Book: Count Frontenac and New France under Louis XIV

F >> Francis Parkman >> Count Frontenac and New France under Louis XIV




Hannah Dustan now resolved on a desperate effort to escape, and Mary
Neff and the boy agreed to join in it. They were in the depths of the
forest, half way on their journey, and the Indians, who had no
distrust of them, were all asleep about their camp fire, when, late in
the night, the two women and the boy took each a hatchet, and crouched
silently by the bare heads of the unconscious savages. Then they all
struck at once, with blows so rapid and true that ten of the twelve
were killed before they were well awake. One old squaw sprang up
wounded, and ran screeching into the forest, followed by a small boy
whom they had purposely left unharmed. Hannah Dustan and her
companions watched by the corpses till daylight; then the Amazon
scalped them all, and the three made their way back to the
settlements, with the trophies of their exploit. [Footnote: This story
is told by Mather, who had it from the women themselves, and by Niles,
Hutchinson, and others. An entry in the contemporary journal of Rev.
John Pike fully confirms it. The facts were notorious at the time.
Hannah Dustan and her companions received a bounty of £50 for their
ten scalps; and the governor of Maryland, hearing of what they had
done, sent them a present.]


[1] "Les témoignages qu'on a rendu à Sa Majesté de l'affection et du
zêle du Sr. de Thury, missionaire chez les Canibas (_Abenakis_), pour
son service, et particulièrement dans l'engagement où il a mis les
Sauvages de recommencer la guerre contre les Anglois, m'oblige de vous
prier de luy faire une plus forte part sur les 1,500 livres de
gratification que Sa Majesté accorde pour les ecclésiastiques de
l'Acadie." _Le Ministre à l'Évesque de Québec_, 16 _Avril_, 1695.

"Je suis bien aise de me servir de cette occasion pour vous dire que
j'ay esté informé, non seulement de vostre zêle et de vostre
application pour vostre mission, et du progrès qu'elle fait pour
l'avancement de la religion avec les sauvages, mais encore de vos
soins pour les maintenir dans le service de Sa Majesté et pour les
encourager aux expeditions de guerre." _Le Ministre à Thury_, 28
_Avril_, 1697. The other letter to Thury, written two years before, is
of the same tenor.

[2] The famous Ouréhaoué, who had been for years under the influence
of the priests, and who, as Charlevoix says, died "un vrai Chrétien,"
being told on his death-bed how Christ was crucified by the Jews,
exclaimed with fervor: "Ah! why was not I there? I would have revenged
him: I would have had their scalps." La Potherie, IV. 91. Charlevoix,
after his fashion on such occasions, suppresses the revenge and the
scalping, and instead makes the dying Christian say, "I would have
prevented them from so treating my God."

The savage custom of forcing prisoners to run the gauntlet, and
sometimes beating them to death as they did so, was continued at two,
if not all, of the mission villages down to the end of the French
domination. General Stark of the Revolution, when a young man, was
subjected to this kind of torture at St. Francis, but saved himself by
snatching a club from one of the savages, and knocking the rest to the
right and left as he ran. The practice was common, and must have had
the consent of the priests of the mission.

At the Sulpitian mission of the Mountain of Montreal, unlike the rest,
the converts were taught to speak French and practise mechanical arts.
The absence of such teaching in other missions was the subject of
frequent complaint, not only from Frontenac, but from other officers.
La Motte-Cadillac writes bitterly on the subject, and contrasts the
conduct of the French priests with that of the English ministers, who
have taught many Indians to read and write, and reward them for
teaching others in turn, which they do, he says, with great success.
_Mémoire contenant une Description détaillée de l'Acadie, etc._, 1693.
In fact, Eliot and his co-workers took great pains in this respect.
There were at this time thirty Indian churches in New England,
according to the _Diary of President Stiles_, cited by Holmes.

