49. A key to these events was Champlain’s weapon, an arquebuse à rouet or wheel lock arquebus, not a matchlock musket as many historians have mistakenly believed. For details and discussion see appendix L below.
50. Lescarbot, Conversion des Sauvages, Jesuit Relations 1:105.
51. Some scholars believe that the battle took place on the sandy beach. Champlain’s drawing and the course of events indicate that it happened on a clearing above the beach, probably near the present Pavilion at Ticonderoga. Had the battle happened on the beach, Champlain’s arquebusiers would not have had a clear shot from the woods.
52. CWB 2:98; Lescarbot, Conversion des Sauvages, Jesuit Relations 1:105.
53. CWB 2:99. Lescarbot’s account differs from Champlain’s in some details, asserting that Champlain loaded with two balls, not four as Champlain wrote. See Lescarbot, Histoire de la Nouvelle-France (Paris, 1609), and his La Conversion des Sauvages 1:51–113.
Lescarbot later wrote other accounts of the battle in subsequent editions of his Histoire de la Nouvelle-France (1611, 1612, 1618). Here he added more information not in Champlain’s account about the weather, and the identity of one of the two arquebusiers who joined the fight in support of Champlain. See above, note 47.
54. CWB 2:101.
55. Ibid. 2:100.
56. The latitude of Ticonderoga is 43 degrees 50 minutes north. Crown Point is 43 degrees 55 minutes.
57. CWB 2:94; 1:284.
58. The timing is crucial to the question of whether the battle was fought at Ticonderoga or Crown Point. Champlain had only three hours for exploring after the battle. See appendix J below.
59. CWB 2:94. This problem of time and distance is decisive in determining the location of the battle at Ticonderoga. It could not have happened at Crown Point. A discussion of the evidence appears in appendix J below.
60. CWB 2:101; on Hudson, see Samuel Purchas, Purchas, His Pilgrims (1613) 3:567–609.
61. CWB 2:105.
62. Ibid. 2:101.
63. Ibid. 2:102.
64. Ibid. 2:103.
65. Ibid. 2:101–05.
66. Nathaniel Knowles, “The Torture of Captives by the Indians of Eastern North America,” American Philosophical Society Proceedings 82 (1940), 151–225; Thomas S. Abler, “Iroquoian Cannibalism: Fact not Fiction,” Ethnohistory 27 (1980), 309–16. For archaeological evidence of cannibalism see James A. Tuck, Onondaga Iroquois Prehistory: A Study in Settlement Archaeology (Syracuse, 1971), 113–14.
67. For example, Daniel Richter, The Ordeal of the Long House: The Peoples of the Iroquois League in the Era of European Colonization (North Carolina, 1993); Roger M. Carpenter, The Renewed, The Destroyed, and the Remade: The Three Thought Worlds of the Iroquois and the Huron, 1609–1650 (East Lansing, Mich., 2004), 22, 25, 26.
68. CWB 2:105.
69. Ibid.
70. Ibid. 2:106.
71. New France was a family enterprise, and kin relations were complex. Jean Godet du Parc was the brother of Captain Claude Godet des Maretz, son-in-law of Pont-Gravé; and uncle of François Godet des Maretz. The Godets belonged to a noble family in Perche. See Trudel, Histoire de la Nouvelle-France 2:167, 472.
72. “laquelle sa Majesté eut pour agréable.” CWB 2:109–10.
73. Samuel E. Morison, Samuel de Champlain: Father of New France (New York, 1972), 231–33; Daniel Boorstin, The Image: A Guide to Pseudo-Events (New York, 1961, 1972) is a history of this intellectual revolution that separates Champlain’s world from ours. To Boorstin’s analysis one might add French materials such as the comte de Mirabeau’s writings on language which argued, ca. 1776, that words are things, with an existence independent from the other things that they purport to describe.
74. CWB 2:109.
75. Ibid. 2:110; Gustave Lanctot, A History of Canada: From its Origins to the Royal Régime (Toronto, 1963) 1:106.
76. CWB 2:110.
77. Ibid. 2:112.
78. Ibid. 2:117; Lanctot 1:106.
79. CWB 2:118.
80. Ibid. 2:121.
81. Ibid. 2:118–19.
82. Ibid. 2:123.
83. CWB 2:125. The new moon was June 21, 1610. See National Aeronautics and Space Administration, Six Millennium Catalog of Phases of the Moon, online at http://sunearth.gsfc.nasa.gov; see also http://eclipse.gsfc.nasa.gov/phase/phasecat.html, a helpful reconstruction of the lunar calendar.
