With a bankrupt colony, short on men, and exposed on all sides there seemed only one solution to Stoughton and his advisors, “that you will take into consideration the reduction of Canada, the unhappy fountain from which issue all our miseries.” The question now was whether the king would listen.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Iberville
BY THE FALL OF 1696 the French outpost of Placentia was struggling to survive. A remote village of some forty buildings clustered along the water’s edge, Placentia was the key to the French cod fisheries on the Great Banks. It was a seasonal town whose population fluctuated wildly with the arrival of the fishing fleets from France in the spring and their departure under escort of the French navy in the fall. Governor Brouillan, who had tended to the colony for over half a dozen years, did what he could to protect this far-flung and isolated outpost. He had expanded the colony’s defenses, reinforced the principal forts, particularly Fort St. Louis with a stone magazine, and erected several batteries to help secure the entrance to the harbor, but in the end it was not determination, know-how, or vision that limited Brouillan’s efforts but resources.1
Although the governor had fended off two major English expeditions and a number of smaller raids, which had proven just as difficult, his pleas for assistance were largely ignored. The town’s garrison of a hundred men a few years before had been whittled down by desertion and illness, and without replacements it was now less than half of its former state. To aggravate matters, the supply ship did not come in 1694, and what arrived the following year was barely enough for the few hundred or so inhabitants to subsist on. Thus, when the letter from France arrived outlining a campaign to secure all of Newfoundland Brouillan was finally convinced that his stars had aligned.
As mapped out in the orders sent by the French court, Iberville’s mission to St. John and the capture of Pemaquid was but the first step in the assault on the English. While Iberville executed his step the French frigate Pelican accompanied by six privateers from St. Malo, France, and supported by a number of smaller vessels arrived at Placentia. The plan called for the governor to join forces with Iberville, and together with the reinforcements sent from France they would seize the English towns along the western side of the island. The English settlers would be sent back to England while the booty would be returned to France to help offset the cost of the expedition. With a sizable force assembled, Brouillan waited until the end of August for Iberville to join him. When Iberville didn’t appear, the governor waited until September 9 and then set sail for St. John’s with his fleet.2
Brouillan’s attack on St. John’s was doomed almost from the onset. After dealing with a storm that scattered his vessels the governor attempted a surprise descent on the harbor. Contrary currents, as well as questionable sailing, however, placed the French fleet “a whole day at the entrance to the harbor, within range of a 4-pound cannon, with a wind off the land.” The maneuver had netted one positive result. A shallop came out of the harbor to inspect the intruders and now found itself in French hands. One of the individuals on board, Captain Ites of the frigate Soldadoes, claimed there were forty ships in St. John’s harbor, a number of which were armed with eighteen to thirty-two guns. The information did not deter Brouillan. In the morning he would land his troops and seize the gun batteries at the entrance to the harbor. Once this was accomplished he could turn these batteries on the town as well as sail into the harbor and support an attack with his warships.
Despite the effort of the crews, this plan unraveled when the tide and current carried the French fleet twenty miles south overnight. In their new position the English post at Bay Bulls lay not far away. Reports had reached Brouillan a few days before that two merchantmen and an English frigate, the thirty-two-gun Sapphire, were in the harbor as well as a number of fishing vessels waiting to be convoyed back to England. The governor had detached two of his vessels to make an attack on the English colony here two days before, but contrary winds had prevented the ships from entering the harbor. Now, with a light breeze at his back, Brouillan’s entire force advanced on the harbor. Two landing parties were formed. The first, under the command of the governor’s nephew Captain St. Ovide, was tasked with taking the English batteries and redoubts at the south entrance to the bay while the second detachment under the commandant of the Placentia garrison, L’Hermite, would land and seize the enemy posts on the north side.
Both commanders quickly accomplished their tasks, which allowed the French fleet to approach the town unmolested. A brief firefight broke out between the anchored Sapphire and Brouillan’s warships, but Captain Thomas Cleasby quickly realized that he would not last long before the French force. After a few volleys he ordered the Sapphire set ablaze and withdrew to shore with his crew. With the English frigate engulfed in flames and the harbor’s defenses captured the town fell quickly. Most of the inhabitants had fled into the woods, but one hundred of the Sapphire’s crew had been captured, the rest, including Cleasby, having made good their escape. Brouillan and his men sacked the village, pausing only as the powder magazine went off on the English frigate sending what was left of it to the bottom of the bay in a hissing fashion. With the pillaging complete the governor ordered the town burned and put back out to sea. Ferryland was the squadron’s next target, and after some stiff resistance the town fell on September 21. Like Bay Bulls the governor and his men looted the town, put it to the torch, and sent the inhabitants back to England in several small ships they had captured. Brouillan looked in on several smaller ports but found them deserted. Satisfied with his take of twenty-nine vessels, and finding no support from the St. Malo captains for another attempt on St. John’s, the governor set sail for Placentia, arriving on October 17.3
Here he found Iberville and his men. Although the latter had been at Placentia for several weeks he could not sail to the aid of Brouillan for lack of supplies. The Pemaquid operation had taken longer than expected and exhausted the detachment’s supplies. Iberville asked for supplies from the town’s garrison, but there were none to be had. With no other options the detachment waited for a pair of vessels from Quebec carrying the men Frontenac had raised for the expedition and a quantity of much-needed supplies. In early October the Wesp and Postillon arrived from Quebec. Reinforced and resupplied Iberville was about to set out for an attack on Carbonear, the northernmost English post on the island, when Brouillan entered port.
