Modern historians have pretty well shot down the idea that Frenchmen were the first white men to set foot
in America, and that one of them led the way for Columbus. But it could have happened. 

According to the discredited story, a French navigator from Dieppe named Cousin was sailing off the coast
of Africa in 1488, four years before Columbus' voyage, when he was forced westward by winds and tides
until he reached an unknown shore. On board the ship was a mutinous seaman named Pinzon who, after
the voyage, was thrown out of the French Navy. Pinzon went to Spain, met Columbus, told him of his
discovery, and sailed with him in 1492. 

There is not much evidence to make us think the story is true, but who knows? We do know of other
instances when ships were blown far to the west and onto strange shores. 

There is, however, good evidence that the first Europeans to establish a permanent settlement in North
America were Frenchmen. They were our ancestral Acadians. And they, like many of us, were fishermen. 

We think that Norman, Breton, and Basque fishermen were fishing Newfoundland's Grand Banks as early
as 1497. After John and Sebastian Cabot explored the area in that year, they swore that cod were so
plentiful that the vast schools sometimes halted the progress of their ships. There was no need for hook line
or bait. It was enough to dip them up with baskets, they said. 

The first reliable records of any French ship on the Grand Banks are those of Jean Denys of Honfleur, who
fished there in 1504, and of Thomas Aubert of Dieppe, who was there two years later. In 1507 a Norman
fisherman returned to Rouen with an extra cargo of seven savages, mostly likely Beathunk Indians. We
know of an early Breton fishing voyage by La Jacquette of Dahouet because of a shipboard brawl. The
master, Guillaume Dobel, alleged that the ship was carrying too much sail. He called the skipper, a man
named Picart, an idiot, and the quartermaster, named Garrouche, a veall, apparently a serious insult. 

Garrouche dropped the tiller, roared up to the quarterdeck, and collected himself a punch in the jaw from
Dobel--who then drew a knife and chased him overboard. The crew tried to rescue Garrouche, but he
drowned. Dobel made the best restitution he could to the widow. He married her. 

The early fishermen who visited the Grand Banks made two trips each year. The first was in late January or
early February, and braving winter westerlies in the North Atlantic, they returned to France as soon as their
holds were full. They sailed again in April or May and went home in September. 

At first, these fishermen cleaned the cod aboard ship and stored them between thick layers of salt. But it
was not long before they found that cod could be sun-dried on land, and that cured cod tasted better and
was easier to store. The fishermen began to go ashore each summer, to build makeshift villages for
themselves and drying stands for their fish. By 1519, the French, the Portuguese, and the English had set up
depots on Newfoundland, on the Acadian peninsula on Cape Breton Island, and on the St. Lawrence
River. 

Salt fish became big business, and they were sold wholesale in France by the thousands. In 1616 Michel
Le Bail of Breton sold more than 17,000 codfish to local merchants at Rouen. By 1529 the Normans were
shipping Newfoundland codfish to England. On just one day in 1542, no fewer than 60 ships departed
from Rouen alone for the Grand Bank. In 1578 there were 250 French vessels there, and 200 from other
nations. 

But, except for the temporary villages, the French made no attempt at settlement. For one thing, they were
being kept busy with wars on the continent. 

Jacques Cartier, lured by Indian tales of gold and of a Northwest Passage to the riches of Cathay, made
voyages to the Canadian wilds in 1534 and 1535 and attempted a short-lived settlement. But a bitter winter
and equally bitter Indians ended that. The Sieur de Robeval tried to revive that colony, but met even less
success. Then official France got itself involved in another war and forgot about North America for awhile. 

But the fishermen kept coming. 

By the middle 1500s, the fishermen, still drying their cod ashore, had begun trading with the Indians for a
rich harvest of furs. The furs found a ready market back home and official interest in the New World
picked up in direct relation to the value of the fur and fish trade. 

It was in the spring, April 7, 1604, that Pierre de Gua, Sieur de Monts, set off with Samuel Champlain and
a tiny fleet to sail around the southern tip of the Acadian peninsula. He discovered the Annapolis Valley,
charted the Bay of Fundy, and, on miniscule Saint Croix island, near the mouth of the river that today
divides New Brunswick from Maine, put down a colony of 79 men. 

Listen to historian Francis Parkman describe the place: 

     The rock-fenced islet was covered with cedars, and when the tide was out the shoals were
     dark with the swash of sea-weed ... (Here), in their leisure moments, the Frenchmen, we
     are told, amused themselves with detaching the limpets from the stones, as a savory
     addition to their fare. But there was little leisure at St. Croix. Soldiers, sailors and
     artisans betook themselves to their task. Before the winter closed in, the northern end of
     the island was covered with buildings, surrounding a square, where a solitary tree had
     been left standing. On the right was a spacious home, well built, and surmounted by one
     of those enormous roofs characteristic of the time. This was the lodging of DeMonts.
     Behind it, and near the water, was a long, covered gallery, for labor or amusement in
     foul weather. Champlain and the Sieur d'Orville ... built a house for themselves nearly
     opposite that of DeMonts; and the remainder of the square was occupied by storehouses,
     a magazine, workshops, lodgings for gentlemen and artisans, and a barrack for the
     soldiers, the whole enclosed with a palisade. Adjacent there was an attempt at a garden
     ... but nothing would grow in the sandy soil. There was a cemetery, too, and a small rustic
     chapel on a projecting point of rock. 

In the summertime, the island was very pretty and cozy. But winter there was something entirely different. 

Vegetables would not grow in the sandy soil, even in summer, so the colonists had to plant their garden and
sow their wheat on the mainland. Their spring went dry, so fresh water had to be brought from the mainland
as well. So also with firewood. 

The first snow fell on October 6. By December 3 ice floes began to cut off the Frenchmen from the
mainland garden, woodlots and water. A bitter wind blew constantly from the northeast, making it
impossible to keep warm. Food froze hard, then rotted. Scurvy began to take its toll. 

Thirty-five of the 79 men were dead by the following spring, when DeMonts decided to move his colony
across the Bay of Fundy to a place he named Port Royal. It would become one of the first permanent
settlements in North America. 

All of the buildings on Saint Croix Island were taken down and freighted, plank by plank, across the Bay of
Fundy. There, at a place later named Lower Grenville, the same materials were used to build a single
habitation in the form of a hollow square. 

This time, the habitation was well sited, fronting on the Annapolis Basin, its back protected from winter
Northers by a range of 500 foot hills. 

The Acadians had settled in to stay, and that was a first. 

As another historian, J.A. Doyle, put it: 

     For the first time there was to be seen in America a colony of Europeans, not a mere band
     of adventurers or explorers, but a settled community subsisting by their own labor. 

These colonists would call the place L'Acadie, a name derived from the work of the ancient Virgil, who
gave it to an idyllic--if imaginary--land inhabited by simple, virtuous people. The name had been
popularized in the 1400s in a novel by Jacopo Sanazzaro, which opens with a tribute to a grove of
"uncommon and extreme beauty" in a place called Arcadia. 

There is another theory about the name--that it was derived from the Micmac Indian word quoddy or
cadie, which meant "fertile" or "beautiful landscape." But folks who believe Micmacs on the land over an
ancient Greek's imagination have no romance in their souls. 

