USA > Massachusetts > Commonwealth history of Massachusetts, colony, province and state, volume 2 > Part 8
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Early in 1693 Phips persuaded the Council to send an address to the King, asking for an expedition against Canada, having otherwise, as they put it, "no prospect of an end of these troubles." The General Court refused to join in the address on the ground that the province was too impoverished to assist such an enterprise.
Before this address reached England the home government had despatched a fleet under Sir Charles Wheeler to attack Canada with the aid of colonial forces. Unfortunately the despatches informing Phips of this enterprise did not reach Boston until July. Wheeler himself had appeared in mid- June, but with a force totally incapicitated by disease. Even intercourse with their ships was forbidden. Under the circum- stances Phips felt it useless to attempt anything, and Wheeler
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was allowed to sail away, to the further disgust of Fletcher who thought something might have been done. So passed the only opportunity offered by the English government during this war to strike a serious blow at French power in North America.
POLICY TOWARDS THE INDIANS (1693-1694)
To counterbalance this failure, Phips could point to the con- clusion of peace with the Eastern Indians during the summer of this same year. Under the document signed by them, which became a model for later treaties, the Indians were compelled to acknowledge themselves subjects of England. That they really considered themselves such is more than ques- tionable; but by signing this treaty they enabled the English to challenge French claims to influence over them, and to stig- matize them after each outbreak as rebels.
The principal hold that the English had over the Indians was the greater cheapness and accessibility of English trade goods. To exploit this advantage, and to cement the peace, the General Court, in June, 1694, passed an act prohibiting all private trade with the Indians, and establishing truckhouses under public management in the eastern country. Scarcely had the act been passed, however, when the Indians yielded to the urgings of French agents and resumed the war.
In another quarter also the skies were darkening. The Five Nations, shaken by a successful French attack on the Mohawks in the winter of 1693, discouraged by the departure of Wheeler's fleet, and persuaded that their white allies were leav- ing them to carry on the war alone, began negotiations with the French for peace. The efforts made by Fletcher and the New England governments to dissuade them were unsuccess- ful, for the various governments were working at cross pur- poses. Fletcher continued to demand assistance from Massa- chusetts and Connecticut for the defence of Albany, while the New England governments desired above everything else to engage the assistance of the Five Nations against the Eastern Indians.
Meantime Fletcher was pressing his complaints at Court; with the result that in August, 1694, an Order in Council was
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POLICY OF GOVERNOR STOUGHTON
issued, fixing the quotas of men or money to be furnished, on application by the Governor of New York, for the defence of that province, by all the colonies exclusive of New Hampshire, from Virginia northward. The quota of 350 men assigned to Massachusetts was absurdly unjust, and against it Massa- chusetts protested in an address to the King setting forth its efforts and its sufferings. When Fletcher attempted to collect the quotas, he was refused by all the colonies. Co-operation could only be achieved by voluntary agreement, it could not be enforced by a royal order.
POLICY OF GOVERNOR STOUGHTON (1694-1697)
With the year 1694 Phips passed from the scene of action which, despite his quarrelsomeness, he had dominated. Called to England to answer numerous charges against his adminis- tration, he died there shortly after his arrival. Lieutenant- Governor William Stoughton now assumed charge of affairs, a public servant of much experience and no little administra- tive ability. With his advent, relations with neighboring governments became more friendly. The querulous Usher ceased complaining, and even Fletcher was brought to admit that Massachusetts could give New York no assistance.
The war, however, continued to go badly. French priva- teers on the coast increased in numbers and destructiveness ; while on the frontier, raid succeeded raid in ghastly iteration. Though the Five Nations resumed the war, they afforded Massachusetts no relief, and the province began to complain loudly of the failure of its neighbors to give assistance.
Gradually, however, a system of defence against French and Indian attacks was elaborated, which served as a model in the later wars. For the protection of its commerce and fisheries, Massachusetts usually had the help of two small English frigates, which were stationed at Boston to act under orders from the Governor. As these were too large to operate in the shallower coastal waters, the province built in 1694 a province galley, which proved very useful during the re- mainder of this and the next war. Vessels for transport service and for expeditions along the coast were hired or impressed.
