France and England in North America, Part VI : Montcalm and Wolfe

363

Journal de Bougainville. This is a fragment; his Journal proper begins a few weeks later.

364

Lévis à–, 5 Avril, 1756.

365

These extracts are translated from copies of the original letters, in possession of the present Marquis de Montcalm.

366

Vaudreuil au Ministre, 30 Oct. 1755.

367

Ordres du Roy et Dépêches des Ministres, Fév. 1756.

368

Le Ministre à Vaudreuil, 15 Mars, 1756. Commission du Marquis de Montcalm. Mémoire du Roy pour servir d'Instruction au Marquis de Montcalm.

369

Ordres du Roy et Dépêches des Ministres, 1756. Le Ministre à Vaudreuil, 15 Mars, 1756.

370

Vaudreuil au Ministre, 16 Juin, 1756. "Qu'il ne se mêle que du commandement des troupes de terre."

371

Of about twelve hundred who came with Montcalm, nearly three hundred were now in hospital. The four battalions that came with Dieskau are reported at the end of May to have sixteen hundred and fifty-three effective men. État de la Situation actuelle des Bataillons, appended to Montcalm's despatch of 12 June. Another document, Dêtail de ce qui s'est passé en Canada, Juin, 1755, jusqu'à Juin, 1756, sets the united effective strength of the battalions in Canada at twenty-six hundred and seventy-seven, which was increased by recruits which arrived from France about midsummer.

372

Except perhaps, the battalion of Béarn, which formerly wore, and possibly wore still, a uniform of light blue.

373

Susane, Ancienne Infanterie Française. In the atlas of this work are colored plates of the uniforms of all the regiments of foot.

374

On the troupes de la marine,—Mémoire pour servir d'Instruction à MM. Jonquière et Bigot, 30 Avril, 1749. Ordres du Roy et Dépêches des Ministres, 1750. Ibid., 1755. Ibid., 1757. Instruction pour Vaudreuil, 22 Mars, 1755. Ordonnance pour l'Augmentation de Soldats dans les Compagnies de Canada, 14 Mars, 1755. Duquesne au Ministre, 26 Oct. 1753. Ibid., 30 Oct. 1753. Ibid., 29 Fév. 1754. Duquesne à Marin, 27 Août, 1753. Atlas de Susane.

375

Récapitulation des Milices du Gouvernement de Canada, 1750. Dénombrement des Milices, 1758, 1759. On the militia, see also Bougainville in Margry, Rélations et Mémoires inédits, 60, and N. Y. Col. Docs., X. 680.

376

Montcalm au Ministre, 1 Sept. 1758.

377

Bigot au Ministre, 12 Avril, 1756. Vaudreuil au Ministre, 1 Juin, 1756. Ibid., 8 Juin, 1756. Journal de ce qui s'est passé en Canada depuis le Mois d'Octobre, 1755, jusqu'au Mois de Juin, 1756. Shirley to Fox, 7 May, 1756. Conduct of Major-General Shirley briefly stated. Information of Captain John Vicars, of the Fiftieth (Shirley's) Regiment. Eastburn, Faithful Narrative. Entick, I. 471. The French accounts place the number of English at sixty or eighty.

378

Correspondance de Montcalm, Vaudreuil, et Lévis.

379

Montreuil au Ministre, 12 Juin, 1756. The original is in cipher.

380

Montcalm au Ministre, 12 Juin, 1756.

381

Ibid., 19 Juin, 1756. "Je suis bien avec luy, sans sa confiance, qu'il ne donne jamais à personne de la France." Erroneously rendered in N. Y. Col. Docs., X. 421.

382

Montcalm au Ministre, 26 Juin, 1756. Détail de ce qui s'est passé, Oct. 1755—Juin, 1756.

383

Lotbinière au Ministre, 31 Oct. 1756. Montcalm au Ministre, 20 Juillet, 1756.

384

Montcalm au Ministre, 20 Juillet, 1756.

385

Lévis au Ministre, 17 Juillet, 1756.

386

Relation de M. Duchat, Capitaine au Régiment de Languedoc, écrite au Camp de Carillon, 15 Juillet, 1756.

