On the 29th the French marched out with the honours of war, laid down their arms, and were put under guard as prisoners, pending their transport to France. Du Chambon handed the keys to Pepperrell at the South Gate. The victorious but disgusted Provincials marched in by the West Gate, and found themselves set to protect the very houses that they had hoped to plunder. Was it not high time to recoup themselves for serving as soldiers at sixpence a day? Great Babylon had fallen, and ought to be destroyed—of course, with due profit to the destroyers. There was a regular Louisbourg legend, current in New England, that stores of goods and money were to be found in the strong rooms of every house. So we can understand the indignation of men whose ideas were coloured by personal contact with smuggling and privateering, and sometimes with downright piracy, when they were actually told off as sentries over these mythical hoards of wealth. One diarist made the following entry immediately after he had heard the news: 'Sabbath Day, ye 16th June [Old Style] they came to Termes for us to enter ye Sitty to morrow, and Poore Termes they Bee too.' Another added that there was 'a great Noys and hubbub a mongst ye Solders a bout ye Plunder: Som a Cursing, Som a Swarein.' Five days later a third indignant Provincial wrote: 'Ye French keep possession yet, and we are forsed to stand at their Dores to gard them.' Another sympathetic chronicler, after pouring out the vials of his wrath on the clause which guaranteed the protection of French private property, lamented that 'by these means the poor souldiers lost all their hopes and just demerit [sic] of plunder promised them.'
While Parson Moody was preaching a great thanksgiving sermon, and all the senior officers were among his congregation, there was what responsible officials called 'excessive stealing in every part of the Towne.' Had this stealing really been very 'excessive' no doubt it would have allayed the grumbling in the camp. But, as a matter of fact, there was so little to steal that the looters began to suspect collusion between their leaders and the French. Another fancied wrong exasperated the Provincials at this critical time. A rumour ran through the camp that Warren had forestalled Pepperrell by receiving the keys himself. Warren was cursed, Pepperrell blamed; and a mutinous spirit arose. Then it was suddenly discovered that Pepperrell had put the keys in his pocket.
Meanwhile the fleet was making haul after haul. When Pepperrell marched through the battered West Gate, at the head of his motley army, Warren had led his squadron into the harbour; and both commanders had saluted the raising of the Union Jack which marked the change of ownership. But no sooner had the sound of guns and cheering died away than the Union Jack was lowered and the French flag was raised again, both over the citadel of Louisbourg and over the Island Battery. This stratagem succeeded beyond Warren's utmost expectations. Several French vessels were lured into Louisbourg and captured with stores and men enough to have kept the British out for some weeks longer. Their cargoes were worth about a million dollars. Then, just as the naval men were wondering whether their harvest was over or not, a fine French frigate made for the harbour quite unsuspectingly, and only discovered her fatal mistake too late to turn back. By the irony of circumstances she happened to be called Notre-Dame de la Delivrance. Among her passengers was the distinguished man of science, Don Antonio de Ulloa, on his way to Paris, with all the results of those explorations in South America which he afterwards embodied in a famous book of travel. Warren treated him with the greatest courtesy and promised that all his collections should be duly forwarded to the Royal Academy of Sciences. Once this exchange of international amenities had been ended, however, the usual systematic search began. The visible cargo was all cocoa. But hidden underneath were layers and layers of shining silver dollars from Peru; and, underneath this double million, another two million dollars' worth of ingots of silver and ingots of gold.
The contrast between the poverty of Louisbourg, where so much had been expected, and the rich hauls of prize-money made by the fleet, was gall and wormwood to the Provincials. But their resentment was somewhat tempered by Warren's genial manner towards them. Warren was at home with all sorts and conditions of men. His own brother-officers, statesmen and courtiers, distinguished strangers like Ulloa, and colonial merchants like Pepperrell, were equally loud in his praise. With the lesser and much more easily offended class of New Englanders found in the ranks he was no less popular. A rousing speech, in which he praised the magnificently stubborn work accomplished by 'my wife's fellow-countrymen,' a hearty generosity all round, and a special hogshead of the best Jamaica rum for the garrison of the Royal Battery, won him a great deal of goodwill, in spite of the fact that his 'Admiral's eighth' of the naval prize-money amounted to some sixty thousand pounds, while Pepperrell found himself ten thousand pounds out of pocket at the end of the siege.
Pepperrell, however, was a very rich man, for those colonial days; and he could well afford to celebrate the fall of Louisbourg by giving the chief naval and military officers a dinner, the fame of which will never fade away from some New England memories. Everything went off without a hitch. But, as the hour approached, there was a growing anxiety, on the part of both host and guests, as to whether or not the redoubtable Parson Moody would keep them listening to his grace till all the meats got cold. He was well known for the length, as well as for the strength, of his discourses. He had once denounced the Devil in a grace of forty minutes. So what was the surprised delight of his fellow-revellers when he hardly kept them standing longer than as many seconds. 'Good Lord!' he said, 'we have so much to thank Thee for, that Time will be too short. Therefore we must leave it for Eternity. Bless our food and fellowship on this joyful occasion, for the sake of Christ our Lord. Amen!'
News of the victory was sent at once to Boston. The vessel bearing it arrived in the middle of the night. But long before the summer sun was up the streets were filled with shouts of triumph, while the church bells rang in peals of exultation, and all the guns and muskets in the place were fired as fast as men could load them.
The mother country's joy was less exuberant. There were so many other things to think of nearer home; among them the British defeat at Fontenoy and the landing of the Young Pretender. Nor was the actual victory without alloy; for prescient people feared that a practically independent colonial army had been encouraged to become more independent still. And who can say the fear was groundless? Louisbourg really did serve to blood New Englanders for Bunker's Hill. But, in spite of this one drawback, the news was welcomed, partly because any victory was welcome at such a time, and partly because the fall of Louisbourg was a signal assertion of British sea-power on both sides of the Atlantic.
London naturally made overmuch of Warren's share, just as Boston made overmuch of Pepperrell's. But the Imperial government itself perfectly understood that the fleet and the army were each an indispensable half of one co-operating whole. Warren was promoted rear-admiral of the blue, the least that could be given him. Pepperrell received much higher honours. He was made a baronet and, like Shirley, was given the colonelcy of a regiment which was to bear his name. Such 'colonelcies' do not imply the actual command of men, but are honorary distinctions of which even kings and conquerors are proud. Nor was the Provincial Marine forgotten. Rous, of the Shirley, was sent to England with dispatches, and was there made a post-captain in the Royal Navy for his gallantry in action against the Vigilant. He afterwards enjoyed a distinguished career and died an admiral. It was in his ship, the Sutherland, that Wolfe wrote the final orders for the Battle of the Plains fourteen years after this first siege of Louisbourg.