The Catal. of the King’s Maps (Brit. Mus.), i. 424, shows a drawn map of the fort at the head of Lake George, under date of 1759, and (p. 425) another of the lake itself.
On the French side, the official report of Dieskau[1382] was used by Parkman in a copy belonging to Sparks, obtained from the French war archives, and this with other letters of Dieskau—one to D’Argenson, Sept. 14; another to Vaudreuil, Sept. 15—can be found in the N. Y. Col. Docs., vol. x. pp. 316, 318 (Paris Documents, 1745-78),[1383] as can the reports of Dieskau’s adjutant, Montreuil (p. 335), particularly those of Aug. 31 and Oct. 1, which, with other papers, are also preserved in the Mass. Archives, documents collected in France (MSS.), ix. 241, 265.[1384] The report made by Vaudreuil,[1385] as well as his strictures on Dieskau, is preserved in the Archives de la Marine, as is a long account by Bigot (Oct. 4, 1755),—both of which are used by Parkman. Cf. also the French narratives in the Penna. Archives, 2d ser., vi. 320, 324, 330. There is also in this same collection (p. 316) a Journal of occurrences, July 23 to Sept. 30, 1755, which is also in the N. Y. Col. Docs., x. p. 337, where are other contemporary accounts, like the letter of Doreil to D’Argenson (p. 360) and those of Lotbinière (pp. 365, 369). The Mémoires of Pouchot is the main early printed French source; though there was a contemporary Gazette, printed in Paris, which will be found in the N. Y. Col. Docs., x. p. 383.
A paper in the Archives de la Guerre is thought by Parkman to have been inspired by Dieskau himself, and, in spite of its fanciful form, to be a sober statement of the events of the campaign. It is called Dialogue entre le Maréchal de Saxe et le Baron de Dieskau aux Champs Elysées.[1386] Some of the events subsequently related by Dieskau to Diderot are noticed in the latter’s Mémoires (1830 ed.), i. 402.
Henry Stevens, of London, offered for sale in 1872, in his Bibliotheca Geographica, no. 553, a manuscript record of events between 1755 and 1760, which came from the family of the Chevalier de Lévis. It purports to be the annual record of the French commanders in the field, beginning with Dieskau, for six successive campaigns. Stevens, comparing this record of Dieskau with such of the papers as are printed in the N. Y. Col. Docs., where they were copied from the documents as they reached the government in France, says that the latter are shown by the collection to have been “cooked up for the home eye in France,” and that “we lose all sympathy for the unfortunate Dieskau.” Stevens refers particularly to two long letters of Dieskau, Sept. 1 and 4, sent to Vaudreuil.[1387]
The feeling was rapidly growing that the next campaign should be a vigorous one. Gov. Belcher (Sept. 3, 1755) enforces his opinion to Sir John St. Clair, that “Canada must be rooted out.”[1388] The Gentleman’s Magazine printed papers of similar import.
In November, 1755, Belcher had written to Shirley, “Things look to me as if the coming year will be the criterion whereby we shall be able to conclude whether the French shall drive us into the sea, or whether King George shall be emperour of North America.”[1389] In December, Shirley assembled a congress of governors at New York, and laid his plans before them.[1390] When Shirley returned to Boston in Jan., 1756, the Journal of the Mass. House of Representatives discloses how active he was in preparing for his projects.[1391] Stone[1392] portrays the arrangements.
To Stone,[1393] too, we must turn to learn the efforts of Johnson to propitiate the Indians,[1394] in which he was perplexed by the movements in Pennsylvania and Virginia against the tribes in that region.[1395] The printed contemporary source, showing Johnson’s endeavors with the Indians, is the Account of Conferences, London, 1756, which may be complemented by much in the Doc. Hist. N. Y., vols. i. and iv. Thomas Pownall published in New York, in 1756, Proposals for securing the friendship of the Five Nations. As the campaign went on, Johnson held conferences at Fort Johnson, July 21 (of which, under date of Aug. 12, he prepared a journal), and attended later meetings at German Flats, Aug. 24-Sept. 3, and again at Fort Johnson. These will be found in the Penna. Archives, 2d ser., vi. 461-496;[1396] and in the same volume, pp. 365-376, will be found the conference of deputies of the Five Nations, July 28, 1756, with Vaudreuil, at Montreal.[1397]
CROWN POINT CURRENCY OF NEW HAMPSHIRE.
From an original bill in an illustrated copy of Historical Sketches of the Paper Currency of the American Colonies, by Henry Phillips, Jr., Roxbury, 1865,—in Harvard College library.