THE COUNTERSTROKE
1776-1778
Six thousand British troops, commanded by Burgoyne, and
four thousand Germans, commanded by Baron Riedesel, had
arrived at Quebec before the battle of Three Rivers.
Quebec itself had then been left to the care of a German
garrison under a German commandant, 'that excellent man,
Colonel Baum,' while the great bulk of the army had
marched up the St Lawrence, as we have seen already. Such
a force as this new one of Carleton's was expected to
dismay the rebel colonies. And so, to a great extent, it
did. With a much larger force in the colonies themselves
the king was confidently expected to master his unruly
subjects, no matter how much they proclaimed their
independence. The Loyalists were encouraged. The trimmers
prepared to join them. Only those steadfast Americans
who held their cause dearer than life itself were still
determined to venture all. But they formed the one party
that really knew its own mind. This gave them a great
advantage over the king's party, which, hampered at every
turn by the opposition in the mother country, was never
quite sure whether it ought to strike hard or gently in
America.
On one point, however, everybody was agreed. The command
of Lake Champlain was essential to whichever side would
hold its own. The American forces at Crown Point might
be too weak for the time being. But Arnold knew that even
ten thousand British soldiers could not overrun the land
without a naval force to help them. So he got together
a flotilla which had everything its own way during the
time that Carleton was laboriously building a rival
flotilla on the Richelieu with a very scanty supply of
ship-wrights and materials. Arnold, moreover, could devote
his whole attention to the work, makeshift as it had to
be; while Carleton was obliged to keep moving about the
province in an effort to bring it into some sort of order
after the late invasion. Throughout the summer the British
army held the line of the Richelieu all the way south as
far as Isle-aux-Noix, very near the lake and the line.
But Carleton's flotilla could not set sail from St Johns
till October 5, by which time the main body of his army
was concentrated round Pointe-au-Fer, at the northern
end of the lake, ninety miles north of the American camp
at Crown Point.
It was a curious situation for a civil and military
governor to be hoisting his flag as a naval
commander-in-chief, however small the fleet might be.
But it is commonly ignored that, down to the present day,
the governor-general of Canada is appointed 'Vice-Admiral
of the Same' in his commissions from the Crown. Carleton
of course carried expert naval officers with him and had
enough professional seamen to work the vessels and lay
the guns. But, though Captain Pringle manoeuvred the
flotilla and Lieutenant Dacre handled the flagship
_Carleton_, the actual command remained in Carleton's
own hands. The capital ship (and the only real square-rigged
'ship') of this Lilliputian fleet was Pringle's
_Inflexible_, which had been taken up the Richelieu in
sections and hauled past the portages with immense labour
before reaching St Johns, whence there is a clear run
upstream to Lake Champlain. The _Inflexible_ carried
thirty guns, mostly 12-pounders, and was an overmatch
for quite the half of Arnold's decidedly weaker flotilla.
The _Lady Maria_ was a sort of sister ship to the
_Carleton_. The little armada was completed by a 'gondola'
with six 9-pounders, by twenty gunboats and four longboats,
each carrying a single piece, and by many small craft
used as transports.
On the 11th of October Carleton's whole naval force was
sailing south when one of Arnold's vessels was seen making
for Valcour Island, a few miles still farther south on
the same, or western, side of Lake Champlain. Presently
the Yankee ran ashore on the southern end of the island,
where she was immediately attacked by some British small
craft while the _Inflexible_ sailed on. Then, to the
intense disgust of the _Inflexible_'s crew, Arnold's
complete flotilla was suddenly discovered drawn up in a
masterly position between the mainland and the island.
It was too late for the _Inflexible_ to beat back now.
But the rest of Carleton's flotilla turned in to the
attack. Arnold's flanks rested on the island and the
mainland. His rear could be approached only by beating
back against a bad wind all the way round the outside of
Valcour Island; and, even if this manoeuvre could have
been performed, the British attack on his rear from the
north could have been made only in a piecemeal way,
because the channel was there at its narrowest, with a
bad obstruction in the middle. So, for every reason, a
frontal attack from the south was the one way of closing
with him. The fight was furious while it lasted and
seemingly decisive when it ended. Arnold's best vessel,
the _Royal Savage_, which he had taken at St Johns the
year before, was driven ashore and captured. The others
were so severely mauled that when the victorious British
anchored their superior force in line across Arnold's
front there seemed to be no chance for him to escape the
following day. But that night he performed an even more
daring and wonderful feat than Bouchette had performed
the year before when paddling Carleton through the American
lines among the islands opposite Sorel. Using muffled
sweeps, with consummate skill he slipped all his remaining
vessels between the mainland and the nearest British
gunboat, and was well on his way to Crown Point before
his escape had been discovered. Next day Carleton chased
south. The day after he destroyed the whole of the enemy's
miniature sea-power as a fighting force. But the only
three serviceable vessels got away; while Arnold burnt
everything else likely to fall into British hands. So
Carleton had no more than his own reduced flotilla to
depend on when he occupied Crown Point.
