War of the Austrian Succession
The War of the Austrian Succession involved most of the powers of Europe over the issue of Archduchess Maria Theresa's succession to the Habsburg Monarchy. The war included peripheral events such as King George's War in British America, the War of Jenkins' Ear, the First Carnatic War in India, the Jacobite rising of 1745 in Scotland, the First and Second Silesian Wars; the cause of the war was Maria Theresa's alleged ineligibility to succeed to her father Charles VI's various crowns, because Salic law precluded royal inheritance by a woman. This was to be the key justification for France and Prussia, joined by Bavaria, to challenge Habsburg power. Maria Theresa was supported by Britain, the Dutch Republic and Saxony. Spain, at war with Britain over colonies and trade since 1739, entered the war on the Continent to re-establish its influence in northern Italy, further reversing Austrian dominance over the Italian peninsula, achieved at Spain's expense as a consequence of Spain's war of succession earlier in the 18th century.
The war ended with the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle in 1748, by which Maria Theresa was confirmed as Archduchess of Austria and Queen of Hungary, but Prussia retained control of Silesia. The peace was soon to be shattered, when Austria's desire to recapture Silesia intertwined with the political upheaval in Europe, culminating in the Seven Years' War; the immediate cause of the War of the Austrian Succession was the death of Emperor Charles VI and the inheritance of the Habsburg Monarchy collectively referred to as'Austria'. The 1703 Mutual Pact of Succession between Emperor Leopold and his sons Joseph and Charles agreed that if the Habsburgs became extinct in the male line, their possessions would go first to female heirs of Joseph those of Charles. Since Salic law excluded women from the inheritance, this required approval by the various Habsburg territories and the Imperial Diet. Joseph died in 1711, leaving two daughters, Maria Josepha and Maria Amalia and Charles became the last male Habsburg heir in the direct line.
In April 1713, he issued the Pragmatic Sanction, permitting female inheritance but placing his own hypothetical daughters ahead of Joseph's. When Charles' daughter Maria Theresa was born in 1717, ensuring her succession dominated the rest of his reign. In 1719 Charles required his nieces Maria Joseph and Maria Amalia to renounce their rights in Maria Theresa's favour in order to marry Frederick Augustus of Saxony and Charles Albert of Bavaria respectively. Charles hoped these marriages would secure his daughter's position since neither Saxony or Bavaria could tolerate the other gaining control of the Habsburg inheritance but his actions undermined the logic of the settlement. A family issue became a European one due to tensions within the Holy Roman Empire, caused by dramatic increases in the size and power of Bavaria and Saxony, mirrored by the post 1683 expansion of Habsburg power into lands held by the Ottoman Empire. Further complexity arose from the fact that the theoretically elected position of Holy Roman Emperor had been held by the Habsburgs since 1437.
These were the centrifugal forces behind a war that reshaped the traditional European balance of power. Bavaria and Saxony refused to be bound by the decision of the Imperial Diet, while in 1738 France agreed to back the'just claims' of Charles of Bavaria, despite accepting the Pragmatic Sanction in 1735. Attempts to offset this involved Austria in the 1734-1735 War of the Polish Succession and the Russo-Turkish War of 1735–1739, it was weakened by the losses incurred. Compounded by the failure to prepare Maria Theresa for her new role, many European statesmen were sceptical Austria could survive the contest that would follow Charles' death, which occurred in October 1740; the war can be divided into three distinct conflicts. In the second, France aimed to weaken Austria in Germany, while Spain sought to recapture territories in Italy lost after the War of the Spanish Succession. In the end, French conquest of the Austrian Netherlands gave them clear dominance on land, while Britain's naval victories made it more dominant at sea.