[3] _Mémoire sur l'Entreprise de Boston, pour M. le Marquis de
Nesmond, Versailles, 21 Avril, 1697; Instruction à M. le Marquis de
Nesmond, même date; Le Roy à Frontenac, même date; Le Roy à Frontenac
et Champigny 27 Avril, 1697; Le Ministre à Nesmond, 28 Avril, 1697;
Ibid., 15 Juin, 1697; Frontenac au Ministre, 15 Oct., 1697; Carte de
Baston, par le Sr. Franquelin, 1697_. This is the map made for the use
of the expedition. A _fac-simile_ of it is before me. The conquest of
New York had originally formed part of the plan. _Lagny au Ministre,
20 Jan., 1695_. Even as it was, too much was attempted, and the scheme
was fatally complicated by the operations at Newfoundland. Four years
before, a projected attack on Quebec by a British fleet, under Admiral
Wheeler, had come to nought from analogous causes.

The French spared no pains to gain accurate information as to the
strength of the English settlements. Among other reports on this
subject there is a curious _Mémoire sur les Établissements anglois au
delà de Pemaquid, jusqu'a Baston_. It was made just after the capture
of Pemaquid, with a view to further operations. Saco is described as a
small fort a league above the mouth of the river Saco, with four
cannon, but fit only to resist Indians. At Wells, it says, all the
settlers have sought refuge in four _petits forts_, of which the
largest holds perhaps 20 men, besides women and children. At York, all
the people have gathered into one fort, where there are about 40 men.
At Portsmouth there is a fort, of slight account, and about a hundred
houses. This neighborhood, no doubt including Kittery, can furnish at
most about 300 men. At the Isles of Shoals there are some 280
fishermen, who are absent, except on Sundays. In the same manner,
estimates are made for every village and district as far as Boston.




CHAPTER XVIII.

1693-1697.

FRENCH AND ENGLISH RIVALRY.

LE MOYNE D'IBERVILLE.--HIS EXPLOITS IN NEWFOUNDLAND.--IN HUDSON'S
BAY.--THE GREAT PRIZE.--THE COMPETITORS.--FATAL POLICY OF THE KING.--
THE IROQUOIS QUESTION.--NEGOTIATION.--FIRMNESS OF FRONTENAC.--ENGLISH
INTERVENTION.--WAR RENEWED.--STATE OF THE WEST.--INDIAN DIPLOMACY.--
CRUEL MEASURES.--A PERILOUS CRISIS.--AUDACITY OF FRONTENAC.


No Canadian, under the French rule, stands in a more conspicuous or
more deserved eminence than Pierre Le Moyne d'Iberville. In the
seventeenth century, most of those who acted a prominent part in the
colony were born in Old France; but Iberville was a true son of the
soil. He and his brothers, Longueuil, Serigny, Assigny, Maricourt,
Sainte-Hélène, the two Châteauguays, and the two Bienvilles, were, one
and all, children worthy of their father, Charles Le Moyne of
Montreal, and favorable types of that Canadian _noblesse_, to whose
adventurous hardihood half the continent bears witness. Iberville was
trained in the French navy, and was already among its most able
commanders. The capture of Pemaquid was, for him, but the beginning of
greater things; and, though the exploits that followed were outside
the main theatre of action, they were too remarkable to be passed in
silence.

The French had but one post of any consequence on the Island of
Newfoundland, the fort and village at Placentia Bay; while the English
fishermen had formed a line of settlements two or three hundred miles
along the eastern coast. Iberville had represented to the court the
necessity of checking their growth, and to that end a plan was
settled, in connection with the expedition against Pemaquid. The ships
of the king were to transport the men; while Iberville and others
associated with him were to pay them, and divide the plunder as their
compensation. The chronicles of the time show various similar bargains
between the great king and his subjects.

