Canada Under Attack Read Free

retake Fort Albany. As D’Iberville’s ship tried to sail out of the mouth of the Albany River into James Bay, two English ships arrived to blockade him. The standoff lasted throughout the winter — while the English and French stared one another down the temperature dropped and all three ships became trapped in the ice. English on the Albany River. When the English requested a truce in order to hunt for fresh game he denied them. Because they lacked adequate supplies the English crew starting showing signs of scurvy. When D’Iberville heard that the English were falling ill he sent word that he would allow the English surgeon to hunt. When the unfortunate surgeon ventured out, D’Iberville promptly arrested him. Although no shots were exchanged, several of the English died of scurvy, cold, and other diseases. Eventually the English were forced to surrender. D’Iberville took his ship back to Quebec full of furs and English prisoners.
    D’Iberville was equally capable of compassion, honour, and unspeakable cruelty. It was his cruelty that won him infamy during his confrontation with the

    D’Iberville’s Defeat of the English Ships in Hudson Bay, 1697.
    For the next 10 years the English and the French would jockey for position in Hudson and James Bays, with first one and then the other seizing control. More often than not, D’Iberville was at the forefront of the French efforts. But he was seldom able to hold onto what he took and 10 years of warring in Canada’s frozen north had wearied him.
    D’Iberville was ready for a new challenge. He found it on the Atlantic coast, where the French and English were engaged in a battle for control of both the fur trade and rich stocks of fish. For more than a century, English and French fishing boats had operated in the waters off Newfoundland. Various settlements were founded by both countries, but they were isolated, sparsely populated outposts. They had little to do with one another and rarely came into contact, let along conflict, with one another. The populations of these outposts were extremely hardy people who had little experience with war. There were a few soldiers garrisoned in the far reaches of Newfoundland, but there did not seem to be much reason for them to be there. However, by the middle of the 17th century the English had greatly increased their presence in the waters southeast of Newfoundland. The area became known as the English Shores.
    The French fishermen were unimpressed. Renewed interest in the fur trade, privateers who preyed on boats from both countries and rivalries from a far-off continent aggravated the tension between the colonies. The French heard that the English fishermen were making a fortune selling their salted cod to Spain and Portugal. They also knew that the English settlements, like Ferryland on the southern shore of the Avalon Peninsula, were isolated, sparse, and lacked basic defensive works. They would make easy targets. France called upon D’Iberville, fresh from his successes at Fort Henry, to drive the English from the shores of Newfoundland once and for all.
    The French government wanted to have sole control of the region and gave D’Iberville the task of eliminating the English presence there. For his first target he chose Fort William Henry, along the Acadia-Maine border, close to present-day Bristol, Maine. The fort was easily taken and D’Iberville moved north. He arrived in the French capital of Placentia, Newfoundland, at the end of August 1696. In Placentia, D’Iberville clashed with the governor, Jacques-François de Monbeton de Brouillan, who, as the civilian representative of the Government of France, had ultimate command over the mission. De Brouillan had a reputation as a strong governor who had successfully defended his colony from repeated English attacks, but he was also a rapacious man who maintained a monopoly over trade and was rumoured to have forced his