Québec expedition

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Henry St. John organized the Québec expedition (painting by Charles Jervas )

The Québec Expedition , also known as the Walker Expedition , was a failed British attack on the city of Québec in New France during the Queen Anne's War , the North American part of the War of the Spanish Succession . It failed due to a serious shipwreck on the St. Lawrence River on August 22, 1711, in which seven transport ships and one supply ship capsized. 890 soldiers and seamen were killed. This disaster is considered to be one of the worst in the history of the Royal Navy .

The expedition was an idea of Robert Harley and was based on plans from 1708. Due to Harley's illness, Henry St. John carried out most of the preparatory planning. The purpose of the Québec expedition was to demonstrate British power at sea. The expedition leaders, Rear Admiral Hovenden Walker and Brigadier John Hill, were selected on the basis of their political views and their ties to the Crown , and the plans were kept secret even from the Admiralty . Despite the secrecy, French spies managed to find out the British intentions and warned the authorities in Québec.

The expedition was due to be equipped in Boston , but the city was not prepared when the ships arrived and the Massachusetts Colony authorities had great difficulty gathering supplies for three months. Walker also struggled to find pilots and nautical charts to help navigate the Saint Lawrence River . The expedition reached the Gulf of Saint Lawrence without incident , but fog, treacherous currents and strong winds drove the fleet to the north bank, near what is now known as Pointe-des-Anglais , where the ships capsized. Walker broke off the expedition and returned to England. Although the Québec expedition failed, Harley continued to pursue his ocean- going naval strategy.

background

Samuel Vetch first proposed a similar expedition in 1708

In October 1710, regular British troops and American colonists took the French fortress Port Royal in Acadia (at what is now Annapolis Royal in Nova Scotia ). Francis Nicholson , the expedition's commander, brought the victory news to London . There he and Jeremiah Dummer (representative of the Province of Massachusetts Bay ) set up an expedition to Québec , the most important settlement in New France . After a government reshuffle in August 1710, Robert Harley was appointed Chancellor of the Exchequer . Harley wanted to realign the British armed forces and sought a deep sea navy at the expense of a reduced army. With a successful campaign he designed, he also wanted to push back the continued influence of his political rival, the Duke of Marlborough . To this end, he ordered sea and land expeditions to conquer Québec. Due to a serious illness, his State Secretary Henry St. John (later Viscount Bolingbroke) took over most of the planning.

The plan of attack was based on considerations that Samuel Vetch had made in 1708 and 1709. A naval expedition was supposed to transport regular troops and colonial militias up the Saint Lawrence River . Rear Admiral Hovenden Walker was appointed Commander-in-Chief , while Brigadier John Hill was given command of the land forces. Walker, who had only been promoted to Rear Admiral in March, is believed to have been chosen because of his friendship with St. John and his political views (supporters of the Tories ). By choosing Hills, St. John probably wanted to ingratiate himself with the royal court: Hill was a brother of Abigail Masham, a confidante of Queen Anne , and a cousin of Sarah Churchill, Duchess of Marlborough . Five of Marlborough's regiments in Flanders and two regiments stationed in Great Britain made up the land force of around 5,000 men. The flotilla set sail from various ports in southern England in April and May 1711. Their destination was a closely guarded secret: Neither Walker nor the Admiralty had been informed of the destination. In order to deceive spies, the ships only had as many supplies on board as is usual for a voyage in European waters.

Stopover in Boston

In June 1711, Francis Nicholson arrived in Boston with news and details of the expedition plans . A meeting of colonial governors in New London (Connecticut) was quickly arranged. The sea expedition was to include militia forces deployed in the New England colonies. Troops raised from Connecticut to Pennsylvania were to march under Nicholson's leadership along the Hudson River and Lake Champlain to Montreal . The colonial forces for Walker's sea expedition were under the command of Samuel Vetch, who had become governor of Nova Scotia in 1710 . They comprised 1,500 men, mostly from Massachusetts, with smaller contingents from New Hampshire and Rhode Island .

