USA > New Hampshire > The history of New Hampshire, from its discovery, in 1614, to the passage of the Toleration act, in 1819 > Part 14
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1757. For the reduction of the strong fortress of Crown Point another expedition was planned by Lord Loudon, the next year. Another regiment was raised in New Hampshire, commanded by Colonel Meserve ; who, with three companies of rangers and a body of one hundred carpenters, marched to Halifax, while the remainder of his regiment, under Lieutenant Colonel Goffe, was posted at fort William Henry, under the command of Colonel Munroe, of the thirty-fifth British regi- Aug. 3. ment. On the third of August, the Marquis de Montcalm, at the head of a strong force of Cana- dians and Indians, invested that fort. For five days the garrison withstood the siege ; but on the sixth, finding their ammunition exhausted, they capitulated. They were allowed the honors of war, and were to be escorted by the French troops to fort Edward, on the shores of lake George.
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Accordingly, on the morning after the surrender, the signal of departure was given, and the garrison, to the number of three thousand, marched out of the fort. The New Hampshire regiment, happen- ing to be in the rear, was the last to depart. The Indians of the French army were enraged at the terms of surrender, as they afforded to them no opportunity for plunder. As the English issued from the fort they were observed to hover near, with evident signs of discontent, a few of them mingling from time to time among the conquered columns. The French soldiers, placed at a re- spectful distance to the right, offered no insult to the vanquished. As the English army proceeded slowly across the plain, accumulated numbers of the Indians pressed into their lines and began to plunder. While no opposition was made, they proceeded quietly in the work. But as soon as resistance was offered, the fatal war-whoop was sounded, and the Indians rushed with fiendlike fury upon the defenceless troops. They butchered and scalped their victims, mingling their triumph- ant yells with the groans of the dying, whom they were permitted to murder without restraint. Although it had been expressly stipulated that the prisoners should be protected from the savages by a guard, and the sick and wounded treated with humanity, yet no guard was provided. Monroe rushed through the French ranks to Montcalm, at the risk of his life, and implored him to fulfil this stipulation for a guard. All his entreaties were ineffectual. The French were passive spectators of the work of death, and no movement was made for protection, although they were near enough to
CHAP. VIII. Aug. 9.
1
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CHAP, hear the shrieks of the wounded and to see the VIII. sick shrinking from the uplifted tomahawk. The 1757. blood-thirsty savages seemed to be heated and maddened beyond their usual ferocity. Out of the New Hampshire regiment alone eighty were killed or taken ; and hundreds more were left dead upon the shores of " The Holy Lake"-their bodies unburied and mangled with all the wantonness of Indian barbarity. History may well be in some doubt what station to assign to Montcalm-wheth- er to rank him with those at once brave and hu- mane, or with those whose deeds of cruelty and blood tarnish the lustre of victory.
Thus closed the third campaign in America. It had been a series of disasters, originating in mis- management and folly. The people of England were indignant, and demanded a new ministry, at the head of whom was placed the celebrated Wil- liam Pitt, who rose from the post of ensign in the guards to control the destinies of England. In nothing was his genius more conspicuous than in his selection of men to fill important stations. He immediately presented to his majesty " a long and melancholy list of lieutenant-generals and major- generals" to be removed; and he promoted to im- portant posts of command a crowd of meritorious young officers, among whom were Amherst, Wolfe, Monckton,* Murray and Townsend. A new vigor was immediately apparent, and the English fleets and arms seemed once more inspired with their ancient love of glory. A powerful force took Louisburg from the French, with its garrison of five thousand men, and one hundred and twenty
1758.
* Horatio Gates, afterwards the conqueror of Burgoyne, was aid to Monckton.
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pieces of cannon. But among the slain was CHAP. Col. Meserve, of Portsmouth, a gallant officer, and VIII. lamented throughout the province. Gen. Forbes gained possession of fort Du Quesne, and General Abercrombie advanced at the head of a third army, which included eight hundred New Hampshire men, to attack the strong fortress of Ticonderoga. He passed down the lake in a fleet of a thousand boats. After landing, Rogers' rangers were not Whi- ton, p. 103. long in engaging the enemy in a skirmish. The next day the whole army moved to attack the French lines. But a murderous fire of artillery and small arms compelled them to retreat, after four hours of desperate fighting, with the loss of two thousand killed and wounded. The English lamented the loss of Lord Howe among the killed; and the whole country was clad in mourning for so many sons slain. Notwithstanding the bloody defeat at Ticonderoga, the British government determined to act with decision ; and the minister, Pitt, marked out a plan for the next campaign, indicative of the energy and boldness of his genius. Three armies were to be led simultaneously against the three strongest posts of the French in America-Niagara, Ticonderoga, and Quebec.