A vexed question, destined to form part of a momentous
issue, now arose. Should Ticonderoga be attacked at once
or not? It commanded the only feasible line of march from
Montreal to New York; and no force from Canada could
therefore attack the new republic effectively without
taking it first. But the season was late. The fort was
strong, well gunned, and well manned. Carleton's
reconnaissance convinced him that he could have little
chance of reducing it quickly, if at all, with the means
at hand, especially as the Americans had supplies close
by at Lake George, while he was now a hundred miles south
of his base. A winter siege was impossible. Sufficient
supplies could never be brought through the dense,
snow-encumbered bush, all the way from Canada, even if
the long and harassing line of communications had not
been everywhere open to American attack. Moreover,
Carleton's army was in no way prepared for a midwinter
campaign, even if it could have been supplied with food
and warlike stores. So he very sensibly turned his back
on Lake Champlain until the following year.
That was the gayest winter Quebec had seen since Montcalm's
first season, twenty years before. Carleton had been
knighted for his services and was naturally supposed to
be the chosen leader for the next campaign. The ten
thousand troops gave confidence to the loyalists and
promised success for the coming campaign. The clergy were
getting their disillusioned parishioners back to the fold
beneath the Union Jack; while _Jean Ba'tis'e_ himself
was fain to admit that his own ways of life and the money
he got for his goods were very much safer with _les
Angla's_ than with the revolutionists, whom he called
_les Bastonna's_ because most trade between Quebec and
the Thirteen Colonies was carried on by vessels hailing
from the port of Boston. The seigneurs were delighted.
They still hoped for commissions as regulars, which too
few of them ever received; and they were charmed with
the little viceregal court over which Lady Maria Carleton,
despite her youthful two-and-twenty summers, presided
with a dignity inherited from the premier ducal family
of England and brought to the acme of conventional
perfection by her intimate experience of Versailles. On
New Year's Eve Carleton gave a public fete, a state
dinner, and a ball to celebrate the anniversary of the
British victory over Montgomery and Arnold. The bishop
held a special thanksgiving and made all notorious
renegades do open penance. Nothing seemed wanting to
bring the New Year in under the happiest auspices since
British rule began.
But, quite unknown to Carleton, mischief was brewing in
the Colonial Office of that unhappy government which did
so many stupid things and got the credit for so many
more. In 1775 the well-meaning Earl of Dartmouth was
superseded by Lord George Germain, who continued the
mismanagement of colonial affairs for seven disastrous
years. Few characters have abused civil and military
positions more than the man who first, as a British
general, disgraced the noble name of Sackville on the
battlefield of Minden in 1759, and then, as a cabinet
minister, disgraced throughout America the plebeian one
of Germain, which he took in 1770 with a suitable legacy
attached to it. His crime at Minden was set down by the
thoughtless public to sheer cowardice. But Sackville was
no coward. He had borne himself with conspicuous gallantry
at Fontenoy. He was admired, before Minden, by two very
brave soldiers, Wolfe and the Duke of Cumberland. And he
afterwards fought a famous duel with as much sang-froid
as any one would care to see. His real crime at Minden
was admirably exposed by the court-martial which found
him 'guilty of having disobeyed the orders of Prince
Ferdinand of Brunswick, whom he was by his commission
bound to obey as commander-in-chief, according to the
rules of war.' This court also found him 'unfit to serve
his Majesty in any military capacity whatever'; and George
II directed that the following 'remarks' should be added
when the sentence was read out on parade to every regiment
in the service: 'It is his Majesty's pleasure that the
above sentence be given out in public orders, not only
in Britain, but in America, and in every quarter of the
globe where British troops happen to be, so that all
officers, being convinced that neither high birth nor
great employments can shelter offences of such a nature,
and seeing they are subject to censures worse than death
to a man who has any sense of honour, may avoid the fatal
consequences arising from disobedience of orders.'
This seemed to mark the end of Sackville's sinister
career. But when George II died and George III began to
reign, with a very different set of men to help him, the
bad general reappeared as an equally bad politician.