The flotilla reached Boston on June 24th and British troops disembarked on Noodle's Island (now the location of Logan International Airport ). According to the historian Samuel Adams Drake, the flotilla was "the most impressive to have ever crossed the Atlantic under the English flag". Having left the UK with insufficient supplies, her organizers expected to be fully supplied in Boston. The number of soldiers and seamen exceeded the population of Boston at the time, so that the implementation of this project caused great problems. Laws were passed to prevent traders from profiteering. The residents were punished for taking in deserters (apparently a serious problem according to contemporary sources).

During the five-week stay in Boston, Walker tried unsuccessfully to recruit river pilots who had experience in navigating the Saint Lawrence River. Even Captain Cyprian Southack, considered one of the colony's finest seafarers, indicated that he had never sailed beyond the mouth of the river. Walker intended to rely mainly on a Frenchman whom he had taken with him from Plymouth before leaving . Vetch, on the other hand, had great distrust of the French. He wrote that he was "not only an ignorant, boastful, lazy, drunk guy", but was also "up to no good". After this report, Walker bribed a Mr. Paradis, the captain of a captured French sloop , to serve as a pilot. The nautical charts that Walker had compiled were missing detailed information about the area of ​​the Saint Lawrence River, as was William Phips ' diary of the 1690 expedition . Walker interviewed some of Phips' expedition members whose inaccurate descriptions did not help to allay his concerns about the dangers to be expected. These concerns led him to use his largest and heaviest ships only for patrol trips. He chose the HMS Edgar as the new flagship .

catastrophe

On this map from 1733 the site of the accident is marked with a red dot

On July 30th the flotilla sailed from Boston. It consisted of various British and colonial ships, including nine warships, two bombards and 60 transport and supply ships. The ships carried 7,500 soldiers and around 6,000 sailors. On August 3, the flotilla reached the coast of Nova Scotia, where Samuel Vetch piloted the ships around Cape Breton and Cape North in the Gulf of Saint Lawrence .

On the morning of August 18, as the expedition was about to reach the mouth of the Saint Lawrence River, the wind began to blow strongly from the northwest. Walker was forced to seek safety in Gaspé Bay . On the morning of August 20th the wind turned southeast and the ships were able to sail slowly past the western tip of the island of Anticosti until the wind eased and thick fog came in. On August 22nd the wind picked up a bit and the fog cleared for a while, but not enough to see the coast. At this point the flotilla was at a point where the St. Lawrence River is about 110 kilometers wide and begins to narrow significantly. In this area there are numerous small islands in front of the north bank (near today's Pointe-des-Anglais ), including the Île aux Œufs (Egg Island), as well as rocky shallows. After consulting the pilots, Walker gave the signal at around 8 p.m. to lead the flotilla approximately on a south-westerly course.

Walker thought he was in the middle of the stream when he gave the order. In fact, he was about 32 km north of the appropriate course and strong currents directed his ships to the northwest. In an easterly wind, the flotilla gradually approached the Île aux Œufs. When Captain George Paddon reported at 10:30 p.m. that land had been sighted immediately ahead of them, Walker mistakenly assumed they were approaching the south bank. Just before he went to bed, he gave the order to take a more northerly course. A few minutes later, Walker was awakened by an Army officer named Goddard who claimed to be seeing the surf ahead . Walker ignored the warning, but a little later Goddard returned and insisted that the Vice Admiral come on deck or they would be lost.

Walker came out in his dressing gown and saw that the east wind was blowing the ship towards the western coast of the Leek . The French pilot also came on deck and made him aware of the true location. Walker immediately ordered the anchor ropes to be cut and sail upwind to avoid the danger. Two of the warships, the HMS Montague and the HMS Windsor, showed more trouble and anchored overnight in a dangerous spot surrounded by breakers. Walker heard cries of distress all night. As the fog cleared, he saw ships that had run aground some distance away. One New Englander wrote that he heard "the screeching of sinking, drowning, departing souls". At 2 a.m. the wind subsided and then turned to the northwest. Most of the fleet managed to stay away from the coast.

While the flotilla searched for survivors, it took three days for the full extent of the disaster to become apparent. Seven transport ships and one supply ship had sunk. Walker's first report mentioned 884 drowned soldiers, later reports revised that number to 740. These included some women who had traveled with them. Historian Gerald Graham adds around 150 seamen dead who were not mentioned in Army reports. Thus, the death toll should have been 890. On August 25, after recovering the last survivors and interviewing some pilots, Walker and Hill decided to break off the expedition. Vetch directly blamed Walker for the disaster: "In my humble opinion, the misfortune cannot be blamed on the difficulty of navigating, but on our wrong course, which inevitably drove us towards the north bank."