Wolfe, though young, yet already considered a hero, with a fleet and eight thousand soldiers, was to ascend the St. Lawrence and attack Quebec. Amherst, with twelve thousand men, was to take Ticonderoga and Crown Point, and having sub- dued the fortresses of lake Champlain, he was to enter the St. Lawrence by the Sorel and form a junction with the army below, under Wolfe. A third force, principally provincials, under General
Hale's Hist. U. S., vol. I., p. 213.
Dun- lap's History of New York, p. 397, vol. I.
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CHAP. Prideaux, accompanied by the warlike Iroquois, VIII. was to take fort Niagara, descend the St. Law- rence, and make themselves masters of Montreal. Whether this plan was well designed to distract the enemy and accomplish the great object of con- quest, or depended for success upon the fortune of Wolfe, against probabilities, it is difficult to con- jecture.
After a short siege, Niagara surrendered to General Prideaux. In the army of General Am- herst were a thousand men of New Hampshire, led by a brother of the lamented Captain Love- well. On the approach of Amherst, late in July, Ticonderoga was immediately abandoned by the French. Amherst pressed forward to take Crown Point, which he found deserted, and immediately pursued the retiring French to Isle aux Noix. After a series of efforts against the storms of lake Champlain, he became convinced that it was im- possible to take this place, and led back his army to Crown Point. The expedition against Quebec
was more daring than the others, and its success
1759. more splendid. The danger of the enterprise seemed to elevate the British soldiers to a level with the difficulties to be encountered ; and the battle which sealed the fate of the two gallant com- manders, Wolfe and Montcalm, gave success to England, but equal glory to the French arms. The city of Quebec, the strong capital of Canada, the Gibraltar of America, and hitherto deemed an impregnable fortress, fell before the daring young generals whom Pitt promoted over their imbecile predecessors ; but both of the contending armies had much to regret, since the one mourned for Wolfe, the other for Montcalm.
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The French being conquered, leisure was given CHAP. to chastise the Indians of the St. Francis. During VIII. 1759. the war, while the fighting men had been absent against the French, these Indians seized the op- portunity for devastation, and murdered without restraint. But the dreaded rangers were now at liberty. Two hundred of these trained warriors, armed with tomahawks and knives, besides their usual equipments, led by Major Rogers, left Crown Point in September, and directed their Sept. course to St. Francis. After a fatiguing march of twenty-one days through the wilderness, they came within sight of the village of St. Francis, and viewed it at the distance of three miles. Major Rogers halted with his men, and in the evening entered the village in disguise, accompanied by two officers. He found the Indians engaged in a grand dance. Late in the night, as they all fell asleep, Rogers returned to his men, formed them into parties, which he posted to advantage, and, just before day, marched to a general assault. The Indians were completely surprised. They were wakened from sleep to meet the same wea- pons which they had so often plunged into the bosoms of unoffending women and children of the frontiers. Some were killed in their houses, and those who attempted to flee were tomahawked by parties who had been stationed to guard all the paths that led to the village.