Most of the Sainte-Croix community was rebuilt at Port Royal. A new kitchen anchored one corner of the
habitation. There were lodgings for sailors and for the few workmen who had survived the winter just past.
There were separate apartments for the colony's leaders, a salle d'armes for the soldiers, and two
platforms facing the water for mounting ships' cannons. 

The habitation fronted on the well-protected Annapolis Basin, its back faced a range of hills 500 to 700
feet high, giving protection from winter northers. 

In this quiet valley, fed by nine rivers, the settlers became more confident that this time they would be able
to stay. 

They also found the friendship of Membertou, the local Indian chief. He allowed himself to be baptized,
became a trusted friend to the Frenchmen, and saw to it that they would not starve. 

When all of the buildings were in place, the Sieur de Monts sailed in the fall for France, to find more
backing and to bring souvenirs to the king (including a live caribou, a live moose calf, and bright bird
feathers). He also brought back a shipload of furs--something much more intriguing to the court than salt
fish. 

As an example of how the Frenchmen made themselves at home in this cozy valley, Samuel Champlain
created a little garden near the habitation, complete with a gazebo, where he could go to relax. He made a
fresh-water pond for live trout and, on the harbor's edge, he created a "little reservoir" of salt water to keep
sea perch and rock cod alive. 

"We often went here, " he would write, "to pass time, and it seemed to please the little birds of the
neighborhood; for they assembled there in great numbers and made such a pleasant warbling and twittering,
of which I have never heard the like." 

The winter of 1605-1606 was not as severe as the preceding one. Snow fell first on December 20. Scurvy
took its toll. Twelve of the 45 men died--including the first black man known to have come to New France.
His name was Mathiueu de Costa or d'Acosta. He had been to Acadie before in a Portuguese ship and
had learned the Micmac language. A Rouen merchant had kidnaped him in Portugal or the East Indies and
sold or lent him to de Monts as an interpreter. 

But things were better despite the hardships. Membertou's men brought meat and the French had enough
wheat to make bread. Only the wine gave out. 

Champlain makes it clear in his journals that conditions were much easier. They seemed to have plenty of
food, and even dined together like veritable gourmets, in the Ordre de Bons Temps(Order of Good
Cheer), which Champlain created. In the Order, each man was chief steward for the day and was expected
to fill the table with the finest fare he could come up with. As a result, the long refectory table in the Great
Hall at Port Royal always had fresh fish and a variety of game, even rich desserts. 

On January 14, 1606, all hands had a picnic in the open air. Pretty soon, trout and smelt began running up
the brooks. Kitchen gardens were prepared in March for May planting. A water-powered grist mill was
built on the little river hat flows into the Annapolis Basin. 

But even so, in 1605, the colony had barely begun. European cultivation of the land had not yet started,
and even after a much milder winter, the spring of 1606 still brought a steady watch for ships from France.
The pioneers still needed more people and new materials if their settlement was to become more than just a
tiny trading center. 

And, still, too, the colony's leaders were not entirely certain that this was the place that would be their
permanent home. 

Neither, apparently, was the French court. 

On Ascension Day, May 24, 1607, a sail appeared before Port Royal. The ship bore a messenger who
brought bad news. De Monts' monopoly had been revoked. River fur traders had complained to the king.
De Monts' domain, that ran from what is today Philadelphia to Newfoundland, would be opened up to all
comers. 

De Monts gave up. His colony had begun to show promise. But now, merchants and shipbuilders from
Dieppe and La Rochelle had succeeded in having his rights to Acadie annulled. He left what rights and
properties he continued to hold to Jean de Biencourt, Sieur de Poutrincourt, a nobleman from Picardy who
was a substantial investor in the colony and had come there with the first expedition. 

Poutrincourt moved quickly. He sailed to France in August 1607 to find new financial backers. 

It would take two years after which he returned with his two sons, Charles de Biencourt and Jacques de
Salazar, as well as Father Jesse Fleche, Louis Hebert, Claude de la Tour de Saint-Etienne and the
17-year-old son of the governor of Dieppe--the governor having helped to finance this new expedition.
Poutrincourt also brought 23 colonists. 

On July 28, 1610, Poutrincourt sent his son, Biencourt, back to France to find more supplies for the
expanding colony--a mission that would become more difficult by the day. 

Religious rivalries in France-- as eventually, did all European rivalries--would now spill into North America.
The Jesuits had gained the king's ear, and they wanted a piece of the Acadian action. 

The king decided to send two Jesuit missionaries, Fathers Ennemond Masse and Pierre Biard, back with
Biencourt. Protestant merchants in Dieppe who had financed Poutrincourt vigorously opposed the Jesuits.
Instead of providing more credit and more supplies, they pulled out--and called in the loans they had
already made. 

Poutrincourt was a good Catholic, but he did not want the Jesuits in the colony, either. The order was
Spanish in origin and in policy, and he suspected they had more on their minds than saving Micmac souls. 

But the Jesuits had the ear of the king and were influential in his court. Poutrincourt would have no choice.
The intrigue reached well beyond his resources to command. 

Neither de Monts nor Poutrincourt had demanded a particular religious belief from the people they had
dealt with. The Edict of Nantes, which King Henry IV had proclaimed in 1598, had established religious
tolerance--or at least its appearance in France. This did not mean unity, but only a "separate but equal"
doctrine between Protestants and Catholics. 

There was still a major division between Protestant and Catholic in France, a division that tangled politics
as well as worship. Neither Protestant nor Catholic were completely happy with the way things were.
Poutrincourt found himself caught in the middle. He had to deal with the Protestant merchants of the
Atlantic seaports, but he also had to deal with the Catholic king. 

The assassination of Henry IV in 1610 made things worse. Henry's widow, Maria de Medici, turned to the
Jesuits for support. Through her, they would work their political will. 

Young Charles de Biencourt, caught in this business-religious-political tug-of-war while his family waited
for supplies, turned in desperation to Antoinette de Pons, Marquess of Guercheville, who had influence at
the court. She paid off the Huguenots and bought their Acadian rights, which she promptly turned over to
the Jesuits Masse and Biard. In addition to their religious influence, the two would now become
Poutrincourt's business partners. 

On January 26, 1611, Biencourt finally raised anchor in Dieppe aboard the Grace de Dieu, bound for
Acadie. His mother, Jeanne de Salazar, was also aboard ship, and would so become one of the first
European women to travel to North America. The Poutrincourts, Fathers Masse and Biard, and 36 men
spent four months at sea, buffeted by the ice and winds of a winter in the North Atlantic. 

But the real storm came when they landed in Acadie. It became immediately clear that there would be a
conflict of interest and of authority between the Poutrincourts and the Jesuits. 

Poutrincourt decided to return to France, hoping that he might make a new agreement with Madame de
Guercheville. She would not be swayed. She stuck by her Jesuit confessors--who were fighting ever more
bitterly with Poutrincourt's sons even as he bargained with the Marquess. When she heard this news, she
decided to withdraw her support entirely from the Port Royal colony and to start one of her own. 

For the entire year of 1612, Port Royal was without assistance of any kind from France. It survived, but
barely. 

