Louisburg – the Traumatic Years
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“Louisburg”
Traumatic Years
The history surrounding fort Louisburg has always intrigued me since I was young. Being from Cape Breton and having such a great history behind me, Louisburg was always a favorite place to visit when I was young. Visiting this 18th century town and looking at all the old buildings, seeing the colorful uniforms that the French wore, and by wearing red they would hassle you, and pretend that you are the British coming back to take over the fort again. Visiting the fort now you can see the way of life from the gentle side of things. During the tour they show you how they made bread and clothes and how they built their houses and kept warm during winter. It is a very friendly tour and you can get a good sense of what life was like back then.
Throughout this essay I will discus the significant events during the year of 1744, also the build up to the mutiny, and in 1745 the first siege of Louisburg. These years played a large part in the shaping of Fort Louisburg.
Louisburg was under construction in the 1720s. It enclosed an area of less than one hundred acres. During the early years of Louisburg harbor, before it was completed, many of the ships that landed to give building supplies were English from New England and Nova Scotia.
The site at which Louisburg was constructed was an ideal site for a fort, it was located in an inlet with a great harbor for shipping, fishing, and docking war vessels. The site was filled with hills and low-lying swampy areas. The main reason for choosing Louisburg to place the fort rather than the many other inlets in Cape Breton was upon realizing that Newfoundland could not remain a part of the French colonies, the French authorities became worried about safeguarding their fisheries in North America. Louisburg, for many, was a new hope for France at expanding their fisheries in the New World. The French wanted a place to relocate their colonists and to give them peaceful fishing grounds suitable for drying their catches. The fort also needed to be easily defended in the face of an attack.
The main line of defense for the fort was the three bastions, the Kings Bastion, the Dauphins Bastion, and the Queens Bastion. Louisburg also had a narrow harbor entrance, which is easily defendable. Two main batteries defended the mouth of the harbor. The first battery was the Island Battery; the other powerful defense was the Royal or Grand Battery. “These two batteries together with the Dauphins Bastion were regarded by the French of Louisburg as their key instruments of defense since the probability of an attack by land was not apparently seriously considered.”
Once the fort was finished twenty-four years later, the French barely had time to settle in. They would only hold the completed fort for one year before surrendering it to the British in 1745. The first year after its completion was a trying year for the French at Louisburg. There were many social problems, such as the mutiny, and battles that were won by the French.
“There were only 700 million people in the world at this time and about one thousandth of one percent lived on Isle Royal” . Why was this year so important to the history of Louisburg? “During 1744 the war between France and Great Britain spread to North America when Louis XV of France and George II of Great Britain declared war on each other” .
The year 1744 was a very significant year for the fort. It was seemingly a nice place to look at, but was at a constant state of unrest. The people had high expectations during the spring of 1744, awaiting ships to return from France, they were isolated during the winter months, and food was a major concern. When a ship finally reached Louisburg in May, it landed with bad news. Since France was at war with Great Britain the fishermen were not going to make it out to Louisburg that summer, and the surplus of food that was brought was not sufficient to feed the colony. This left most occupants of Louisburg very upset. Along with this, a man by the name of Bigot was supposed to stock up the ships belonging to the Compagnie des Indes with fresh meat and other provisions necessary for their voyage back to France. Bigot, while being pressured to join the war effort, was trying to construct a plan to gain the respect of France, as well as that of his colonists.
“To Duquesnel and to the senior officers in the garrison at Louisburg whose advice he sought, the timing for striking at Nova Scotia, particularly Canso, would probably never be better than it was in May 1744. Not only would it satisfy Maurepass instructions to wage an aggressive offensive, but, if they acted quickly enough, they were likely to catch the small garrison at Canso totally unprepared. Once Canso was captured the shipping lane from Acadia to Louisburg would be safe temporarily, thereby alleviating short-term worries about provisions.”
With May past and the victory at Canso in behind them, the French quickly began taking over the seas around Nova Scotia and Isle Royal. During the month of June “The Signe” captured vessels near Canso, Sable Island and the surrounding areas. In total there were six vessels taken as prizes. The reason for this was that the news of the capture of Canso did not reach Boston until June 10th. Therefore there were many British ships sailing off the coasts of Isle Royal fishing, they were unaware that hostilities had started between the French and British and were unsuspecting of the French sailors who were preparing to take their ships as prizes.
Later in the month of June they were less and less dependent upon taking British ships as prizes, for the main reason that there were not many around the ports of Louisburg or off the near coast. They would have to go further down the waters closer to Boston. If in fact they were to keep taking British vessels as prizes, then there would soon be British ships looking for French ships to commandeer. During the second half of the month the French privateer ships were larger than that of the ones earlier. They were more heavily armed with cannons, and men. Having larger ships and more weaponry was not satisfying to Duquesnel and Bigot. They wanted to protect their own merchant and commercial ships from British privateers. On June 10th, they rented a schooner called Succes. It was used to patrol the seas like the coast guard would today. In addition the captain who was hired to sail the ship was none other than captain Morpain. He was well known for his accomplishments during the War of Spanish Succession. He captured many ships in the waters off of New England and of