The two men began to disagree almost from the moment they met. The governor was not interested in Carbonear and ordered Iberville to call off his attack. Instead he pushed for a second naval assault on St. John’s with the combined forces. Iberville was wholly against the idea, pointing out that St. John’s was now warned and would expect just such an action. The difference in opinion was magnified by a confused command structure. Brouillan was in command of the naval forces, but Iberville had been given an independent command over his Canadians who were to conduct land operations. The argument reached an impasse and Brouillan threatened to use his rank as governor to take command of Iberville’s men. At this point Iberville came close to abandoning the operation and returning to France with his grievances, but it did not prove necessary.
Brouillan had seriously underestimated the Le Moyne name. When his Canadian troops heard that the governor was to bypass Iberville’s command they threatened to leave. They had signed on to serve with Iberville, they had orders from Count Frontenac appointing Iberville their commander, and if this were not to be the case then they would march back to Quebec and ask why.4
Brouillan was taken aback by the display and quickly moved away from any such decision, knowing that the Canadians were likely to carry through with their threat. The two men soon found a compromise. Part of the problem was that Iberville and his investors were funding his portion of the expedition, which meant that the task at hand was as much about booty as it was seizing the island in the name of the king. The St. Malo privateers were thinking in a similar fashion and, the governor realized, were jus
t as likely to leave as the Canadians. Brouillan attempted to diffuse the situation by stating that he only desired the honor of taking St. John’s in the name of the king. To address this matter an agreement was reached where Iberville would take the lion’s share of any captured loot. In return, Brouillan would be nominally in command and would attack the English settlements by sea while Iberville attacked by land.
With an understanding in place both men agreed that St. John’s was the prize, but their orders were to reduce the English settlements along the coast as well. To address this, the plan called for Brouillan to set out with the fleet for Renews Harbor while Iberville and his men marched across the frozen island to the town. The latter proposition must have seemed like madness to the governor, but he agreed and sailed out with the remainder of the troops. On November 1, 1696, Iberville and 125 men began a grueling sixty-mile trek that essentially bisected the island. “We marched nine days,” one participant noted, “sometimes in woods so thick we could scarcely pass, sometimes in these lands of moss, through rivers and lakes, quite frequently up to our waist in water.”5
On November 10, Iberville arrived at a deserted Ferryland. The next day while arrangements were being made to contact Brouillan, who was anchored a few miles south, a small detachment under an officer named Rancogne arrived. Iberville was at first annoyed to find out that Brouillan had sent a detachment toward St. John’s and then dismayed when Rancogne informed him that his party had captured an Englishman from St. John’s and then allowed him to escape after they were ambushed by an English patrol.
Iberville met with Brouillan on the twelfth and expressed his concern regarding Rancogne’s scouting expedition, but before the conversation proceeded any further the old arguments resurfaced. The governor once again asserted his authority over Iberville and disavowed any agreement between the men concerning claims to the spoils taken at St. John’s or elsewhere. Iberville objected to the breach in the agreement, and when Brouillan informed him that there had never been any other agreement, Iberville left without further discussion. Back at Ferryland the young French commander penned an angry letter to the king’s secretary of state, Pontchartrain, informing him of the proceedings with the governor and how he would not release control of the troops under his command to such a man. Fortunately for Iberville, the governor once again reversed course and agreed to the previous arrangement.
It was not to be the end of the matter. On November 22, the governor sent the Profond back to France with letters and a number of prisoners Iberville’s scouts had taken. The departure of the frigate seems to have created a political opportunity in Brouillan’s mind, causing him once again to return to his old position. He moved his troops up to Ferryland and laid his demands before Iberville. Apparently the honor of taking St. John’s in the name of the king was no longer sufficient, and Brouillan demanded half the booty from the expedition. When Brouillan attempted to exercise command over the Canadians and news of the broken agreement reached a gathering of troops on both sides, matters quickly turned ugly. Perceiving the consequences of the divided command Iberville relented to the governor’s demands and informed him that he would make his complaint at court. Until then there were greater matters to deal with in terms of the English.
On the twenty-third the combined forces, loaded onto longboats, sailed into Bay Bulls. There they found a hundred-ton English merchantman in the harbor and seized it along with its crew. A number of colonists, busy rebuilding after Brouillan’s attack a few weeks before, were also taken. Now established at the bay Iberville began sending scouting parties north toward St. John’s. On the twenty-sixth after leaving a dozen men to guard the boats at Bay Bulls, Iberville loaded his sleds and struck out by land toward Petty Harbor.
