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THE story of the manner in which the eastern
coast of North America became known to the people of Europe is one
that can never be told because, of the hardy men who first explored
these shores, few have left any record of their voyages. leaving out
of the account the voyages of the Norsemen in the eleventh century,
which had no effect on the settlement of the new world, the first
Europeans to reach the coast of North America were John and
Sebastian Cabot, father and son, who conducted an expedition under
the patronage of Henry VIII. of England. The chief interest of this
voyage arises from the fact, that it was made the basis of the
claims put forward by England to the ownership of all North America
by right of priority of discovery. The first voyage of the Cabots
was made in 1497. Their land-fail has been the subject of much
controversy, Labrador, Newfoundland and Cape Breton each having
their advocates, while one learned writer claims that they entered
the Gulf of St. Lawrence by the Straits of Cabot and discovered
Prince Edward Island. In 1498 Sebastian Cabot made a second voyage
to the new world, and traversed a considerable portion of the coast
of North America, hut apparently lie (lid not reach any portion of
New Brunswick. His track was followed by Gaspar de Cortereal, a
Portuguese navigator, in 1300, but these voyages led to nothing
substantial except that they showed the way to the fishermen of
Europe who soon began to resort to the coast of America.
The Basque and Breton fishermen began to fish on
the Banks of Newfoundland and the coast of Cape Breton as early as
the year 1504, and the. shores of that portion of America soon
became familiar to them. There can be no doubt that they entered
both the Gulf of St. Lawrence and the Bay of Fundv in the early
years of the sixteenth century, long before any voyager who has
written an account of his discoveries had sailed on these waters. Of
these voyagers it is only necessary for me to mention two in
connection with the history of New Brunswick, Jacques Carrier and
Samuel de Cham-plain. Carrier's first voyage to America was made in
1534, under the patronage of Francis 1. oi France. Carrier had two
small vessels of 00 tons burthen, each carrying (51 men, and he
entered the Gulf of St. Lawrence through the Straits of Belleisle.
Many learned papers have been written for the purpose of describing
his track through the Gulf and identifying the places he visited,
but it is not necessary to deal with this matter except in general
terms. What is certain is that he sighted the coast of New Brunswick
somewhere in the vicinity of Point Escuminac, and followed the coast
north to Cape Miscou, entering the Bay Ohaleur, and exploring it for
its entire length. Cartier visited severs] of the harbours in the
Bay Chaleur and traded with the Indians It was in the month of July
and the weather wa.s excessively hot, hence the name which he gave
to the beautiful bay which he was the first to describe, if not to
explore, "The Bay of Heat."
Champlain's
first voyage to Acadia was made in 1604, just seventy years after
that of Jacques Cartier, yet in that long period hardly anything had
been done to promote the settlement of the northern parts of America
and nothing whatever to people Acadia. Champlain has told the story
of his voyages to Acadia, in a work of which many editions have been
published.
The leader of the expedition which Champlain
conducted to Acadia in 1604 was De Monte, a gentleman attached to
the person of Henry IV. of France, and his voyage was undertaken
under the patronage of that great King. De Monte and Champlain
reached the coast of Acadia in April, and they followed it from Cape
La Have to the Bay of Fundv which was entered and thoroughly
explored. On the 24th June they reached the mouth of the River St.
John, and, as it was the day of St. John the Baptist, Champlain gave
it that name, which it has borne ever since. By the Indians it was
called the Wigoudi. Champlain's book contains a very good chart of
the harbour of St. John, and, it appears from his narrative, that
the Indians
had a town there,' in which they resided a considerable part of the
year.
' From the St. John Champlain and De Mouts went
to the St. Croix, and on an island in that river erected buildings
and fortifications with a view to forming a permanent settlement.
But the place' was ill chosen, for the island was small and it was
without wood and water. It seems to have been selected with a view
to security from the Indians, but the precaution was needless,
because the Indians proved friendly and they always continued so to
the French while they retained possession of Acadia A more dangerous
foe to the settlement appeared during the winter in the shape of an
epidemic of scurvy, which proved so fatal that out of seventy-nine
colonists, thirty-five died, and many of the survivors were only
saved by the timely arrival of warmer weather. This led to the
abandonment of St. Croix Island and the removal of the colonists to
Port Royal. There, on the shores of the Basin, was established a
settlement which became the headquarters of French power in Acadia,
and which witnessed as many changes and vicissitudes as any other
spot of earth in North America.