For much of the eighteenth century, France approached its wars in the same way: It would either let its colonies defend themselves, or would offer only minimal help, anticipating that fights for the colonies would be lost anyway. This strategy was, to a degree, forced upon France: geography, coupled with the superiority of the British navy, made it difficult for the French navy to provide significant supplies and support to French colonies. Several long land borders made an effective domestic army imperative for any ruler of France. Given these military necessities, the French government, based its strategy overwhelmingly on the army in Europe: it would keep most of its army on the European continent, hoping that such a force would be victorious closer to home. At the end of the War of Austrian Succession, France gave back its European conquests, while recovering such lost overseas possessions as Louisbourg restoring the status quo ante as far as France was concerned; the British—by inclination as well as for pragmatic reasons—had tended to avoid large-scale commitments of troops on the Continent.
They sought to offset the disadvantage this created in Europe by allying themselves
Siege of Port Toulouse
The Siege of Port Toulouse took place between May 2–10, 1745 when a New England colonial force aided by a British fleet captured Port Toulouse in the French colony of Île-Royale from its French defenders during the War of the Austrian Succession, known as King George's War in the British colonies. Port Toulouse was of strategic importance to the French because it was the closest settlement to the British occupied mainland Nova Scotia and it was the closest base to the Mi'kmaq. Mi'kmaq chiefs came to Port Toulouse annually for their alliance renewal with the French not only from Île-Royale but from the mainland; the two greatest ongoing royal expenditures in the southeastern corner of Île-Royale had to do with maintaining the alliance with the Mi'kmaq and with keeping Port Toulouse defensible. The two were inter-connected. Port Toulouse was the logical location for the French to launch attacks against the British at Canso. Port Toulouse was home to a garrison of 23 soldiers of the Compagnies Franches de la Marine.
Port Toulouse was only one of two places on Ile Royale, outside of Louisbourg, assigned any kind of military capability. There were a palisade at Port Toulouse; the 200 Acadians who were there began vacating the village in the fall of 1744 after the French attack on Canso. Pierre Maillard led a mission of Mi'kmaq at St. Peter's during this time of about 80 families; the New England expedition set sail from Boston in stages beginning in early March 1745 with 4,200 soldiers and sailors aboard a total of 90 ships. The force was under the command of William Pepperrell of Kittery, a fleet of colonial ships was assembled and placed under the command of Captain Edward Tyng; the force stopped at Canso to reprovision and there they were met by Commodore Peter Warren, enlarging the expedition by 16 ships. In late March, the naval forces began to blockade Louisbourg just as the ice fields were being swept from the Gulf of St. Lawrence to the seas off Louisbourg. On May 2, Pepperell sent Jeremiah Moulton with 70 soldiers and two vessels to capture the fortified village of Port Toulouse.
The New Englanders were only able to capture a single sloop and burn a few houses before being repelled by the French soldiers, Acadians and Mi'kmaq. They wounded three New Englanders. Eight days on May 10, the New Englanders returned with a force four times larger – 270 men, they burned every standing structure at Port Toulouse, demolished the fort, desecrated a cemetery where Mi'kmaq were buried. Some French were killed in the assault and others were taken prisoner. New Englanders proceeded to destroy Petit-de-Grat, Isle Madame, Nerichac; the New Englanders besieged Louisbourg itself. Following 47 days of the siege, the French capitulated on June 17, 1745; the Acadians who escaped from Port Toulouse made their way to the Isthmus of Chignecto at Beaubassin and Quebec. The Acadians returned in 1749, they were deported again after the second Siege of Louisbourg. After the fall of Louisbourg, the thousands of Acadians who remained on Île-Royale were deported to France. Military history of Nova Scotia Military history of the Mi’kmaq People Military history of the Acadians Johnston, A. J.
