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A Half Century of Conflict, Volume II

F >> Francis Parkman >> A Half Century of Conflict, Volume II




It was not his nature to rule with a stiff hand,--and this, perhaps, was
fortunate. Order and discipline, the sinews of an army, were out of the
question; and it remained to do as well as might be without them, keep men
and officers in good-humor, and avoid all that could dash their ardor. For
this, at least, the merchant-general was well fitted. His popularity had
helped to raise the army, and perhaps it helped now to make it efficient.
His position was no bed of roses. Worries, small and great, pursued him
without end. He made friends of his officers, kept a bountiful table at his
tent, and labored to soothe their disputes and jealousies, and satisfy
their complaints. So generous were his contributions to the common cause
that according to a British officer who speaks highly of his services, he
gave to it, in one form or another, £10,000 out of his own pocket.
[Footnote: _Letter from an Officer of Marines_, appended to _A
particular Account of the Taking of Cape Breton_ (London, 1745).]

His letter-books reveal a swarm of petty annoyances, which may have tried
his strength and patience as much as more serious cares. The soldiers
complained that they were left without clothing, shoes, or rum; and when he
implored the Committee of War to send them, Osborne, the chairman, replied
with explanations why it could not be done. Letters came from wives and
fathers entreating that husbands and sons who had gone to the war should be
sent back. At the end of the siege a captain "humble begs leave for to go
home" because he lives in a very dangerous country, and his wife and
children are "in a declining way" without him. Then two entire companies
raised on the frontier offered the same petition on similar grounds.
Sometimes Pepperrell was beset with prayers for favors and promotion;
sometimes with complaints from one corps or another that an undue share of
work had been imposed on it. One Morris, of Cambridge, writes a moving
petition that his slave "Cuffee," who had joined the army, should be
restored to him, his lawful master. One John Alford sends the General a
number of copies of the Reverend Mr. Prentice's late sermon, for
distribution, assuring him that "it will please your whole army of
volunteers, as he has shown them the way to gain by their gallantry the
hearts and affections of the Ladys." The end of the siege brought countless
letters of congratulation, which, whether lay or clerical, never failed to
remind him, in set phrases, that he was but an instrument in the hands of
Providence.

One of his most persistent correspondents was his son-in-law, Nathaniel
Sparhawk, a thrifty merchant, with a constant eye to business, who
generally began his long-winded epistles with a bulletin concerning the
health of "Mother Pepperrell," and rarely ended them without charging his
father-in-law with some commission, such as buying for him the cargo of a
French prize, if he could get it cheap. Or thus: "If you would procure for
me a hogshead of the best Clarett, and a hogshead of the best white wine,
at a reasonable rate, it would be very grateful to me." After pestering him
with a few other commissions, he tells him that "Andrew and Bettsy
[children of Pepperrell] send their proper compliments," and signs himself,
with the starched flourish of provincial breeding, "With all possible
Respect, Honoured Sir, Your Obedient Son and Servant." [Footnote:
_Sparhawk to Pepperrell,-June_, 1745. This is but one of many letters
from Sparhawk.] Pepperrell was much annoyed by the conduct of the
masters of the transports, of whom he wrote: "The unaccountable irregular
behaviour of these fellows is the greatest fatigue I meet with;" but it may
be doubted whether his son-in-law did not prove an equally efficient
persecutor.




CHAPTER XX.

1745.

LOUISBOURG TAKEN.

A RASH RESOLUTION.--THE ISLAND BATTERY.--THE VOLUNTEERS.--THE ATTACK.--THE
REPULSE.--CAPTURE OF THE "VIGILANT."--A SORTIE.--SKIRMISHES.--DESPONDENCY
OF THE FRENCH.--ENGLISH CAMP THREATENED.--PEPPERRELL AND WARREN.--WARREN'S
PLAN.--PREPARATION FOR A GENERAL ATTACK.--FLAG OF TRUCE.--CAPITULATION.
--STATE OF THE FORTRESS.--PARSON MOODY.--SOLDIERS DISSATISFIED.--DISORDERS.
--ARMY AND NAVY.--REJOICINGS.--ENGLAND REPAYS PROVINCIAL OUTLAYS.


