skilful  captain,  Vauquelin,  had 
moored  her  beside  the  Barachois,  or  sea-pond, 
so  that  he  could  outflank  Amherst's  approach 
against  the  right  land  face  of  Louisbourg. 
Then,  of  still  more  immediate  interest  was  the 
nimble  little  Echo,  which  tried  to  run  the 
gauntlet  of  the  British  fleet  on  June  i8,  a  day 
long  afterwards  made  famous  on  the  field  of 
Waterloo.  Drucour  had  entrusted  his  wife 
and  several  other  ladies  to  the  captain  of  the 
EchOy  who  was  to  make  a  dash  for  Quebec  with 
dispatches  for  the  governor  of  Canada.  A 
muffling  fog  shut  down  and  seemed  to  promise 
her  safety  from  the  British,  though  it  brought 
added  danger  from  that  wrecking  coast. 
With  infinite  precautions  she  slipped  out  on 
the  ebb,  between  the  French  at  the  Island 
Battery  and  Wolfe's  strenuous  workers  at  the 
Lighthouse  Point.  But  the  breeze  that  bore 
her  north  also  raised  the  fog  enough  to  let  the 
Juno  and  Sutherland  sight  her  and  give  chase. 
She  crowded  on  a  press  of  sail  till  she  was 
overhauled,  when  she  fought  her  captors  till 
her  case  was  hopeless. 

Madame  Drucour  and  the  other  ladies  were 
then  sent  back  to  Louisbourg  with  every 
possible  consideration  for  their  feelings.     This 


112  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

act  of  kindness  was  remembered  later  on, 
when  a  regular  interlude  of  courtesies  followed 
Drucour's  offer  to  send  his  own  particularly 
skilful  surgeon  to  any  wounded  British  officer 
who  might  need  his  services.  Amherst  sent 
in  several  letters  and  messages  from  wounded 
Frenchmen,  and  a  special  message  from  him- 
self to  Madame  Drucour,  complimenting  her 
upon  her  bravery,  and  begging  her  acceptance 
of  some  West  Indian  pineapples.  Once  more 
the  flag  of  truce  came  out,  this  time  to  return 
the  compliment  with  a  basket  of  wine.  As 
the  gate  swung  to,  the  cannon  roared  again 
on  either  side.  Amherst's  was  no  unmerited 
compliment ;  for  Madame  Drucour  used  to 
mount  the  ramparts  every  day,  no  matter 
what  the  danger  was,  and  fire  three  cannon  for 
the  honour  of  her  king.  But  the  French  had 
no  monopoly  in  woman's  work.  True,  there 
were  no  officers'  wives  to  play  the  heroine  on 
the  British  side.  But  there  were  others  to 
play  a  humbler  part,  and  play  it  well.  In 
those  days  each  ship  or  regiment  bore  a  cer- 
tain proportion  of  women  on  their  books  for 
laundering  and  other  work  which  is  still  done, 
at  their  own  option,  by  women  *  married  on 
the  strength '  of  the  Army.  Most  of  the 
several  hundred  women  in  the  besieging  fleet 


LOST  FOR  EVER  113 

and  army  became  so  keen  to  see  the  batteries 
armed  that  they  volunteered  to  team  the 
guns,  which,  in  some  cases,  they  actually  did, 
with  excellent  effect. 

By  June  26  Louisbourg  had  no  defences  left 
beyond  its  own  walls,  except  the  reduced 
French  squadron  huddled  together  in  the 
south-west  harbour.  The  more  exposed  ships 
had  come  down  on  the  2ist,  after  a  day's 
bombardment  from  Wolfe's  terrific  battery  at 
Lighthouse  Point :  *  they  in  return  making 
an  Infernall  Fire  from  all  their  Broadsides  ; 
but,  wonderfull  to  think  of,  no  harm  done  us.' 
Five  days  later  every  single  gun  in  the  Island 
Battery  was  dumb.  At  the  same  time 
Amherst  occupied  Green  Hill,  directly  opposite 
the  citadel  and  only  half  a  mile  away.  Yet 
Drucour,  with  dauntless  resolution,  resisted 
for  another  month.  His  object  was  not  to 
save  his  own  doomed  fortress  but  Quebec. 

He  needed  all  his  resolution.  The  British 
were  pressing  him  on  every  side,  determined 
to  end  the  siege  in  time  to  transfer  their 
force  elsewhere.  Louisbourg  itself  was  visibly 
weakening.  The  walls  were  already  crumb- 
ling under  Amherst's  converging  fire,  though 
the    British    attack   had    not   yet    begun   in 

G.F.  H 


114  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

earnest.  Surely,  thoroughly,  and  with  an 
irresistible  zeal,  the  besiegers  had  built  their 
road,  dragged  up  their  guns,  and  begun  to 
worm  their  way  forward,  under  skilfully  con- 
structed cover,  towards  the  right  land  face  of 
Louisbourg,  next  to  the  south-west  harbour, 
where  the  ground  was  less  boggy  than  on  the 
left.  The  French  ships  fired  on  the  British 
approaches  ;  but,  with  one  notable  exception, 
not  effectively,  because  some  of  them  masked 
others,  while  they  were  all  under  British  fire 
themselves,  both  from  the  Lighthouse  and  the 
Royal  Batteries,  as  well  as  from  smaller 
batteries  along  the  harbour.  Vauquelin,  who 
shares  with  Iberville  the  honour  of  being  the 
naval  hero  of  New  France,  was  the  one  excep- 
tion. He  fought  the  Arethuse  so  splendidly 
that  he  hampered  the  British  left  attack 
long  enough  to  give  Louisbourg  a  comparative 
respite  for  a  few  hasty  repairs. 

But  nothing  could  now  resist  Boscawen  if 
the  British  should  choose  to  run  in  past  the 
demolished  Island  Battery  and  attack  the 
French  fleet,  first  from  a  distance,  with  the 
help  of  the  Lighthouse  and  Royal  Batteries, 
and  then  hand-to-hand.  So  the  French 
admiral,  des  Gouttes,  agreed  to  sink  four  of 
his  largest  vessels  in  the  fairway.     This,  how- 


LOST  FOR  EVER  115 

ever,  still  left  a  gap  ;  so  two  more  were  sunk. 
The  passage  was  then  mistakenly  reported  to 
be  safely  closed.  The  crews,  two  thousand 
strong,  were  landed  and  camped  along  the 
streets.  This  caused  outspoken  annoyance 
to  the  army  and  to  the  inhabitants,  who 
thought  the  crews  had  not  shown  fight  enough 
afloat,  who  consequently  thought  them  of 
little  use  ashore,  who  found  them  in  the  way, 
and  who  feared  they  had  come  in  without 
bringing  a  proper  contribution  of  provisions 
to  the  common  stock. 

The  Arethuse  was  presently  withdrawn 
from  her  perilous  berth  next  to  the  British 
left  approach,  as  she  was  the  only  frigate  left 
which  seemed  to  have  a  chance  of  running  the 
gauntlet  of  Boscawen's  fleet.  Her  shot-holes 
were  carefully  stopped  ;  and  on  the  night  of 
July  14  she  was  silently  towed  to  the  harbour 
mouth,  whence  she  sailed  for  France  with 
dispatches  from  Drucour  and  des  Gouttes. 
The  fog  held  dense,  but  the  wind  was  light, 
and  she  could  hardly  forge  ahead  under  every 
stitch  of  canvas.  All  round  her  the  lights  of 
the  British  fleet  and  convoy  rose  and  fell  with 
the  heaving  rollers,  like  little  embers  blurring 
through  the  mist.  Yet  Vauquelin  took  his 
dark  and  silent  way  quite  safely,  in  and  out 


ii6  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

between  them,  and  reached  France  just  after 
Louisbourg  had  fallen. 