A few hours after leaving Bay Bulls Iberville, in charge of the vanguard, met one of his scouting parties. The men informed him that they had encountered thirty English from Petty Harbor. Iberville steered his troops toward the reported English, and when he found them, he ordered a charge that shattered the English detachment and carried the town. Thirty-six of the defenders had been killed in the sudden encounter, and a few were taken prisoner, but another two dozen had fled north toward St. John’s. Brouillan and the rest of the army, numbering around some 250 men, arrived and encamped for the evening. That night a winter storm brought snow in such quantities that the French army could not move. St. John’s lay only half a dozen miles away, a few hours’ march at most, but it would have to wait one more day.6
The citizens of St. John’s were no strangers to French threats during the war. Raiders and privateers were a constant menace, and a large French fleet had attempted to force its way into the harbor in the early summer of 1696 but was dissuaded from carrying through with its attack by the town’s well-manned batteries. Brouillan had also appeared before the harbor in September, sending yet another alarm through the community. The problem that now faced the town, however, was different. The previous attacks had always come from the sea. This one was coming from the land side where there were no defenses.
The storm that had stalled the French advance broke on the evening of the twenty-seventh, and the next morning, although cold and grey, was good enough to move forward. Jacques Testard de Montigny, who had served with Iberville at Schenectady, was placed in charge of the advance guard, which consisted of thirty Canadians and a handful of Abenaki. Some five hundred yards behind this was the main column. The troops from Placentia with Iberville and Brouillan at their head came first, followed by the Canadians, a group of which made up the rear guard. By late morning Montigny’s men were exchanging shots with a large detachment of English militia on the outskirts of St. John’s.
The town’s governor had originally assembled a force of thirty-four men to march to the relief of Petty Harbor when he heard news of Iberville’s attack, but the same storm that stalled the French advance drove this force back into St. John’s. The next day a larger detachment of eighty-four men resumed the effort, but they had barely marched a mile before they found themselves engaged with a French scouting party. Taking up positions behind a rocky crest the English detachment exchanged shots with Montigny, still unaware of how large a French war party they had stumbled upon.
Upon hearing the gunfire in front of them Iberville and Brouillan agreed on a plan. The governor would lead the Placentia men forward and reinforce Montigny while Iberville took the Canadians and circled around the English right. For over a half hour the St. John’s militia, by virtue of their defensive position, held off the steadily increasing fire coming from before them. Suddenly, Iberville was upon their flank, threatening to cut them off from St. John’s. Caught between two fires, the militia panicked and broke for St. John’s. Iberville followed the retreating English into the town and, using the confusion generated, quickly seized two small forts. The panic was such that he might well have carried Fort William, where over two hundred people had taken refuge, but at this point the risk was unnecessary.
Fort William was a neglected, poorly supplied structure in want of food and ammunition. It was now filled with most of the town’s inhabitants. With the French in control of the town itself, and Brouillan’s fleet not far down the coast, it was not if but only when the fort surrendered. Iberville sent a detachment back to Bay Bulls to bring up some mortars while the remainder of the army set themselves to the task of pillaging the town. The next evening the first steps toward reducing the fort were undertaken when the homes near the stronghold were put to the torch. The act yielded the desired results when the following morning,
A man came from the fort with a white flag, to speak of surrender. Afterwards the Governour with four of the principal citizens came for an interview. They would not allow us to enter the fort, lest we should see the miserable plight to which they were reduced. It was agreed they should surrender on condition of being allowed to depart for England. The capitulation was brought in writing to the fort, and approved of by the principal citizens and signed by the Governour and M. de
Brouillan.7
St. John’s had fallen. A few settlers had escaped by ship when the attack first began, but most of the town’s men, women, and children had been captured. Another fifty-five were estimated killed and perhaps as many wounded. In addition 125 fishing vessels were captured as well as a third of the English fishing production on the island.8
After the prisoners were placed on a handful of vessels and sent back to England another argument broke out between Brouillan and Iberville. The governor wanted to garrison the port. A French fleet was expected in the spring and the location would be a perfect anchorage for them. Iberville objected. His orders were to expel the English from Newfoundland and there were still a number of locations to the north to be dealt with. He could not afford to leave men behind if he was to take these posts. Brouillan realized that he already had several incidents to explain to the minister of the marine regarding his conduct but as of yet none that could be construed as outright preventing Iberville from carrying through with his orders. Thinking the better of pursuing the matter the governor dropped the idea, and St. John’s was burned to the ground and its guns thrown into the harbor.
Brouillan returned to Placentia while Iberville gathered his men and marched toward Conception Bay. On January 13, a vanguard of ten men under the command of de Montigny broke a path with their snowshoes to Portugal Cove. By January 17, Iberville and the main party, numbering 114 in all, had joined Montigny on their march to the base of Conception Bay. It was treacherous winter terrain. Rocks buried under the snow broke snowshoes, and fallen timber covered in white provided plenty of trip hazards, so much so that it became something of a joke when someone was caught by one and fell headlong into the snow.
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