1687-1689.
The Iroquois Invasion.
Altercations • Attitude of Dongan • Martial Preparation • Perplexity of
Denonville • Angry Correspondence • Recall of Dongan • Sir Edmund Andros
• Humiliation of Denonville • Distress of Canada • Appeals for Help •
Iroquois Diplomacy • A Huron Macchiavel • The Catastrophe • Ferocity of
the Victors • War with England • Recall of Denonville.
When Dongan heard that the French had invaded the Senecas, seized
English traders on the lakes, and built a fort at Niagara, his wrath was
kindled anew. He sent to the Iroquois, and summoned them to meet him at
Albany; told the assembled chiefs that the late calamity had fallen upon
them because they had held councils with the French without asking his
leave; forbade them to do so again, and informed them that, as subjects
of King James, they must make no treaty, except by the consent of his
representative, the governor of New York. He declared that the Ottawas
and other remote tribes were also British subjects; that the Iroquois
should unite with them, to expel the French from the west; and that all
alike should bring down their beaver skins to the English at Albany.
Moreover, he enjoined them to receive no more French Jesuits into their
towns, and to call home their countrymen whom these fathers had
converted and enticed to Canada. "Obey my commands," added the governor,
"for that is the only way to eat well and sleep well, without fear or
disturbance." The Iroquois, who wanted his help, seemed to assent to all
he said. "We will fight the French," exclaimed their orator, "as long as
we have a man left." [1]
[1] Dongan's Propositions to the Five Nations; Answer of the Five
Nations, N. Y. Col. Docs., III. 438, 441.
At the same time, Dongan wrote to Denonville demanding the immediate
surrender of the Dutch and English captured on the lakes. Denonville
angrily replied that he would keep the prisoners, since Dongan had
broken the treaty of neutrality by "giving aid and comfort to the
savages." The English governor, in return, upbraided his correspondent
for invading British territory. "I will endevour to protect his
Majesty's subjects here from your unjust invasions, till I hear from the
King, my Master, who is the greatest and most glorious Monarch that ever
set on a Throne, and would do as much to propagate the Christian faith
as any prince that lives. He did not send me here to suffer you to give
laws to his subjects. I hope, notwithstanding all your trained souldiers
and greate Officers come from Europe, that our masters at home will
suffer us to do ourselves justice on you for the injuries and spoyle you
have committed on us; and I assure you, Sir, if my Master gives leave, I
will be as soon at Quebeck as you shall be att Albany. What you alleage
concerning my assisting the Sinnakees (Senecas) with arms and ammunition
to warr against you was never given by mee untill the sixt of August
last, when understanding of your unjust proceedings in invading the King
my Master's territorys in a hostill manner, I then gave them powder,
lead, and armes, and united the five nations together to defend that
part of our King's dominions from your jnjurious invasion. And as for
offering them men, in that you doe me wrong, our men being all buisy
then at their harvest, and I leave itt to your judgment whether there
was any occasion when only foure hundred of them engaged with your whole
army. I advise you to send home all the Christian and Indian prisoners
the King of England's subjects you unjustly do deteine. This is what I
have thought fitt to answer to your reflecting and provoking letter." [2]
[2] Dongan to Denonville, 9 Sept., 1687, in N. Y. Col. Docs., III. 472.
As for the French claims to the Iroquois country and the upper lakes, he
turned them to ridicule. They were founded, in part, on the missions
established there by the Jesuits. "The King of China," observes Dongan,
"never goes anywhere without two Jessuits with him. I wonder you make
not the like pretence to that Kingdome." He speaks with equal irony of
the claim based on discovery: "Pardon me if I say itt is a mistake,
except you will affirme that a few loose fellowes rambling amongst
Indians to keep themselves from starving gives the French a right to the
Countrey." And of the claim based on geographical divisions: "Your
reason is that some rivers or rivoletts of this country run out into the
great river of Canada. O just God! what new, farr-fetched, and
unheard-of pretence is this for a title to a country. The French King
may have as good a pretence to all those Countrys that drink clarett and
Brandy." [3] In spite of his sarcasms, it is clear that the claim of
prior discovery and occupation was on the side of the French.
[3] Dongan's Fourth Paper to the French Agents, N. Y. Col. Docs., III. 528.
The dispute now assumed a new phase. James II. at length consented to
own the Iroquois as his subjects, ordering Dongan to protect them, and
repel the French by force of arms, should they attack them again. [4] At
the same time, conferences were opened at London between the French
ambassador and the English commissioners appointed to settle the
questions at issue. Both disputants claimed the Iroquois as subjects,
and the contest wore an aspect more serious than before.
[4] Warrant, authorizing Governor Dongan to protect the Five Nations, 10
Nov., 1687, N. Y. Col. Docs., III. 503.
