JOHN CHURCHILL, FIRST DUKE OF MARLBOROUGH From the painting in the National Portrait Gallery
Perhaps the gay gentlemen of the Governing Committee made merry too long at times, for it appears to have been necessary to impose a fine on all committee men who did not attend 'yt one hour after ye deputy-governor turns up ye hour glass,' the fines to go to the Poor Box as 'token of gratitude for God's so great a blessing to ye Comp'y.'
In February the Governing Committee was always in a great bustle chartering or buying frigates for the year's voyages. Then the goods for trade, to be exchanged with the Indians for furs, were chosen and stored. In the list for 1672 are found '200 fowling pieces and 400 powder horns and 500 hatchets.' Gewgaws, beads, ribbons, and blankets innumerable were taken on the voyages, and always more or less liquor; but the latter, it should be remarked, was not traded to the Indians except in times of keen competition, when the Company had to fight rivals who used it in trade. Secret orders were given to the captains before sailing. These orders contained the harbour signals. Ships not displaying these signals were to be fired on by the forts of Hudson Bay or lured to wreck by false lights. The sailing orders were always signed 'a God speede, a good wind, a faire saile, y'r loving friends'; and the gentlemen of the Committee usually went down to the docks at Gravesend to search lockers for illicit trade, to shake hands and toss a sovereign and quaff drinks. From the point where a returning ship was 'bespoken' the chief trader would take horse and ride post-haste to London with the bills and journals of the voyage. These would beused to check unlading. Next, the sorting of the furs, the payment of the seamen's wages—about £20 per year to each man; then the public auction of the furs. A pin would be stuck in a lighted candle and bids received till the light burnt below the pin. Sack and canary and claret were served freely at the sales. Money accruing from sales was kept in an iron box at the Goldsmiths' exchange, and later in the warehouse in Fenchurch Street.
Trading in the early days was conducted with a ceremony such as kings might have practised in international treaty. Dressed in regimentals, with coloured velvet capes lined with silk, swords clanking, buglers and drummers rattling a tattoo, the white trader walked out to meet the Indian chief. The Indian prostrated himself and presented the kingly white man with priceless furs. The white man kneeled and whiffed pipes and thanked the Sun for the privilege of meeting so great warriors, and through his interpreters begged to present the Great Chief with what would render him invincible among all foes—firearms. Then with much parleying the little furs such as rabbit and muskrat were exchanged for the gewgaws.
Later, the coming of rival traders compelled the Company to change its methods and to fix a standard of trade. This standard varied with the supply of furs and the caprice of fashion; but at first in respect to beaver it stood thus:
½lb.beads1 beaver.1kettle1 "1lb.shot1 "5lbs.sugar1 "1lb.tobacco1 "1gal.brandy4 "2awls1 "12buttons1 "20fish-hooks1 "20flints1 "1gun12 "1pistol4 "8balls1 "
A wicket would be opened at the side of the main gate of the fort. Up to this wicket the Indians would file with their furs and exchange them according to the standard. Tally was kept at first with wampum shells or little sticks; then with bits of lead melted from teachests and stamped with the initials of the fort. Finally these devices were supplantedby modern money. We may suppose that the red man was amply able to take care of himself in the trade, especially when rivals at other points were bidding for the furs. If the white man's terms were exorbitant and no rival trader was within reach, the Indian's remedy was a scalping foray. Oftener than not the Indian was in debt for provisions advanced before the hunt. If the Indian forgot his debt or carried his fur to a competitor, as he often did in whole flotillas, the white man would have his revenge some season when food was scarce; or, if his physical prowess permitted, he would take his revenge on the spot by administering a sound thrashing to the transgressor. It is on record that one trader, in the early days of Moose Factory, broke an oar while chastising an Indian who had failed in his duty.
Many of the lonely bachelors at the forts contracted marriage with native women. These marriages were entered on the books of the Company, and were considered as valid as if bound by clergy. Sometimes they led to unhappy results. When men returned from the service, the Indian wife, transplanted to England, lived in wretched loneliness; and the children—'les petits,' as they are enteredin the books—were still less at home amid English civilization. Gradually it became customary to leave the Indian women in their native land and to support them with a pension deducted from the wages of the retired husband and father. This pension was assured by the Company's system of holding back one-third of its servants' wages for a retiring fund. If a servant had left any 'petits' behind him, a sum of money was withheld from his wages to provide a pension for them, and a record of it was kept on the books. This rule applied even to men who were distinguished in the service.
In June 1670, one month after the charter was granted, three ships—theWavero, theShaftesbury Pink, and thePrince Rupert—conveying forty men and a cargo of supplies, sailed for Hudson Bay. Gillam commanded thePrince Rupert, Radisson went as general superintendent of trade, and Charles Bayly as governor of the fort at the Rupert river. Gorst the secretary, Romulus the surgeon, and Groseilliers accompanied the expedition. The ships duly arrived at Fort Charles, and, while Bayly and his men prepared the fort for residence and Groseilliers plied trade with theIndians, Radisson cruised the west coast of the Bay on theWavero. He made observations at Moose and Albany rivers, and passed north to Nelson harbour, where Button had wintered half a century before. Here, on the projection of land between two great rivers—the future site of York Factory—Radisson erected the arms of the English king. The southern river he named Hayes, after Sir James Hayes, Prince Rupert's secretary. The mouth of this river was a good place to get furs, for down its broad tide came the canoes of the Assiniboines, the 'Stone Boilers' whom Radisson had met near Lake Superior long ago, and of the Crees, who had first told him of the Sea of the North.
Radisson returned to England with Gillam on thePrince Rupert, while Groseilliers wintered on the Bay; and it appears that, during the next three years, Radisson spent the winters in London advising the Company, and the summers on the Bay, cruising and trading on the west coast. In 1672 he married Mary Kirke. Sir James Hayes said afterwards that he 'misled her into marrying him,' but there is nothing to show that the wife herself ever thought so. Perhaps Radisson hoped that his marriage to the daughter of one of the leading directors of the Company wouldstrengthen his position. He received £100 a year for his services, but, although his efforts had turned a visionary search for the North-West Passage into a prosperous trading enterprise, he was not a shareholder in the Company.
Every year three ships were sailing to the Bay and returning to England laden with peltry; but in 1672 it was observed by the traders at the fort that fewer Indians than usual came down the river with furs. In the next year there were still fewer. For some reason the trade was falling off. Radisson urged Bayly to establish new forts on the west coast, and at length the governor consented to go with him on his regular summer cruise to Nelson. When they came back to Rupert in August they were surprised to find the fort tenanted by a Jesuit from Quebec, Father Albanel, who handed letters to Radisson and Groseilliers, and passports from the governor of New France to Bayly. The sudden decrease of trade was explained. French traders coming overland from the St Lawrence had been intercepting the Indians. But France and England were at peace and bound in closest amity by secrettreaty, and Bayly was compelled to receive the passports and to welcome the Jesuit, as the representative of a friendly nation, to the hospitality of Fort Charles. What the letters to Radisson and Groseilliers contained we can only guess, but we do know that their contents, made the French explorers thoroughly dissatisfied with their position in the Hudson's Bay Company. Bayly accused the two Frenchmen of being in collusion with the Company's rivals. A quarrel followed and at this juncture Captain Gillam arrived on one of the Company's ships. The Frenchmen were suspected of treachery, and Gillam suggested that they should return to England and explain what seemed to need explaining.
