5 See 'Papers relating to Oswego,' in O'Callaghan's Documentary History of New York, vol. i, pp. 488-503.
| The French attack. Oswego surrenders. |
The French prepared to bombard this eastern fort, but, before their trenches were complete, it was evacuated, and the garrison was withdrawn across the river. The abandonment was inevitable, but it sealed the fate of the main fort, which, for protection on the lake and river side, depended on Fort Ontario. One day's fighting saw the conclusion of the matter. The French brought their guns into position by the side of the abandoned fort; and, firing across the river, riddled Fort Oswego. At the same time, Canadians and Indians forded the river higher up, and attacked on the southern side. The English commander, Colonel Mercer, was killed: the troops, consisting mainly of convalescents and recruits, were not in condition for a stubborn defence; women and children found no shelter from the enemy's fire; the position was hopeless, and the garrison surrendered. The prisoners, who were carried off, numbered about 1,600; guns, boats, and supplies fell into the hands of the French, the forts were burnt to the ground, and every vestige of British occupation was for the time obliterated.
| Effect of the fall of Oswego. |
The news of the fall of Oswego, after so many years of British occupation, caused consternation in England. Colonel Daniel Webb, who at the time was bringing up reinforcements along the line of the Mohawk and Wood Creek rivers, beat a hurried and discreditable retreat, burning the forts at the Carrying Place6 and blocking the waterway with fallen timber. In England the blow followed on that of the capture of Minorca, for which Byng was made a scapegoat. 'Minorca is gone, Oswego gone, the nation is in a ferment,' wrote Horace Walpole; and again, 'Oswego, of ten times more importance even than Minorca, is so annihilated that we cannot learn the particulars.'7 It was in truth a great success for France, the result of a plan boldly conceived and brilliantly executed. The garrison had been taken completely by surprise; in four days from the date when Montcalm landed within reach of the forts, he had achieved his object, and left the English no foothold on Lake Ontario. The defeat of Braddock had given to France command of the Ohio; the fall of Oswego gave her undisputed mastery of the lakes. All the west, and all the ways to the west, were now in her hands, and her forces could be concentrated on the central line of advance to the south up Lake Champlain. There already some way had been made, for, in addition to holding Crown Point, the French were now firmly planted at Ticonderoga.
6 Fort Williams was rebuilt in 1758, and named Fort Stanwix. See [below].
7 Letters of Horace Walpole, vol. iii, pp. 41, 42 (Letter of Nov. 4, 1756).
Great as were the immediate material results of Montcalm's success, the indirect moral advantage which the French derived from it was greater still. Oswego, Burke reminds us in the Annual Register for 1758,8 was 'designed to cover the country of the Five Nations, to secure the Indian trade, to interrupt the communication between the French northern and southern establishments, and to open a way to our arms to attack the forts of Frontenac and Niagara.' A few pages later, he describes the effect of the disaster in the following words: 'Since Oswego had been taken, the French remained entirely masters of all the lakes, and we could do nothing to obstruct their collecting the Indians from all parts, and obliging them to act in their favour. But our apprehensions (or what shall they be called?) did more in favour of the French than their conquests. Not satisfied with the loss of that important fortress, we ourselves abandoned to the mercy of the enemy all the country of the Five Nations, the only body of Indians who preserved even the appearance of friendship to us. The forts we had at the Great Carrying Place were demolished, Wood Creek was industriously stopped up and filled with logs, by which it became evident to all those who knew that country that our communication with our allied Indians was totally cut off, and, what was worse, our whole frontier left perfectly uncovered to the irruption of the enemy's savages.'
8 pp. 13, 29.