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Glimpses of the Past: History of the River St. John, A.D. 1604-1784

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Title: Glimpses of the Past: History of the River St. John, A.D. 1604-1784

Author: W. O. Raymond


        
Release date: February 23, 2010 [eBook #31368]

Language: English

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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK GLIMPSES OF THE PAST: HISTORY OF THE RIVER ST. JOHN, A.D. 1604-1784 ***




Produced by Robin Monks, Dan Horwood and the Online
Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
file was produced from images generously made available
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    GLIMPSES OF THE PAST.

           History
           of the
       River St. John

      A. D. 1604-1784.

             By
  Rev. W. O. RAYMOND, LL.D.

       St. John, N. B.
            1905.




                  *       *       *       *       *




[Illustration: SAMUEL DE CHAMPLAIN.

Discoverer of the River St. John. The Father of New
France. Born at Brouage in 1567. Died at Quebec, Dec. 25, 1635.]




PREFACE.


Born and reared upon the banks of the River Saint John, I have always
loved it, and have found a charm in the study of everything that
pertains to the history of those who have dwelt beside its waters.

In connection with the ter-centenary of the discovery of the river by
de Monts and Champlain, on the memorable 24th of June, 1604, the
chapters which follow were contributed, from time to time, to the
Saturday edition of the Saint John _Daily Telegraph_. With the
exception of a few minor corrections and additions, these chapters are
reprinted as they originally appeared. Some that were hurriedly
written, under pressure of other and more important work, might be
revised with advantage. Little attempt at literary excellence has been
practicable. I have been guided by an honest desire to get at the
facts of history, and in so doing have often quoted the exact language
of the writers by whom the facts were first recorded. The result of
patient investigation, extending over several years, in the course of
which a multitude of documents had to be consulted, is a more
elaborate and reliable history of the Saint John River region than has
yet appeared in print. The period covered extends from the discovery
of the river in 1604 to the coming of the Loyalists in 1784. It is
possible that the story may one day be continued in a second volume.

At the conclusion of this self-appointed task, let me say to the
reader, in the words of Montaigne, "I bring you a nosegay of culled
flowers, and I have brought little of my own but the string that ties
them."

W. O. RAYMOND.

ST JOHN, N. B., December, 1905.




ERRATA.


Page 36, line 8. After word "and," the rest of the line should
read--"beautiful islands below the mouth of."

Page 97, line 31. The last half of this line is inverted.




GLIMPSES OF THE PAST.

INCIDENTS IN THE HISTORY OF THE ST. JOHN RIVER.




CHAPTER I.

THE MALISEETS.


The Indian period of our history possesses a charm peculiarly its own.
When European explorers first visited our shores the Indian roamed at
pleasure through his broad forest domain. Its wealth of attractions
were as yet unknown to the hunter, the fisherman and the fur-trader.
Rude as he was the red man could feel the charms of the wilderness in
which he dwelt. The voice of nature was not meaningless to one who
knew her haunts so well. The dark recesses of the forest, the sunny
glades of the open woodland, the mossy dells, the sparkling streams
and roaring mountain torrents, the quiet lakes, the noble river
flowing onward to the sea with islands here and there embosomed by its
tide--all were his. The smoke of his wigwam fire curled peacefully
from Indian village and temporary encampment. He might wander where he
pleased with none to say him nay.

But before the inflowing tide of the white-man's civilization the
Indian's supremacy vanished as the morning mist before the rising sun.
The old hunting grounds are his no longer. His descendants have long
ago been forced to look for situations more remote. The sites of the
ancient villages on interval and island have long since been tilled by
the thrifty farmer's hands.

But on the sites of the old camping grounds the plough share still
turns up relics that carry us back to the "stone age." A careful study
of these relics will tell us something about the habits and customs of
the aborigines before the coming of the whites. And we have another
source of information in the quaint tales and legends that drift to us
out of the dim shadows of the past, which will always have peculiar
fascination for the student of Indian folk-lore.

With the coming of the whites the scene changes and the simplicity of
savage life grows more complicated. The change is not entirely for the
better; the hardships of savage life are ameliorated, it is true, but
the Indian learns the vices of civilization.

The native races naturally play a leading part in early Acadian
history, nor do they always appear in a very amiable light. The
element of fierceness and barbarity, which seems inherent in all
savage races, was not wanting in the Indians of the River St. John.
They united with their neighbours in most of the wars waged with the
whites and took their full share in those bloody forays which nearly
annihilated many of the infant settlements of Maine and New Hampshire.
The early annals of Eastern New England tell many a sad story of the
sacrifice of innocent lives, of women and children carried into
captivity and homes made desolate by savage hands.

And yet, it may be that with all his faults the red man has been more
sinned against than sinning.

Many years ago the provincial government sent commissioners to the
Indian village of Medoctec on the St. John river, where the Indians
from time immemorial had built their wigwams and tilled their
cornfields and where their dead for many generations had been laid to
rest in the little graveyard by the river side. The object of the
commissioners was to arrange for the location of white settlers at
Medoctec. The government claimed the right to dispossess the Indians
on the ground that the lands surrounding their village were in the
gift of the crown. The Indians, not unnaturally, were disinclined to
part with the heritage of their forefathers.

On their arrival at the historic camping ground the commissioners made
known the object of their visit. Presently several stalwart captains,
attired in their war paint and feathers and headed by their chief,
appeared on the scene. After mutual salutations the commissioners
asked: "By what right or title do you hold these lands?"

The tall, powerful chief stood erect, and with the air of a plumed
knight, pointing within the walk of the little enclosure beside the
river, replied: "There are the graves of our grandfathers! There are
graves of our fathers! There are the graves of our children!"

To this simple native eloquence the commissioners felt they had no
fitting reply, and for the time being the Maliseets remained
undisturbed.

It in not necessary to discuss at length the origin of the Indians who
lived on the banks of the St. John at the time the country became
known to Europeans. Whether or not the ancestors of our Indians were
the first inhabitants of that region it is difficult to determine. The
Indians now living on the St. John are Maliseets, but it is thought by
many that the Micmacs at one time, possessed the valley of the river
and gradually gave place to the Maliseets, as the latter advanced from
the westward. There is a tradition among the St. John river Indians
that the Micmacs and Maliseets were originally one people and that the
Maliseets after a while "went off by themselves and picked up their
own language." This the Micmacs regarded as a mongrel dialect and gave
to the new tribe the name Maliseet (or Milicete), a word derived from
Mal-i-see-jik--"he speaks badly." However, in such matters, tradition
is not always a safe guide. It is more probable the two tribes had an
independent origin, the Micmacs being the earlier inhabitants of
Acadia, while the Maliseets, who are an offshoot of the Abenaki (or
Wabenaki) nation, spread eastward from the Kennebec to the Penobscot
and thence to the St. John. The Indians who are now scattered over
this area very readily understand one another's speech, but the
language of the Micmacs is unintelligible to them.

The Micmacs seem to have permitted their neighbors to occupy the St.
John river without opposition, their own preference inclining them to
live near the coast. The opinion long prevailed in Acadia that the
Maliseets, were a more powerful and ferocious tribe than the Micmacs;
nevertheless there is no record or tradition of any conflict between
them.

That the Maliseets have for centuries inhabited the valley of the
River St. John is indicated by the fact that the Indian names of
rivers, lakes, islands and mountains, which have been retained by the
whites, are nearly all of Maliseet origin. Nevertheless the Micmacs
frequented the mouth of the St. John river after the arrival of
Europeans, for we learn that the Jesuit missionary, Enemond Masse,
passed the winter of 1611-2 at St. John in the family of Louis
Membertou, a Micmac, in order to perfect himself in the Micmac
language, which he had already studied to some extent at Port Royal.
The elder Membertou, father of the Indian here named, was, perhaps,
the most remarkable chieftain Acadia ever produced. His sway as grand
sagamore of the Micmac nation extended from Gaspe to Cape Sable. In
the year 1534 he had welcomed the great explorer Jacques Cartier to
the shores of Eastern New Brunswick, as seventy years later he
welcomed de Monts and Poutrincourt to Port Royal. The Jesuit
missionary, Pierre Biard, describes Membertou as "the greatest, most
renowned and most formidable savage within the memory of man; of
splendid physique, taller and larger limbed than is usual among them;
bearded like a Frenchmen, although scarcely any of the others have
hair upon the chin; grave and reserved with a proper sense of the
dignity of his position as commander." "In strength of mind, in
knowledge of war, in the number of his followers, in power and in the
renown of a glorious name among his countrymen, and even his enemies,
he easily surpassed the sagamores who had flourished during many
preceding ages."

In the year 1605 Pennoniac, one of the chiefs of Acadia, went with de
Monts and Champlain as guide on the occasion of their voyage along the
shores of New England and was killed by some of the savages near Saco.
Bessabez, the sagamore of the Penobscot Indians, allowed the body of
the dead chief to be taken home by his friends to Port Royal and its
arrival was the signal of great lamentation. Membertou was at this
time an old man, but although his hair was white with the frosts of a
hundred winters, like Moses of old, his eye was not dim nor his
natural force abated. He decided that the death of Pennoniac must be
avenged. Messengers were sent to call the tribes of Acadia and in
response to the summons 400 warriors assembled at Port Royal. The
Maliseets joined in the expedition. The great flotilla of war canoes
was arranged in divisions, each under its leader, the whole commanded
by Membertou in person. As the morning sun reflected in the still
waters of Port Royal the noiseless procession of canoes, crowned by
the tawny faces and bodies of the savage warriors, smeared with
pigments of various colors, the sight struck the French spectators
with wonder and astonishment.

Uniting with their allies of the River St. John, the great war party
sped westward over the waters of the Bay of Fundy and along the coast
till they reached the land of the Armouchiquois. Here they met and
defeated their enemies after a hard-fought battle in which Bessabez
and many of his captains were slain, and the allies returned in
triumph to Acadia singing their songs of victory.

The situation of the Maliseets on the River St. John was not without
its advantages, and they probably obtained as good a living as any
tribe of savages in Canada. Remote from the war paths of the fiercer
tribes they hunted in safety. Their forests were filled with game, the
rivers teemed with fish and the lakes with water fowl; the sea shore
was easy of access, the intervals and islands were naturally adapted
to the cultivation of Indian corn, wild grapes grew luxuriantly along
the river banks, there were berries in the woods and the sagaabum (or
Indian potato) was abundant. Communication with all arts of the
surrounding country was easily had by means of the short portages that
separated the sources of interlacing rivers and with his light bark
canoe the Indian could travel in any direction his necessity or his
caprice might dictate.

The characteristics of the Indians of Acadia, whether Micmacs or
Maliseets, were in the main identical; usually they were closely
allied and not infrequently intermarried Their manners and habits have
been described with much fidelity by Champlain, Lescarbot, Denys and
other early explorers. Equally accurate and interesting is the graphic
description of the savages contained in the narrative of the Jesuit
missionary Pierre Biard, who came to America in 1611 and during his
sojourn visited the St. John River and places adjacent making Port
Royal his headquarters. His narrative, "A Relation of New France, of
its Lands, Nature of the Country and of its Inhabitants," was printed
at Lyons in 1616. A few extracts, taken from the splendid edition of
the Jesuit Relations recently published at Cleveland, will suffice to
show that Pierre Biard was not only an intelligent observer but that
he handled the pen of a ready writer. "I have said before," he
observes, "that the whole country is simply an interminable forest;
for there are no open spaces except upon the margins of the sea, lakes
and rivers. In several places we found the grapes and wild vines which
ripened in their season. It was not always the best ground where found
them, being full of sand and gravel like that of Bourdeaux. There are
a great many of these grapes at St. John River in 46 degrees of
latitude, where also are to be seen many walnut (or butternut), and
hazel trees."

This quotation will show how exact and conscientious the old French
missionary was in his narration. Beamish Murdoch in Ibis History of
Nova Scotia (Vol. 1, p. 21) ventures the observation, "It may perhaps
be doubted if the French account about grapes is accurate, as they
mention them to have been growing on the banks of the Saint John
where, if wild grapes exist, they must be rare." But Biard is right
and Murdoch is wrong. Wild grapes naturally grow in great abundance on
the islands and intervals of the River St. John and, in spite of the
interference of the farmers, are still to be found as far north at
least in Woodstock. Biard visited the St. John River in October, 1611,
and stayed a day or two at a small trading post on an island near Oak
Point. One of the islands in that vicinity the early English settlers
afterwards called "Isle of Vines," from the circumstance that wild
grapes grew there in great profusion.

We quote next Father Biard's description of the Indian method of
encampment: "Arrived at a certain place, the first thing they do is to
build a fire and arrange their camp, which they will have finished in
an hour or two; often in half an hour. The women go into the woods and
bring back some poles which are stuck into the ground in a circle
around the fire and at the top are interlaced in the form of a
pyramid, so that they come together directly over the fire, for there
is the chimney. Upon the poles they throw some skins, matting or bark.
At the foot of the poles under the skins they put their baggage. All
the space around the fire is strewn with soft boughs of the fire tree,
so they will not feel the dampness of the ground; over these boughs
are thrown some mats or seal skins as soft as velvet; upon these they
stretch themselves around the fire with their heads resting upon their
baggage; and, what no one would believe, they are very warm in there
around that little fire, even in the greatest rigors of the winter.
They do not camp except near some good water, and in an attractive
location."

The aboriginies of Acadia when the country became known to Europeans,
no doubt lived as their ancestors had lived from time immemorial. A
glimpse of the life of the Indian in prehistoric times is afforded us
in the archæological remains of the period. These are to be found at
such places as Bocabec, in Charlotte county, at Grand Lake in Queens
county, and at various points along the St. John river. Dr. L. W.
Bailey, Dr. Geo. F. Matthew, Dr. W. F. Ganong, James Vroom, and others
have given considerable attention to these relics and they were
studied also to some extent by their predecessors in the field of
science, Dr. Robb, Dr. Gesner and Moses H. Perley. The relics most
commonly brought to light include stone implements, such as axes,
hammers, arrow heads, lance and spear heads, gouges and chisels, celts
or wedges, corn crushers, and pipes; also bone implements such as
needles, fish hooks and harpoons, with specimens of rude pottery.

When Champlain first visited our shores the savages had nothing better
than stone axes to use in clearing their lands. It is to their credit
that with such rude implements they contrived to hack down the trees
and, after burning the branches and trunk, planted their corn among
the stumps and in the course of time took out the roots. In
cultivating the soil they used an implement of very hard wood, shaped
like a spade, and their method of raising corn, as described by
Champlain, was exactly the same as that of our farmers today. The corn
fields at the old Medoctic Fort were cultivated by the Indians many
years before the coming of the whites. Cadillac, writing in 1693,
says: "The Maliseets are well shaped and tolerably warlike; they
attend to the cultivation of the soil and grow the most beautiful
Indian corn; their fort is at Medocktek." Many other choice spots
along the St. John river were tilled in very early times, including,
probably, the site of the old Government House at Fredericton, where
there was an Indian encampment long before the place was dreamed of as
the site of the seat of government of the province.

Lescarbot, the historian, who wrote In 1610, tells us that the Indians
were accustomed to pound their corn in a mortar (probably of wood) in
order to reduce it to meal. Of this they afterwards made a paste,
which was baked between two stones heated at the fire. Frequently the
corn was roasted on the ear. Yet another method is thus described by
the English captive, John Gyles, who lived as a captive with the St.
John river Indians in 1689: "To dry the corn when in the milk, they
gather it in large kettles and boil it on the ears till it is pretty
hard, then shell it from the cob with clam shells and dry it on bark
in the sun. When it is thoroughly dry a kernel is no bigger than a
pea, and will keep years; and when it is boiled again it swells as
large as when on the ear and tastes incomparably sweeter than other
corn. When we had gathered our corn and dried it in the way described,
we put some of it into Indian barns, that is into hole in the ground
lined and covered with bark and then with earth. The rest we carried
up the river upon our next winter's hunting."

The Indians were a very improvident race, and in this respect the
Maliseets were little better than the Micmacs, of whom Pierre Biard
writes: "They care little about the future and are not urged on to
work except by present necessity. As long as they have anything they
are always celebrating feasts and having songs dances and speeches. If
there is a crowd of them you certainly need not expect anything else.
Nevertheless if they are by themselves and where they may safely
listen to their wives, for women are everywhere the best managers,
they will sometimes make storehouses for the winter where they will
keep smoked meat, roots, shelled acorns, peas, beans, etc."

Although the Indians living on the St. John paid some attention to the
cultivation of the soil there can be no doubt that hunting and fishing
were always their chief means of support. In Champlain's day the
implements of the chase were very primitive. Yet they were able to
hunt the largest game by taking advantage of the deep snow and making
use of their snow-shoes. Champlain says. "They search for the track of
animals, which, having found, they follow until they get sight of the
creature, when they shoot at it with their bows or kill it by means of
daggers attached to the end of a short pike. Then the women and
children come up, erect a hut and they give themselves to feasting.
Afterwards they proceed in search of other animals and thus they pass
the winter. This is the mode of life of these people, which seems to
me a very miserable one."

There can be little doubt that wild game was vastly more abundant in
this country, when it was discovered by Europeans, than it is today.
In the days of La Tour and Charnisay as many as three thousand moose
skins were collected on the St. John in a single year, and smaller
game was even more abundant. Wild fowl ranged the coasts and marshes
and frequented the rivers in incredible numbers. Biard says that at
certain seasons they were so abundant on the islands that by the
skilful use of a club right and left they could bring down birds as
big as a duck with every blow. Denys speaks of immense flocks of wild
pidgeons. But the Indian's food supply was not limited to these; the
rivers abounded with salmon and other fish, turtles were common along
the banks of the river, and their eggs, which they lay in the sand,
were esteemed a great delicacy, as for the musquash it is regarded as
the "Indian's turkey."

A careful examination of the relics discovered at the sites of the old
camping grounds suffices to confirm the universal testimony of early
writers regarding the nomadic habits of the Indians. They were a
restless race of people, for ever wandering from place to place as
necessity or caprice impelled them. At one time they were attracted to
the sea side where clams, fish and sea fowl abounded; at another they
preferred the charms of the inland waters. Sometimes the mere love of
change led them to forsake one camping place and remove to some other
favorite spot. When game was scarce they were compelled by sheer
necessity to seek new hunting grounds. At the proper season they made
temporary encampments for salmon fishing with torch and spear. Anon
they tilled their cornfields on the intervals and islands. They had a
saying: "When the maple leaf is as big as a squirrel's foot it is time
to plant corn." Occasionally the outbreak of some pestilence broke up
their encampments and scattered them in all directions. In time of
peace they moved leisurely, but in time of war their action was much
more vigorous and flotillas of their bark canoes skimmed swiftly over
the lakes and rivers bearing the dusky warriors against the enemies of
their race. Many a peaceful New England hamlet was startled by their
midnight war-whoop when danger was little looked for.

It is a common belief in our day that the Indians were formerly more
numerous than they now are. Exactly the same opinion seems to have
prevailed when the country was first discovered, but it is really very
doubtful whether there were ever many more Indians in the country than
there are today. In the year 1611 Biard described them as so few in
number that they might be said to roam over rather than to possess the
country. He estimated the Maliseets, or Etchemins, as less than a
thousand in number "scattered over wide spaces, as is natural for
those who live by hunting and fishing." Today the Indians of Maine and
New Brunswick living within the same area as the Etchemins of 1611,
number considerably more than a thousand souls. There are, perhaps, as
many Indians in the maritime provinces now as in the days of
Champlain. As Hannay observes, in his History of Acadia, excellent
reasons existed to prevent the Indians from ever becoming very
numerous. A wilderness country can only support a limited population.
The hunter must draw his sustenance from a very wide range of
territory, and the life of toil and privation to which the Indian was
exposed was fatal to all but the strongest and most hardy.

One of the most striking Indian characteristics is the keenness of
perception by which they are enabled to track their game or find their
way through pathless forests without the aid of chart or compass. The
Indian captive, Gyles, relates the following incident which may be
mentioned in this connection:

"I was once travelling a little way behind several Indians and,
hearing them laugh merrily, when I came up I asked them the cause of
their laughter. They showed me the track of a moose, and how a
wolverene had climbed a tree, and where he had jumped off upon the
moose. It so happened that after the moose had taken several large
leaps it came under the branch of a tree, which, striking the
wolverene, broke his hold and tore him off; and by his tracks in the
snow it appeared he went off another way with short steps, as if he
had been stunned by the blow that had broken his hold. The Indians
were wonderfully pleased that the moose had thus outwitted the
mischievous wolverene."