B.. Storied Shores: St. Peter's, Isle Madame, Chapel Island in the 17th and 18th Centuries. Cape Breton University Press. ISBN 978-1-897009-00-0. Collections of the Massachusetts Historical Society. Vol. I. Boston. 1792. P. 22. – Pepperrell to Shirley April 1745
William Pepperrell
Sir William Pepperrell, 1st Baronet was an American merchant and soldier in Colonial Massachusetts. He is remembered for organizing and leading the 1745 expedition that captured the French garrison at Fortress Louisbourg during King George's War. During his day Pepperrell was called "the hero of Louisburg," a victory celebrated in the name of Louisburg Square in Boston's Beacon Hill neighborhood, he is the great-great-great grandfather of actor Robert Hardy. William Pepperrell was a native of Kittery, Maine a part of the Province of Massachusetts Bay, lived there all his life. Born to William Pepperrell, an English settler of Welsh descent who began his career as a fisherman's apprentice, Margery Bray, daughter of a well-to-do Kittery merchant, William Pepperrell studied surveying and navigation before joining his father in business. Young William Pepperrell expanded their enterprise to become one of the most prosperous mercantile houses in New England with ships carrying lumber and other products to the West Indies and Europe.
The Pepperrells sunk their profits into land, soon they controlled immense tracts. Pepperrell served in the militia, becoming a captain, lieutenant-colonel, in 1726 colonel, he married well, to the granddaughter of Samuel Sewall of Boston. In short, the rise of the Pepperrells within two generations was meteoric. Pepperrell served in the Massachusetts General Court, the provincial legislature, from 1726 to 1727, in the Governor's Council from 1727 to 1759, including eighteen years as its president. Although not a trained lawyer, he was chief justice of the Court of Common Pleas from 1730 until his death. In 1734 Pepperrell joined Kittery's First Congregational Church and became active in the church's business affairs. During King George's War, he was one of several people who proposed an expedition against the French Fortress of Louisbourg on Île-Royale, he gathered volunteers and trained the land forces in that campaign. When they sailed in April 1745, he was commander-in-chief, supported by a British naval squadron under Captain Peter Warren, appointed Commodore on a temporary basis.
They besieged Louisbourg the strongest coastal fortification in North America, captured it on 16 June after a six-week siege. In 1746 Pepperell was made a baronet for his exploits, the first American so honoured, given a colonel's commission in the British Army to raise his own regiment, its first incarnation did not last long. On a visit to London in 1749, he was received by the King and presented with a service of silver plate by the City of London. In Boston in 1753 he published Conference with the Penobscot of the weird Tribe. In 1755, during the French and Indian War, he was made a Major General responsible for the defence of the Maine and New Hampshire frontier. Throughout that war he was instrumental in training troops for the Massachusetts colony. Two regiments were raised locally with funds supplied by the British Crown, entering the army list as the 50th and 51st Regiments of Foot. Both regiments took part in the disastrous British campaign of 1755/56. Wintering near Lake Ontario, the force occupied three forts, Oswego and George, collectively known as Fort Pepperrell.
Surrounded and besieged by a French force under Montcalm, both regiments surrendered after the local commander was killed. Prisoners were massacred by the Indian allies of the French. Both regiments were subsequently removed from the army list. Between March and August 1757, he was acting governor of Massachusetts. In February 1759, he was appointed Lieutenant-General; as he left no son to carry on the name, he had adopted his grandson William Pepperrell Sparhawk, son of Colonel Nathaniel Sparhawk, on the condition that the boy agree to change his surname to Pepperrell, which he did by act of legislature. The younger Pepperell graduated from Harvard College in 1766, became a merchant and inherited the bulk of his grandfather's business enterprises, he was chosen a member of the Governor's Council. In 1774 the baronetcy was revived in his favour. On the eve of the American Revolution, he fled to England as a Loyalist. En route to England, his wife Elizabeth died of smallpox in Halifax, Nova Scotia and is buried in the Old Burying Ground.