Meanwhile  Drucour  had  made  several  sorties 
against  the  British  front,  while  Boishebert 
had  attacked  their  rear  with  a  few  hundred 
Indians,  Acadians,  and  Canadians.  Bois- 
hebert's  attack  was  simply  brushed  aside  by 
the  rearguard  of  Amherst's  overwhelming 
force.  The  American  Rangers  ought  to  have" 
defeated  it  themselves,  without  the  aid  of 
regulars.  But  they  were  not  the  same  sort 
of  men  as  those  who  had  besieged  Louisbourg 
thirteen  years  before.  The  best  had  volun- 
teered then.  The  worst  had  been  enlisted 
now.  Of  course,  there  were  a  few  good  men 
with  some  turn  for  soldiering.  But  most 
were  of  the  wastrel  and  wharf-rat  kind. 
Wolfe  expressed  his  opinion  of  them  in  very 
vigorous  terms :  '  About  500  Rangers  are 
come,  which,  to  appearance,  are  little  better 
than  la  canaille.  These  Americans  are  in 
general  the  dirtiest,  most  contemptible,  cow- 
ardly dogs  that  you  can  conceive.  There  is 
no  depending  upon  'em  in  action.  They  fall 
down  dead  in  their  own  dirt,  and  desert  by 
battalions,  officers  and  all.* 

Drucour's  sorties,  made  by  good  French 
regulars,  were  much  more  serious  than  Bois- 


LOST  FOR  EVER  117 

hebert's  feeble,  irregular  attack.  On  the  night 
of  July  8,  while  Montcalm's  Ticonderogan 
heroes  were  resting  on  their  hard-won  field 
a  thousand  miles  inland,  Drucour's  best  troops 
crept  out  unseen  and  charged  the  British 
right.  Lord  Dundonald  and  several  of  his 
men  were  killed,  while  the  rest  were  driven 
back  to  the  second  approach,  where  desperate 
work  was  done  with  the  bayonet  in  the 
dark.  But  Wolfe  commanded  that  part  of 
the  line,  and  his  supports  were  under  arms 
in  a  moment.  The  French  attack  had  broken 
up  into  a  score  of  little  rough-and-tumble 
fights — bayonets,  butts,  and  swords  all  at  it ; 
friend  and  foe  mixed  up  in  wild  confusion. 
So  the  first  properly  formed  troops  carried  all 
before  them.  The  knots  of  struggling  com- 
batants separated  into  French  and  British. 
The  French  fell  back  on  their  defences.  Their 
friends  inside  fired  on  the  British ;  and 
Wolfe,  having  regained  his  ground,  retired 
in  the  same  good  order  on  his  lines. 

A  week  later  Wolfe  suddenly  dashed  for- 
ward on  the  British  left  and  seized  Gallows 
Hill,  within  a  musket-shot  of  the  French  right 
bastion.  Here  his  men  dug  hard  all  night 
long,  in  spite  of  the  fierce  fire  kept  up  on 
them  at  point-blank  range.     In  the  morning 


ii8  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

reliefs  marched  in,  and  the  digging  still  con- 
tinued. Sappers,  miners,  and  infantry  reliefs, 
they  never  stopped  till  they  had  burrowed 
forward  another  hundred  yards,  and  the  last 
great  breaching  battery  had  opened  its  annihi- 
lating fire.  By  the  21st  both  sides  saw  that 
the  end  was  near,  so  far  as  the  walls  were 
concerned. 

But  it  was  not  only  the  walls  that  were 
failing.  For,  that  very  afternoon  of  the  21st, 
a  British  seaman  gunner's  cleverly  planted 
bomb  found  out  a  French  ship's  magazine, 
exploded  it  with  shattering  force,  and  set  fire 
to  the  ships  on  either  side.  All  three  blazed 
furiously.  The  crews  ran  to  quarters  and 
did  their  best.  But  all  to  no  purpose.  Mean- 
while the  British  batteries  had  turned  every 
available  gun  on  the  conflagration,  so  as  to 
prevent  the  French  from  saving  anything. 
Between  the  roaring  flames,  the  bursting  shells, 
and  the  whizzing  cannon  balls,  the  three 
doomed  vessels  soon  became  an  inferno  too 
hot  for  men  to  stay  in.  The  crews  swarmed 
over  the  side  and  escaped ;  not,  however, 
without  losing  a  good  many  of  their  number. 
Then  the  British  concentrated  on  the  only 
two  remaining  vessels,  the  Prudent  and  the 
Bienfaisant.     But   the    French   sailors,   with 


LOST  FOR  EVER  119 

admirable  pluck  and  judgment,  managed  to 
haul  them  round  to  a  safer  berth. 

Next  day  a  similar  disaster  befell  the  Louis- 
bourg  headquarters.  A  shell  went  through 
the  roof  of  the  barracks  at  the  King's  Bastion, 
burst  among  the  men  there,  and  set  the  whole 
place  on  fire.  As  the  first  tongues  of  flame 
shot  up  the  British  concentrated  on  them. 
The  French  ran  to  the  threatened  spot  and 
worked  hard,  in  spite  of  the  storm  of  British 
shot  and  shell.  But  nothing  was  saved,  ex- 
cept Drucour's  own  quarters.  During  the 
confusion  the  wind  blew  some  burning  debris 
against  the  timbers  which  protected  the 
nearest  casemates  from  exploding  shells.  An 
alarm  was  raised  among  the  women  and 
children  inside.  A  panic  followed  ;  and  the 
civilians  of  both  sexes  had  their  nerves  so 
shaken  that  they  thought  of  nothing  but 
surrender  on  the  spot. 

Hardly  had  this  excitement  been  allayed 
when  the  main  barracks  themselves  caught 
fire.  Fortunately  they  had  been  cleared  when 
the  other  fire  had  shown  how  imminent  the 
danger  was  to  every  structure  along  the  walls. 
The  barracks  were  in  special  danger  of  fire, 
for  they  had  been  left  with  the  same  wooden 
roof  which  the  New  Englanders  had  put  on 


120  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

thirteen  years  before.  Again  the  British  guns 
converged  their  devastating  fire  on  the  point 
of  danger,  and  the  whole  place  was  burned  to 
the  ground. 

Most  of  the  troops  were  now  deprived  of  all 
shelter.  They  had  no  choice  but  to  share  the 
streets  with  a  still  larger  number  of  sailors 
than  those  to  whom  they  had  formerly  ob- 
jected. Yet  they  had  scarcely  tried  to  settle, 
down  and  make  the  best  of  it  before  another 
batch  of  sailors  came  crowding  in  from  the 
last  of  the  whole  French  fleet.  At  one  o'clock 
in  the  morning  of  July  25  a  rousing  British 
cheer  from  the  harbour  had  announced  an 
attack  on  the  Prudent  and  the  Bienfaisant  by 
six  hundred  bluejackets,  who  had  stolen  in, 
with  muffled  oars,  just  on  the  stroke  of  mid- 
night. Presently  the  sound  of  fighting  died 
away,  and  all  was  still.  At  first  the  nearest 
gunners  on  the  walls  had  lost  their  heads  and 
begun  blazing  away  at  random.  But  they 
were  soon  stopped ;  and  neither  side  dared 
fire,  not  knowing  whom  the  shots  might  kill. 
Then,  as  the  escaping  French  came  in  to  the 
walls,  a  bright  glare  told  that  the  Prudent 
was  on  fire.  She  had  cut  her  cable  during  the 
fight  and  was  lying,  hopelessly  stranded,  right 
under  the   inner  walls  of   Louisbourg.     The 


LOST  FOR  EVER  121 

Bienfaisant,  however,  though  now  assailed  by 
every  gun  the  French  could  bring  to  bear,  was 
towed  off  to  a  snug  berth  beside  the  Light- 
house Battery,  the  British  bluejackets  showing 
the  same  disregard  of  danger  as  their  gallant 
enemies  had  shown  on  the  21st,  when  towing 
her  to  safety  in  the  opposite  direction. 