The early French writers all notice the skill and ingenuity of the
savages, in adapting their mode of life to their environment. Nicholas
Denys, who came to Acadia in 1632, gives a very entertaining and
detailed account of their ways of life and of their skillful
handicraft. The snowshoe and the Indian bark canoe aroused his special
admiration. He says they also made dishes of bark, both large and
small, sewing them so nicely with slender rootlets of fir that they
retained water. They used in their sewing a pointed bodkin of bone,
and they sometimes adorned their handiwork with porcupine quills and
pigments. Their kettles used to be of wood before the French supplied
them with those of metal. In cooking, the water was readily heated to
the boiling point by the use of red-hot stones which they put in and
took out of their wooden kettle.

Until the arrival of Europeans the natives were obliged to clothe
themselves with skins of the beaver and other animals. The women made
all the garments, but Champlain did not consider them very good
tailoresses.

Like most savage races the Indians were vain and consequential. Biard
relates that a certain sagamore on hearing that the young King of
France was unmarried, observed: "Perhaps I may let him marry my
daughter, but the king must make me some handsome presents, namely,
four or five barrels of bread, three of peas and beans, one of
tobacco, four or five cloaks worth one hundred sous apiece, bows,
arrows, harpoons, and such like articles."

Courtship and marriage among the Maliseets is thus described by John
Gyles: "If a young fellow determines to marry, his relations and the
Jesuit advise him to a girl, he goes into the wigwam where she is and
looks on her. If he likes her appearance, he tosses a stick or chip
into her lap which she takes, and with a shy side-look views the
person who sent it; yet handles the chip with admiration as though she
wondered from whence it came. If she likes him she throws the chip to
him with a smile, and then nothing is wanting but a ceremony with the
Jesuit to consummate the marriage. But if she dislikes her suitor she
with a surly countenance throws the chip aside and he comes no more
there."

An Indian maiden educated to make "monoodah," or Indian bags, birch
dishes and moccasins, to lace snowshoes, string wampum belts, sew
birch canoes and boil the kettle, was esteemed a lady of fine
accomplishments. The women, however, endured many hardships. They were
called upon to prepare and erect the cabins, supply them with fire,
wood and water, prepare the food, go to bring the game from the place
where it had been killed, sew and repair the canoes, mend and stretch
the skins, curry them and make clothes and moccasins for the whole
family. Biard says: "They go fishing and do the paddling, in short
they undertake all the work except that alone of the grand chase.
Their husbands sometimes beat them unmercifully and often for a very
slight cause."

Since the coming of the whites the Maliseets have had few quarrels
with the neighboring tribes of Indians. They entertained, however,
a dread of the Mohawks, and there are many legends that have been
handed down to us which tell of their fights with these implacable
foes. One of the most familiar--that of the destruction of the
Mohawk war party at the Grand Falls--told by the Indians to the early
settlers on the river soon after their arrival in the country and has
since been rehearsed in verse by Roberts and Hannay and in prose by
Lieut.-Governor Gordon in his "Wilderness Journeys," by Dr. Rand
in his Indian legends and by other writers.

John Gyles, the English captive at Medoctec village in 1689, relates
the following ridiculous incident, which sufficiently shows the
unreasonable terror inspired in the mind of the natives of the river
in his day by the very name of Mohawk:

"One very hot season a great number of Indians gathered at the
village, and being a very droughty people they kept James Alexander
and myself night and day fetching water from a cold spring that ran
out of a rocky hill about three-quarters of a mile from the fort.[1]
In going thither we crossed a large interval corn field and then a
descent to a lower interval before we ascended the hill to the spring.
James being almost dead as well as I with this continual fatigue
contrived (a plan) to fright the Indians. He told me of it, but
conjured me to secrecy. The next dark night James going for water set
his kettle on the descent to the lowest interval, and ran back to the
fort puffing and blowing as in the utmost surprise, and told his
master that he saw something near the spring which looked like Mohawks
(which he said were only stumps--aside): his master being a most
courageous warrior went with James to make discovery, and when they
came to the brow of the hill, James pointed to the stumps, and withal
touched his kettle with his toe, which gave it motion down hill, and
at every turn of the kettle the bail clattered, upon which James and
his master could see a Mohawk in every stump in motion, and turned
tail to and he was the best man who could run the fastest. This
alarmed all the Indians in the village; they, though about thirty or
forty in number, packed off bag and baggage, some up the river and
others down, and did not return under fifteen days, and the heat of
the weather being finally over our hard service abated for this
season. I never heard that the Indians understood the occasion of the
fright, but James and I had many a private laugh about it."

    [1] The old Medoctec fort was on the west bank of the River St. John
        about eight miles below the town of Woodstock. The spring is
        readily identified; an apparently inexhaustible supply of pure
        cold water flows from it even in the driest season.

Until quite recently the word "Mohawk," suddenly uttered, was
sufficient to startle a New Brunswick Indian. The late Edward Jack
upon asking an Indian child, "What is a Mohawk?" received this reply,
"A Mohawk is a bad Indian who kills people and eats them." Parkman
describes the Mohawks as the fiercest, the boldest, yet most politic
savages to whom the American forests ever gave birth and nurture. As
soon as a canoe could float they were on the war path, and with the
cry of the returning wild fowl mingled the yell of these human tigers.
They burned, hacked and devoured, exterminating whole villages at
once.

A Mohawk war party once captured an Algonquin hunting party in which
were three squaws who had each a child of a few weeks or months old.
At the first halt the captors took the infants, tied them to wooden
spits, roasted them alive before a fire and feasted on them before
the eyes of the agonized mothers, whose shrieks, supplications and
frantic efforts to break the cords that bound them, were met with
mockery and laughter. "They are not men, they are wolves!" sobbed one
of the wretched women, as she told what had befallen her to the Jesuit
missionary.

Fearful as the Maliseets were of the Mohawks they were in turn
exceedingly cruel to their own captives and, strange as it may appear,
the women were even more cruel than the men. In the course of the
border wars English captives were exposed to the most revolting and
barbarous outrages, some were even burned alive by our St. John river
Indians.

But while cruel to their enemies, and even at times cruel to their
wives, the Indians were by no means without their redeeming features.
They were a modest and virtuous race, and it is quite remarkable that
with all their bloodthirstiness in the New England wars there is no
instance on record of the slightest rudeness to the person of any
female captive. This fact should be remembered to their credit by
those who most abhor their bloodthirstiness and cruelty. Nor were the
savages without a certain sense of justice. This we learn from the
following incident in the experience of the English captive John
Gyles.

"While at the Indian village (Medoctec) I had been cutting wood and
was binding it up with an Indian rope in order to carry it to the
wigwam when a stout ill-natured young fellow about 20 years of age
threw me backward, sat on my breast and pulling out his knife said
that he would kill me, for he had never yet killed an English person.
I told him that he might go to war and that would be more manly than
to kill a poor captive who was doing their drudgery for them.
Notwithstanding all I could say he began to cut and stab me on my
breast. I seized him by the hair and tumbled him from off me on his
back and followed him with my fist and knee so that he presently said
he had enough; but when I saw the blood run and felt the smart I at
him again and bid him get up and not lie there like a dog--told him of
his former abuses offered to me and other poor captives, and that if
ever he offered the like to me again I would pay him double. I sent
him before me, took up my burden of wood and came to the Indians and
told them the whole truth and they commended me, and I don't remember
that ever he offered me the least abuse afterward, though he was big
enough to have dispatched two of me."

The unfortunate conduct of some of the New England governors together
with other circumstances that need not here be mentioned, led the
Maliseets to be hostile to the English. Toward the French, however,
they were from the very first disposed to be friendly, and when de
Monts, Champlain and Poutrincourt arrived at the mouth of our noble
river on the memorable 24th day of June, 1604, they found awaiting
them the representatives of an aboriginal race of unknown antiquity,
and of interesting language, traditions and customs, who welcomed them
with outward manifestations of delight, and formed with them an
alliance that remained unbroken throughout the prolonged struggle
between the rival powers for supremacy in Acadia.

[Illustration: Indian Encampment and Chief]




CHAPTER II.

THE COMING OF THE WHITE MAN.


There are yet to be found in New Brunswick forest clad regions, remote
from the haunts of men, that serve to illustrate the general features
of the country when it was discovered by European adventurers 300
years ago. Who these first adventurers were we cannot with certainty
tell. They were not ambitious of distinction, they were not even
animated by religious zeal, for in Acadia, as elsewhere, the trader
was the forerunner of the priest.

The Basque, Breton, and Norman, fishermen are believed to have made
their voyages as early as the year 1504, just 100 years before
Champlain entered the mouth of the St. John river. But these early
navigators were too intent upon their own immediate gain to think of
much beside; they gave to the world no intelligent account of the
coasts they visited, they wave not accurate observers, and in their
tales of adventure fact and fiction were blended in equal proportion.
Nevertheless, by the enterprise and resolution of these hardy mariners
the shores of north-eastern America were fairly well known long before
Acadia contained a single white inhabitant.

Adventurers of Portugal, Spain and Italy vied with those of France and
Britain in the quest of treasure beyond the sea. They scanned our
shores with curious eyes and pushed their way into every bay and
harbor. And thus, slowly but surely, the land that had lain hidden in
the mists of antiquity began to disclose its outlines as the keen
searchlight of discovery was turned upon it from a dozen different
sources.

While the first recorded exploration of the southern shores of New
Brunswick is that of de Monts and Champlain in 1604, there can be
little doubt that European fishers and traders had entered the Bay of
Fundy before the close of the 16th century and had made the
acquaintance of the savages, possibly they had ventured up the St.
John river. The Indians seem to have greeted the new-comers in a very
friendly fashion and were eager to barter their furs for knives and
trinkets. The "pale-faces" and their white winged barks were viewed at
first with wonder not unmixed with awe, but the keen-eyed savages
quickly learned the value of the white man's wares; and readily
exchanged the products of their own forests and streams for such
articles as they needed. Trade with the savages had assumed
considerable proportions even before the days of Champlain.

But while it is probable that the coasts of Acadia were visited by
Europeans some years before Champlain entered the Bay of Fundy, it is
certain that the history of events previous to the coming of that
intrepid navigator is a blank. The Indians gradually become familiar
with the vanguard of civilization as represented by the rude fishermen
and traders, that is all we know.

The honor of the first attempt at colonization in Acadia belongs to
the Sieur de Monts, a Huguenot noblemen who had rendered essential
service to the French king. This nobleman, with the assistance of a
company of merchants of Rouen and Rochelle, collected a band of 120
emigrants, including artisans of all trades, laborers and soldiers,
and in the month of April, 1604, set sail for the new world. Henry IV
of France gave to the Sieur de Monts jurisdiction over Acadia, or New
France, a region so vast that the sites of the modern cities of
Montreal and Philadelphia lay within its borders. The Acadia of de
Monts would today include the maritime provinces, the greater part of
Quebec and half of New England.

The colonists embarked in two small vessels, the one of 120, the other
of 150 tons burden; a month later they reached the southern coast of
Nova Scotia. They proceeded to explore the coast and entered the Bay
of Fundy, to which the Sieur de Monts gave the name of La Baye
Francaise. Champlain has left us a graphic account of the voyage of
exploration around the shores of the bay. In this, however, we need
not follow him. Suffice it to say that on the 24th day of June there
crept cautiously into the harbor of St. John a little French ship; she
was a paltry craft, smaller than many of our coasting schooners, but
she carried the germ of an empire for de Monts, Champlain and
Poutrincourt, the founders of New France, were on her deck.

There is in Champlain's published "voyages" an excellent plan of St.
John harbor which, he says, lay "at the mouth of the largest and
deepest river we had yet seen which we named the River Saint John,
because it was on this saint's day that we arrived there."

Champlain did not ascend the river far but Ralleau, the secretary of
the Sieur de Monts, went there sometime afterwards to see Secoudon (or
Chkoudun), the chief of the river, who reported that it was beautiful,
large and extensive with many meadows and fine trees such as oaks,
beeches, walnut trees and also wild grape vines. In Champlain's plan
of St. John harbor a cabin is placed on Navy Island, which he
describes as a "cabin where the savages fortify themselves." This was
no doubt the site of a very ancient encampment.

Lescarbot, the historian, who accompanied de Monts, says they visited
the cabin of Chkoudun, with whom they bartered for furs. According to
his description: "The town of Ouigoudy, the residence of the said
Chkoudun, was a great enclosure upon a rising ground, enclosed with
high and small tress, tied one against another; and within the
enclosure were several cabins great and small, one of which was as
large as a market hall, wherein many households resided." In the large
cabin which served as a council chamber, they saw some 80 or 100
savages all nearly naked. They were having a feast, which they called
"Tabagie." The chief Chkoudun made his warriors pass in review before
his guests.

Lescarbot describes the Indian sagamore as a man of great influence
who loved the French and admired their civilization. He even attended
their religious services on Sundays and listened attentively to the
admonitions of their spiritual guides, although he did not understand
a word. "Moreover," adds Lescarbot, "he wore the sign of the cross
upon his bosom, which he also had his servants wear; and he had in
imitation of us a great cross erected in the public place called
Oigoudi at the port of the River Saint John." This sagamore
accompanied Poutrincourt on his tour of exploration to the westward
and offered single handed to oppose a hostile band who attacked the
French.

According to Champlain's plan of St. John harbor, the channel on the
west, or Carleton, side of Navy Island was much narrower in his day
than it is now. The name Ouygoudy (or Wigoudi), applied by the
Indians to Chkoudun's village on Navy Island, is nearly identical with
the modern word "We-go-dic," used by the Maliseets to designate any
Indian village or encampment. They have always called the St. John
river "Woolastook," but their name for the place on which the city of
St. John is built is "Men-ah-quesk," which is readily identified with
"Menagoueche," the name generally applied to St. John harbor by
Villebon and other French commanders in Acadia.

[Illustration: CHAMPLAIN'S PLAN OF ST. JOHN HARBOR.

The figures indicate fathoms of water. A. Islands above
the falls. B. Mountains two leagues from the river. D. Shoals or flats.
E. Cabin where the savages fortify themselves. F. A pebbly point where
there is a cross (Sand Point). G. Partridge Island. H. A., small river
coming from a little pond (mill pond and its outlet). I. Arm of the sea,
dry at low tide (Courtenay Bay and the Marsh Creek). P. Way by which the
savages carry their canoes in passing the falls.]

Navy Island assumes a historic interest in our eyes as the first
inhabited spot, so far as we know, within the confines of the city of
St. John. In Champlain's plans the principal channel is correctly
given as on the east side of Partridge Island. Sand Point is shown,
and the cross at its extremity was probably erected by the explorers
in honor of their discovery. Groups of savages are seen on either side
of the harbor, and a moose is feeding near the present Haymarket
Square. A little ship rests on the flats, the site of the new dry
dock.

De Monts and Champlain passed their first winter in America on an
island in the St. Croix river. Their experience was disastrous in the
extreme. Nearly half of their party died of "mal de la terre," or
scurvy, and others were at the point of death. Pierre Biard, the
Jesuit missionary, attributed the fatality of the disease to the mode
of life of the people, of whom only eleven remained well. "These were
a jolly company of hunters who preferred rabbit hunting to the air of
the fireside, skating on the ponds to turning over lazily in bed,
making snowballs to bring down the game to sitting around the fire
talking about Paris and its good cooks." In consequence of their
unfortunate experience during the first winter the little colony
removed to Port Royal.

The advent of European explorers and traders materially affected the
manner of life of the Indians. Hitherto they had hunted the wild
animals merely for subsistence, but now the demand of the traders for
furs and peltry stimulated enormously the pursuit of game. The
keen-eyed savages saw the advantages of the white man's implements and
utensils. Steel knives, axes, vessels of metal, guns, powder and shot,
blankets, ornaments and trinkets excited his cupidity. Alas, too, love
of the white man's "fire water" soon became a ruling passion and the
poor Indian too often received a very indifferent compensation for his
toil and exposure.

In the summer time, when the annual ships arrived from France, the
Indians gathered in large numbers at the various trading posts. They
came from far and near, and for several weeks indulged in feasting and
revelry. Pierre Biard comments severely on their folly. He says: "They
never stop gorging themselves excessively during several weeks. They
get drunk not only on wine, but on brandy, so that it is no wonder
they are obliged to endure some gripes of the stomach during the
following autumn."

The Maliseets frequently came to the mouth of the St. John to trade
with the French; sometimes they even resorted to Port Royal, for these
daring savages did not fear to cross the Bay of Fundy in their frail
barks.

The chief of the savages of the River St. John, Chkoudun, proved a
valuable ally of the French owing to his extensive knowledge of the
country and of the tribes that inhabited it. Champlain crossed over to
St. John from Port Royal in the autumn of 1605 to get him to point out
the location of a certain copper mine on the shores of the Bay of
Fundy, supposed to be of fabulous richness. Chkoudun readily agreed to
accompany his visitor and they proceeded to the mine, which was on the
shores of the Basin of Minas. The master miner, a native of Sclavonia,
whom de Monts had brought to Acadia to search for precious metals,
deemed the outlook not unpromising, but Champlain was disappointed,
and says: "The truth is that if the water did not cover the mines
twice a day, and if they did not lie in such hard rocks, something
might be expected from them."

The commercial spirit that has ever predominated in our good city of
St. John evidently goes back to the days of its discovery. Chkoudun
lived at "Menagoueche" in his fortified village on Navy Island when
Champlain invited him to go with the Sieur de Poutrincourt and himself
as guide on a tour of exploration along the coast of New England. They
set out in the month of September, 1606, and the chief took with him
in a shallop certain goods he had obtained from the fur traders to
sell to his neighbors the Armouchiquois, with whom he proposed to make
an alliance. The savages of New England were beginning to covet the
axes and other implements of civilization that their neighbors to the
eastward had obtained from the fishermen and traders who visited their
shores.

The Indians were now for a season to part with their friends and
allies. In 1607 de Monts decided to abandon his attempt to establish a
colony and Champlain and his associates were recalled to France.
Acadia was once more without a single European inhabitant. Three years
later Poutrincourt, to the great joy of the savages, returned to Port
Royal, and most of the rights and privileges formerly held by de Monts
were transferred to him.

The summer of 1611 was notable for the arrival of the Jesuit
missionaries, Pierre Biard and Enemond Masse.

It seems that the French traders did not quietly acquiesce in
Poutrincourt's monopoly of trade, and the masters of certain ships of
St. Malo and Rochelle boasted to the Indians that they would devour
Poutrincourt as the fabled Gougou would a poor savage. This was an
insult our nobleman was not disposed to endure, so accompanied by the
missionary Biard he crossed over to St. John and proceeded along the
coast as far as Passamaquoddy. The offenders were sternly admonished
and compelled to acknowledge his authority. Later it was discovered
that they had carried away nearly all that was valuable of the fur
trade for that season.

Biard at this time succeeded in reconciling Poutrincourt and the
younger Pontgrave who for some misdemeanor had been banished from Port
Royal and had spent the previous winter among the Indians of the St.
John river, living just as they did. Biard speaks of him as "a young
man of great physical and mental strength, excelled by none of the
savages in the chase, in alertness and endurance and in his ability to
speak their language."

Early in the month of October a little island in Long Reach called
Emenenic--now known as Caton's Island--was the scene of an exciting
incident of which Biard has left us a picturesque description. It
seems that Poutrincourt's son, Biencourt, wished to exact submission
on the part of a number of traders of St. Malo, who had established a
trading post on the island. Accordingly accompanied by a party of
soldiers and the Jesuit missionary he proceeded to the scene of
operations. Father Biard did not admire, as do our modern travellers,
the "reversing falls" at the mouth of our noble river. "The entrance
to this river," he says, "is very narrow and very dangerous * * and if
you do not pass over it at the proper moment and when the water is
smoothly heaped up, of a hundred thousand barques not an atom would
escape, but men and goods would all perish."