The dawn of day disclosed to the victorious as- 1759. sailants the sight of several hundred scalps of their countrymen, which the Indians had brought home and elevated upon poles. They found the village filled with the plunder of the frontiers, and enriched
:
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CHAP. VIII. by the sale of captives. The houses of the French, who had mingled with the Indians, were well fur- Bel- knap, p. 320. nished-the church adorned with plate. The rangers loaded themselves with pillage, and, hav- ing set fire to the village, directed their retreat up the river St. Francis, intending to rendezvous at the upper Coos. Only one had been killed and six wounded in the attack; but their retreat was Whiton, p. 105. attended with distressing reverses. They directed their march, passing on the eastern side of Lake Memphremagog, towards the mouth of the Am- monoosuck. They had not proceeded far, before their provisions were entirely exhausted. Their situation was such as might daunt the stoutest hearts. They were in the midst of a trackless wilderness, many miles from any human habita- tion, with a blood-thirsty, savage foe pressing upon their rear. That they might procure subsistence with less difficulty, by hunting, they separated into small parties. Two of these parties were soon overtaken by the Indians and slain, or made pris- oners. The commander, with the main body, famished and march-worn, finally arrived at the mouth of the Ammonoosuck, where they expected to find an abundant supply of provisions. But they were cruelly disappointed. The party en- trusted with the provisions had departed but a few hours before they arrived, leaving their fires still burning. Guns were fired to recall them, which 1759. they distinctly heard ; but supposing them to be fired by an enemy, they kept on their march down the river. The rangers were now reduced to the last extreme of suffering. They were entirely destitute of provisions, and seventy miles from
Whiton, p. 105.
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Number Four,* the nearest place of relief. CHAP. Ground-nuts and beech-nuts were the only provi- VIII. Whiton, p. 105. sions of the forest. To such extremities were they reduced, that they boiled their powder-horns and all their leathern accoutrements, that they might taste something ever so slightly tinctured with ani- mal matter. As a last expedient, Rogers, with two others, by the slow process of burning down Whiton, p. 106. trees, constructed a raft, with which they floated down Connecticut river to Charlestown, and de- spatched canoes up the river, laden with provisions. But ere they could reach the starving rangers, fifty had fallen by the hands of the enemy, or perished in the woods, of hunger, exhaustion and despair. One mant left the main body to seek out his father's house on the banks of the Merrimac, by a nearer route. The hunters afterwards found his skeleton in the wilderness of the White Mountains.
Early in the ensuing spring, the French, having concentrated their remaining forces at Montreal, made attempts to regain possession of Quebec. Unsuccessful in these, they retired to Montreal. But this year witnessed the completion of the conquest of Canada. Three British armies, penetrating the wilderness by different routes, arrived almost simultaneously at Montreal. Eight hundred troops, under Colonel Goffe, marched from New Hamp- shire, and formed part of the forces concentrated round Montreal. The French found it impossible to resist the newly-awakened energy of the British ministry and their armies. Montreal surrendered, and the other French posts, in rapid succession, fell into the power of the English. The tragic scenes
1760. Hale, I., p. 218.
* Charlestown.
+ Benj. Bradley, of Concord.
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CHAP. of Indian warfare ended with the reduction of VIII. Canada, and the terrific war-whoop of the savage, which had been heard for so many years, ceased to resound through the forests and the settlements. The Indians passed under the dominion of Britain. Her brave armies had encircled her name with glory, and added extensive territories to her domin- ions. But, in doing this, three hundred and twenty Hale, millions of dollars had been added to the national I., p. 219. 1763.
debt, already overwhelming. A definitive treaty of peace, signed at Paris in 1763, closed this long and tremendous struggle. France had lost all her North American colonies. For this splendid suc- cess, England was indebted to the energy of the government, the blood and treasure of her own people, and the powerful aid of the American colonists. Some of her bravest officers had fallen.
From the time of the conquest of Canada may be dated the more rapid progress of New Hamp- shire in wealth, and a greater increase of population. While exposed to continual danger from the savage tribes of the St. Francis, the growth of the settle- ments had been stinted and circumscribed.
During the war, other affairs of the colony had been overlooked in the absorbing pursuit of arms. Yet the colony had advanced in morals and intelli- gence. A printing-press, the first in New Eng- land, had been established in Portsmouth, and the New Hampshire Gazette* had been issued in the October following. The conquest of Canada was the signal for the speedy downfall of the Indians.
1756. August 1.
* The Portsmouth Journal, at Portsmouth, was established in 1789 ; the Keene Sentinel in March, 1799, and the Farmer's Cabinet, at Amherst, Nov. 11, 1802.