At  daylight  Drucour  made  a  thorough 
inspection  of  the  walls,  while  the  only  four 
serviceable  cannon  left  fired  slowly  on,  as  if 
for  the  funeral  of  Louisbourg.  The  British 
looked  stronger  than  ever,  and  so  close  in  that 
their  sharpshooters  could  pick  off  the  French 
gunners  from  the  foot  of  the  glacis.  The  best 
of  the  French  diarists  made  this  despairing 
entry  :  '  Not  a  house  in  the  whole  place  but 
has  felt  the  force  of  their  cannonade.  Between 
yesterday  morning  and  seven  o'clock  to-night 
from  a  thousand  to  twelve  hundred  shells  have 
fallen  inside  the  town,  while  at  least  forty 
cannon  have  been  firing  incessantly  as  well. 
The  surgeons  have  to  run  at  many  a  cry  of 
^Ware  Shell!  for  fear  lest  they  should  share 
the  patients'  fate.'  Amherst  had  offered  to 
spare  the  island  or  any  one  of  the  French 
ships  if  Drucour  would  put  his  hospital  in 
either  place.  But,  for  some  unexplained 
reason,  Drucour  declined  the  offer  ;    though 


122  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

Amherst  pointed  out  that  no  spot  within  so 
small  a  target  as  Louisbourg  itself  could  pos- 
sibly be  made  immune  by  any  gunners  in  the 
world. 

Reduced  to  the  last  extremity,  the  French 
council  of  war  decided  to  ask  for  terms. 
Boscawen  and  Amherst  replied  that  the  whole 
garrison  must  surrender  in  an  hour.  Drucour 
sent  back  to  beg  for  better  terms.  But  the 
second  British  answer  was  even  sterner — 
complete  surrender,  yes  or  no,  in  half  an  hour. 
Resentment  still  ran  high  against  the  French 
for  the  massacre  at  Fort  William  Henry  the 
year  before.  The  actual  massacre  had  been 
the  work  of  drunken  Indians.  The  Canadians 
present  had  looked  on.  The  French,  headed 
by  Montcalm,  had  risked  their  lives  to  save 
the  prisoners.  But  such  distinctions  had  been 
blotted  out  in  the  general  rage  among  the 
British  on  both  sides  of  the  Atlantic  ;  and 
so  Louisbourg  was  now  made  the  scapegoat. 

Drucour  at  once  wrote  back  to  say  that  he 
stood  by  his  first  proposal,  which  meant,  of 
course,  that  he  was  ready  to  face  the  storming 
of  his  works  and  no  quarter  for  his  garrison. 
His  flag  of  truce  started  off  with  this  de- 
fiance. But  Prevost  the  intendant,  with  other 
civilians,  now  came  forward,  on  behalf  of  the 


LOST  FOR  EVER  123 

inhabitants,  to  beg  for  immediate  surrender 
on  any  terms,  rather  than  that  they  should 
all  be  exposed  to  the  perils  of  assault.  Drucour 
then  gave  way,  and  sent  an  officer  running 
after  the  defiant  flag  of  truce.  As  soon  as 
this  second  messenger  got  outside  the  walls 
he  called  out,  at  the  top  of  his  voice,  *  We 
accept !  We  accept !  '  He  then  caught  up 
to  the  bearer  of  the  flag  of  truce,  when  both 
went  straight  on  to  British  headquarters. 

Boscawen  and  Amherst  were  quite  prepared 
for  either  surrender  or  assault.  The  storming 
parties  had  their  scaling-ladders  ready.  The 
Forlorn  Hopes  had  been  told  off  to  lead  the 
different  columns.  Every  gun  was  loaded, 
afloat  and  ashore.  The  fleet  were  waiting 
for  the  signal  to  file  in  and  turn  a  thousand 
cannon  against  the  walls.  Nothing  was  lack- 
ing for  complete  success.  On  the  other  hand, 
their  terms  were  also  ready  waiting.  The 
garrison  was  to  be  sent  to  England  as  prisoners 
of  war.  The  whole  of  Louisbourg,  Cape 
Breton,  and  Isle  St  Jean  (now  Prince  Edward 
Island)  were  to  be  surrendered  immediately, 
with  all  the  public  property  they  contained. 
The  West  Gate  was  to  be  handed  over  to  a 
British  guard  at  eight  the  next  morning ; 
and  the  French  arms  were  to  be  laid  down 


124  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

for  good  at  noon.  With  this  document  the 
British  commanders  sent  in  the  following 
note : 

Sir, — ^We  have  the  honour  to  send  Your 
Excellency  the  signed  articles  of  Capitula- 
tion. 

Lieutenant     Colonel     d '  Anthony    has    ^ 
spoken   on   behalf   of   the   people   in   the 
town.     We  have  no  intention  of  molest- 
ing them  ;     but  shall  give  them  all  the 
protection  in  our  power. 

Your  Excellency  will  kindly  sign  the  • 
duplicate  of  the  terms  and  send  it  back  t 
to  us. 

It  only  remains  for  us  to  assure  Your 
Excellency  that  we  shall  seize  every  oppor- 
tunity of  convincing  you  that  we  are,  with 
the  most  perfect  consideration,  Your  Excel- 
lency's most  Obedient  Servants, 

E.  BOSCAWEN. 

J.  Amherst. 

No  terms  were  offered  either  to  the  Indians 
or  to  the  armed  Canadians,  on  account  of 
Fort  William  Henry  ;  and  it  is  certain  that 
all  these  would  have  been  put  to  the  sword, 
to  the  very  last  man,  had  Drucour  decided  to 
stand  an  assault.     To  the  relief  of  every  one 


LOST  FOR  EVER  125 

concerned  the  Indians  paddled  off  quietly 
during  the  night,  which  luckily  happened  to 
be  unusually  dark  and  calm.  The  Canadians 
either  followed  them  or  mingled  with  the 
unarmed  inhabitants.  This  awkward  problem 
therefore  solved  itself. 

Few  went  to  bed  that  last  French  night  in 
Louisbourg.  All  responsible  officials  were  busy 
with  duties,  reports,  and  general  superintend- 
ence. The  townsfolk  and  soldiery  were  rest- 
less and  inclined  to  drown  their  humiliation 
in  the  many  little  cabarets,  which  stood  open 
all  night.  A  very  different  place,  the  parish 
church,  was  also  kept  open,  and  for  a  very 
different  purpose.  Many  hasty  marriages  were 
performed,  partly  from  a  wholly  groundless 
fear  of  British  licence,  and  partly  because  those 
who  wished  to  remain  in  Cape  Breton  thought 
they  would  not  be  allowed  to  do  so  unless  they 
were  married. 

Precisely  at  eight  the  next  morning  Major 
Farquhar  drew  up  his  grenadiers  in  front  of 
the  West  Gate,  which  was  immediately  sur- 
rendered to  him.  No  one  but  the  officers 
concerned  witnessed  this  first  ceremony.  But 
the  whole  population  thronged  every  point  of 
vantage  round  the  Esplanade  to  see  the  formal 
surrender  at  noon.     All  the  British  admirals 


126  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

and  generals  were  present  on  parade  as 
Drucour  stepped  forward,  saluted,  and  handed 
his  sword  to  Boscawen.  His  officers  followed 
his  example.  Then  the  troops  laid  down 
their  arms,  in  the  ranks  as  they  stood,  many- 
dashing  down  their  muskets  with  a  muttered 
curse. 