The party settled on the island of Emenenic included their captain,
Merveille, and young Pontgrave. Biard in his narrative terms them "the
Malouins"--or people of St. Malo. "We were still," he says, "one
league and a half from the island when the twilight ended and night
came on. The stars had already begun to appear when suddenly towards
the northward a part of the heavens became blood red; and this light
spreading little by little in vivid streaks and flashes, moved
directly over the settlement of the Malouins and there stopped. The
red glow was so brilliant that the whole river was tinged and made
luminous by it. This apparition lasted about five minutes and as soon
as it disappeared another came of the same form, direction and
appearance.

"Our savages, when they saw this wonder, cried out in their language,
'Gara, gara, maredo'--we shall have war, there will be blood.

"We arrived opposite the settlement when the night had already closed
in, and there was nothing we could do except to fire a salute from the
falconet, which they answered with one from the swivel gun.

"When morning came and the usual prayers ware said, two Malouins
presented themselves upon the bank and signified to us that we could
disembark without being molested, which we did. It was learned that
their captains were not there but had gone away up the river three
days before, and no one knew when they would return. Meanwhile Father
Biard went away to prepare his altar and celebrate holy mass. After
mass Sieur de Biencourt placed a guard at the door of the habitation
and sentinels all around it. The Malouins were very much astonished at
this way of doing things. The more timid considered themselves as
lost; the more courageous stormed and fumed and defied them.

"When night came on Captain Merveille returned to his lodgings,
knowing nothing of his guests. The sentinel hearing him approach
uttered his "qui voila"--who goes there? The Malouin, thinking it was
one of his own people, answered mockingly, 'who goes there thyself?'
and continued upon his way. The sentinel fired his musket at him in
earnest and it was a great wonder (merveille) that Merveille was not
killed. But he was very much astonished and still more so when he saw
some soldiers upon him with naked swords who seized him and took him
into the house; you may imagine how soldiers and sailors act at such
times, with their cries, their theats and their gesticulations.

"Merveille had his hands bound behind his back so tightly that he
could not rest and he began to complain very pitifully. Father Biard
begged Sieur de Biencourt to have the sufferer untied, alleging that
if they had any fears about the said Merveille they might enclose him
in one of the Carthusian beds, and that he would himself stay at the
door to prevent his going out. Sieur de Biencourt granted this
request."

"Now I could not describe to you," Biard goes on to say, "what a night
this was; for it passed in continual alarms, gun shots and rash acts
on the part of some of the men; so that it was feared with good reason
that the prognostications seen in the heavens the night before would
have their bloody fulfilment upon earth. I do not know that there was
one who closed his eyes during the night. For me, I made many fine
promises to our Lord never to forget His goodness if He were pleased
to avert bloodshed. This He granted in His infinite mercy. * *
Certainly Captain Merveille and his people showed unusual piety for
notwithstanding this so annoying encounter, two days afterwards they
confessed and took communion in a very exemplary manner, and at our
departure they all begged me very earnestly, and particularly young du
Pont, to come and stay with them as long as I liked. I promised to do
so and am only waiting the opportunity, for in truth I love these
honest people with all my heart."

The missionaries, Biard and Masse, were anxious to cultivate the
friendship of young du Pont, knowing that he could greatly assist them
in learning the Indian language, a knowledge of which was essential to
the work they hoped to accomplish amidst the forests of Acadia.
Inspired by their motto "ad majoram Dei gloriam," they shrank from no
toil or privation. Father Masse passed the winter of 1611-12 with
Louis Membertou and his family at the River St. John with only a
French boy as his companion, his object being to increase his
knowledge of the Indian language. He suffered many hardships, was at
one time seriously ill, but eventually returned in safety to Port
Royal. He describes the winter's experience with the savages as "a
life without order and without daily fare, without bread, without
salt, often without anything; always moving on and changing, * * for
roof a wretched cabin, for couch the earth, for rest and quiet odious
cries and songs, for medicine hunger and hard work."

The missionaries found immense difficulty in acquiring the language of
the natives. The task was not so difficult so long as they sought to
learn the names of objects that might be touched or seen, but when it
came to such abstract words as virtue, vice, reason, justice, or to
such terms as to believe, to doubt or to hope, "for these," said
Biard, "we had to labor and sweat; in these were the pains of
travail." They were compelled to make a thousand gesticulations and
signs that greatly amused their savage instructors who sometimes
palmed off on them words that were ridiculous and even obscene, so
that the Jesuits labored with indifferent success in the preparation
of their catechism. Their work was still in the experimental stage
when the destruction of Port Royal by Argal in 1613, and the capture
and removal of the missionaries brought everything to a stand and put
an end to all attempts at colonization in Acadia for some years.

The Indians, however, were not forgotten; the Jesuits had failed, but
in 1619 a party of Recollet missionaries from Aquitaine began a
mission on the St. John. These humble missionary laborers had no
historian to record their toils and privations, and unlike the Jesuits
they did not become their own annalists. We know, however, that one of
their number, Father Barnardin, while returning from Miscou to the
River St. John, in the year 1623, died of hunger and fatigue in the
midst of the woods, a martyr to his charity and zeal. Five years
afterwards, the Recollets were compelled to abandon their mission
which, however, was reoccupied by them before many years had passed.
Meanwhile the fur traders established a post on the River St. John as
a convenient centre for trade with the Indians.

The French, with young Biencourt at their head, still kept a feeble
hold on Acadia. Biencourt had as his lieutenant, Charles de la Tour,
who had come to the country many years before when a mere boy of 14
years of age. Biencourt and la Tour--such was their poverty--were
compelled to live after the Indian fashion, roaming through the woods
from place to place. In this rude life la Tour acquired an extensive
knowledge of the country and its resources, and in all probability
became familiar with the St. John river region. Biencourt at his death
left him all his property in Acadia.

The destruction of Port Royal by Argal was the first incident in the
struggle between England and France for sovereignty in Acadia, a
struggle that for a century and a half was to remain undecided.

The next attempt at colonization was made on the part of the British,
but it proved as futile as that of de Monts. James I. of England, in
the year 1621, gave to Sir William Alexander, under the name of Nova
Scotia, the peninsula which is now so called, together with a vast
adjacent wilderness as a fief of the Scottish crown. For several years
this favored nobleman seems to have contented himself with sending
annually a ship to explore the shores of his domain and to trade with
the Indians. Later he devised a scheme to facilitate the settlement of
a colony by the creation of an order of baronets of Nova Scotia, each
of whom was to receive an estate six miles in length and three in
breadth in consideration of his assistance in the colonization of the
country. In the course of 10 years more than 100 baronets were
created, of whom 34 had estates within the limits of our own province.
To that part of Nova Scotia north of the Bay of Fundy, now called New
Brunswick, Sir William gave the name of the Province of Alexandria.
The St. John river he called the Clyde and the St. Croix, which
divided New England and New Scotland, he not inaptly called the
Tweed.

When war broke out between England and France in 1627, young Charles
la Tour found his position in Acadia very insecure. However, he was
naturally resourceful and by his diplomacy and courage continued for
many years to play a prominent part in the history of affairs. He
sought and obtained from Louis XIII. of France a commission as the
King's lieutenant-general and at the same time obtained from Sir
William Alexander the title of a Baronet of Nova Scotia. He procured
from his royal master a grant of land on the River St. John and
obtained leave from Sir William Alexander to occupy it.

By the treaty of St. Germain, in 1632, Acadia was ceded to France.
Immediately after the peace de Razilly came to the country at the head
of a little colony of settlers, many of them farmers, whose
descendants are to be found among the Acadians of today. With de
Razilly came d'Aulnay Charnisay, who was destined to become la Tour's
worst enemy. De Razilly died in 1635, leaving his authority to
Charnisay, his relative and second in command. Charnisay made his
headquarters at Port Royal and nobody disputed his authority except la
Tour, who claimed to be independent of him by virtue of his commission
from the crown and his grant from the Company of New France. The
dissensions between la Tour and Charnisay at length culminated in war
and the strife was long and bitter.




CHAPTER III.

THE RIVAL FEUDAL CHIEFS.


Charles de Menou, Seigneur d'Aulnay Charnisay, came of a distinguished
family of Touraine. He married Jeanne Motin, a daughter of the
Seigneur de Courcelles. She came to Acadia with him in 1638. They
resided at Port Royal where Charnisay in his log mansion reigned like
a feudal lord.

Charles St. Etienne de la Tour was probably of less conspicuous
lineage than his rival, although in legal documents he is called "a
gentleman of distinguished birth." He married Frances Marie Jacquelins
who, according to the questionable testimony of his enemies, was the
daughter of a barber of Mans. She was a Huguenot and whatever may have
been her origin her qualities of mind and heart have deservedly won
for her the title of "the heroine of Acadia." Never had man more
faithful ally than Marie Jacquelins proved to Charles la Tour.

As early as the year 1630 la Tour had be concerned in a project to
erect a strong fort at the mouth of the St. John river in order to
ward off the incursions of hostile adventurers and secure control of
the far trade of the vast wilderness region extending from the mouth
of the river nearly to the St. Lawrence. It was not, however, until
the 15th of January, 1635, that the Company of New France granted him
his tract of land at St. John, extending five leagues up the river and
including within its bounds "the fort and habitation of la Tour."

The French government endeavored to establish a good understanding
between la Tour and Charnisay. A royal letter was addressed to the
latter in which he was cautioned against interference with la Tour's
settlement at the River St. John. La Tour received a like caution as
regards Charnisay's settlement at Port Royal. Charnisay was
commissioned the king's lieutenant-general from Chignecto to Penobscot
and la Tour was given like jurisdiction over the Nova Scotian
peninsula. Thus la Tour's settlement and fort at St. John lay within
the limits of Charnisay's government and Charnisay's settlements at La
Have and Port Royal lay within the government of la Tour, an
arrangement not calculated to promote harmony on the part of the
rivals.

It is rather difficult to get at all the facts of the quarrel that now
rapidly developed between la Tour and Charnisay. The statements of
their respective friends are very diverse, sometimes contradictory,
and even the official records of the court of France are conflicting.
Nicolas Denys, the historian, had reason to dislike Charnisay, and
perhaps some of his statements concerning Charnisay's barbarity should
be received with caution. On the other hand the friends of Charnisay
have cast aspersions an the character of Lady la Tour that seem
entirely unwarranted.[2] The fact remains that Acadia, large as it
was, not large enough for two such ambitious men as Charles la Tour
and d'Aulnay Charnisay.

    [2] See "Feudal Chiefs of Acadia," by Parkman in Atlantic Monthly of
        January and February, 1893.

The exact site of la Tour's fort at the mouth of the River St. John
has been the subject of controversy, Dr. W. F. Ganong, a most
conscientious and painstaking student of our early history, has
argued strongly in favor of its location at Portland Point (the green
mound near Rankine's wharf at the foot of Portland street); the late
Joseph W. Lawrence and Dr. W. P. Dole have advocated the claims of
Fort Dufferin, but the site usually accepted is that known as "Old
Fort," on the west side of the harbor opposite Navy Island. It seems
probable that la Tour resided at one time at "Old Fort," in Carleton,
and his son-in-law the Sieur de Martignon lived there afterwards, but
whether this was the site of the first fort built by la Tour and so
bravely defended by his wife is at least a debatable question.

In the absence of positive information as to the exact location of la
Tour's first fort, it is perhaps unadvisable to disturb popular
opinion until a thorough search of the records in France shall have
been made in order if possible to settle the question.

Upon his arrival at St. John, la Tour speedily surrounded himself with
soldiers and retainers and established an extensive traffic with the
Indians, who came from their hunting grounds when the ships arrived
laden with goods for the Indian trade. Doctor Hannay gives a graphic
picture of la Tour's situation:--

"A rude abundance reigned at the board where gathered the defenders of
Fort la Tour. The wilderness was then a rich preserve of game, where
the moose, caribou and red deer roamed in savage freedom. Wild fowl of
all kinds abounded along the marsh, and interval lands of the St.
John, and the river itself--undisturbed by steamboats and unpolluted
by saw mills--swarmed with fish. And so those soldier-traders lived on
the spoils of forest, ocean and river, a life of careless freedom,
undisturbed by the politics of the world and little crossed by its
cares. Within the fort, Lady la Tour led a lonely life, with no
companions but her domestics and her children, for her lord was often
away ranging the woods, cruising on the coast, or perhaps on a voyage
to France. She was a devout Huguenot, but the difference of religion
between husband and wife seems never to have marred the harmony of
their relations."

In the struggle between the rival feudal chiefs, Charnisay had the
advantage of having more powerful friends at court, chief among them
the famous Cardinal Richelieu.

Representations made concerning the conduct of la Tour led the French
monarch in 1641 to order him to return to France to answer the charges
against him. In the event of his refusal, Charnisay was directed to
seize his person and property. The commission of la Tour was also
revoked.

The contest now entered upon an acute stage. La Tour claimed that the
royal order had been obtained through misrepresentation, and
absolutely refused to submit to Charnisay. The latter, not daring to
attack la Tour in his stronghold, repaired to France where he
succeeded in fitting out five vessels and in obtaining the services of
500 soldiers to compel his rival to submission. He also procured
another and more definite order from the king, directing him to seize
la Tour's fort and person and to send him to France as a rebel and a
traitor.

Meanwhile la Tour was not idle. His friends at Rochelle sent out to
him a large armed vessel, the Clement, loaded with ammunition and
supplies and having on board 150 armed men. When the vessel neared
St. John, it was discovered that Charnisay had established a blockade
at the mouth of the harbor and that entrance was impracticable. In
this emergency la Tour resolved to seek aid from the people of New
England, whose trade and friendship he had begun to cultivate. Boston
was then but a straggling village, in its 13th year, with houses
principally of boards or logs gathered around its plain little meeting
house. Eluding the vigilance of the blockading squadron, la Tour and
his wife succeeded in getting safely on board the Clement, and at once
repaired to Boston, where their arrival created some consternation,
for Boston happened to be at that time in a particularly defenceless
position. Governor Winthrop remarked: "If la Tour had been ill-minded
towards us, he had such an opportunity as we hope neither he nor any
other shall ever have the like again." However, la Tour had come with
no ill intent, and after some negotiations, which he conducted with
much skill and discretion, he was allowed to hire from Edward Gibbons
and Thomas Hawkins, four vessels with 50 men and 38 guns. He also
obtained the assistance of 92 soldiers. With these he hurried back to
the relief of his fort. Charnisay was compelled to raise the blockade
and retire to his defences at Port Royal, where he was defeated with
loss by the united forces of la Tour and his allies.

While at St. John, the Bostonians captured a pinnace belonging to
Charnisay, laden with 400 moose and 400 beaver skins; their own
pinnace went up the river to Grand Lake and loaded with coal. This
little incident shows that the coal mines of Queens county were known
and worked more than 250 years ago.

As the struggle with la Tour proceeded Charnisay became more and more
determined to effect the destruction of his rival. La Tour's resources
were nearly exhausted and his situation had became exceedingly
critical. He dared not leave his fort and yet he could not hold out
much longer unaided. His brave wife was equal to the emergency; she
determined herself to go to France for assistance. This was indeed an
arduous undertaking for a woman, but her spirit rose to the occasion,
and neither the perils of the deep nor the difficulties that were to
confront her at the court of France served to daunt her resolute soul.
Fearlessly she set out upon the long and dangerous voyage and in the
course of more than a year's absence endured disappointments and
trials that would have crushed one less resolute and stout hearted.
Her efforts in her native country were foiled by her adversaries, she
was even threatened with death if she should venture to leave France,
but setting the royal command at defiance she went to England and
there chartered a ship to carry stores and munitions of war to St.
John. The master of the ship, instead of proceeding directly to his
destination, went up the River St. Lawrence to trade with the Indians.
When, after a six months' voyage, they at length entered the Bay of
Fundy some of Charnisay's vessels were encountered, and the English
captain to avoid the seizure and confiscation of his ship was obliged
to conceal Madame la Tour and her people and proceed to Boston. Here
his own tribulations began for Madame la Tour brought an action
against him for violation of his contract and after a four days' trial
the jury awarded her two thousand pounds damages. With the proceeds of
this suit she chartered three English ships in Boston and proceeded
to St. John with all the stores and munitions of war that she had
collected. The garrison at Fort la Tour hailed her arrival with
acclamations of delight for they had begun to despair of her return.

Charnisay's attempt to reduce la Tour to subjection was foiled for the
time being, but his opportunity came a little later. In February,
1645, he learned of la Tour's absence and that his garrison numbered
only fifty men. He determined at once to attack the fort. His first
attempt was an abject failure. The Lady la Tour inspired her little
garrison with her own dauntless spirit, and so resolute was the
defence and so fierce the cannon fire from the bastions that
Charnisay's ship was shattered and disabled and he was obliged to warp
her off under the shelter of a bluff to save her from sinking. In this
attack twenty of his men were killed and thirteen wounded. Two months
later he made another attempt with a stronger force and landed two
cannon to batter the fort on the land side. On the 17th of April,
having brought his largest ship to within pistol shot of the water
rampart, he summoned the garrison to surrender. He was answered by a
volley of cannon shot and shouts of defiance.

The story of the taking of Fort la Tour, as told by Nicholas Denys, is
well known. For three days Madame la Tour bravely repelled the
besiegers and obliged them to retire beyond the reach of her guns. On
the fourth day whilst she, hoping for some respite, was making her
soldiers rest a miserable Swiss sentinel betrayed the garrison, and
when the alarm was given the enemy were already scaling the walls.
Lady la Tour even in so desperate an emergency as this succeeded in
rallying the defenders, who bravely resisted the attack, though
greatly outnumbered by their assailants. She only surrendered at the
last extremity and under condition that the lives of all should be
spared. This condition Charnisay is said to have shamefully violated;
all the garrison were hanged, with the exception of one who was spared
on condition of acting the part of executioner, and the lady commander
was compelled to stand at the scaffold with a rope around her neck as
though she were the vilest criminal.

It is but fair to state that our knowledge of the gross indignity to
which Lady la Tour was subjected is derived from Denys' narrative, and
its authenticity has been questioned by Parkman. Nevertheless accounts
of the transaction that have come to us from sources friendly to
Charnisay admit that he hanged the greater number of his prisoners,
"to serve as an example to posterity," and that Madame la Tour was put
into confinement where, as Charnisay's reporter somewhat brutally
observes, "she fell ill with spite and rage." The Lady la Tour did not
long survive her misfortunes. Scarcely three weeks had elapsed after
the capture of the fort she had so gallantly defended when she died
and was laid to rest near the spot consecrated by her devotion, the
scene of so many hopes and fears.

There will always be a peculiar charm for us in the story of our
Acadian heroine. Fearless, energetic, resolute undoubtedly she was,
yet who shall say that the motives that actuated her were other than
pure and womanly? A heart more loyal and true never beat in a human
breast. She gave her life to protect her husband, her children and
the humbler dependents that followed their fortunes from the hands of
a bitter and unscrupulous enemy.

The capture of his stronghold and the death of his faithful wife
involved la Tour in what appeared to be at the time irreparable ruin.
He found himself once more, as in his younger days, an exile and a
wanderer.

The booty taken by Charnisay was valued at £10,000 sterling and as it
had been accumulated in traffic with the Indians we may form some idea
of the value of the trade of the St. John river at this time.

When the capture of la Tour's fort was known at the court of
Versailles the young king was well pleased. He confirmed Charnisay's
authority in Acadia and even extended it--on paper--from the St.
Lawrence to Virginia. He could build forts, command by land and sea,
appoint officers of government and justice, keep such lands as he
fancied and grant the remainder to his vassals. He had also a monopoly
of the fur trade and with Fort la Tour, the best trading post in
Acadia, in his possession, the prospect for the future was very
bright. Charnisay possessed the instincts of a colonizer and had
already brought a number of settlers to Acadia. Everything at this
juncture seemed to point to a growing trade and a thriving colony; but
once again the hand of destiny appears. In the very zenith of his
fortune and in the prime of manhood Charnisay was drowned on the 24th
day of May, 1650, in the Annapolis river near Port Royal.

With Charnisay's disappearance la Tour reappears upon the scene. His
former defiant attitude is forgotten, he is recognized as the most
capable man of affairs in Acadia and in September, 1651, we find him
again in possession of his old stronghold at St. John. The king now
gave him a fresh commission as lieutenant-general in Acadia with ample
territorial rights. Disputes soon afterwards arose concerning the
claims of the widow of d'Aulnay Charnisay; these disputes were set at
rest by the marriage of the parties interested. The marriage contract,
a lengthy document, was signed at Port Royal the 24th day of February,
1653, and its closing paragraph shows that there was little sentiment
involved: "The said seigneur de la Tour and the said dame d'Aulnay his
future spouse, to attain the ends and principal design of their
intended marriage, which is the peace and tranquillity of the country
and concord and union between the two families, wish and desire as
much as lies with them that in the future their children should
contract a new alliance of marriage together."