He continued to reside in London, where he helped to found Foreign Bible Society. He died at his residence at Portman Square in London in 1816. Pepperrell's house is listed on the National Register of Historic Places; the town of Pepperell, Massachusetts is named for him. From 1762 to 1805, the town of Saco, which he had a role in founding, was known as "Pepperellborough". Pepperrell Air Force Base, a United States Air Force base located in St. John's, Canada from 1941 to 1960 was named in his honor. Namesake of Pepperell St. Halifax, Nova Scotia Leigh Rayment's Peerage Pages Usher Parsons, Life of Sir William Pepperell, Francis Parkman, A Half-Century of Conflict, Byron Fairchild, Messrs. William Pepperrell: Merchants at Piscataqua, Neil Rolde, Sir William Pepperrell, Daniel Marston, The French-Indian War 1754-60, The Taking of Louisburg 1745 by Samuel Adams Drake, L
Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle (1748)
The Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle of 1748, sometimes called the Treaty of Aachen, ended the War of the Austrian Succession following a congress assembled on 24 April 1748 at the Free Imperial City of Aachen, called Aix-la-Chapelle in French and also in English, in the west of the Holy Roman Empire. The resulting treaty was signed on 18 October 1748 by Great Britain and the Dutch Republic. Two implementation treaties were signed at Nice on 4 December 1748 and 21 January 1749 by Austria, Sardinia and Genoa. Great Britain and France dictated the proposed terms of the treaty, agreed at the Congress of Breda, other nations accepted them: Austria recognised Frederick II of Prussia's conquest of Silesia and renounced parts of its Italian territories to Spain. France had some of its colonies returned. France regained Cape Breton Island in Canada, lost during the war, it returned the captured city of Madras in India to Great Britain and gave up the Barrier towns to the Dutch. Maria Theresa ceded the Duchy of Parma and Guastalla in present-day Italy to Philip of Bourbon, son of Philip V of Spain and Elisabeth Farnese.
The Duchy of Modena and the Republic of Genoa, conquered by Austria, were restored. The Asiento slavery contract, guaranteed to Great Britain in 1713 through the Treaty of Utrecht, was renewed. Spain raised objections to the Asiento clauses, the Treaty of Madrid, signed on 5 October 1750, surrendered Great Britain's claims without war in return for a sum of £100,000. For the most part, the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle and the War of Austrian Succession concluded status quo ante bellum. In the commercial struggle between Britain and France in the West Indies and India, nothing was settled. In France, there was a general resentment at what was seen as a foolish throwing away of advantages, it came to be popular in Paris to use the phrases Bête comme la paix and La guerre pour le roi de Prusse. By the same token, British colonists in New England and merchants back in Great Britain resented the return of Louisbourg to the French after they had captured the stronghold in a 46-day siege. In fact, Britain had exchanged Louisbourg.
Madras, captured by French Admiral La Bourdonnais in 1746, was returned to Britain likewise. Lord Macaulay said the treaty, "had been in Europe no more than an armistice; the celebration was deliberately held near the royal residence of St James's Palace so as to present the king in a better light, as a British king and the prime mover in a peace, successful for Britain.. George and Britain gained from the treaty in one respect: that one clause of it had compelled the French to recognise the Hanoverian succession to the British throne and expel the Jacobites from France. In Austria, reactions to the peace were mixed; the Pragmatic Sanction of 1713 had been issued by Holy Roman Emperor Charles VI to alter the law of succession of the Habsburg family, allowing his daughter Maria Theresa to inherit the Habsburg lands. Ostensibly, the source of the long, bitter War of Austrian Succession, this sanction was upheld by the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle; the monarchy, led by Maria Theresa's foreign affairs chancellor Wenzel Anton, Prince of Kaunitz-Rietberg, had survived a disastrous crisis that could have brought its destruction, the Habsburg pre-eminence was confirmed in Germany.
The Austrians had saved the duchy of Milan, conceding only minor concessions in Italy. Maria Theresa was happy that France had given back the Austrian Netherlands that it had conquered. Overall, she referred to the war as a miracle. However, she was upset by the loss of the rich province of Silesia at the hand of Prussia. Britain's support for this repossession at Aix-la-Chapelle spurred Kaunitz to establish an unprecedented alliance with Austria's traditional enemy, following the establishment of the treaty. In the West Indies, the treaty did little to address possession of the islands. European powers had long pursued control of the Americas, viewing them as well-needed resources and proof of power. Spain, the Netherlands and Britain all had unresolved tensions following settlements like the Treaty of Breda, the Treaty of Westminster and the Treaty of Nijmegen. By 1713, the islands of Saint Lucia and Tobago were the subjects of Anglo-Franco conflict. However, the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle declared neutrality in Tobago, Saint Vincent and Dominica, allowing all European powers unfettered economic access and forbidding garrisons.