The  French — naval,  military,  and  civilian 
— were  soon  embarked.  The  curse  of  Louis- 
bourg  followed  most  of  them,  in  one  form  or 
another.  The  combatants  were  coldly  re- 
ceived when  they  eventually  returned  to 
France,  in  spite  of  their  gallant  defence,  and 
in  spite  of  their  having  saved  Quebec  for  that 
campaign.  Several  hundreds  of  the  inhabi- 
tants were  shipwrecked  and  drowned.  One 
transport  was  abandoned  off  the  coast  of 
Prince  Edwa  d  Island,  with  the  loss  of  two 
hundred  lives.  Another  sprang  a  leak  as  she 
was  nearing  England  ;  whereupon,  to  their 
eternal  dishonour,  the  crew  of  British  merchant 
seamen  took  all  the  boats  and  started  to 
pull  off  alone.  The  three  hundred  French 
prisoners,  men,  women,  and  children,  crowded 
the  ship's  side  and  begged  that,  if  they  were 
themselves  to  be  abandoned,  their  priest 
should  be  saved.  A  boat  reluctantly  put 
back  for  him.     Then,  leaving  the  ship  to  her 


LOST  FOR  EVER  127 

fate,  the  crew  pulled  for  Penzance,  where  the 
people  had  just  been  celebrating  the  glorious 
victory  of  Louisbourg. 

The  French  loss  had  been  enough  without 
this.  About  one  in  five  of  all  the  combatants 
had  been  hit.  Twice  as  many  were  on  the 
sick  list.  Officers  and  men,  officials  and 
traders,  fishermen  and  other  inhabitants,  all 
lost  something,  in  certain  cases  everything 
they  had  ;  and  it  was  to  nothing  but  the  sheer 
ruin  of  all  French  power  beside  the  American 
Atlantic  that  Madame  Drucour  waved  her 
long  white  scarf  in  a  last  farewell. 

France  was  stung  to  the  quick.  Her  sea 
link  gone,  she  feared  that  the  whole  of  Canada 
would  soon  be  won  by  the  same  relentless 
British  sea-power,  which  was  quite  as  irre- 
sistible as  it  was  ubiquitous  in  the  mighty 
hands  of  Pitt.  So  deeply  did  her  statesmen 
feel  her  imminent  danger  on  the  sea,  and 
resent  this  particular  British  triumph  in  the 
world-wide  '  Maritime  War,'  that  they  took 
the  unusual  course  of  sending  the  following 
circular  letter  to  all  the  Powers  of  Europe : 

We  are  advised  that  Louisbourg  capitu- 
lated to  the  English  on  July  26.     We  fully 


128  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

realize  the  consequences  of  such  a  grave 
event.  But  we  shall  redouble  our  efforts 
to  repair  the  misfortune. 

All  commercial  nations  ought  now  to 
open  their  eyes  to  their  own  interests  and 
join  us  in  preventing  the  absolute  tyranny 
which  England  will  soon  exercise  on  every 
sea  if  a  stop  be  not  put  to  her  boundless 
avarice  and  ambition. 

For  a  century  past  the  Powers  of  Europe 
have  been  crying  out  against  France  for 
disturbing  the  balance  of  power  on  the 
Continent.  But  while  England  was  art- 
fully fomenting  this  trouble  she  was  her- 
self engaged  in  upsetting  that  balance  of 
power  at  sea  without  which  these  different 
nations'  independent  power  on  land  cannot 
subsist.  All  governments  ought  to  give 
their  immediate  and  most  serious  attention 
to  this  subject,  as  the  English  now  threaten 
to  usurp  the  whole  world's  seaborne  com- 
merce for  themselves. 

While  the  French  were  taken  up  with  un- 
availing protests  and  regrets  the  British  were 
rejoicing  with  their  whole  heart.  Their  loss 
had  been  small.  Only  a  twentieth  of  their 
naval  and  military  total  had  been  killed  or 


LOST  FOR  EVER  129 

wounded,  or  had  died  from  sickness,  during 
the  seven  weeks'  siege.  Their  gain  had  been 
great.  The  one  real  fortress  in  America,  the 
last  sea  link  between  Old  France  and  New, 
the  single  sword  held  over  their  transatlantic 
shipping,  was  now  unchallengeably  theirs. 

The  good  news  travelled  fast.  Within 
three  weeks  of  the  surrender  the  dispatches 
had  reached  England.  Defeats,  disasters, 
and  exasperating  fiascos  had  been  common 
since  the  war  began.  But  at  last  there  was  a 
genuine  victory,  British  through  and  through, 
won  by  the  Army  and  Navy  together,  and 
won   over  the   greatest  of  all  rivals,   France. 

*  When  we  lost  Minorca,'  said  the  London 
Chronicle,  just  a  month  after  the  surrender, 

*  a  general  panic  fell  upon  the  nation  ;  but 
now  that  Louisbourg  is  taken  our  streets 
echo  with  triumph  and  blaze  with  illumina- 
tions.' Loyal  addresses  poured  in  from  every 
quarter.  The  king  stood  on  the  palace  steps 
to  receive  the  eleven  captured  colours  ;  and 
then,  attended  by  the  whole  court,  went  in 
state  to  the  royal  thanksgiving  service  held 
in  St  Paul's  Cathedral. 

The  thanks  of  parliament  were  voted  to 
Amherst  and  Boscawen.  Boscawen  received 
them  in  person,  being  a  member  of  the  House 

G.F.  T 


130  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

of  Commons.  The  speaker  read  the  address, 
which  was  couched  in  the  usual  verbiage 
worked  up  by  one  of  the  select  committees 
employed  on  such  occasions.  But  Boscawen 
replied,  as  men  of  action  should,  with  fewer 
words  and  much  more  force  and  point ;  *  Mr 
Speaker,  Sir,  I  am  happy  to  have  been  able 
to  do  my  duty.  I  have  no  words  to  express 
my  sense  of  the  distinguished  reward  that 
has  been  conferred  upon  me  by  this  House  ; 
nor  can  I  thank  you.  Sir,  enough  for  the 
polite  and  elegant  manner  in  which  you 
have  been  pleased  to  convey  its  resolution 
to  me.' 

The  American  colonists  in  general  rejoiced 
exceedingly  that  Louisbourg  and  all  it  meant 
had  been  exterminated.  But,  especially  in 
New  England,  their  joy  was  considerably 
tempered  by  the  reflection  that  the  final  blow 
had  been  delivered  without  their  aid,  and  that 
the  British  arms  had  met  with  a  terrible 
reverse  at  Ticonderoga,  where  the  American 
militia  had  outnumbered  the  old -country 
regulars  by  half  as  much  again.  Neverthe- 
less Boston  built  a  *  stately  bonfire,'  which 
made  a  *  lofty  and  prodigious  blaze  ' ;  while 
Philadelphia,  despite  its  parasitic  Quakers, 
had   a  most   elaborate   display   of   fireworks 


LOST  FOR  EVER  131 

representing  England,  Louisbourg,  the  siege, 
the  capture,  the  triumph,  and  reflected  glory- 
generally. 

At  the  inland  front,  near  Lake  Champlain, 
where  Abercromby  now  went  by  the  opprob- 
rious nickname  of  *  Mrs  Nabbycrumby,'  *  The 
General  put  out  orders  that  the  breastwork 
should  be  lined  with  troops,  and  to  fire  three 
rounds  for  joy,  and  give  thanks  to  God  in  a 
Religious  Way.'  But  the  joy  was  more  whole- 
hearted among  the  little,  half-forgotten  garri- 
sons of  Nova  Scotia.  At  Annapolis  no  news 
arrived  till  well  on  in  September,  when  a 
Boston  sloop  came  sailing  up  the  bay.  Cap- 
tain Knox,  that  most  industrious  of  diarists, 
records  the  incident. 

Every  soul  was  impatient,  yet  shy  of 
asking.  At  length  I  called  out,  *  What 
news  from  Louisbourg  ?  '  To  which  the 
master  simply  replied,  and  with  some 
gravity,  *  Nothing  strange.'  This  threw 
us  all  into  great  consternation,  and  some 
of  us  even  turned  away.  But  one  of  our 
soldiers  called  out  with  some  warmth, 
*  Damn  you,  Pumpkin,  isn't  Louisbourg 
taken  yet  ?  '  The  poor  New  England  man 
then    answered :     '  Taken,    yes,    above   a 


132  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

month  ago  ;  and  I  have  been  there  since  ; 
but  if  you  haven't  heard  of  it  before,  I 
have  a  good  parcel  of  letters  for  you  now.' 
Instantly  all  hats  flew  off,  and  we  made 
the  neighbouring  woods  resound  with  our 
cheers  for  almost  half  an  hour. 