There is no evidence to show that la Tour's second marriage proved
unhappy, though it is a very unromantic ending to an otherwise very
romantic story. His second wife had also been the second wife of
Charnisay who was a widower when he married her; her maiden name was
Jeanne Motin. Descendants of la Tour by his second marriage are to be
found in the families of the d'Entremonts, Girouards, Porliers and
Landrys of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia.

La Tour and his new wife were quietly living at St. John the year
after their marriage when four English ships of war suddenly appeared
before the fort and demanded its surrender. These ships had in the
first instance been placed at the disposal of the people of
Massachusetts by Oliver Cromwell for the purpose of an expedition
against the Dutch colony of Manhattan (now New York); but on the eve
of their departure news arrived that peace had been made with Holland.
It was then decided that the expedition should proceed under Major
Robert Sedgewick's command to capture the French strongholds in
Acadia. This was a bold measure for England and France were then
ostensibly at peace. La Tour at once saw that resistance was useless
and surrendered his fort and the flag of Britain was hoisted over the
ramparts. However, la Tour's address did not desert him; he went to
England and laid before Cromwell his claim as a grantee under the
charter of Sir William Alexander. He proved as skilful a diplomatist
as ever and obtained, cojointly with Thomas Temple and William Crowne,
a grant which practically included the whole of Acadia.

La Tour, now more than 60 years of age, was sagacious enough to see
that disputes were sure again to arise between England and France with
regard to Acadia, and not wishing to be the football of fortune, sold
his rights to Sir Thomas Temple his co-partner, and retired to private
life. He died in 1666 at the age of 72 years and his ashes rest within
the confines of his beloved Acadia.




CHAPTER IV.

FRENCH COMMANDERS OF ACADIA.


After the capture of Fort la Tour by Sedgewick's Massachusetts
invaders in 1654, Acadia remained nominally in possession of the
English for twelve years. Half a century had elapsed since the attempt
of de Monts to establish his colony, yet little progress had been made
in the settlement of the country and the valley of the St. John
remained an almost unbroken wilderness. The first English trading post
on the river, of which we have any knowledge was that established in
1659 by Sir Thomas Temple at the mouth of the Jemseg.

As related in the last chapter, la Tour, Temple and Crowne received
from Oliver Cromwell a grant that included nearly the whole of Acadia,
and la Tour soon after sold his right to Temple, his co-partner. The
latter decided to establish a fortified post at the Jemseg as more
convenient for the Indian trade and less exposed to marauders than the
fort at the mouth of the river. There can be little doubt that Temple
would soon have enjoyed a flourishing trade, but unfortunately for his
prospects, Acadia was restored to France by the treaty of Breda, in
1667. He attempted to hold possession of his lands, claiming that they
did not fall within the boundaries of Acadia, but at the expiration of
three years, during which there was considerable correspondence with
the home authorities, he received the peremptory orders of Charles II.
to surrender the fort to the Sieur de Soulanges. In the formal deed of
surrender the fort is termed "Fort Gemisick, 25 leagues up the River
St. John." It was a palisaded enclosure, with stakes 18 feet high
connected by cross pieces fastened with nails to the stakes and firmly
braced on the inside with pickets nine feet high leaned against the
stakes. The gate of the fort was of three thicknesses of new plank. It
was evidently a frail defence, but sufficient for the Indian trade.
The armament consisted of five iron guns, varying in weight from 300
pounds to 625 pounds, mounted on wooden platforms. Within the palisade
was a house 20 paces by 10, two chimneys, a forge, two sheds and a
store house. The fort stood on a small mound near the top of a hill,
less than 100 yards from the bank of the Jemseg river. It commanded an
extensive view both up and down the River St. John. A fragment of the
rampart is still visible, and numerous relics have from time to time
been dug up at the site or in the vicinity. The fort site is now owned
by Mr. Geo. F. Nevars.

After the treaty of Breda the Chevalier Grand-fontaine was appointed
to command in Acadia, with Pierre de Joibert, Seigneur de Soulanges et
Marson, as his lieutenant. One of the first acts of Grand-fontaine was
to have a census taken, from which we learn that there were then only
a little more than 400 people in Acadia, very few of whom were to be
found north of the Bay of Fundy. Grand-fontaine was recalled to France
in 1673, and Chambly, who had been an officer in the famous Carignan
Salieres regiment, succeeded him as commandant. The control of affairs
in New France was now transferred to Quebec, where a governor-general
and intendant, or lieutenant-governor, resided.

About this time large tracts of land were granted as "seigniories" by
Count Frontenac and his successors. The seignior was usually a person
of some consideration by birth and education. He received a free
grant of lands from the crown on certain conditions; one of these was
that whenever the seigniory changed hands the act of "faith and
homage" was to be tendered at the Castle of St. Louis in Quebec. The
tendering of faith and homage was quite an elaborate ceremony, in
which the owner of the land, divesting himself of arms and spurs, with
bared head, on bended knee, repeated before the governor, as
representative of the sovereign, his acknowledgement of faith and
homage to the crown. Provision was made in all seignioral grants for
the reservation of oaks for the royal navy, of lands required for
fortifications or highways, and of all mines and minerals; the
seignior was also required to reside on his land or to place a certain
number of tenants thereon and to clear and improve a certain portion
within a stated time. From the year 1672 to the close of the century
as many as 16 seigniories were granted on the St. John river, besides
others in various parts of New Brunswick. The first in order of time
was that to Martin d'Arpentigny Sieur de Martignon. It included a
large tract at the mouth of the River St. John, on the west side of
the harbor, extending six leagues up the river from Partridge Island
(Isle de la Perdrix) and six leagues in depth inland. This seigniory
would now include Carleton and the parishes of Lancaster, Musquash and
Westfield. The owner of this valuable property is described as "an old
inhabitant of Acadia." He married Jeanne de la Tour, only daughter of
Charles la Tour by his first wife: she was born in Acadia in 1626. It
is stated in his grant that he intended to bring over people from
France to settle his seigniory, also that he was a proprietor of lands
on the River St. John "from the River de Maquo to the mines of the
said country of Acadia."[3]

    [3] Dr. Ganong is probably correct in identifying the "River de
        Maquo" with Maquapit and the "mines" with the coal mines at
        Newcastle in Queens county. In this case the sieur de
        Martignon owned the lands on the north side of Grand Lake
        including the site of the old Indian village at Indian point
        where so any relics have been discovered. It is quite possible
        that the sieur de Martignon and his wife, Jeanne de la Tour,
        may have lived there for a time.

After la Tour's death his son-in-law, the Sieur de Mantignon,
seems to have taken up his abode at the old fort on the west side of
the harbor, which in Franquet's map of 1707 is called "Fort de
Martinnon."

In the little world of Acadia, Pierre de Joibert, sieur de Soulanges,
played a leading part during his eight years residence. He was a
native of the little town of Soulanges in the old French province of
Champagne. He had served as lieutenant in Grand-fontaine's company of
infantry and came with that officer to Acadia. It is said that "he
rendered good and praiseworthy service to the king both in Old and New
France." As a recognition of those services he was granted, October
20, 1672, a seigniory at the mouth of the St. John on the east side of
the river a league in depth and extending four leagues up the river;
this seigniory seems to have included the present city of St.
John--Carleton excepted. The Sieur de Soulanges, however, did not
reside there but at the Jemseg. This is evident from the fact that the
document that conveyed to him his St. John seigniory gave him in
addition "the house of fort Gemesik," which the great states "he shall
enjoy for such time only as he shall hold his commission of commander
on the said river in order to give him a place of residence that he
may act with more liberty and convenience in everything relating to
the king's service." The wife of Soulanges was Marie Francoise,
daughter of Chartier de Lotbeniere, attorney-general of Quebec. Their
daughter Louise Elizabeth was born at "Fort Gemesik" in 1673.

The sieur de Soulanges did not long enjoy peaceable possession of his
place of residence; disturbance came from an entirely unexpected
quarter. A band of Dutch marauders under their leader Arenson in the
summer of 1674 pillaged and greatly damaged the fort and seized and
carried off its commander, but soon after set him at liberty. As a
recompense for this misfortune Soulanges received the grant of a large
tract of land at the Jemseg, two leagues in depth and extending a
league on each side of the fort. It is stated in the grant that "he
had made various repairs and additions to the fort in order to make it
habitable and capable of defence, there having been previously only a
small wooden house in ruins surrounded by palisades half fallen to the
ground, in fact it would have been better to have rebuilt the whole,
for he would yet have to make a large outlay to put it in proper
condition on account of the total ruin wrought by the Dutch (les
Hollandois) when they made him their prisoner in the said fort two
years ago."

The little daughter of Soulanges, whose infant slumbers were disturbed
by these rude Dutch boors, was afterwards the marchioness de
Vaudreuil, the wife of one governor general of Canada and the mother
of another.

It is evident the authorities at Quebec knew little of the value of
the lands on the St. John river or they would hardly have granted
them with such prodigality. The Sieur de Soulanges seems to have been
highly favored by Frontenac for the three seigniories granted to him
included an area of more than a hundred square miles. The one at
the mouth of the river possessed all those natural advantages that
have made St. John the leading commercial city of the maritime
provinces. That at the Jemseg was for a short time the head
quarters of French power in Acadia and in its modest way the
political capital of the country. The third seigniory--at the very
heart of which lay the site of Fredericton--remains to be described.
In the grant to Soulanges it is termed, "the place called Nachouac
(Nashwaak), to be called hereafter Soulanges, upon the River St.
John 15 leagues from Gemesk, two leagues on each side of said river
and two leagues deep inland." The grant was made in consideration
of the services rendered by Soulanges and to encourage him to continue
those services; it was made so large because little of it was
thought to be capable of cultivation. This seigniory would include at
the present day the city of Fredericton and its suburbs, the town of
Marysville, villages of Gibson and St. Mary's and a large tract of the
surrounding country; the owner of such a property today would be
indeed a multi-millionaire.

Upon Chambly's appointment as governor of Granada he was succeeded as
governor of Acadia by the Sieur de Soulanges who did not, however,
long enjoy the honors of his new position, for he died about the year
1678 and his widow and children soon afterwards removed to Quebec.
Count Frontenac's interest in the family continued, and on March 23,
1691, a grant of a large tract of land on the River St. John was made
to Marie Francoise Chartier, widow of the Sieur de Soulanges. Her
seigniory included the larger portion of Gagetown parish in Queens
county, the central point being opposite her old residence or, as the
grant expresses it, "vis-a-vis la maison de Jemsec."

The seigniories granted to Soulanges and his widow proved of no value
to their descendants; either the titles lapsed on account of
non-fulfilment of the required conditions, or the lands were forfeited
when the country passed into the hands of the English.

Louise Elizabeth Joibert, the daughter of Soulanges, who was born on
the River St. John, was educated at the convent of the Ursulines in
Quebec. At the age of seventeen she married the Marquis Vaudreuil, a
gentleman thirty years her senior. She is described as a very
beautiful and clever woman possessed of all the graces which would
charm the highest circles; of rare sagacity and exquisite modesty. She
was the mother of twelve children. Her husband, the Marquis de
Vaudreuil, was for twenty-two years governor general of Canada, and
her son held the same position when the French possessions passed into
the hands of the English; he was consequently the last governor
general of New France.

La Valliere succeeded the Sieur de Soulanges and was for six years
commander of Acadia. He cared little for the dignity or honor of his
position provided he could use it for his own benefit. He established
a small settlement at the River St. John and engaged in fishing and
trading. Many complaints were preferred against him by rival traders.
They alleged that he encouraged the English to fish on the coasts,
granting them licenses for the purpose, that he traded with them in
spite of the king's prohibition; also that he robbed and defrauded the
savages.

These charges seem to have been well founded. An Indian captain named
Negascouet says that as he was coming from Neguedchecouniedoche, his
usual residence, he was met by the Sieur de la Valliere, who took from
him by violence seventy moose skins, sixty martins, four beaver and
two otter, without giving him any payment, and this was not the first
time la Valliere had so acted.

In 1685 la Valliere was replaced by Perrot whose conduct was, if
possible, even more reprehensible than that of his predecessor. He was
such a money making genius that he thought nothing of selling brandy
to the Indians by the pint and half-pint before strangers and in his
own house, a rather undignified occupation certainly for a royal
governor of Acadia.

Examples such as these on the part of those in authority naturally
found many imitators, indeed there was at this time a general
disposition on the part of young men of the better families in New
France to become "coureurs de bois," or rangers of the woods, rather
than cultivators of the soil. The life of a coureur de bois was wild
and full of adventure, involving toil and exposure, but the possible
profits were great and the element of danger appeared in the eyes of
many an additional fascination. The rulers of New France from time to
time enacted stringent laws against these "outlaws of the bush" but
they were of little avail. The governor of Quebec felt compelled to
represent the conduct of the Canadian noblesse in unfavorable terms to
his royal master. "They do not," he writes, "devote themselves to
improving their land, they mix up in trade and send their children to
trade for furs in the Indian villages and in the depths of the forest
in spite of the prohibition of his majesty."

The rapid progress of New England caused Louis XIV to express
dissatisfaction at the slow development of Acadia, and he desired a
report of the condition of the colony to be transmitted to Versailles.
Monsieur de Meulles, the intendant, accordingly visited Acadia in 1686
where he found the French settlements "in a neglected and desolate
state." He caused a census to be taken which showed the total
population to be 915 souls, including the garrison at Port Royal.
There were at that time only five or six families on the St. John
river. Bishop St. Vallier made a tour of Acadia the same year,
visiting all the Indians and French inhabitants he could find. The
Marquis de Denonville in a letter to the French minister of November
10, 1686, announced the safe return of the bishop to Quebec after a
most fatiguing journey and adds: "He will give you an account of the
numerous disorders committed in the woods by the miserable outlaws who
for a long while have lived like the savages without doing anything at
all towards the tilling of the soil."

[Illustration: ESTAT PRESENT DE L'EGLISE ET DE LA COLONIE FRANCOISE DANS
LA NOUVELLE FRANCE

_Par M. L'Evèque de Quebec_

A PARIS, Chez ROBERT PEPIE, ruë S. Jacques, à l'image S. Basile, au
dessus de la Fontaine S. Severin.

M. DC. LXXXVIII.]

Many interesting incidents of the tour of Mgr. St. Vallier are related
in a work entitled "The Present State of the Church and of the French
Colony in New France," printed in Paris in 1688. A fac-simile of the
title page of the original edition appears opposite. As this rare
little volume contains the first published references to the upper St.
John region some extracts from its pages will be of interest. The
bishop was accompanied by two priests and five canoe men. They left
the St. Lawrence on the 7th of May and proceeded by way of the Rivers
du Loup and St. Francis to the St. John.

"Our guides," the bishop says, "in order to take the shortest road,
conducted us by a route not usually traveled, in which it was
necessary sometimes to proceed by canoe and sometimes on foot and this
in a region where winter still reigned; we had sometimes to break the
ice in the rivers to make a passage for the canoes and sometimes to
leave the canoes and tramp amid snow and water over those places that
are called portages (or carrying places) because it is necessary for
the men to carry the canoes upon their shoulders. In order the better
to mark our route we gave names to all these portages as well as to
the lakes and rivers we had to traverse.

"The St. Francis is rather a torrent than a river; it is formed by
several streams which descend from two ranges of mountains by which
the river is bordered on the right and left; it is only navigable from
the tenth or twelfth of May until about the end of June; it is then so
rapid that one could make without difficulty twenty to twenty-five
leagues in a day if it were not crossed in three or four places by
fallen trees, which in each instance occupy about fifteen feet of
space, and if they were cut out, as could be done with very little
expense, the passage would be free; one would not suppose that it
would cost 200 pistoles to clear the channel of these obstacles which
much delay the traveler.

"The River St. John is of much greater extent and beauty than that
just named, its course is everywhere smooth and the lands along its
banks appear good; there are several very fine islands, and numerous
tributary rivers abounding in fish enter its channel on both sides. It
seemed to us that some fine settlements might be made between Medogtok
and Gemesech, especially at a certain place which we have named
Sainte Marie, where the river enlarges and the waters are divided by a
large number of islands that apparently would be very fertile if
cultivated. A mission for the savages would be well placed there: the
land has not as yet any owner in particular, neither the king nor the
governor having made a grant to any person."

The place here referred to by St. Vallier afterwards became the
mission of Ekouipahag or Aukpaque. A mission for the Indians has been
maintained in that vicinity, with some interruptions, to the present
day. The islands which the bishop mentions are the well known and
beautiful islands below the mouth of the Keswick stream. There is no
mention by St. Vallier of the Indian village at Aukpaque, which was
probably of rather later origin: there may have been a camping ground
in that locality, however, for the Indians had many camping places on
the islands and intervals, particularly at the mouths of rivers, to
which they resorted at certain seasons. The name Ekouipahag or, as our
modern Indians call it, Ek-pa-hawk, signifies "the head of the tide,"
or beginning of the swift water. The charms of the place have excited
the admiration of many a tourist since St. Vallier's day. At the time
of the Acadian expulsion a number of fugitives, who escaped their
pursuers, fled for refuge to the St. John river, and took up their
abode at this spot where they cultivated the intervals and islands
until the arrival of the Loyalists in 1783, when they were again
obliged to look for situations more remote.

The progress of Bishop St. Vallier coming down the St. John river was
expeditious, the water being then at freshet height. At the mouth of
the Madawaska, which he named St. Francois de Sales, he met a small
band of savages, who pleaded for a missionary. The day following, May
17th, he came to the Grand Falls, or as he calls it "le grand Sault
Saint Jean-Baptiste." His book contains the first published
description of this magnificent cataract[4]. The rapidity of the
journey is seen in the fact that the bishop and his party slept the
next night at the Indian village of Medoctec, "the first fort of
Acadia," eighty miles below the Grand Falls. Here they found a hundred
savages, who were greatly pleased when informed that the bishop had
come for the purpose of establishing a mission for their benefit. This
promise was fulfilled soon after by the sending to them the Recollet
missionary Simon, of whom we shall hear more ere long. It is evident
that the French adventurers the bishop encountered in the course of
this wilderness journey led a pretty lawless life, for he observed in
his narrative: "It is to be wished that the French who have their
habitations along this route, were so correct in their habits as to
lead the poor savages by their example to embrace Christianity, but we
must hope that in the course of time the reformation of the one may
bring about the conversion of the other."

    [4] "Nous vimes l'endroit qu'on appelle le grand Sault Saint
        Jean-Baptiste, ou la riviere de Saint Jean faisant du haut
        d'un rocher fort eleve une terrible cascade dans un abime,
        forme un brouillard qui derobe l'eau a la veue, et fait un
        bruit qui avertit de loin les navigateurs de descendre de
        leurs canots."

Medoctec was undoubtedly the principal Indian village on the St. John
at this time; it was situated on the right bank of the river, eight
miles below the Town of Woodstock. Here the Maliseets had a palisaded
fort and large cabin, similar to that described by Lescarbot at the
village Ouigoudy on Navy Island, where de Monts was welcomed by
Chkoudun in 1604. The only other fortification constructed by the
Indians on the St. John river, so far as known, was that at the mouth
of the Nerepis, at Woodman's Point, called by Villebon, in 1697, "Fort
des Sauvages de Nerepisse." It was evidently merely a palisaded
enclosure, and on Southack's map of that period is marked "Wooden
Fort."

Hitherto the Indians of Acadia had lived peaceably with the whites,
but the closing years of the seventeenth century were destined to
witness a sad transformation.




CHAPTER V.

KING WILLIAM'S WAR.


There lived at Quebec in the latter part of the seventeenth century
one Charles le Moyne, seigneur de Longueil, who is called by
Charlevoix the Baron de Becancourt; he was of Norman extraction, but
his sons were natives of New France. As was the custom with the French
noblesse each son adopted a surname derived from some portion of the
ancient family estate. At least five of Becancourt's sons were
prominent in the affairs of Acadia; they are known in history as
Menneval, Portneuf, Villebon, d'Iberville and des Isles.