Then on May 12, 1613, Le Fleur de May, a ship equipped by Madame de Guercheville, sailed into the
Port Royal harbor. The bad news was that the ship made off with everything that it could carry, "even the
church ornaments given by the Queen." The good news was that it also carried away Fathers Baird and
Masse. 

Port Royal was left to fend for itself. The Jesuits and Le Fleur de May headed for a place then called
Mont-Deserts de Pentagoet (today it is Penobscot, Maine), there to found a new colony which was called
Saint-Sauver. 

It was an idea that the settlers in Port Royal.could live with, even if it meant a struggle. But British
neighbors, who by this time had settled in Virginia, had another view of the matter. And that would set off a
struggle of a different sort. 

If rivalries in court were not enough, the Acadian colony would soon be beset by rivalries closer to home.
The Atlantic Seaboard was about to become more crowded. In 1608 the French would establish Quebec.
The Pilgrims would land at Plymouth Rock in 1620. Six years later the Dutch would put down in a place
now known as Manhattan. 

Settlement of what was to become the United States and Canada would continue to pick up speed: John
Winthrop founded Boston in 1630; Samuel Champlain set up Trois-Rivieres, Canada, in 1634. South
Carolina would be settled in 1663. William Penn established Pennsylvania in 1681. 

The Spanish still claimed much of North America, but the Atlantic Seaboard was being preempted by
others. 

Spanish power had declined rapidly after 1550. Her armies were defeated by the French, and a revolt by
the Netherlands--secretly aided by England--had drained Spain of strength. By the late 1500s, English "sea
dogs" such as John Hawkins and Francis Drake were seizing Spanish ships wherever they met them. 

Queen Elizabeth sent the plunder to the Tower of London, to be "restored to King Philip III." Needless to
say, it never got back to Spain, and the Queen herself went down to the Thames to knight Drake on the
deck of his ship. He had made the first English voyage around the world (1557 to 1580) and had returned
laden to the gunwales with spoils taken from Spanish ships. 

The raids, of course, angered Spanish King Philip, and he was made angrier by the execution of Mary,
Queen of Scots, Elizabeth's Catholic rival for the English throne. He assembled a massive fleet of ships and
sent them to overthrow Elizabeth, take her island and restore Catholicism there. But the Spanish Armada
was defeated, some say by luck, some say by skill, some say by the chance happenings of a storm. Indeed,
the ships that managed to escape British guns were driven ashore and broken up by a terrific storm. 

The defeat of the armada successfully defended the British isles, but it did more: It opened the seas to
British shipping, and North America to British colonization. 

Until then, England hadn't made much of an attempt at colonization. It was busy building a strong state at
home--and, besides, there was more profit in letting the Spanish do the work, than plundering the treasure
fleet. Still, the queen had given a charter to Sir Humphrey Gilbert in 1578, giving him the right to "inhabit
and possess all remote and heathen lands not in the actual possession of any Christian princes. Gilbert was
lost at sea after an abortive attempt to found a colony on the coast of Newfoundland. 

His half-brother, Sir Walter Raleigh, inherited the charter. In 1585 he sent more than 100 men under
Captain Ralph Lane to Roanoke Island, off the coast of North Carolina. Raleigh named the land Virginia,
after the virgin queen, but--reminiscent of the French at Fort Caroline--Lane's adventurers started hunting
for gold instead of settling down to work. They quarreled among themselves and with the Indians, and
finally sailed home after only a year. 

After a second failure Raleigh sponsored a third voyage in 1587, and, against his orders, the settlers landed
at the same place. Virginia Dare was born there, the first American-born child of English parents. But that
was apparently the end of the good news. What became of this lost colony on Roanoke Island is still a
mystery. A relief expedition in 1591 found the island completely deserted. 

After James I came to the English thrown, Raleigh was accused of plotting against the king, and was
eventually executed. But Raleigh's investors decided to try again at colonizing North America. There were
two groups of interested merchants, one in Plymouth and one in London. In 1606 the London group
received a charter from the king, giving them the exclusive right to colonize between the 34th and 38th
parallels (roughly between today's Charleston, South Carolina, and Washington, D.C.). They intended to
found a trading post. 

Now, in the spring of 1607, as the French were recalling de Monts, three small ships, the Goodspeed,
Discovery, and Sarah Constant, carrying 120 men sailed into Chesapeake Bay and up the James River.
The colonists ran into big trouble from the moment they landed and began to build Jamestown. 

Though beautiful to look at, the site was low and swampy. It was surrounded by thick woods which were
hard to clear for cultivation, and it was threatened by hostile Indians under Chief Powhatan. The settlers
could barely feed themselves, and the promoters in London complicated things by demanding a quick
return on their investment. 

When the men in Jamestown should have been growing food, they were required to hunt for gold and pile
up lumber, tar, pitch and iron ore for outgoing vessels. Inbound ships brought new colonists, but not enough
supplies. Leadership in the colony was divided among the members of a council, who quarreled constantly. 

Finally Captain John Smith took charge. He may have turned things around, but was seriously burned and
returned to England for treatment. 

Jamestown was saved when its promoters created the Virginia Company, selling stock to anyone willing to
hazard money, and giving tools and equipment to planters willing to migrate. The company began to build
an agricultural economy as well as a trading post. 

With these better beginnings, a new charter was granted in 1609 and the boundaries of Virginia were
redefined to include 400 miles along the Atlantic Coast. The English said this included Penobscot, Maine. 

The French had been in Penobscot little more than a month when Samuel Argall, "admiral of Virginia,"
sailed into the place with a fleet from Jamestown (by now a thriving settlement with several thousand
colonists). Argall had been in the area before, in 1610, when his ship was driven there by a storm. But this
time he was here by design. 

He had instructions from the Virginia Company to make certain that no Frenchmen were encroaching on
the Company's lands. It was an assignment he took quickly. 

When he had been this way before, he'd seen no signs of any Frenchmen. He didn't think he'd find any this
time, and looked on the expedition as a fishing trip. 

He was surprised, indeed, to sight the new little colony on Mount Desert, but he was true to his orders. He
was to prevent French colonization, and he did. He put the torch to the colony, killed anyone who resisted,
took a handful of prisoners back to Virginia on a captured French ship, and set Father Masse and 15
others adrift in an open boat (from which they would be rescued by fishermen). 

Argall's success encouraged Thomas Dale, governor of Virginia. He decided to rid the entire Atlantic Coast
of the French. In October 1613, while Charles de Blencourt was in the interior trading with the Micmac
Indians, and while the settlers were fending fields five or six miles up the Annapolis Valley, Argall's fleet
struck Port Royal. He burned the settlement and made off with cattle and whatever provisions he found. 

Biencourt and his colonists immediately began building temporary shelters, working against time as winter
drew near, storing artichokes and other native roots and vegetables. Hunting, never a sport, became a
battle of survival as quarters and sides of moose and deer were put aside. Luckily for the settlers, Argall
had not found a flour mill farther up the Annapolis. Fortunately, too, the Micmacs shared what they could. 