Halifax  naturally  heard  the  news  sooner 
than  other  places ;  and  being  then,  as  now, 
a  naval  port  and  a  garrison  town,  it  gave  full 
vent  to  its  feelings.  Bells  pealed.  Bonfires 
blazed.  Salutes  thundered  from  the  fort  and 
harbour.  But  all  this  was  a  mere  preliminary 
canter.  The  real  race  came  off  when  the 
victorious  fleet  and  army  returned  in  triumph. 
Land  and  water  were  then  indeed  alive  with 
exultant  crowds.  The  streets  were  like  a 
fair,  and  a  noisy  one  at  that.  Soldiers,  sailors, 
and  civilians  drank  standing  toasts  the  whole 
night  through.  The  commissioner  of  excise 
recorded,  not  without  a  touch  of  proper  pride, 
that,  quite  apart  from  all  illicit  wines  and 
spirits,  no  less  than  sixty  thousand  gallons  of 
good  Jamaica  rum  were  drunk  in  honour  of 
the  fall  of  Louisbourg.  In  higher  circles, 
where  wine  was  commoner  than  spirits,  the 
toasts  were  honoured  just  as  often.  Governor 
Lawrence,    fresh    from    Louisbourg    himself, 


LOST  FOR  EVER  133 

opened  the  new  Government  House  with  a 
grand  ball ;  and  Wolfe,  whom  all  now  thought 
the  coming  man,  drank  healths,  sang  songs, 
and  danced  with  pretty  partners  to  his  heart's 
content. 


CHAPTER  V 

ANNIHILATION 
1760 

The  new  garrison  of  Louisbourg  hated  it  as 
thoroughly  as  any  of  their  predecessors,  French 
or  British.  They  repaired  the  breaches,  in 
a  temporary  way,  and  ran  up  shelters  for 
the  winter.  Interest  revived  with  the  spring  ; 
for  Wolfe  was  coming  back  again,  this  time 
to  command  an  army  of  his  own  and  take 
Quebec. 

The  great  absorbing  question  was,  Who  's 
for  the  front  and  who  for  the  base  ?  Both 
fleet  and  army  made  their  rendezvous  at  Louis- 
bourg ;  a  larger  fleet  and  a  smaller  army  than 
those  of  the  year  before.  Two  new  toasts 
were  going  the  rounds  of  the  Service  :  '  Here  's 
to  the  eye  of  a  Hawke  and  the  heart  of 
a  Wolfe  I  *  and  '  Here  's  to  British  colours 
on  every  French  fort,  port,  and  garrison  in 
America  I  '  Of  course  they  were  standing 
toasts.     The  men  who  drank  them  already 

134 


ANNIHILATION  135 

felt  the  presage  of  Pitt's  great  Empire  Year 
of  1759. 

The  last  two  weeks  in  May  and  the  first  in 
June  were  full  of  glamour  in  crowded,  stirring 
Louisbourg.  There  was  Wolfe's  picked  army 
of  nine  thousand  men,  with  Saunders's  mighty 
fleet  of  fifty  men-of-war,  mounting  two  thou- 
sand guns,  comprising  a  quarter  of  the  whole 
Royal  Navy,  and  convoying  more  than  two 
hundred  transports  and  provision  ships  ;  all 
coming  and  going,  landing,  embarking,  drilling, 
dividing,  massing ;  every  one  expectant  of 
glorious  results  and  eager  to  begin.  Who 
wouldn't  be  for  the  front  at  the  climax  of  a 
v/ar  like  this  ? 

Then  came  the  final  orders  issued  in  Louis- 
bourg. *  ist  June,  1759.  The  Troops  land 
no  more.  The  flat-bottomed  boats  to  be 
hoisted  in,  that  the  ships  may  be  ready  to  sail 
at  the  first  signal.'  *  2nd  June,  1759.  The 
Admiral  purposes  sailing  the  first  fair  wind.* 
On  the  4th  a  hundred  and  forty-one  sail 
weighed  anchor  together.  All  that  day  and 
the  next  they  were  assembling  outside  and 
making  for  the  island  of  Scatari,  just  beyond 
the  point  of  Cape  Breton,  which  is  only  ten 
miles  north  of  Louisbourg.  By  noon  on  the 
6th  the  last  speck  of  white  had  melted  away 


136  THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 

from  the  Louisbourg  horizon  and  the  men 
for  the  front  were  definitely  parted  from  those 
left  behind  at  the  base. 

Great  things  were  dared  and  done  at  the 
front  that  year,  in  Europe,  Asia,  and  America. 
But  nothing  was  done  at  dull  little  Louisbourg, 
except  the  wearisome  routine  of  a  disgustingly 
safe  base.  Rocks,  bogs, fogs,  sand,  and  scrubby 
bush  ashore.  Tantalizing  news  from  the  stir- 
ring outside  world  afloat.  So  the  long,  blank, 
summer  days  wore  through. 

The  second  winter  proved  a  little  more  com- 
fortable than  the  first  had  been.  But  there 
was  less,  far  less,  for  the  garrison  to  expect  in 
the  spring.  In  February  1760  the  death- 
warrant  of  Louisbourg  was  signed  in  London 
by  Pitt  and  King  George  H.  In  the  following 
summer  it  was  executed  by  Captain  John 
Byron,  R.N.,  the  poet's  grandfather.  Sailors, 
sappers,  and  miners  worked  for  months 
together,  laying  the  pride  of  Louisbourg  level 
with  the  dust.  That  they  carried  out  their 
orders  with  grim  determination  any  one  can 
see  to-day  by  visiting  the  grave  in  which 
they  buried  so  many  French  ambitions. 

All  ,the  rest  of  He  Royale  lost  its  French 


ANNIHILATION  I37 

life  in  the  same  supreme  catastrophe — the 
little  forts  and  trading-posts,  the  fishing- 
villages  and  hamlets  ;  even  the  farms  along 
the  Mira,  which  once  were  thought  so  like 
the  promise  of  a  second  French  Acadia. 

Nothing  remains  of  that  dead  past,  any- 
where inland,  except  a  few  gnarled,  weather- 
beaten  stumps  of  carefully  transplanted  plum 
and  apple  trees,  with,  here  and  there,  a  strag- 
gling little  patch  of  pale,  forlorn  narcissus,  now 
soothing  the  alien  air  in  vain,  round  shapeless 
ruins,  as  absolute  and  lone  as  those  of  Louis- 
bourg  itself. 


BIBLIOGRAPHICAL  NOTE 


p 


There  is  no  complete  naval  and  military  history  | 
of  Louisbourg,  in  either  French  or  English.  The 
first  siege  is  a  prominent  feature  in  all  histories  of 
Canada,  New  England,  and  the  United  States, 
though  it  is  not  much  noticed  in  works  written  in 
the  mother  country.  The  second  siege  is  noticed 
everywhere.  The  beginning  and  end  of  the  story 
is  generally  ignored,  and  the  naval  side  is  always 
inadequately  treated. 