Frequent councils of war were held in solemn form at headquarters. On the
7th of May a summons to surrender was sent to Duchambon, who replied that
he would answer with his cannon. Two days after, we find in the record of
the council the following startling entry: "Advised unanimously that the
Town of Louisbourg be attacked by storm this Night." Vaughan was a member
of the board, and perhaps his impetuous rashness had turned the heads of
his colleagues. To storm the fortress at that time would have been a
desperate attempt for the best-trained and best-led troops. There was as
yet no breach in the walls, nor the beginning of one; and the French were
so confident in the strength of their fortifications that they boasted that
women alone could defend them. Nine in ten of the men had no bayonets,
[Footnote: _Shirley to Newcastle, 7 June, 1745._] many had no shoes,
and it is said that the scaling-ladders they had brought from Boston were
ten feet too short. [Footnote: Douglas, _Summary_, I. 347.] Perhaps it
was unfortunate for the French that the army was more prudent than its
leaders; and another council being called on the same day, it was "Advised,
That, inasmuch as there appears a great Dissatisfaction in many of the
officers and Soldiers at the designed attack of the Town by Storm this
Night, the said Attack be deferred for the present." [Footnote: _Record
of the Council of War, 9 May, 1745._]

Another plan was adopted, hardly less critical, though it found favor with
the army. This was the assault of the Island Battery, which closed the
entrance of the harbor to the British squadron, and kept it open to ships
from France. Nobody knew precisely how to find the two landing-places of
this formidable work, which were narrow gaps between rocks lashed with
almost constant surf; but Vaughan would see no difficulties, and wrote to
Pepperrell that if he would give him the command and leave him to manage
the attack in his own way, he would engage to send the French flag to
headquarters within forty-eight hours. [Footnote: _Vaughan to Pepperell,
11 May, 1745._] On the next day he seems to have thought the command
assured to him, and writes from the Grand Battery that the carpenters are
at work mending whale-boats and making paddles, asking at the same time for
plenty of pistols and one hundred hand-grenades, with men who know how to
use them. [Footnote: _Vaughan to Pepperell, 12 May, 1745._] The
weather proved bad, and the attempt was deferred. This happened several
times, till Warren grew impatient, and offered to support the attack with
two hundred sailors.

At length, on the 23d, the volunteers for the perilous enterprise mustered
at the Grand Battery, whence the boats were to set out. Brigadier Waldo,
who still commanded there, saw them with concern and anxiety, as they came
dropping in in small squads, without officers, noisy, disorderly, and, in
some cases, more or less drunk. "I doubt," he told the General, "whether
straggling fellows, three, four, or seven out of a company, ought to go on
such a service." [Footnote: _Waldo to Pepperell, 23 May, 1745._] A
bright moon and northern lights again put off the attack. The volunteers
remained at the Grand Battery, waiting for better luck. "They seem to be
impatient for action," writes Waldo. "If there were a more regular
appearance, it would give me greater sattysfaction." [Footnote: _Ibid.,
26 May, 1745._] On the 26th their wish for action was fully gratified.
The night was still and dark, and the boats put out from the battery
towards twelve o'clock, with about three hundred men on board. [Footnote:
"There is scarce three hundred men on this atact [attack], so there will be
a sufficient number of Whail boats." _Ibid., 26 May, 10-1/2 p.m._]
These were to be joined by a hundred or a hundred and fifty more from
Gorham's regiment, then stationed at Lighthouse Point. The commander was
not Vaughan, but one Brooks,--the choice of the men themselves, as were
also his subordinates. [Footnote: The list of a company of forty-two
"subscribers to go voluntarily upon an attack against the Island Battery"
is preserved. It includes a negro called "Ruben." The captain, chosen by
the men, was Daniel Bacon. The fact that neither this name nor that of
Brooks, the chief commander, is to be found in the list of commissioned
officers of Pepperrell's little army (see Parsons, _Life of Pepperell,
Appendix_) suggests the conclusion that the "subscribers" were permitted
to choose officers from their own ranks. This list, however is not quite
complete.] They moved slowly, the boats being propelled, not by oars, but
by paddles, which, if skilfully used, would make no noise. The wind
presently rose; and when they found a landing-place, the surf was lashing
the rocks with even more than usual fury. There was room for but three
boats at once between the breakers on each hand. They pushed in, and the
men scrambled ashore with what speed they might.