The Argall raids were the first clash in what would become a long struggle between France and England
over who would control the Atlantic Seaboard, although nothing much came of it at the time. The two
countries were then technically at peace, so they exchanged stern diplomatic notes and clucked across the
English Channel at each other. The upshot: The English gave back the French ship they'd taken but refused
to make restitution for loss of life and property. 

Pourtrincourt would return to France to seek, once again, the supplies he would need to rebuild his colony.
He would find a France torn worse than ever by religious strife. It would be the death of him. He never
returned to Acadie. 

His son, Charles de Biencourt took up the struggle to carry on what his father had started. He and his
colonists had no further connections with France except through contact with the Norman, Breton and
Basque fishermen who had been plying the Atlantic and the Gulf of St. Lawrence for centuries. 

Biencourt set up a series of observation posts along the coast and used them to signal ships when he had
furs to trade in exchange for ammunition and other provisions. In 1616 he was able to ship some 25,000
pelts back to France from trading posts at Port Royal, Cape Sable, Penobscot and the St. John River. 

Port Royal thus became temporarily more of a trading post than an agricultural colony. Cut off from
investment capital in France, Biencourt and his lieutenant Charles de la Tour, found that their tiny band of
about 20 men could eke out a living in Acadie. 

Claude de la Tour, Charles' father, went back to France to try to recruit new colonists for the Acadian
colony. But in 1619, before de la Tour could return, the Virginians sent Samuel Argall on yet another raid
against the French. He burned Saint-Sauveur, then sailed for Saint Croix Island, where he once again
burned all of the buildings and destroyed the fort. 

At Port Royal he found the fort undefended, since the Acadians were working in the fields a few miles
away. The smoke of their burning houses and fort gave the first warning that strangers were nearby. Along
with their buildings, they lost all of their provisions. 

But, once again they began to rebuild. 

Biencourt died in 1624 at the age of 31. Charles de la Tour, then 27, took over Biencourt's estate as
Seigneur at Port Royal by claiming that Biencourt had bequeathed it to him--a claim that would later be
disputed. But, for now, la Tour moved the colonies' headquarters to Cape Sable on the Atlantic Coast, so
that it would be more accessible to the fishing craft that were their primary link to Europe and to trade
goods. 

From there, he and his band of coureurs de bois (woods runners), as they would come to be called,
continued to eke out what existence they could. 

Ever since John Cabot and his son had sailed on Columbus' heels to North America, the English had laid
vague claims to the land of Acadie and most of the Atlantic Coast. Now, in 1620, James I took advantage
of the civil war in France to decree that Massachusetts, where the Pilgrims had just landed, included not
only Acadie, but all of Canada. 

James I was the son of Mary Queen of Scots and succeeded to the throne in England on the death of
Elizabeth in 1603. He had already won for himself a reputation as "the wisest fool in Christendom." When
he ascended the British throne he brought with him a train of Scotsmen as eager as he was to escape the
poverty of Scotland. 

One of them was William Alexander of Menstrie, who was tutor to Prince Henry, the oldest of the King's
children. William was a poet, and this endeared him to the king, who thought that he, too, had a way with
words. 

But Alexander wanted to do more with his life than write poetry. He wanted to lord over lands of his own.
And the best chance he had for that was in North America. It was largely at Alexander's urging that King
James decided to claim the Canadian lands. 

On Sept. 10, 1620, King James granted Acadie and Canada to Alexander. The poet was given the
authority to "erect cities, appoint fairs, hold courts, grant lands and coin money." All Alexander had to do
was to find the wherewithal to take possession of the lands the king had granted him. The way to do it, he
decided, was to divide the spoils with men who already had money. 

A new order was created, the Knights Baronet of Nova Scotia--New Scotland. Any man of property who
would settle in North America, or who would put 150 sterling pounds into the pot, would get his title and a
grant of land six miles by three. He would also have the right to wear "an orange tawny ribbon from which
shall hang pendant in an escutcheon argent a saltire azure with the arms of Scotland." 

Nothing much came of this immediately, except the settling of small groups here and there around the Bay
of Fundy and the creation of much ill feeling between the newcomers and the French at Port Royal. But,
after the death of King James, and with the beginning of yet another war with France (Protestant vs.
Catholic, what else?), Alexander began to take the enterprise a bit more seriously. He enlisted merchants
and financiers in London into the Company of Merchant Adventurers to take control of the Canadian lands.
 

As a part of the war effort, the merchant company raised 60,000 pounds to equip an expedition against the
French in Canada. Three ships set out early in 1628 under the command of David, Lewis and Thomas
Kirke, the sons of Gervase Kirke, who was a member of the company. 

Sailing into Gaspe Bay, the Kirke brothers surprised French Admiral Roquemont and an armada that had
been sent to reinforce Quebec. His four convoy ships and 20 transports were crammed with men, women
and children, soldiers, mechanics and priests who had been sent by a newly formed Company of One
Hundred Associates to provision and people the new Quebec colony. But Roquemont's heavily laden ships
had been forced into the bay by heavy storms. Now, as the Kirke brothers approached, the French could
not maneuver in the tight spaces. Most of their guns were lashed below decks. Roquemont had not
expected a fight and wasn't ready for one. They were easy pickings. 

The Kirkes burned some of the transports and took the rest to Newfoundland and then to England--taking
the spoils of Victory, and a host of prominent prisoners with them. More importantly, they had cleared the
way for the occupation of Quebec. Without the provisions Roquemont was to deliver, the French there had
no choice but to surrender. 

When a company of British officers and men came ashore to take possession of the city in August 1629
they found no food there except for one tub filled with potatoes and roots. 

The Kirke expedition also cleared the way for William Alexander to begin anew his settlement attempt. In
1628 he sent 100 men and women to settle in Acadie near Port Royal. They built Charlesfort, also known
as Scotch Fort, five miles from the French colony. 

The Acadians gave one last try. 

Charles de la Tour and his coureurs de bois hid themselves in the woods while Charles' father, Claude de
la Tour, tried to get to France to ask for help. But Claude was captured by the Kirkes and taken to
London--where he decided to try to make the best out of a bad deal. 

Claude somehow managed to finagle British baronetcies for himself and his son, and since Charles had
already been commissioned Lieutenant-General of Acadie by the French king, they would--Claude
reckoned--be okay no matter who ended up in charge. And it worked. 

The Treaty of Saint Gemain-en-Laye in 1632 would give the Acadian colony back to France, but later in
the century, when the French would once again lose Acadie to the British, Charles de la Tour would be
recognized as its legal governor. 

When Acadie was returned to France in 1632 under the Treaty of Saint Gemain-en-Laye, Cardinal
Armand Jean du Plessis, Duc de Richelieu, had come to power in France. He would prove himself one of
the ablest of French statesmen. He would hold strong influence over King Louis XIII, and would, in fact,
be the actual ruler of France for more than 18 years. 

Richelieu saw the coming struggle for supremacy in North America, and saw that France would have to
strengthen its colonies there if it was going to compete with the growing British strength. He immediately
organized a trading company for Quebec and one of Acadie, sending his cousin, Isaac de Razilly to North
America as lieutenant governor of all New France and Governor of Acadia. 

In July 1632 Razilly sailed from France aboard the Esperance a Dieu. With him were two transports
carrying 300 people, livestock, seeds, tool, arms--everything needed to establish and maintain a
community. He would begin the first true steps toward permanent settlement of the Acadian colony. 

