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65-595: Fort Beauséjour ( French pronunciation: [fɔʁ boseʒuʁ] ), renamed Fort Cumberland in 1755, is a large, five- bastioned fort on the Isthmus of Chignecto in eastern Canada, a neck of land connecting the present-day province of New Brunswick with that of Nova Scotia . The site was strategically important in Acadia , a French colony that included primarily the Maritimes , the eastern part of Quebec, and northern Maine of

130-499: A Mi'kmaq force from Chignecto raided Major Ezekiel Gilman's sawmill at present-day Dartmouth, Nova Scotia , killing four workers and wounding two. In response, Cornwallis issued a proclamation offering a bounty for the capture or scalps of Mi'kmaw men and for the capture of women and children: "every Indian you shall destroy (upon producing his Scalp as the Custom is) or every Indian taken, Man, Woman or Child." In this Cornwallis followed

195-401: A band of Acadian and Mi'kmaq partisans also raided Fort Cumberland, killing and scalping two men and taking two prisoners. In July, Mi'kmaq captured two of Gorham's rangers outside Fort Cumberland. In March 1758, forty Acadian and Mi'kmaq attacked a schooner at Fort Cumberland and killed its master and two sailors. In the winter of 1759, five British soldiers on patrol were ambushed while crossing

260-633: A bridge near Fort Cumberland. They were scalped and their bodies were mutilated as was common in frontier warfare. In October 1761, commander of the fort Roderick McKenzie of the Montgomery's Highlanders went to Bay of Chaleurs to remove the 787 Acadians. He captured 335. In 1776, early in the American Revolutionary War , Fort Cumberland and its garrison of the Royal Fencible American Regiment repelled several rebel attacks in

325-624: A generation later, it was the site of the 1776 Battle of Fort Cumberland , when the British forces repulsed sympathisers of the American Revolution . Since 1920 the site has been designated as a National Historic Site of Canada , named the Fort Beauséjour – Fort Cumberland National Historic Site. Portions of the fort have been restored, and a museum and visitor facilities were added to the site. It attracts about 6000 visitors annually. During

390-399: A larger area than most towers. This allows more cannons to be mounted and provided enough space for the crews to operate them. Surviving examples of bastions are usually faced with masonry. Unlike the wall of a tower this was just a retaining wall; cannonballs were expected to pass through this and be absorbed by a greater thickness of hard-packed earth or rubble behind. The top of the bastion

455-633: A loyalty oath to the British Crown since the defeat in Port-Royal in 1710, but the settlers were unable to assist French efforts to recapture Nova Scotia without French military support. Le Loutre was born in 1709 to Jean-Maurice Le Loutre Després, a paper maker, and Catherine Huet, the daughter of a paper maker, in the parish of Saint-Matthieu in Morlaix , France in Brittany . In 1730, the young Le Loutre entered

520-401: A number of respects. Bastions are lower than towers and are normally of similar height to the adjacent curtain wall. The height of towers, although making them difficult to scale, also made them easy for artillery to destroy. A bastion would normally have a ditch in front, the opposite side of which would be built up above the natural level then slope away gradually. This glacis shielded most of

585-477: A time of peace. But Cornwallis eventually sent Lawrence to the Missaguash River with a stronger force and they routed a group of Abenaki and allied Indians led by Father Le Loutre , a French agent provocateur. In the autumn of 1750 Lawrence built Fort Lawrence near the site of the ruined village of Beaubassin. In November 1750 Governor General de la Jonquière ordered that two forts be built at either end of

650-507: A town; and at Fort Sackville , Bedford . The French rebuilt the Fortress of Louisbourg , and re-occupied Fort Nerepis as part of their defences. In 1750 the French added to the military personnel in their colony. In April of that year Governor Edward Cornwallis of Nova Scotia sent British Major Charles Lawrence with a small force to establish British authority in the isthmus of Chignecto. On

715-517: A trench was dug across the rear (gorge) of the bastion, isolating it from the main rampart. Various kinds of bastions have been used throughout history: Attribution: Jean-Louis Le Loutre Father Le Loutre’s War Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre ( French: [ʒɑ̃lwi ləlutʁ] ; 26 September 1709 – 30 September 1772) was a Catholic priest and missionary for the Paris Foreign Missions Society . Le Loutre became