In 1687 Menneval replaced Perrot as governor of Acadia, and as the
conduct of Perrot had given rise to grave dissatisfaction his
successor received elaborate instructions concerning his duties. He
was to rebuild the defences of Acadia, to resist the encroachments of
the English, to suppress the lawless trade of the Coureurs de bois, to
deal kindly and honestly with the savages, taking care to promote
their conversion to the Christian faith, and to restore to the crown
all seigniories and granted lands that had not been occupied or
improved.

The year that followed Menneval's appointment was notable for the
outbreak of the most dreadful Indian war in the annals of Acadia. All
the tribes east of the Merrimac took part in it, including the
Maliseets and Micmacs. This war is known in history as King William's
war, from the name of the English monarch in whose reign it occurred.
It lasted with little intermission for ten years, and during its
progress the settlers of eastern New England suffered the most fearful
outrages at the hands of the infuriated savages. Every settlement in
Maine save Wells, York, Kittery and the Isle of Shoals was over run,
and a thousand white people killed or taken prisoners.

As in the case of other wars which the Indians have waged with the
whites, the latter were responsible for its origin. About twelve years
before it broke out, Major Waldron treacherously seized a band of
Indians at Dover in New Hampshire and sent them to Boston, where
several of them were hanged for alleged complicity in Philip's war[5]
and others sold into slavery. This despicable act the Indians never
forgot nor forgave.

    [5] This war broke out in 1675 and was confined chiefly to the
        tribes of Massachusetts. It was of short duration; the Indian
        Sagamore Philip was slain.

The immediate cause of King William's war, however, was the ill
considered act of Governor Andros of pillaging the trading post of
Baron de St. Castin, at Penobscot. St. Castin had formerly served in
the Carignan Salieres regiment under Frontenac, but for twenty years
had lived in this region, where he had married a daughter of the
Maliseet chieftain Madockawando and was highly esteemed by the
savages.

It was at the instigation of St. Castin and Madockawando that the
Indians determined to take the war path. The first notable incident of
the war was the destruction of Dover, where Major Waldron and
twenty-two others were killed and twenty-nine taken prisoners. This
occurred in June, 1689, and the story of the affair, as told by the
St. John river Indians to their English captive, John Gyles, is in
substance as follows:--

There was a truce with the Indians for some days, during which time
two squaws came into the garrison. They told Major Waldron that a
number of Indians were not far away with a considerable quantity of
beaver and would be there to trade with him the next day. The weather
was inclement and the women begged leave to lodge in the garrison.
Some of the people were much opposed to this, but the major said: "Let
the poor creatures lodge by the fire." The defences of the place were
of the weakest kind, the gates had no locks but were fastened with
pins and the garrison kept no watch. The squaws had a favorable
opportunity to prosecute their design. They went into every apartment
observing the number in each, and when all the people were asleep
arose and opened the gates, gave the signal agreed upon and the other
Indians came to them and, having received an account of the state of
the garrison, they divided their forces according to the number of the
people in each apartment and soon took or killed them all. Major
Waldron lodged within an inner room and when the Indians broke in upon
him he cried out: "What now! What now!" and jumping out of his bed
seized his sword and drove them before him through two or three doors,
but upon his turning about towards the apartment he had just left, an
Indian came up behind him and knocked him on the head with his
hatchet, which stunned him and he fell. They then seized him, dragged
him out, and setting him up on a long table in his hall, bade him
"judge Indians again." Then they cut and stabbed him and he cried out
"O Lord! O Lord!" They called for his book of accounts and ordered him
to cross out all the Indian debts, he having traded much with them.
Then one and another gashed his naked breast, saying in derision: "I
cross out my account." Then cutting a joint from a finger, one would
say: "Will your fist weigh a pound now?" This in allusion to his
having sometimes used his fist as a pound weight in buying and
selling. And so they proceeded to torture him to death with every
refinement of savage cruelty, after which they burned the garrison
post and drew off.

A few days after this tragic event a number of people were killed by
the Indians at Saco, and in the month of August the important post at
Pemaquid, midway between the Kennebec and Penobscot rivers, was taken
and the adjoining settlement destroyed. According to Charlevoix a
large number of St. John river Indians participated in this exploit.
Among their prisoners was a lad named Gyles whose experience during
the nine years he lived in captivity on the St. John river is told in
his very interesting narrative published in Boston in 1736. We shall
have more to say about Gyles and his narrative further on, but it may
be observed in passing that we are greatly indebted to him for the
knowledge we possess of the life of the Indians of the River St. John
two centuries ago. As Doctor Hannay well observes: "By the light of
such a narrative we are able to perceive how wretched was the lot of
an Acadian Indian, even during the period when his very name carried
terror to the hearts of the settlers of Maine and New Hampshire.
Modern civilization may have degraded him in some respects but it has
at least rescued him from the danger of starvation and also from the
cruel necessity of abandoning his kindred to perish when unable longer
to supply their own wants or endure the constant journeys necessitated
by the nature of their nomad life."

Early in 1690 Count Frontenac dispatched an expedition from Quebec
to ravage the New England settlements; their leader was Portneuf,
brother of Menneval and Villebon. There were fifty French and
seventy Indians in the original party, which was afterwards joined by
thirty-six French and a large band of Maliseets from the St. John,
also by the Indians of Passamaquoddy and Penobscot, making a war
party of five hundred men. On the 26th of May they attacked the town
of Falmouth--now Portland. The inhabitants fled for protection
within the ramparts of Fort Loyal. At the expiration of four or five
days the garrison was obliged to surrender and Portneuf promised the
vanquished quarter and a guard to the nearest English town. The
terms of surrender were shamefully violated, Fort Loyal and Falmouth
were reduced to ashes and over one hundred men, women and children
murdered by the savages. From May to October their bodes lay
exposed to the elements and wild beasts but were finally buried by
Major Benjamin Church as he passed on an expedition to the eastward.

To revenge themselves on the French, whom they regarded as the
instigators of this savage warfare, the New Englanders fitted out an
expedition under Sir William Phips which captured Port Royal and
carried Menneval, the governor, away a prisoner. His brother Villebon,
who suceeded to the command, concluded to abandon Port Royal and to
re-establish the post at the mouth of the Jemseg on the River St.
John.

Villebon, with all his faults, is one of the most picturesque
characters in the history of Acadia. He was greatly admired by the
savages who deemed him to be every inch a chief. Diereville, the poet
historian, saw him at St. John in 1700 and describes him as "a great
man of fine appearance and full of energy." Having served for several
years in a subordinate capacity at Port Royal he was now called upon
to fill a difficult position and it must be confessed he acted with
zeal and ability. Adverse fortune embittered him at the outset. Two
pirate vessels came to Port Royal while he was absent preparing for
his removal to the St. John river. These marauders burned the houses
and killed the cattle; they even hanged two of the inhabitants and
burned a woman and her children in her own dwelling. What was still
worse for Villebon they captured the ship Union, just arrived from
France with merchandize, provisions, ammunition and presents for the
savages.

Villebon was well fitted for such an emergency as this; he assembled
his dusky allies, explained the loss of their presents and offered
himself to go to their great father, the King of France, for more. The
Indians pledged their fidelity and promised him one hundred and fifty
warriors the next spring to aid him in his designs against the
English.

At the court of France Villebon was favorably received and returned
with a commission from the king to command in Acadia. Soon after he
abandoned the Jemseg Fort and moved up the river to the mouth of the
Nashwaak where in the upper angle formed by the junction of that river
with the St. John he built in 1692 a new fort which he called Fort St.
Joseph. It was an ordinary palisaded fort about 120 feet square, with
four bastions, and had eight cannon mounted. In the old French
documents of the period it is usually called Fort Nachouac, with many
varieties of spelling, such as Naxoat, Naxouac, Natchouak, etc. The
older French maps place the fort on the south, or Fredericton side of
the river, but there can be no doubt as to its proper location in the
upper angle formed by the junction of the River Nashwaak with the St.
John. The greater portion of the site has been washed away, but traces
of the ramparts were visible within the memory of those yet living and
many cannon balls and other relics have been found in the vicinity.

Villebon had now been some years in Acadia, for Bishop St. Vallier
says that he was in command of the garrison at Port Royal at the time
of his visit there in 1686. He had ample opportunity of becoming
familiar with the country and its native inhabitants, and was in this
way fitted to second the ambitious designs of the French, which
embraced the destruction of New York and the conquest of New England.

When Count Frontenac came out to Quebec in 1689, to fill for the
second time the position of Governor and Commander-in-Chief of New
France, he was in his seventieth year, yet his old time vigor and
determination were unabated. It was part of his plan to avail himself
of the hostility of the savages to wear down and discourage the
English settlers and so to pave the way for French supremacy. He had
no abler lieutenants in the work he had undertaken than the sons of
Charles le Moyne, of whom Villebon, Portneuf and d'Iberville were
particularly conspicuous in the Indian wars. Immediately after his
arrival, Frontenac encouraged the savages to begin those operations
against the English settlements known in the history of New England as
the "winter raids." Montague Chamberlain tersely describes the
situation thus: "Frontenac decided that he could only succeed in
holding Canada for the French crown by enlisting the aid of the
savages, and to secure that aid he must permit them to make war in
their own savage way, and so from all the doomed hamlets came the same
horrifying tale--houses burned, men, women and children slaughtered or
carried into captivity."

It is difficult at this distant day to conceive the horrors of the
savage warfare that prevailed at this time on the New England
frontiers. The Indians roamed over the country like wolves, and the
white settlers never knew when their appalling war whoop would ring in
their startled ears. It was an age of cruelty and the outrages
perpetrated provoked reprisals on the part of the New Englanders. The
close alliance between the Indians and the French, and the fact that
in several of the raids the savages were led by French officers, led
to a bitter race hatred and mutual distrust between the descendants of
the Saxon and the Gaul, which lasted for generations.

In the course of the desultory warfare that followed the destruction
of Falmouth, more than 200 houses were burned in various parts of the
country, and Frontenac himself speaks of the ravages of the savages as
"impossible to describe." On the 5th February, 1692, they raided the
frontier settlement of York, which they left in ashes after killing
about seventy-five persons and taking 100 prisoners--among those
killed was the venerable Mr. Dummer, the minister of the place.

With the opening of the spring time Villebon received a delegation of
100 warriors of the Kennebec and Penobscot tribes at his fort. The
visitors were welcomed with imposing ceremonies; there was the usual
interchange of compliments and speeches by the chiefs and captains,
presents from the king were distributed and the inevitable banquet
followed with its mirth and revelry. It was agreed at this conference
to organize a great war party. Couriers were dispatched to summon all
the tribes of Acadia and the response was general. The site of what is
now the village of Gibson, opposite Fredericton, was dotted with the
encampments of the Indians, and as the warriors arrived and departed,
arrayed in their war paint and feathers, the scene was animated and
picturesque. The Maliseets of the St. John sent their delegation from
Medoctec, the Micmacs of the Miramichi arrived a few days later, and
then came another band of Micmacs from Beaubassin (or Chignecto),
accompanied by Father Baudoin, their priest. Speeches of welcome,
presents and feasts were made in turn to all, and each band proceeded
by the old and well known route[6] to the rendezvous on the Penobscot,
near Oldtown (Maine.) Here there gathered a war party of at least 400
men, including a score of Frenchmen. Their first attack was made on
the little village of Wells, where there were only some thirty men to
resist the attack, but they were led by Captain Converse, a very
courageous and determined officer, who had already tried the mettle of
the savages and who was not to be overawed even by overwhelming
numbers. The attacking party advanced with hideous yells, firing and
calling on the English to surrender, but the bullets of the defenders
was the only answer they received. Even the women of the settlement
took part in the fight, passing ammunition to the men, loading their
guns, and sometimes themselves firing on the enemy.

    [6] The route was up the St. John to the Medoctec village, thence by
        Eel river and the chain of lakes to the Mattawamkeag and down
        that river to the Penobscot.

The savages became discouraged and offered favorable terms to the
garrison, Converse replied: "We want nothing but men to fight with."
An Indian, who could speak English, shouted, "Don't stay in the house
like a squaw, come out and fight like a man!" Converse replied: "Do
you think I am fool enough to come out with thirty men to fight five
hundred?" The Indians at length abandoned the attack and retired
greatly crest fallen. Thus a few determined men foiled one of the most
formidable bands that ever took the war path in Acadia.

Same of the horrors of Indian warfare almost pass description and if
Villebon did not sanction he at least did little to hinder the
atrocities of his savage allies. He writes in his journal, "An English
savage was taken on the lower part of the St. John river; I gave him
to our savages to be burned, which they did the next day; one could
add nothing to the torments that they made him suffer."

From time to time the Indians appear to have grown weary of fighting.
Their failure at Wells, the rebuilding of Fort Pemaquid and the
erection of other fortifications by the now thoroughly aroused New
Englanders, the desire for the ransom of relatives held by the enemy
as hostages, and a suspicion that the French were making use of them
in their own interest inclined them to make peace with the English.
Villebon was obliged to exert all his influence to keep them on the
war path. He flattered and feasted the chiefs, made presents to the
warriors, provided powder and shot for their hunting and finally
adopted Taxous, one of their most famous chiefs, as his brother and to
honor the occasion gave him his own best coat.

The journals and correspondence of Villebon are full of interest to
the student of affairs on the St. John. At this time there came
annually to St. John harbor--then known by its Indian name,
Menagoesche--a French man of war with supplies for Fort Nachouac and a
variety of articles for the Indians. An inventory now in the Boston
Public Library, dated 1693, shows that in that year the frigate
"Suzanne" brought out for the "Malecites" a supply of powder, lead,
guns, bayonets; also shirts, blankets, laced hats, etc. The arrival of
the annual warships was eagerly looked for by the Indians and Villebon
was able to make good use of the articles he received. The reference
made by John Gyles in his narrative to the arrival of the ships from
France is of interest. "There came annually," he says, "one or two men
of war to supply the fort which was on the river about 34 leagues from
the sea. The Indians (of Medoctec) having advice of the arrival of a
man of war at the mouth of the river, they about forty in number went
on board, for the gentlemen from France made a present to them every
year, and set forth the riches and victories of their monarch, etc. At
this time they presented the Indians with a bag or two of flour with
some prunes as ingredients for a feast.

"I, who was dressed up in an old greasy blanket without cap, hat or
shirt, (for I had no shirt for six years, except the one I had on at
the time I was made prisoner) was invited into the great cabin, where
many well-rigged gentlemen were sitting, who would fain have had a
full view of me. I endeavored to hide myself behind the hangings, for
I was much ashamed, thinking how I had once worn clothes and of my
living with people who could rig as well as the best of them.... This
was the first time I had seen the sea during my captivity, and the
first time I had tasted salt or bread. My master presently went on
shore and a few days later all the Indians went up the river."

In connection with Villebon's endeavors to keep the savages loyal to
the king of France there are items in the accounts transmitted by him
to the French minister that are quite interesting and suggestive, as
for example the following:

"To the wife of Nadanouil, a savage, for making two pairs of snowshoes
for the King, tobacco 2 lbs."

"Jan., 1696. To 2 savages come from the river of Medoctic to bring
some letters of Father Simon to Mon. de Villebon, flour, 12 lbs.;
tobacco, 8 oz.

"July 10, 1696. M. Thury, missionary, having arrived with Taxous,
chief of the Canibas and other savages from Pentagouet; brandy, 1
gallon; tobacco, 2 lbs."

The garrison at Fort Nashwaak was always small, comprising only about
forty soldiers besides an armorer, gunner and surgeon. There was also
a chaplain of the Recollet order, Father Elizee, who is described as a
man so retiring by nature as to meddle with nothing outside his
ministerial duty. This was not the case with the other missionary
priests, however, who influenced by patriotic motives and encouraged
by the French authorities took quite an energetic part in helping on
the warfare against New England. The French owed much of the aid
afforded their cause, including the co-operation of their Indian
allies, to the zeal of the missionaries settled on the different
rivers, Ralle on the Kennebec, Thury on the Penobscot and Simon on the
St. John. The only woman who lived within the ramparts of Fort
Nashwaak seems to have been the wife of the armorer. She was deemed
one of the garrison and received her daily allowance with the rest.

In spite of Villebon's energy and ability and of his zeal in the
service of his country very serious complaints were made against him
by some of the French people living on the St. John river. They
asserted that his threats and ill usage had caused several of the
settlers to abandon their habitations and remove to Quebec with their
families; that he tried to monopolize the fur trade, sending his
brothers Portneuf and des Isles into the woods to engage in unlawful
traffic with the Indians; that the former was guilty of gross
immorality and the latter traded the peltry obtained from the savages
with one John Alden, an Englishman, by whom it was carried to Boston.
This John Alden was, by the way, the eldest son of the famous John
Alden of the "Mayflower," the Plymouth magistrate, by his wife
Priscilla, the Puritan maiden immortalized by Longfellow. He made many
trading voyages to the Bay of Fundy and on several occasions narrowly
escaped capture by the French.

That there was some ground for the charges preferred against Villebon
seems likely from the fact that most of the missionaries censured him
and confirmed the reports of the inhabitants concerning the misconduct
of his brothers. The chaplain at Fort Nachouac, however, spoke
favorably of Villebon, although he was silent with regard to Portneuf.
In his letters to the authorities in France, Villebon vigorously
replies to his accusers and brings counter charges; he is seemingly
very indignant with the d'Amour brothers of whom we shall hear more in
another chapter.

In consequence of the charges preferred against him Portneuf was
superseded by Villieu, an officer of reputation whom Count Frontenac
sent to Acadia in October, 1693, to lead the savages against the
English. This new lieutenant spent the winter at the Nashwaak fort and
as soon as the ice was out of the river went in a canoe to Medoctec,
where he assembled the chiefs who promised to assist him. He then
proceeded to Penobscot resolved to put an end, if possible, to the
parleys that the savages had been holding with the English and to
incite them to renew the war. After a week's negotiation, in which he
was aided by the powerful influence of the missionaries Bigot and
Thury, he returned to Fort Nachouac with a delegation of the Indians
to receive the presents which the King of France had sent to them, and
at the same time to secure the assistance of some of Governor
Villebon's soldiers. The governor, however, piqued by the dismissal of
Portneuf, contented himself with entertaining the delegates. He
declined to furnish provisions or supplies, and kept his soldiers from
joining the expedition. Father Simon, the Recollet missionary on the
St. John, also displayed little sympathy with Villieu and kept many of
the Indians from joining him. However, with the help of the Penobscot
and Kennebec tribes a band of 250 warriors was at last collected and
Villieu placed himself at their head arrayed in the war paint and
feathers of an Indian chief. It was decided to strike a blow at the
settlement of Oyster River, twelve miles from Portsmouth, New
Hampshire. The English settlers, having been informed that peace had
been made with the Indians and that they could now work with safety on
their farms, were totally unprepared for an attack. Among their
unprotected houses the carnage was horrible. One hundred persons,
chiefly women and children, half naked from their beds, were
tomahawked, shot, or killed by slower and more cruel methods, twenty
seven were kept as prisoners.

After engaging in some minor depredations Villieu proceeded to
Montreal accompanied by several of the chiefs where they presented a
string of English scalps to Count Frontenac as a token of their
success and received his hearty congratulations. Villieu thus summed
up the results of the campaign: "Two small forts and fifty or sixty
houses captured and burnt, and one hundred and thirty English killed
or made prisoners." He had done his work all too well and had sown
such seeds of distrust between the English and the Indians as to
render it almost impossible to re-establish peace between them. The
enmity lasted for generations and almost every year witnessed some act
of hostility even though the crowns of France and England were
themselves at peace.

In the midst of their triumphs an appalling pestilence swept away
great numbers of the Indians. On the River St. John more than one
hundred and twenty persons died, including some of the most noted
warriors and their chief. The pestilence scattered the savages in all
directions and for a time their town of Medoctec was abandoned. A
party of warriors who went with Montigny, an officer of Villebon's
garrison, to assist their brethren to the westward was sent back to
Medoctec on account of the contagion that had broken out among them.
The nature of the disease it is impossible at this distance of time to
determine. It could scarcely have been smallpox, according to the
description of John Gyles, who says: "A person seeming in perfect
health would bleed at the mouth and nose, turn blue in spots and die
in two or three hours." The first outbreak of the pestilence was in
the autumn of 1694. A year later Mon. Tibierge, agent of the company
of Acadia, writes that "the plague (la maladie) had broken out afresh:
there had died on the river more than 120 persons of every age and
sex."