After landing at La Have on September 8, Razilly took possession of Port Royal and then took the fort at
Penobscot by force. Scottish families still in Port Royal were sent back to England. He annoyed the English
in doing so, and he also annoyed Charles de la Tour, who thought that he should have been lieutenant
governor, and who also wanted to protect the valuable fur trade he'd established. 

Razilly found a compromise with la Tour. Razilly would settle his people at La Have, on Nova Scotia's
south shore. La Tour and his men would continue their fur trading from their main outpost at Cape Sable.
Razilly also gave la Tour the Seigneurie de Jemseg, a rich hunting and fishing area along the St. John River
in New Brunswick. 

Razilly brought with him two lieutenants. Charles de Menou de Charnisay, Sieur d'Aulnay, was placed in
charge of settling the new emigres on the land and getting them started in farming. Nicolas Denys,
meanwhile, was to begin building up the Acadian fisheries, the fur trade and an export lumber trade with
France. 

These men would have a large hand in putting down the first truly permanent beginnings of the Acadiana
colony. But they would do so in the face of conflict, both from within the French ranks, and from their
British neighbors. 

In 1633 English traders from Massachusetts set up a post at Machias, on the coast of Maine, to trade with
the Indians there. La Tour, afraid that the competition would hurt his Jemseg profits, attacked the English.
He killed two guards, captured three others, and brought them and a passel of captured furs and provisions
to Cape Sable. 

The English in Boston called la Tour's attack piracy and decided to do something about it. In 1634, a
Boston merchant named Allerton who owned an interest in the Machias post, sailed to Acadie to reclaim
the booty and bring back la Tour's prisoners. La Tour answered that Machias was now French territory
and that he had acted in the name of France. At the same time, albeit coincidentally, Razilly told New
England authorities to limit their trading with the Indians to the mouth of the Kennebec River, near today's
Portland, Maine. 

It was apparent that the Frenchmen meant to stay this time, and the La Have colony made real progress
under Razilly. But Razilly died in 1635, and d'Aulnay, who succeeded him, decided to shift the focus of the
settlement from trade to farming. He moved the bulk of his settlers to Port Royal, where there was more
tillable land, and more importantly, he began to bring the first families to Acadie. By 1640 he made Port
Royal once again the centerpiece of French Acadie. 

By 1650, there were more than 300 settlers in Acadie--50 or so families and about 60 single men, and
another handful of settlers would continue to arrive along with a few shipwrecked sailors. But the flood of
settlers had begun to dwindle, because both the French government and French merchants were beginning
to lose interest in Acadie. France wasn't interested in farmers. Fur traders sent home the profits, and
Quebec by now had become the center of the fur trade. And, besides, the French government by now had
also become deeply involved in its own internal problems. 

In 1643, a four-year-old boy had become King Louis XIV of France. Although he would later be a very
powerful king, the war with the nobility that would make him so was now draining the royal treasury. There
was no money left for Acadie. It would have to make do as best it could. 

The 1640s were also tumultuous years within the colony. Two groups began to fight for control of the
declining Acadian fur trade. Charles de la Tour continued to claim ownership of much of Acadie, and his
claim was recognized by the government in France. But that same government also recognized the rights of
the Company of New France, now headed by d'Aulnay. The two interests were inevitably to collide. 

The fight began in earnest in 1630, when la Tour expropriated a ship that d'Aulny had sent to Penobscot.
The next year, la Tour tried to surprise Port Royal with two warships, but d'Aulnay captured him and his
men. 

The fighting brought things to a head, and in 1641, the French Court revoked la Tour's commission, called
him to Paris (though he would never go), and named d'Aulnay governor. 

La Tour defied the royal decree, and, in February 1642, d'Aulnay was ordered to take him by force and
bring him to France. 

La Tour barricaded himself in his fort at Jemseg and sent agents to seek an alliance with the English in
Massachusetts. The Boston merchants turned him down at first. La Tour kept trying, and finally made a
deal. 

Here is an account attested to by eight Capuchin priests on October 20, 1643: 

     After harassing d'Aulnay for seven years, the English of Grande Baie (Plymouth),
     accompanying la Tour, mounted an assault on Port Royal with four ships and two armed
     frigates on August 6, 1643, wounded seven men, killed three others and took one captive.
     They killed a quantity of livestock and took a ship loaded with furs, powder and food. 

The priests told the French Court that "of the 18,000 livres worth of furs stolen in Port Royal, the
Bostonians kept two-thirds, and la Tour one-third." They sought help for d'Aulnay so that he may carry out
his generous plan against the enemies of the true religion and in particular against the Sieur de la Tour, a
very evil Frenchman who attends Protestant services when he is in Grande Baie." 

On March 6, 1644, the French government declared la Tour an outlaw. But he still refused to give in.
Instead, he sent his wife, Francoise-Marie Jacquelin, to plead his case before the king's ministers, and to
fetch badly needed supplies. 

In early 1645, la Tour himself went to Boston to seek aid, leaving his wife in command of the fort at
Jemseg. D'Aulnay decided that this would be the time to strike. He arrived at the fort on April 13, 1645,
with 200 men. 

There was a murderous fight. D'Aulnay lost 13 men in the three-day fight, but captured the fort. Then he
forced Madame la Tour, with a rope around her neck, to watch while her men were hanged. She died in
prison three weeks later. La Tour, escaping the battle, roved for a time as a privateer in the Gulf of St.
Lawrence, then took refuge in Quebec. 

D'Aulnay would not live long enough to enjoy the spoils of his victory. He was drowned in 1650 when he
fell (some say he was pushed) from his canoe. 

D'Aulnay's death left the Acadian colony with little direction and virtually no help from France. They turned
to the soil, and to New England. The fertile Annapolis Basin gave them crops enough to feed themselves,
with some left over for trade with the thousands of settlers now pouring into Massachusetts. For once, the
French and the English needed each other. 

The influx of Puritans into New England had caused a food shortage there, new colonists were coming in
quicker than the crops did. By the 1640s, enterprising Yankee traders had begun to send ships to Acadie
to buy cattle and garden crops. The trade, of course, was completely illegal, but hunger was a lot closer to
the doorstep than were either the French or the British authorities. 

The trade brought a measure of independence to the Frenchmen in Acadie. Farming, along with some
fishing and hunting, gave them a good livelihood. They were finding that they could survive in the New
World through their own effort, despite the neglect of official France. And there was another important
realization: They were beginning to think of themselves as a distinct people. They were still allied to France,
but they were now something more. They were the settlers of Acadie. They had become Acadians. 

I have a mind's-eye vision of Jean Gaudet as a crusty, old Frenchman, sunburnt, with dark, work-hardened
hands, capable of doing what had to be done to wrest a simple life from the soil. He was probably an
independent old cuss. He was 61 years old in 1636, when he and his brother, Aubin, migrated to L'Acadie,
traveling to a colony still far from a certain thing. 

Settlement in North America was still a new and risky venture. The British colony at Jamestown was less
than 30 years old. The Pilgrims had landed at Plymouth but 16 years before. It would be 40 years before
Marquette and Joliette would explore the Mississippi Valley, nearly 50 before LaSalle would plant his
cross at the river's mouth and claim Louisiana for France. George Washington would not be born for more
than 100 years. 