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780-670: The Battle of Fort Cumberland . These were mounted by local guerrillas led by the American sympathizer Jonathan Eddy . After the end of the Revolutionary War, by which the United States gained independence, the British abandoned Fort Cumberland in the late 1780s. When territorial conflict with the United States resumed in the War of 1812 , Britain sent forces to refurbish the fort and garrison it. It

845-562: The Seven Years' War . By the middle of the 1700s, over one million British colonists occupied a limited area along the Atlantic coast, but the primarily ethnic French population of what is now The Maritimes was 18,544, part of a total New France population of 70,000. As tensions escalated, in 1749 the British erected fortifications in Nova Scotia at Citadel Hill , Halifax , which they founded as

910-572: The Siege of Port Royal (1710) . Under the terms of the 1713 Treaty of Utrecht , the Kingdom of France had ceded to the Kingdom of Great Britain the territory known today as mainland Nova Scotia. The treaty stated that France retained control of Île Royale (now Cape Breton Island ) and Île Saint-Jean ( Prince Edward Island ). France's colony of Canada, or New France, extended from the Gaspé Peninsula in

975-631: The Séminaire du Saint-Esprit in Paris ; both his parents had already died. After completing his training, Le Loutre transferred to the Séminaire des Missions Étrangères (Seminary of Foreign Missions) in March 1737, as he intended to serve the church abroad. Most of the priests associated with the Paris Foreign Missions Society were assigned as missionaries to Asia, particularly during the nineteenth century, but Le Loutre

1040-450: The guerrilla resistance to the British building forts in the Acadian villages, because the French army was unable to fight the British, who possessed the territory. Le Loutre and the French were established at Beauséjour, just opposite Beaubassin. Charles Lawrence first tried to establish control over Beauséjour and then at Beaubassin early in 1750, but his forces were repelled by Le Loutre,

1105-489: The 1600s and 1700s, European monarchies were nearly continuously at war with each other. The threat of Anglo-American invasion of New France was constant, as England tried to establish power in North America, and Acadia was particularly vulnerable to attacks by water. Its capital, Port-Royal , was founded in 1605, destroyed by the British in 1613, moved upstream in 1632, besieged by the British in 1707 , and finally taken in

1170-508: The Acadians could escape the risk of starvation. Granted additional monies, Le Loutre sailed back to Acadia with other missionaries in 1753. In 1754 Bishop Henri-Marie Dubreil de Pontbriand of Quebec appointed Le Loutre vicar-general of Acadia. He continued to encourage the Mi'kmaq to harass the British. He directed Acadians from Minas and Port Royal to assist in building a cathedral at Beauséjour. It

1235-465: The Acadians from leaving as the English preferred to retain their substantial economic value in farming. However, deputies of the Acadian communities presented him with a petition to allow them to refuse to take arms against fellow Frenchman or they would leave. Cornwallis strongly refused their request and directed them that if they left, they could not take any belongings, and warned them that if they went to

1300-631: The British at Annapolis Royal. The first Siege of Fort Anne was made in July 1744 but ended after four days due to the failure of French naval support to arrive. A second attempt in September was orchestrated by François Dupont Duvivier . Without with siege guns and cannon, Duvivier could make little headway. In the late-spring/early summer Nova Scotia Lieutenant-Governor Paul Mascarene wrote to Massachusetts governor William Shirley requesting military aid. Gorham's Rangers arrived in late September to reinforce

1365-427: The British authorities remained cordial. The conquest of Acadia by Great Britain began with the 1710 capture of the provincial capital, Port Royal. In the 1713 Treaty of Utrecht, France formally ceded Acadia to Britain. However, there was disagreement about the provincial boundaries, and some Acadians also resisted British rule. With renewed war imminent in 1744, the leaders of New France formulated plans to retake what

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1430-467: The British built forts in the major Acadian communities: Fort Edward (at Piziquid), Fort Vieux Logis at Grand Pré and Fort Lawrence (at Beaubassin ). They were also interested in building forts in the various Acadian communities to control the local populations. Le Loutre wrote to the minister of the Marine, "As we cannot openly oppose the English ventures, I think that we cannot do better than to incite