The pestilence, however, did not put a stop to the Indian warfare.
In June, 1695, Villebon assembled at his fort a general representation
of the tribes of Acadia, including fourteen chiefs and their
attendants; the conference lasted three days and the proceedings are
reported at length in his journal. After the customary feasting
and distribution of presents a standard of prices for the purchase and
sale of goods was agreed upon more favorable to the natives than
heretofore. The chiefs departed firmly resolved to continue the war
against the English. Their opportunity did not come until the
following summer when a combined effort on the part of the French
and Indians resulted in the destruction of Fort William Henry at
Pemaquid. This fortification had just been rebuilt by the colony of
Massachusetts at a cost of £20,000 and was the strongest work the
English colonists had up to that time erected in America. The walls
had a compass in all of 747 feet and were of solid masonry, varying
from 10 to 22 feet in height. Eight feet from the ground, where the
walls had a thickness of six feet, there was a tier of 28 port
holes. At one corner was a round tower 29 feet high. The fort was
well manned and provisioned and was thought to be impregnable.

The leader of the enterprise, which resulted in the destruction of
Fort William Henry, was Villebon's brother d'Iberville, whose romantic
career has earned for him the description of "the Cid of New France."
D'Iberville's Indian auxiliaries included Micmacs from Cape Breton, a
large band of Maliseets and many of their kindred of Passamaquoddy,
Penobscot and Kennebec. Two warships lately arrived from Quebec,
accompanied the expedition.

Villebon left his fort on the 18th June to go to "Menagoesche" to
await the coming of the French ships. On his arrival there he
discovered the British ships Sorlings of 34 guns and Newport of 24
guns cruising near the harbor and sent information to d'Iberville in
order that he might guard against surprise. Soon after entering the
Bay of Fundy the French vessels sighted their antagonists and an
engagement ensued in the course of which d'Iberville in the Envieux
dismasted the smaller English vessel, the Newport, and obliged her to
surrender. Favored by night and fog the Sorlings managed to escape
after a combat with the Profond lasting three hours. The next day,
July 15, 1696, the vessels put into St. John harbor, where they were
welcomed by Villebon and Father Simon and a band of Indians. Before
proceeding to the attack of Pemaquid an attempt was made to capture
John Alden at Port Royal but with his usual good luck he sailed thence
just before the arrival of the French. Villebon with Father Simon's
assistance contrived to collect 150 Indians--Maliseets and Micmacs--to
join the expedition under his brother, which was further reinforced by
a small vessel owned and commanded by the Sieur de Chauffours, an
inhabitant of the St. John river.

The start of the expedition was not a very auspicious one, for on
leaving the harbor of St. John (or "havre de Menuagoesche," as
Villebon calls it) at 2 o'clock on the afternoon of the 2nd of August,
d'Iberville ran the Envieux upon a reef; however, the damage was not
serious as the ship floated when the tide rose. At Penobscot Baron St.
Castin joined the expedition with 130 Indians. The French priests
Simon and Thury, as the event proved, were no mere figure heads; they
actively assisted in the operations of the siege and at the same time
restrained the passions of the savages. Batteries were erected within
half cannon shot of the fort and it was summoned to surrender. Captain
Chubb, the commander, proved to be a weak man for so responsible a
position. He at first replied that though the sea were covered with
French ships and the land with Indians he would not surrender unless
compelled to do so, but the very next day ignominiously pulled down
his flag. D'Iberville sent the garrison to Boston in the vessel
belonging to the Sieur de Chauffours which he had brought from the St.
John river. The people of New England were greatly vexed at the
destruction of Pemaquid and enraged at the cowardly conduct of its
commander. Father Simon got back to Fort Nachouac on the 29th August
bringing the news of d'Iberville's success.




CHAPTER VI.

NACHOUAC AND MENAGOUECHE.


It was now proposed by the French authorities to re-establish the
stronghold at the mouth of the St. John. The old fort of four bastions
so far remained that it could readily be restored; the ditches needed
to be deepened, the parapets to be raised and new palisades
constructed. It was thought that 150 men would suffice to garrison the
post as well as that at the Nashwaak. The fort was needed to protect
French privateers and French commerce. Many English vessels were
brought to Menagoueche at this time by the privateersmen Baptiste and
Guyon. The company of Acadia, with Tibierge as their agent, continued
to develop a thriving trade, and it seems, too, that the forest wealth
of the country was beginning to attract attention for Villebon, a year
or two later, sent home to France a mast, as a specimen, 82 feet long,
31 inches in diameter at one end and 21 at the other.

The French privateers were not allowed to ply their vocation with
impunity, they often had spirited encounters with the British ships in
which there were losses on both sides.

In 1694 one Robineau of Nantes, who had taken several English vessels,
was forced to burn his ship in St. John harbor, in order to escape
capture by an English ship, and to defend himself on shore. The
vessels employed as privateers evidently were small, for they
sometimes went up the river to Villebon's fort. The prisoners taken
were kept at the fort or put in charge of the French inhabitants
living on the river, and from time to time ransomed by their friends
or exchanged for French prisoners taken by the English. Villebon
informs us that in June, 1695, an English frigate and a sloop arrived
at Menagoueche (St. John) on business connected with the ransom of
eight captives who were then in the hands of the French. Messages were
exchanged with Nachouac and the captain of the English ship, a jovial
old tar, expressed a wish to meet Governor Villebon and "drink with
him" and to see Captain Baptiste, whom he called a brave man, but his
overtures were declined.

The ships Envieux and Profond, before proceeding to the attack of Fort
Pemaquid, had landed at St. John a number of cannon and materials of
all sorts to be used in the construction of the new fort. This project
was not viewed with complacency by the people of New England, and
Lieut.-Governor William Stoughton, of Massachusetts, thus explains the
line of action proposed against the French in a communication
addressed to Major Benjamin Church, the old Indian fighter, who had
been sent from Boston in August, 1696, on an expedition against the
settlements of Acadia: "Sir, His Majesty's ship Orford having lately
surprised a French shallop with 23 of the soldiers belonging to the
fort (at Nashwaak) upon St. John's river in Nova Scotia, together with
Villieu, their captain, providence seems to encourage the forming of
an expedition to attack that fort, and to disrest and remove the enemy
from that post, which is the chief source from whence the most of our
disasters do issue, and also to favor with an opportunity for gaining
out of their hands the ordnance, artillery, and other warlike stores
and provisions lately supplied to them from France for erecting a new
fort near the river's mouth, whereby they will be greatly strengthened
and the reducing of them rendered more difficult."

Before the order from which the above extract is quoted was placed in
Major Church's hands he had arrived at St. John, having previously
devastated the French settlements at Chignecto. Being desirous, if
possible, to surprise the men engaged upon the new fort Church landed
at Manawagonish Cove, a little to the west of the harbor; what
followed we shall let him tell in his own quaint fashion. "Next
morning early the Major, with his forces, landed to see what discovery
they could make, travelled across the woods to the old fort or falls
at the mouth of St. John's river, keeping themselves undiscovered from
the enemy. Finding that there were several men at work, and having
informed themselves as much as they could, returned back (the enemy
being on the other side of the river could not come at them). But
night coming on and dark wet weather with bad travelling, were obliged
to stop in the woods till towards next day morning and then went on
board. Soon after the Major ordered all the vessels to come to sail
and go into the mouth of the river, the French firing briskly at them,
but did them no harm, and running fiercely upon the enemy they soon
fled to the woods. The Major ordered a brisk party to run across a
neck to cut them off from their canoes[7] which the day before they
had made a discovery of. So the commander, with the rest, ran directly
towards the new fort they were building, not knowing but they had some
ordnance mounted. The enemy running directly to their canoes were met
by our forces who fired at them, and killed one and wounded Corporal
Canton, who was taken. The rest threw down what they had and ran into
the woods. The prisoner Canton being brought to the Major told him if
he would let his surgeon dress his wound and cure him he would be
serviceable to him as long as he lived. So being dressed he was
examined and gave the Major an account of the twelve great guns which
were hid in the beach, below high water mark--the carriages, shot, and
wheelbarrows, some flour and pork all hid in the woods.

    [7] These canoes were probably lying in the cove at Indiantown just
        above the falls.

"The next morning the officers being all ordered to meet together to
consult about going to Vilboon's fort, and none amongst them being
acquainted but the Aldens, who said the water in the river was very
low so that they could not get up to the fort; and the prisoner Canton
told the commander that what the Aldens said was true * * so concluded
it was not practicable to proceed. Then ordered some of the forces to
get the great guns on board the open sloops and the rest to range the
woods for the enemy, who took one prisoner and brought him in. * * Now
having with a great deal of pains and trouble got all the guns, shot,
and other stores aboard intended on our design which we came out first
for. But the wind not serving, the commander sent out his scouts into
the woods to seek for the enemy. And four of our Indians coming upon
three Frenchmen undiscovered concluded that if the French should
discover them they would fire at them and might kill one or more of
them, which to prevent fired at the French, killed one and took the
other two prisoners. And it happened that he who was killed was
Shavelere (Chevalier), the chief man there."

Major Church's design was to make a raid on the settlement of Baron
St. Castin and his Indians at Penobscot by way of retaliation for the
destruction of Fort William Henry at Pemaquid, but as he was sailing
down the bay he met a small squadron having on board a reinforcement
of 100 men under Colonel Hawthorne. The command now passed to
Hawthorne as the senior officer, and it was decided to attempt the
capture of Fort Nachouac. This was against the advice of Major Church,
but as the expedition now numbered about 500 men, Hawthorne was
unwilling to return to Boston without striking a blow at the chief
stronghold of the French in Acadia.

Villebon was on the alert: he had stationed his ensign, Chevalier,
with five scouts at the mouth of the river and on the 4th of October
he learned of the presence of the English at Menagoueche. Chevalier
was at first alarmed by the appearance of Church's ships off Partridge
Island, and sent word directly to Fort Nachouac; a day or two later he
was killed by some of Church's Indians as already related. Villebon
sent his brother Neuvillette down the river to continue the look out
and in the meantime made every possible preparation for a siege. His
garrison, numbering about 100 soldiers, was busily employed in
throwing up new intrenchments and mounting additional guns, word was
sent to the French inhabitants of the vicinity to repair to the fort
and assist in its defence, and Villebon, on the 11th October, sent an
urgent message to Father Simon, the missionary at Medoctec, to get the
Indians to come down as soon as possible if they wished to fight the
English. He lost not a moment and having sent out word on all sides
(the Indians being then dispersed upon the river) he arrived the
afternoon of the 14th, with thirty-six warriors and expressed his
desire to remain at the fort as the chaplain was absent. Two days
later Neuvillette returned to the fort and reported that he had seen
the enemy in great force about a league and a half below the Jemseg.
The last preparations were now hurriedly made and on the evening of
the 17th, Villebon caused the "generale" (or assembly) to be beat and
all the garrison being drawn up under arms he addressed them in
stirring words, bidding them to maintain the honor of their country
and the reputation of French soldiers, adding that if any should be
maimed in the approaching combat the king would provide for him during
the rest of his life. This speech created the greatest enthusiasm and
the cry of "Vive le roy" awoke the forest echoes and was borne over
the waters. The same evening a dozen Frenchmen who lived in the
vicinity arrived at the fort. Among them were the brothers Mathieu and
Rene d'Amours and the privateersman Baptiste. Villebon assigned to
Baptiste and Rene d'Amours the duty of heading the Indians and
opposing the landing of the English.

The sketch on the next page, based upon a plan in the archives de la
Marine, Paris[8] will serve to give an idea of the general character
of Fort Nachouac. The space of ground enclosed by the palisade was
about 125 feet square; the site, as already stated, lay in the upper
angle formed by the junction of the Nashwaak with the river St. John,
nearly opposite the Cathedral in Fredericton. The general arrangement
of the buildings is shown in the plan. At the rear of the enclosure is
the commandant's lodging, on the right hand side the guard house and
on the left the soldiers' barracks; at the front is the gate and in
the lower left hand corner the bake oven; cannons were placed at each
corner. A small room in the left end of the commandant's lodging was
fitted up as a chapel. The ditches and ramparts that surrounded the
enclosure added considerably to the strength of the position. The
bastions were so arranged that the space outside the walls was
entirely commanded by the musketry fire of the defenders. The
loopholes at the corners from which the fire was delivered are shown
in the sketch.

    [8] The author is indebted to Dr. W. F. Ganong for his kindness in
        furnishing the sketch from which the accompanying plan of
        illustration has been made. It is not, of course, a copy of
        the original, but gives an idea of the general character of
        the fortification.

[Illustration: FORT NACHOUAC, A. D. 1696.]

Everything being now in order for the defence of his fort Villebon
ordered the garrison to pass the night under arms, as from the barking
of the dogs it was believed the enemy was drawing near. The next
morning between eight and nine o'clock, whilst Father Simon was
celebrating mass in the chapel, a shallop filled with armed men
rounded the point below, followed by two others. The alarm was at once
given and every man repaired to his post. The sloops approached within
the distance of half a cannon shot when the guns of the fort opened on
them and they were forced to retire below the point where they
effected a landing. Villebon did not deem it prudent to oppose the
landing as his men would have had to cross the Nashwaak river to do so
and this would have been very imprudent. The English took up a
position on the south side of the Nashwaak stream and threw up an
earthwork upon which they placed two field guns from which they opened
fire on the fort; a third gun of larger size was mounted soon
afterwards nearer the fort, but not being sheltered it was not much
used. The beseigers hoisted the royal standard of England and there
were cheers and counter-cheers on the part of the combatants. The
cannon fire was heavy on both sides but the guns of the fort being
better mounted and well served had rather the advantage. There was
also a sharp exchange of musketry fire, the St. John river Indians,
from the bushes along the shore, engaging in a vicious fight with
Church's Indians on the opposite side of the stream. When darkness
ended the day's struggle the English had made little or no progress.
The following night being very cold they made fires to keep themselves
from freezing, but this afforded a sure mark for the French cannon,
which opened on them with grape shot, and they were obliged to put
them out and suffer the inclemency of the weather. Major Church's men
being almost bare of clothing from their long service, suffered
extremely and were ill disposed to continue the siege. At daybreak the
musketry fire from the fort recommenced and about 8 o'clock the
English again got their guns into operation, but la Cote, who had
distinguished himself the evening before by firing rapidly and
accurately, dismounted one of their field guns and silenced the
other.

It was now apparent that the fort could not be taken without a regular
investment and in view of the lateness of the season this was not
deemed advisable. The Massachusetts historian Mather quaintly
observes, "The difficulty of the cold season so discouraged our men
that after some few shot the enterprize found itself under too much
congelation to proceed any further." And so the following night
the New England troops re-embarked after lighting fires over a
considerable extent of ground in order to deceive the French. When the
morning dawned their camp was deserted and soon after Neuvillette,
who had been sent down the river to reconnoitre, reported that after
he had gone three leagues he found them embarked in four vessels
of about 60 tons and going down the river with a fair wind. On
their return towards the mouth of the river the invaders burned the
house and barns of Mathieu d'Amours at Freneuse, opposite the
Oromocto, and laid waste his fields. The sieur de Freneuse was
himself so much injured by exposure during the siege that he died
shortly afterwards. Major Church took back with him to Boston a
Negro man of Marblehead, who had been taken prisoner by the French
and kept amongst them for some time. He was probably the first of
his race to set foot within the borders of New Brunswick.

In the siege of his fort Villebon lost only one man killed and two
wounded while the English loss is said to have been eight soldiers
killed and five officers and twelve soldiers wounded.

The effect of the capture of Pemaquid by d'Iberville and the
repulse of the English by Villebon greatly encouraged the savages of
Acadia in their hostility and the following summer another raid on
the English settlements was planned. A large number of Micmacs came
from the eastward, some of them from the Basin of Minas, with St.
Cosme, their priest, at their head. They were entertained by
Villebon, furnished with ammunition and supplies and sent on to the
rendezvous at Penobscot. Father Simon and 72 Maliseets were sent in
the same direction soon afterwards with instructions to pick up the
Passamaquoddies on their way; they departed in high spirits with
the intention of giving no quarter to the enemy and Villebon
encouraged their animosity, exhorting them "to burn and to destroy."
This advice they followed to the letter for the Governor wrote in
his journal shortly afterwards, "the missionary, M. de Thury,
confirms the report I already had received of four small parties of
our Indians having killed fifteen or sixteen English and burnt one of
them alive on account of one of their chiefs being slain." The
vindictiveness of the Indians is further illustrated by an incident
that happened at the Medoctic village in the time of King William's
war, in which John Gyles and James Alexander, two English captives,
were cruelly abused. A party of Indians from Cape Sable, having
had some of their relatives killed by English fishermen, travelled
all the way to Medoctec in order to wreak their vengeance upon any
English captives they might find. They rushed upon their unfortunate
victims like bears bereaved of their whelps, saying, "Shall we, who
have lost our relations by the English, suffer an English voice to be
heard among us?" The two captives were brutally beaten and ill used
and made to go through a variety of performances for the amusement of
their tormenters. Gyles says: "They put a tomahawk into my hands
and ordered me to get up, sing and dance Indian, which I performed
with the greatest reluctance and while in the act seemed determined to
purchase my death by killing two or three of these monsters of
cruelty, thinking it impossible to survive the bloody treatment....
Not one of them showed the least compassion, but I saw the tears run
down plentifully on the cheeks of a Frenchman who sat behind." The
tortures were continued until the evening of what Gyles might well
call "a very tedious day." Finally a couple of Indians threw the
two wretched men out of the big wigwam, where they had been
tormented; they crawled away on their hands and knees and were
scarcely able to walk for several days.

The experience of Gyles was, however, nothing in comparison with that
of his brother and another captive taken by the Indians at the same
time as himself. This unfortunate pair attempted to desert, but failed
and were subjected to the most horrible tortures and finally burned
alive by the savages.

The people of the frontier settlements were now so on the alert that,
although the Indians roamed over the country like wolves, they were
usually prepared to meet them. Every little village had its block
house and sentinels, and every farmer worked in his fields with his
musket at his side. Nevertheless tragic events occasionally happened.
In February, 1698, Captain Chubb, of Pemaquid notoriety, and six
others were killed by the Indians at Andover, several of the
inhabitants were captured and many houses burned; Major Frost was
slain at Kittery and a number of people at Wells; Major Marsh had a
sharp fight near Pemaquid, in which he lost twenty-five of his men,
but succeeded in putting the savages to rout. This was the last blood
shed during King William's war. The Indians were becoming weary of
fighting and the peace of Ryswick deprived them of the open assistance
of their French allies. For a brief season peace reigned in Acadia.

The expedition under Church had interrupted the rebuilding of the fort
at St. John and shown the correctness of Villebon's prediction in a
letter written to the French minister in 1696 that it was impossible
with the few men at his disposal to attempt a work which, though easy
to repair could not be completed as quickly as the enemy could get
ready to destroy it. In the same letter he speaks of making plank near
Fort Nachouac for the madriens, or gun platforms, of the fort at
Menagoueche. As there were mills at this time at Port Royal, it would
be possible from this incident to frame a theory that Villebon had a
saw mill a short distance up the Nashwaak, say at Marysville, but it
is more probable the planks were cut in saw pits by the soldiers of
the garrison. The plan of the fort at St. John was agreed on in 1698,
and 3,000 livres granted for its construction. Villebon paid his
workmen 30 sous (about 30 cts.) a day, his laborers 20 sous, and the
soldiers 4 sous a day over their pay and a weekly allowance of 1 qr.
lb. tobacco. The walls of the fort were laid in clay and mortar, 24
pounders were placed on the bastions and 36-pounders could be placed
there three on each bastion. By the end of the year Villebon was able
to report the fort in a condition to do honor to whoever should defend
it. He had left Nachouac just as it was, leaving only two men to see
that nothing was spoiled by the savages.