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FRONTIER DEFENCE (1694-1697)
The problem of frontier defence was a most difficult one for the unmilitary commonwealth. During King Philip's war the Indians had been surrounded in forts and refuges and nea.ly wiped out. At least one veteran of that war, Major Benjamin Church, thought that a similar policy would serve in this war. Unfortunately the headquarters of the various Abnaki tribes lay on the headwaters of the Saco, the Kenne- bec, and the Penobscot. Long before any white force could reach them the Indians had withdrawn into the forest, leaving . only a few wigwams to be burned. All that could be under- taken by way of offence, therefore, was to destroy their crops, and to prevent them from visiting the coast to fish.
The main burden rested on the defence. As in King Philip's war, fortified garrison houses in the various villages served as rallying places for the inhabitants. In each frontier village a few men paid by the province were stationed to stiffen and animate the defence, while companies of twenty men or so were employed to scout regularly from village to village.
Men for garrison and scout duty, and for special expedi- tions, were drawn from the organized militia of the province by a combination of volunteering and draft. Service on the frontier was dangerous and unpopular, especially in parts of the province not directly exposed to attack. It is therefore not to be wondered at, that contemporary records tell us much of evasion of service, desertion, disobedience to orders, and negligence of duty, the typical faults of an unmilitary people. It appears also that the hiring of substitutes was permitted, with results similar to those experienced during the Civil War of 1861.
The province also sought to stimulate the warlike ardor of the population by offering to outfit and pay volunteer com- panies who would undertake to seek out or pursue the enemy; but in this war their usefulness appears to have been slight. A considerable reward was also offered for scalps and captives.
HARDSHIPS OF THE FRONTIER (1694-1696)
It was the dwellers on the frontier who bore the brunt of the French and Indian attacks. They furnished most of the
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DISASTROUS CLOSE OF THE WAR
garrisons and scouting parties, and upon them fell the greatest loss. Many towns and settlements were altogether abandoned, and what became of these wretched fugitives is one of the unwritten chapters in the history of the Commonwealth. Those who remained lived continually in the presence of dan- ger, forced to plant and gather their crops at the peril of their lives, and exposed constantly to the total loss of all they pos- sessed. The General Court was repeatedly compelled to abate the taxes of the frontier towns, and to assist them in the main- tenance of their ministers. The hardship of frontier existence passes the imagination of a generation for which the garrison house and the scalping party possess only antiquarian interest. Nevertheless, familiarity with danger bred a certain contempt, and military officers charged with the defence of the frontier complained of carelessness in keeping watch, insubordination, and neglect of the fortifications.
Honorable mention should be given in a discriminating history of the Commonwealth to frontier leaders like Hooke and Frost of Maine; Saltonstall and Hinchman of the Merri- mac frontier ; and Pynchon of Springfield, upon whom rested the burden or responsibility. The despairing words of Salton- stall, written in 1695 from Haverhill, might doubtless have been penned by any one of those men: "I have been ready to serve my Country, and this town, under many disadvant- ages, dissatisfactions, and discouragements ; but may not, and cannot, hold out longer with the usage I meet with."
Such were the losses on the frontier, and so great was the temptation to escape its perils, that the General Court was compelled, in March, 1695, to pass an act forbidding the de- sertion of the remaining frontier towns. It went so far as to command the return of freeholders who had already removed, under threat of forfeiture of their estates. Eleven towns were named in the act, marking the line of frontier from Wells in Maine to Deerfield on the Connecticut.
DISASTROUS CLOSE OF THE WAR (1696)
The war closed with a series of reverses which brought the Province of Massachusetts to its knees before the King, with a petition that he would order the neighboring governments to
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share in the burdens of the war; that he would effectually gar- rison Port Royal and St. Johns; that he would increase the number of frigates stationed at Boston; and finally that he would undertake the reduction of Canada, "the unhappy Fountain from whence issue all our Miserys." The province, so it was represented, was "quite exhausted and ready to sinke under the Calamitys and fatigue of a tedious consuming War."
