WHEREIN THE REASONS FOR YOUNG CHOUART GROSEILLERS’ MYSTERIOUS MESSAGE TO OUR GOOD FRIEND “PÉRÉ” ARE EXPLAINED—THE FOREST ROVERS OF NEW FRANCE RAID THE BAY BY SEA AND LAND—TWO SHIPS SUNK—PÉRÉ, THE SPY, SEIZED AND SENT TO ENGLAND
It is now necessary to follow the fleet of seven ships—four large frigates, three sloops for inland waters—to the bay. Radisson goes as general superintendent with Captain Bond and Captain Lucas to Nelson—the port farthest north. In these ships, too, go young Chouart Groseillers and his French companions, bound for four years to the Hudson’s Bay Company, albeit they have received and sent mysterious messages to and from “our good friend, Monsieur Jan Péré,” of Quebec, swearing they will meet him at some secret rendezvous or “perish in the attempt.” What Chouart Groseillers and his friends—sworn to serve the English company—mean by secret oaths to meet French bush-rovers from Quebec—remains to be seen. Young Mike Grimmington is second mate on Captain Outlaw’s ship, The Success, destined for the fort south of Nelson—Albany, where bluff old Governor Sargeant holds sway from his bastioned stronghold on the island at the mouth of Albany River. Bridgar—quondam governor at Nelson—now goes with the small sloops bound for the bottom of the bay—Moose and Charlton Island and Rupert River.
No Robin Hoods of legendary lore ever lived in more complete security than the Gentlemen Adventurers of Hudson Bay. Radisson—the one man to be feared as a rival—had been compelled by the French Court to join them. So had his followers. The forts on the bay seemed immune from attack. To the south, a thousand miles of juniper swamp and impassable cataracts separated the English fur traders from the fur traders of New France. To the west, was impenetrable, unknown wilderness. To the north, the realm of iron cold. The Adventurers of Hudson Bay slumbered secure on the margin of their frozen sea. Rupert and Moose—the forts of the south—yearly collected 5,000 beaver pelts each, not counting as many again of other rare furs. Albany—where the bay turns north—gave a yearly quota of 3,500, and Nelson sent out as much as $100,000 worth of beaver in a single year. The Adventurers had found a gold mine rich as Spanish Eldorado.
To be sure, the French fur traders, who had been led to the bay by Radisson once, would now be able to find the way there for themselves, but the French fur traders demanded four beavers in barter where the English asked only two, and two French ships that had come up under Lamartiniére commissioned “to seize Radisson,” could neither find Radisson nor an Indian who would barter them a single pelt. They dare not land at Nelson, for it was now English. Reefing sails, Lamartiniére’s ships spent the summer of ’85 dodging the ice floes and hiding round Digges’ Island at the inside end of the straits for reasons that young Chouart Groseillers might have explained if he would.
It was July before the fleet of Hudson’s Bay boats reached the straits. Ice jam and tide-rip had presently scattered the fleet. As usual, the smaller vessels showed their heels to danger and slipping along the lee edge of the floes, came to the open water of the bay first. The Happy Return, under Captain Bond with Monsieur Radisson, Monsieur Chouart and his comrades; The Success, under Captain Outlaw; The Merchant Perpetuana, under Captain Hume, with mates Smithsend and Mike Grimmington looking anxiously over decks at the tumult of ramming ice that swept past—came worming their way laboriously through the ice floes, small sails only out, grappling irons hooked to the floating icepans, cables of iron strength hauling and pulling the frigates up to the ice, with crews out to their armpits in ice slush ready to loose and sheer from the danger of undertow when the tide ripple came.
On July 27, with the crews forespent and the ships badly battered, the three emerged on the open water of Hudson Bay and steered to rest for the night under shelter of the rocky shores off Digges’ Island. Like ghosts from the gloom, shadows took form in the night mist—two ships with foreign sails on this lonely sea, where all other ships were forbidden. In a trice, the deathly silence of the sea is broken by the roar of cannonading. It is Monsieur Radisson, on whose head there is a price, who realizes the situation first and with a shout that they are trapped by French raiders—by Lamartiniére—bids Captain Bond flee for his life. Captain Bond needs no urgings. The Happy Return’s sails are out like the wings of a frightened bird and she is off like a terrified quarry pursued by a hawk. Nor does Captain Outlaw on The Success wait for argument. With all candles instantly put out, he, too, steers for the hiding of darkness on open water. The Perpetuana is left alone wedged between Lamartiniére’s two French ships. Hooked gang planks seize her on both sides in a death grapple. Captain Hume, Mates Smithsend and Mike Grimmington with half a dozen others are surrounded, overpowered, disarmed, fettered and clapped under hatches of the victorious ships. Before morning, The Perpetuana had been scuttled of her cargo. Fourteen of her crew have been bayoneted and thrown overboard. A month later, cargo and vessel and captives are received with acclaim at Quebec. Captain Hume is sent home to France in December on a man-of-war to lie in a dungeon of Rochelle till he can obtain ransom. So are Mr. Richard Alio and Andrew Stuckey—seamen. The rest are to lie in the cells below Château St. Louis, Quebec, on fare of bread and water for six months.
Montagu House, Hayes River, where The Dobbs and The California wintered in 1747—photographed from Henry Ellis’s Voyages.
Mike Grimmington is held and “tortured” to compel him to betray the secrets of navigation at the different harbors of Hudson Bay, but Mate Grimmington tells no tales; for he learns that rumors of raid are in the air at Quebec. Though England and France are at peace, the fur traders of Quebec are asking commission for one Chevalier de Troyes with the brothers of the family Le Moyne, to raid the bay, fire the forts, massacre the English. Smithsend by secret messenger sends a letter with warnings of the designs to the Hudson’s Bay Company in England, and Smithsend for his pains is sold with his comrades into slavery in Martinique, whence he escapes before spring. Grimmington is held prisoner for two years before a direct order from the French Court sets him free. Other things, Grimmington hears in Quebec of the French on the bay.