General Bouquet—General Haldimand.
Early in 1765 General Henry Bouquet having been assigned to the command
of the southern military district of the colonies, of which Pensacola
was the headquarters, sailed from Philadelphia in a small schooner for
that place. He arrived there in the early spring, and on the following
September died.[4] Of the day and cause of his death nothing seems to be
known. Of the fact that his grave was marked by a monument, there is the
most conclusive proof.[5]
Where is that monument? That time and the elements are responsible for
its disappearance is improbable. That it is not even a subject of
tradition suggests the painful suspicion that it was willfully
destroyed; a suggestion which explains the absence of all memorials of
the people who must have died in Pensacola during the nearly twenty
years of the British dominion, and removes from their generation the
reproach of having had no respect for the memory and ashes of their
departed friends and comrades.
An exodus of the English occurred in 1783, as a future page will show,
like that of the Spaniards in 1763 already mentioned. The town was
filled by a new and strange population, whose needs for building
material were urgent, and their reverence for the dead too feeble,
perhaps, to resist the temptation of supplying their wants by plundering
tombs deserted by their natural guardians.
Nature, too, conspired with man in the work of desecration. The
necropolis of the English was at the western extremity of the town,
extending southward and embracing a slight bluff on the Bay. From 1860
to 1870 the water abraded that place, washing out human bones, and thus
compelled the earth to surrender its dead to the sport of the waves.
General Bouquet was born at Rolle, in the canton of Berne, Switzerland.
That he attained so high a rank is evidence of his merit. His masterly
campaign, in 1763, against the Ohio Indians, including the Delawares,
the Shawnees, and Mingoes, as related by the classic pen of Dr.
Kingsford, in his History of Canada,[6] is a most interesting and
striking chapter of our colonial annals. The result was the removal of a
terrible scourge from the western borders of Pennsylvania and Virginia,
and the restoration to liberty and to friends of three hundred white men
and women by a treaty, the terms of which were left to the discretion of
General Bouquet by General Gage. So highly appreciated were his skill
and courage at the time that both colonies honored him with votes of
thanks for his “great services,” which were supplemented by a
complimentary letter from the king.
But the royal letter and his promotion were only Dead Sea apples. Their
result was a voyage in a small vessel to the distant shores of the Gulf
of Mexico, where he was to die in a few months in a little garrison town
with his laurels yet fresh on his brow, away from the friends and that
admiring social circle he had left so recently at Philadelphia. Had he
been the son, or cousin, whether first, second or third, would have
mattered not, of a minister, he would have won a pension and obtained an
enviable appointment.
General Bouquet was not only a distinguished soldier, but he also left
behind him another claim to distinction in the thirty volumes of
manuscript in the British museum, known as the “Bouquet Collection,”
which now calendared is available to the historical student.
His monument has perished; his bones, perhaps, have been the sport of
the unpitying waves; generations have unconsciously trampled on his
dust; but, in “the Pantheon of history,” his name and his fame are as
fresh as when on these shores he drew his last breath and heaved his
last sigh.
A letter[7] from his confidential friend Ourry inspires the suspicion
that a romantic passion, nourished by exile and inaction, contributed to
his early death. He was devoted to a Miss Willing of Philadelphia, and
supposed to be her affianced. A Mr. Francis, a wealthy Londoner, wooed
and won the lady whilst the soldier was winning laurels on the western
frontier. But for vandal hands his tomb would be a shrine where
disappointed love could make its votive offerings.
General Frederick Haldimand was the successor of General Bouquet in the
command of the southern district. He, too, was a Swiss, and a native of
the Canton of Berne. He had held important commands in Canada before he
came to Florida. In 1773 he was appointed governor of New York. In the
same year, during General Gage’s absence in England, he was
commander-in-chief of the colonies. He was, from 1778 to 1784,
governor-general of Canada. To the qualities of a distinguished soldier,
he added ability for civil affairs and the statesmanlike qualities which
great crises sometimes require in a military commander, as appears from
Lord Dartmouth’s correspondence with him during Gage’s absence.[8]
There is an interesting coincidence in the lives of Bouquet and
Haldimand. Drawn to each other, doubtless, by the tie of nativity and
profession, similarity of disposition, interests and fortunes, a
life-long friendship was the natural consequence. They were associates
in land investments. Bouquet bequeathed his entire estate to his native
brother-in-arms, including the valuable collection before referred to.
More fortunate than the former, the latter lived to be made a Knight of
the Bath, and to die in his native town of Yverdun.[9]
-----
Footnote 4:
Kingford’s History of Canada, Vol. V., p. 110.
Footnote 5:
A statement of the English grey bricks used in the monument exists in
the Canadian archives at Ottawa, dated February 1, 1770. Haldimand
Papers, K. 15, p. 84.
Footnote 6:
Volume V., pp. 93-113.
Footnote 7:
J’ai lu mon cher ami, et relu avec attention votre triste lettre du
premier, et suis sensiblement touché de votre état. Je vois que votre
esprit agité, comme la mer après une rude secousse de tremblement de
terre, n’a pas encore repris son assiette. Je n’avois que trop bien
prévu l’effet funeste; plût à Dieu que je l’eusse aussi bien pu
prévenir!... Je suis attendri du récit touchant que vous me faites de
votre situation douloureuse, et je vous conjure par ce que vous tenez
du plus cher et de plus sacré, de ne vous pas laisser aller à la merci
d’une passion qui vous mène, et qui vous privera bientôt, si vous n’y
prenez garde, des moyens qui vous restent encore pour la dompter
(Kingsford Hist. of Can., Vol. V., p. 110).
Footnote 8:
I trust the designs of those who have apparently from self-interested
motives endeavored to spread an alarm, and create fresh disturbances
in consequence of the importation of tea by the East India company
will prove abortive.... In the present state of uncertainty with
regard to what may be the issue of this disagreeable business, I
cannot say more to you; and, indeed, the sentiments you have expressed
in your former dispatches in respect to the propriety or impropriety
of employing a military force in case of civil commotion are so just,
and your conduct in that delicate situation so temperate and prudent,
as to render any particular instructions from me on that head
unnecessary. Dartmouth to Haldimand—Canadian Archives, Series B., Vol.
35, p. 64.
Footnote 9:
Kingsford’s Hist. of Can., Vol. 4, p. 318.
------------------------------------------------------------------------