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Neither the degenerate Iroquois, who had fought as allies of Britain in the conquest of Canada, nor the western savages, who had followed the fortunes of France, saw that peace would be fatal to them. Yet this was inevitable. When the white men ceased from the work of destroying each other, they would naturally turn to exterminating the red race, who now sought, fortunately too late, for the means of staying the irresistible progress of a superior people. Scarcely had the red warriors raised a shout of barbarous triumph, when they were called upon to resist the aggression of those 1760. for whom they had bled in the recent wars. It would have been the same in the event of French conquest. Contention between two rival nations, claiming the soil of Canada, put a stop to that colo- nization which drove the red men away; but the strife being ended, the victorious party, who had dispossessed its rival, would turn to the only re- maining obstacle, and pursue with a double zeal the work of exterminating the native inhabitants of the wilderness. The Indians awoke suddenly to a perception of the danger impending, and formed, with astonishing rapidity, a combination for exter- minating the whites. There was a simultaneous rush of the Indians from all quarters upon the out- posts, which in some instances were carried; but hostilities were finally terminated by compelling the Indian to submit to the power of the white man.
While the wars continued with the French and Indians, numerous bodies of troops passed and repassed through the green and fertile country now known as the state of Vermont. The soldiers
CHAP. VIII. --
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HISTORY OF
CHAP. VIII. perceived the fertility of the soil, and immediately upon the cessation of hostilities a great crowd of adventurers and speculators made application for these lands. Applications increased, and the sur- veys were extended so rapidly, that, during the 1761. year 1761, not less than sixty townships were granted on the west, and eighteen on the east side of the river. The governor's coffers were filled by 1763. the fees ; and scarcely had two years more elapsed before the number of townships on the west side of the river amounted to one hundred and thirty- eight. A stream of emigration poured northward from Charlestown to Lancaster and Northumber- land; and settlements were soon extended to Clare- Whi- ton, p. 109. mont and Plainfield, Lebanon, Hanover, Lyme, Orford, Newport, Lempster, Alstead, and Mar- low. At the same time new settlements stretched along the Merrimac, and up the Pemigewasset, over the western parts of Hillsborough and Mer- rimac counties, the eastern sections of Cheshire and Sullivan, and the northern part of Strafford. The passion for occupying new lands seemed hardly exceeded by the passion for granting them. The soldiers, to whom they had been promised as a reward for their meritorious services in conquer- ing the country from France, were forgotten in the hasty covetousness of an avaricious governor. Wentworth retained five hundred acres of land in each town to himself. The grants on the western side of the Connecticut alarmed the government of New York, who claimed the soil, under the grant of King Charles to the Duke of York, as far east- ward as Connecticut river. The emoluments of granting lands were coveted by the governor of
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New York. The grasping selfishness of these CHAP. two royal governors produced a disaffection, which VIII. Dunlap, vol. I., p. 431. F. Bel- knap, 325. portended civil war, and would soon have led to it, if the stamp act had not absorbed every other con- sideration, and called the "Sons of Liberty" to consider the general defence and welfare, rather than conflicting rights founded upon royal grants.
On the application of New York, an order was passed by the king in council, declaring " the western banks of Connecticut river, from where it 1764. enters the province of Massachusetts Bay, as far July 20. north as the forty-fifth degree of latitude, to be the boundary line between the two provinces of New Hampshire and New York." The settlers now found themselves involved in a controversy with the government of New York. The grantees of the lands understood the words TO BE in the future tense, (their obvious meaning,) and consequently believed that their grants, derived from the crown through one of its governors, were valid. The government of New York referred these words to the time past, and construed them as a declara- tion that the banks of the Connecticut always had been the eastern limit of New York ; con- sequently, that the grants made by New Hampshire were invalid, and might be granted again. These opposite opinions proved a cause of litigation, enmity, and frequently of open fight, which lasted for ten years. It was but natural that the settlers, threatened by New York with having their lands wrested from them, should think of independence and self-protection. Such the sequel will prove. They were at this time a hardy and intrepid, but uncultivated race of men. Without the advan-
F. Bel- knap,p. 326.
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HISTORY OF NEW HAMPSHIRE.
CHAP. tages of education, destitute of the conveniences VIII.