In addition, France gained Saint Lucia as a colony. In contrast to French and British unhappiness with the treaty, Italy gained stability for the first time in the 18th century; the new territorial settlement and the accession of the peaceful Ferdinand VI of Spain allowed the Aix settlement to last until the out
American Indian Wars
The American Indian Wars is the collective name for the various armed conflicts fought by European governments and colonists, the United States and Canadian governments and American and Canadian settlers, against various American Indian and First Nation tribes. These conflicts occurred in North America from the time of the earliest colonial settlements in the 17th century until the 1920s; the various Indian Wars resulted from a wide variety of factors, including cultural clashes, land disputes, criminal acts committed on both sides. European powers and the colonies enlisted Indian tribes to help them conduct warfare against one another's colonial settlements. After the American Revolution, many conflicts were local to specific states or regions and involved disputes over land use; the British Royal Proclamation of 1763, included in the Constitution of Canada, prohibited white settlers from taking the lands of indigenous peoples in Canada without signing a treaty with them. It continues to be the law in Canada today, 11 Numbered Treaties, covering most of the First Nations lands, limited the number of such conflicts.
As white settlers spread westward across America after 1780, the size and intensity of armed conflicts increased between settlers and various cultures of Indians. The climax came in the War of 1812, which resulted in the defeat of major Indian coalitions in the Midwest and the South. Conflict with settlers became much less common and were resolved by treaty through sale or exchange of territory between the federal government and specific tribes; the Indian Removal Act of 1830 authorized the US government to enforce the Indian removal from east of the Mississippi River to the west, what the government considered the sparsely populated American frontier. The federal US policy of removal was refined in the West, as American settlers kept expanding their territories, to relocate Indian tribes to specially designated and federally protected reservations; the colonization of North America by the English, Spanish and Swedish was resisted by some Indian tribes and assisted by other tribes. Wars and other armed conflicts in the 17th and 18th centuries included: Beaver Wars between the Iroquois and the French, who allied with the Algonquians Anglo-Powhatan Wars, including the 1622 Jamestown Massacre, between English colonists and the Powhatan Confederacy in the Colony of Virginia Pequot War of 1636–38 between the Pequot tribe and colonists from the Massachusetts Bay Colony and Connecticut Colony Kieft's War in the Dutch territory of New Netherland between colonists and the Lenape people Peach Tree War, the large-scale attack by the Susquehannocks and allied tribes on several New Netherland settlements along the Hudson River Esopus Wars, conflicts between the Esopus tribe of Lenape Indians and colonial New Netherlanders in Ulster County, New York King Philip's War in New England between colonists and the Narragansett people Tuscarora War in the Province of North Carolina Yamasee War in the Province of South Carolina Dummer's War in northern New England and French Acadia Pontiac's War in the Great Lakes region Lord Dunmore's War in western Virginia In several instances, warfare in America was a reflection of European rivalries, with American Indian tribes splitting their alliances among the powers siding with their trading partners.
Various tribes fought on each side in King William's War, Queen Anne's War, Dummer's War, King George's War, the French and Indian War, allying with British or French colonists according to their own self interests. Indian tribes differed in their alliances during the American Revolution and the War of 1812; the Cherokees supported the British in the Revolutionary War and raided frontier American settlements in the hope of driving out the settlers, four Iroquois tribes fought against the Patriots. Other tribes fought for the American Patriots, such as the Oneida people and Tuscarora people of the Iroquois Confederacy in New York. British merchants and government agents began supplying weapons to Indians living in the United States following the Revolution in the hope that, if a war broke out, they would fight on the British side; the British further planned to set up an Indian nation in the Ohio-Wisconsin area to block further American expansion. The US protested and went to war in 1812. Most Indian tribes supported the British those allied with Tecumseh, but they were defeated by General William Henry Harrison.
