by Rob Mundle
The marshland had made it extremely difficult for the British to move their heavy guns and equipment into advantageous positions for an all-out attack, and it was not until 26 June that the cannons boomed into action. The French withstood the barrage for a month – until the night of 25 July. That was when Admiral Boscawen, using the cover that came from a thick fog, sent small boats from as many British ships as possible, into the port in order to take off with the two French men-of-war that remained. Some 600 men were involved, and they were able to successfully tow one of the large ships, Bienfaisant, away from the dock, while the other, Prudent, ran aground and was torched by British sailors.
This attack, which Boscawen described as ‘a very brilliant affair, well carried out’, was the breaking point for the French, as they then had no means of escape from Louisbourg. Their commander, Chevalier de Drucour, surrendered the following day, with Cook logging the time as 11 am. Soon afterwards, the Union flag was flying over Louisbourg.
The British victory would later be recognised as a major turning point in the Seven Years War. It was the first powerful step by Britain towards ending French domination in North America.
With that battle decided, one could easily have expected the British to base a force of considerable size in the fortress, but Mr Pitt had other ideas. Having seen England forced to surrender the same fort as part of the peace negotiations with France in 1745, following what was known in the British colonies as King George’s War, Pitt resolved for it never to happen again. To that end, in 1760 the prime minister would instruct sappers and engineers to tunnel under the fortifications and destroy the town and port using explosives. That way, there was nothing left to trade with the French in any further peace negotiations.
After the guns fell silent following the siege, the British moved in and took control of Louisbourg. Cook took the opportunity to go ashore from Pembroke, landing on the sandy beach in Kennington Cove at the same spot where General Wolfe had established his beachhead seven weeks earlier.
As he wandered along the beach among the wreckage of small boats, abandoned cannons and other military equipment, he became intrigued by the activities of a man who was working quietly and methodically nearby. What especially drew Cook’s attention was an odd-looking piece of equipment this fellow had with him – a long-legged tripod of about chest height, topped by a small flat board, approximately 2 foot square. Each time the man stopped somewhere, he would set up the tripod, level the little tabletop and place a few instruments on its surface, before apparently taking some sights on the surrounding topographical features and jotting down notes. He’d then move on to another location and repeat the procedure.
Cook’s intrigue soon had the better of him. He approached the man, introduced himself, and asked the obvious questions. The tripod, he learned, was called a plane table and it was used as a tool for collecting data when surveying.
The conversation continued and before long Cook became aware that he was speaking with Samuel Holland, Royal Engineer and first Surveyor-General of British North America. As a member of the British Army, Holland had been commissioned by the government to survey and map a large part of the east coast of North America.
Prior to the recent offensive, Wolfe had tapped the Dutch-born surveyor’s exceptional skills, by requesting he go into enemy territory around Louisbourg and study the terrain. After carrying out his surveys, Holland would send the information back to Halifax so that the general could formulate the most effective plan of attack. And his contribution had been extensive: Holland surveyed most of the land around the fort’s perimeter – more than 2½ miles of high stone block walls. There were times when he had to duck for cover, as French soldiers in the fort spotted him and fired their muskets in his direction. He also sounded water depths in and around the harbour and surveyed some of the nearby coastline. Once they had all of Holland’s information at their disposal, Wolfe and his fellow commanders were able to decide that Kennington Cove was where the British forces should land. Now, with the battle won, Holland was spending the remainder of the summer completing the work he had started.
The surveyor and Pembroke’s master quickly struck up a rapport, so much so that Holland, realising that Cook held a genuine interest in the science, offered to teach him the skills needed to be a surveyor. Cook’s ship lay at anchor in Louisbourg Harbour until 28 August. It was a month that would prove to be of significant assistance to the Yorkshireman’s career in the long term.
During that same period, the possibility of an immediate attack on Québec was discussed by the military hierarchy – Royal Navy and British Army. It was the prime minister’s wish, and Wolfe and Simcoe, Pembroke’s captain, both supported the idea. The navy’s admirals overruled them, however, arguing that it was late in the summer season, and if winter snow and ice arrived early, all would be lost.
An alternative form of immediate action against the French was authorised, however. In early September 1758, Sir Charles Hardy led a small squadron of ten ships, including Pembroke – carrying between them three battalions of soldiers led by Wolfe – to the Bay of Gaspé and the Gulf of St Lawrence. Their orders were to harass and destroy as many French settlements as possible and leave the inhabitants in no doubt as to what was to come the following summer: an uncompromising British attack on Québec. Hardy’s mission was not as successful as had been hoped, but at least the French knew the British were on their way.
The ships were back at anchor in Louisbourg on 2 October, and during the six weeks they lay there, what would later become an important artefact in British maritime history came into existence. With the encouragement of John Simcoe, and through the application of what he had learned from Samuel Holland, Cook had taken the time during the ‘harass and destroy’ operation to carry out a survey of Gaspé Bay and its harbour. During the following year, this would become the first published chart created by Cook. It was credited to ‘James Cook Master of his Majesty’s Ship the Pembroke’, and its creator dedicated the work to the master and wardens of Trinity House, Deptford, where he had successfully sat for his Master’s Certificate.