1495-411: The British called Nova Scotia with an assault on the capital, which the British had renamed Annapolis Royal. During King George's War , the neutrality of Le Loutre and the Acadians was tested. By the end of the war, most British officials who had been sympathetic toward the Acadians concluded that they and Le Loutre were supportive of the French position. Le Loutre may have been involved in two raids on

1560-671: The Isthmus of Chignecto to block the British: one was Fort Gaspareaux on the Northumberland Strait and the other Fort Beauséjour on the Bay of Fundy . Construction began in April 1751 under the direction of Lieutenant Gaspard-Joseph Chaussegros de Léry . By 1751 the gunpowder magazine , a well, four casemates , and officers' quarters were finished. The barracks were added the following year. By 1753

1625-539: The Mi'kmaq to continue warring on the English; my plan is to persuade the Mi'kmaq to send word to the English that they will not permit new settlements to be made in Acadia. … I shall do my best to make it look to the English as if this plan comes from the Mi'kmaq and that I have no part in it." Governor General Jacques-Pierre de Taffanel de la Jonquière, Marquis de la Jonquière , wrote in 1749 to his superior in France, "It will be

1690-415: The Mi'kmaq, and Acadians. On 23 April, Lawrence was unsuccessful in setting a base at Chignecto because Le Loutre burned the village of Beaubassin, preventing Lawrence from using its supplies to establish a fort. Defeated at Beaubassin, Lawrence went to Piziquid where he built Fort Edward ; he forced the Acadians to destroy their church and replaced it with the British fort. Lawrence eventually returned to

1755-417: The agreement of the two captains, Le Loutre wrote to Ramezay suggesting an attack be made on Annapolis Royal without the full expedition; but his advice was not acted upon. They waited over two months for the expedition to arrive; slowed by contrary winds and ravaged by disease, the expedition returned home. After the failed expedition, Le Loutre returned to France. While in France, he made two attempts during

1820-527: The area north of the Missaguash River they would still be in English territory and still be British subjects. The Cobequid Acadians wrote to the people in Beaubassin about British soldiers who, "... came furtively during the night to take our pastor [Girard] and our four deputies .... [A British officer] read the orders by which he was authorized to seize all the muskets in our houses, thereby reducing us to

1885-517: The area of Beaubassin to build Fort Lawrence . He encountered continued resistance there, with the Mi'kmaq and Acadians dug in before Lawrence's return to defend the remains of the village. Le Loutre was joined by the Acadian militia leader Joseph Broussard . They were eventually overwhelmed by force, and the New Englanders erected Fort Lawrence at Beaubassin. In the spring of 1751, the French countered by building Fort Beauséjour . Le Loutre saved

1950-413: The bastion from the attacker's cannon while the distance from the base of the ditch to the top of the bastion meant it was still difficult to scale. In contrast to typical late medieval towers, bastions (apart from early examples) were flat sided rather than curved. This eliminated dead ground making it possible for the defenders to fire upon any point directly in front of the bastion. Bastions also cover

2015-502: The bastions. The resulting construction was called a bolwerk . To augment this change they placed v-shaped outworks known as ravelins in front of the bastions and curtain walls to protect them from direct artillery fire. These ideas were further developed and incorporated into the trace italienne forts by Sébastien Le Prestre de Vauban , that remained in use during the Napoleonic Wars . Bastions differ from medieval towers in

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2080-437: The bell from Notre Dame d'Assumption Church in Beaubassin and put it in the cathedral he had built beside Fort Beauséjour. In 1752 he proposed a plan to the French court to destroy Fort Lawrence and return Beaubassin to the Mi'kmaq and Acadians. Both New England and New France military officials made allies of the aboriginal tribes in their struggles for control. The aboriginal allies also engaged independently in warfare against

2145-572: The capital Annapolis Royal , while Acadians and the native Mi'kmaq occupied the rest of the region. Île-Royale (present-day Cape Breton Island ) remained under French control, as it had been granted to the French under the Treaty of Utrecht, and the mainland portion of Acadia (present-day Nova Scotia and New Brunswick ) was British and contested by the French. In 1738, the French had no formal military presence at mainland Nova Scotia because they had been evicted in 1713. The Acadians had refused to sign

