For the British, this day had turned into a nightmare. Their fleet had been defeated to the point of having to retreat in the morning, and throughout the afternoon until late in the evening, they were defeated one after another on land!
This is a disaster! A young British officer with a youthful face thought nervously, biting his nails.
The encirclement of the fortified city of Louisbourg had weakened this army, once renowned for its strength and iron discipline, everywhere.
From Pointe Plate, a French force of about five thousand men had moved north, defeating one by one the units sent piecemeal by the general. The latter had sought to preserve his forces to avoid breaking his siege formation. The result: by around six o’clock, the French had reached the British headquarters.
To make matters worse, Hopson and Webb are missing, and Whitmore had been seriously wounded! What should we do? Ah! If only the general had listened to me!
As James Wolfe had anticipated, the soldiers defending Louisbourg had made a sortie in the afternoon to join Marshal Richelieu’s troops, and they had literally crushed everyone wearing an English uniform.
The troops of La Celle and Forben had been obliterated by cannon fire before they could even respond with their muskets—a fate the second American battalion of Monckton had narrowly escaped, as they were positioned further back.
Robert Monckton had witnessed the slaughter in front of him and had decided to move east to hit the artillery, their own cannons now turned against them, from a blind spot.
To do so, they had to cross a marshy area, difficult to traverse even in this season and swarming with mosquitoes.
Alas, it went badly, as the French from Louisbourg joined their rescuers at that very moment. With an enemy to the east and another to the west, few managed to escape.
Monckton was one of those few, managing with great difficulty to rejoin the regiment of Hatvey, Braggs, Austraher, and the one commanded by Valbertonne. With Monckton’s survivors, they formed a force of just twenty-five hundred men.
This was far too few to stop the French, now numbering nearly twelve thousand!
"Don’t slow down! Keep the pace!" James Wolfe, who had no choice but to return to his post on the general’s direct orders, was forced to march back to their headquarters once it was directly threatened.
He had marched his roughly eleven hundred men part of the afternoon around the small Havre Bay, where British ships were still being brought in as prisoners. Slowly, all captured soldiers, sailors, women, children, and elderly were being locked up in the fortified city.
Behind him, another eight hundred men who had been stationed further east, near his original position at Lorembec, were also advancing quickly. They had been placed there in case of a French landing in that area.
They covered the six kilometers to their objective at a forced pace, but, unfortunately, they arrived too late.
"Sir…"
"I know, Mr. Bell. Let the men rest. I need to speak with these gentlemen. But have the men ready to move out again."
"Understood!"
In this area, there were three important regiments. The first was commanded by Charles Lawrence, who held the same rank as Wolfe for this expedition, the Scottish regiment led by Colonel Fraiser, and finally, a special regiment composed of woodsmen without uniforms and Iroquois, commonly referred to here as "savages," commanded by a man Wolfe knew only by name, Quennedy.
Since arriving in the New World, Wolfe had seen a few of these savages. Everything about them seemed primitive to him. It was as if they had chosen not to evolve over the centuries.
He had concluded at first glance that this was why Europeans had been able to impose themselves on this continent and build a colonial empire.
Unfortunately, it was these people on whom the British had to rely for peace in the New World. This powerful Indian tribe called "Iroquois" was actually a confederation of six distinct tribes. The primary purpose of this confederation was to prevent wars between the member nations.
The name "Iroquois" had been given by Europeans, who hadn’t even bothered to call them by their true name: the Haudenosaunee, meaning "the people of the longhouse." Wolfe had learned this while passing through during his journey to this forest-covered continent. This name represented much more than their place of residence: it symbolized where the original five tribes had gathered, with a sixth joining the confederation in 1722, to form this powerful union. It was where the Iroquois met to discuss peace, justice, and governance.
The longhouse was thus the symbol of their community and peace. If everything Wolfe had heard was true, these poorly dressed and uneducated people saw their six tribes as one longhouse.
This confederation dominated a vast region south of the Great Lakes, bordering Britain’s northernmost colonies like New York and Pennsylvania.
In reality, it would be more accurate to say that they were caught between two powerful colonial empires. When war broke out between France and Britain, the Iroquois had to choose a side, helped along by the actions of the French and their colonists.
The Iroquois chose the British, more out of hatred for the French and their allies than sympathy for the English. Conversely, all the other tribes in the region sided with the French, their old allies and trade partners.
To the soldiers, especially those newly arrived in the New World, the woodsmen were closer to savages than to Europeans. These were travelers, traders, and diplomats who maintained close relations with the Indians.
Wolfe trusted neither these men nor the Indians any more than before.
There had been several violent clashes between colonists and Indians throughout history, and many things were said about them all the way to London, most often negative. However, since his arrival in these hostile lands, he had to admit that they were very useful for tracking and fighting in such terrain.
James Wolfe immediately headed into a tent where a certain commotion was taking place.