387

Minutes of Council of War held at New York, 12 and 13 Dec. 1755. Shirley to Robinson, 19 Dec. 1755. The Conduct of Major-General Shirley briefly stated. Review of Military Operations in North America.

388

Lords of Trade to Lords of the Treasury, 12 Feb. 1756. Fox to American Governors, 13 March, 1756. Shirley to Phipps, 15 June, 1756. The sum was £115,000, divided in proportion to the expense incurred by the several colonies; Massachusetts having £54,000, Connecticut £26,000, and New York £15,000, the rest being given to New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and New Jersey.

389

Letter and Order Books of General Winslow, 1756.

390

Fox to Shirley, 13 March, 1756. Ibid., 31 March, 1756. Order to Colonel Webb, 31 March, 1756. Order to Major-General Abercromby, 1 April, 1756. Halifax to Shirley, 1 April, 1756. Shirley to Fox, 13 June, 1756.

391

Letter and Order Books of Winslow, 1756.

392

Vote of General Court, 26 Feb. 1756.

393

The above particulars are gathered from the voluminous papers in the State House at Boston, Archives, Military, Vols. LXXV., LXXVI. These contain the military acts of the General Court, proclamations, reports of committees, and other papers relating to military affairs in 1755 and 1756. The Letter and Order Books of Winslow, in the Library of the Massachusetts Historical Society, have supplied much concurrent matter. See also Colonial Records of R. I., V., and Provincial Papers of N. H., VI.

394

Vaudreuil, in his despatch of 12 August, gives particulars of these raids, with an account of the scalps taken on each occasion. He thought the results disappointing.

395

Bagley to Winslow, 2 July, 1756.

396

Ibid., 15 July, 1756.

397

Wooster to Winslow, 2 June, 1756.

398

Report of Rogers, 19 June, 1756. Much abridged in his published Journals.

399

Fox to Johnson, 13 March, 1756. Papers of Sir William Johnson.

400

Conferences between Sir William Johnson and the Indians, Dec. 1755, to Feb. 1756, in N. Y. Col. Docs., VII. 44-74. Account of Conferences held and Treaties made between Sir William Johnson, Bart., and the Indian Nations of North America (London, 1756).

401

Minutes of Councils of Onondaga, 19 June to 3 July, 1756, in N. Y. Col. Docs., VII. 134-150.

402

Minutes of Councils at Fort Johnson, 9 July to 12 July, in N. Y. Col. Docs., VII. 152-160.

403

Conferences between M. de Vaudreuil and the Five Nations, 28 July to 20 Aug., in N. Y. Col. Docs., X. 445-453.

404

Johnson to Lords of Trade, 28 May, 1756. Ibid., 17 July, 1756. Johnson to Shirley, 24 April, 1756. Colonial Records of Pa., VII. 75, 88, 194.

405

Shirley to Fox, 7 May, 1756. Shirley to Abercromby, 27 June, 1756. London to Fox, 19 Aug. 1756.

406

Détail de ce qui s'est passé en Canada, Oct. 1755—Juin, 1756.

407

Letter of J. Choate, Albany, 12 July, 1756, in Massachusetts Archives, LV. Three Letters from Albany, July, Aug. 1756, in Doc. Hist. of N. Y., I. 482. Review of Military Operations. Shirley to Fox, 26 July, 1756. Abercromby to Sir Charles Hardy, 11 July, 1756. Niles, in Mass. His. Coll., Fourth Series, V. 417. Lossing, Life of Schuyler, I. 131 (1860). Mante, 60. Bradstreet's conduct on this occasion afterwards gained for him the warm praises of Wolfe.

408

Nouvelles du Camp établi au Portage de Chouaguen, première Relation. Ibid., Séconde Relation, 10 Juillet, 1756. Bougainville, Journal, who gives the report as he heard it. Lettre du R. P. Cocquard, S. J., 1756. Vaudreuil au Ministre, 10 Juillet, 1756. Ursulines de Québec, II. 292. N. Y. Col. Docs., X. 434, 467, 477, 483. Some prisoners taken in the first attack were brought to Montreal, where their presence gave countenance to these fabrications.