The War of 1812 spread to Indian rivalries, as well. Many refugees from defeated tribes went over the border to Canada. During the early 19th century, the federal government was under pressure by settlers in many regions to expel Indians from their areas; the Indian Removal Act of 1830 offered Indians the choices of assimilating and giving up tribal membership, relocation to an Indian reservation with an exchange or payment for lands, or moving west. Some resisted most notably the Seminoles in a series of wars in Florida, they were never defeated. The United States gave up on the remainder, by living defensively deep in the swamps and Everglades. Others were moved to reservations west of the Mississippi River, most famously the Cherokee whose relocation was call
Battle of Rocoux
The Battle of Rocoux was a French victory over an allied Austrian, British and Dutch army in Rocourt, outside Liège during War of the Austrian Succession. The result was a major French victory but not the crushing blow French commander Maurice de Saxe had hoped to inflict; the French army was commanded by Marshall Saxe and the army of the Pragmatic Allies by Prince Charles of Lorraine of Austria and the British General Sir John Ligonier. Saxe had nearly completed his campaign to take Flanders and was threatening to invade the Netherlands; the allies took up a position next to Liège with the Dutch under Waldeck on the left from Liège to Rocoux, the British and Hanoverians in the center and the Austrians on the right to the River Jeker. The French main attack went against the Dutch portion on the left of the allied line between Liege and Rocoux. Outnumbering the Dutch, the French defeated them on the third assault; the Dutch were forced to withdraw behind the Hannoverian lines. In the face of a general French advance the allied line began to give way.
The Austrians on the allied right were not engaged and made no attempt to take the initiative and advance against the French left flank. Ligonier's cavalry and some British and Dutch infantry formed a rear guard that held off the French as the army withdrew; the French were victorious. The French captured Liège; this was the second great victory of three after Fontenoy and prior to Lauffeld. The French were victorious capturing Liège and breaking Austrian control over the Austrian Netherlands for the remainder of the war. Chisholm, Hugh, ed.. "Flag". Encyclopædia Britannica. 10. Cambridge University Press. Pp. 454–463. Ripley, George. "Flag". The American Cyclopædia. 8. P. 250. "The Vinkhuijzen collection of military uniforms: France, 1750-1757". New York Public Library. 25 March 2011. Archived from the original on 8 March 2013. Smith, Whitney. Flags through the ages and across the world. England: McGraw-Hill. Pp. 114–119. ISBN 0-07-059093-1. Browning, Reed; the War of the Austrian Succession, St. Martin's Press, New York,: ISBN 0-312-12561-5 Chandler, David.
The Art of Warfare in the Age of Marlborough. Spellmount Limited,: ISBN 0-946771-42-1 Skrine, Francis Henry. Fontenoy and Great Britain's Share in the War of the Austrian Succession 1741-48. London, Edinburgh, 1906
Battle at Port-la-Joye
The Battle at Port-la-Joye was a battle in King George's War that took place with British against French troops and Mi'kmaq militia on the banks of present-day Hillsborough River, Prince Edward Island in the summer of 1746. French officer Jean-Baptiste Nicolas Roch de Ramezay sent French and Mi'kmaq forces to Port-la-Joye where they surprised and defeated a company of 200 Massachusetts militia in two British naval vessels that were gathering provisions for captured Louisbourg. After the first fall of Louisbourg, British commander William Pepperrell sent an expedition against Ile Saint Jean in July 1745; this force divided, one part going to the other to Port-La-Joye. At Three Rivers, Acadian Jean Pierre Roma and others did not give any resistance because they only had one six pound cannon to mount a defence. Roma, along with his son and daughter escaped into the woods where they witnessed the New Englanders burn the village; the family escaped to Saint Peters and went on to Quebec, remaining there until the end of the war.