Parkman  gives  a  good  account  of  the  first  siege 
in  A  Half-Century  of  Conflict^  and  a  less  good 
account  of  the  second  in  Montcalm  and  Wolfe. 
Kingsford's  accounts  are  in  volumes  iii  and  iv  of 
the  History  of  Canada.  Sir  John  Bourinot,  a  native 
of  the  island,  wrote  a  most  painstaking  work  on 
Cape  Breton  and  its  Memorials  of  the  French 
RSgime  which  was  first  published  in  the  Trans- 
actions of  the  Royal  Society  of  Canada  for  1891. 
Garneau  and  other  French-Canadian  historians 
naturally  emphasize  a  different  set  of  facts 
and  explanations.  An  astonishingly  outspoken 
account  of  the  first  siege  is  given  in  the  anony- 
mous Lettre  d'ua  Habitant  de  Louisbourg^  which 

138 


BIBLIOGRAPHICAL  NOTE         139 

has  been  edited,  with  a  translation,  by  Professor 
Wrong.  The  gist  of  many  accounts  is  to  be  found, 
unpretentiously  put  together,  in  The  Last  Siege  of 
Louisbourg,  by  C.  O.  Macdonald.  New  England 
produced  many  contemporary  and  subsequent 
accounts  of  the  first  siege,  and  all  books  concerned 
with  the  Conquest  give  accounts  of  the  second. 

Those  who  wish  to  go  straight  to  original 
sources  will  find  useful  bibliographies  in  the 
notes  to  Parkman's  and  Bourinot's  books,  as  well 
as  in  Justin  Winsor's  Narrative  and  Critical 
History  of  America.  But  none  of  these  includes 
some  important  items  to  be  found  either  in  or 
through  the  Dominion  Archives  at  Ottawa,  the 
Public  Records  Office  in  London,  and  the  Archives 
de  la  Marine  in  Paris. 


INDEX 


Abercromby,  General,  defeated 
by  Montcalm,  loi ;  on  the 
fall  of  Louisbourg,  131. 

Acadians,  prefer  to  stay  in 
Acadia,  3-4,  26,  81 ;  their  rela- 
tions with  Louisbourg,  8, 
116;  their  eizpulsion,  95. 

Aix-la-Chapelle,  treaty  of,  89, 

American  Rangers,  the,  116. 

Amherst,  General,  in  command 
at  siege  of  Louisbourg,  102-4, 
108,  109-10, 1 13-14, 121 ;  com- 
pliments Madame  Drucour, 
1 12 ;  the  surrender,  122-6,  129. 

Annapolis,  siege  of,  26,  36 ;  and 
the  British  victory  at  Louis- 
bourg, 131. 

Anson,  Admiral,  89 ;  first  lord  of 
the  Admiralty,  102. 

Anville,  Due  d',  his  disastrous 
expedition,  84-7. 

Bigot,  intendant  of  Louis- 
bourg, 13 ;  promoted  to 
Quebec,  92. 

Boishebert,  attacks  British  rear 
at  Louisbourg,  116,  117. 

Boscawen,  Admiral,  95 ;  in  com- 
mand of  fleet  at  siege  of 
Louisbourg,  102-4,  109,  no  ; 
the  surrender,  122-6  ;  his  re- 
ply to  parliament,  129-30. 

Boston,  its  relations  with 
Louisbourg,  41, 53,  71,  72,  83, 
92,  130 ;  prepares  for  French 

140 


invasion,  82-3 ;  receives  New 

England's  war  indemnity,  91. 

Braddock,  General,  his  defeat, 

95- 
Bradstreet,   Colonel   John,    at 

first  siege  of  Louisbourg,  40. 
Byng,  Admiral,  his  failure,  96. 
Byron,    Captain    John,    razes 

Louisbourg,  136. 

Canso,  its  surrender,  25 ;  the 
New  England  forces  at,  32,33. 

Cape  Breton,  under  France,  3, 
4,  8,  9 ;  resources  of,  9-10 ; 
surrendered  to  Britain,  123, 
136-7. 

Cape  Finisterre,  naval  battle 
off,  89. 

Chaffault,  Admiral  du,  at 
Louisbourg,  100. 

Chambon,  Governor  du,  de- 
fends Louisbourg  against 
New  England's  attack,  34-5, 

47.  51.  54.  55.  60.  61;  sur- 
renders, 63-6. 

Conflans,  Admiral,  and  the  re- 
capture of  Louisbourg,  85-6. 

Connecticut,  and  New  Eng- 
land expeditions  against  the 
French,  28,  80. 

Crown  Point,  raid  on,  82. 

Drucour,  governor  of  Louis- 
bourg, his  forces,  loi ;  op- 
poses  the   British   landing, 


INDEX 


141 


105-7;  J^is  interchange  of 
courtesies  with  Amherst,  lii- 
112  ;  his  objectto  save  Quebec, 
113,  116,  117,  121 ;  surrenders, 
122-6. 

Drucour,  Madame,  at  siege  of 
Louisbourg,  111-12,  127. 

Dundonald,  Lord,  killed  in 
sortie  at  Louisbourg,  117. 

Estournel,  Admiral  d*,  his  tra- 
gic death,  87. 

Farquhar,  Major,  receives  the 
surrender  of  the  West  Gate, 
125. 

Flat  Point,  on  Gabarus  Bay, 
38,  42,  105,  107,  108,  no. 

Fort  William  Henry,  massacre 
at,  122,  124. 

France,  and  Louisbourg,  5-6, 
9,  10 ;  her  system  of  colonial 
government,  11-13 ;  her  dis- 
astrous expeditions  to  retake 
Louisbourg,  82,  84-9 ;  re- 
ceives Louisbourg  under 
Treaty  of  Aix-la-Chapelle, 
89,  93-4,  100  ;  stung  by  the 
second  fall  of  Louisbourg, 
126,  127 ;  her  circular  to  the 
Powers  of  Europe  on  Britain's 
sea-power,  127-8. 

Freshwater  Cove,  on  Gabarus 
Bay,  38. 

Gabarus  Bay,  20 ;  landing  of 
New  England's  army  at,  36, 
38-9,  43 ;  and  of  Amherst's 
army,  104-7,  ^^o- 

Gallows  Hill,  battery  erected 
on,  1 17-18. 

Gibson,  James,  9 ;  assists 
Shirley  in  his  plans  against 
Louisbourg,  27,  28. 


Gorham,  of  the  Rangers,  his 
report  on  Louisbourg,  98. 

Gorham's  Post,  at  Louisbourg, 
60-1. 

Gouttes,  Admiral  des,  at  de- 
fence of  Louisbourg,  114-15. 

Great  Awakening,  the,  in  New 
England,  30,  53. 

Great  Britain,  and  the  first  fall  of 
Louisbourg,  71-2, 90-1  ;  gives 
up  Louisbourg  to  France, 
89  ;  her  navy  compared  with 
that  of  France,  84-5,  102, 
127-8 ;  rejoicing  in  at  second 
fall  of  Louisbourg,  128-30. 

Green  Hill,  battery  at,  45,  64, 

"3- 
Gridley,  Colonel,  at  first  siege 
of  Louisbourg,  61. 

Halifax,  85,  86  ;  founded,  90-1, 
92,  103  ;  rejoicing  in  at  the 
British  victory  at  Louisbourg, 

132-3. 

Hardy,  Sir  Charles,  97 ;  his 
blockade  of  Louisbourg,  104. 

Hawke,  Admiral,  100,  134. 

Hay,  Sir  Charles,  his  criticism 
of  Loudoun's  preparations, 
97-8. 

Holbourne,  Admiral,  his  dis- 
astrous expedition,  97-9. 

He  Royale,  3,   10.     See  Cape 

Breton. 
He  St  Jean,    13.     See  Prince 

Edward  Island. 
Indians,  in  Maritime  Provinces, 

16 ;    with    Marin,   36 ;    with 

Drucour,  loi,  116,  124,  125. 
Island  Battery  of  Louisbourg, 

19,  20,  56,  93,  loi.  III ;  the 

night     attack     on,     57-60; 

silenced,  61-2,  68,  113,  114. 


142 


THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 


Kennington  Cove,  Wolfe's 
landing-place  on  Gabarus 
Bay,  105-6. 

Knox,  Captain,  on  the  second 
fall  of  Louisbourg,  131-2. 

La  Jonquiere,  Admiral,  his 
defeat  off  Cape  Finisterre, 
87-9. 

La  Motte,  Admiral,  at  Louis- 
bourg,  98-9. 