The royal declaration was a great relief to Dongan. Thus far he had
acted at his own risk; now he was sustained by the orders of his king.
He instantly assumed a warlike attitude; and, in the next spring, wrote
to the Earl of Sunderland that he had been at Albany all winter, with
four hundred infantry, fifty horsemen, and eight hundred Indians. This
was not without cause, for a report had come from Canada that the French
were about to march on Albany to destroy it. "And now, my Lord,"
continues Dongan, "we must build forts in ye countrey upon ye great
Lakes, as ye French doe, otherwise we lose ye Countrey, ye Bever trade,
and our Indians." [5] Denonville, meanwhile, had begun to yield, and
promised to send back McGregory and the men captured with him. [6]
Dongan, not satisfied, insisted on payment for all the captured
merchandise, and on the immediate demolition of Fort Niagara. He added
another demand, which must have been singularly galling to his rival. It
was to the effect that the Iroquois prisoners seized at Fort Frontenac,
and sent to the galleys in France, should be surrendered as British
subjects to the English ambassador at Paris or the secretary of state in
London. [7]
[5] Dongan to Sunderland, Feb., 1688, N. Y. Col. Docs., III. 510.
[6] Denonville à Dongan, 2 Oct., 1687. McGregory soon arrived, and
Dongan sent him back to Canada as an emissary with a civil message to
Denonville. Dongan to Denonville, 10 Nov., 1687.
[7] Dongan to Denonville, 31 Oct., 1687; Dongan's First Demand of the
French Agents, N. Y. Col. Docs., III. 515, 520.
Denonville was sorely perplexed. He was hard pressed, and eager for
peace with the Iroquois at any price; but Dongan was using every means
to prevent their treating of peace with the French governor until he had
complied with all the English demands. In this extremity, Denonville
sent Father Vaillant to Albany, in the hope of bringing his intractable
rival to conditions less humiliating. The Jesuit played his part with
ability, and proved more than a match for his adversary in dialectics;
but Dongan held fast to all his demands. Vaillant tried to temporize,
and asked for a truce, with a view to a final settlement by reference to
the two kings. [8] Dongan referred the question to a meeting of Iroquois
chiefs, who declared in reply that they would make neither peace nor
truce till Fort Niagara was demolished and all the prisoners restored.
Dongan, well pleased, commended their spirit, and assured them that King
James, "who is the greatest man the sunn shines uppon, and never told a
ly in his life, has given you his Royall word to protect you." [9]
Vaillant returned from his bootless errand; and a stormy correspondence
followed between the two governors. Dongan renewed his demands, then
protested his wish for peace, extolled King James for his pious zeal,
and declared that he was sending over missionaries of his own to convert
the Iroquois. [10] What Denonville wanted was not their conversion by
Englishmen, but their conversion by Frenchmen, and the presence in their
towns of those most useful political agents, the Jesuits. [11] He
replied angrily, charging Dongan with preventing the conversion of the
Iroquois by driving off the French missionaries, and accusing him,
farther, of instigating the tribes of New York to attack Canada.[12]
Suddenly there was a change in the temper of his letters. He wrote to
his rival in terms of studied civility; declared that he wished he could
meet him, and consult with him on the best means of advancing the cause
of true religion; begged that he would not refuse him his friendship;
and thanked him in warm terms for befriending some French prisoners whom
he had saved from the Iroquois, and treated with great kindness. [13]
[8] The papers of this discussion will be found in N. Y. Col. Docs.,
III.
[9] Dongan's Reply to the Five Nations, Ibid., III. 535.
[10] Dongan to Denonville, 17 Feb., 1688, Ibid., III. 519.
[11] "II y a une nécessité indispensable pour les intérais de la
Religion et de la Colonie de restablir les missionaires Jésuites dans
tous les villages Iroquois: si vous ne trouvés moyen de faire retourner
ces Pères dans leurs anciennes missions, vous devés en attendre beaucoup
de malheur pour cette Colonie; car je dois vous dire que jusqu'icy c'est
leur habilité qui a soutenu les affaires du pays par leur sçavoir-faire
à gouverner les esprits de ces barbares, qui ne sont Sauvages que de
nom." Denonville, Mémoire adressé au Ministre, 9 Nov., 1688.
[12] Denonville à Dongan, 24 Avril, 1688; Ibid., 12 Mai, 1688. Whether
the charge is true is questionable. Dongan had just written that, if the
Iroquois did harm to the French, he was ordered to offer satisfaction,
and had already done so.
[13] Denonville à Dongan, 18 Juin, 1688; Ibid., 5 Juillet, 1688; Ibid.,
20 Aug., 1688. "Je n'ai donc qu'à vous asseurer que toute la Colonie a
une très-parfaite reconnoissance des bons offices que ces pauvres
malheureux ont reçu de vous et de vos peuples."