Pemaquid was no sooner destroyed, than Iberville sailed for
Newfoundland, with the eighty men he had taken at Quebec; and, on
arriving, he was joined by as many more, sent him from the same place.
He found Brouillan, governor of Placentia, with a squadron formed
largely of privateers from St. Malo, engaged in a vain attempt to
seize St. John, the chief post of the English. Brouillan was a man of
harsh, jealous, and impracticable temper; and it was with the utmost
difficulty that he and Iberville could act in concert. They came at
last to an agreement, made a combined attack on St. John, took it, and
burned it to the ground. Then followed a new dispute about the
division of the spoils. At length it was settled. Brouillan went back
to Placentia, and Iberville and his men were left to pursue their
conquests alone.

There were no British soldiers on the island. The settlers were rude
fishermen without commanders, and, according to the French accounts,
without religion or morals. In fact, they are described as "worse than
Indians." Iberville now had with him a hundred and twenty-five
soldiers and Canadians, besides a few Abenakis from Acadia. [Footnote:
The reinforcement sent him from Quebec consisted of fifty soldiers,
thirty Canadians, and three officers. _Frontenac au Ministre_, 28
_Oct_., 1696.] It was mid-winter when he began his march. For two
months he led his hardy band through frost and snow, from hamlet to
hamlet, along those forlorn and desolate coasts, attacking each in
turn and carrying havoc everywhere. Nothing could exceed the hardships
of the way, or the vigor with which they were met and conquered. The
chaplain Baudoin gives an example of them in his diary. "January 18th.
The roads are so bad that we can find only twelve men strong enough to
beat the path. Our snow-shoes break on the crust, and against the
rocks and fallen trees hidden under the snow, which catch and trip us;
but, for all that, we cannot help laughing to see now one, and now
another, fall headlong. The Sieur de Martigny fell into a river, and
left his gun and his sword there to save his life." A panic seized the
settlers, many of whom were without arms as well as without leaders.
They imagined the Canadians to be savages, who scalped and butchered
like the Iroquois. Their resistance was feeble and incoherent, and
Iberville carried all before him. Every hamlet was pillaged and
burned; and, according to the incredible report of the French writers,
two hundred persons were killed and seven hundred captured, though it
is admitted that most of the prisoners escaped. When spring opened,
all the English settlements were destroyed, except the post of
Bonavista and the Island of Carbonnière, a natural fortress in the
sea. Iberville returned to Placentia, to prepare for completing his
conquest, when his plans were broken by the arrival of his brother
Serigny, with orders to proceed at once against the English at
Hudson's Bay. [1]

It was the nineteenth of May, when Serigny appeared with five ships of
war, the "Pelican," the "Palmier," the "Wesp," the "Profond," and the
"Violent." The important trading-post of Fort Nelson, called Fort
Bourbon by the French, was the destined object of attack. Iberville
and Serigny had captured it three years before, but the English had
retaken it during the past summer, and, as it commanded the fur-trade
of a vast interior region, a strong effort was now to be made for its
recovery. Iberville took command of the "Pelican," and his brother of
the "Palmier." They sailed from Placentia early in July, followed by
two other ships of the squadron, and a vessel carrying stores. Before
the end of the month they entered the bay, where they were soon caught
among masses of floating ice. The store-ship was crushed and lost, and
the rest were in extreme danger. The "Pelican" at last extricated
herself, and sailed into the open sea; but her three consorts were
nowhere to be seen. Iberville steered for Fort Nelson, which was
several hundred miles distant, on the western shore of this dismal
inland sea. He had nearly reached it, when three sail hove in sight;
and he did not doubt that they were his missing ships. They proved,
however, to be English armed merchantmen: the "Hampshire" of fifty-two
guns, and the "Daring" and the "Hudson's Bay" of thirty-six and
thirty-two. The "Pelican" carried but forty-four, and she was alone. A
desperate battle followed, and from half past nine to one o'clock the
cannonade was incessant. Iberville kept the advantage of the wind,
and, coming at length to close quarters with the "Hampshire," gave her
repeated broadsides between wind and water, with such effect that she
sank with all on board. He next closed with the "Hudson's Bay," which
soon struck her flag; while the "Daring" made sail, and escaped. The
"Pelican" was badly damaged in hull, masts, and rigging; and the
increasing fury of a gale from the east made her position more
critical every hour. She anchored, to escape being driven ashore; but
the cables parted, and she was stranded about two leagues from the
fort. Here, racked by the waves and the tide, she split amidships; but
most of the crew reached land with their weapons and ammunition. The
northern winter had already begun, and the snow lay a foot deep in the
forest. Some of them died from cold and exhaustion, and the rest built
huts and kindled fires to warm and dry themselves. Food was so scarce
that their only hope of escape from famishing seemed to lie in a
desperate effort to carry the fort by storm, but now fortune
interposed. The three ships they had left behind in the ice arrived
with all the needed succors. Men, cannon, and mortars were sent
ashore, and the attack began. Fort Nelson was a palisade work,
garrisoned by traders and other civilians in the employ of the English
fur company, and commanded by one of its agents, named Bailey. Though
it had a considerable number of small cannon, it was incapable of
defence against any thing but musketry; and the French bombs soon made
it untenable. After being three times summoned, Bailey lowered his
flag, though not till he had obtained honorable terms; and he and his
men marched out with arms and baggage, drums beating and colors
flying. Iberville had triumphed over the storms, the icebergs, and the
English. The north had seen his prowess, and another fame awaited him
in the regions of the sun; for he became the father of Louisiana, and
his brother Bienville founded New Orleans. [Footnote: On the capture
of Fort Nelson, _Iberville au Ministre, 8 Nov., 1697_; Jérémie,
_Relation de la Baye de Hudson_; La Potherie, I. 86-109. All these
writers were present at the attack.]