Jean Gaudet had come to clear forest into farmland, build dikes to reclaim tidal marshes, hew timbers for
his home and keep a family fed while he was doing it. He would farm his Annapolis Basin lands for more
than 30 years, dying at the age of 97. He was one of my first ancestors in North America, and there was a
lot of history packed into his lifetime. 

Jean Gaudet and his second wife, Nicole Colleson, were among the first families settled in Acadie. Until
now, the French who had come to North America, except for the wives of one or two officials, were
mostly contract workers who were employed in the fisheries or fur trade, and who returned to France once
their stint was done. 

Jean Gaudet was one of the first Frenchmen who would come to Acadie to stay. Three
children--Francoise, Denis and Marie--came with him. Another, Jean, was probably born in the New
World. 

Jean Gaudet was a farmer, and he and others who came at the time brought skills and crafts useful in
building and running a colony. Germain Doucet, another of my ancestors to arrive about this time, was
commandant at Port Royal under d'Aulnay. Another, Antoine Bourg, was royal notary and syndic (justice
of the peace). Others, such as Rene Landry, Jean Terriot and Francois Gauterot were probably farmers.
Guillaume Blanchard was a fisherman. 

By 1650 there were some 50 families in Acadie. They would establish farms and families and live a life
described in 1638 by Nicolas Denys, who wrote, "there are plenty of clams, whelks, mussels, and other
mollusks and an abundance of lobsters ... some of which have a claw so large it will hold a pint of wine."
He mentions swordfish "as large as a cow," and writes of huge flocks of wild pigeons flying over his camp.
He says he was kept awake by the noise from flocks of geese and ducks nearby. 

Historian Rameau de SaintPere, drawing from accounts by an early priest of the colony, Ignace de Senlis,
tells us: 

     On Sunday, the Acadian farmers emerged from the folds of this charming valley, some in
     canoes, others on horseback, their wives and daughters riding behind, while long lines of
     Micmac, brightly painted and with colorful ornaments, mingled with them. Around the
     church grounds, d'Aulnay had developed extensive green areas, which were called les
     champs commune, where the arrivals tethered their mounts and left their belongings. After
     the service, the colonists relaxed on the champs commune, discussing crops, hunting,
     progress of clearing the land, the work undertaken by the Siegneur, a thousand and one
     topics about their private lives and gossiping the way it is done in all French countries. 
 
 

D'Aulnay himself often mingled with them ... recounting adventures of his travels into the interior Indian
country. Many old-timers ... added their bit to the conversation, while the more venerable sages of the
Micmacs often solemnly joined in the conversation. It was an auspicious occasion to find out how each
family was making out. The banker naturally encouraged new marriages and ways to establish new homes
on new farms, because one of the dominating desires was to increase the number of homes. 

The Acadians were left to themselves, with little guidance or support from France, and they liked it that
way. The colony was once again growing in peace and prosperity when European intrigue again interrupted
its life. 

In 1651, when King Charles and Oliver Cromwell were battling for control of England, Parliament passed
a Navigation Act, requiring that goods from Asia, Africa and America be carried to England only on
English ships. The act was aimed chiefly at the Dutch, who were supporting the King in his feud with the
Parliament. The British and the Dutch went to war over the issue and France (allied with the Dutch) was
soon drawn into it. 

So it was in 1654 that an English force from Boston headed to Acadie with orders from Cromwell to clear
the French from the place. The British commander, Robert Sedgwick, had easy work. He quickly subdued
the lightly defended Acadian lands, but instead of clearing the Frenchmen out, left the colony in control of a
local council headed by Guillaume Trahan. 

Little changed in everyday life during the council's administration. The Acadians farmed their lands. There
was no flood of new British settlers to disrupt their lives. In fact, the years of British rule passed very quietly
until, in 1667, the Treaty of Breda once again returned the colony to France. 

But two important things had happened. The first was that the 16 years of benign English neglect had
strengthened the Acadians' sense of independence. They discovered that they could get along quite well,
thank you, with little help from the outside. The other thing was that the British began to think that maybe,
next time, they ought to keep this place for themselves--and ship those papist Frenchmen someplace else. 

In all, we believe that some 10,000 immigrants traveled to Canada--not all of them to Acadie--during the
French regime (1604 to 1713) and that between 5,000 and 6,000 of them arrived before the year 1700.
More than half of those who came from France before 1700 were from the old provinces of Poitou and
Aunio--from towns such as Rochefort, la Rochelle, Ile Oleron, and Chatelleraut. 

But progress was interrupted by regular raids from British freebooters who preyed upon Acadie almost at
will. There were only about 400 people listed on the census of 1671, the first taken in Acadie, yet
three-fourths of the Acadians alive today can trace their roots to these folks. 

Rameu de Saint-Pere tells us about the life they lived: 

     Port Royal consisted (c.1700) of a rough fort formed by earthworks topped by a large
     wooden palisade. The church and some houses surrounded it. Most of the farmers were
     spread out around the countryside, and each settler lived on his own land. 

     The homes were built of squared logs or of heavy beams planted in the soil with the
     interstices sealed with moss and clay. Chimneys were formed with poles and hardened
     clay. The roof was covered with rushes, bark, even sod at times. Wood being in abundant
     supply, the houses were easy to build, and if disaster struck, just as easily abandoned
     and lost without much regret, an important consideration because the frequent incursions
     of the English led to a certain indifference and they therefore endeavored to leave
     nothing of value to the enemy. 

     When the latter appeared in force, the settlers fled to the woods without worrying about
     what was left behind. Their small herds of cattle were used to the woods, and belongings
     were easily moved; a few iron pots, arms, tools and packages of clothing. Those with too
     many belongings buried some of them and carried the rest. But all knew the trails to safe
     retreats in the heavily wooded valleys only a gunshot away but impenetrable to everyone
     save themselves and their friends, the Micmacs of the interior. 
 
 

In 1701, when England and France went back to war, the backwash once again hit the American colonies.
Jacques de Brouillan, then governor of Acadie, tried in vain to negotiate neutrality with the Americans. The
English in Massachusetts had other ideas. They struck first at Penobscot, but were driven back. Acadians
and some of their Indian allies retaliated, hitting village after village as far south as Portland, Maine. At the
same time, troops from New France attacked New England striking at Deerfield, Connecticut, where 200
British were killed or made prisoner during a night raid in February, 1704. 

In May 1704 three English warships, four transports and 36 other ships, loaded with 1,300 men, headed
for Acadie under the command of Colonel Church, who had successfully raided the Beaubassin area in
1696. He had orders from Governor Dudley of Massachusetts to burn every house in Acadie, smash all of
the dikes protecting the recovered lands, and to haul off everything and everyone he could. 

Church took Penobscot easily and killed or imprisoned everyone there. He then moved to Passamoquoddy
Bay, at the mouth of the Saint-Croix River, and looted and destroyed what was there. He arrived at Port
Royal on July 2, 1704, but had to retreat three days later because of the stiff Acadian resistance. He did
burn a number of homes and take 30 prisoners. 