This change was due to despatches from Versailles, in which Denonville
was informed that the matters in dispute would soon be amicably settled
by the commissioners; that he was to keep on good terms with the English
commanders, and, what pleased him still more, that the king of England
was about to recall Dongan. [14] In fact, James II. had resolved on
remodelling his American colonies. New York, New Jersey, and New England
had been formed into one government under Sir Edmund Andros; and Dongan
was summoned home, where a regiment was given him, with the rank of
major-general of artillery. Denonville says that, in his efforts to
extend English trade to the Great Lakes and the Mississippi, his late
rival had been influenced by motives of personal gain. Be this as it
may, he was a bold and vigorous defender of the claims of the British
crown.
[14] Mémoire pour servir d'Instruction au Sr. Marquis de Denonville, 8
Mars, 1688; Le Roy à Denonville, même date; Seignelay à Denonville, même
date. Louis XIV. had demanded Dongan's recall. How far this had
influenced the action of James II. it is difficult to say.
Sir Edmund Andros now reigned over New York; and, by the terms of his
commission, his rule stretched westward to the Pacific. The usual
official courtesies passed between him and Denonville; but Andros
renewed all the demands of his predecessor, claimed the Iroquois as
subjects, and forbade the French to attack them. [15] The new governor
was worse than the old. Denonville wrote to the minister: "I send you
copies of his letters, by which you will see that the spirit of Dongan
has entered into the heart of his successor, who may be less passionate
and less interested, but who is, to say the least, quite as much opposed
to us, and perhaps more dangerous by his suppleness and smoothness than
the other was by his violence. What he has just done among the Iroquois,
whom he pretends to be under his government, and whom he prevents from
coming to meet me, is a certain proof that neither he nor the other
English governors, nor their people, will refrain from doing this colony
all the harm they can." [16]
[15] Andros to Denonville, 21 Aug., 1688; Ibid., 29 Sept., 1688.
[16] Mémoire de l'Estat Présent des Affaires de ce Pays depuis le 10me
Aoust, 1688, jusq'au dernier Octobre de la mesme année. He declares that
the English are always "itching for the western trade," that their
favorite plan is to establish a post on the Ohio, and that they have
made the attempt three times already.
While these things were passing, the state of Canada was deplorable, and
the position of its governor as mortifying as it was painful. He thought
with good reason that the maintenance of the new fort at Niagara was of
great importance to the colony, and he had repeatedly refused the
demands of Dongan and the Iroquois for its demolition. But a power
greater than sachems and governors presently intervened. The provisions
left at Niagara, though abundant, were atrociously bad. Scurvy and other
malignant diseases soon broke out among the soldiers. The Senecas
prowled about the place, and no man dared venture out for hunting,
fishing, or firewood. [17] The fort was first a prison, then a hospital,
then a charnel-house, till before spring the garrison of a hundred men
was reduced to ten or twelve. In this condition, they were found towards
the end of April by a large war-party of friendly Miamis, who entered
the place and held it till a French detachment at length arrived for its
relief. [18] The garrison of Fort Frontenac had suffered from the same
causes, though not to the same degree. Denonville feared that he should
be forced to abandon them both. The way was so long and so dangerous,
and the governor had grown of late so cautious, that he dreaded the risk
of maintaining such remote communications. On second thought, he
resolved to keep Frontenac and sacrifice Niagara. He promised Dongan
that he would demolish it, and he kept his word. [19]
[17] Denonville, Mémoire du 10 Aoust, 1688.
[18] Recueil de ce qui s'est passé en Canada depuis l'année 1682. The
writer was an officer of the detachment, and describes what he saw.
Compare La Potherie, II. 210; and La Hontan, I. 131 (1709).
[19] Denonville à Dongan, 20 Aoust, 1688; Procès-verbal of the Condition
of Fort Niagara, 1688; N. Y. Col. Docs., IX. 386. The palisades were
torn down by Denonville's order on the 15th of September. The rude
dwellings and storehouses which they enclosed, together with a large
wooden cross, were left standing. The commandant De Troyes had died, and
Captain Desbergères had been sent to succeed him.
He was forced to another and a deeper humiliation. At the imperious
demand of Dongan and the Iroquois, he begged the king to send back the
prisoners entrapped at Fort Frontenac, and he wrote to the minister: "Be
pleased, Monseigneur, to remember that I had the honor to tell you that,
in order to attain the peace necessary to the country, I was obliged to
promise that I would beg you to send back to us the prisoners I sent you
last year. I know you gave orders that they should be well treated, but
I am informed that, though they were well enough treated at first, your
orders were not afterwards executed with the same fidelity. If ill
treatment has caused them all to die,--for they are people who easily
fall into dejection, and who die of it,--and if none of them come back,
I do not know at all whether we can persuade these barbarians not to
attack us again." [20]
[20] Denonville, Mémoire de 10 Aoust, 1688.