The Island Battery was a strong work, walled in on all sides, garrisoned by
a hundred and eighty men, and armed with thirty cannon, seven swivels, and
two mortars. [Footnote: _Journal of the Siege_, appended to Shirley's
report.] It was now a little after midnight. Captain d'Aillebout, the
commandant, was on the wratch, pacing the battery platform; but he seems to
have seen nothing unusual till about a hundred and fifty men had got on
shore, when they had the folly to announce their presence by three cheers.
Then, in the words of General Wolcott, the battery "blazed with cannon,
swivels, and small-arms." The crowd of boats, dimly visible through the
darkness, as they lay just off the landing, waiting their turn to go in,
were at once the target for volleys of grape-shot, langrage-shot, and
musket-balls, of which the men on shore had also their share. These
succeeded, however, in planting twelve scaling-ladders against the wall.
[Footnote: _Duchambon au Ministre, 2 Sept. 1745. Bigot au
Ministre, 1 Août. 1745._] It is said that some of them climbed
into the place, and the improbable story is told that Brooks, their
commander, was hauling down the French flag when a Swiss grenadier cut him
down with a cutlass. [Footnote: The exploit of the boy William Tufts in
climbing the French flag-staff and hanging his red coat at the top as a
substitute for the British flag, has also been said to have taken place on
this occasion. It was, as before mentioned, at the Grand Battery.] Many of
the boats were shattered or sunk, while those in the rear, seeing the state
of things, appear to have sheered off. The affair was soon reduced to an
exchange of shots between the garrison and the men who had landed, and who,
standing on the open ground without the walls, were not wholly invisible,
while the French, behind their ramparts, were completely hidden. "The fire
of the English," says Bigot, "was extremely obstinate, but without effect,
as they could not see to take aim." They kept it up till daybreak, or about
two hours and a half; and then, seeing themselves at the mercy of the
French, surrendered to the number of one hundred and nineteen, including
the wounded, three or more of whom died almost immediately. By the most
trustworthy accounts the English loss in killed, drowned, and captured was
one hundred and eighty-nine; or, in the words of Pepperrell, "nearly half
our party." [Footnote: Douglas makes it a little less. "We lost in this mad
frolic sixty men killed and drowned, and one hundred and sixteen
prisoners." _Summary_, i. 353.] Disorder, precipitation, and weak
leadership ruined what hopes the attempt ever had.

As this was the only French success during the siege, Duchambon makes the
most of it. He reports that the battery was attacked by a thousand men,
supported by eight hundred more, who were afraid to show themselves; and,
farther, that there were thirty-five boats, all of which were destroyed or
sunk, [Footnote: "Toutes les barques furent brisées ou coulées à fond; le
feu fut continuel depuis environ minuit jusqu'à trois heures du matin."
_Duchambon au Ministre, 2 Sept. 1745_.]--though he afterwards says
that two of them got away with thirty men, being all that were left of the
thousand. Bigot, more moderate, puts the number of assailants at five
hundred, of whom he says that all perished, except the one hundred and
nineteen who were captured. [Footnote: _Bigot au Ministre, 1 Août,
1745_.]

At daybreak Louisbourg rang with shouts of triumph. It was plain that a
disorderly militia could not capture the Island Battery. Yet captured or
silenced it must be; and orders were given to plant a battery against it at
Lighthouse Point, on the eastern side of the harbor's mouth, at the
distance of a short half mile. The neighboring shore was rocky and almost
inaccessible. Cannon and mortars were carried in boats to the nearest
landing-place, hauled up a steep cliff, and dragged a mile and a quarter to
the chosen spot, where they were planted under the orders of Colonel
Gridley, who thirty years after directed the earthworks on Bunker Hill. The
new battery soon opened fire with deadly effect.

The French, much encouraged by their late success, were plunged again into
despondency by a disaster which had happened a week before the affair of
the Island Battery, but did not come to their knowledge till some time
after. On the 19th of May a fierce cannonade was heard from the harbor, and
a large French ship-of-war was seen hotly engaged with several vessels of
the squadron. She was the "Vigilant," carrying 64 guns and 560 men, and
commanded by the Marquis de la Maisonfort. She had come from France with
munitions and stores, when on approaching Louisbourg she met one of the
English cruisers,--some say the "Mermaid," of 40 guns, and others the
"Shirley," of 20. Being no match for her, the British or provincial frigate
kept up a running fight and led her towards the English fleet. The
"Vigilant" soon found herself beset by several other vessels, and after a
gallant resistance and the loss of eighty men, struck her colors. Nothing
could be more timely for the New England army, whose ammunition and
provisions had sunk perilously low. The French prize now supplied their
needs, and drew from the _Habitant de Louisbourg_ the mournful
comment, "We were victims devoted to appease the wrath of Heaven, which
turned our own arms into weapons for our enemies."