At Grand Pre, the Acadians fled into the woods, after smashing their dikes, making it impossible for Church
to unload his troops. At Beaubassin, English troops went ashore during a heavy fog on July 28. They
burned about 20 houses and killed all of the livestock they found, but soon returned to New England. 

The English struck again at Port Royal on June 6, 1707. After a ten-day siege the British commander,
Colonel Marsh, ordered his men back to their ships, leaving behind about 100 dead and as many
wounded. He withdrew to Portland, Maine where Governor Dudley sent him reinforcements. On August
20, 1707, some 2,000 men and about 20 ships stood off Port Royal, this time under the command of
Colonel Wainwright. 

The Acadians were warned of the approaching fleet by friendly Indians and had dug in for defense. The
English withdrew after a 16-day siege and heavy losses--going home to an angry reception. (Some of the
people of Boston were so upset they wanted to hang the expedition leaders. ) 

But the English controlled the seas, and Acadie was cut off from vital food and supplies, and from help
from France. It was only a matter of time. The Acadians were finally forced to submit. In 1713 the Treaty
of Utrecht ended the War of Spanish Succession in Europe. It ceded Acadie and Newfoundland to
England once and for all. 

Acadie would now become Nova Scotia. But the Acadians would not become Nova Scotians. 

Almost from the beginning of their regime (in 1713), the British governors of Acadie faced a dilemma. They
needed the Acadians and their expertise, but they also mistrusted their loyalty. The English solution was to
try to force the Acadians to take an oath of allegiance to Great Britain. Most Acadians steadfastly refused.
The oath would become the nominal bone of contention that would, in the next generation, finally bring their
exile. The fact that the Acadians owned some of the richest farmland on the Eastern seaboard, and that the
English lusted for it, didn't help matters much, either. 

The Acadians had good reason to refuse the oath. They feared it would require them to give up the
independence they'd begun to enjoy, and that it might one day force them to fight against France. Also, they
didn't want to make promises to a government that they hoped might not be around that long. (Their fathers
had lived for awhile under the British, but had seen the colony eventually returned to France.) And, most of
all, they knew that, at least for now, they held the upper hand. There were more Acadians than British in
the Annapolis Basin, and the British needed the Acadians to feed their tiny garrison. 

The Treaty of Utrecht that ceded Acadie to England had given the Acadians certain rights and options. It
provided, for example, that "in the pursuance of this treaty (the Acadians) may have liberty to remove
themselves within a year to any other place as they shall think fit, with all their moveable effects. But those
who are willing to remain here, and to be subjects of the Kingdom of Great Britain are to enjoy the free
exercise of their religion according to the usage of the Church of Rome as far as the laws of Great Britain
allow the same." 

Queen Anne later agreed to relieve the Acadians from any time limit for moving. On June 23, 1713, she
wrote to her governor in Acadie: 

     Whereas our good brother, the Most Christian King (of France) hath at our desire,
     released from imprisonment ... such of his subjects as were detained on account of their
     ... Protestant religion; we, being willing to show ... how kind we take his compliance
     herein, have therefore thought fit ... to ... permit such of them as have any lands or
     tenements in the places under our Government in Acadia and Newfoundland ... and are
     willing to continue our subjects, to retain and enjoy their said lands and tenements
     without molestation, as fully and freely as our other subjects do ... or to sell the same, if
     they shall rather choose to remove elsewhere. 
 
 

Thus, the Acadians who decided to stay were guaranteed freedom of religion and equal rights with other
British subjects. Those who planned to leave thought they could do so at any time they wanted to. But now
the struggle began for their hearts and minds, and warm bodies. 

In January 1714 Pastour de Costebellow, the last French governor of Newfoundland, became the first
governor of Cape Breton (Ile Royale) which was still French and built the historic fort of Louisbourg. He
immediately tried to convince the Acadians that they should migrate there. The English, meanwhile, wanted
to keep the Acadians in Nova Scotia, at least for awhile longer. 

Lt. Gov. Samuel Vetch wrote to his British superiors on November 243, 1714: 

     One hundred of the Acadians who were born upon this continent, and are perfectly at
     home in the woods, can march upon snowshoes and understand the use of birch canoes,
     are of more value and service than five times their number of raw men newly arrived from
     Europe. 

     So their skill in the fishery, as well as the cultivating of the soil must make at once of
     Cape Breton the most powerful colony the French have in America, and to the greatest
     danger and damage to all the British colonies as well as the universal trade of Great
     Britain. 
 
 

Later he wrote to the Board of Trade in London: 

     ... the removal of (the Acadians) and their cattle to Cape Breton would be a great
     addition to that new colony, so it would wholly ruin Nova Scotia unless supplied by a
     British colony, which could not be done in several years, so that the Acadians with their
     stocks of cattle remaining here is very much for the advantage of the Crown. 
 
 

Most Acadians didn't want to move, anyway. These had been their lands for generations--and Cape
Breton, though French, offered them little. A delegation visited there during the summer of 1713. The
report: 

     On the whole, the island there is no land fit for the maintenance of our families, since
     there is (sic) no grass lands large enough to feed our cattle which is our principal means
     of livelihood ... To leave our homes and cleared lands for new uncultivated land which
     must be cleared without help nor credit would expose our families to perishing by famine. 

Some young Acadians moved to New Brunswick, which they regarded as French soil, but most of the
established families decided to stay put on the farms and homesteads they had worked long and hard to
build. 

Efforts to require an oath of allegiance from these families began in earnest after Queen Anne died in 1714,
and colonial officials took advantage of King George's accession to require sworn fealty to the new ruler. 

The Acadians of Grand Pre and Beaubassin refused to take the oath, period. They argued that France and
England were still arguing over boundaries, and whether their lands had been ceded under the treaty. They
said they could take no oath until the issue was decided. 

That argument could not be made at Port Royal, however, and 36 Acadians signed a provisional oath on
January 13, 1716, to "be faithful and maintain a true allegiance to His Majesty King George, as long as I
shall be in Acadia or Nova Scotia and that I shall be permitted to withdraw wheresoever I shall think fit
with all my moveable goods and effects, when I shall think fit, without any one ... to hinder me." 

In November 1717 the provincial administrator, Capt. John Doucett, made another attempt to force an
oath from the Acadians. Representatives of Grand Pre, Pisiquid, Cobequid and Beaubassin, knowing the
British didn't have the manpower needed, said they'd sign if they got protection from the Indians. They
argued that the Indians, afraid they would lose hunting and fishing grounds, were sworn enemies of the
English. The Acadians claimed that taking the oath would be the same as making a pact with the Indians'
worst enemy, and the Indians would retaliate. 

"For the present," the Acadians said, "we can only answer that we shall be ready to carry into effect the
demand proposed to us as soon as His Majesty shall have done us the favor of providing some means of
sheltering us from the Indians, who are always ready to do all kinds of mischief ... (since) we cannot take
the oath demanded without exposing ourselves to have our throats cut in our houses at any time, which they
have already threatened to do." 

In March 1718, Doucett threatened to cut off Acadian trade and fishing rights if they didn't sign. The
Acadians appealed to Gov. Richard Phillipps, who did what any good bureaucrat would do. He ordered a
study. 