The flotilla sailed away from the Gulf of St. Lawrence and anchored on September 4th at Spanish River, now the port of Sydney (Nova Scotia) . There they discussed whether the French should be attacked in the Plaisance settlement on Newfoundland instead . With the summer coming to an end, insufficient supplies to winter in the region and rumors of strong defenses in Plaisance, the officers' council decided against an attack and decided to return to Great Britain.

return

Francis Nicholson learned of the disaster when he camped with his troops on Lake George , whereupon he broke off the campaign. The sea expedition was haunted by misfortune on its return home: Walker had previously written to New York asking for support from HMS Feversham and any other available supply ships. Without his knowing anything about it, the HMS Feversham and the transporters Joseph, Mary and Neptune ran aground on the coast of Cape Breton on October 7th, killing more than 100 men (the news did not reach London until November). The flotilla arrived in Portsmouth on October 10th . Walker's flagship ship, the HMS Edgar, exploded a few days later, possibly due to mishandling of gunpowder. As a result, Walker lost numerous important papers; William Phips' diary is also said to have been destroyed in the explosion.

Despite the extent of the failure of the expedition, the political consequences were limited. Harley continued to pursue an aggressive high seas policy designed to keep Britain's enemies at bay. To this end, he withdrew further funds from the army's European campaigns. Since the project had been organized by the incumbent government, it was not interested in further investigating the causes of the failure. Walker was received sympathetically by the Queen, and both he and Hill received new assignments. Walker later wrote a detailed and outspoken report based on his memories and saved journals and papers. The beginning of the reign of George I led to numerous changes in positions of power, whereupon Walker was removed from his rank in 1715.

In Great Britain, the lack of support from the colonies was generally blamed for the failure because of stinginess and stubbornness. The colonies denied these allegations; Francis Nicholson and Governor Joseph Dudley instead accused Walker. Relations between the army command and the colonial population had not always been cordial during the troops' stay near Boston. They gave a taste of the tense relations between civilians and military occupiers in the years leading up to the American Revolutionary War . One of Hill's officers wrote of the "bad temper and bitterness of these people whose government, doctrine, manners, hypocrisy and hypocrisy are unsustainable"; if they were not brought under tighter leadership, the colonists would "become more stubborn and disobedient every day." For their part, the colonists noted with some indignation that neither Walker nor Hill had to face any consequences for the failure of the expedition.

French actions

The French authorities had already been warned in March 1711 that Nicholson was organizing an expedition against Québec. They were also informed of the composition of Hill's force, but were ignorant of their purpose until July. Philippe de Rigaud de Vaudreuil , the governor of New France , sent Louis Denys de La Ronde to Boston in early June under the pretext of overseeing an exchange of prisoners. La Ronde received secret instructions to convince the authorities there to withhold support for the British forces. On June 8, coincidentally on the same day as Nicholson, La Ronde arrived in Boston. His efforts to influence the opinion of the colonists were evidently unsuccessful. Nicholson became aware of La Ronde's activities and had him arrested. After copies of his classified instructions were found aboard a captured French ship, La Ronde was held in Boston until November.

Governor Vaudreuil was warned again in August that an expedition against Québec and Montreal was planned. He raised his militia and gathered local Indian tribes together. Vaudreuil prepared the defenses as best he could and put the entire colony in a state of war. In mid-October, Québec learned that large ships were approaching, adding to the tension. It turned out that these ships were French. On board one of the ships was a scout whom Vaudreuil had sent out on September 19 to look for the British flotilla. The scout reported seven capsized ships and estimated the losses at 1,500 men. Although the locals had already started looting the wrecks, the colony organized a formal recovery operation that found various items such as anchors, chains, tents and cannons. The recovered items were auctioned.