The whole of Acadia, when first visited by
Europeans, was the hunting ground of tribes of Indians who had dwelt
there probably for many centuries. The whole of the peninsula of
Nova Scotia and the entire coast of New Brunswick was given up to
the Micmacs, who are first described by Cartier, who came i„i
contact with them when he explored the Bay of Chaleur in 1534. When
De Monts and Champlain first came to Acadia they found the Micmacs
living at Port Royal and at the mouth of the St. John river. Their
chief, Membertou, was a very aged man who remembered Carrier's visit
to the Bay of Chaleur, and in this way the identity of the Indians
seen bv this early explorer is established. In Champlain's time
another tribe of Indians, called the Etchemins or Malicites,
occupied the upper portion of the St. John River. At a later period
they extended their camps farther down the river, and finally they
reached its mouth, the Micmacs giving way to them and confining
themselves to the peninsula of Nova
Scotia and that portion of New Brunswick
which borders on the Gulf of St. Lawrence and the Bay of Chaleur.
These two Indian tribes, although the languages they spoke were
entirely different, were always friends and allies, and have never
been at war with each other since the first settlement oi' the
country by the French. Living as they did, mainly by hunting and
fishing, they never were numerous and Father Biard, a Jesuit
missionary, who was engaged in the work of converting them, writing
in the year 1612, estimates the number of Micmacs at 2,000 and
Malicites at 1,000. The Micmacs now number 3,852 and the Malicites
in New Brunswick and Quebec 818. The l'assamaquoddy Indians are
Malicites. If this estimate is correct, the Micmacs have increased
considerably in three hundred years while the Malicites have not
declined in numbers. Indeed their mode of living made it impossible
that they should ever have been numerous, so that their legends of
being at. one time great and powerful may be dismissed as unworthy
of belief. The conversion of the Indians to the Christian religion
was one of the avowed objects of the men who undertook to found
colonies in Acadia and the missionary usually accompanied the
trader, and indeed sometimes preceded him.
In
1611
two Jesuit fathers, Biaitl and Masse, came to Acadia to devote
themselves to missionary work, and Masse spent some time among the
Indians at the mouth of the St. John River, learning the Indian
language and endeavouring to teach these untamed savages the
doctrines of Christianity. This was the beginning of a work which
was continued by the French missionaries for a century and a half
with great zeal and energy, but apparently without producing much
effect on the Indian's nature. The savages became Christians after a
fashion, but this did not prevent them from continuing the same
cruel practices, in war and peace, that hail prevailed among their
forefathers. Cowardice and treachery were always the leading
features of the Indian character in the early days of Acadia and as
there is no scope in modern days for the exercise of these
qualities, shiftlessness and laziness have taken their places. Hence
three hundred years of Christian teaching and civilizing influences
have hardly raised the Indian a single step above the condition he
was in when first visited by white men.
The colony which DeMonts and Champlain first
settled at Port Royal in 1605, had a sore struggle for existence.
The Charter of DeMonts gave him jurisdiction over the territory of
Acadia between the 40th and 46tli degrees of latitude and the
exclusive right to trade between the 40tli degree of latitude and
Cape de Raze. But these privileges (lid not yield him much profit.
His monopoly of trade was revoked three years after it had been
granted and Poutrincourt, a gentleman o£ Picardy, who had been with
DeMonts in his first voyage to Acadia, undertook to continue the
colony at Port Royal. He obtained a grant of Port Royal from the
King of France and he seems also to have claimed both the trade and
the shore fishery of Acadia, for Father Hiard relates that, in 1611,
his son Biencourt broke up a fishing establishment which Pontgrave
had erected on an island on the St. John River named Emeninec. This
statement is interesting as showing that the splendid fisheries of
that great river had thus early attracted attention. The Port Royal
colony was broken up by Argal, an adventurer from Virginia, in 1613,
came Biencourt, who was at the head of it, with a few followers, had
to take refuge in the forest. For the next twenty years Port Royal
disappears from history.