"Abandon?! Flee with our tails between our legs?! I'd rather die than return to England sullied by such humiliation! I would a thousand times prefer to die in battle!" exclaimed a man with a bulldog face, spitting as a large vein bulged from his forehead.
"Tsk! You can die if you wish," replied a young man with a proud chin, calmly, "but that’s not my intention! If we persist, we will all die in vain!"
"So what, Mr. Lawrence?! We retreat quietly to Halifax and then launch another assault on Louisbourg? By the time we get there and make preparations, winter will have begun. And in case you've forgotten, we’re on a bloody island!"
"Ah, James! I sent a messenger for you earlier, but it seems you’ve come to join us before that."
"Charles, Mr. Quennedy, tell me everything. What’s our current situation?"
"Bad. Very bad, in fact. So much so that we’re debating whether to retreat or continue fighting."
"Is it that bad?" replied the young brigadier general, raising a thin eyebrow.
"Yes, it’s that bad," sighed his colleague, of equal rank, with a deep breath. "The French who landed have linked up with the soldiers from Louisbourg who made a sortie. They now have nearly twelve thousand men. To say they’re a threat would be an understatement. We are being crushed regiment after regiment without the French being seriously threatened."
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"That’s exactly what I feared," the young officer sighed heavily. "That’s why I tried to warn General Amherst. I’ve come with all my men. I’ve brought eleven hundred, and eight hundred more will arrive shortly."
"Good! Counting all our troops and those of Fraiser, who should arrive soon, we have about five thousand men. We’ll go far with that!" Quennedy remarked sarcastically, crossing his arms over his chest.
"Is that all we have left?!" James Wolfe choked, having expected a much higher number. "From our entire army?!"
"Well, between our losses, the wounded and sick at the general hospital, those trying to fight on their own, and those who’ve fled… yes."
"What a failure," the officer sighed once more, disgusted by this dramatic turn of events.
"Indeed."
"That’s why we’re trying to agree on the best course of action. Young Wolfe, tell me, what do you think of the situation now?"
The two men looked at him, not expecting a miracle.
After a moment of reflection over a map of the region, his verdict came.
"The longer we stay here, the heavier our losses will be, which means our chances of victory in New France will only grow slimmer. Bringing troops over from England is too difficult and requires too many resources. We’ll mainly have to rely on the regiments already present on the continent, knowing that the more we take from elsewhere, the weaker those places will become. However, it is crucial that we keep this key position for the future of our operations. Therefore, we must preserve as much of our forces as possible if we are to hope for revenge one day from this humiliation."
The two men slowly nodded because everything Wolfe said made sense.
"It’s pointless to expect any mercy from the French. They only speak of humanity when they’re in desperate situations, but never when it’s the other way around. We can only rely on ourselves to get back to British soil. I therefore propose we contact all officers who still have control over their troops, to warn them of the danger and our decision. Finally, to prevent the French from achieving a total victory, I suggest we sabotage as many of the artillery pieces as possible that we’ll have to abandon here, ideally by dumping them into the sea. After all, it’s always possible to repair a cannon whose touch hole has been plugged. That’s my opinion on what we should do."
The two men, their expressions so grave that one might easily mistake this for a wake, remained silent for a long time.
"The Scots are proud and brave," Charles Lawrence articulated slowly in a grave voice. "Will they follow us?"
"For their sake, I hope so. Otherwise, may God have mercy on their souls."
The three officers could easily imagine these hot-blooded men preferring a heroic, albeit futile, death over the shame of retreat.
Their reputation was so solid that it wasn’t hard to anticipate their reaction. Even stripped of their uniforms and weapons, they would likely still be ready to fight if they believed it was their duty.
Even far from their homeland, they were proud sons of Scotland. Descendants of Robert the Bruce and William Wallace. Many words could describe them, but "cowards" was certainly not one of them.
Fortunately, James Wolfe’s and Charles Lawrence’s concerns were unfounded.
When Colonel Fraiser arrived a bit later with his regiment of Scotsmen, they unanimously approved young Wolfe’s idea. It was thus decided to retreat to Halifax, the nearest major British town to Louisbourg.
It wouldn’t be easy, as the region was wild, full of dangers, without roads or signs to show them the way. They would have to chart their own course and find a good route to leave the area.
After they had destroyed all the cannons north of Havre Bay, the troops took everything useful without overloading themselves and headed west until they reached a small river that flowed into the bay. There, they changed direction and began to follow it upstream.
They went north for a while before turning west again. The sun was still high, yet it would be night in just a few hours.
Led by the Iroquois, the British army arrived where they had landed a week earlier. At that time, they thought their victory was assured, and nothing could stop the fall of Louisbourg. The Crown had deployed such great resources to achieve it, and yet they had failed.
This French force and their fleet had ruined everything.
