Governor Shirley.
[1745]
Sir William Pepperrell.
This opened in 1744, England against France once more, and in 1745 came
the capture of Louisburg, then the Gibraltar of America. This was
brought about through the energy of Governor Shirley, of Massachusetts,
the most efficient English commander this side the Atlantic. That
commonwealth voted to send 3,250 men, Connecticut 500, New Hampshire and
Rhode Island each 300. Sir William Pepperrell, of Kittery, Me.,
commanded, Richard Gridley, of Bunker Hill fame, being his chief of
artillery. The expedition consisted of thirteen armed vessels, commanded
by Captain Edward Tyng, with over 200 guns, and about ninety transports.
The Massachusetts troops sailed from Nantasket March 24th, and reached
Canso, April 4th. "Rhode Island," says Hutchinson, "waited until a
better judgment could be made of the event, their three hundred not
arriving until after the place had surrendered." The expedition was very
costly to the colonies participating, and four years later England
reimbursed them in the sum of 200,000 pounds. Yet at the disgraceful
peace of Aix-la-Chapelle, in 1748, she surrendered Louisburg and all
Cape Breton to France again.
[1746-1748]
In 1746 French and Indians from Crown Point destroyed the fort and
twenty houses at Saratoga, killing thirty persons, and capturing sixty.
Orders came this year from England to advance on Crown Point and
Montreal, upon Shirley's plan, all the colonies as far south as Virginia
being commanded to aid. Quite an army mustered at Albany. Sir William
Johnson succeeded in rousing the Iroquois, whom the French had been
courting with unprecedented assiduity. But D'Anville's fleet threatened.
The colonies wanted their troops at home. Inactivity discouraged the
soldiers, alienated the Indians. At last news came that the Canada
project was abandoned, and in 1748 the Peace of Aix-la-Chapelle was
declared.
This very year France began new efforts to fill the Ohio Valley with
emigrants. Virginia did the same. To anticipate the English, the French
sent Bienville to bury engraved leaden plates at the mouths of streams.
They also fortified the present sites of Ogdensburg and Toronto. Even
now, therefore, France's power this side the Atlantic was not visibly
shaken. The continental problem remained unsolved.
CHAPTER IX.
THE FRENCH AND INDIAN WAR
[1748]
The Peace of Aix-la-Chapelle had been made only because the contestants
were tired of fighting. In America, at least, each at once began taking
breath and preparing to renew the struggle. Not a year passed that did
not witness border quarrels more or less bloody. The French authorities
filled the Ohio and Mississippi valleys with military posts; English
settlers pressed persistently into the same to find homes. In this
movement Virginia led, having in 1748 formed, especially to aid western
settlement, the Ohio Company, which received from the king a grant of
five hundred thousand acres beyond the Alleghanies. A road was laid out
between the upper Potomac and the present Pittsburgh, settlements were
begun along it, and efforts made to conciliate the savages.
Map showing Position of French and English Forts and Settlements.
The Ambuscade.
[1754]
One of the frontier villages was at what is now Franklin, Penn., and the
location involved Virginia with the colony of Pennsylvania. As
commissioner to settle the dispute George Washington was sent out.
The future Father of his Country was of humble origin. Born in
Westmoreland County, Va., "about ten in ye morning of ye 11th day of
February, 1731-32," as recorded in his mother's Bible, he had been an
orphan from his earliest youth. His education was of the slenderest. At
sixteen he became a land surveyor, leading a life of the roughest sort,
beasts, savages, and hardy frontiersmen his constant companions,
sleeping under the sky and cooking his own coarse food. No better man
could have been chosen to thread now the Alleghany trail.
Washington reported the French strongly posted in western Pennsylvania
on lands claimed by the Ohio Company. Virginia fitted out an expedition
to dislodge them. Of this Washington commanded the advance. Meeting at
Great Meadows the French under Contrecoeur, commander of Fort Du Quesne
(Pittsburgh); he was at first victorious, but the French were
re-enforced before he was, and Washington, after a gallant struggle, had
to capitulate. This was on July 3, 1754. The French and Indian War had
begun.
Baddock's Route.
[1755]
The English Government bade the colonies defend their frontier, and in
this interest twenty-five delegates from the seven northern colonies met
at Albany on June 19, 1754. Benjamin Franklin represented Pennsylvania,
and it was at this conference that he presented his well-considered
plan, to be described in our chapter on Independence, for a general
government over English America. The Albany Convention amounted to
little, but did somewhat to renew alliance with the Six Nations.
[footnote: Increased from five to six by the accession of the
Tuscaroras.]
In this decisive war England had in view four great objects of conquest
in America: 1. Fort Du Quesne; 2. The Ontario basin with Oswego and Fort
Niagara; 3. The Champlain Valley; 4. Louisburg. The British ministry
seemed in earnest. It sent Sir Edward Braddock to this side with six
thousand splendidly equipped veterans, and offered large sums for
fitting out regiments of provincials. Braddock arrived in February,
1755, but moved very languidly. This was not altogether his fault, for
he had difficulties with the governors and they with their legislatures.