The English laid claim to Acadia on the ground
of Cabot's discovery and in 1012 James I. gave Sir William
Alexander, a Scotch gentleman, a grant in North America which
embraced the whole of the provinces of New Brunswick and Nova
Scotia. The territory thus granted was to be known by the name of
Nova Scotia, and by that name the whole of that territory continued
to be described by the English until the year 1784, when New
Brunswick was made a separate province, and the name of Nova Scotia
was confined to the peninsula. Sir William Alexander was ambitious
to establish a colony in Nova Scotia and in 1628 he settled a number
of Scotch colonists at Port Royal in the ruined fort originally
built by Champlain. But this colony was abandoned four years later
when Acadia was restored to France under the terms of the Treaty of
Suza. The country was placed under the control of the Company of New
France, a powerful association under the patronage of Cardinal
Richelieu, and new settlements were formed at La Have and Port
Royal. The colonists then brought to Acadia by the Commander Isaac
de Razilly, became the ancestors of the Acadian people of today.
In the meantime the missionary and the trader
were at work i» the territory now known as New Brunswick. In 1619
two associations of merchants were formed in France to develop the
resources of Acadia. One of these companies engaged in the shore
fishery and the other in the fur trade. The fishing company hail its
establishment at Miscou, while the fur traders had their post at the
River St. John. To provide tor the religious wants of these
fishermen and traders, and to aid in the conversion of the Indians,
three Recollet Missionaries were sent out from France. A melancholy
interest attaches to this mission from the fact that one of the
Iiecollets, Father Bernardian, in 1623 died of hunger and fatigue
while travelling through the woods from Miscou and Nejnsiquit to the
River St. John, where the missionaries had their headquarters.
Father Le Clerg states that in 1620 the Recollets had a mission
station at Nepisiquit. All these missions appear to have been
abandoned during the war between France and England which began in
1627, because the fishing and trading establishments were then
broken up, but they were renewed soon after the peace by the
Jesuits. Two fathers of this great order were sent to Piscou in
1631, to minister to the spiritual wants of twenty-three Frenchmen
who were living there and engaged in the fisheries. The place proved
very unhealthy; most of the Frenchmen and one of the Jesuits died
and the other had to return to France. This mission, however, was
continued by other Jesuit fathers and in 1044 a branch was
established at Nepisiquit.
In 1635 St. John, which for centuries had been
the residence of savages, became the home of the most remarkable man
who appears in Acadian history, Charles De La Tour. This person came
to Acadia with his father, Claude De St. Estienne Seigneur De La
Tour in 1009, when a mere boy. The La Tours were people of birth and
property in France who had been ruined by the civil ware which
afflicted that country prior to the reign of Henry IV. The elder La
Tour was a Huguenot, but his son seems to have been in his latter
years reconciled to the Church of Home. He was a member of the, Port
Royal Colony when it was broken up by Argal in 1613 and he shared in
the fortunes of Biencourt and became his lieutenant and friend. When
the latter retired from Acadia he left I^a Tour in possession of his
property there and free to carve out his own fortunes. He lived for
several years in a fort near Cape Sable, but, in 1635, on receiving
a grant of the territory at the mouth of the River St. John, he
removed to the new fort which he had erected there, a stronghold
which was destined to become, in future years, the scene of heroic
valor and of frightful cruelty.
La Tour was one of the lieutenants of DeRazilly,
and, when the latter died, he continued to exercise authority over a
portion of Acadia under a commission which he had received from
Louis XIII in 1613. But he had a rival and enemy in Charles deMenou,
Sieur d'Aulnay Charnisay, who also sought to compass his ruin.