The Admiralty records for 1674 contain mention of Captain Gillam's arrival from Hudson Bay on theShaftesbury Pinkwith 'a French Jesuit, a little ould man, and an Indian, a very lusty man.' This Jesuit could not have been Albanel, for in the French archives is conclusive proof that Albanel returned to Quebec. The 'little ould man' must have been another Jesuit found by Gillam at the Bay.
The winter of 1673-74 found Radisson andGroseilliers back in England pressing the directors of the Company for better terms. The Governing Committee first required oaths of fealty. Conferences were multiplied and prolonged; but still Radisson and Groseilliers refused to go back to the Bay until something was done. On June 29, 1674, the Governing Committee unanimously voted that 'there be allowed to Mr Radisson £100 per annum in consideration of services, out of which shall be deducted what hath already been paid him; and if it pleases God to bless the Company with good success, hereafter that they come to be in a prosperous condition, then they will reassume consideration.' 'Prosperous condition!' At this time the shareholders were receiving dividends of fifty and one hundred per cent.
Now, in Radisson's pockets were offers from Colbert, the great minister at the French Court, for service in the French Navy at three times this salary. Abruptly, in the fall of 1674, the two Frenchmen left London and took service under Colbert. But now another difficulty blocked Radisson's advance. Colbert insisted that Radisson's wife should come to France to live. He thought that as long as Madame Radisson remained in England her husband'sloyalty could not be trusted. Besides, her father, Sir John Kirke, was a claimant against France for £40,000 damages arising out of the capture of Quebec in 1629 by his relatives and its restoration to France in 1632 without recognition of the family's rights. If Sir John's daughter was residing in Paris as the wife of a French naval officer, the minister saw that this dispute might be more easily adjusted; and so he declined to promote the two Frenchmen until Madame Radisson came to France.
In 1679, during shore leave from the navy, Radisson met one of his old cronies of Quebec—Aubert de la Chesnaye, a fur trader. 'He proposed to me,' Radisson says, 'to undertake to establish the beaver trade in the great Bay where I had been some years before on account of the English.' It may be supposed that naval discipline ill-suited these wild wood-wanderers, and after this it is not surprising that we find Radisson and Groseilliers again in New France at a conference of fur traders and explorers, among whom were La Salle, Jolliet, Charles Le Moyne, the soldier with the famous sons, and La Chesnaye. No doubt Radisson told those couriers of the wilderness tales of profit on the sea in the north that brought great cursesdown on the authorities of New France who forbade the people of the colony free access to that rich fur field. La Chesnaye had introduced the brothers-in-law to Frontenac, the governor of New France, and had laid before him their plans for a trading company to operate on the great bay; but Frontenac 'did not approve the business.' He could not give a commission to invade the territory of a friendly power; still, if La Chesnaye and his associates chose to assume risks, he could wink at an invasion of rival traders' domains. A bargain was made. La Chesnaye would find the capital and equip two ships, and Radisson and Groseilliers would make the voyage. The brothers-in-law would sail at once for Acadia, there to spend the winter, and in the spring they would come with the fishing fleets to Isle Percé, where La Chesnaye would send their ships.
During the winter of 1681-82 La Chesnaye persuaded some of his friends to advance money for provisions and ships to go to the North Sea. Among these friends were Jean Chouart, Groseilliers' son, and a Dame Sorrel, who, like the English Lady Drax, was prepared to give solid support to a venture that promised profit. Thus was begun the Company of theNorth[2] (la Compagnie du Nord) that was to be a thorn in the side of the 'Adventurers of England' for over thirty years. Frontenac granted permission for two unseaworthy vessels, theSt Anneand theSt Pierre, to fish off Isle Percé. Strange bait for cod lay in the lockers.
[2] While there are earlier records referring to the Company of the North, this year (1682) is generally given as the date of its founding. Similarly 1670 is taken as the date of the founding of the Hudson's Bay Company, although, as we have seen, it was practically begun three years earlier.
With profound disappointment Radisson and Groseilliers saw at Isle Percé in July the boats which they were to have. TheSt Pierre, outfitted for Radisson, was a craft of only fifty tons and boasted a crew of only twelve men. Groseilliers' vessel, theSt Anne, which carried his son, Jean Chouart, was still smaller and had fifteen men. Both crews consisted of freshwater sailors who tossed with woe and threatened mutiny when the boats rolled past the tidal bore of Belle Isle Strait and began threading their way in and out of the 'tickles' and fiords of the ribbed, desolate, rocky coast of Labrador. Indeed, when the ships stopped to take on water at a lonely 'hole in the wall' on the Labrador coast, the mutiny would have flamed into open revolt but for the sail of apirate ship that appeared on the horizon. Thereupon Radisson's ships crowded sail to the wind and sped on up the coast. What pirate ship this was may be guessed from what happened three weeks later.
Early in September the two vessels reached the Hayes river, which Radisson had named twelve years before and where he had set up the arms of the English king. Advancing fifteen miles up-stream, they chose a winter harbour. Leaving Groseilliers to beach the boats and erect cabins, Radisson and young Jean Chouart canoed farther up to the rendezvous of the Cree and Assiniboine Indians. The Indians were overjoyed to meet their trader friend of long past years. The white man's coming meant firearms, and firearms ensured invincible might over all foes. 'Ho, young men, be not afraid. The Sun is favourable to us. Our enemies shall fear us. This is the man we have wished for since the days of our fathers,' shouted the chief of the Assiniboines as he danced and tossed arrows of thanks to the gods.
When the voyageurs glided back down-stream on the glassy current, other sounds than those of Indian chants greeted them. The Hayes river, as we have seen, is divided fromthe Nelson on the north by a swampy stretch of brushwood. Across the swamp boomed and rolled to their astonished ears the reverberation of cannon. Was it the pirate ship seen off Labrador? or was it the coming of the English Company's traders? Radisson's canoe slipped past the crude fort that Groseilliers had erected and entered the open Bay. Nothing was visible but the yellow sea, chopped to white caps by the autumn wind. When he returned to the fort he learned that cannonading had been heard from farther inland. Evidently the ships had sailed up the Nelson river. Now, across the marsh between the two rivers lay a creek by which Indian canoes from time immemorial had crossed. Taking a canoe and three of his best men, Radisson paddled and portaged over this route to the Nelson. There, on what is now known as Seal or Gillam Island, stood a crude new fort; and anchored by the island lay a stout ship—theBachelor's Delight—cannons pointing from every porthole. Was it the pirate ship seen off Labrador? It took very little parleying to ascertain that the ship was a poacher, commanded by young Ben Gillam of Boston, son of the Company's captain, come here on illicit trade, with John Outlaw and MikeGrimmington, who later became famed seamen, as first and second mates. Radisson took fate by the beard, introduced himself to young Gillam, went on board the ship—not, however, without first seeing that two New Englanders remained as hostages with his three Frenchmen—quaffed drinks, observed that the ship was stout and well manned, advised Ben not to risk his men too far from the fort among the Indians, and laughed with joyous contempt when Ben fired cannon by way of testing the Frenchman's courage.