Two disasters produced this petition. The first was the cap- ture of the galley Newport, which was cruising in the Bay of Fundy to intercept the supply ship annually sent from France to Acadia; the second was the capture shortly afterwards, in July, 1696, of Pemaquid, which was disgracefully surrendered to Iberville by its incompetent commander, Chubb. Although the province had complained loudly of the cost of maintaining this fort, its capture made a deep impression. Animated by these disasters, the province once more attempted a serious offensive. A force under Church was despatched to the east- ward, and raided French settlements as far as Chignecto on the Bay of Fundy; but the attempt to capture Villebon's fort on the St. Johns proved a failure.
The ill success which had thus far attended the English efforts convinced many of the necessity of closer co-operation ; and the closing years of the war were prolific in schemes of colonial union. The plan advocated at Court by Massachusetts through its agents was a union of all the northern colonies under a Captain-General to be appointed by the Crown. Yield- ing to these representations the English government, in 1697, appointed the Earl of Bellomont to be governor of New Hampshire, Massachusetts, and New York, and Captain- General of all the northern colonies.
FRENCH AND INDIAN RELATIONS BETWEEN THE WARS (1698-1702)
Before Bellomont arrived in America, the peace of Ryswick had been signed in 1697. The principal result, from the view- point of New England, was the restoration of Acadia to French control, despite the protests of the Massachusetts government, protests which were abundantly justified by the course which the French government now pursued.
Excellentie Richard Goote. Earle of' Bellomont. Lurd Boote Colooney. in the Kingdome of Ireland. Governour of new England. Mens york. nen Hampsher and vice admirall of those Seas
From a mezzotint in the Harvard College Library
THE EARL OF BELLOMONT
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FRENCH AND INDIAN RELATIONS
For that government immediately claimed the Kennebec as the boundary of Acadia, and instructed Villebon to prevent the English from trading within the limits of his province and from fishing off its shores. As a warning two fishing vessels were actually seized in the summer of 1698, although they were later released. The French further strengthened them- selves by building a strong fort at Port Royal, which again became the seat of government. All this produced a fresh crop of memorials to the King, asking for a settlement of the boundary and provision for the security of the fisheries.
For Massachusetts the results of the war had been dis- astrous. Trade languished at Boston, in contrast to New York which had prospered by trading with pirates. The fishing fleet had been greatly reduced in numbers. Little was done to repeople the frontier, where conditions were still too disturbed to invite settlement. In fact, the Council, in 1699, forbade settlement east of Wells without the direction and approval of the government.
The Indians did not make peace until January, 1699; but measures were at once taken to make it enduring. An act was passed on the model of the abortive act of 1694, for- bidding private trade and establishing truckhouses. Old laws against the secret and fraudulent purchase of land were also revived. Bellomont had a scheme to settle some of the Abnaki at Scaghticoke, where they could be under the in- fluence of the Five Nations; but little came of the project. Bellomont seems also to have secured the passage, in 1700, of an act banishing Jesuits and Popish priests from the pro- vince on pain of perpetual imprisonment or death. Such was the success of these measures that the French began to fear the loss of their influence over the Indians.
Events in Europe now produced a change in the American policy of the French government. Desirous of uniting the French and Spanish monarchies, and confronted by a coalition of Austria, England, and Holland, Louis XIV was conscious of France's maritime inferiority, and therefore instructed his representatives in America to secure an agreement for neutral- ity, in case of war, between the English and French colonies.
Conditions in America favored the success of this scheme. The Iroquois, who had not made peace until 1701, were ready
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to promise neutrality if the French would let New York alone. The Albany traders were glad to continue the trade which since the conclusion of peace they had begun with Montreal, and it was not in human nature for the people of New York to refuse to profit by a situation which spared them the cost of defence. During the first period of Queen Anne's War, therefore, there was peace on the New York frontier, while the frontiers of New England were red with blood.
In 1701 the Massachusetts government was offered the chance to make a similar agreement by Brouillan, the new Governor of Acadia, and the Council in its cautiously worded reply (Bellomont and Stoughton were both dead) showed no hostility to the idea. Brouillan further showed his anxiety for peace by releasing two fishing vessels, which the Cape Sable Indians had seized, and it appeared that the peace might remain unbroken. The decision, however, rested with Joseph Dudley, who arrived in the summer of 1702, just after the declaration of war, to govern his native province.