Lawrence,  Governor,  at  Hali- 
fax, 132-3. 

Lighthouse  Point,  21,  37,  58 ; 
a  battery  erected  at,  60-2,  93, 
loi ;  destroyed  and  abandoned 
by  Drucour,  107-8 ;  erected 
by  the  British,  108-9,  iii,  113, 
114. 

Loudoun,  Earl  of,  his  prepara- 
tions against  Louisbourg, 
97-8. 

Louisbourg,  1-2,  7,  17,  74,  90, 
134,  136 ;  the  building  of  the 
fortress,  5,  6,  22-3 ;  character 
of  the  French  population,  3, 
4,  S,  8 ;  its  contraband  trade 
with  New  England,  7-8,  92  ; 
its  system  of  government,  11- 
14,  21,  35 ;  army  life  in,  14- 
16,  22,  35,  93  ;  the  '  Dunkirk  ' 
of  New  France,  17-18 ;  works 
and  fortifications  of,  19-23, 
93,  108 ;  its  position  in  rela- 
tion to  New  England,  24-5  ; 
its  preparations  against  at- 
tack, 34-6, 38 ;  First  Siege 
—  Royal  Battery  captured, 
39-42  ;  the  bombardment, 
45-50,  62 ;  the  blockade,  36, 
54-S;  the  Island  Battery 
night  attack,  57-60 ;  Island 
Battery  silenced,  61-2 ;  sur- 
render of  Louisbourg  to  Pep- 


perrell  and  Warren,  63-6; — 
garrisoned  by  New  Eng- 
land men,  67-8,  74-80  ;  given 
back  to  France,  89,  90 ;  La 
Motte  at,  98 ;  its  preparations 
to  withstand  siege,  101-2; 
Second  Siege— isolated  by 
Pitt,  100,  loi ;  the  landing  of 
the  British,  104-7 ,  the  siege, 
108-21  ;  surrendered  to  Am- 
herst and  Boscawen,  122-6 ; 
the  fate  of  the  prisoners,  126- 
127 ;— serves  as  Wolfe's  base 
in  siege  of  Quebec,  134-6; 
utterly  destroyed,  136-7. 

Marin,  guerilla  leader,  besieges 
Annapolis,  36,  51. 

Maritime  War,  the,  95, 100, 127. 

Maryland,  and  war  against  the 
French,  80. 

Mascarene,  Paul,  defends  An- 
napolis, 26. 

Massachusetts,  and  Shirley's 
plan  against  Louisbourg,  25, 
26-8 ;  mutiny  of  the  men  of, 
76,  77 ;  and  the  extirpation  of 
the  French  from  Canada,  80, 
82 ;  the  royal  message  to,  91. 
See  New  England  States. 

Mauger,  Joseph,  a  Halifax 
trader,  amasses  great  wealth 
by  smuggling,  92. 

Meserve,  Colonel,  his  gun- 
sleigh  at  Louisbourg,  44. 

Micmacs,  the,  16,  92. 

Mira  river,  the  French  settle- 
ment at,  8-9,  137. 

Montcalm,  Marquis  de,  French 
commander  in  Canada,  15, 
95,  96,  loi,  122. 

Moody,  Parson,  with  the  New 
England  forces  at  siege  of 
Louisbourg,  31,  33,  67,  71. 


INDEX 


143 


Newcastle,  Duke  of,  and   the 

New  England  army,  78,  81. 
New  England  States,  their 
colonists  compared  with  the 
French,  4,  16 ;  their  contra- 
band trade  with  Louisbourg, 
7,  92  ;  their  erroneous  ideas 
concerning  the  strength  of 
French  resources,  11 ;  their 
preparations  against  Louis- 
bourg, 24-5,  26,  28-9,  30,  41  ; 
their  forces,  31-2,  33,  76  ;  the 
landing  on  Gabarus  Bay,  38- 
39,  43 ;  capture  of  Royal  Bat- 
tery, 39-42 ;  hardships  and 
difficulties,  43-5 ;  the  bom- 
bardment, 45-50,  62 ;  some 
irregularities,  51-2;  and 
gaieties,  52  -  3  ;  the  night 
attack  on  Island  Battery,  57- 
60 ;  the  surrender  of  Louis- 
bourg to  Pepperrell  and 
Warren,  63-6 ;  disappoint- 
ment of  the  Provincials,  66-8, 
70,  75  ;  their  discontent  and 
miseries  in  Louisbourg,  76- 
80 ;  the  army  disbanded,  81  ; 
their  fear  of  French  invasion, 
82-3,  88 ;  their  resentment  in 
connection  with  the  Treaty 
of  Aix-la-Chapelle,  89,  90-1  ; 
effect  of  the  second  fall  of 
Louisbourg  in,  130-1. 

New  France  in  1720,  1-4  ;  sys- 
tem of  government  in,  11-13  ; 
and  the  Indians,  16-17 ;  and 
Louisbourg,  103. 

New  Hampshire,  and  war 
against  the  French,  28,  80. 

New  Jersey,  and  Shirley's  plans 
against  the  French,  80. 

New  York,  and  the  New  Eng- 
land attack  on  Louisbourg,  29 ; 
and  French  extirpation,  80, 82. 


Paris,  peace  of,  i. 

Pennsylvania,  and  war  against 
the  French,  80-1. 

Pepperrell,  Sir  William,  com- 
mander of  New  England 
army  at  siege  of  Louisbourg, 
29,  30.  34»  38,  40,  45.  48,  51. 
55,  56-7,  58,  63-6,  68;  cele- 
brates his  victory,  70-1 ;  made 
a  baronet,  72, 78 ;  his  troubles 
with  his  army  in  Louisbourg, 
74-7.80. 

Pitt,  William,  minister  of  War, 
96,  102 ;  his  world  -  wide 
campaign,  99-100,  127 ;  his 
Empire  Year,  135,  136. 

Prevost,  intendant  of  Louis- 
bourg, 93,  122-3. 

Prince,  Rev.  Thomas,  and  the 
New  England  attack  on 
Louisbourg,  31  ;  his  litany 
on  the  threatened  French  in- 
vasion, 83-4. 

Prince  Edward  Island,  13 ; 
surrendered  to  Britain,  123. 

Quakers  of  Pennsylvania,  their 

principles,  81,  130. 
Quebec,     its     relations     with 

Louisbourg,    11-12,    22,    36, 

103,  III,  113,  126,   134;   on 

the  defensive,  loi. 
Quesnel,   Governor  du,    much 

disliked  in  Louisbourg,  25, 

34- 

Rhode  Island,  and  war  against 
the  French,  28-9,  80. 

Rous,  Captain,  at  siege  of 
Louisb'iurg,  73. 

Royal  Battery  of  Louisbourg, 
19,  37,  93,  10 1 ;  its  capture 
in  New  England  siege,  39- 
42,  48,  54,  58,  62 ;  destroyed 


144 


THE  GREAT  FORTRESS 


by  Drucour,  107-8 ;  erected 
again  by  the  British,  108-9, 
114. 

Saunders,  Admiral,  his  fleet  at 
Louisbourg,  135. 

Scott,  Major,  with  Wolfe  in 
landing-  on  Gabarus  Bay,  106. 

Seven  Years'  War,  beginning 
of,  94-5. 

Shirley,  Governor,  of  Massa- 
chusetts, plans  an  attack  on 
Louisbourg,  26,  27,  28,  29, 
32 ;  his  plan,  36-7  ;  receives 
a  colonelcy,  72,  78 ;  settles 
grievances  of  the  New 
England  army,  77-8 ;  his 
scheme  against  the  French, 
80. 

Titcomb's  Battery,  the  mount- 
ing of  guns  at,  48,  56. 

Ulloa,  Don  Antonio  de,  taken 

prisoner  at  Louisbourg,  69. 
Utrecht,  treaty  of,  i,  2,  4,  18. 