Wil- liams' Hist. of Ver- mont, p. 218.
and elegancies of life, with nothing to soften their manners, and strongly provoked by injustice, rash- ness, excess and violence naturally marked their proceedings. An equal extreme of ferocity, though graced with the name of law, marked the doings of the New York government, when they proceeded to brand the Vermonters as felons, traitors, and rebels, and offered rewards for their discovery and appre- hension. Posterity will easily decide which was most blamable, the greedy governor of New York, who gave a forced construction to plain words, in order to make laws to dispossess honest settlers, or the settlers, who, when pursued and hunted as criminals for acting in open and avowed opposition to the wrong with which they were threatened, declared, " We will kill and destroy any person or persons whomsoever that shall presume to be accessory, aiding or assisting in taking any of us." Both parties remained in this state of exasperation until the drama of the Revolution opened at Lex- ington, and the attention of all orders of men was immediately engaged, and all local and provincial contests absorbed, by the novelty, the grandeur and importance of the contest between Britain and America.
Hist. of Ver- mont, Wil- liams, p. 226.
CHAPTER IX.
THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION.
ADMINISTRATION of Pitt-Taxation-Stamp act-Duties-Debates in Parlia- ment-Excitement occasioned by the stamp act-Stamp distributor at Portsmouth compelled to resign-Riots in other colonies-Threatened destruction of tea at Portsmouth-Removal of Gov. Wentworth, and ap- pointment of John Wentworth-Assault upon fort William and Mary, led by Langdon and Sullivan-Ammunition and cannon removed by the provincials-Battle of Concord and Lexington-A convention called at Exeter-Governor Wentworth recommends reconciliation-Royal gov- ernment dissolved in New Hampshire-Boston besieged by the provin- cials-Battle of Bunker's Hill-Death of Warren and McClary-Whigs and tories-Formation of a state government in New Hampshire- Adoption of a constitution-Meshech Ware, president-New Hampshire fits out a ship of war-Land forces-Expedition to Canada-Sullivan meets the army retreating-New Hampshire resolves on a declaration of independence-Public sentiment-Burgoyne advances into Vermont- Battles of Bennington and Stillwater-General Sullivan's expedition to Rhode Island-Surrender of Cornwallis-Great Britain acknowledges the independence of the United Colonies-Washington retires to Mount Vernon.
THE administration of William Pitt shed an CHAP. undying glory upon the name of England. In IX. every quarter of the world the British flag was triumphant. Nor was it the least of those splen- did events, which gave eclat to the administration of Pitt, that the French had been defeated and driven from their possessions in America. All the colonies had passed under the dominion of Great Britain. Such was the success and the glory of England, under the guidance of Pitt. Rising from an island in the midst of the sea, she had
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HISTORY OF
CHAP. grown to a nation able to threaten the repose and IX. liberty of Europe. Space seemed to set no limits to her ambition. Resting upon her American colonies in the West, and her East India posses- sions in the East, she seemed to touch the extremi- ties of the globe, and to grasp at universal domin- ion. By the treaty of Paris, of 1763, she became mistress of the vast continent of North America, from the banks of the Mississippi to the shores of Greenland. She also gained many islands in the West Indies. In the East her empire was greatly extended ; and so vast was her power, and so solid the foundations on which it rested, that her com- merce and her arms reigned without a rival and without control. Aspiring to rule the sea, she became to all the powers of Europe, and espe- cially to the maritime states, the object of universal umbrage and distrust. All nations desired to see her humbled. Holland, and the other maritime states, whose commerce she had harassed, ardent- ly wished to see her power reduced. Above all, France, martial France, stung with her recent discomfiture-burning to avenge her defeated le- gions-ardently desired to humble her great adver- sary, and waited, with impatient longing, for an opportunity to repair her losses and reconquer her lost glory.
The powers of Europe could not injure England more effectually than by separating from her the American colonies. The Americans could there- fore hope, in case of a rupture, for at least, an al- liance with France. It is not strange that they began to reflect upon what they were capable of achieving, and to consider themselves no longer in
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a state of infancy, but a nation strong and formi- CHAP. dable of itself, and to ask by what right a distant IX. island should assume to rule an immense and pop- ulous continent. To the most sagacious minds it was already apparent that America must, in the natural order of events, be free; and that it de- pended on the policy of the British ministry to hasten or stay the progress of freedom. Although a conciliatory policy on the part of the British ministry might retard the march of independence, yet, in any event, the Americans could not fail to accomplish their destiny. But though the col- onies felt their importance and their power, there was, as yet, no appearance of discontent or dis- loyalty. By avoiding all irritating measures,* the mother country might still have hoped to keep the Americans attached to the same government under which they had been conducted to their present prosperous and flourishing condition.
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