Terms of surrender between Le Moyne d’Iberville and Governor Walsh at York Fort. These terms, the Hudson’s Bay Company averred in petitions, were grossly violated by the French. Original in the H. B. C. Memorial Books transferred to Public Records.
James Knight, who had acted variously as apprentice, trader and captain from the beginning of the Company—was now appointed commander of the south end of the bay, with headquarters at Albany, at a salary of £400 a year. Here, he was to resist the French and keep them from advancing north to Nelson. New Severn, next north, was still to serve as a refuge in case of attack. At Nelson, in addition to Walsh, Bailey—a new man—Geyer, a captain, and Kelsey were to have command as officers. Three frigates—The Dering, The Hudson’s Bay and The Hampshire are commissioned to the bay with letters of marque to war on all enemies, and three merchantmen—The Prosperous, The Owner’s Love and The Perry are also to go to the bay. Mutinous of voyages to the bay, seamen are paid in advance, and two hundred and twenty gallons of brandy are divided among the ships to warm up courage as occasion may require.
But Iberville was not the man to let his winnings slip through his fingers. It had now become more than a guerrilla warfare between gamesters of the wilderness. It was a fight for ascendency on the continent. It was a struggle to determine which nation was to command the rivers leading inland to the unknown West. If the French raiders were to hold the forts at the bottom of the bay, they must capture the great stronghold of the English—Nelson.
Taking on board one hundred and twenty woodrangers, Iberville sailed from Quebec on August 10, 1694. He had two frigates—The Poli and Salamander. By September 24, he was unloading his cannon below the earthworks of one hundred great guns at Nelson. Steady bombardment from his frigates poured bombs into the fort from September 25 to October 14, and without ceasing, the fort guns sent back a rain of fire and ball. Chateauguay, Iberville’s brother, landed to attempt a rush with his bush-rovers by the rear. He was met at the pickets by a spattering fire and fell shot as other brave sons of the Le Moyne family fell—wounded in front, shouting a rally with his dying breath. The death of their comrade redoubled the fury of the raiders. While long-range guns tore up the earthworks and cut great gashes in the shattered palisades to the fore, the bushrangers behind had knocked down pickets and were in a hand-to-hand fight in the ditch that separated the rows of double palisades. In the hope of saving their furs, Walsh and Kelsey hung out a tablecloth as flag of truce. For a day, the parley lasted, the men inside the pickets seizing the opportunity to eat and rest, and spill all liquor on the ground and bury ammunition and hide personal treasures. The weather had turned bitterly cold. Winter was impending. No help could come from England till the following July. Walsh did his best in a bad bargain, asking that the officers be lodged till the ships came the next year, that the English be allowed the same provisions as the French, that no injury be offered the English traders during the winter, and that they should be allowed to keep the Company’s books.
Iberville was depending on loot to pay his men, and would not hear of granting the furs to the English, but he readily subscribed to the other conditions of surrender, and took possession of the fort. When Iberville hastily sailed away to escape through the straits before winter closed them, he left De la Forêst commander at Nelson, Jeremie, interpreter. And De la Forêst quickly ignored the conditions of surrender. He was not a good man to be left in charge. He was one of those who had outfitted Radisson in ’83 and lost when Radisson turned Nelson over to the English in ’84. Early next year, the English ships would come. If De la Forêst could but torture some of the English officers, who were his prisoners, into betraying the secret signals of the ships, he might lure them into port and recoup himself for that loss of ten years ago. Only four officers were kept in the fort. The rest of the fifty-three prisoners were harried and abused so that they were glad to flee to the woods. Beds, clothes, guns and ammunition—everything, was taken from them. Eight or ten, who hung round the fort, were treated as slaves. One Englishman was tied to a stake and tortured with hot irons to compel him to tell the signals of the English ships. But the secret was not told. No English ships anchored at Port Nelson in the summer of ’95. The sail that hove on the offing was a French privateer. In the hold of this, the English survivors were huddled like beasts, fed on pease and dogs’ meat. The ship leaked, and when the water rose to mid-waist of the prisoners, they were not allowed to come above decks, but set to pumping the water out. On the chance of ransom money, the privateer carried the prisoners in irons to France because—as one of the sufferers afterward took oath—“we had not the money to grease the commander’s fist for our freedom.” Of the fifty-three Hudson’s Bay men turned adrift from Nelson, only twenty-five survived the winter.
So the merry game went on between the rival traders of the North, French and English fighting as furiously for a beaver pelt as the Spanish fought for gold. The English Adventurers’ big resolutions to capture back the bay had ended in smoke. They had lost Nelson and now possessed only one fort on the bay—Albany, under Governor Knight; but one thing now favored the English. Open war had taken the place of secret treaty between France and England. The Company applied to the government for protection. The English Admiralty granted two men-of-war, The Bonaventure and Seaforth, under Captain Allen. These accompanied Grimmington and Smithsend to Nelson in ’96, so when Iberville’s brother, Serigny, came out from France with provisions on The Poli and Hardi for the French garrisons at Nelson, he found English men-of-war lined up for attack in front of the fort. Serigny didn’t wait. He turned swift heel for the sea, so swift, indeed, that The Hardi split on an ice floe and went to the bottom with all hands. On August 26, Captain Allen of the Royal Navy, demanded the surrender of Nelson from Governor De la Forêst. Without either provision or powder, La Forêst had no choice but to capitulate. In the fort, Allen seized twenty thousand beaver pelts.
Nelson or York—as it is now known—consisted under the French rule of a large square house, with lead roof and limestone walls. There were four bastions to the courtyard—one for the garrisons’ lodgings, one for trade, one for powder, one for provisions. All the buildings were painted red. Double palisades with a trench between enclosed the yard. There were two large gates, one to the waterside, one inland, paneled in iron with huge, metal hinges showing the knobs of big nail heads. A gallery ran round the roof of the main house, and on this were placed five cannon. Three cannon were also mounted in each bastion. The officers’ mess room boasted a huge iron hearth, oval tables, wall cupboards, and beds that shut up in the wall-panels.