These northern conflicts were but episodes. In Hudson's Bay,
Newfoundland, and Acadia, the issues of the war were unimportant,
compared with the momentous question whether France or England should
be mistress of the west; that is to say, of the whole interior of the
continent. There was a strange contrast in the attitude of the rival
colonies towards this supreme prize: the one was inert, and seemingly
indifferent; the other, intensely active. The reason is obvious
enough. The English colonies were separate, jealous of the crown and
of each other, and incapable as yet of acting in concert. Living by
agriculture and trade, they could prosper within limited areas, and
had no present need of spreading beyond the Alleghanies. Each of them
was an aggregate of persons, busied with their own affairs, and giving
little heed to matters which did not immediately concern them. Their
rulers, whether chosen by themselves or appointed in England, could
not compel them to become the instruments of enterprises in which the
sacrifice was present, and the advantage remote. The neglect in which
the English court left them, though wholesome in most respects, made
them unfit for aggressive action; for they had neither troops,
commanders, political union, military organization, nor military
habits. In communities so busy, and governments so popular, much could
not be done, in war, till the people were roused to the necessity of
doing it; and that awakening was still far distant. Even New York, the
only exposed colony, except Massachusetts and New Hampshire, regarded
the war merely as a nuisance to be held at arm's length. [Footnote:
See note at the end of the chapter.]

In Canada, all was different. Living by the fur trade, she needed free
range and indefinite space. Her geographical position determined the
nature of her pursuits; and her pursuits developed the roving and
adventurous character of her people, who, living under a military
rule, could be directed at will to such ends as their rulers saw fit.
The grand French scheme of territorial extension was not born at
court, but sprang from Canadian soil, and was developed by the chiefs
of the colony, who, being on the ground, saw the possibilities and
requirements of the situation, and generally had a personal interest
in realizing them. The rival colonies had two different laws of
growth. The one increased by slow extension, rooting firmly as it
spread; the other shot offshoots, with few or no roots, far out into
the wilderness. It was the nature of French colonization to seize upon
detached strategic points, and hold them by the bayonet, forming no
agricultural basis, but attracting the Indians by trade, and holding
them by conversion. A musket, a rosary, and a pack of beaver skins may
serve to represent it, and in fact it consisted of little else.