ON THE HAYES RIVERFrom a photograph by R. W. Brock
There was enough to try Radisson's courage the very next day. While gliding leisurely down the current of the Nelson, he saw at a bend in the river the Hudson's Bay Company's shipPrince Rupert, commanded by his quondam enemy, Captain Gillam, sailing straight for the rendezvous already occupied by Ben Gillam. At any cost the two English ships must be kept apart; and at once! Singly, perhaps they could be mastered by the French. Together, they would surely overpower Radisson. It was nightfall. Landing and concealing his comrades, Radisson kindled such a bonfire as Indians used to signal trade. The ship immediately anchored. There was a comical meeting on thePrince Rupertthenext morning, at which Radisson represented to the new governor, John Bridgar, who was on the ship with Gillam, that each of his three paddlers was a captain of large ambushed forces. Charity will, perhaps, excuse Radisson for his fabulous tales of a powerful French fort on the Nelson and his disinterested observation that this river had a dangerous current higher up. It appears that Radisson succeeded completely in deceiving the Englishmen. Had they known how helpless he was, with only a few rude 'shacks' on the Hayes river garrisoned by twenty or thirty mutinous sailors, surely they would have clapped him under hatches. But he was permitted to leave the ship, and Bridgar began the preparation of his winter quarters on the shore.
Some days later Radisson came back. His old enemy Gillam was suspicious and ordered him away; but Radisson came again, and this time he brought with him the captain's son, young Ben, dressed as a wood-runner. This was enough to intimidate the old captain, for he knew that if his son was caught poaching on the Bay both father and son would be ruined. One day two of Bridgar's men who had been ranging for game dashed in with the news that they had seen a strange fort up the Nelson afew miles away. This, of course, Bridgar thought, was Radisson's fort, and Captain Gillam did not dare to undeceive him. Then a calamity befell the English winterers. A storm rose and set the tidal ice driving against thePrince Rupert. The ship was jammed and sunk with loss of provisions and fourteen men, including the captain himself. So perished Captain Zachariah Gillam, whom we first met as master of theNonsuch, the pioneer of all the ships that have since sailed into the Bay in the service of the Hudson's Bay Company.
ENTRANCE TO NELSON and HAYES RIVERSMap by Bartholomew
The wreck of the ship left Bridgar helpless in his rude fort without either food or ammunition, and he at once began to console himself for loss of ship and provisions by deep drinking. Then Radisson knew that he had nothing further to fear from that quarter and he sent food to the starving Englishmen.
Ben Gillam was outwitted through defiantly accepting an invitation to visit the French fort. Gillam visited his rivals to spy on their weakness, and openly taunted them at the banquet table about their helpless condition. When he tried to depart he was coolly told that he was a prisoner, and that, with the aid of any nine Frenchmen Ben chose to pick out from 'thehelpless French,' Radisson purposed capturing the poacher's fort and ship. The young captain had fallen into a trap. Radisson had left French hostages at Gillam's fort for his safe return, but these had been instructed to place firearms at convenient places and to post themselves so that they could prevent the sudden closing of the gates. Such precautions proved unnecessary. Radisson walked into the New England poacher's fort and quietly took possession.
A few days later Bridgar, who had learned too late that the fort on the Nelson was not French but English, marched his men up-stream to contrive a junction with young Gillam's forces. When the Hudson's Bay men knocked on the gate of the New Englanders' fort for admission, the sentinel opened without question. The gates clapped shut with a slamming of bolts, and the Englishmen found themselves quietly and bloodlessly captured by the intrepid Radisson.
Meanwhile Groseilliers and his son, Jean Chouart, had been plying a thriving trade. To be sure, the ice jam of spring in the Hayes river had made Radisson's two cockle-shell craft look more like staved-in barrels than merchant ships. But in the spring, when the Assiniboines and Crees came riding down the river flood invast brigades of birch canoes laden to the waterline with peltry, the Frenchmen had in store goods to barter with them and carried on a profitable trade.
Radisson now had more prisoners than he could conveniently carry to Quebec. Rigging up the remnants of his rickety ships for a convoy, he placed in them the majority of the Hudson's Bay Company and New England crews and sent them south to Rupert and Moose. Taking possession of Ben Gillam's ship, theBachelor's Delight, he loaded it with a cargo of precious furs, and set out for Quebec with Bridgar and young Gillam as prisoners. Jean Chouart and a dozen Frenchmen remained on the Hayes river to trade. Twenty miles out from port, Bridgar and young Gillam were caught conspiring to cut the throats of the Frenchmen, and henceforth both Englishmen were kept under lock and key in their cabins.
But once again Radisson had to encounter the governing bodies of Quebec. The authorities of New France were enraged when they learned that La Chesnaye had sent an expedition to the North Sea. In the meantime Frontenac had been replaced by another governor, La Barre. Tax collectors beset the ships like rats long before Quebec was sighted,and practically confiscated the cargo in fines and charges. La Barre no doubt supposed that the treaty of peace existing between England and France gave him an excuse for seizing the cargo of furs. At all events he ordered Radisson and Groseilliers to report at once to Colbert in France. He restored theBachelor's Delightforthwith to Ben Gillam and gave him full clearance papers. He released Bridgar, the Company's trader. His stroke of statesmanship left the two French explorers literally beggared, and when they reached Paris in January 1684 Colbert was dead.
But, though Ben Gillam secured his release from the governor of New France, he did not escape the long hand of the Hudson's Bay Company, who had written from London to Mr Randolph of the American Plantations to effect the arrest of Ben Gillam at any cost. At the same time they sent Randolph a £10 present of silver plate. On reaching Boston, Ben Gillam was duly arrested. He afterwards became a pirate, and his ultimate fate was involved with that of the famous Captain Kidd. Both were sent to England to be tried for crimes on the high seas; and it is supposed that, like Kidd, Ben suffered execution. Bridgar,suddenly freed from all danger, as suddenly regained a sense of his own importance. He made drafts on the Company and set out from Quebec in such state as befitted his dignity, with secretary and interpreter and valet. He rode hurriedly along the old post-road between Boston and New York, filling the countryside with the story of his adventures. Then he took ship to England; but there his valour suffered a sudden chill. The Company had refused to honour his bills. They repudiated his drafts, reprimanded him severely, and suspended him from service for several years. Mike Grimmington and Outlaw and the others, who had been shipped down from Nelson to Moose and Rupert, promptly took passage home to England on the Company's yearly ship. By the time Radisson and Groseilliers reached Paris, Europe was ringing with the outrage involved in their exploits.