2210-632: The church at Beaubassin when that village was burned. The defeat was the catalyst for the Deportation of the Acadians . The bell is held at the Fort Beauséjour National Historic Site. Aware of his risk, Le Loutre escaped to Quebec through the woods. In the late summer, he returned to Louisbourg and sailed for France. His ship was seized by the British in September 1755, and Le Loutre was taken prisoner. After three months in Plymouth , he

2275-483: The colonists and opposing tribes, without their English or French allies. Often aboriginal allies fought on their own while the imperial powers tried to conceal their involvement in such initiatives, to prevent igniting large-scale warfare between England and France. Le Loutre worked with the Mi'kmaq to harass British settlers and prevent the expansion of British settlements. By the time Cornwallis had arrived in Halifax, there

2340-588: The condition of the Irish .... Thus we see ourselves on the brink of destruction, liable to be captured and transported to the English islands and to lose our religion." Despite Cornwallis' threats, most Acadians in the Cobequid followed Le Loutre. The priest tried to establish new communities, but found it difficult to supply the new settlers, the Mi'qmaq, and the garrisons at Fort Beauséjour and Île Saint-Jean (now Prince Edward Island) with food and other necessities. Finding

2405-527: The conflicts between France and Great Britain in the 1700s, and the later struggle between rebels of the Thirteen Colonies and Britain. Attracting about 6000 visitors each year, the fort contributes to heritage tourism in the Maritimes. Bastion By the middle of the 15th century, artillery pieces had become powerful enough to make the traditional medieval round tower and curtain wall obsolete. This

2470-514: The defense of Fort Beauséjour, and the British used this as a reason to begin the Expulsion of the Acadians . Acadian homes were burnt to prevent their return. As the British army had relocated to Fort Cumberland, they abandoned and burned Fort Lawrence in October 1756. Fort Cumberland became one of the sites in which the British imprisoned or temporarily held Acadians during the nine years of the expulsion,

2535-491: The east to Quebec in the west. The treaty of Utrecht defined neither which nation had sovereignty over the land between Gaspesie and Nova Scotia, now New Brunswick, nor the western border of Nova Scotia. The de facto border became the Isthmus of Chignecto at the Missiguash River , site of the prosperous Acadian settlement Beaubassin . In the mid-1700s France and Britain were about to clash worldwide and in North America in

2600-564: The example set in New England. He set the price at the same rate that the Mi'kmaq received from the French for British scalps. Rangers scoured the area around Halifax looking for Mi'kmaq, but never found any. With the founding of Halifax and the British occupation of Nova Scotia intensifying, Le Loutre led the Acadians who lived in the Cobequid region of mainland Nova Scotia to New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island . Cornwallis tried to prevent

2665-443: The first time to a force of New Englanders . After the capture of Louisberg, the British attempted to lure La Loutre to come there for his own safety, but he chose to go to Québec to confer with the authorities. They made Le Loutre their liaison with the Mi'kmaq, who were already at war with the British along the frontier. Thus the French government could work with the Mi'kmaq militia in Acadia. Yet another attempt at Annapolis Royal

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2730-422: The fort had palisade walls and a five-metre-high (16 ft) earthwork. It was a pentagon-shaped fort with bastions built of earth and pickets at the corners. In 1754, Louis Du Pont Duchambon de Vergor became the commander of Fort Beausejour. Events eventually revealed that he was unfit for military command. Louis-Léonard Aumasson de Courville, who became Vergor's secretary at Beauséjour claimed that Vergor

2795-476: The forts had been "very ill defended" and Vergor was summoned before a court martial at Quebec in September ;1757 but was acquitted. In the months following the fort's capture, British forces ordered Acadians living in the region to sign an oath of allegiance to the British Crown. However, the Acadians refused, preferring to remain neutral. Some Acadians reported that they had been coerced into assisting in

2860-474: The garrison. Wampanoag , Nauset , and Pequawket members were offered bounties for Mi'kmaq scalps and prisoners as part of their pay. The Mi'kmaq's withdrew and Duvivier was forced to retreat back to Grand Pré in early October. After the two attacks on Annapolis Royal, Massachusetts Governor William Shirley put a bounty on the Passamaquoddy , Mi’kmaq and Maliseet . The following year, Louisburg fell for