409

Mackellar to Shirley, June, 1756. Mercer to Shirley, 2 July, 1756.

410

Information of Captain John Vicars, of the Fiftieth (Shirley's) Regiment, enclosed with a despatch of Lord Loudon. Vicars was a veteran British officer who left Oswego with Bradstreet on the third of July. Shirley to Loudon, 5 Sept. 1756.

411

Shirley to Fox, 4 July, 1756.

412

Loudon (to Fox?), 19 Aug. 1756.

413

Order concerning the Rank of Provincial General and Field Officers in North America. Given at our Court at Kensington, 12 May, 1756.

414

Winslow to Shirley, 21 Aug. 1756.

415

Correspondence of Loudon, Abercromby, and Shirley, July, Aug. 1756. Record of Meeting of Provincial Officers, July, 1756. Letter and Order Books of Winslow.

416

Burton to Loudon, 27 Aug. 1756.

417

Dr. Thomas Williams to Colonel Israel Williams, 28 Aug. 1756.

418

Bougainville, Journal.

419

I owe to my friend George S. Hale, Esq., the opportunity of examining the autograph Journal; it has since been printed in the Magazine of American History for March, 1882.

420

The autograph letter is in Massachusetts Archives, LVI. no. 142. The same volume contains a letter from Colonel Frye, of Massachusetts, in which he speaks of the forlorn condition in which Chaplain Weld reached the camp. Of Chaplain Crawford, he says that he came decently clothed, but without bed or blanket, till he, Frye, lent them to him, and got Captain Learned to take him into his tent. Chaplains usually had a separate tent, or shared that of the colonel.

421

Letter and Order Books of Winslow.

422

Loudon (to Fox?), 19 Aug. 1756.

423

Conduct of Major-General Shirley briefly stated. Shirley to Loudon, 4 Sept. 1756. Shirley to Fox, 16 Sept. 1756.

424

Thomas Williams to Colonel Israel Williams, 28 Aug. 1756.

425

Colonel William Williams to Colonel Israel Williams, 30 Aug. 1756.

426

Vaudreuil au Ministre, 12 Août, 1756. Montcalm à sa Femme, 20 Juillet, 1756.

427

Vaudreuil au Ministre, 4 Août, 1756. Vaudreuil à Bourlamaque,—Juin, 1756.

428

Bougainville, Journal.

429

Vaudreuil au Ministre, 10 Juillet, 1756. Résumé des Nouvelles du Canada, Sept. 1756.

430

Bougainville, Journal.

431

Pouchot, I. 76.

432

Vaudreuil au Ministre, 20 Août, 1756. He elsewhere makes the number somewhat greater. That the garrison, exclusive of civilians, did not exceed at the utmost fourteen hundred, is shown by Shirley to Loudon, 5 Sept. 1756. Loudon had charged Shirley with leaving Oswego weakly garrisoned; and Shirley replies by alleging that the troops there were in the number as above. It was of course his interest to make them appear as numerous as possible. In the printed Conduct of Major-General Shirley briefly stated, they are put at only ten hundred and fifty.

433

Several English writers say, however, that fifteen or twenty young men were given up to the Indians to be adopted in place of warriors lately killed.

434

On the capture of Oswego, the authorities examined have been very numerous, and only the best need be named. Livre d'Ordres, Campagne de 1756, contains all orders from headquarters. Mémoire pour servir d'Instruction à M. le Marquis de Montcalm, 21 Juillet; 1756, signé Vaudreuil. Bougainville, Journal. Vaudreuil au Ministre, 15 Juin, 1756 (designs against Oswego). Ibid., 13 Août, 1755. Ibid., 30 Août. Pouchot, I. 67-81. Relation de la Prise des Forts de Chouaguen. Bigot au Ministre, 3 Sept. 1756 Journal du Siége de Chouaguen. Précis des Événements, 1756. Montcalm au Ministre, 20 Juillet, 1756. Ibid., 28 Août, 1756. Desandrouins à–, même date. Montcalm à sa Femme, 30 Août. Translations of several of the above papers, along with others less important, will be found in N. Y. Col. Docs., X., and Doc. Hist. N. Y., I.