Haughty, cantankerous, and self-opinionated to the last
degree, Germain, who had many perverse abilities fitting
him for the meaner side of party politics, was appointed
to the post for which he was least qualified just when
Canada and the Thirteen Colonies most needed a master
mind. Worse still, he cherished a contemptible grudge
against Carleton for having refused to turn out a good
officer and put in a bad one who happened to be a pampered
favourite. At first, however, Carleton was allowed to do
his best. But in the summer of 1776 Germain restricted
Carleton's command to Canada and put Burgoyne, a junior
officer, in command of the army destined to make the
counterstroke. The ship bearing this malicious order had
to put back; so it was not till the middle of May 1777
that Carleton was disillusioned by its arrival as well
as by a second and still more exasperating dispatch
accusing him of neglect of duty for not having taken
Ticonderoga in November and thus prevented Washington
from capturing the Hessians at Trenton. The physical
impossibility of a winter siege, the three hundred miles
of hostile country between Trenton and Ticonderoga, and
the fact that the other leading British general, Howe,
had thirty thousand troops in the Colonies, while Carleton
had only ten thousand with which to hold Canada that year
and act as ordered next year, all went for nothing when
Germain found a chance to give a good stab in the back.
On May 20 Carleton wrote a pungent reply, pointing out
the utter impossibility of following up his victory on
Lake Champlain by carrying out Germain's arm-chair plan
of operations in the middle of winter. 'I regard it as
a particular blessing that your Lordship's dispatch did
not arrive in due time.' As for the disaster at Trenton,
he 'begs to inform his Lordship' that if Howe's thirty
thousand men had been properly used the Hessians could
never have been taken, 'though all the rebels from
Ticonderoga had reinforced Mr Washington's army.' Moreover,
'I never could imagine why, if troops so far south [as
Howe's] found it necessary to go into winter quarters,
your Lordship could possibly expect troops so far north
to continue their operations.' A week later Carleton
wrote again and sent in his resignation. 'Finding that
I can no longer be of use, under your Lordship's
administration ... I flatter myself I shall obtain the
king's permission to return home this fall. ... I shall
embark with great satisfaction, still entertaining the
ardent wish that, after my departure, the dignity of the
Crown in this unfortunate Province may not appear beneath
your Lordship's concern.'
Burgoyne had spent the winter in London and had arrived
at Quebec about the same time as Germain's dispatches.
He had loyally represented Carleton's plans at headquarters.
But he did not know America and he was not great enough
to see the weak points in the plan which Germain proposed
to carry out with wholly inadequate means.
There was nothing wrong with the actual idea of this
plan. Washington, Carleton, and every other leading man
on either side saw perfectly well that the British army
ought to cut the rebels in two by holding the direct line
from Montreal to New York throughout the coming campaign
of 1777. Given the irresistible British command of the
sea, fifty thousand troops were enough. The general idea
was that half of these should hold the four-hundred-mile
line of the Richelieu, Lake Champlain, and the Hudson,
while the other half seized strategic points elsewhere
and still further divided the American forces. But the
troops employed were ten thousand short of the proper
number. Many of them were foreign mercenaries. And the
generals were not the men to smash the enemy at all costs.
They were ready to do their duty. But their affinities
were rather with the opposition, which was against the
war, than with the government, which was for it. Howe
was a strong Whig. Burgoyne became a follower of Fox.
Clinton had many Whig connections. Cornwallis voted
against colonial taxation. To make matters worse, the
government itself wavered between out-and-out war and
some sort of compromise both with its political opponents
at home and its armed opponents in America.
Under these circumstances Carleton was in favour of a
modified plan. Ticonderoga had been abandoned by the
Americans and occupied by the British as Burgoyne marched
south. Carleton's idea was to use it as a base of operations
against New England, while Howe's main body struck at
the main body of the rebels and broke them up as much as
possible. Germain however, was all for the original plan.
So Burgoyne set off for the Hudson, expecting to get into
touch with Howe at Albany. But Germain, in his haste to
leave town for a holiday, forgot to sign Howe's orders
at the proper time; and afterwards forgot them altogether.
So Howe, pro-American in politics and temporizer in the
field, manoeuvred round his own headquarters at New York
until October, when he sailed south to Philadelphia.