What had brought the marquis to this pass? Famine, destitution, disease,
and the Iroquois were making Canada their prey. The fur trade had been
stopped for two years; and the people, bereft of their only means of
subsistence, could contribute nothing to their own defence. Above Three
Rivers, the whole population was imprisoned in stockade forts hastily
built in every seigniory. [21] Here they were safe, provided that they
never ventured out; but their fields were left untilled, and the
governor was already compelled to feed many of them at the expense of
the king. The Iroquois roamed among the deserted settlements or prowled
like lynxes about the forts, waylaying convoys and killing or capturing
stragglers. Their war-parties were usually small; but their movements
were so mysterious and their attacks so sudden, that they spread a
universal panic through the upper half of the colony. They were the
wasps which Denonville had failed to kill.
[21] In the Dépot des Cartes de la Marine, there is a contemporary
manuscript map, on which all these forts are laid down.
"We should succumb," wrote the distressed governor, "if our cause were
not the cause of God. Your Majesty's zeal for religion, and the great
things you have done for the destruction of heresy, encourage me to hope
that you will be the bulwark of the Faith in the new world as you are in
the old. I cannot give you a truer idea of the war we have to wage with
the Iroquois than by comparing them to a great number of wolves or other
ferocious beasts, issuing out of a vast forest to ravage the neighboring
settlements. The people gather to hunt them down; but nobody can find
their lair, for they are always in motion. An abler man than I would be
greatly at a loss to manage the affairs of this country. It is for the
interest of the colony to have peace at any cost whatever. For the glory
of the king and the good of religion, we should be glad to have it an
advantageous one; and so it would have been, but for the malice of the
English and the protection they have given our enemies." [22]
[22] Denonville au Roy, 1688; Ibid., Mémoire du 10 Aoust, 1688; Ibid.,
Mémoire du 9 Nov., 1688.
And yet he had, one would think, a reasonable force at his disposal. His
thirty-two companies of regulars were reduced by this time to about
fourteen hundred men, but he had also three or four hundred Indian
converts, besides the militia of the colony, of whom he had stationed a
large body under Vaudreuil at the head of the Island of Montreal. All
told, they were several times more numerous than the agile warriors who
held the colony in terror. He asked for eight hundred more regulars. The
king sent him three hundred. Affairs grew worse, and he grew desperate.
Rightly judging that the best means of defence was to take the
offensive, he conceived the plan of a double attack on the Iroquois, one
army to assail the Onondagas and Cayugas, another the Mohawks and
Oneidas. [23] Since to reach the Mohawks as he proposed, by the way of
Lake Champlain, he must pass through territory indisputably British, the
attempt would be a flagrant violation of the treaty of neutrality.
Nevertheless, he implored the king to send him four thousand soldiers to
accomplish it. [24] His fast friend, the bishop, warmly seconded his
appeal. "The glory of God is involved," wrote the head of the church,
"for the Iroquois are the only tribe who oppose the progress of the
gospel. The glory of the king is involved, for they are the only tribe
who refuse to recognize his grandeur and his might. They hold the French
in the deepest contempt; and, unless they are completely humbled within
two years, his Majesty will have no colony left in Canada." [25] And the
prelate proceeds to tell the minister how, in his opinion, the war ought
to be conducted. The appeal was vain. "His Majesty agrees with you,"
wrote Seignelay, "that three or four thousand men would be the best
means of making peace, but he cannot spare them now. If the enemy breaks
out again, raise the inhabitants, and fight as well as you can till his
Majesty is prepared to send you troops." [26]
[23] Plan for the Termination of the Iroquois War, N. Y. Col. Docs., IX.
375.
[24] Denonville, Mémoire du 8 Août, 1688.
[25] Saint-Vallier, Mémoire sur les Affaires du Canada pour Monseigneur
le Marquis de Seignelay.
[26] Mémoire du Ministre adressé à Denonville, 1 Mai, 1689.
A hope had dawned on the governor. He had been more active of late in
negotiating than in fighting, and his diplomacy had prospered more than
his arms. It may be remembered that some of the Iroquois entrapped at
Fort Frontenac had been given to their Christian relatives in the
mission villages. Here they had since remained. Denonville thought that
he might use them as messengers to their heathen countrymen, and he sent
one or more of them to Onondaga with gifts and overtures of peace. That
shrewd old politician, Big Mouth, was still strong in influence at the
Iroquois capital, and his name was great to the farthest bounds of the
confederacy. He knew by personal experience the advantages of a neutral
position between the rival European powers, from both of whom he
received gifts and attentions; and he saw that what was good for him was
good for the confederacy, since, if it gave itself to neither party,
both would court its alliance. In his opinion, it had now leaned long
enough towards the English; and a change of attitude had become
expedient. Therefore, as Denonville promised the return of the
prisoners, and was plainly ready to make other concessions, Big Mouth,
setting at naught the prohibitions of Andros, consented to a conference
with the French. He set out at his leisure for Montreal, with six
Onondaga, Cayuga, and Oneida chiefs; and, as no diplomatist ever
understood better the advantage of negotiating at the head of an
imposing force, a body of Iroquois warriors, to the number, it is said,
of twelve hundred, set out before him, and silently took path to Canada.