Nor was this the last time when the defenders of Louisbourg supplied the
instruments of their own destruction; for ten cannon were presently
unearthed at low tide from the flats near the careening wharf in the
northeast arm of the harbor, where they had been hidden by the French some
time before. Most of them proved sound; and being mounted at Lighthouse
Point, they were turned against their late owners at the Island Battery.

When Gorham's regiment first took post at Lighthouse Point, Duchambon
thought the movement so threatening that he forgot his former doubts, and
ordered a sortie against it, under the Sieur de Beaubassin. Beaubassin
landed, with a hundred men, at a place called Lorembec, and advanced to
surprise the English detachment; but was discovered by an outpost of forty
men, who attacked and routed his party. [Footnote: _Journal of the
Siege_, appended to Shirley's report. Pomeroy, _Journal_.] Being
then joined by eighty Indians, Beaubassin had several other skirmishes with
English scouting-parties, till, pushed by superior numbers, and their
leader severely wounded, his men regained Louisbourg by sea, escaping with
difficulty from the guard-boats of the squadron. The Sieur de la Valliere,
with a considerable party of men, tried to burn Pepperrell's storehouses,
near Flat Point Cove; but ten or twelve of his followers were captured, and
nearly all the rest wounded. Various other petty encounters took place
between English scouting-parties and roving bands of French and Indians,
always ending, according to Pepperrell, in the discomfiture of the latter.
To this, however, there was at least one exception. Twenty English were
waylaid and surrounded near Petit Lorembec by forty or fifty Indians,
accompanied by two or three Frenchmen. Most of the English were shot down,
several escaped, and the rest surrendered on promise of life; upon which
the Indians, in cold blood, shot or speared some of them, and atrociously
tortured others.

This suggested to Warren a device which had two objects,--to prevent such
outrages in future, and to make known to the French that the ship
"Vigilant," the mainstay of their hopes, was in English hands. The
treatment of the captives was told to the Marquis de la Maisonfort, late
captain of the "Vigilant," now a prisoner on board the ship he had
commanded, and he was requested to lay the facts before Duchambon. This he
did with great readiness, in a letter containing these words: "It is well
that you should be informed that the captains and officers of this squadron
treat us, not as their prisoners, but as their good friends, and take
particular pains that my officers and crew should want for nothing;
therefore it seems to me just to treat them in like manner, and to punish
those who do otherwise and offer any insult to the prisoners who may fall
into your hands."

Captain M'Donald, of the marines, carried this letter to Duchambon under a
flag-of-truce. Though familiar with the French language, he spoke to the
Governor through an interpreter, so that the French officers present, who
hitherto had only known that a large ship had been taken, expressed to each
other without reserve their discouragement and dismay when they learned
that the prize was no other than the "Vigilant". Duchambon replied to La
Maisonfort's letter that the Indians alone were answerable for the
cruelties in question, and that he would forbid such conduct for the
future. [Footnote: _De la Maisonfort à Duchambon, 18 Juin_ (new
style), 1745. _Duchambon à de la Maisonfort, 19 Juin_ (new style),
1745.]

The besiegers were now threatened by a new danger. We have seen that in the
last summer the Sieur Duvivier had attacked Annapolis. Undaunted by
ill-luck, he had gone to France to beg for help to attack it again; two
thousand men were promised him, and in anticipation of their arrival the
Governor of Canada sent a body of French and Indians, under the noted
partisan Marin, to meet and co-operate with them. Marin was ordered to wait
at Les Mines till he heard of the arrival of the troops from France; but he
grew impatient, and resolved to attack Annapolis without them. Accordingly,
he laid siege to it with the six or seven hundred whites and Indians of his
party, aided by the so-called Acadian neutrals. Mascarene, the governor,
kept them at bay till the 24th of May, when, to his surprise, they all
disappeared. Duchambon had sent them an order to make all haste to the aid
of Louisbourg. As the report of this reached the besiegers, multiplying
Marin's force four-fold, they expected to be attacked by numbers more than
equal to those of their own effective men. This wrought a wholesome reform.
Order was established in the camp, which was now fenced with palisades and
watched by sentinels and scouting-parties.