At the same time, in July 1745, the other English detachment landed at Port-la-Joye. Under the command of Joseph de Pont Duvivier, the French had a garrison of 20 French troops at Port-la-Joye; the troops fled and New Englanders burned the capital to the ground. Duvivier and the twenty men retreated up the Northeast River, pursued by the New Englanders until the French troops received reinforcements from the Acadian militia and the Mi'kmaq; the French troops and their allies were able to drive the New Englanders to their boats, nine New Englanders killed, wounded or made prisoner. The New Englanders took six Acadian hostages, who would be executed if the Acadians or Mi'kmaq rebelled against New England control; the New England troops left for Louisbourg. Duvivier and his 20 troops left for Quebec. After the fall of Louisbourg, the resident French population of Ile Royal were deported to France; the Acadians of Ile Saint-Jean lived under the threat of deportation for the remainder of the war. The following year, in an effort to recapture Acadia, an expedition under the command of de Ramezay was sent from Quebec to work with the Duc d'Anville Expedition.
De Ramezay's force arrived in Nova Scotia in July 1746. He had 21 officers, he made camp at Chignecto, where he was met by 300 Abenaki from St. John River and about 300 Mi'kmaq from Nova Scotia; the total French-Indian force numbered close to 1,300 men. De Ramezay's soldiers spent the summer and the fall waiting for the arrival of the long overdue D'Anville expedition. During this time period, Ramzay sent troops to British-occupied Port-La-Joye on present-day Prince Edward Island. Captain John Rous commanded a schooner on a tender. On board the vessel was 40 soldiers of F. B. Fuller's 29th Regiment including Captain Hugh Scott; the newly appointed British governor of the Isle Royal, Commodore Sir Charles Knowles, 1st Baronet sent Rous to get supplies from the Acadians to feed the British troops at Louisbourg. Ramezay sent French officer Boishébert to Ile Saint-Jean on a reconnaissance to assess the size of the New England force. Boishébert learned there were two English naval vessels and 200 troops - the galley HMS Shirley and HMS Ruby - at Port-la-Joye boarding supplies for Louisburg.
On board the vessels were at least two of the Acadian hostages taken by New Englanders the year before. After Boishébert returned, Ramezay sent Joseph-Michel Legardeur de Croisille et de Montesson along with over 500 men, 200 of whom were Mi'kmaq, to Port-La-Joye. While the 29th regiment waited for the Acadians to release half of their cattle for the British at Louisbourg, the regiment was unarmed in the field on the banks of the Northeast River, close to Port-la-Joye, making hay, their arms remained in a tent. On July 11, de Montesson caught the New England troops by surprise; the Acadian and Mi'kmaq force "massacred" 34 of the British troops. The British knocked out two others with a firelock. While the attack was happening, Captain Rous and Captain Scott were on the Shirley, which open fired on the attackers, with little effect; the attacking party retreated and Captain Scott took 40 Acadians prisoners and ransomed them to the commander of the Duc D'Anville Expedition. On July 23, 1746, de Montesson returned to de Ramezay at Chignecto with two of the Acadian prisoners the New Englanders had taken numerous English prisoners and the Acadian pilot.
Months Ramzey was unsuccessful in his attack on Annapolis Royal because of the failure of the Duc d'Anville Expedition to arrive at the capital. The following year Ramezay would have victory at the Battle of Grand Pré. Montesson took the prisoners first to Baie-Verte and Ramezay sent them under heavy guard to the prison camp at Québec, along with a commendation for Montesson for having distinguished himself in his first independent command; the battle led to an order that all officers in the 29th Regiment must always be armed, thus earning their first nickname as the Ever Sworded due to the swords the officers are required to wear when off-duty a tradition still in effect today as the orderly officer is still armed at the officers mess. Military history of Nova Scotia List of massacres in Canada Harvey, Daniel C; the French régime in Prince Edward Island, Yale University Press. 1926. Lockerby, Earle. "Threats and indulgences: Ile-Saint-Jean in 1745-1747." Island Magazine 54: 2-10. Major H. Everard, History of Thos.
Farrington's Regiment, subsequently designated the 29th Foot, 1694 to 1891. Worcester, 1