literature

  • James Carr: Seeds of Discontent: the Deep Roots of the American Revolution, 1650-1750 . Bloomsbury, New York 2008, ISBN 978-0-8027-1512-8 .
  • Gerald S. Graham: The Walker Expedition to Quebec, 1711 . Ed .: The Champlain Society. Toronto 1953, ISBN 0-8371-5072-8 .
  • Frederick Hervey: The Naval History of Great Britain . tape 3 . J. Bew, London 1779, OCLC 5053540 (on- line ).
  • Francis Parkman : France and England: a Half-Century of Conflict . Little, Brown, Boston 1893, OCLC 10205640 .
  • Brendan Simms: Three Victories and a Defeat: The Rise and Fall of the First British Empire . Penguin Books, London 2008, ISBN 978-0-14-028984-8 .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Parkman: France and England: a Half-Century of Conflict. P. 149.
  2. ↑ Parkman: France and England: a Half-Century of Conflict. P. 156.
  3. ↑ a b Simms: Three Victories and a Defeat, pp. 64-66.
  4. ^ A b Parkman: France and England: a Half-Century of Conflict. P. 157.
  5. ↑ a b c Gerald S. Graham: Hovenden Walker . In: Dictionary of Canadian Biography . 24 volumes, 1966–2018. University of Toronto Press, Toronto ( English , French ).
  6. ^ Hervey: The Naval History of Great Britain. P. 317.
  7. ↑ Parkman: France and England: a Half-Century of Conflict. Pp. 157-158.
  8. ^ Hervey: The Naval History of Great Britain. P. 318.
  9. ^ A b Parkman: France and England: a Half-Century of Conflict. P. 158.
  10. ↑ Parkman: France and England: a Half-Century of Conflict. P. 159.
  11. ↑ Drake: The Border Wars of New England. P. 275.
  12. ↑ Drake: The Border Wars of New England. P. 270.
  13. ^ Graham: The Walker Expedition to Quebec. P. 23.
  14. ↑ Parkman: France and England: a Half-Century of Conflict. P. 161.
  15. ^ Graham: The Walker Expedition to Quebec. P. 26.
  16. ^ Graham: The Walker Expedition to Quebec. P. 28.
  17. ^ Graham: The Walker Expedition to Quebec. Pp. 29-30.
  18. ^ Graham: The Walker Expedition to Quebec. Pp. 30-31.
  19. ^ Graham: The Walker Expedition to Quebec. Pp. 33-34.
  20. ^ Graham: The Walker Expedition to Quebec. P. 34.
  21. ↑ Parkman: France and England: a Half-Century of Conflict. P. 165.
  22. ^ A b c Graham: The Walker Expedition to Quebec. P. 35.
  23. ↑ Parkman: France and England: a Half-Century of Conflict. P. 166.
  24. ↑ Parkman: France and England: a Half-Century of Conflict. P. 167.
  25. ^ A b Graham: The Walker Expedition to Quebec. P. 36.
  26. ↑ Parkman: France and England: a Half-Century of Conflict. Pp. 167-168.
  27. ^ Graham: The Walker Expedition to Quebec. P. 44.
  28. ↑ Parkman: France and England: a Half-Century of Conflict. P. 170.
  29. ↑ Parkman: France and England: a Half-Century of Conflict. P. 174.
  30. ^ Graham: The Walker Expedition to Quebec. P. 38.
  31. ↑ Parkman: France and England: a Half-Century of Conflict. Pp. 170-171.
  32. ^ Graham: The Walker Expedition to Quebec. P. 39.
  33. ↑ Drake: The Border Wars of New England. P. 282.
  34. ^ Graham: The Walker Expedition to Quebec. Pp. 45, 50.
  35. ^ Graham: The Walker Expedition to Quebec. Pp. 51-52.
  36. ^ Graham: The Walker Expedition to Quebec. P. 46.
  37. ^ Graham: The Walker Expedition to Quebec. P. 40.
  38. ^ Carr: Seeds of Discontent. P. 106.
  39. ^ Carr: Seeds of Discontent. P. 108.
  40. ^ Graham: The Walker Expedition to Quebec. Pp. 17-19.
  41. ^ Graham: The Walker Expedition to Quebec. P. 25.
  42. ↑ Parkman: France and England: a Half-Century of Conflict. P. 171.
  43. ↑ Parkman: France and England: a Half-Century of Conflict. P. 172.
  44. ^ Graham: The Walker Expedition to Quebec. P. 43.