State of Facts relating to the Loss of Oswego, in London Magazine for 1757, p. 14. Correspondence of Shirley. Correspondence of Loudon. Littlehales to Loudon, 30 Aug. 1756. Hardy to Lords of Trade, 5 Sept. 1756. Conduct of Major-General Shirley briefly stated. Declaration of some Soldiers of Shirley's Regiment, in N. Y. Col. Docs., VII. 126. Letter from an officer present, in Boston Evening Post of 16 May, 1757. The published plans and drawings of Oswego at this time are very inexact.

435

Review of Military Operations, 187, 189 (Dublin, 1757).

436

Loudon to Shirley, 6 Sept. 1756.

437

The correspondence on both sides is before me, copied from the originals in the Public Record Office.

438

"The principal thing for which I sent Mr. Mackellar to Oswego was to strengthen Fort Ontario as much as he possibly could." Shirley to Loudon, 4 Sept. 1756.

439

Works of Franklin, I. 220.

440

"Nous sommes tant à Carillon qu'aux postes avancés 5,300 hommes." Bougainville, Journal.

441

Winslow to Loudon, 29 Sept. 1756.

442

Examination of Sergeant James Archibald.

443

In the Public Record Office, America and West Indies, LXXXII., is a manuscript map showing the positions of such of these posts as were north of Virginia. They are thirty-five in number, from the head of James River to a point west of Esopus, on the Hudson.

444

Colonial Records of Pa., VII. 76.

445

Washington to Morris,—April, 1756

446

Colonial Records of Pa., VII. 232, 242; Pennsylvania Archives, II. 744.

447

Report of Armstrong to Governor Denny, 14 Sept. 1756, in Colonial Records of Pa., VII. 257,—a modest yet very minute account. A List of the Names of the Persons killed, wounded, and missing in the late Expedition against the Kittanning. Hazard, Pennsylvania Register, I. 366.

448

Dumas à Vaudreuil, 9 Sept. 1756, cited in Bigot au Ministre, 6 Oct. 1756, and in Bougainville, Journal.

449

Dépêches de Vaudreuil, 1756.

450

Minute of Lieutenant Kennedy's Scout. Winslow to Loudon, 20 Sept. 1756.

451

Winslow to Loudon, 16 Oct. 1756.

452

Report of a Scout to Ticonderoga, Oct. 1756, signed Israel Putnam.

453

Compare Massachusetts Archives, LXXVI. 81.

454

Bougainville, Journal.

455

A large engraved portrait of him, nearly at full length, is before me, printed at London in 1776.

456

Rogers, Journals, Introduction (1765).

457

Provincial Papers of New Hampshire, VI. 364. Correspondence of Gage, 1766. N. Y. Col. Docs., VII. 990. Caleb Stark, Memoir and Correspondence of John Stark, 386.

458

Rogers, Journals. Report of the Adjutant-General of New Hampshire (1866), II. 158, 159.

459

Letter and Order Books of Winslow. "One Lydiass … whom we suspect for a French spy; he lives better than anybody, without any visible means, and his daughters have had often presents from Mr. Vaudreuil." Loudon (to Fox?), 19 Aug. 1756.

460

Report of Rogers to Sir William Johnson, July, 1756. This incident is suppressed in the printed Journals, which merely say that the man "soon died."

461

Rogers, Journals, 20. Shirley to Fox, 26 July, 1756. "This afternoon Capt. Rogers came down with 4 scalps and 8 prisoners which he took on Lake Champlain, between 20 and 30 miles beyond Crown Point." Surgeon Williams to his Wife, 16 July, 1756.

462

Bougainville, Journal.

463

This kind of divination was practised by Algonkin tribes from the earliest times. See Pioneers of France in the New World, 315.

464

Bougainville, Journal. Malartic, Journal.

465

Letter and Order Books of Winslow. Winslow to Halifax, 30 Dec. 1756.