Receiving no orders from Germain, and having no initiative
of his own, he had made no attempt to hold the line of
the Hudson all the way north to Albany, where he could
have met Burgoyne and completed the union of the forces
which would have cut the Colonies in two. Meanwhile
Burgoyne, ignorant of Germain's neglect and Howe's
futilities, was struggling to his fate at Saratoga, north
of Albany. He had been receiving constant aid from
Carleton's scanty resources, though Carleton knew full
well that the sending of any aid beyond the limits of
the province exposed him to personal ruin in case of a
reverse in Canada. But it was all in vain; and, on the
17th of October, Burgoyne--much more sinned against than
sinning--laid down his arms. The British garrison
immediately evacuated Ticonderoga and retired to St Johns,
thus making Carleton's position fairly safe in Canada.
But Germain, only too glad to oust him, had now notified
him that Haldimand, the new governor, was on the point
of sailing for Quebec. Haldimand, to his great credit,
had asked to have his own appointment cancelled when he
heard of Germain's shameful attitude towards Carleton,
and had only consented to go after being satisfied that
Carleton really wished to come home. The exchange, however,
was not to take place that year. Contrary winds blew
Haldimand back; and so Canada had to remain under the
best of all possible governors in spite of Germain.
Germain had provoked Carleton past endurance both by his
public blunders and by his private malice. Even in 1776
there was hate on one side, contempt on the other. When
Germain had blamed Carleton for not carrying out the
idiotic winter siege of Ticonderoga, Carleton, in his
official reply, 'could only suppose' that His Lordship
had acted 'in other places with such great wisdom that,
without our assistance, the rebels must immediately be
compelled to lay down their arms and implore the King's
mercy.' After that Germain had murder in his heart to
the bitter end of Carleton's rule. Carleton had frequently
reported the critical state of affairs in Canada. 'There
is nothing to fear from the Canadians so long as things
are in a state of prosperity; nothing to hope from them
when in distress. There are some of them who are guided
by sentiments of honour. The multitude is influenced by
hope of gain or fear of punishment.' The recent invasion
had proved this up to the hilt. Then welcome reaction
began. The defeat of the invaders, the arrival of Burgoyne's
army, and the efforts of the seigneurs and the clergy
had considerably brightened the prospects of the British
cause in Canada. The partial mobilization of the militia
which followed Burgoyne's surrender was not, indeed, a
great success. But it was far better than the fiasco of
two years before. There was also a corresponding improvement
in civil life. The judges whom Carleton had been obliged
to appoint in haste all proved at leisure the wisdom of
his choice; and there seemed to be every chance that
other nominees would be equally fit for their positions,
because the Quebec Act, which annulled every appointment
made before it came into force, opened the way for the
exclusion of bad officials and the inclusion of the good.
But the chance of perverting this excellent intention
was too much for Germain, who succeeded in foisting one
worthless nominee after another on the province just as
Carleton was doing his best to heal old sores. One of
the worst cases was that of Livius, a low-down,
money-grubbing German Portuguese, who ousted the future
Master of the Rolls; Sir William Grant, a man most
admirably fitted to interpret the laws of Canada with
knowledge, sympathy, and absolute impartiality. Livius
as chief justice was more than Carleton could stand in
silence. This mongrel lawyer had picked up all the Yankee
vices without acquiring any of the countervailing Yankee
virtues. He was 'greedy of power, more greedy of gain,
imperious and impetuous in his temper, but learned in
the ways and eloquence of the New England provinces, and
valuing himself particularly on his knowledge of how to
manage governors.' He had been sent by Germain 'to
administer justice to the Canadians when he understands
neither their laws, manners, customs, nor language.'
Other like nominees followed, 'characters regardless of
the public tranquility but zealous to pay court to a
powerful minister and--provided they can obtain
advantages--unconcerned should the means of obtaining
them prove ruinous to the King's service.' These
pettifoggers so turned and twisted the law about for the
sake of screwing out the maximum of fees that Carleton
pointedly refused to appoint Livius as a member of the
Legislative Council. Livius then laid his case before
the Privy Council in England. But this great court of
ultimate appeal pronounced such a damning judgment on
his gross pretensions that even Germain could not prevent
his final dismissal from all employment under the Crown.
Wounded in the house of those who should have been his
friends, thwarted in every measure of his self-sacrificing
rule, Carleton served on devotedly through six weary
months of 1778--the year in which a vindictive government
of Bourbon France became the first of the several foreign
enemies who made the new American republic an accomplished
fact by taking sides in a British civil war. His burden
was now far more than any man could bear. Yet he closed
his answer to Germain's parting shot with words which
are as noble as his deeds:
'I have long looked out for the arrival of a successor.
Happy at last to learn his near approach, I resign the
important commands with which I have been entrusted into
hands less obnoxious to your Lordship. Thus, for the
King's service, as willingly I lay them down as, for his
service, I took them up.'