The ambassadors paddled across the lake and presented themselves before
the commandant of Fort Frontenac, who received them with distinction,
and ordered Lieutenant Perelle to escort them to Montreal. Scarcely had
the officer conducted his august charge five leagues on their way, when,
to his amazement, he found himself in the midst of six hundred Iroquois
warriors, who amused themselves for a time with his terror, and then
accompanied him as far as Lake St. Francis, where he found another body
of savages nearly equal in number. Here the warriors halted, and the
ambassadors with their escort gravely pursued their way to meet
Denonville at Montreal. [27]
[27] Relation des Évenements de la Guerre, 30 Oct., 1688.
Big Mouth spoke haughtily, like a man who knew his power. He told the
governor that he and his people were subjects neither of the French nor
of the English; that they wished to be friends of both; that they held
their country of the Great Spirit; and that they had never been
conquered in war. He declared that the Iroquois knew the weakness of the
French, and could easily exterminate them; that they had formed a plan
of burning all the houses and barns of Canada, killing the cattle,
setting fire to the ripe grain, and then, when the people were starving,
attacking the forts; but that he, Big Mouth, had prevented its
execution. He concluded by saying that he was allowed but four days to
bring back the governor's reply; and that, if he were kept waiting
longer, he would not answer for what might happen. [28] Though it
appeared by some expressions in his speech that he was ready to make
peace only with the French, leaving the Iroquois free to attack the
Indian allies of the colony, and though, while the ambassadors were at
Montreal, their warriors on the river above actually killed several of
the Indian converts, Denonville felt himself compelled to pretend
ignorance of the outrage. [29] A declaration of neutrality was drawn up,
and Big Mouth affixed to it the figures of sundry birds and beasts as
the signatures of himself and his fellow-chiefs. [30] He promised, too,
that within a certain time deputies from the whole confederacy should
come to Montreal and conclude a general peace.
[28] Declaration of the Iroquois in presence of M. de Denonville, N. Y.
Col. Docs., IX. 384; Relation des Événements de la Guerre, 30 Oct.,
1688; Belmont, Histoire du Canada.
[29] Callières à Seignelay, Jan., 1689.
[30] See the signatures in N. Y. Col. Docs., IX. 385, 386.
The time arrived, and they did not appear. It became known, however,
that a number of chiefs were coming from Onondaga to explain the delay,
and to promise that the deputies should soon follow. The chiefs in fact
were on their way. They reached La Famine, the scene of La Barre's
meeting with Big Mouth; but here an unexpected incident arrested them,
and completely changed the aspect of affairs.
Among the Hurons of Michillimackinac there was a chief of high renown
named Kondiaronk, or the Rat. He was in the prime of life, a redoubted
warrior, and a sage counsellor. The French seem to have admired him
greatly. "He is a gallant man," says La Hontan, "if ever there was one;"
while Charlevoix declares that he was the ablest Indian the French ever
knew in America, and that he had nothing of the savage but the name and
the dress. In spite of the father's eulogy, the moral condition of the
Rat savored strongly of the wigwam. He had given Denonville great
trouble by his constant intrigues with the Iroquois, with whom he had
once made a plot for the massacre of his neighbors, the Ottawas, under
cover of a pretended treaty. [31] The French had spared no pains to gain
him; and he had at length been induced to declare for them, under a
pledge from the governor that the war should never cease till the
Iroquois were destroyed. During the summer, he raised a party of forty
warriors, and came down the lakes in quest of Iroquois scalps. [32] On
the way, he stopped at Fort Frontenac to hear the news, when, to his
amazement, the commandant told him that deputies from Onondaga were
coming in a few days to conclude peace, and that he had better go home
at once.
[31] Nicolas Perrot, 143.
[32] Denonville à Seignelay, 9 Nov., 1688. La Hontan saw the party set
out, and says that there were about a hundred of them.
"It is well," replied the Rat.
He knew that for the Hurons it was not well. He and his tribe stood
fully committed to the war, and for them peace between the French and
the Iroquois would be a signal of destruction, since Denonville could
not or would not protect his allies. The Rat paddled off with his
warriors. He had secretly learned the route of the expected deputies;
and he shaped his course, not, as he had pretended, for
Michillimackinac, but for La Famine, where he knew that they would land.