84. CWB 2:126.
85. Champlain was in low swampy ground at the junction of three rivers: the St. Lawrence, the Yamaska, and the Richelieu, which he called the Rivière des Iroquois in 1610. He was moving through a huge area of wetlands that is now the Lac Saint-Pierre Biosphere Reserve. It holds 40 percent of the St. Lawrence wetlands and is home to hundreds of species of birds, including the largest heron colony in North America. It is still overrun by huge swarms of mosquitoes.
86. CWB 2:127–28; 4:105–18.
87. Ibid. 2:128. Champlain wrote that they went about “une lieue & demi” from the St. Lawrence River. The location of the Mohawk barricade was on the southeast bank of the Richelieu River, about three miles from the St. Lawrence River, at a cape which came to be called cap de victoire or the cap du massacre. The Huron called it Onthrandéen. It is now within the city of Sorel-Tracy. See Abbé A. Couillard Després, Histoire de Sorel, de ses origines à nos jours (Montreal, 1926), 12, 21–24. Biggar in CWB 4:105 was mistaken about its location, and he confused Champlain’s references to the Richelieu and the St. Lawrence rivers. Historians who have it right are Trudel in Histoire de la Nouvelle-France 2:171; and Morison, Champlain, 120–21.
88. CWB 2:128.
89. Ibid. 2:130.
90. Ibid. 2:130–33.
91. Ibid. 2:131.
92. Ibid. 2:132.
93. Ibid. 2:131–34; 4:112–13.
94. Ibid. 2:134.
95. Ibid. 2:136.
96. Ibid. 2:137. For a thoughtful discussion, see Elisabeth Tooker, Ethnographie des Hurons, 1615–1649 (Montreal, 1987, 1997), 32–40. This excellent work was first published in English as “An Ethnography of the Huron Indians, 1615–1649,” Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin 190 (Washington, 1964).
97. William N. Fenton, The Great Law and the Long House, 243–44.
98. For the high estimate, see Léo-Paul Desrosiers, Iroquoisie (Montreal, 1947) 47; for lower ones, see Trudel, Histoire de la Nouvelle-France 2:164, 171. For the population of the Mohawks, ca. 1600, estimates by Snow and Starna range from 8,110 to 10,570. Engelbrecht thinks that those estimates are “generous,” and Trigger reckoned the population was “probably no more than 5,000.” Cf. Dean R. Snow and William Starna, “Sixteenth-Century Depopulation: A View from the Mohawk Valley,” American Anthropologist 91 (1989), 142–49;
99. Engelbrecht, Iroquoia, 125; Bruce G. Trigger, Children of Aataentsic: A History of the Huron People to 1660 (1976, new edition, Montreal, 1987), 260. 99. Trigger, Natives and Newcomers, 176–77; Trigger, The Children of Aataentsic, 260–61. Other factors were expanding trade with the Dutch in the Hudson Valley to the south and collisions in the Ottawa Valley.
13. MARIE DE MEDICI
1. Henry Percival Biggar, ed., The Works of Samuel de Champlain, 6 vols. and a portfolio of maps and drawings (CWB), (Toronto, 1922–36, reprinted 1971) 2:144–45; 3:15.
2. Ibid. 2:117, 147.
3. CWB 2:145.
4. CWB 2:144–45.
5. Marcel Trudel, Histoire de la Nouvelle-France, vol. 2: Le Comptoir, 1604–1627 (Montreal, 1966) 2:167; CWB 4:34.
6. CWB 2:146–48. Claude Godet des Maretz was a captain in the King’s Marine. Lescarbot described him as a “jeune gentilehomme.” He came from Perche and married Jeanne, daughter of Francois Gravé du Pont. Also active in New France were his son, François Godet des Maretz, born at Honfleur in 1616 and his brother Jean Godet du Parc. They would play important roles in Quebec for many years—in 1609, 1610, 1611, 1613, 1616–17, and 1623. Godet du Parc commanded there in 1610–11, and again in 1616–17. See CWB 2: 63, 143, 117, 146n,
305; 3:603, 182, 167, 273, 473, 486–87; 5:97; Trudel, Histoire de la Nouvelle-France 2:161, 167, 473, passim.
7. CWB 2:154.
8. Ibid. 2:154.
9. Victor-L. Tapié, France in the Age of Louis XIII and Richelieu (Paris, 1952, 1957, tr. Cambridge, 1974, 1984), 4.
10. Joe C. W. Armstrong, Champlain (Toronto, 1987), 268.
11. Tapié, France in the Age of Louis XIII, 65.
12. Ibid., 49; Gustave Lanctot, History of Canada, 1:107.
13. Champlain’s pension was awarded by Henri IV, canceled under the queen regent, revived by Louis XIII, canceled by Richelieu, and revived once more by Louis XIII. He also received various salaires as lieutenant, mostly paid by commercial companies. Cf. Morison, Champlain, 208; Robert Le Blant et René Baudry, eds., Nouveaux documents sur Champlain et son époque (Ottawa, 1967), 1:17, 253, 259, 316, 412.