THE WAR POLICY OF GOVERNOR JOSEPH DUDLEY (1702-1713)
From the outset Dudley was bent upon war. Sparing no efforts on the one hand to keep the Eastern Indians quiet, he began immediately to send out privateers to prey upon French shipping, and with this attack the war in America revived. Whether Dudley could have kept the peace, had he so desired, is more than doubtful; for with the Jesuits and officials at Quebec it had become an axiom that the only way the French could retain their hold over the Abnaki was to keep them in a state of hostility to the English. Even the government at Versailles was dubious about the wisdom of such a course at this time; but the policy of Vaudreuil, the efficient Governor of Canada, prevailed; and within a few weeks after they had solemnly promised Dudley to keep the peace, the Indians made a general attack upon the Maine settlements in the summer of 1703.
It was fortunate for the province that at this new crisis the Massachusetts government was in charge of one who was not only familiar with American conditions, but who possessed
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WAR POLICY OF GOVERNOR DUDLEY
the confidence of his superiors in England. Long experience in both England and America had made Dudley a politician and an administrator who could challenge comparison with the best. As a war governor he has no rival except the later Shirley. As a politician he stands unrivalled among the governors of the province. No higher praise can be bestowed upon him than to say that, by his skilful conduct of affairs during a decade of war, he softened ancient enmities and won the respect of a reluctant and suspicious people.
Dudley made it the cornerstone of his policy to root out the French from Canada and Acadia. Only thus, he believed, could his province be free from the French and Indian menace ; only thus could the British Empire in America attain full stature. For the accomplishment of this supreme object he realized that the assistance of England was necessary. It was possible that the New England colonies, by putting forth all their strength, might conquer Acadia; but when in 1703 he found the General Court favoring an attack by an ill-organized volunteer force, he ceased to hope that the colonies unaided would accomplish anything. His policy thenceforward was to conduct a successful defence until such time as he could persuade the English government to send him the necessary assistance.
In the work of defence Dudley profited by the experience of the late war. Though unable to persuade the General Court to rebuild the fort at Pemaquid, he did maintain forts at Saco and Casco beyond the settled area. To him was due an innovation of great utility which enabled him to keep scouting parties out winter as well as summer, imitating the French by sending parties against the Indian villages in winter. This was the use of snowshoes. Dudley boasted that as a result of these measures not one town had been abandoned during the war, and that the losses of the province had been greatly reduced.
Curiously enough, although French naval power in Euro- 1 pean waters was at a low ebb, Massachusetts suffered more at the hands of French privateers than in the preceding war. Since there is some evidence that the prosperity of the colony was much less affected than in the preceding war, it is possible that the larger losses reflect in part an increasing commercial
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activity. Nevertheless, the operations of the French were annoying. It was found necessary regularly to convoy the provision ships from Connecticut, and to provide convoys and guardships for the fishing fleet. Until the fall of Port Royal French activity increased rather than diminished. In 1709 the French took nearly forty vessels, some of them almost in sight of Boston. As late as 1711 Wait Winthrop warned his son that it was not safe to come by water from Connecticut to Boston.
The expense of these defensive measures was, for the time and place, enormous. The province was forced to spend on the war alone an average of £30,000 a year; and in 1711 Dudley reported the debt of the province at more than £120,- 000. Taxation produced twenty-five or thirty thousand pounds a year; the rest was provided by successive issues of paper money.
RELATIONS WITH NEIGHBORING COLONIES (1702-1706)
Like his predecessors Dudley sought to ease the burden by getting aid from the neighboring colonies. With the Assembly of New Hampshire, of which province also he was Governor, he worked harmoniously, and that government did its share. Rhode Island contributed to all the expeditions against Acadia. As in the preceding war, Connecticut maintained a consider- able force in the western towns which covered its own frontier.