Having reached his destination, he watched and waited four or five days,
till canoes at length appeared, approaching from the direction of
Onondaga. On this, the Rat and his friends hid themselves in the bushes.
The new comers were the messengers sent as precursors of the embassy. At
their head was a famous personage named Decanisora, or Tegannisorens,
with whom were three other chiefs, and, it seems, a number of warriors.
They had scarcely landed when the ambushed Hurons gave them a volley of
bullets, killed one of the chiefs, wounded all the rest, and then,
rushing upon them, seized the whole party except a warrior who escaped
with a broken arm. Having secured his prisoners, the Rat told them that
he had acted on the suggestion of Denonville, who had informed him that
an Iroquois war-party was to pass that way. The astonished captives
protested that they were envoys of peace. The Rat put on a look of
amazement, then of horror and fury, and presently burst into invectives
against Denonville for having made him the instrument of such atrocious
perfidy. "Go, my brothers," he exclaimed, "go home to your people.
Though there is war between us, I give you your liberty. Onontio has
made me do so black a deed that I shall never be happy again till your
five tribes take a just vengeance upon him." After giving them guns,
powder, and ball, he sent them on their way, well pleased with him and
filled with rage against the governor.
In accordance with Indian usage, he, however, kept one of them to be
adopted, as he declared, in place of one of his followers whom he had
lost in the skirmish; then, recrossing the lake, he went alone to Fort
Frontenac, and, as he left the gate to rejoin his party, he said coolly,
"I have killed the peace: we shall see how the governor will get out of
this business." [33] Then, without loss of time, he repaired to
Michillimackinac, and gave his Iroquois prisoner to the officer in
command. No news of the intended peace had yet reached that distant
outpost; and, though the unfortunate Iroquois told the story of his
mission and his capture, the Rat declared that it was a crazy invention
inspired by the fear of death, and the prisoner was immediately shot by
a file of soldiers. The Rat now sent for an old Iroquois who had long
been a prisoner at the Huron village, telling him with a mournful air
that he was free to return to his people, and recount the cruelty of the
French, who, had put their countryman to death. The liberated Iroquois
faithfully acquitted himself of his mission. [34]
[33] "Il dit, J'ai tué la paix." Belmont, Histoire du Canada. "Le Rat
passa ensuite seul à Catarakouy (Fort Frontenac) sans vouloir dire le
tour qu'il avoit fait, dit seulement estant hors de la porte, en s'en
allant, Nous verrons comme le gouverneur se tirera d'affaire."
Denonville.
[34] La Hontan, I. 189. (1709) Most of the details of the story are
drawn from the writer, whose statement I have compared with that of
Denonville, in his letter dated Nov. 9, 1688; of Callières, Jan., 1689;
of the Abstract of Letters from Canada, in N. Y. Col. Docs., IX. 393;
and of the writer of Relation des Événements de la Guerre, 30 Oct.,
1688. Belmont notices the affair with his usual conciseness. La Hontan's
account is sustained by the others in most, though not all of its
essential points. He calls the Huron chief Adario, ou le Rat. He is
elsewhere mentioned as Kondiaronk, Kondiaront, Soüoïas, and Soüaïti. La
Hontan says that the scene of the treachery was one of the rapids of the
St. Lawrence, but more authentic accounts place it at La Famine.
One incident seemed for a moment likely to rob the intriguer of the
fruits of his ingenuity. The Iroquois who had escaped in the skirmish
contrived to reach Fort Frontenac some time after the last visit of the
Rat. He told what had happened; and, after being treated with the utmost
attention, he was sent to Onondaga, charged with explanations and
regrets. The Iroquois dignitaries seemed satisfied, and Denonville wrote
to the minister that there was still good hope of peace. He little knew
his enemy. They could dissemble and wait; but they neither believed the
governor nor forgave him. His supposed treachery at La Famine, and his
real treachery at Fort Frontenac, filled them with a patient but
unextinguishable rage. They sent him word that they were ready to renew
the negotiation; then they sent again, to say that Andros forbade them.
Without doubt they used his prohibition as a pretext. Months passed, and
Denonville remained in suspense. He did not trust his Indian allies, nor
did they trust him. Like the Rat and his Hurons, they dreaded the
conclusion of peace, and wished the war to continue, that the French
might bear the brunt of it, and stand between them and the wrath of the
Iroquois. [35]
[35] Denonville au Ministre, 9 Nov., 1688.
In the direction of the Iroquois, there was a long and ominous silence.