Whence came the numerical weakness of New France, and the real though
latent strength of her rivals? Because, it is answered, the French
were not an emigrating people; but, at the end of the seventeenth
century, this was only half true. The French people were divided into
two parts, one eager to emigrate, and the other reluctant. The one
consisted of the persecuted Huguenots, the other of the favored
Catholics. The government chose to construct its colonies, not of
those who wished to go, but of those who wished to stay at home. From
the hour when the edict of Nantes was revoked, hundreds of thousands
of Frenchmen would have hailed as a boon the permission to transport
themselves, their families, and their property to the New World. The
permission was fiercely refused, and the persecuted sect was denied
even a refuge in the wilderness. Had it been granted them, the valleys
of the west would have swarmed with a laborious and virtuous
population, trained in adversity, and possessing the essential
qualities of self-government. Another France would have grown beyond
the Alleghanies, strong with the same kind of strength that made the
future greatness of the British colonies. British America was an
asylum for the oppressed and the suffering of all creeds and nations,
and population poured into her by the force of a natural tendency.
France, like England, might have been great in two hemispheres, if she
had placed herself in accord with this tendency, instead of opposing
it; but despotism was consistent with itself, and a mighty opportunity
was for ever lost.

As soon could the Ethiopian change his skin as the priest-ridden king
change his fatal policy of exclusion. Canada must be bound to the
papacy, even if it blasted her. The contest for the west must be waged
by the means which Bourbon policy ordained, and which, it must be
admitted, had some great advantages of their own, when controlled by a
man like Frontenac. The result hung, for the present, on the relations
of the French with the Iroquois and the tribes of the lakes, the
Illinois, and the valley of the Ohio, but, above all, on their
relations with the Iroquois; for, could they be conquered or won over,
it would be easy to deal with the rest. Frontenac was meditating a
grand effort to inflict such castigation as would bring them to
reason, when one of their chiefs, named Tareha, came to Quebec with
overtures of peace. The Iroquois had lost many of their best warriors.
The arrival of troops from France had discouraged them; the war had
interrupted their hunting; and, having no furs to barter with the
English, they were in want of arms, ammunition, and all the
necessaries of life. Moreover, Father Milet, nominally a prisoner
among them, but really an adopted chief, had used all his influence to
bring about a peace; and the mission of Tareha was the result.
Frontenac received him kindly. "My Iroquois children have been drunk;
but I will give them an opportunity to repent. Let each of your five
nations send me two deputies, and I will listen to what they have to
say." They would not come, but sent him instead an invitation to meet
them and their friends, the English, in a general council at Albany; a
proposal which he rejected with contempt. Then they sent another
deputation, partly to him and partly to their Christian countrymen of
the Saut and the Mountain, inviting all alike to come and treat with
them at Onondaga. Frontenac, adopting the Indian fashion, kicked away
their wampum belts, rebuked them for tampering with the mission
Indians, and told them that they were rebels, bribed by the English;
adding that, if a suitable deputation should be sent to Quebec to
treat squarely of peace, he still would listen, but that, if they came
back with any more such proposals as they had just made, they should
be roasted alive. A few weeks later, the deputation appeared. It
consisted of two chiefs of each nation, headed by the renowned orator
Decanisora, or, as the French wrote the name, Tegannisorens. The
council was held in the hall of the supreme council at Quebec. The
dignitaries of the colony were present, with priests, Jesuits,
Récollets, officers, and the Christian chiefs of the Saut and the
Mountain. The appearance of the ambassadors bespoke their destitute
plight; for they were all dressed in shabby deerskins and old
blankets, except Decanisora, who was attired in a scarlet coat laced
with gold, given him by the governor of New York. Colden, who knew him
in his old age, describes him as a tall, well-formed man, with a face
not unlike the busts of Cicero. "He spoke," says the French reporter,
"with as perfect a grace as is vouchsafed to an uncivilized people;"
buried the hatchet, covered the blood that had been spilled, opened
the roads, and cleared the clouds from the sun. In other words, he
offered peace; but he demanded at the same time that it should include
the English. Frontenac replied, in substance: "My children are right
to come submissive and repentant. I am ready to forgive the past, and
hang up the hatchet; but the peace must include all my other children,
far and near. Shut your ears to English poison. The war with the
English has nothing to do with you, and only the great kings across
the sea have power to stop it. You must give up all your prisoners,
both French and Indian, without one exception. I will then return
mine, and make peace with you, but not before." He then entertained
them at his own table, gave them a feast described as "magnificent,"
and bestowed gifts so liberally, that the tattered ambassadors went
home in embroidered coats, laced shirts, and plumed hats. They were
pledged to return with the prisoners before the end of the season, and
they left two hostages as security. [Footnote: On these negotiations,
and their antecedents, Callières, _Relation de ce qui s'est passé de
plus remarquable en Canada depuis Sept., 1692, jusqu'au Départ des
Vaisseaux en 1693_; La Motte-Cadillac, _Mémoire des Negociations avec
les Iroquois, 1694; Callières au Ministre, 19 Oct., 1694_; La
Potherie, III. 200-220; Colden, _Five Nations_, chap. x.;_ N. Y. Col.
Docs._, IV. 85.]