Radisson found small comfort in Paris. Possibly Colbert's death had deprived him of a sympathetic protector, and the French court was as reluctant now to interfere with the actions of the colonial authorities at Quebec as it had been twenty years before. After petitioning vainly for consideration, Groseilliers seems to have given up the contest and retiredfor the remainder of his life to a small patrimony near Three Rivers. Not so Radisson! He was bound to the Old World by marriage; and now international complications came to bind him yet more completely. 'It is impossible,' wrote Louis XIV to Governor La Barre, 'to imagine what you mean by releasing Gillam's boat and relinquishing claim to the North Sea,' At the same time Louis was in a quandary. He would not relinquish the French claim to the North Sea; but he dared not risk a rupture of his secret treaty with England by openly countenancing Radisson's exploit on the Nelson river. Radisson was secretly ordered to go back to the Bay and, unofficially, in his private capacity, restore the Nelson river fur posts to the Hudson's Bay Company. The words of the order in part are: 'To put an end to the differences between the two Nations touching the settlements made by Messrs Groseilliers and Radisson on Hudson's Bay, the said Groseilliers and Radisson shall return and withdraw the French with all effects belonging to them and shall restore to the English Company the Habitation by them settled to be enjoyed by the English without molestation.'
At the very same time that these royalorders sent Radisson to restore the forts, a privateering frigate was dispatched from France to Quebec with equally secret orders to attack and sink English vessels on the Bay. The 'Adventurers of England,' too, were involved in a game of international duplicity. While Mr Young, the fashionable man about town, wrote letters imploring Radisson to come back to England, Sir James Hayes bombarded the French court with demands that the Frenchman be punished. 'I am confirmed,' he wrote, 'in our worst fears. M. Radisson, who was at the head of the action at Port Nelson, is arrived in France the 8th of this month and is in all post haste to undermine us on the Bay. Nothing can mend but to cause ye French King to have exemplary justice done on ye said Radisson.'
On May 10, 1684, Radisson arrived in London. He was met by Mr Young and Sir James Hayes and welcomed and forthwith carried to Windsor, where he took the oath of fidelity as a British subject. The Company, sunk a month before in the depths of despair, were transported with joy and generous rejoicings, and the Governing Committee voted Mr Young thanks for bringing Mr Radisson from France. Two days after Radisson'sarrival, Sir James Hayes and Mr Young reported to the Company that Mr Radisson had tendered his services to the Company, that they 'have presented him to our Governor, His Royal Highness, who was pleased to advise he should again be received in service, under wage of £50 per annum and benefit of dividends on £200 capital stock during life, to receive £25 to set him out for this present expedition.' On May 21 Sir James Hayes reported that he had presented Mr Radisson with 'a silver tankard, charged to the Company at £10 14. 0.'
Radisson returned to the Bay on theHappy Return, sailed by Captain Bond. On the same ship went the new governor, William Phipps, who had been appointed to succeed Bridgar, and a boy named Henry Kelsey, of whom we shall hear more later. Outlaw, who had been with Ben Gillam, had a commission for the Company and sailed theSuccess. His mate was Mike Grimmington, also of the old poacher crew. There was a sloop, too, theAdventure—Captain Geyer—for inland waters.
When Radisson arrived at the Hayes river and told Jean Chouart—who, as we have seen, had been left in charge of the French trade there—of the looting of the fur cargoes at Quebecand of the order from the French king to transfer everything to the English, the young Frenchman's rage may be imagined. He had risked his entire fortune on the expedition from Quebec; but what account did this back-stairs trick of courtiers take of his ruin? Radisson told him that he had been commissioned to offer him £100 a year for service under the English, and £50 each to his underling traders. Jean listened in sullen silence. The furs gathered by the Frenchmen were transferred to the holds of the English vessels, but Jean and his companions evinced no eagerness to go aboard for England. On September 4, just as the sailors were heaving up anchors to the sing-song of a running chant, Phipps, the governor, summoned the French to a final council on board theHappy Return. Young Jean looked out through the ports of the captain's cabin. The sea was slipping past. TheHappy Returnhad set sail. The Frenchmen were trapped and were being carried to England. In an instant, hands were on swords and the ship was in an uproar. Radisson besought his countrymen to bethink themselves before striking. What could five men do against an armed English crew? Once in England, they could listen to whatthe Company had to offer: meanwhile they were suffering no harm. The Frenchmen sullenly put back their swords. The boat reached Portsmouth in the last week of October. Radisson took horse and rode furiously for London.
If the adventurers had been exultant over his return from France, they were doubly jubilant at his victorious return from the Bay. He was publicly thanked, presented with a hundred guineas, and became the lion of the hour. The Governing Committee on November 14, 1684, three weeks after Radisson's return, voted that he had 'done extraordinary service to the great liking and satisfaction of the Company...the committee are resolved to bestow some mark of respect to the son of Mr Groseilliers and order 20s. a week paid him beginning October 30.' A present of seven musquash skins was now given Mr Young for having induced Radisson to resume his services.
Radisson was requested to make terms with the young Frenchman, but this was not such an easy matter. Some one suggested that Jean Chouart should follow the example of his uncle and marry an English wife. Jean shrugged his shoulders. In a letter to his mother at Three Rivers he wrote: 'I am offered proposals of marriage to which I will not listen. I would leave, but they hold back my pay, and orders have been given to arrest me in case I try. Cause it to be well known that I never intended to follow the English. I have been forced to this by my uncle's subterfuge. Assure M. Du Lhut of my humble services. I will have the honour of seeing him as soon as I can. Tell the same to M. Péré and all our good friends.' To M. Comporte he writes: 'I will be at the place you desire me to go, or perish.' As M. Du Lhut had been dispatched by the Company of the North with the knowledge of the governor of Quebec to intercept Indians going down to the English on Hudson Bay, and M. Péré and M. Comporte were suave diplomats and spies in his service, it may be guessed that the French passed secret messages into the hands of young Jean Chouart in London, and that he passed messages back to them. At all events, from being doggedly resistant to all overtures, he suddenly became complaisant in March of 1685, and took out papers of 'deninization,' or naturalization, in preference to the oath of fidelity, and engaged with the English Company at £100 a year. He was given another £100 to fit him out, and his four comrades were engaged atfrom £45 to £80 a year. How could the gentlemen of the Company guess that young Jean was betraying them to the Company of the North in Canada, where a mine was being laid to blow up their prosperity?
The Hudson's Bay Company declared dividends of fifty per cent, and chartered seven vessels for the season of 1685—some from a goldsmith, Sir Stephen Evance; and bespoke my Lord Churchill as next governor in place of James, Duke of York, who had become King James II.