2925-467: The later United States. The fort was built by the French from 1751 to 1752. They surrendered it to the British in 1755 after their defeat in the Battle of Fort Beauséjour , during the Seven Years' War . The British renamed the structure as Fort Cumberland. The fort was strategically important throughout the Anglo-French rivalry of 1749–63, known as the French and Indian Wars by British colonists. Less than

2990-631: The leader of the French forces and the Acadian and Mi'kmaq militias during King George's War and Father Le Loutre's War in the eighteenth-century struggle for power between the French , Acadians , and Miꞌkmaq against the British over Acadia (present-day Nova Scotia and New Brunswick ). Nova Scotia had been under the rule of the British since the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713. The British were settled mostly in

3055-459: The living conditions deplorable at New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island, he made repeated appeals in 1752 for aid from the authorities in Quebec . He returned to France to seek funds, which he gained in 1753 from the courts, for the purpose of building dykes in Acadia. Protecting low-lying lands from the tides would enable their use as pasture for cattle and development with cultivation for crops, so

3120-498: The missionaries who will manage all the negotiation, and direct the movement of the savages, who are in excellent hands, as the Reverend Father Germain and Monsieur l'Abbe Le Loutre are very capable of making the most of them, and using them to the greatest advantage for our interests. They will manage their intrigue in such a way as not to appear in it." As an official peace existed between France and Britain, Le Loutre led

3185-463: The mouth of the Missaguash River on 2 June. The next day the troops, under the command of Lieutenant-Colonel Robert Monckton of the regular army, disembarked a few kilometres from Fort Beauséjour. To defend the fort, Commander Louis Du Pont Duchambon de Vergor had only 150 soldiers from the Compagnies franches de la Marine and a dozen canonniers-bombardiers. On June 16, a large English bomb went through

3250-544: The north bank of the Missaguash River, Lawrence found French forces under Louis de La Corne , who had orders to prevent any British advance beyond that point. De La Corne evacuated and burned the village of Beaubassin to prevent its aiding the British. Rather than fight the French, with whom the British were not at war, or admit to any territorial limitation, Lawrence withdrew. Officials in London disagreed about how far to direct actions of troops in establishing national claims during

3315-479: The others being Fort Edward (Nova Scotia) ; Fort Frederick, Saint John, New Brunswick , and Fort Charlotte, Georges Island, Halifax . Under the leadership of French officer Boishébert, Acadians and Mi'kmaq fought the expulsion from their homeland. In the early spring of 1756, a band of Acadian and Mi'kmaq partisans ambushed a small party of New England soldiers' cutting wood for Fort Cumberland, killing and mutilating nine men. In April 1757, after raiding Fort Edward,

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3380-461: The roof of a casemate and killed many of its occupants. Vergor laid down his weapons. The fort was surrendered, and renamed Fort Cumberland. The next day Fort Gaspereau was surrendered without being attacked. The fall of these forts settled the boundary dispute in favour of the British and marked the beginning of the Expulsion of the Acadians. The minister of Marine, Machault, had good reason to believe

3445-402: The steps necessary for capture, which Lieutenant-Colonel  Robert Monckton  later used in the attacks. Pichon delayed the strengthening of Beauséjour by advising that the British would not attack that year. A convoy of 31 transports and three warships left Boston on 19 May 1755, carrying nearly 2,000 New England provincial troops and 270 British regulars, and dropped anchor near

3510-408: The war to return to Acadia. On both occasions he was imprisoned by the English. In 1749, after the war, he finally returned. Le Loutre moved his base of operation in 1749 from Shubenacadie to Pointe-à-Beauséjour on the Isthmus of Chignecto . When Le Loutre arrived at Beauséjour, France and England were disputing the ownership of present-day New Brunswick. A year after they established Halifax in 1749,