Another tribulation fell upon the General. Shirley had enjoined it upon
him to keep in perfect harmony with the naval commander, and the injunction
was in accord with Pepperrell's conciliating temper. Warren was no less
earnest than he for the success of the enterprise, lent him ammunition in
time of need, and offered every aid in his power, while Pepperrell in
letters to Shirley and Newcastle praised his colleague without stint. But
in habits and character the two men differed widely. Warren was in the
prime of life, and the ardor of youth still burned in him. He was impatient
at the slow movement of the siege. Prisoners told him of a squadron
expected from Brest, of which the "Vigilant" was the forerunner; and he
feared that even if it could not defeat him, it might elude the blockade,
and with the help of the continual fogs, get into Louisbourg in spite of
him, thus making its capture impossible. Therefore he called a council of
his captains on board his flagship, the "Superbe," and proposed a plan for
taking the place without further delay. On the same day he laid it before
Pepperrell. It was to the effect that all the king's ships and provincial
cruisers should enter the harbor, after taking on board sixteen hundred of
Pepperrell's men, and attack the town from the water side, while what was
left of the army should assault it by land. [Footnote: _Report of a
Consultation of Officers on board his Majesty's ship "Superbe,"_
enclosed in a letter of _Warren to Pepperrell, 24 May, 1745._] To
accept the proposal would have been to pass over the command to Warren,
only about twenty-one hundred of the New England men being fit for service
at the time, while of these the General informs Warren that "six hundred
are gone in quest of two bodies of French and Indians, who, we are
informed, are gathering, one to the eastward, and the other to the
westward." [Footnote: _Pepperrell to Warren, 28 May, 1745._]

To this Warren replies, with some appearance of pique, "I am very sorry
that no one plan of mine, though approved by all my captains, has been so
fortunate as to meet your approbation or have any weight with you." And to
show his title to consideration, he gives an extract from a letter written
to him by Shirley, in which that inveterate flatterer hints his regret
that, by reason of other employments, Warren could not take command of the
whole expedition,--"which I doubt not," says the Governor, "would be a most
happy event for his Majesty's service." [Footnote: _Warren to Pepperrell,
29 May, 1745._]

Pepperrell kept his temper under this thrust, and wrote to the commodore
with invincible courtesy: "Am extremely sorry the fogs prevent me from the
pleasure of waiting on you on board your ship," adding that six hundred men
should be furnished from the army and the transports to man the "Vigilant,"
which was now the most powerful ship in the squadron. In short, he showed
every disposition to meet Warren half way. But the Commodore was beginning
to feel some doubts as to the expediency of the bold action he had
proposed, and informed Pepperrell that his pilots thought it impossible to
go into the harbor until the Island Battery was silenced. In fact, there
was danger that if the ships got in while that battery was still alive and
active, they would never get out again, but be kept there as in a trap,
under the fire from the town ramparts.

Gridley's artillery at Lighthouse Point had been doing its best, dropping
bombshells with such precision into the Island Battery that the French
soldiers were sometimes seen running into the sea to escape the explosions.
Many of the Island guns were dismounted, and the place was fast becoming
untenable. At the same time the English batteries on the land side were
pushing their work of destruction with relentless industry, and walls and
bastions crumbled under their fire. The French labored with energy under
cover of night to repair the mischief; closed the shattered West Gate with
a wall of stone and earth twenty feet thick, made an epaulement to protect
what was left of the formidable Circular Battery,--all but three of whose
sixteen guns had been dismounted,--stopped the throat of the Dauphin's
Bastion with a barricade of stone, and built a cavalier, or raised battery,
on the King's Bastion,--where, however, the English fire soon ruined it.
Against that near and peculiarly dangerous neighbor, the advanced battery,
or, as they called it, the _Batterie de Francœur_, they planted
three heavy cannon to take it in flank. "These," says Duchambon, "produced
a marvellous effect, dismounted one of the cannon of the Bastonnais, and
damaged all their embrasures,--which," concludes the Governor, "did not
prevent them from keeping up a constant fire; and they repaired by night
the mischief we did them by day." [Footnote: _Duchambon au Ministre, 2
Sept._ 1745.]

Pepperrell and Warren at length came to an understanding as to a joint
attack by land and water. The Island Battery was by this time crippled, and
the town batteries that commanded the interior of the harbor were nearly
destroyed. It was agreed that Warren, whose squadron was now increased by
recent arrivals to eleven ships, besides the provincial cruisers, should
enter the harbor with the first fair wind, cannonade the town and attack it
in boats, while Pepperrell stormed it from the land side. Warren was to
hoist a Dutch flag under his pennant, at his main-top-gallant mast-head, as
a signal that he was about to sail in; and Pepperrell was to answer by
three columns of smoke, marching at the same time towards the walls with
drums beating and colors flying. [Footnote: _Warren to Pepperrell, 11
June, 1745. Pepperrell to Warren, 13 June, 1745._]

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