14. CWB 3:15.
15. Ibid. 3:15.
16. Champlain’s account, ibid. 2:257; 4:156.
17. Lescarbot, History of New France 1:11, 2:335.
18. Champlain’s account, CWB 2:257; 4:156.
19. Robert Le Blant, “La Famille Boullé, 1586–1639; 1. Nicolas Boullé,” RHAF 17 (1963), 55–69; idem, “L’ascension sociale d’un huissier: Nicolas Boullé,” Bulletin philologique et historique (1969) 819–36; also Le Blant and Baudry, Nouveaux documents 1:16n, 108, 330, 398, 401.
20. Le Blant, “L’ascension sociale d’un huissier;” idem, “La famille Boullé.”
21. Documents on the terms of the marriage, including the marriage contract, were brought together by E. Cathelineau in Nova Francia 5 (1930), 142–55; Trudel, Histoire de la Nouvelle-France 2:174; Abbé C.-H. Laverdière, ed., Oeuvres de Champlain publiées sous le patronage de l’Université Laval (Quebec, 1946), 372, 1445–47.
22. Marriage Contract 27 Dec. 1610, Archives nationales de France, Paris, series Y, vol. 150, 293ff. The text is published in CWB 2:315–24.
23. CWB 3:23.
24. Buisseret, Henri IV (London, 1984), 122.
25. Madame de Guercheville (ca. 1570–1632) was born Antoinette de Pons, the daughter of the comte de Marenne. She was married at a very early age to the Comte de La Roche Guyon, who left her a widow with an infant son in 1586, when she was about sixteen. After his death she withdrew to the country estate of La Roche Guyon in Normandy. In 1594 she remarried and became the wife of Charles du Plessis, marquis de Liancourt and comte de Beaumont-sur-Oise. She and her two husbands had great wealth and were figures of high eminence at court. See Lucien Campeau in Monumenta Novae Franciae 1:679–80; Trudel in Histoire de la Nouvelle-France 2:95–96; Adrian Huguet, Jean de Poutrincourt (fondateur de Port-Royal en Acadie …) (Amiens and Paris, 1932), 292–95; Herouard, “Journal,” in Le Canada pendant la jeunesse de Louis XIII, ed. A-Léo Leymarie, Nova Francia 1:161–65.
26. The story was told by the Abbé de Choisy and written by Francis Parkman, Pioneers of France in the New World (1865, revised edition with corrections, 1885; rpt. Boston, 1901), 290–91. Parkman’s sources are given as Mémoires de l’Abbé de Choisy, book xii; Biographie générale and Biographie universelle, and Les amours du Grand Alcandre [a Catholic pejorative for Henry IV]; Collection Petitot, 63:515; Morison, Champlain, 148.
27. Parkman, Pioneers of New France, 290–91.
28. Pierre-François-Xavier de Charlevoix, Histoire de l’établissement desprogrès et de la décadence du christianisme … (Rouen, 1713), 1:122; Parkman, Pioneers of New France, 202; primary documents appear in the Factum du procès entre Jean de Biencourt, Sr. de Poutrincourt et les Pères Biard et Massé, Jésuites (1614, ed. Gabriel Marcel [Paris, 1887]), which includes letters between Madame de Guercheville and Henri IV’s Jesuit confessor, Pierre Coton.
29. Association des Jésuites au trafique du Canada, contract dated Jan. 20, 1611, in Parkman, Pioneers of New France, 294.
30. Other islanders have located Saint-Sauveur in different places, but Jesuit Point is the most likely, in the judgment of this historian.
31. Champlain included an account of this disaster in his Voyages; CWB 4:2–34; the fullest accounts are those of Father Pierre Biard in reports to his superiors, Jesuit Relations, 2: 4–285; and in materials collected by Lucien Campeau from archives in Rome, and published in Monumenta Novae Franciae 1:3–638, which go beyond what is available in the Jesuit Relations.
32. CWB 4:28; Lescarbot, History of New France 3:47, 48–49n.
14. TRANSATLANTIC TRIALS
1. Henry Percival Biggar, ed., The Works of Samuel de Champlain, 6 vols. and a portfolio of maps and drawings (CWB), (Toronto, 1922–36, reprinted 1971) 2:242.
2. Elsie McLeod, “Savignon,” DCB, s.v. “Savignon;” Marcel Trudel, “Nicolas Vignau,” DCB, s.v. “Vignau;” Marcel Trudel, Histoire de la Nouvelle-France (Montreal, 1966) 2:174–75.