As a break from his role as master aboard Pembroke while in Louisbourg, Cook was given a task that was a throwback to his early days aboard the Whitby colliers. He was appointed to the command of a small schooner and directed to sail to a port in Nova Scotia – probably Sydney, which was 60 nautical miles away on the northern coast – to take on a cargo of coal.
Louisbourg was destined to be icebound during winter. While it was still necessary to maintain a presence there, the fleet commander, Rear-Admiral Philip Durell, ordered his ships, Pembroke among them, to head for Halifax, where they would spend the season. After a five-day passage south, the fleet arrived there on 19 November.
Although Halifax was considered the best place to ride out the winter, it still proved to be a frigidly cold, wet and windy season. During January, conditions worsened, with the arrival of huge snowfalls and frosts. This was a particularly tough time for the men of the lower deck, primarily because their clothing was inadequate for such bitterly cold weather. Light pants, a shirt, vest and light jacket were all that most of them had for protection and bodily warmth. Some didn’t even have shoes. Still, they worked as demanded, cleaning and maintaining their ship so that she would be ready to sail come spring. Living in such a claustrophobic, harsh environment meant misdemeanours were not uncommon among the men, but the cat-o’-nine-tails and detentions kept indiscretions to a minimum.
As bad as this North American winter was, it soon became apparent that being in Halifax, and not Louisbourg, was the right decision. This point was not lost in a letter that Durell sent to the Secretary of the Admiralty:
This winter of 1759 has proved the severest that has been known since the settling of the place. For these two months past I have not heard from Louisbourg. Many vessels have attempted to go there, but have met with ice eighteen and twenty leagues [60 nautical miles] from the land; so were obliged to return, after hav
ing had some of their people froze to death, and others frost-bitten to that degree as to lose legs and arms …
During these bitterly cold months, Cook was far from idle. He and Holland, working alongside Simcoe, spent a considerable amount of time in the great cabin aboard Pembroke. There, using the limited information available, they created charts of the Gulf of St Lawrence and its river, which led to Québec – all part of the preparation for the British attack there. Holland expressed admiration for his protégé’s ability to learn and for the surveying skills that he was already demonstrating. In a letter sent later to Captain Simcoe’s son, the Dutchman wrote: ‘Mr Cook could not fail to improve and thoroughly brought in his hand as well in drawing as in protracting, etc.’
Simcoe, whom Holland recognised as a ‘truly scientific’ man, urged Cook to learn spherical trigonometry and the practical part of astronomy – the primary elements in celestial navigation. Cook took up the challenge, and very much lived up to his captain’s expectations. Through Simcoe’s encouragement, Pembroke’s master was on his way to becoming one of the first men to comprehend and apply the ‘new’ form of navigation – celestial navigation – using a sextant. The first example of such an instrument had been created by Englishman John Bird just two years earlier.
It is probable that these chart-making sessions also resulted in the creation of the first known ‘sailing directions’ for seafarers, titled as directions for the ‘Harbour of Louisbourg in Cape Breton’. And all the signs are that most, if not all, of the documents, were created by Cook’s hand. This material was designed to provide ships’ captains and navigators with as much detail as possible relating to known navigational hazards in the region, together with information on the location of safe channels and the flow of currents. The work is undated, but the documents must have been created soon after the British attack on Louisbourg, as the wreck of the French ship Prudent is shown near the harbour entrance as a point of reference for navigators.
One of the major benefits that came from wintering in Halifax rather than returning to England was that the British fleet was spared a time-consuming return voyage across the Atlantic before making the move to take Québec. The entrance to the St Lawrence River was only 450 nautical miles away – perhaps twelve days’ sailing time – and from there it was another 400 miles upstream to Québec. An added bonus was that the French were denied three additional months to prepare their defences. It also greatly decreased the possibility of there being any significant relief or reinforcements coming from France.
The water-borne attack on Québec was to be, like that seen in Louisbourg, a combined army and navy operation that included 9000 ‘redcoats’ under Wolfe’s command, and 13,500 sailors. The naval element, led by the highly regarded Admiral Sir Charles Saunders, later appointed First Lord of the Admiralty, would transport Wolfe and his battalions up the St Lawrence to the point of engagement at Québec, while at the same time securing control of the gulf and the river. As an additional tactical ploy, an army of foot-soldiers, commanded by General Jeffrey Amherst, and comprising British troops and American rangers, would move on Québec overland from the west.
Amherst knew all too well that his would not be an easy undertaking: his army had to contend with challenging terrain and well-defended French forts that they needed to overrun along the way. The navy’s role was equally demanding, as the large fleet, ranging from ships-of-the-line to small support vessels, would surely struggle when it came to navigating the river as they closed in on Québec.
What few details that were available on navigating the St Lawrence River originated from earlier British attempts to take the clifftop settlement, during the reigns of King William III and Queen Anne. But the fact that Saunders and his fellow strategists had no reliable charts of the gulf or the river – even the chart that Cook and Holland had drawn was based on scant information – was only part of the problem. Of major concern was that the larger and lumbering ships-of-sail, which were extremely difficult to manoeuvre in tight quarters, would have to contend with unseen sandbanks, rocky shoals and unpredictable eddies as they moved up what was known to be a hazard-strewn waterway. Most of the time, there was likely to be insufficient wind for them to counter the fast-flowing ebb tide, which meant that their progress would be staggered: they could only ride the flood tide for its duration, usually between five and six hours, before they would be forced to stop again and hold their ground at anchor.
