HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES.
CHAPTER I.
COMMENCEMENT OF THE GREAT WARS.
In 1744, the disputed Austrian succession threw the whole of Europe into arms, and France and England were of course once more at war. In expectation of this event, when an invasion from Canada might be feared, New York fortified Albany and Oswego, and the friendship of the Six Nations was secured. This precaution was additionally necessary, as they had taken offence, owing to a collision which some of their people had come into with the backwoodsmen of Virginia. At a convention held at Lancaster, to which Virginia, Pennsylvania, and Maryland were parties, the Six Nations, with due oratory and ceremonial, relinquished all title to the valley of the Blue Ridge, the central chain of the Alleganies. The western frontiers thus secured, New England proposed a combination of the five northern colonies for their mutual defence, which New York declined, trusting to enjoy her former neutrality.
The war broke out. Fort Canso, in Nova Scotia, was taken by the French; Annapolis was besieged by a united force of Canadians and Indians; privateers issued from Louisburg, and the eastern Indians again attacked the frontiers of Maine. The northern provinces were routed, and Governor Shirley of Massachusetts resolved to attack Louisburg. Louisburg, the capital of Cape Breton, was called, from the strength of its fortifications, the Dunkirk of America. Its position was one of great importance, commanding the navigation of the St. Lawrence and the fisheries of the adjoining seas.
The scheme was a bold one, and Shirley applied to the British ministry for naval assistance, in the meantime laying open his views to the general assembly, after having first sworn all the members to secrecy. Six days were taken to deliberate upon it, and then the scheme was negatived as too hazardous and expensive. And so it might have ended, had not one of the members, during his evening devotions, been heard to pray for the success of the undertaking. The scheme got wind, and the populace approved; the plan was therefore again proposed in the council, and carried by one vote.
Troops were immediately raised by New England. Connecticut sent 500 men; Rhode Island and New Hampshire each 300; but those of Rhode Island did not arrive until Louisburg was taken. Pennsylvania, refusing troops, furnished provisions; and New York, £3,000, a quantity of provisions, and ten eighteen-pounders. The great burden of the war, of course, fell upon Massachusetts, who furnished an army of 3,250 men, with ten armed vessels,—all the fishermen, whose trade the war had interrupted, entering the service as volunteers. The command in chief was given to William Pepperell, a rich merchant in Maine, who was celebrated for his universal good fortune; and Whitfield, then preaching in New Hampshire, suggested as the motto of their flag, “Never despair with Christ for the captain;” and one of the army chaplains, a disciple of Whitfield, carried with him a hatchet, to hew down the images in the French chapels.[[1]]
An express sent to Commodore Warren, in the West Indies, requesting the co-operation of such ships as he could spare, returned with a negative answer just before the expedition was leaving Boston. Nothing daunted, however, they set sail, and approaching Cape Breton, were prevented from entering its harbours by the great quantity of floating ice. Returning then to Casco, they lay there for several days under a bright sky and in clear weather, and here were agreeably surprised by the arrival of a squadron from Commodore Warren, who had received subsequent orders to render all possible assistance. The next day, nine vessels from Connecticut joined them also, with the troops from that colony. On the 30th of April, the fleet, consisting of 100 vessels, entering Cape Breton, came in sight of Louisburg. This commanding fortress, the walls of which were forty feet thick at the base and from twenty to thirty feet high, was surrounded by a ditch eighty feet wide, and was furnished with 101 cannon, seventy-six swivels, and six mortars; its garrison numbered 1,600 men, and the harbour was defended by an island battery of thirty twenty-two pounders, and by the royal battery on the shore, having thirty large cannon, a moat, and bastions, all so perfect that it was supposed 200 men could defend it against 5,000. The assailants, on the contrary, had only eighteen cannon and three mortars. Reaching the shore, however, they effected a landing almost without opposition, and the following day Colonel Vaughan of New Hampshire led a detachment through the woods, past the city, which they greeted with three cheers. The French, at their approach, having spiked their guns, fled from the royal battery in the night, and the next morning Vaughan and thirteen of his men, having gained possession, defended it against the boats which were sent from Louisburg to retake it. Seth Pomroy, a gunsmith, and a major in one of the Massachusetts regiments, was now employed in the oversight of twenty smiths, who were employed in drilling the cannon; and in the meantime, and for fourteen nights in succession, the hardy besiegers were engaged in dragging their artillery over some miles of boggy morass impassable to wheels, and for the carriage of which a New Hampshire colonel, a carpenter, constructed sledges, which the men, with straps over their shoulders and midleg-deep in mud, drew safely over. Five unsuccessful attempts were made on a battery which defended the town, and the troops, insufficiently provided with tents and other comforts, suffered severely in that cold and foggy climate. But nothing could daunt their ardour. Seth Pomroy, the gunsmith-major, wrote to his wife: “Louisburg is an exceedingly strong place, and seems impregnable. It looks as if our campaign would last long; but I am willing to stay till God’s time comes to deliver the city into our hands.” And his wife replied in the same resolute spirit: “Suffer no anxious thoughts to rest in your mind about me. The whole town is much engaged with concern for the expedition, how Providence will order the affair, for which religious meetings every week are maintained. I leave you in the hand of God.”
At length it was resolved that the fleet should enter the harbour and bombard the city, whilst the land forces attempted to scale the walls. Whilst this was under meditation, a French ship of sixty-four guns, laden with supplies, was taken, after an active engagement, within sight of the town. Fortunately for the besiegers, disaffection prevailed within the walls, and the governor, dispirited by this success of the enemy, sent out a flag of truce and offers of capitulation. On the forty-ninth day of the siege, Louisburg surrendered, together with the island of Cape Breton. When the conquerors entered the city and beheld the strength of the works, their very hearts sunk within them at the greatness of their undertaking; “God has gone out of the way of his common providence,” said they, “to incline the hearts of the French to give up this strong city into our hands.”
The loss of Louisburg exasperated the French nation, and a powerful armament was fitted out to ravage, in return, the whole coast of North America; but Providence again interfered in their behalf; the fleet, under the Duke d’Anville, was scattered and destroyed by storms and wreck, and, to complete its misfortunes, the commander died suddenly, and his successor, in a fit of delirium, committed suicide. The following year, a second fleet, sent out for the same purpose, was taken by Anson and Warren.
The capture of Louisburg was not less a cause of rejoicing in England than in the colonies. Pepperell was made a baronet, and commissioned as a colonel in the British army, and Warren promoted to the rank of rear-admiral. The report of Warren, however, as regarded the New England people, only confirmed the suspicions which were entertained of them at home. “They have,” said he, “the highest notions of the rights and liberties of Englishmen, and, indeed, are almost levellers.”