Relations with New York were curiously involved. Gover- nor Lord Cornbury, who was in office until 1708, was content to profit by the agreement for neutrality made by the French and Iroquois, and would do nothing to assist New England. The Dutch traders of Albany, finding peace more profitable than war, used their influence to block the attempt made by Massachusetts and Connecticut, in 1704, to engage the Five Nations against the Eastern Indians.
To this general apathy toward the sufferings of a neighbor- ing province an honorable exception must be noted. The in- fluential Schuyler family, headed by Peter Schuyler and his brother John, used the information they gained from the Christian Mohawks of Canada, who traded at Albany, to send repeated warnings to the western frontier of the approach
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NEGOTIATIONS WITH VAUDREUIL
of raiding parties. According to contemporary accounts it was because the people of Deerfield failed to heed such a warn- ing that they were surprised by the French and Indians. Peter Schuyler also sought to persuade the Canadian Iroquois to for- bear their attacks on the New England frontier. In this he was unsuccessful, but so great were his services that in 1708 the General Court granted him a present of £100.
NEGOTIATIONS WITH VAUDREUIL (1704-1706)
Down to 1709 the activities of the province were largely confined to defensive operations. The sack of Deerfield, how- ever, in February, 1704, so aroused the people that a retalia- tory expedition under Church was despatched along the coast of Maine and Acadia. Church was eager to attack Port Royal, but this Dudley forbade. He did, however, inflict much dam- age upon the other French settlements, and returned with enough prisoners to enable Dudley to begin negotiations on even terms for an exchange.
These negotiations were protracted on both sides, and in 1705 there was a lull in the war. Concerning Dudley's policy at this time there is some controversy. On the authority of French accounts it is alleged that he proposed a treaty of neutrality. It is more probable that all he desired was a standing agreement for the exchange of prisoners; and that it was Vaudreuil who sought to engage Dudley in a treaty of neutrality. The treaty as proposed by Vaudreuil was certainly unacceptable, for it forbade the English to fish in French waters; and it was only binding when accepted by the other English colonies. Without revealing his own opinions Dudley submitted the French proposal to his own Province and to the government of New York, both of which expressed their dis- approval. Vaudreuil concluded that Dudley was playing with him and again let loose his war parties in the spring of 1706.
The year 1706 was marked by an explosion of popular anger which threatened to cost Dudley his place. It was dis- covered in the early summer that certain traders employed by him to effect an exchange of prisoners with the French of Port Royal had been trading with the enemy. One of them, Samuel Vetch, was a friend of Dudley, and had been employed
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by him the preceding year in the negotiations with Vaudreuil. So great was the anger of the country deputies at the sale of supplies to their enemies that they were willing to believe any- thing. Dudley's enemies now accused him of complicity, hop- ing to drive him from the government, but he kept his head, made no attempt to shield the culprits, permitted the General Court to proceed by act of attainder, and in this way weathered the storm.
THE ACADIAN EXPEDITION OF 1707
It was probably as a result of this episode, however, that Dudley decided to oppose no longer the popular demand for an expedition against Port Royal. With some slight assist- ance from New Hampshire and Rhode Island (Connecticut refused), Dudley raised a force of over a thousand men under the command of a veteran frontier fighter, Colonel John March. The men, though raw, were eager to fight; but the in- capacity of the leaders and their lack of harmony were such that after making a landing the force retired to Casco Bay. An explosion of popular wrath greeted news of the failure, and Dudley ordered the expedition to make a second attempt, shrewdly sending a commission of popular leaders to super- vise it. By this time the morale of the force was gone, and a second failure was the only result. Dudley was thus justified in his conviction that without English assistance no serious blow at the French could be struck.
FIASCO OF 1709
The combination of circumstances which produced the Eng- lish assistance for which Dudley had long petitioned is one of the most curious in historical annals. The deus ex machina was Samuel Vetch, whose conviction for trading with the enemy has just been noted. Vetch was a Scotchman, who after the failure of the Darien expedition of 1698 had settled in New York, and who, early in the war, had come to Massa- chusetts to seek employment. Following his conviction Vetch went to England to appeal from the sentence to the Privy Council, and here he gained the ear of men influential in the government.
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