The move came on 5 May 1759, when the flag signal went aloft aboard Durell’s flagship, signalling that the quest for Québec was about to start. It was time for the fleet to depart the port.
Crews of the thirteen ships-of-the-line rushed up the ratlines for the first time in months and manned the yards, ensuring that the sails unfurled in the appropriate succession while orders were barked their way, and elsewhere, from the quarterdeck. When everything was prepared, other crewmen manned the windlass on the foredeck, inserting the heavy wooden bars in their slots, then, when ready, they began heaving down on those bars, hauling in the bower cable and raising the bower to the constant rhythm of the large ratchet pawls clacking away.
Soon enough, the ships of this fleet, which had been at anchor in Halifax for almost six months, were easing their way out of the harbour, nudging their respective bows into Atlantic Ocean swells before turning north for the looping course to Louisbourg, then to the west and the Gulf of St Lawrence.
Before long, though, captains and crews alike were starting to think they might have departed too soon. Their ships were surrounded by fields of large and loose ice – a significant threat to any vessel. Cook, who was probably experiencing such an event for the first time in his maritime career, registered his impressions in his log: ‘at 7 [am] tacked Close along Side the Ice which Stretched away to the ESE as far as Could be distinguished from the Mast Head.’
With the ice came a fog so thick that the lookouts on each ship had soon lost sight of the other vessels. Over the following days, to ensure they stayed in contact and did not collide, cannons and small arms were fired at regular intervals, so that positions of ships in close proximity could be recognised.
Ten days out from Halifax, deep grief descended on Pembroke and across the fleet. Captain Simcoe, who had been ailing for some time and confined to his cabin since the fleet was off Louisbourg, died as the result of a severe bout of pneumonia. It was a profoundly sad time for Cook. He had lost a good captain and close friend; one of the cherished few who’d had a substantial influence on his career. The following day, 16 May, Simcoe was buried at sea off Anticosti Island, at the entrance to the St Lawrence River. Cook logged brief details: ‘at 6 Buried the Corpse of Captain John Simcoe & fired 20 Guns half a Minute between Each Gun.’
Adding to the challenge for the British fleet, as the ships made their long, south-westerly passage up the St Lawrence, was the lack of buoys in the river marking the channel. This was only to be expected: the French, knowing that an attack would be coming in the spring, had no doubt removed them late the previous year as part of their defence strategy. However, as the British had hoped, any plan by the French to establish gun batteries on the riverbanks and on islands in the river, and of scuttling ships in the narrows to create a blockade, had been rendered impossible. The defenders had had no time to implement their desired level of resistance before the warmer weather made its first appearance.
By 20 May, the fleet was anchored off the small, cigar-shaped Barnaby Island, 150 nautical miles downstream from Québec. From that moment, word spread rapidly upriver to the capital that the British were advancing. Admiral Saunders directed a small number of ships to remain at the island for protection purposes; then, on the next flood tide, the bulk of the fleet, including Pembroke, moved another 100 nautical miles upstream to Île aux Coudres, just 50 nautical miles from the target. By this time, Cook’s vessel had a new captain, John Wheelock, who had been promoted to the position from the 20-gunner HMS Squirrel.
The most formidable threat to the p
rogress of the British fleet towards Québec came on 8 June, when a section of the river known as The Traverse was reached. The British knew this stretch of the river was notorious for its shallows, its proliferation of shifting sandbanks, and its churning currents – hazards again made much worse for their ships by the absence of channel markers. For two days after the fleet arrived there and anchors had been set, Cook and the masters of a number of other ships were aboard small boats taking soundings and mapping a way through the maze. His log, written as tersely as ever, noted: ‘9th June, the boats of the fleet engaged sounding the channel of The Traverse … returned satisfied with being acquainted with the channel …’
Occasionally, a few French soldiers, as well as members of the local indigenous population, would fire on the British ships after they began moving through The Traverse, but they caused little trouble.
By 27 June, the French were left in no doubt as to the magnitude of the threat their town was facing. There, on their doorstep to the north-east, was an armada of vessels – near 150 of them – all flying the Union flag and most anchored in the river basin between Point Lévis and Île d’Orléans. The ships were within a 3-mile radius of the town, which sat atop Cap Diamant, a 300-foot-high promontory along the northern side of the river as the St Lawrence stretched downstream to the north-east. In his clifftop fortress, the French commander, Lieutenant-General Louis-Joseph de Montcalm, had rallied some 15,000 troops with which to defend Québec and New France.
Within twenty-four hours the pendulum had swung dramatically in France’s favour. A powerful storm whipped up and rolled across Québec, causing many of the British ships to drag anchor, some of them running aground, while several small boats were lost. Fast and responsible action by the crews minimised the problems for the invaders, only for the fleet to then be confronted by an even greater danger.