Vaughan,  William,  and  the 
New  England  attack  on 
Louisbourg,  26,  28,  57 ;  cap- 
tures the  Royal  Battery,  39- 
40. 

Vauquehn,  captam  of  the 
*  Ar^thuse '  in  the  defence  of 


Louisbourg,  iii,  114;  runs 
the  gauntlet  of  the  British 
fleet  and  reaches  France,  115- 
116. 

Virginia,  and  war  against  the 
French,  80. 

Vivier,  du,  captures  Canso,  25  ; 
besieges  Annapolis,  26,  36. 

Warren,  Admiral,  aids  New 
England  in  her  attack  on 
Louisbourg,  32  ;  his  fleet,  32- 
33,  51,  62,  63;  begins  the 
blockade,  34,  36,  48,  54-7, 
63-5,  72 ;  the  success  of  his' 
stratagem,  68-9  ;  his  popular- 
ity, 70;  with  Anson  defeats 
the  French  off  Cape  Finis- 
terre,  89. 

Whitefield,  George,  famous 
preacher,  30 ;  and  the  New 
England  attack  on  Louis- 
bourg, 30,  31. 

White  Point,  on  Gabarus  Bay, 
105,  107. 

Wolfe,  General,  with  Amherst 
at  siege  of  Louisbourg,  103, 
116  ;  at  the  landing  on  Gab- 
arus Bay,  105-6;  erects 
Royal  and  Lighthouse  Bat- 
teries, 108-9  >  defeats  French 
sortie  and  seizes  Gallows 
Hill,  117;  at  Halifax,  133; 
at  Louisbourg  preparing  for 
the  siege  of  Quebec,  134-5. 


Printed  by  T.  and  A.  Constable,  Printers  to  His  Majesty 
at  the  Edinburgh  University  Press 


THE  CHRONICLES  OF  CANADA 

Edited  by  George  M.  Wrong  and  H.  H.  Langton 
of  the  University  of  Toronto 

A  series  of  thirty-two  freshly-written  narratives  for 
popular  reading,  designed  to  set  forth,  in  historic  con- 
tinuity, the  principal  events  and  movements  in  Canada, 
from  the   Norse  Voyages  to   the   Railway  Builders. 


PART  I.  THE  FIRST  EUROPEAN  VISITORS 

1.  The  Dawn  of  Canadian  History 

A  Chronicle  of  Aboriginal  Canada 

BY  STEPHEN  LEACOCK 

2.  The  Mariner  of  St  Malo 

A  Chronicle  of  the  Voyages  of  Jacques  Cartier 
BY  STEPHEN  LEACOCK 

PART  II.  THE  RISE  OF  NEW  FRANCE 

3.  The  Founder  of  New  France 

A  Chronicle  of  Champlain 

BY  CHARLES  W.  COLBY 

4.  The  Jesuit  Missions 

A  Chronicle  of  the  Cross  in  the  Wilderness 

BY  THOMAS  GUTHRIE  MARQUIS 

5.  The  Seigneurs  of  Old  Canada 

A  Chronicle  of  New- World  Feudalism 

BY  WILLIAM  BENNETT  MUNRO 

6.  The  Great  Intendant 

A  Chronicle  of  Jean  Talon 

BY  THOMAS  CHAPAIS 

7.  The  Fighting  Governor 

A  Chronicle  of  Frontenac 

BY  CHARLES  W,  COLBY 


The  Chronicles  of  Canada 

PART  III,  THE  ENGLISH  INVASION 

8.  The  Great  Fortress 

A  Chronicle  of  Louisbourg 

BY  WILLIAM  WOOD 

9.  The  Acadian  Exiles 

A  Chronicle  of  the  Land  of  Evangeline 

BY  ARTHUR  G.  DOUGHTY 

TO.   The  Passing  of  New  France 

A  Chronicle  of  Montcalm 

BY  WILLIAM  WOOD 

11.  The  Winning  of  Canada 

A  Chronicle  of  Wolfe 

BY  ^VILLIAM  WOOD 

PART  IV.  THE  BEGINNINGS  OF  BRITISH  CANADA 

12.  The  Father  of  British  Canada 

A  Chronicle  of  Carleton 

BY  WILLIAM  WOOD 

13.  The  United  Empire  Loyalists 

A  Chronicle  of  the  Great  Migration 

BY  W.  STEWART  WALLACE 

14.  The  War  with  the  United  States 

A  Chronicle  of  1812 

BY  WILLIAM  WOOD 

PART  V.  THE  RED  MAN  IN  CANADA 

15.  The  War  Chief  of  the  Ottawas 

A  Chronicle  of  the  Pontiac  War 

BY  THOMAS  GUTHRIE  MARQUIS 

16.  The  War  Chief  of  the  Six  Nations 

A  Chronicle  of  Joseph  Brant 

BY  LOUIS  AUBREY  WOOD 

17.  Tecumseh 

A  Chronicle  of  the  last  Great  Leader  of  his  People 
BY  ETHEL  T.  RAYMOND 


The  Chronicles  of  Canada 

PART  VI.   PIONEERS  OF  THE  NORTH  AND  WEST 

1 8.  The  *  Adventurers  of  England '  on  Hudson 

Bay    , 

A  Chronicle  of  the  Fur  Trade  in  the  North 
BY  AGNES  C.  LAUT 

19.  Pathfinders  of  the  Great  Plains 

A  Chronicle  of  La  Verendrye  and  his  Sons 

BY  LAWRENCE  J.  BURPEE 

20.  Adventurers  of  the  Far  North 

A  Chronicle  of  the  Arctic  Seas 

BY  STEPHEN  LEACOCK 

21.  The  Red  River  Colony 

A  Chronicle  of  the  Beginnings  of  Manitoba 

BY  LOUIS  AUBREY  WOOD 

22.  Pioneers  of  the  Pacific  Coast 

A  Chronicle  of  Sea  Rovers  and  Fur  Hunters 
BY  AGNES  C.  LAUT 

23.  The  Cariboo  Trail 

A  Chronicle  of  the  Gold-fields  of  British  Columbia 
BY  AGNES  C.  LAUT 

PART  VIL  THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  POLITICAL  FREEDOM 

24.  The  Family  Compact 

A  Chronicle  of  the  Rebellion  in  Upper  Canada 

BY  W.  STEWART  WALLACE 

25.  The  Patriotes  of  'sj 

A  Chronicle  of  the  Rebellion  in  Lower  Canada 

BY  ALFRED  D.  DECELLES 

26.  The  Tribune  of  Nova  Scotia 

A  Chronicle  of  Joseph  Howe 

BY  WILLIAM  LAWSON  GRANT 

27.  The  Winning  of  Popular  Government 

A  Chronicle  of  the  Union  of  1841 

BY  ARCHIBALD  MACMECHAN 


The  Chronicles  of  Canada 

PART  VIII,  THE  GROWTH  OF  NATIONALITY 

28.  The  Fathers  of  Confederation 

A  Chronicle  of  the  Birth  of  the  Dominion 

BY  A.  H.  U.  COLQUHOUN 

29.  The  Day  of  Sir  John  Macdonald 

A  Chronicle  of  the  Early  Years  of  the  Dominion 
BY  SIR  JOSEPH  POPE 

30.  The  Day  of  Sir  Wilfrid  Laurier 

A  Chronicle  of  Our  Own  Times 

BY  OSCAR  D.  SKELTON 

PART  IX.  NATIONAL  HIGHWAYS 

31.  All  Afloat 

A  Chronicle  of  Craft  and  Waterways 

BY  WILLIAM  WOOD 

32.  The  Railway  Builders 

A  Chronicle  of  Overland  Highways 

BY  OSCAR  D.  SKELTON 


Published  by 
Glasgow,  Brook  &  Company 

TORONTO,  CANADA 


.A.  x/  ^ 


L 


SMC 

Wood,  William  Charles 

Henry,  1864-1947. 
The  great  fortress  :  a 

chronicle  of 
AYS-4541  (mcab) 


I