3575-549: Was "avaricious in the extreme," and in his memoirs is a quotation attributed to François Bigot : "Profit, my dear Vergor, by your opportunity [at Beauséjour]; trim, – cut – you have the power – in order that you may soon join me in France and purchase an estate near me." The French position may have been undermined by Thomas Pichon , a clerk at the fort. The British commandant at Fort Lawrence paid Pichon for information about French activities. Pichon provided accounts of French activities, plans of forts and an outline of

3640-617: Was a long history of conflict between the Wabanaki Confederacy (which included the Mi'kmaq) and the British. Governor Edward Cornwallis was informed in August that two vessels were attacked by the Indians at Canso whereby "three English and seven Indians were killed." Council believed the attack had been orchestrated by an Abbe Le Loutre. The Governor offered a reward of £50 for capture of La Loutre dead or alive. On September 30, 1749 when

3705-446: Was an exact replica of the original Notre-Dame de Québec Cathedral . A month after the cathedral was completed, the British attacked . Upon the imminent fall of Fort Beauséjour, Le Loutre burned the cathedral to the ground to prevent its falling into the hands of the British. He had the bell removed and saved. Not only were such cast bells expensive, that particular bell was a symbolic act of hope for rebuilding, as he had brought it from

3770-558: Was assigned to eastern Canada and the Mi'kmaq , an Algonquian -speaking people. Le Loutre arrived at mainland Nova Scotia in 1738. Shortly after being ordained, Le Loutre sailed for Acadia and arrived in Louisbourg , Île-Royale, New France in the autumn of 1737. He spent about a year at Malagawatch, Île-Royale , working with missionary Pierre Maillard to learn the Miꞌkmaq language . Le Loutre

3835-537: Was assigned to replace Abbé de Saint-Vincent, at the Mission Sainte-Anne in Shubenacadie . He left for Saint-Anne's on 22 September 1738. His duties included the French posts at Cobequid and Tatamagouche . Lawrence Armstrong was lieutenant-governor at Annapolis Royal . Although Armstrong was initially annoyed that La Loutre hadn't presented himself at Annapolis Royale, on the whole, La Loutre's relations with

3900-582: Was exemplified by the campaigns of Charles VII of France who reduced the towns and castles held by the English during the latter stages of the Hundred Years War , and by the fall of Constantinople in 1453 to the large cannon of the Turkish army. During the Eighty Years War (1568–1648) Dutch military engineers developed the concepts further by lengthening the faces and shortening the curtain walls of

3965-408: Was exposed to enemy fire, and normally would not be faced with masonry as cannonballs hitting the surface would scatter lethal stone shards among the defenders. If a bastion was successfully stormed, it could provide the attackers with a stronghold from which to launch further attacks. Some bastion designs attempted to minimise this problem. This could be achieved by the use of retrenchments in which

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4030-462: Was held in Elizabeth Castle , Jersey , for eight years, until after the signing of the Treaty of Paris (1763) that ended the Seven Years' War . After that, he tried to help Acadians deported to France to settle in areas such as Morlaix , Saint-Malo , and Poitou . Le Loutre died at Nantes on 30 September 1772 on a trip to Poitou to show Acadians the land. He was buried the following day at

4095-489: Was not the site of any action in that war. In 1835 the British military declared the fort surplus property and it was abandoned. In 1920 the fort was designated as a National Historic Site of Canada for its significance to French and British history in the country. It is named the Fort Beauséjour – Fort Cumberland National Historic Site. Portions of the fort have been restored. In addition, a museum and visitor facilities have been constructed. The museum depicts and interprets

4160-399: Was organized with Jean-Baptiste Nicolas Roch de Ramezay and the ill-fated Duc d'Anville Expedition in 1746. With Louisbourg captured by the British, Le Loutre became the liaison between the Acadian settlers and French expeditions by land and sea. The authorities directed him to receive the expedition at Baie de Chibouctou ( Halifax Harbour in present-day Halifax, Nova Scotia ). Le Loutre

4225-491: Was virtually the only person to know the signals to identify the ships of the fleet. He had to coordinate the operations of the naval force with those of the army of Ramezay, sent to retake Acadia by capturing Annapolis Royal early in June 1746. Ramezay and his detachment arrived at Beaubassin (near present-day Amherst, Nova Scotia ) in July, when only two frigates of the French squadron had reached Baie de Chibouctou. Without seeking

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