3. For Thomas Le Gendre, see Charles Bréard and Paul Bréard, Documents relatifs à la Marine Normande … aux XVIe et XVIIe siècles (Rouen, 1889), 115–16; for Lucas Le Gendre, see Robert Le Blant et René Baudry, eds., Nouveaux documents sur Champlain et son époque (Ottawa, 1967), xiii, xiv, 224, 256, 289, passim; for others aboard, see Trudel, Histoire de la Nouvelle-France 2:274.
4. CWB 2:157.
5. Ibid. 2:158–59.
6. Ibid. 2:160.
7. Ibid. 2:161.
8. Ibid. 2:161.
9. Ibid. 2:167.
10. Ibid. 2:157; 168; Samuel E. Morison, Champlain: Father of New France (New York, 1972), 124–25.
11. CWB 2:171.
12. Consul Willshire Butterfield, History of Brûlé’s Discoveries and Explorations (Cleveland, 1898), 18–25.
13. CWB 2:173.
14. Ibid. 2:175.
15. Ibid. 2:176. For earlier inhabitants see Roland Tremblay, Les Iroquiens du Saint-Laurent: peuple du maïs (Montreal, 2006), 99–130.
16. CWB 2:178–79; Trudel, Histoire de la Nouvelle-France 2:174–76.
17. It appears on Champlain’s map dated 1612, reproduced in Laverdière, ed., Oeuvres de Champlain publiées sous le patronage de l’Université Laval (Quebec, 1879), 3: endpages; Trudel, Histoire de la Nouvelle-France 2:177.
18. CWB 2:179.
19. Ibid. 2:181.
20. Ibid. 2:185.
21. Ibid. 2:184–85. On the naming of the rapids compare Trudel in Histoire de la Nouvelle-France 2:176; it would have been typical of Champlain to have had both purposes that Trudel considers.
22. CWB 2:187–88.
23. Ibid. 2:188–89.
24. Ibid. 192.
25. Ibid. 2:196–97; compare Bruce Trigger, Natives and Newcomers: Canada’s “Heroic Age” Reconsidered (Montreal, 1985), 195–97, which represents the Huron as strongly supportive of the traders and suspicious of Champlain. Trigger also asserted that Champlain tried to undercut the traders in his dealings with the Huron. This was the opposite of what happened. The Huron were deeply suspicious of the traders, and complained about them to Champlain. He in turn tried to defend them.
26. CWB 2:204.
27. Ibid. 2:204.
28. Ibid. 2:205.
29. Ibid. 2:206–12.
30. Ibid. 2:213
31. Ibid. 2:214.
32. Ibid. 2:242–43; N.-E. Dionne, Champlain: fondateur de Québec etpère de la Nouvelle-France, 2 vols. (Quebec, 1891, 1906) 1:303–05; Jean Liebel, Pierre Dugua, sieur de Mons, fondateur de Québec (Paris, 1999), 280–85; William Inglis Morse, Pierre Du Gua, Sieur de Monts (London, 1939), 52.
33. CWB 2:215.
34. Ibid. 2:243.
35. Ibid. 2:243; for the young king in 1611–12, see A. Lloyd Moote, Louis XIII, the Just (Berkeley, 1889), 39–60; and Jehan Herouard, Journal sur l’enfance et la jeunesse de Louis XIII, 2 vols. (Paris, 1868).
36. Gustave Lanctot, A History of Canada: From its Origins to the Royal Régime (Toronto, 1963), 107.
37. CWB 2:243–44, 4:208–09; 5:143; Lanctot, History of Canada, 106.
38. For the centrality of Champlain’s role, see Henry Percival Biggar, Early Trading Companies: A C
ontribution to the History of Commerce and Discovery in North America (Toronto, 1901, 1937; rpt. Clifton N.J., 1972), 86; Biggar writes that Soissons was “proposed by Champlain,” and “at Champlain’s request the vice-regency and the monopoly were then transferred to Soissons’ nephew, the young Condé. Trudel agrees in Histoire de la Nouvelle-France 2:188.
39. Louis XIII to Condé, Nov. 13, 1612; a copy was found in the archives of the Parlement of Rouen by Biggar, Early Trading Companies, 195–96; the right to license trade appears to have been limited to the St. Lawrence and did not include Acadia; see Lescarbot, History of New France (Toronto, 1907) 3:335; Trudel, Histoire de la Nouvelle-France 2:188–89.
40. Morison, Champlain, 137.
41. Lanctot, History of Canada, 107.
42. CWB 2:244–47.
43. Little is known about Quebec in the period from the fall of 1611 to the spring of 1613. We do not know the names or numbers of those who lived there. Probably the commander continued to be Jean Godet du Parc, who had that title in 1613 and 1616. See Trudel’s reconstruction of the habitants each winter in Histoire de la Nouvelle-France 2:488–89.
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