cover by The Canadian Frontier 1534-1750

Author:The Canadian Frontier, 1534-1750
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Published: 2011-01-18T00:11:09+00:00

page_118

< previous page

page_118

next page >

Page 118

Hubert Jaillot's map, 1685, depicting the struggle for control of Hudson Bay.

(Public Archives of Canada)

< previous page

page_118

next page >

file:///C:/Users/User/AppData/Local/Temp/Rar$EX00.152/The%20Canadian%20Frontier,%201534-1760/files/page_118.html[1/17/2011 4:12:16 PM]

page_119

< previous page

page_119

next page >

Page 119

been crushed. He therefore began making very careful preparations for a full-scale campaign against the Seneca, the most numerous and the farthest removed of the Five Nations.

While he was engaged in these preparations, his fears and suspicions of the role played by the English authorities and traders of New York were confirmed. In 1686 Thomas Dongan sent a trading expedition to the Ottawa of

Michilimackinac, offering them goods at very low prices. This further undermined the French position in the west, already gravely weakened by Frontenac's craven policy and the failure of La Barre's campaign. Dongan intended sending another expedition the following year, and Denonville had to counter it. This he did with such success that two parties of Albany traders going by different routes were captured and spent some weeks in jail at Quebec before being sent home to spread the good word. The Canadian renegades who had guided them were summarily executed. The Albany merchants made no further attempts to invade French-claimed territory north of the Great Lakes.

The Seneca campaign, launched in June 1687, did not enjoy an equal measure of success. Denonville reached the villages with his motley force of some 1500 men, regular troops, Canadian militia, coureurs de bois, and allied Indians. To have brought a force of this size so far into the enemy country was no mean feat, but after a brief skirmish with a few casualties on both sides, the Seneca fled. Their villages and food supplies were destroyed, but the enemy lived to fight another day.

It was clear that a much larger force than the colony could provide was needed to subdue the Iroquois. The alternatives were a long drawn-out war of attrition, which inevitably meant heavy casualties and destruction in the French settlements, or a negotiated peace settlement. The abandonment of the west was not even contemplated.

The growing threat of war in Europe as the League of Augsburg mustered its forces against France precluded any hope that additional troops would be sent to Canada. To make matters worse, an epidemic of smallpox and measles decimated the colony. Of a total population of just over 11,000 including the troops, over a thousand died. 26 With the sanction of Louis XIV, Denonville entered into negotiations for peace with the Iroquois and was able to bring them to accept his terms. They agreed that their ambassadors would return in the spring of the following year, 1689, to ratify the treaty. Denonville availed himself of the respite to send a large party of voyageurs to Michilimackinac to bring back the furs stored there. His Seneca campaign had prevented them being brought down during the preceding two years.

The Canadians were now really in a bad way. The heavy death toll from disease had been a cruel blow; Iroquois war parties had already inflicted some casualties; and the interruption in the flow of furs from the west had reduced the people to penury.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.