The Company now had permanent forts at Rupert, Albany, and Moose rivers on James Bay, and at the mouth of the Hayes river on the west coast. The very year that Churchill was appointed governor and took his place at the board of the Governing Committee, a small sloop had sailed as far north as Churchill, or the River of the Strangers, to reconnoitre and fix a site for a post. The fleet of trading vessels had increased even faster than the forts. Seven ships—four frigates and three sloops—were dispatched for the Bay in 1685. Radisson, young Jean, and the four Frenchmen went on theHappy Returnwith Captain Bond bound for Nelson. Richard Lucas commanded theOwner's Good Will. Captain Outlaw, with Mike Grimmington as mate, took the big shipSuccess, destined for Albany. Captain Hume, with Smithsend for mate, took his cargo boat, theMerchant Perpetuana.The Company did not own any of these vessels. They were chartered from Sir Stephen Evance and others, for sums running from £400 to £600 for the voyage, with £100 extra for the impress money. The large vessels carried crews of twenty men; the smaller, of twelve; and each craft boasted at least six great guns. In March, after violent debate over old Bridgar's case, the Committee reinstated him at £100 a year as governor at Rupert. Phipps went as governor to Port Nelson. One Nixon was already stationed at Moose. Bluff old Henry Sargeant, as true a Viking as ever rode the north seas, had been at Albany for a year with his family—the first white family known to have resided on the Bay. Radisson had been reappointed superintendent of trade over the entire Bay; and he recommended for this year 20,500 extra flints, 500 extra ice-chisels for trapping beaver above the waterfalls, and several thousand extra yards of tobacco—thereby showing the judgment of an experienced trader. This spring the curious oaths of secrecy, already mentioned, were administered to all servants. It may be inferred that theHappy Returnand thePerpetuanawere the heaviest laden, for they fell behind the rest of the fleet on the wayout, and were embayed, along with Outlaw'sSuccess, in the icefields off Digges Island in July. It was the realm of almost continuous light in summer; but there must have been fogs or thick weather, for candles were lighted in the binnacles and cabins, and the gloom outside was so heavy that it was impossible to see ten feet away from the decks in the woolly night mist.
Meanwhile the governor at Albany, Henry Sargeant, awaited the coming of the yearly ships. It may be guessed that he waited chuckling. He and Nixon, who seem to have been the only governors resident on the Bay that summer, must have felt great satisfaction. They had out-tricked the French interlopers. One La Martinière of the Company of the North had sailed into the Bay with two ships laden with cargo from Quebec for the fur trade; and the two Hudson's Bay traders had manipulated matters so craftily that not an Indian could the French find. Not a pelt did La Martinière obtain. The French captain then inquired very particularly for his compatriot—M. Radisson. M. Radisson was safe in England. One can see old Sargeant's eyes twinkle beneath his shaggy brows. La Martinière swears softly; a price is on M.Radisson's head. The French king had sent orders to M. de Denonville, the governor of New France, to arrest Radisson and 'to pay fifty pistoles' to anyone who seized him. Has His Excellency, M. Sargeant, seen one Jean Péré, or one M. Comporte? No, M. Sargeant has seen neither 'Parry'—as his report has it—nor 'a Comporte.'
La Martinière sailed away, and old Sargeant sent his sentinel to the crow's nest—a sort of loft or lighthouse built on a high hill behind the fort—to hoist the signals for incoming boats and to run up the flag. He had dispatched Sandford or 'Red Cap,' one of his men, a little way up the Albany to bring him word of the coming of the Indian canoes; but this was not Sandford coming back, and these were not Indian canoes coming down the Albany river from the Up-Country. This was the long slow dip of white voyageurs, not the quick choppy stroke of the Indian; and before Sargeant could rub the amazement out of his eyes, three white men, with a blanket for sail, came swirling down the current, beached their canoe, and, doffing caps in a debonair manner, presented themselves before the Hudson's Bay man dourly sitting on a cannon in the gateway. The nonchalant gentleman who introduced the others was Jean Péré, dressed as a wood-runner, voyaging and hunting in this back-of-beyond for pleasure. A long way to come for pleasure, thought Sargeant—all the leagues and leagues from French camps on Lake Superior. But England and France were at peace. The gentlemen bore passports. They were welcomed to a fort breakfast and passed pretty compliments to Madame Sargeant, and asked blandly after M. Radisson's health, and had the honour to express their most affectionate regard for friend Jean Chouart. Now where might Jean Chouart be? Sargeant did not satisfy their curiosity, nor did he urge them to stay overnight. They sailed gaily on down-stream to hunt in the cedar swamps south of Albany. That night while they slept the tide carried off their canoe. Back they had to come to the fort. But meanwhile some one else had arrived there. With a fluttering of the ensign above the mainmast and a clatter as the big sails came flopping down, Captain Outlaw had come to anchor on theSuccess; and the tale that he told—one can see the anger mount to old Sargeant's eyes and the fear to Jean Péré's—was that theMerchant Perpetuana, off Digges Island, had been boarded and scuttled in the midnightgloom of July 27 by two French ships. Hume and Smithsend had been overpowered, fettered, and carried off prisoners to Quebec. Mike Grimmington too, who seems to have been on Hume's ship, was a prisoner. Fourteen of the crew had been bayoneted to death and thrown overboard. Outlaw did not know the later details of the raid—how Hume was to be sent home to France for ransom, and Mike Grimmington was to be tortured to betray the secret signals of the Bay, and Smithsend and the other English seamen to be sold into slavery in Martinique. Ultimately, all three were ransomed or escaped back to England; but they heard strange threats of raid and overland foray as they lay imprisoned beneath the Château St Louis in Quebec. Fortunately Radisson and the five Frenchmen, being on board theHappy Return, had succeeded in escaping from the ice jam and were safe in Nelson.
What Jean Péré remarked on hearing this recital is not known—possibly something not very complimentary about the plans of the French raiders going awry; but the next thing is that Mr Jan Parry—as Sargeant persists in describing him—finds himself in 'the butter vat' or prison of Albany with fetters onhis feet and handcuffs on his wrists. On October 29 he is sent prisoner to England on the home-bound ships of Bond and Lucas. His two companion spies are marooned for the winter on Charlton Island. As well try, however, to maroon a bird on the wing as a French wood-runner. The men fished and snared game so diligently that by September they had full store of provisions for escape. Then they made themselves a raft or canoe and crossed to the mainland. By Christmas they had reached the French camps of Michilimackinac. In another month they were in Quebec with wild tales of Péré, held prisoner in the dungeons of Albany. France and England were at peace; but the Chevalier de Troyes, a French army officer, and the brothers Le Moyne, dare-devil young adventurers of New France, asked permission of the governor of Quebec to lead a band of wood-runners overland to rescue Péré on the Bay, fire the English forts, and massacre the English. Rumours of these raids Smithsend heard in his dungeon below Château St Louis; and he contrived to send a secret letter to England, warning the Company.
In England the adventurers had lodged 'Parry' in jail on a charge of having 'damnified the Company.' Smithsend's letter of warning had come; but how could the Company reach their forts before the ice cleared? Meanwhile they hired twenty extra men for each fort. They presented Radisson with a hogshead of claret. At the same time they had him and his wife, 'dwelling at the end of Seething Lane on Tower Hill,' sign a bond for £2000 by way of ensuring fidelity. 'Ye two journals of Mr Radisson's last expedition to ye Bay' were delivered into the hands of the Company, where they have rested to this day.