Meanwhile, the authorities of New York tried to prevent the threatened
peace. First, Major Peter Schuyler convoked the chiefs at Albany, and
told them that, if they went to ask peace in Canada, they would be
slaves for ever. The Iroquois declared that they loved the English,
but they repelled every attempt to control their action. Then
Fletcher, the governor, called a general council at the same place,
and told them that they should not hold councils with the French, or
that, if they did so, they should hold them at Albany in presence of
the English. Again they asserted their rights as an independent
people. "Corlaer," said their speaker, "has held councils with our
enemies, and why should not we hold councils with his?" Yet they were
strong in assurances of friendship, and declared themselves "one head,
one heart, one blood, and one soul, with the English." Their speaker
continued: "Our only reason for sending deputies to the French is that
we are brought so low, and none of our neighbors help us, but leave us
to bear all the burden of the war. Our brothers of New England,
Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Virginia, all of their own accord took
hold of the covenant chain, and called themselves our allies; but they
have done nothing to help us, and we cannot fight the French alone,
because they are always receiving soldiers from beyond the Great Lake.
Speak from your heart, brother: will you and your neighbors join with
us, and make strong war against the French? If you will, we will break
off all treaties, and fight them as hotly as ever; but, if you will
not help us, we must make peace." Nothing could be more just than
these reproaches; and, if the English governor had answered by a
vigorous attack on the French forts south of the St. Lawrence, the
Iroquois warriors would have raised the hatchet again with one accord.
But Fletcher was busy with other matters; and he had besides no force
at his disposal but four companies, the only British regulars on the
continent, defective in numbers, ill-appointed, and mutinous.
[Footnote: Fletcher is, however, charged with gross misconduct in
regard to the four companies, which he is said to have kept at about
half their complement, in order to keep the balance of their pay for
himself.] Therefore he answered not with acts, but with words. The
negotiation with the French went on, and Fletcher called another
council. It left him in a worse position than before. The Iroquois
again asked for help: he could not promise it, but was forced to yield
the point, and tell them that he consented to their making peace with
Onontio. It is certain that they wanted peace, but equally certain
that they did not want it to be lasting, and sought nothing more than
a breathing time to regain their strength. Even now some of them were
for continuing the war; and at the great council at Onondaga, where
the matter was debated, the Onondagas, Oneidas, and Mohawks spurned
the French proposals, and refused to give up their prisoners. The
Cayugas and some of the Senecas were of another mind, and agreed to a
partial compliance with Frontenac's demands. The rest seem to have
stood passive in the hope of gaining time. They were disappointed. In
vain the Seneca and Cayuga deputies buried the hatchet at Montreal,
and promised that the other nations would soon do likewise. Frontenac
was not to be deceived. He would accept nothing but the frank
fulfilment of his conditions, refused the proffered peace, and told
his Indian allies to wage war to the knife. There was a dog-feast and
a war-dance, and the strife began anew.

Copyright (c) 2007. knowncrafts.net. All rights reserved.