It was broken at last by the crash of a thunderbolt. On the night
between the fourth and fifth of August, a violent hail-storm burst over
Lake St. Louis, an expansion of the St. Lawrence a little above
Montreal. Concealed by the tempest and the darkness, fifteen hundred
warriors landed at La Chine, and silently posted themselves about the
houses of the sleeping settlers, then screeched the war-whoop, and began
the most frightful massacre in Canadian history. The houses were burned,
and men, women, and children indiscriminately butchered. In the
neighborhood were three stockade forts, called Rémy, Roland, and La
Présentation; and they all had garrisons. There was also an encampment
of two hundred regulars about three miles distant, under an officer
named Subercase, then absent at Montreal on a visit to Denonville, who
had lately arrived with his wife and family. At four o'clock in the
morning, the troops in this encampment heard a cannon-shot from one of
the forts. They were at once ordered under arms. Soon after, they saw a
man running towards them, just escaped from the butchery. He told his
story, and passed on with the news to Montreal, six miles distant. Then
several fugitives appeared, chased by a band of Iroquois, who gave over
the pursuit at sight of the soldiers, but pillaged several houses before
their eyes. The day was well advanced before Subercase arrived. He
ordered the troops to march. About a hundred armed inhabitants had
joined them, and they moved together towards La Chine. Here they found
the houses still burning, and the bodies of their inmates strewn among
them or hanging from the stakes where they had been tortured. They
learned from a French surgeon, escaped from the enemy, that the Iroquois
were all encamped a mile and a half farther on, behind a tract of
forest. Subercase, whose force had been strengthened by troops from the
forts, resolved to attack them; and, had he been allowed to do so, he
would probably have punished them severely, for most of them were
helplessly drunk with brandy taken from the houses of the traders. Sword
in hand, at the head of his men, the daring officer entered the forest;
but, at that moment, a voice from the rear commanded a halt. It was that
of the Chevalier de Vaudreuil, just come from Montreal, with positive
orders from Denonville to run no risks and stand solely on the
defensive. Subercase was furious. High words passed between him and
Vaudreuil, but he was forced to obey.
The troops were led back to Fort Roland, where about five hundred
regulars and militia were now collected under command of Vaudreuil. On
the next day, eighty men from Fort Rémy attempted to join them; but the
Iroquois had slept off the effect of their orgies, and were again on the
alert. The unfortunate detachment was set upon by a host of savages, and
cut to pieces in full sight of Fort Roland. All were killed or captured,
except Le Moyne de Longueuil, and a few others, who escaped within the
gate of Fort Rémy. [36]
[36] Recueil de ce qui s'est passé en Canada depuis l'année 1682;
Observations on the State of Affairs in Canada, 1689, N. Y. Col. Docs.,
IX. 431; Belmont, Histoire du Canada; Frontenac au Ministre, 15 Nov.,
1689. This detachment was commanded by Lieutenant de la Rabeyre, and
consisted of fifty French and thirty Indian converts.
Montreal was wild with terror. It had been fortified with palisades
since the war began; but, though there were troops in the town under the
governor himself, the people were in mortal dread. No attack was made
either on the town or on any of the forts, and such of the inhabitants
as could reach them were safe; while the Iroquois held undisputed
possession of the open country, burned all the houses and barns over an
extent of nine miles, and roamed in small parties, pillaging and
scalping, over more than twenty miles. There is no mention of their
having encountered opposition; nor do they seem to have met with any
loss but that of some warriors killed in the attack on the detachment
from Fort Rémy, and that of three drunken stragglers who were caught and
thrown into a cellar in Fort La Présentation. When they came to their
senses, they defied their captors, and fought with such ferocity that it
was necessary to shoot them. Charlevoix says that the invaders remained
in the neighborhood of Montreal till the middle of October, or more than
two months; but this seems incredible, since troops and militia enough
to drive them all into the St. Lawrence might easily have been collected
in less than a week. It is certain, however, that their stay was
strangely long. Troops and inhabitants seem to have been paralyzed with
fear.
At length, most of them took to their canoes, and recrossed Lake St.
Louis in a body, giving ninety yells to show that they had ninety
prisoners in their clutches. This was not all; for the whole number
carried off was more than a hundred and twenty, besides about two
hundred who had the good fortune to be killed on the spot. As the
Iroquois passed the forts, they shouted, "Onontio, you deceived us, and
now we have deceived you." Towards evening, they encamped on the farther
side of the lake, and began to torture and devour their prisoners. On
that miserable night, stupefied and speechless groups stood gazing from
the strand of La Chine at the lights that gleamed along the distant
shore of Châteaugay, where their friends, wives, parents, or children
agonized in the fires of the Iroquois, and scenes were enacted of
indescribable and nameless horror. The greater part of the prisoners
were, however, reserved to be distributed among the towns of the
confederacy, and there tortured for the diversion of the inhabitants.