The ransom demanded for Hume was paid by the Company at secret sessions of the Governing Committee, and the captain came post-haste from France with word of La Martinière's raid. My Lord Churchill being England's champion against 'those varmint' the French, 'My Lord Churchill was presented with a catt skin counter pane for his bedd' and was asked to bespeak the favour of the king that France should make restitution. My Lord Churchill brought back word that the king said: 'Gentlemen, I understand your business! On my honour, I assure you I will take particular care on it to see that you are righted.' In all, eighty-nine men were on the Bay at this time. It proved not easy to charter ships thatyear. Sir Stephen Evance advanced his price on theHappy Returnfrom £400 to £750. Knight, of whom we shall hear anon, and Red Cap Sandford, of whom the minutes do not tell enough to inform us whether the name refers to his hair or his hat, urged the Governing Committee to send at least eighteen more men to Albany, twelve more to Moose, six more to Rupert, and to open a trading post at Severn between Nelson and Albany. They advised against attempting to go up the rivers while French interlopers were active. Radisson bought nine hundred muskets for Nelson, and ordered two great guns to be mounted on the walls. When Smithsend arrived from imprisonment in Quebec, war fever against the French rose to white-heat.
But, while all this preparation was in course at home, sixty-six swarthy Indians and thirty-three French wood-runners, led by the Chevalier de Troyes, the Le Moyne brothers, and La Chesnaye, the fur trader, were threading the deeply-forested, wild hinterland between Quebec and Hudson Bay. On June 18, 1686, Moose Fort had shut all its gates; but the sleepy sentry, lying in his blanket across the entrance, had not troubled to load the cannon. He slept heavily outside the high palisade made ofpickets eighteen feet long, secure in the thought that twelve soldiers lay in one of the corner bastions and that three thousand pounds of powder were stored in another. With all lights out and seemingly in absolute security, the chief factor's store and house, built of whitewashed stone, stood in the centre of the inner courtyard.
Two white men dressed as Indians—the young Le Moyne brothers, not yet twenty-six years of age—slipped noiselessly from the woods behind the fort, careful not to crunch their moccasins on dead branches, took a look at the sleeping sentry and the plugged mouths of the unloaded cannon, and as noiselessly slipped back to their comrades in hiding. Each man was armed with musket, sword, dagger, and pistol. He carried no haversack, but a single blanket rolled on his back with dried meat and biscuit enclosed. The raiders slipped off their blankets and coats, and knelt and prayed for blessing on their raid.
The next time the Le Moynes came back to the sentinel sleeping heavily at the fort gate, one quick, sure sabre-stroke cleft the sluggard's head to the collar-bone. A moment later the whole hundred raiders were sweeping over thewalls. A gunner sprang up with a shout from his sleep. A single blow on the head, and one of the Le Moynes had put the fellow to sleep for ever. In less than five minutes the French were masters of Moose Fort at a cost of only two lives, with booty of twelve cannon and three thousand pounds of powder and with a dozen prisoners.
While the old Chevalier de Troyes paused to rig up a sailing sloop for the voyage across the bottom of James Bay to the Rupert river, Pierre Le Moyne—known in history as d'Iberville—with eight men, set out in canoes on June 27 for the Hudson's Bay fort on the south-east corner of the inland sea. Crossing the first gulf or Hannah Bay, he portaged with his men across the swampy flats into Rupert Bay, thus saving a day's detour, and came on poor old Bridgar's sloop near the fort at Rupert, sails reefed, anchor out, rocking gently to the night tide. D'Iberville was up the hull and over the deck with the quiet stealth and quickness of a cat. One sword-blow severed the sleeping sentinel's head from his body. Then, with a stamp of his moccasined feet and a ramp of the butt of his musket, d'Iberville awakened the sleeping crew below decks. By way of putting the fear of God and of Franceinto English hearts, he sabred the first three sailors who came floundering up the hatches. Poor old Bridgar came up in his nightshirt, hardly awake, both hands up in surrender—his second surrender in four years. To wake up to bloody decks, with the heads of dead men rolling to the scuppers, was enough to excuse any man's surrender.
The noise on the ship had forewarned the fort, and the French had to gain entrance thereto by ladders. With these they ascended to the roofs of the houses and hurled down bombs—hand-grenades—through the chimneys, 'with,' says the historian of the occasion, 'an effect most admirable.' Most admirable, indeed! for an Englishwoman, hiding in a room closet, fell screaming with a broken hip. The fort surrendered, and the French were masters of Rupert with thirty prisoners and a ship to the good. What all this had to do with the rescue of Jean Péré would puzzle any one but a raiding fur trader.
With prisoners, ship, cannon, and ammunition, but with few provisions for food, the French now set sail westward across the Bay for Albany, La Chesnaye no doubt bearing in mind that a large quantity of beaver stored there would compensate him for his losses atNelson two years before when the furs collected by Jean Chouart on behalf of the Company of the North had been seized by the English. The wind proved perverse. Icefloes, driving towards the south end of the Bay, delayed the sloops. Again Pierre Le Moyne d'Iberville could not constrain patience to await the favour of wind and weather. With crews of voyageurs he pushed off from the ship in two canoes. Fog fell. The ice proved brashy, soft to each step, and the men slithered through the water up to the armpits as they carried the canoes. D'Iberville could keep his men together only by firing guns through the fog and holding hands in a chain as the two crews portaged across the soft ice.
By August 1 the French voyageurs were in camp before Albany, and a few days later de Troyes arrived with the prisoners and the big sloop. Before Albany, Captain Outlaw's ship, theSuccess, stood anchored; but the ship seemed deserted, and the fort was fast sealed, like an oyster in a shell. Indians had evidently carried warning of the raid to Sargeant, and Captain Outlaw had withdrawn his crew inside the fort. The Le Moynes, acting as scouts, soon discovered that Albany boasted forty-three guns. If Jean Péré were prisoner herein durance vile, his rescue would be a harder matter than the capture of Moose or Rupert. If the French had but known it, bedlam reigned inside the fort. While the English had guns, they had very little ammunition. Gunners threw down their fuses and refused to stand up behind the cannon till old Sargeant drove them back with his sword hilt. Men on the walls threw down muskets and declared that while they had signed to serve, they had not signed to fight, 'and if any of us lost a leg, the Company could not make it good.' The Chevalier de Troyes, with banner flying and fifes shrilling, marched forward, and under flag of truce pompously demanded, in the name of the Most Christian Monarch, Louis XIV, King of France, the instant release of Monsieur Jean Péré. Old Sargeant sent out word that Mister Parry had long since sailed for France by way of England. This, however, did not abate the demands of the Most Christian King of France. Bombs began to sing overhead. Bridgar came under flag of truce to Sargeant and told him the French were desperate. It was a matter of life and death. They must take the fort to obtain provisions for the return to Quebec. If it were surrendered, mercy would be exercised. If taken forcibly, nopower could restrain the Indians from massacre. Sargeant, as has been explained before, had his family in the fort. Just at this moment one of the gunners committed suicide from sheer terror, and Captain Outlaw came from the powder magazine with the report that there was not another ball to fire. Before Sargeant could prevent it, an underling had waved a white sheet from one of the upper windows in surrender. The old trader took two bottles of port, opened the fort gates, walked out and sat down on a French cannon while he parleyed with de Troyes for the best terms obtainable. The English officers and their families were allowed to retire on one of the small ships to Charlton Island to await the coming of the Company's yearly boats. When the hungry French rushed into the fort, they found small store of food, but an enormous loot of furs. The season was advancing. The Chevalier de Troyes bade his men disband and find their way as best they could to Quebec. Only enough English prisoners were retained to carry the loot of furs back overland. The rest were turned adrift in the woods. Of fifty prisoners, only twenty survived the winter of 1686-87. Some perished while trying to tramp northward to Nelson, and some died in thewoods, after a vain endeavour to save their miserable lives by cannibalism.