D'Aulnay had been brought to Acadia by De Razilly, and served under
him and when De Razilly died, D'Aulnay took possession of his
property under an arrangement he made with the deceased Commander's
brother and assumed the state and functions of a lioyal governor. He
bu'lt a new fort at Port Royal and proceeded to strengthen himself
on all sides with a view to becoming the sole power in Acadia. He
had a very strong motive for this in the fact that La Tour had the
control of the St. John River and its tributaries, beyond all
comparison the best hunting ground in Acadia, although the territory
through which the St. John flowed was nominally under D'Aulnay's
jurisdiction, D'Aulnay used his influence at the French Court to
injure La Tour, but at first without much success. In 1638 a royal
letter was addressed to both La Tour and D'Aulnay defining the
limits of their jurisdictions as governors of Acadia and requiring
them to preserve a good understanding with each other. D'Aulnay was
given authority over all the territory of Acadia north of the Bay of
Fundv, while La Tour hail similar jurisdiction over all the
territory south of it. But as La Tour's fort and settlement at St.
John was within D'Aulnav's jurisdiction, and the latter's
settlements at La Have and Port Royal were within La Tour's
jurisdiction, these places were excepted, and were to continue to
remain under the control of their owners. This, it must he
confessed, was an arrangement well calculated to breed disputes
between the rival Seigneurs.
D'Aulnay was not discouraged by the failure of
his first attempt and he continued to use the influence of his
powerful friends at the French Court to destroy his rival. The
character of La Tour was painted by them in the darkest of colors
and his wife was denounced as a Huguenot, who was leading her
husband into rebellious courses. The result of these representations
was that a royal order was issued in February 1641, commanding La
Totir to embark and come to France immediately, and, if he failed to
obey, D'Aulnay was ordered to seize his person and his forts and to
make an inventory of his effects. La Tour set this order at defiance
and D'Aulnay went to France to obtain the assistance necessary to
carry it out. Txi Tour in the meantime sent to his friends at
Rochelle for assistance in the struggle which he knew to be near.
Early in the spring of 1043 D'Aulnay with two
ships and a galliot and four small vessels, manned by live hundred
men attacked Fort La Tour and, being unable to carry it by assault,
proceeded to blockade it. This blockade had lasted several weeks and
supplies were running low when the Clement, a ship from Rochelle,
appeared on the coast. She had been sent out by La Tour's friends in
France and, in addition to abundance of ammunition and supplies,
brought a timely reinforcement of 140 men. Fortunately lier presence
was not discovered by D'Anlnav's fleet, and La Tour and his wife
succeeded in boarding her in the night and set sail for Boston,
where they hoped to obtain assistance. The authorities of Boston
refused to grant La Tour any help officially, but they permitted him
to hire ships and men to enable him to return to his fort in safety.
La Tour hired four vessels in Boston with fifty two men and
thirty-eight pieces of cannon, and enlisted ninety-two soldiers.
When La Tour's ships made their appearance oft Partridge Island
D'Aulnay's blockading fleet promptly hoisted sail and stood for Port
Royal. Tour and his allies followed and attacked them and inflicted
considerable loss on the enemy.
After this victory Lady La Tour went to France
to obtain more help against D'Aulnay, who was more determined than
ever to bring about her husband's ruin. D'Aulnay went to France also
and while there heard of the arrival of Lady La Tom. He procured an
order for her arrest, but she was warned in time and escaped to
England. She returned to Fort La Tour in the summer of 164L In the
following February, while La Tour was absent, D'Aulnay attacked Fori
La Tour with an armed ship, but Lady La Tour inspired the garrison
with such courage that he was beaten off with heavy loss. His vessel
was so much shattered by the cannon of the fort that, to prevent her
from sinking, he hail to run her ashore below Sand Point. Twenty of
his men were killed and thirteen wounded. Two months later D'Aulnay
made another attempt on Fort La Tour with a much larger force and
succeeded in capturing it. He hanged all the garrison except one
man, who was pardoned on becoming executioner for the others, and
Lady La Tour was treated with so much
cruelty and indignity that she died three weeks after the surrender
of the fort, leaving a little child to the mercy of her conqueror.
The ruin of La Tour was thus completed and he was compelled to take
refuge in Boston and afterwards in Quebec, while his rival D'Aulnay
occupied his possessions and enjoyed the large and profitable trade
which belonged to them. |