Louisbourg would remain French for at least another year, but James Wolfe swore he would bring it down the following spring.
They marched for a long time, almost until the last light of day, and set up a very rudimentary camp a little north of Anse au Sable. Most of the soldiers slept no more than a few hours, fearing they would be attacked during the night and killed in their sleep. Fortunately, nothing of the sort happened. There was no raid that night.
The next morning, before the sun even appeared between the branches and the bright green leaves, the young brigadier general adjusted his officer’s uniform and his tricorne before packing up his few belongings. It didn’t take long, as most of his equipment had been left at their former camp near the lighthouse facing Louisbourg.
Having anticipated the worst, he had ordered his men to bring food from their original camp at Anse Gauthier. Thus, unlike some soldiers, his men did not resume their journey on empty stomachs.
Some soldiers, driven by hunger, stopped to eat as many wild berries as they could, attracted by their bright colors. But their knowledge of plants was poor, unlike that of the Indians and the woodsmen. Several of them fell ill with stomach cramps and vomiting. Among them was Wolfe’s aide-de-camp, young Thomas Bell. Out of sheer curiosity, he had made the mistake of tasting a round, purple fruit that looked a lot like some berries found along field edges in England.
"Aaaaargh... My stomach hurts so much!"
He groaned in pain, constantly clutching his stomach. The young man was as pale as a sheet and so weak that he could barely walk.
"It feels like my intestines are being twisted!" he said, bent over and leaning against a large tree that had clearly been rubbed against by a very large animal.
A barely-dressed man, an Iroquois with a strange, colorful headdress, handed the young man a handful of leaves, which he eyed with a grimace.
The man uttered a few words in his language, which neither Wolfe nor Bell understood. It sounded more like an ancient curse than anything else, and it was a woodsman who translated what the dark-skinned man had said.
"He says to chew these leaves. They’ll ease the pain and flush out the toxins," said the man, probably in his fifties, sporting a thick red beard.
The Indian continued speaking in his language, which sounded nothing like any of the languages James Wolfe knew.
"He also says," added the woodsman, "not to eat those little dark berries. They’re bad."
The man pointed to a bush covered in small, almost black berries, which, to Wolfe’s eyes, looked edible.
Thomas Bell accepted the leaves and, after a brief hesitation, shoved them all into his mouth and began to chew.
James Wolfe turned to the woodsman to ask how to say "thank you" in the Iroquois language.
Surprised that an English officer, clearly from a respectable bourgeois family, would want to learn the Indians' language, the woodsman complied with a discreet smile. James Wolfe repeated what the man had said, addressing the Indian, but the man merely nodded before walking away.
The troop continued their journey, following the coastline for a while before veering inland.
In the days that followed, the men did nothing but walk through the woods, skirting lakes and crossing rivers of clear water. Over time, this ragged troop gradually approached the western tip of Cape Breton Island.
Most of the soldiers were now as filthy as the woodsmen or Indians.
James Wolfe had, of course, left his toiletries at the camp and now sported a light beard as red as his hair. His beard, however, was the least of his worries, as his health was once again deteriorating.
He had always been in fragile health, but in recent years, he had endured painful episodes that sometimes confined him to bed.
Leaning against a tree, his legs trembling, he tried to urinate without too much pain, all the while pleading with God for help. Despite his efforts and prayers, only a few drops came out, more red than yellow.
“Haaa!”
“Are you all right, sir?”
“I-I’ll be fine, thank you, Mr. Bell. C-continue on, I’ll catch up.”
James Wolfe rebuttoned his breeches and shakily closed the bottom of his uniform. That’s when he noticed unusual activity among the men.
He approached one of them and asked what was going on.
“Sir, the woodsmen have spotted a fleet anchored nearby! It’s our fleet! The one that managed to escape from Gabarus Bay!”
The young officer immediately understood the reason for their joy. If they could contact those ships, hopefully still under Admiral Boscawen’s command, they could return to Halifax without trouble!
An hour later, they arrived at a high vantage point overlooking a sheltered body of water, where, indeed, the remnants of the fleet lay: about twenty warships and frigates. They made their way down the steep slope to the sea with some difficulty and lit a large fire to attract attention.
It worked, for the admiral soon sent a small, single-masted vessel that had been used to transport troops to Louisbourg. The captain was very surprised to find the remnants of His Majesty’s army and took as many men as he could aboard, promising those who couldn’t fit that he would return for the others.
James Wolfe decided not to board right away, choosing to stay with the soldiers until the end and board only the last boat.
He boarded the HMS Pembroke, which had suffered greatly during the Battle of Gabarus Bay, under the command of Captain James Simcoe. The man who helped him aboard was a very young officer with a sharp look in his eyes, who introduced himself as James Cook.
Contrary to what he had expected upon returning to Halifax, they were hailed as heroes simply for making it back alive.