The English flag still flew at Nelson; but the French were masters of every other post on the Bay.
In spite of French raid and foray, the Governing Committee in London pursued the even tenor of its way. Strict measures were enforced to stop illicit and clandestine trading on the part of the Company's servants. In a minute of November 2, 1687, the Committee 'taking notice that several of the officers and servants have brought home in their coats and other garments severall pieces of furrs to the great prejudice of the Co'y, do order that such as have any garments lined with furrs shall forthwith bring the same to the warehouse and there leave all the same furrs, or in default shall forfeit and loose all salary and be liable to such prosecution as the Co'y think fitt.'
Silent anger and resentment grew against Radisson; for was it not he who had revealed the secrets of the great Bay to marauding Frenchmen? Sargeant was sued in £20,000 damages for surrendering Albany; but onsecond thought, the case was settled by arbitration, and the doughty old trader was awarded £350. Jean Chouart and the other Frenchmen came back to London in 1689, and Jean was awarded £202 for all arrears. Also, about this time, the Company began trade with North Russia in whale blubber, which, like the furs, was auctioned by light of candle.
William of Orange was welcomed to the throne, in 1688, with an address from the adventurers that would have put Henry VIII's parliament to the blush: 'that in all yr. undertakings Yr. Majesty may bee as victorious as Caesar, as beloved as Titus, and have the glorious long reign and peaceful end of His Majesty Augustus.' Three hundred guineas were presented along with this address in 'a faire embroidered purse by the Hon. the Deputy Gov'r. upon his humble knees.' For pushing claims of damages against France, Sir Edward Dering, the deputy-governor, was voted two hundred guineas. Stock forfeited for breaking oaths of secrecy was voted to a fund for the wounded and widows of the service. The Company's servants were put on the same pensions as soldiers in the national service. Henceforth 'one pipe of brandy' was to go on each vessel for use during war;but, in spite of 'pipes of brandy,' the seamen were now very mutinous about going aboard, and demanded pay in advance, which with 'faire words doth allay anger.' It was a difficult matter now to charter ships. The Company had to buy vessels; and it seems there was a scarcity of ready money, for one minute records that 'the tradesmen are very importunate for their bills.'
Many new shareholders had come into the Company, and 'Esquire Young' had great ado to convince them that Radisson had any rightful claim on them at all. Radisson, for his part, went to law; and the arrears of dividends were ordered to be paid. But when the war waxed hotter there were no dividends. Then Esquire Young's petitions set forth that 'M. Radisson is living in a mean and poor condition.' When the Frenchman came asking for consideration, he was not invited into the committee room, but was left cooling his heels in the outer hall. But the years rolled on, and when, during the negotiation of the Treaty of Ryswick in 1697, the Company pressed a claim of £200,000 damages against France, 'the Committee considering Mr Peter Radisson may be very useful at this time, as to affairs between the French and this Co'y,the Sec. is ordered to take coach and fetch him to the Committee'; 'on wh. the Committee had discourse with him till dinner.' The discourse—given in full in the minutes—was the setting forth, on affidavit, of that secret royal order from the king of France in 1684 to restore the forts on the Bay to England. Meanwhile amounts of £250 were voted widows of captains killed in the war; and the deputy-governor went to Hamburg and Amsterdam to borrow money; for the governor, Sir Stephen Evance, was wellnigh bankrupt.
A treaty of neutrality, in 1686, had provided that the Bay should be held in common by France and England, but the fur traders of New France were not content to honour such an ambiguous arrangement. D'Iberville came overland again to Rupert river in 1687, promptly seized the English sloop there, and sent four men across to Charlton Island to spy on Captain Bond, who was wintering on the shipChurchill. Bond clapped the French spies under hatches; but in the spring one was permitted above decks to help the English sailors launch theChurchillfrom her skids. The Frenchman waited till six of the English were up the masts. Then, seizing an ax, he brained two sailors near by, opened thehatches, called up his comrades, and, keeping the other Englishmen up the mast poles at pistol point, steered the vessel across to d'Iberville at Rupert.
The English on their side, like the French, were not disposed to remain inert under the terms of the treaty. Captain Moon sailed down from Nelson, with two strongly-manned ships, to attempt the recapture of Albany. At the moment when he had loaded a cargo of furs from the half-abandoned fort on one of his vessels, d'Iberville came paddling across the open sea with a force of painted Indian warriors. The English dashed for hiding inside the fort, and d'Iberville gaily mounted to the decks of the fur-laden ship, raised sail, and steered off for Quebec. Meeting the incoming fleet of English vessels, he threw them off guard by hoisting an English flag, and sailed on in safety.
When France and England were again openly at war, Le Moyne d'Iberville was occupied with raids on New England; and during his absence from the Bay, Mike Grimmington, who had been promoted to a captaincy, came sailing down from Nelson to find Albany in the possession of four Frenchmen under Captain Le Meux. He sacked the fort, clapped Le Meux and hismen in the hold of his English vessel, carried them off to England, and presented them before the Governing Committee. Captain Mike was given a tankard valued at £36 for his services. At the same time Captain Edgecombe brought home a cargo of 22,000 beavers from Nelson, and was rewarded with £20 worth of silver plate and £100 in cash. Meanwhile our friend Jean Péré, who had escaped to France, was writing letters to Radisson, trying to tempt him to leave England, or perhaps to involve him in a parley that would undermine his standing with the English.
Grimmington's successful foray encouraged the 'Adventurers of England' to make a desperate effort to recapture all the forts on the Bay. James Knight, who had started as an apprentice under Sargeant, was sent to Albany as governor, and three trusted men, Walsh, Bailey, and Kelsey, were sent to Nelson, whence came the largest cargoes of furs.
But d'Iberville was not the man to let his winnings slip. Once more he turned his attention to Hudson Bay, and on September 24, 1694, the French frigatesPoliandSalamanderwere unloading cannon, under his direction, beneath the ramparts of Nelson. For threeweeks, without ceasing day or night, bombs were singing over the eighteen-foot palisades of the fort. From within Walsh, Kelsey, and Bailey made a brave defence. They poured scalding water on the heads of the Frenchmen and Indians who ventured too near the walls. From the sugar-loaf tower roofs of the corner bastions their sharpshooters were able to pick off the French assailants, while keeping in safety themselves. They killed Chateauguay, d'Iberville's brother, as he tried to force his way into the fort through a rear wall. But the wooden towers could not withstand the bombs, and at length both sides were ready to parley for terms. With the hope that they might save their furs, the English hung out a tablecloth as a flag of truce, and the exhausted fighters seized the opportunity to eat and sleep. The weather had turned bitterly cold. No ship could come from England till spring. Under these conditions, Walsh made the best bargain he could. It was agreed that the English officers should be lodged in the fort and should share the provisions during the winter. D'Iberville took possession; and again, only one post on the Bay—Albany, in charge of James Knight—remained in English hands.