A plan in the Marine Archives at Paris, made by Villieu in 1700,
shows that "Fort de la Riviere de St. Jean," or Fort Menagoueche, was
built at "Old Fort Site," behind Navy Island in Carleton. The
general plan was the same as that of Fort Nachouac, but it was
considerably larger, nearly 200 feet square. Within the enclosure
were barracks for the soldiers, a residence for the governor with
small chapel adjoining it, a house for the officers of the garrison,
lodgings for the surgeon, gunner and armorer, a small prison and a
well, and just outside the gate were two bake-houses. The water
supply of the fort seems always to have been inadequate. The
sieur des Goutins, who disliked Villebon, complains in a letter of
23rd June, 1699, "the Governor keeps the water within the fort for
the exclusive use of his kitchen and his mare, others being obliged
to use snow-water, often very dirty." Diereville, who visited St. John
during his short stay in Acadia describes the fort as "built of
earth, with four bastions fraised (or picketed) each having six
large guns." A new industry was now coming into existence, namely
the shipping of masts to France for the King's navy; Diereville sailed
to France in the Avenant "a good King's ship," mounting 44 guns which
had brought out the ammunition and provisions that Placentia and the
Fort on the River St. John received annually. This ship took on board
a number of fine masts that 14 carpenters and mast makers in his
majesty's service had manufactured at the River St. John. The
vessel left Acadia on the 6th of October and reached France in 33
days.

The period of Governor Villebon's residence at St. John was of about
two years' duration. He died on the 5th July, 1700, and was buried
near the fort. The life of this devoted son of New France went out
with the century and with his death the seat of government of Acadia
was again transferred to Port Royal.

Brouillan now succeeded to the command. He found the fort at St. John
in good order, as was to be expected, it having been just rebuilt, but
in the opinion of the new governor it was of little use for the glory
of the King or for the preservation of the country. He condemned the
situation as being commanded on one side by an island at the distance
of a pistol shot, and on the other by a height at the distance only of
a hundred and odd fathoms (toises), and with a very insufficient water
supply. He therefore caused the fortifications to be razed, demolished
the houses, and carried away the guns and everything else of a
portable character to Port Royal. The inhabitants living on the River
St. John were left without protection and they seem almost without
exception to have removed, some to Quebec and others to Port Royal.
The valley of the St. John was thus left as deserted and desolate as
it had been previous to the arrival of Champlain. The Indian might
wander at will among the ruins of forts and dwellings abandoned to his
care, or left to be converted into hiding places for the wild beasts
and wonder at the folly of the white man who had forsaken the finest
river in all Acadia with its wealth of forest and stream and its
fertile lands awaiting the hands of industry and thrift.




CHAPTER VII.

THE BROTHERS D'AMOURS.


Among the young adventurers who came to Acadia towards the close of
the seventeenth century were four brothers, sons of Mathieu
d'Amours[9] of Quebec. The father's political influence as a member of
the Supreme Council enabled him to obtain for each of his sons an
extensive seigniory. That of Louis d'Amours, the eldest, included a
tract of land of generous proportions at the Richibucto river; the
grant was issued September 20, 1684, but the seignior had already
built there a fort and two small houses, and for two years had been
cultivating a piece of land. His sojourn was brief, for in a year or
two we find him living on the River St. John, where his brothers
Mathieu and Rene were settled and where they were not long after
joined by their brother Bernard.

    [9] This gentleman married in 1652 Marie, the eldest daughter of
        Nicolas Marselot of Quebec; she was a very youthful bride,
        being only 14 years old at the time of her marriage; she was
        the mother of 15 children.

As mentioned in a previous chapter, it was customary among the French
noblesse for each son to take a surname derived from some portion of
the family estate; accordingly the sons of Councillor d'Amours figure
in history as Louis d'Amours, sieur de Chauffours; Mathieu d'Amours,
sieur de Freneuse; Rene d'Amours, sieur de Clignancourt and Bernard
d'Amours, sieur de Plenne.

After his arrival at the River St. John, Louis d'Amours fixed his
abode on the banks of the Jemseg and became the proprietor of the
seigniory formerly owned by the sieur de Soulanges. His brother, and
nearest neighbor, Mathieu's seigniory included all the land "between
Gemisik and Nachouac," two leagues in depth on each side of the river.
The wives of Louis and Mathieu d'Amours were sisters, Marguerite and
Louise Guyon of Quebec.

To Rene d'Amours, sieur de Clignancourt, was granted a seigniory
extending from the Indian village of Medoctec to the "longue sault."
The longue sault was probably the Meductic rapids twelve miles below
the village of Medoctec, although it may have been the Grand Falls
eighty miles above. The sieur de Clignancourt fixed his headquarters a
few miles above Fredericton at or near Eccles Island, which was
formerly called "Cleoncore"--a corruption of Clignancourt. An old
census shows he lived in that vicinity in 1696, and this is confirmed
by a statement in an official report of the same year that he lived a
league from Fort Nachouac. Rene d'Amours had an extensive trade with
the Indians, he was unmarried and lived the life of a typical "coureur
de bois."

Bernard d'Amours, the youngest of the quartette, came to Acadia
rather later than his brothers and was granted a seigniory at
Canibecachice (Kennebecasis), a league and a half along each side of
the river and two leagues in depth.[10] He married Jeanne le Borgne,
and their son Alexander was baptized at Port Royal in 1702 by a
Recollet missionary.

   [10] The grants of Louis d'Amours at Richibucto, and of Mathieu and
        Rene on the St. John river are of the same date, September 20,
        1684; that of Bernard on the Kennebeccasis is dated June 20,
        1695.

The brothers d'Amours were in the prime of life when they came to
Acadia; the census of de Meulles taken in 1686 gives the age of Louis
as 32 years and that of Mathieu as 28. All the brothers engaged in
hunting and trading with the Indians and were in consequence disliked
by Governor Villebon, who viewed them with a jealous eye and mentions
them in unfavorable terms in his official dispatches. Villebon's
hostility was no doubt intensified by a representation made to the
French ministry in 1692 by Louis d'Amours that the Governor of Acadia,
to advance his own private fortune, engaged in trade, absolutely
prohibited by his majesty, both with the natives of the country and
with the people of New England.

Frontenac and Champigny at this time filled the offices respectively
of governor and intendant (or lieutenant governor) of New France, and
the king in his message to them, dated at Versailles June 14, 1695,
refers to matters on the River St. John in the following terms:

"His Majesty finds it necessary to speak on the subject of the grants
obtained by the Sieurs d'Amours, which comprehend an immense tract of
land along the River St. John. It is commonly reported that since they
have lived there they have not engaged in clearing and cultivating
their lands, that they have no cattle nor any other employment than
that of a miserable traffic exclusively with the savages; and as his
Majesty has been informed that the lands in those parts are the best
in the world, watered by large rivers and in a situation more
temperate and pleasant than other parts of Canada, the sieurs d'Amours
must be compelled to establish themselves upon a better footing; and
those people who are to have new grants of land are directed to this
part of Acadia where, as his Majesty is informed, the sieurs d'Amours
pretend to have exclusive possession of about thirty leagues of
country."

That the sentiments of this royal message were inspired by Villebon is
evident from the tenor of the letters he addresses to the French
ministry at this time. In one of these he says of the brothers
d'Amours: "They are four in number living on the St. John river. They
are given up to licentiousness and independence for the ten or twelve
years they have been here. They are disobedient and seditious and
require to be watched." In another communication he scornfully terms
them "the pretended gentry" (soi disant gentilhommes). Writing to the
French minister the next year he observes: "I have no more reason, my
lord, to be satisfied with the sieurs d'Amours than I previously had.
The one who has come from France has not pleased me more than the
other two. Their minds are wholly spoiled by long licentiousness and
the manners they have acquired among the Indians, and they must be
watched closely as I had the honor to state to you last year."

Fortunately for the reputation of the brothers d'Amours we have
evidence that places them in a more favorable light than does the
testimony of Governor Villebon. M. de Champigny, the intendant at
Quebec, wrote to the French minister. "The sons of the sieur d'Amours,
member of the supreme council at Quebec, who are settled on the River
St. John, apply themselves chiefly to cultivating their lands and
raising cattle.

"I sent you, my Lord, the census of their domain, which has been made
by Father Simon, the Recollet, who is missionary on the same river, in
which you may have every confidence, he being a very honest man. It is
very unfortunate, my lord, that any one should have informed you that
they lead a licentious life with the savages for I have reliable
testimony that their conduct is very good. It seems as if all who
live in that locality are in a state of discord; the inhabitants make
great complaints against the Sieurs de Villebon and des Goutins. Some
who have come to Quebec say they are constantly so harrassed and
oppressed that if things are not put upon a better footing they will
be compelled to abandon the country."

That the inhabitants living on the river were turning their attention
to agriculture is shown by a communication to Frontenac or Champigny
in 1696, in which the writer, probably Villieu, says: "I informed you
last year, Monsieur, by the memo that I did myself the honor to send
you, that the inhabitants of this river begin to cultivate their
lands. I have since learned that they have raised some grain. M. de
Chouffours, who had sown so considerably last year, has not received
anything in return, the worms having eaten the seed in the ground; M.
de Freneuse, his brother, has harvested about 15 hogsheads of wheat
and M. de Clignancourt very little; M. Bellefontaine, about 5
hogsheads; the Sieur Martel very little, as he has only begun to
cultivate his land during the last two years; the other inhabitants
nothing at all, unless it is a little Indian corn. The Sieurs
d'Amours, except the Sieur Clignancourt, have sown this year pretty
considerably of wheat and the Sieur Bellefontaine also, the Sieur
Martel some rye and wheat and much peas. The other inhabitants have
sown some Indian corn, which would have turned out well only they have
sown too late on account of their land being inundated."

Baron la Hontan visited Fort Nashouac about 1694. He describes the St.
John as "a very pleasant river, adorned with fields that are very
fertile in grain." He says that two gentlemen of the name of d'Amours
have a settlement there for beaver hunting.

The census made in 1695 by Simon, the French missionary, shows that
there were then ten families, numbering forty-nine persons, on the St.
John river, besides the garrison at Fort Nachouac. Their live stock
included 38 cattle and 116 swine; there were 166 acres of land under
cultivation and 73 in pasture; the crop of that year included 130
bushels of wheat, 370 of corn, 30 of oats, 170 of peas.

The testimony of John Gyles, who spent three years in the family of
Louis d'Amours at the Jemseg, conclusively disproves Villebon's
assertion that the d'Amours tilled no land and kept no cattle. He
speaks of a fine wheat field owned by his master, in which the
blackbirds created great havoc and describes a curious attempt made by
a friar to exorcise the birds. A procession was formed, headed by the
friar, in his white robe with a young lad as his attendant and some
thirty people following. Gyles asked some of the prisoners, who had
lately been taken by privateers and brought to the Jemseg, whether
they would go back with him to witness the ceremony, but they
emphatically refused to witness it and when Gyles expressed his
determination to go, one of them, named Woodbury, said he was "as bad
as a papist and a d--d fool." The procession passed and re-passed from
end to end of the field with solemn words of exorcism accompanied by
the tinkling of a little bell, the blackbirds constantly rising before
them only to light behind them. "At their return," says Gyles, "I told
a French lad that the friar had done no service and recommended them
to shoot the birds. The lad left me, as I thought, to see what the
friar would say to my observation, which turned out to be the case,
for he told the lad that the sins of the people were so great that he
could not prevail against those birds."

A story analogous to this is related in Dr. Samuel Peters' history of
Connecticut, of the celebrated George Whitefield, the New England
Independent minister and revivalist: "Time not having destroyed the
wall of the fort at Saybrooke, Whitefield, in 1740, attempted to bring
down the wall as Joshua did those of Jericho, hoping thereby to
convince the multitude of his divine mission. He walked seven times
around the fort with prayer and ram's horn blowing, he called on the
angel of Joshua to do as he had done at the walls of Jericho; but the
angel was deaf to his call and the wall remained. Thereupon George
cried aloud: 'This town is accursed and the wall shall stand as a
monument of a sinful people!'"

Mathieu d'Amours, Sieur de Freneuse, seems to have thought seriously
of leaving the St. John river on account of the difficulties and
discouragements of his situation, for on the 6th August, 1696, he made
out to one Michel Chartier, of Schoodic, in Acadia, a lease of his
seignioral manor of Freneuse, consisting of 30 arpents (acres) of
arable land under the plough, meadow, forest and undergrowth, with
houses, barns and stables thereon, a cart and plough rigged ready for
work; also all the oxen, cows, bullocks, goats, pigs, poultry,
furniture and household utensils that might remain from the sale which
he proposed to make. Chartier was to enjoy the right of trade with the
Indians through the whole extent of the manor except where lands had
been granted by the Sieur de Freneuse to private individuals. The
lease was to be for a term of five years beginning with the first day
of May following, and the lessee was to pay the Sieur de Freneuse 600
livres annually, half in money and half in small furs, such as beaver,
otter and martins.

It is not likely that this transaction was ever consummated, for less
than three months after the lease was arranged and six months before
Chartier was to take possession, all the buildings of the Sieur de
Freneuse were burned, his cattle destroyed and his fields laid waste
by Hawthorne's expedition returning from their unsuccessful seige of
Fort Nachouac. The original lease, a very interesting document, is now
in possession of Dr. W. F. Ganong and a fac-simile of the signature of
the Sieur de Freneuse is here given.[11]

   [11] A copy of the original lease of the Seigniory of Freneuse, with
        translation, and remarks by Dr. Ganong, will be found in Vol.
        I., p. 121, of Acadiensis, printed at St. John by D. R. Jack,
        to whose kindness and that of Dr. Ganong I am indebted for the
        signature given above.--W. O. R.

[Illustration: Signature of Sieur de Freneuse]

The seigniory included both sides of the St. John river in Sunbury
county, and the most fertile portions of the parishes of Maugerville,
Sheffield, Burton and Lincoln. The name Freneuse is found in most of
the maps of that region down to the time of the American Revolution.
The residence of the Sieur de Freneuse stood on the east bank of the
St. John opposite the mouth of the Oromocto river.

Mathieu d'Amours, as already stated, died in consequence of exposure
at the siege of Fort Nachouac. Sixty years later the lands he had
cleared and tilled and the site of his residence were transferred to
the hands of the first English settlers on the river, the Maugerville
colony of 1763. His widow, Madame Louise Guyon, went to Port Royal,
where her indiscretion created a sensation that resulted in voluminous
correspondence on the part of the authorities and finally led to her
removal to Quebec.

Rene d'Amours, during his sojourn on the River St. John, was much
engrossed in trade with the natives. He made periodical visits to
their villages and was well known at Medoctec, where Gyles lived as a
captive, and it is not unlikely the Frenchmen living at that village
were his retainers. He seems to have made little or no attempt to
fulfil the conditions necessary to retain possession of his seignioral
manor, for to his mind the charms of hunting and trading surpassed
those of farming. His visits to Medoctec to purchase furs and skins
when the Indians had returned from their winter hunts were of doubtful
advantage to the poor savages, for Gyles tells us that "when they came
in from hunting they would be drunk and fight for several days and
nights together, till they had spent most of their skins in wine and
brandy, which was brought to the village by a Frenchman called
Monsieur Sigenioncor" (Clignancourt).

The latter portion of the narrative of John Gyles throws light on the
course of events on the St. John during Villebon's regime, and
supplies us with a particularly interesting glimpse of domestic life
in the home of Louis d'Amours on the banks of the Jemseg, where Gyles
spent the happiest years of his captivity. The wife of the Sieur de
Chauffours, Marguerite Guyon[12], appears in an especially amiable
light. Her lonely situation and rude surroundings, the perils of the
wilderness and of savage war, amidst which her little children were
born, evoke our sympathy. Her goodness of heart is seen in her
motherly kindness to Gyles, the young stranger of an alien race--the
"little English," as she calls him. But with all her amiability and
gentleness she possessed other and stronger qualities, and it was her
woman's wit and readiness of resource that saved her husband's
fortunes in a grave emergency. The story shall be told in Gyles' own
words.

   [12] Louis d'Amours married Marguerite Guyon in 1686, about the time
        he settled on the St. John river. They had three children.

"When about six years of my doleful captivity had passed, my second
Indian master died, whose squaw and my first Indian disputed whose
slave I should be. Some malicious persons advised them to end the
quarrel by putting a period to my life; but honest father Simon, the
priest of the river, told them that it would be a heinous crime and
advised them to sell me to the French."

The suggestion of father Simon was adopted and Gyles, now in his
sixteenth year, went with the missionary and the Indians to the mouth
of the river, the occasion of their journey being the arrival of a
French man-of-war at Menagoueche with supplies for the garrison and
presents for the Indians.

"My master asked me," continues Gyles, "whether I chose to be sold
aboard the man-of-war or to the inhabitants? I replied with tears, I
should be glad if you would sell me to the English from whom you took
me, but if I must be sold to the French, I chose to be sold to the
lowest on the river, or nearest inhabitant to the sea, about 25
leagues from the mouth of the river; for I thought that if I were sold
to the gentlemen aboard the man-of-war I should never return to the
English. * * My master presently went on shore and a few days after
all the Indians went up the river. When we came to a house which I had
spoken to my master about, he went on shore with me and tarried all
night. The master of the house (Louis d'Amours) spoke kindly to me in
Indian, for I could not then speak one word of French. Madam also
looked pleasant on me and gave me some bread. The next day I was sent
six leagues further up the river to another French house. My master
and the friar tarried with Monsieur De Chauffours, the gentleman who
had entertained us the night before. Not long after father Simon came
and said, 'Now you are one of us, for you are sold to that gentleman
by whom you were entertained the other night.'

"I replied, 'Sold!--to a Frenchman!' I could say no more, but went
into the woods alone and wept till I could scarce see or stand. The
word 'sold,' and that to a people of that persuasion which my dear
mother so much detested and in her last words manifested so great
fears of my falling into; the thought almost broke my heart.

"When I had thus given vent to my grief I wiped my eyes, endeavoring
to conceal its effects, but father Simon perceiving my eyes swollen,
rolled me aside bidding me not to grieve, for the gentleman he said to
whom I was sold was of a good humor; that he had formerly bought two
captives of the Indians who both went home to Boston. This in some
measure revived me; but he added he did not suppose that I would ever
incline to go to the English for the French way of worship was much to
be preferred. He said also he would pass that way in about ten days,
and if I did not like to live with the French better than the Indians
he would buy me again.

"On the day following, father Simon and my Indian master went up the
river six and thirty leagues to their chief village and I went down
the river six leagues with two Frenchmen to my new master. He kindly
received me, and in a few days Madam made me an osnaburg shirt and
French cap and a coat out of one of my master's old coats. Then I
threw away my greasy blanket and Indian flap; and I never more saw the
old friar, the Indian village or my Indian master till about fourteen
years after when I saw my old Indian master at Port Royal, and again
about twenty-four years since he came from St. John to Fort George to
see me where I made him very welcome.

"My French master had a great trade with the Indians, which suited me
very well, I being thorough in the language of the tribes at Cape
Sable[13] and St. John. I had not lived long with this gentleman
before he committed to me the keys of his store, etc., and my whole
employment was trading and hunting, in which I acted faithfully for
my master and never knowingly wronged him to the value of one
farthing. They spoke to me so much in Indian that it was some time
before I was perfect in the French tongue."

   [13] The Micmacs, as distinguished from the St. John river Indians or
        Maliseets.

It was in the summer of the year 1695 that John Gyles was purchased of
the Indians by Louis d'Amours, having been nearly six years in
captivity at the Medoctec village. The strong prejudice against the
French instilled into his mind by his mother, who was a devout
puritan, was soon overcome by the kindness of Marguerite d'Amours.

The goods needed by the Sieur de Chauffours for his trade with the
Indians were obtained from the man-of-war which came out annually from
France, and Gyles was sometimes sent with the Frenchmen in his
master's employ to the mouth of the river for supplies. On one of
these trips, in the early spring time, the party in their frail canoes
were caught in a violent storm as they were coming down the
Kennebeccasis--having crossed over thither from Long Reach by way of
Kingston Creek, the usual route of travel. They were driven on Long
Island opposite Rothesay and remained there seven days without food,
unable to return by reason of the northeast gale and unable to advance
on account of the ice. At the expiration of that time the ice broke up
and they were able to proceed, but in so exhausted a state that they
could "scarce hear each other speak." After their arrival at St. John,
two of the party very nearly died in consequence of eating too
heartily, but Gyles had had such ample experience of fasting in his
Indian life that he had learned wisdom, and by careful dieting
suffered no evil consequences.

In the month of October, 1696, the quietude of the household at the
Jemseg was disturbed by the appearance of the Massachusetts military
expedition under Hawthorne and Church.