While some of the invaders went home to celebrate their triumph, others
roamed in small parties through all the upper parts of the colony,
spreading universal terror. [37]
[37] The best account of the descent of the Iroquois at La Chine is that
of the Recueil de ce qui s'est passé en Canada, 1682-1712. The writer
was an author under Subercase, and was on the spot. Belmont, superior of
the mission at Montreal, also gives a trustworthy account in his
Histoire du Canada. Compare La Honton, I. 193 (1709) and La Potherie,
II. 229. Farther particulars are given in the letters of Callières, 8
Nov.; Champigny, 16 Nov.; and Frontenac, 15 Nov. Frontenac, after
visiting the scene of the catastrophe a few weeks after it occurred,
writes: "Ils (les Iroquois) avoient bruslé plus de trois lieues de pays,
saccagé toutes les maisons jusqu'aux portes de la ville, enlevé plus de
six vingt personnes, tant hommes, femmes, qu'enfants, après avoir
massacré plus de deux cents dont ils avoient cassé la teste aux uns,
bruslé, rosty, et mangé les autres, ouverte le ventre des femmes grosses
pour en arracher les enfants, et fait des cruautez inouïes et sans
exemple." The details are given by Belmont, and by the author of
Histoire de l'Eau de Vie en Canada, are no less revolting. The
last-mentioned writer thinks that the massacre was a judgment of God
upon the sale of brandy at La Chine.
Some Canadian writers have charged the English with instigating the
massacre. I find nothing in contemporary documents to support the
accusation. Denonville wrote to the minister, after the Rat's treachery
came to light, that Andros had forbidden the Iroquois to attack the
colony. Immediately after the attack at La Chine, the Iroquois sachems,
in a conference with the agents of New England, declared that "we did
not make war on the French at the persuasion of our brethren at Albany;
for we did not so much as acquaint them of our intention till fourteen
days after our army had begun their march." Report of Conference in
Colden, 103.
Canada lay bewildered and benumbed under the shock of this calamity; but
the cup of her misery was not full. There was revolution in England.
James II., the friend and ally of France, had been driven from his
kingdom, and William of Orange had seized his vacant throne. Soon there
came news of war between the two crowns. The Iroquois alone had brought
the colony to the brink of ruin; and now they would be supported by the
neighboring British colonies, rich, strong, and populous, compared to
impoverished and depleted Canada.
A letter of recall for Denonville was already on its way. [38] His
successor arrived in October, and the marquis sailed for France. He was
a good soldier in a regular war, and a subordinate command; and he had
some of the qualities of a good governor, while lacking others quite as
essential. He had more activity than vigor, more personal bravery than
firmness, and more clearness of perception than executive power. He
filled his despatches with excellent recommendations, but was not the
man to carry them into effect. He was sensitive, fastidious, critical,
and conventional, and plumed himself on his honor, which was not always
able to bear a strain; though as regards illegal trade, the besetting
sin of Canadian governors, his hands were undoubtedly clean. [39] It is
said that he had an instinctive antipathy for Indians, such as some
persons have for certain animals; and the coureurs de bois, and other
lawless classes of the Canadian population, appeared to please him no
better. Their license and insubordination distressed him, and he
constantly complained of them to the king. For the Church and its
hierarchy his devotion was unbounded; and his government was a season of
unwonted sunshine for the ecclesiastics, like the balmy days of the
Indian summer amid the gusts of November. They exhausted themselves in
eulogies of his piety; and, in proof of its depth and solidity, Mother
Juchereau tells us that he did not regard station and rank as very
useful aids to salvation. While other governors complained of too many
priests, Denonville begged for more. All was harmony between him and
Bishop Saint-Vallier; and the prelate was constantly his friend, even to
the point of justifying his worst act, the treacherous seizure of the
Iroquois neutrals. [40] When he left Canada, the only mourner besides
the churchmen was his colleague, the intendant Champigny; for the two
chiefs of the colony, joined in a common union with the Jesuits, lived
together in unexampled concord. On his arrival at court, the good
offices of his clerical allies gained for him the highly honorable post
of governor of the royal children, the young Dukes of Burgundy, Anjou,
and Berri.
[38] Le Roy à Denonville, 31 Mai, 1689.
[39] "I shall only add one article, on which possibly you will find it
strange that I have said nothing; namely, whether the governor carries
on any trade. I shall answer, no; but my Lady the Governess (Madame la
Gouvernante), who is disposed not to neglect any opportunity for making
a profit, had a room, not to say a shop, full of goods, till the close
of last winter, in the château of Quebec, and found means afterwards to
make a lottery to get rid of the rubbish that remained, which produced
her more than her good merchandise." Relation of the State of Affairs in
Canada, 1688, in N. Y. Col. Docs., IX. 388. This paper was written at
Quebec.
[40] Saint-Vallier, État Présent, 91, 92 (Quebec, 1856).