On the miseries of the English prisoners that winter there is no time to dwell. D'Iberville had departed, leaving La Forest, one of his men, in command. The terms of the surrender were ignored. Only four officers were maintained in the fort and given provisions. The rest of the English were driven to the woods. Those who hung round the fort were treated as slaves. Out of the fifty-three only twenty-five survived. No English ship came to Nelson in the following summer—1695. The ship that anchored there that summer was a French privateer, and in her hold some of the English survivors were stowed and carried to France for ransom.
In August 1696, however, two English warships—theBonaventureand theSeaforth—commanded by Captain Allen, anchored before Nelson. La Forest capitulated almost on demand; and, again, the English with Nelson in their hands were virtually in possession of the Bay. Allen made prisoners of the whole garrison and seized twenty thousand beaver pelts. While theBonaventureand theSeaforthlay in front of the fort, two ships of France, in command of Serigny, one of d'Iberville's brothers, with provisions for La Forest, sailed in, and on sight of the English shipssailed out again to the open sea—so hurriedly, indeed, that one of the craft struck an icefloe, split, and sank. As Allen's two English vessels, on their return journey, passed into the straits during a fog, a volley of shot poured across the deck and laid the captain dead on the spot. The ship whence this volley came was not seen; there is no further record of the incident, and we can only surmise that the shot came from Serigny's remaining ship. What is certain is that Allen was killed and that the English ships arrived in England with an immense cargo of furs, which went to the Company's warehouse, and with French captives from Nelson, who were lodged in prison at Portsmouth.
The French prisoners were finally set free and made their way to France, where the story of their wrongs aroused great indignation. D'Iberville, who was now in Newfoundland, carrying havoc from hamlet to hamlet, was the man best fitted to revenge the outrage. Five French warships were made ready—thePelican, thePalmier, theProfond, theViolent, and theWasp. In April 1697 these were dispatched from France to Placentia, Newfoundland, there to be taken in command by d'Iberville, with orders to proceed to HudsonBay and leave not a vestige remaining of the English fur trade in the North.
Meanwhile preparations were being made in England to dispatch a mighty fleet to drive the French for ever from the Bay. Three frigates were bought and fitted out—theDering, Captain Grimmington; theHudson's Bay, Captain Smithsend; and theHampshire, Captain Fletcher—each with guns and sixty fighting men in addition to the regular crew. These ships were to meet the enemy sooner than was expected. In the last week of August 1697 the English fleet lay at the west end of Hudson Strait, befogged and surrounded by ice. Suddenly the fog lifted and revealed to the astonished Englishmen d'Iberville's fleet of five French warships: thePalmierto the rear, back in the straits; theWaspand theViolent, out in open water to the west; thePelican, flying the flag of the Admiral, to the fore and free from the ice; and theProfond, ice-jammed and within easy shooting range. The Hudson's Bay ships at once opened fire on theProfond, but this only loosened the ice and let the French ship escape.
D'Iberville's aim was not to fight a naval battle but to secure the fort at Nelson. Accordingly, spreading thePelican'ssails to the wind, he steered south-west, leaving the other ships to follow his example. Ice must have obstructed him, for he did not anchor before Nelson till September 3. The place was held by the English and he could find no sign of his other ships. He waited two days, loading cannon, furbishing muskets, drilling his men, of whom a great many were French wood-runners sick with scurvy. On the morning of the 5th the lookout called down 'A sail.' Never doubting but that the sail belonged to one of his own ships, d'Iberville hoisted anchor and fired cannon in welcome. No answering shot signalled back. There were sails of three ships now, and d'Iberville saw three English men-of-war racing over the waves to meet him, while shouts of wild welcome came thundering from the hostile fort to his rear.
D'Iberville did not swerve in his course, nor waste ammunition by firing shots at targets out of range. Forty of his soldiers lay in their berths disabled by scurvy; but he quickly mustered one hundred and fifty able-bodied men and ordered ropes to be stretched, for hand hold, across the slippery decks. The gunners below stripped naked behind the great cannon. Men were marshalled readyto board and rush the enemy when the ships locked.
TheHampshire, under Captain Fletcher, with fifty-two guns and sixty fighting men, first came up within range and sent two roaring cannonades that mowed the masts and wheel-house from thePelicandown to bare decks. At the same time Grimmington'sDeringand Smithsend'sHudson's Baycircled to the other side of the French ship and poured forth a pepper of musketry.
D'Iberville shouted orders to the gunners to fire straight into theHampshire'shull; sharpshooters were to rake the decks of the two off-standing English ships, and the Indians were to stand ready to board. Two hours passed in sidling and shifting; then the death grapple began. Ninety dead and wounded Frenchmen rolled on thePelican'sblood-stained decks. The fallen sails were blazing. The mast poles were splintered. Railings went smashing into the sea. The bridge crumbled. ThePelican'sprow had been shop away. D'Iberville was still shouting to his gunners to fire low, when suddenly theHampshireceased firing and tilted. D'Iberville had barely time to unlock thePelicanfrom the death grapple, when the English frigatelurched and, amid hiss and roar of flame in a wild sea, sank like a stone, engulfing her panic-stricken crew almost before the French could realize what had happened. Smithsend at once surrendered theHudson's Bay, and Mike Grimmington fled for Nelson on theDering.
A fierce hurricane now rose and the English garrison at Nelson had one hope left—that the wild storm might wreck d'Iberville's ship and its absent convoys. Smashing billows and ice completed the wreck of thePelican; nevertheless the French commander succeeded in landing his men. When the storm cleared, his other ships came limping to his aid. Nelson stood back four miles from the sea, but by September 11 the French had their cannon placed under the walls. A messenger was sent to demand surrender, and he was conveyed with bandaged eyes into the fort. Grimmington,[3] Smithsend, Bailey, Kelsey—all were for holding out; but d'Iberville's brother, Serigny, came in under flag of truce and bade them think well what would happen if the hundred Indians were turned loose on the fort. Finally the English surrendered and marched out withthe honours of war. Grimmington sailed for England with as many of the refugees as his ship, theDering, could convey. The rest, led by Bailey and Smithsend, marched overland south to the fort at Albany.
[3] Grimmington, with theDering, had reached the fort in safety. Smithsend's captive ship, theHudson's Bay, had been wrecked with thePelican, but he himself had escaped to the fort.
The loss of Nelson fell heavily on the Hudson's Bay Company. Their ships were not paid for; dividends stopped; stock dropped in value. But still they borrowed money to pay £20 each to the sailors. The Treaty of Ryswick, which halted the war with France, provided that possession on the Bay should remain as at the time of the treaty, and England held only Albany.