466

Loudon to Denny, 28 Oct. 1756. Colonial Records of Pa., VII. 358-380. Loudon to Pitt, 10 March, 1757. Notice of Colonel Bouquet, in Pennsylvania Magazine, III. 124. The Conduct of a Noble Commander in America impartially reviewed (1758).

467

Smith, Hist. of N. Y., Part II. 242. William Corry to Johnson, 15 Jan., 1757, in Stone, Life of Sir William Johnson, II. 24, note. Loudon to Hardy, 21 Nov. 1756.

468

Massachusetts Archives, LXXVI. 153.

469

Rogers, Journals, 38-44. Caleb Stark, Memoir and Correspondence of John Stark, 18, 412. Return of Killed, Wounded, and Missing in the Action near Ticonderoga, Jan. 1757; all the names are here given. James Abercromby, aide-de-camp to his uncle, General Abercromby, wrote to Rogers from Albany: "You cannot imagine how all ranks of people here are pleased with your conduct and your men's behavior."

The accounts of the French writers differ from each other, but agree in placing the English force at from seventy to eighty, and their own much higher. The principal report is that of Vaudreuil au Ministre, 19 Avril, 1757 (his second letter of this date). Bougainville, Montcalm, Malartic, and Montreuil all speak of the affair, placing the English loss much higher than is shown by the returns. The story, repeated in most of the French narratives, that only three of the rangers reached Fort William Henry, seems to have arisen from the fact that Stark with two men went thither in advance of the rest. As regards the antecedents of the combat, the French and English accounts agree.

470

Strength of the Garrison of Fort William Henry when the Enemy came before it, enclosed in the letter of Major Eyre to Loudon, 26 March, 1757. There were also one hundred and twenty-eight invalids.

471

Eyre to Loudon, 24 March, 1757. Ibid., 25 March, enclosed in Loudon's despatch of 25 April, 1757. Message of Rigaud to Major Eyre, 20 March, 1757. Letter from Fort William Henry, 26 March, 1757, in Boston Gazette, No. 106, and Boston Evening Post, No. 1,128. Abstract of Letters from Albany, in Boston News Letter, No. 2,860. Caleb Stark, Memoir and Correspondence of John Stark, 22, a curious mixture of truth and error. Relation de la Campagne sur le Lac St. Sacrement pendant l'Hiver, 1757. Bougainville, Journal. Malartic, Journal. Montcalm au Ministre, 24 Avril, 1757. Montreuil au Ministre, 23 Avril, 1757. Montcalm à sa Mère, 1 Avril, 1757. Mémoires sur le Canada, 1749-1760.

The French loss in killed and wounded is set by Montcalm at eleven. That of the English was seven, slightly wounded, chiefly in sorties. They took three prisoners. Stark was touched by a bullet, for the only time in his adventurous life.

472

The preceding extracts are from Lettres de Montcalm à Madame de Saint-Véran, sa Mère, et à Madame de Montcalm, sa Femme, 1756, 1757 (Papiers de Famille); and Lettres de Montcalm à Bourlamaque, 1757. SeeAppendix E.

473

Vaudreuil au Ministre de la Marine, 13 Août, 1756.

474

Vaudreuil au Ministre de la Marine, 1 Sept. 1756.

475

Ibid., 6 Nov. 1756.

476

Vaudreuil au Ministre de la Marine, 23 Oct. 1756. The above extracts are somewhat condensed in the translation. See the letter in Dussieux, 279.

477

Montcalm au Ministre de la Guerre, 11 Juillet, 1757.

478

Montcalm au Ministre de la Guerre, 1 Nov. 1756.

479

Ibid., 18 Sept. 1757.

480

Ibid., 4 Nov. 1757.

481

Ibid., 28 Août, 1756.

482

Montcalm à Madame de Saint-Véran, 23 Sept. 1757.

483

Bougainville à Saint-Laurens, 19 Août, 1757.

484

Bougainville, Journal.

485

Événements de la Guerre en Canada, 1759, 1760.

486

Vaudreuil au Ministre de la Marine, 19 Avril, 1757.