"We heard of them," says Gyles, "some time before they came up the
river by the guard that Governor Villebon had ordered at the river's
mouth. Monsieur the gentleman whom I lived with was gone to France,
and Madam advised with me; she then desired me to nail a paper on the
door of our house containing as follows:--

  'I intreat the General of the English not to burn my House or
  Barn, nor destroy my Cattle. I don't suppose that such an army
  comes up this River to destroy a few Inhabitants but for the Fort
  above us. I have shewn kindness to the English captives as we were
  capacitated and have bought two Captives of the Indians and sent
  them to Boston, and have one now with us and he shall go also when
  a convenient opportunity presents and he desires it.'

"This done, Madam said to me, 'Little English; we have shewn you
kindness and now it lies in your power to serve or disserve us, as you
know where our goods are hid in the woods and that Monsieur is not at
home. I could have sent you to the Fort and put you under confinement,
but my respect for you and assurance of your love to us have disposed
me to confide in you, persuaded that you will not hurt us nor our
affairs. And now if you will not run away to the English, who are
coming up the river, but serve our interest I will acquaint Monsieur
of it at his return from France which will be very pleasing to him;
and I now give my word that you shall have liberty to go to Boston on
the first opportunity, if you desire it, or that any other favor in my
power shall not be deny'd you.'

"I replied:--'Madam, it is contrary to the nature of the English to
requite evil for good. I shall endeavor to serve you and your
interest. I shall not run to the English; but if I am taken by them
shall willingly go with them and yet endeavor not to disserve you
either in your persons or goods.'

"This said we embarked and went in a large boat and canoe two or three
miles up an eastern branch of the river that comes from a large pond
[Grand Lake] and in the evening sent down four hands to make
discovery; and while they were sitting in the house the English
surrounded it and took one of the four; the other three made their
escape in the dark through the English soldiers and came to us and
gave a surprising account of affairs.

"Again Madam said to me, 'Little English, now you can go from us, but
I hope you will remember your word!' I said, 'Madam, be not concerned,
for I will not leave you in this strait.' She said 'I know not what to
do with my two poor little Babes.' I said 'Madam, the sooner we embark
and go over the great Pond the better.' Accordingly we embarked and
went over the Pond.

"The next day we spake with Indians, who were in a canoe and gave us
an account that Chignecto-town was taken and burnt. Soon after we
heard the great guns at Governor Villebon's fort, which the English
engaged several days, killed one man, and drew off and went down the
river; for it was so late in the fall that had they tarried a few days
longer in the river, they would have been frozen in for the winter.

"Hearing no report of the great guns for several days, I, with two
others, went down to our house to make discovery, where we found our
young lad who was taken by the English when they went up the river;
for the general was so honorable that, on reading the note on our
door, he ordered that the house and barn should not be burnt nor their
cattle or other creatures killed, except one or two, and the poultry
for their use, and at their return ordered the young lad to be put
ashore.

"Finding things in this posture, we returned and gave Madam an
account. She acknowledged the many favors which the English had shown,
with gratitude, and treated me with great civility. The next spring
Monsieur arrived from France in the man-of-war, who thanked me for my
care of his affairs, and said that he would endeavor to fulfil what
Madam had promised me."

At the expiration of another year, peace having been proclaimed, a
sloop came to Menagoueche with ransom for one Michael Coombs, and
Gyles at once reminded the Sieur de Chauffours of his promise. That
gentleman advised him to remain, offering to do for him as if he were
his own child, but Gyles' heart was set upon going to Boston, hoping
to find some of his relations yet alive. His master then advised him
to go up to the fort and take leave of the Governor, which he did, and
says the Sieur de Villebon spoke very kindly to him. Some days after
he took an affecting leave of Madame d'Amours and his master went down
to the mouth of the river with him to see him on board. A few days
afterwards he arrived safely in Boston and was welcomed by his
relatives as one risen from the dead.

[Illustration: Signature of John Gyles]

After Villebon's death his successor, de Brouillan, dismantled Fort
Nachouac and the fort at the mouth of the St. John river and
transferred the garrisons to Port Royal. The French families living on
the river soon followed, as they found themselves without protection
and did not care to remain in a situation so exposed. The houses
abandoned by these settlers had been built upon the interval lands on
the east side of the river between the Nashwaak and the Jemseg. The
soil was very fertile, entirely free from rock or stone and little
incumbered by forest. But the situation had its disadvantages--as it
has still. In the spring of the year 1701 the settlers had a most
unhappy experience in consequence of an extraordinarily high freshet.
This event increased Brouillan's aversion to the St. John, and he
writes:

"The river is altogether impracticable for habitations, the little
the people had there being destroyed this year by the freshets
(inondations) which have carried off houses, cattle and grain.
There is no probability that any families will desire to expose
themselves hereafter to a thing so vexatious and so common on that
river. Monsieur De Chauffours, who used to be the mainstay of the
inhabitants and the savages, has been forced to abandon it and to
withdraw to Port Royal, but he has no way to make a living there for
his family, and he will unhappily be forced to seek some other retreat
if the Court pays no consideration to the services which he
represents in his petition, and does not grant him some position in
order to retain him in this colony."

The next year France and England were again at war and in the course
of the conflict the fortunes of the d'Amours in Acadia were involved
in utter ruin. The gentle spirit of Marguerite Guyon d'Amours did not
survive the struggle, and with the close of the century she passed
from the scene of her trials. Louis d'Amours, while serving his
country in arms, was taken by the English, and for more than two years
remained a prisoner in Boston. His brother, the Sieur de Clignancourt,
served in various expeditions against the New Englanders and for
several years is heard of in connection with military affairs.
Eventually most of the surviving members of the d'Amours family
removed from Acadia leaving behind them no abiding record of their
sojourn on the St. John river.

Two of the daughters of Louis d'Amours were married at Port Royal
while very young. Perhaps they possessed their mother's winsome
manners, perhaps, also the scarcity of marriageable girls in Acadia
may have had something to do with the matter; at any rate Charlotte
d'Amours was but seventeen years of age when she married the young
baron, Anselm de St. Castin. Their wedding took place at Port Royal in
October, 1707, just two months after young St. Castin had greatly
distinguished himself in the heroic and successful defense of Port
Royal against an expedition from New England.[14] The event no doubt
caused a flutter of excitement in the then limited society of Port
Royal. The officiating priest was Father Antoine Gaulin, of the
Seminary of Quebec, at which institution the young baron had finished
his studies only three years before. Among the witnesses of the
marriage were the Chevalier de Subercase, governor of Acadia;
Bonaventure, who had for some years rendered signal service as
commander of the "Envieux" and other warships; Mon. de la Boularderie,
a French officer who had been wounded in the recent siege, and the
bride's farther, Louis d'Amours--who, signs his name D'Amour
D'Echofour.

   [14] The mortification of the Bostonians at the failure of this
        expedition was extreme. So confident of success were they that
        preparations were made for a public rejoicing on the
        anticipated capture of Port Royal. The young baron St. Castin
        was wounded in the defence of Port Royal. His conduct in
        leading the defenders on several critical occasions was
        characterized by such dash and intrepidity that Governor
        Subercase in describing the siege wrote to the French minister
        at Versailles that if it had not been for the presence of the
        Baron St. Castin he knew not what would have been the result.
        See Murdoch's Hist. Nova Scotia, vol. I., p. 289.

A few years later the Marquis de Vaudreuil entrusted to St. Castin the
command of Acadia. After the treaty of Utrecht he retired to his
ancestral residence on the banks of the Penobscot, where he lived on
amicable terms with the English and kept the Penobscot Indians from
making encroachments on their neighbors. His sister, Ursule de St.
Castin, married his wife's brother, a son of Louis d'Amours, a
circumstance of interest not only as being a double marriage between
the families of St. Castin and d'Amours, but also from the fact that
the familiar titles of the d'Amours family seem to have been retained
in this, the oldest branch of their family. In proof of this fact, the
distinguished Acadian genealogist, Placid P. Gaudet, has shown that
among the Acadians residing at the Islands of St. Pierre and Miquelon
in 1767 (according to the census of that year), were Ursule de St.
Castin, widow of the only son of Louis d'Amours, then 71 year of age,
who resided with her son Joseph d'Amours, deChauffour, and his family.
Joseph d'Amours was at that time 49 years of age, and his wife,
Genevieve Roy, 44 years of age. They had seven children and the oldest
sons were Joseph d'Amours, aged 19 years; Paul d'Amours de Freneuse,
aged 16 years, and Louis d'Amours de Clignancourt, aged 13 years. As
the father himself retained the title of de Chauffours it is evident
that on his decease it would fall to his oldest son, Joseph.

Marie d'Amours, sister of the young Baroness de St. Castin, married
Pierre de Morpain, the commander of a privateer of St. Domingo. It
chanced that he had just brought a ship load of provisions to Port
Royal when it was attacked in 1707, and he was able to render good
service in its defence. Two years afterwards he was again at Port
Royal and in the course of a ten days' cruise took nine prizes and
destroyed four more vessels. Being attacked by a coast-guard ship of
Boston a furious engagement ensued in which the English captain was
killed with one hundred of his men and his vessel made a prize and
taken to Port Royal. The commander, Subercase, highly commended
Morpain's bravery and persuaded him to remain at Port Royal where, on
August 13, 1709, he married Marie d'Amours de Chauffours.

Louis d'Amours, Sieur de Chauffours, returned to Port Royal in 1706
after a two years captivity at Boston. On the 17th January, 1708, only
a few weeks after the marriage of his daughter to St. Castin, he took
to himself a wife in the person of Anne Comeau. The marriage was
witnessed by Governor Subercase and other officials at Port Royal,
also by his daughter Charlotte and her husband, the Baron de St.
Castin, and by the widow of his brother the Sieur de Freneuse. It
seems probable that his health had suffered through his long
imprisonment, for very shortly after his second marriage he was
stricken with an illness which proved fatal. The Recollet missionary,
Justinien Durad, records in his parish register the burial in the
cemetery of St. Jean Baptiste at Port Royal on May 19, 1708, of "Louis
d'Amour d'Echauffour, aged not far from sixty years [should be 54
years], after an illness of three months, during which he received the
sacraments with great edification." And this brings us to the last
incident in the romantic story of the brothers d'Amours.




CHAPTER VIII.

THE OLD MEDOCTEC FORT.


Twelve miles below the town of Woodstock there enters the River St.
John, from the westward, a good sized tributary known as Eel River. It
is a variable stream, flowing in the upper reaches with feeble
current, over sandy shallows, with here and there deep pools, and at
certain seasons almost lake-like expansions over adjoining swamps, but
in the last twelve miles of its course it is transformed into a
turbulent stream, broken by rapids and falls to such an extent that
only at the freshet season is it possible to descend in canoes. The
Indian name of Eel River is "Madawamkeetook," signifying "rocky at its
mouth."

[Illustration: Plan of Old Medoctec Village]

The Medoctec Fort stood on the west bank of the St. John four miles
above the mouth of Eel River. It guarded the eastern extremity of the
famous portage, five miles in length, by which canoes were carried in
order to avoid the rapids that obstruct the lower part of Eel River.
The rivers were nature's highway for the aboriginal inhabitants and a
glance at the map will show that Madawamkeetook, or Eel River, formed
a very important link in the chain of communication with the western
portion of ancient Acadie by means of the inland waters.

In early days the three principal villages of the Maliseets were
Medoctec on the St. John, Panagamsde on the Penobscot and Narantsouak
on the Kennebec. In travelling from Medoctec to the westward the
Indians passed from the lakes at the head of Eel River, by a short
portage, to the chain of lakes at the head of the St. Croix from
which there was communication by another short portage with the
Mattawamkeag, an eastern branch of the Penobscot. In the course of the
stirring events of the war-period in Acadia the Indian braves and
their French allies made constant use of this route, and the Medoctec
village became a natural rendezvous whenever anything of a warlike
nature was afoot on the St. John. But Medoctec possessed many local
advantages; the hunting in the vicinity was excellent, the rivers
abounded in salmon, sturgeon, bass, trout and other fish, and the
intervals were admirably adapted to the growth of Indian corn--which
seems to have been raised there from time immemorial.

The reader by examining the accompanying plan will have a better idea
of the situation of the old fort.

The site of this ancient Maliseet town is a fine plateau extending
back from the river about fifty rods, then descending to a lower
interval, twenty rods wide, and again rising quite abruptly sixty or
seventy feet to the upland. The spring freshet usually covers the
lower interval and the elevated plateau then becomes an island. The
spot is an exceedingly interesting one, but, unfortunately for the
investigator, the soil has been so well cultivated by the hands of
thrifty farmers that little remains to indicate the outlines of the
old fortifications. It is impossible to determine with absolute
certainty the position of the stockade, or of the large wigwam, or
council chamber, and other features commonly found in Indian towns of
that period. The only place where the old breast-work is visible is
along the south and east sides of the burial ground, where it is about
two feet high. The burial ground has never been disturbed with the
plough, the owners of the property having shown a proper regard for
the spot as the resting place of the dead. It is, however, so thickly
overgrown with hawthorn as to be a perfect jungle difficult to
penetrate. Many holes have been dug there by relic hunters and seekers
of buried treasure.

At the spot marked A* on the plan, between the grave-yard and the
river, there is a mass of ashes and cinders with numberless bones
scattered about. This is believed to be the site of the old council
fire. Here the visitor will find himself in touch with the events of
savage life of centuries ago. Here it was Governor Villebon harangued
his dusky allies; here the horrible dog feast was held and the hatchet
brandished by the warriors on the eve of their departure to deluge
with blood the homes of New England; here at the stake the luckless
captive yielded up his life and chanted his death-song; here the Sieur
de Clignancourt bargained with the Indians, receiving their furs and
peltry and giving in exchange French goods and trinkets, rum and
brandy; here good Father Simon taught the savages the elements of the
Christian faith and tamed as best he could the fierceness of their
manners; here too when weary of fighting the hatchet was buried and
the council fire glowed its brightest as the chiefs smoked their
calumet of peace.

Some have supposed the old Medoctec fort to have been quite an
elaborate structure, with bastions, etc., but it was more probably
only a rude Indian fortification with ditch and parapet surmounted by
a stockade, within which was a strongly built cabin, in size about
thirty by forty feet. Parkman in his "Jesuits in North America," gives
a good description of similar forts built by the Hurons and other
tribes of Canada. The labor originally involved in the erection of the
palisade must have been very great, and nothing but stern necessity is
likely to have driven so naturally improvident a people to undertake
it. The stout stakes were cut, pointed and firmly planted with no
better implement than the stone axe of prehistoric times.

In the lower right hand corner of the plan will be found the spring
referred to in the opening chapter[15] as the scene of the ludicrous
Mohawk scare. Its distance from the old fort is about half a mile, and
the situation and surroundings correspond so exactly with Gyles'
description that there is not the slightest doubt as to its identity.
The water that flows from it never fails and is very clear and cool.

   [15] See page 13.

At the back of the lower interval is a curious gully, something like a
broad natural roadway, which affords an easy ascent to the upland.
This no doubt was the commencement of the famous portage by which
bands of savages in ancient days took their way westward to devastate
the settlements of eastern New England.

The small stream which enters the St. John a little above the old
village site is known as Hay's Creek, but in some of the early maps
and land grants is called "Meductic river." About a mile from its
mouth there is a very beautiful cascade; the volume of water is not
large but the height of the fall, 95 feet perpendicular, is
remarkable, surpassing by at least ten feet the Grand Falls of the
River St. John.

Our knowledge of the village Medoctec, and the ways of its people two
centuries ago, is derived mainly from the narrative of John Gyles, the
English lad who was captured at Pemaquid in 1689 and brought by his
Indian master to the River St. John. At the time of his capture Gyles
was a boy of about twelve years of age. He seems to have met with
kindly treatment from his master though not from all the Indians. His
first rude experience was at Penobscot fort where upon the arrival of
the captives, some fifty in number, the squaws got together in a
circle dancing and yelling, as was their custom on such occasions.
Gyles says, "An old grimace squaw took me by the hand and leading me
into the ring, some seized me by my hair and others by my feet, like
so many furies; but, my master laying down a pledge, they released me.
A captive among the Indians is exposed to all manner of abuses and to
the extremest tortures, unless their master, or some of their master's
relatives lay down a ransom, such as a bag of corn, a blanket, or the
like, which redeems them from their cruelty for that dance."

After a long and wearisome journey the little captive at length neared
his destination, the canoes were paddling down the Madawamkeetook (or
Eel) river. When they reached the rapids they landed, and we shall let
Gyles tell in his own words the story of the last stage of his journey
and of his reception at Medoctec. He says: "We carried over a long
carrying place to Medoctock Fort, which stands on a bank of St. John's
river. My Indian master went before and left me with an old Indian
and three squaws. The old man often said (which was all the English he
could speak), 'By and by come to a great Town and Fort.' So I
comforted myself in thinking how finely I should be refreshed when I
came to this great town.

"After some miles travel we came in sight of a large Corn-field and
soon after of the Fort, to my great surprise; for two or three squaws
met us, took off my pack, and led me to a large hut or wigwam, where
thirty or forty Indians were dancing and yelling round five or six
poor captives. * * I was whirled in among them and we looked at each
other with a sorrowful countenance; and presently one of them was
seized by each hand and foot by four Indians, who swung him up and let
his back with force fall on the hard ground, till they had danced (as
they call it) round the whole wigwam, which was thirty or forty feet
in length. * *

"The Indians looked on me with a fierce countenance, as much as to say
it will be your turn next. They champed cornstalks, which they threw
into my hat as I held it in my hand. I smiled on them though my heart
ached. I looked on one and another, but could not perceive that any
eye pitied me. Presently came a squaw and a little girl and laid down
a bag of corn in the ring. The little girl took me by the hand, making
signs for me to come out of the circle with them. Not knowing their
custom, I supposed they designed to kill me and refused to go. Then a
grave Indian came and gave me a pipe and said in English, 'Smoke it,'
then he took me by the hand and led me out. My heart ached, thinking
myself near my end. But he carried me to a French hut about a mile
from the Indian Fort. The Frenchman was not at home, but his wife, who
was a squaw, had some discourse with my Indian friend, which I did not
understand. We tarried there about two hours, then returned to the
Indian village, where they gave me some victuals. Not long after I saw
one of my fellow-captives who gave me a melancholy account of their
sufferings after I left them.

"After some weeks had passed," Gyles continues, "we left this village
and went up St. John's river about ten miles to a branch called
Medockscenecasis, where there was one wigwam. At our arrival an old
squaw saluted me with a yell, taking me by the hair and one hand, but
I was so rude as to break her hold and free myself. She gave me a
filthy grin, and the Indians set up a laugh and so it passed over.
Here we lived on fish, wild grapes, roots, etc., which was hard living
for me."

Where the one wigwam stood in 1689, there stands today a town of 4,000
people. The stream which Gyles calls Medockscenecasis is the
Meduxnakik and the town is Woodstock. On the islands and intervals
there, wild grapes and lily roots, butter-nuts and cherries are still
to be found, and many generations of boys have wandered with light
hearts in quest of them without a thought of the first of white boys,
who in loneliness and friendlessness trod those intervals more than
two hundred years ago.

It seems to have been the custom of the Indians at the beginning of
the winter to break up into small parties for the purpose of hunting,
and Gyles' description of his first winter's experience will serve to
illustrate the hardships commonly endured by the savages.

"When the winter came on," he says, "we went up the river, till the
ice came down running thick in the river, when, according to the
Indian custom, we laid up our canoes till spring. Then we traveled,
sometimes on the ice and sometimes on land, till we came to a river
that was open but not fordable, where we made a raft and passed over,
bag and baggage. I met with no abuse from them in this winter's
hunting, though I was put to great hardships in carrying burdens and
for want of food. But they underwent the same difficulty, and would
often encourage me by saying in broken English, 'By and by great deal
moose!' Yet they could not answer any question I asked them; and
knowing very little of their customs and ways of life, I thought it
tedious to be constantly moving from place to place, yet it might be
in some respects an advantage, for it ran still in my mind that we
were traveling to some settlement; and when my burden was over heavy,
and the Indians left me behind, and the still evening came on, I
fancied I could see thro' the bushes and hear the people of some great
town; which hope might be some support to me in the day, though I
found not the town at night.

"Thus we were hunting three hundred miles from the sea

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