Capt. Paul Mascarne reported that the Acadians still had Phillips over a barrel. If the Acadians were forced
from their lands, the English garrison would be isolated and without a regular source of food. On leaving,
the Acadians could destroy the dikes protecting their farms, damaging the land for years. The Indians
would destroy what the Acadians didn't and would become much more dangerous than before. Finally, the
Acadians would become a powerful military force against the English colonies once they settled in French
territory. 

Phillipps wrote to London: 

     ... the Acadians cannot be let go now at least. Their departure, if they went to ... Cape
     Breton, would render our neighbors too powerful. We need them to erect fortifications
     and to provision our forts till the English are powerful enough to go on ... 
 
 

London wrote back: 

     As to the Acadians of Nova Scotia ... we are apprehensive they will never become good
     subjects to His Majesty ... We are of opinion they ought to be removed as soon as the
     forces which we have proposed to be sent to you shall arrive in your Province. But ... you
     are not to attempt their removal without His Majesty's positive order ... you will do well in
     the meantime to continue the same prudent and cautious conduct towards them... 
 
 

The English wanted the Acadians out, but weren't strong enough to force the issue - not yet. 

The War of Austrian Succession, which erupted in 1740, was fought over whether a fat lady named Maria
Theresa would inherit the Hapsburg Empire in Europe. It had nothing to do with Acadie, except that the
French jumped in on one side of the war and the British jumped in on the other. Whenever that happened,
the Acadians seemed sure to get caught in the middle. 

It came at a time when things in the Cajun homeland were settling down some, perhaps settling down too
much. 

During the 1720s there had been two incidents that deepened the animosity between the Acadians and the
English, but the next decade brought relative peace and prosperity. Then things began to fall apart. 

On March 24,1724, during an English attack against an Abernaki village on the coast of Maine, missionary
priest Sebastian Rasle was shot by the English at the door of his church, scalped, and his body mutilated.
That did nothing for Acadian spirits. At about the same time, 50 Micmac Indians, friends of the French,
surprised the English garrison at Annapolis Royal, killing two soldiers and seriously wounding a dozen
more. That irked the English, who claimed the Acadians had incited the Indian raid. The Brits burned many
of the Acadians' homes and sent their priests away. 

In the fall of 1726 Major Lawrence Armstrong became provincial administrator, and was determined to
force the Acadians to take the oath of allegiance. Once again they refused to take it unless it contained a
clause that they would not be forced to fight against the French. Armstrong agreed to insert the clause, and
did--in the margin of the French translation, only. But he sent the English version, without the clause, to
London. 

Finally, in 1730 Governor Phillips got what he and the British Crown wanted. He reported that all Acadians
"of all parishes" had taken the conditional oath. He had finally promised not only that they would not have
to fight against the French and the Indians, but also that they could maintain their Catholic faith. The
Acadians, in return, promised not to fight against the English. 

The Acadians became known in London and in New England as "French Neutrals," and were themselves
convinced that their neutral status had been officially granted to them by Governor Phillips. Besides, they
were promised freedom of religion and their lands would not be taken from them. 

There would be some exceptions, but the Acadian population as a whole would respect the pledge. They
were happy, gave up the idea of abandoning their farms, and began to do what Cajuns do: multiply. 

The Acadian population increased so rapidly that the old farms could no longer hold them all. In 1732,
Governor Phillips estimated the population at 800 families, double what it had been ten years earlier. A
census in 1737 found 7,598 Acadians in Nova Scotia. And that presented a new problem. 

In 1740, the year France and England went back to war the acting governor wrote to London: 

     The increase of the Acadians calls for some fresh instructions how to dispose of them.
     They have divided and subdivided amongst their children the lands they were in
     possession of ... They applied for new grants which the Governor Phillips and Armstrong
     did not think themselves authorized to favor them with, as His Majesty's instruction ...
     prescribed the grant of unappropriated lands to Protestant subjects only ... if they are
     debarred from new possessions, they must live here miserably and consequently be
     troublesome, or else, they will possess themselves of new tracts contrary to orders, or they
     must be made to withdraw to the neighboring French colony. 
 
 

     The French of Cape Breton will naturally watch all opportunities of disturbing the peace
     of this Province, especially at this juncture, in case of war with France; and, if occasion
     of disgust was given to these people here, they would soon distress the garrison if not
     taking the fort which is in a very ruinous condition. 
 
 

The Acadians had pledged not to bear arms, either for France or against England, but in Nova Scotia, they
still had the numbers and that bothered the English, especially Gov. William Shirley of Massachusetts. In
1746 he wrote that "the enemy will soon find a way to wrest Acadia from us if we do not remove the most
dangerous French inhabitants and replace them with English families." A month later he added, "The
Province of Nova Scotia will never be out of danger so long as the French inhabitants are tolerated under
the present mode of submission." On a visit to England he laid a plan before British authorities to bring
6,000 families to Nova Scotia over a ten-year period: two thousand from the British Isles, two thousand
from New England, and two thousand retired soldiers. 

His plan was followed up in 1749 when Edward Cornwallis, replacing Phillips as governor, arrived at
Halifax with 2,500 settlers, including 1,100 women and children. Cornwallis immediately issued orders for
armories to be built at Grand Pre, Bale Verte, Whiteland, and La Heve, all with enough troops to man
them. At the same time, he gave the Acadians three months to take an unconditional oath, and he required
that they have special authorization to ship grain, livestock, or other products to any foreign colony. 

Cornwallis' proclamation upset the Acadians. Three delegates from Grand Pre, Jean and Philipe Melanson
and Claude LeBlanc, went to see the governor to say that the new oath was different than the one
Governor Phillips had accepted in 1730. Besides, for almost a generation the Acadians had thought the
question of allegiance had been settle. 

Cornwallis held to his demand. 

In September 1749 another delegation, this time people from Annapolis Royal, Grand Pre, Beaubassin,
Pisiquid, Cobequid, and Chopoudy, appeared before Cornwallis They brought a petition, with more than
1,000 signatures, declaring that they had signed oaths on the condition that they could not be conscripted
for war. 

The petition added: "The inhabitants in general, sir, have resolved not to take the oath which your
Excellency requires of us. But, if your Excellency will grant us our old oath, which was given by Governor
Phillips, with an exemption from taking arms, we will accept it. If your Excellency is not disposed to grant
us what we take the liberty of asking, we are resolved every one of us to leave the country." 

Cornwallis said Phillips had exceeded his authority, and that the Acadians must swear without condition.
Then he went on building strategic military posts that would isolate the Acadians and block communications
with the French in Quebec or their troublesome neighbors at Louisbourg. 

The English ministers who negotiated the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713 had not been very wise. True they had
gained Acadie but it was an Acadie with ill-defined and disputed boundaries and one that--whatever its
boundaries--was difficult to defend. But worse, the British in giving Cape Breton Island to the French,
destroyed the military value of their hold on the Annapolis Basin. 

King Louis of France saw that Cape Breton guarded the Saint Lawrence. That's why, beginning in 1720,
he'd built and fortified Louisbourg, against the inevitable day when war would flare afresh and France
would recover Acadie. Louisbourg became a harbor so well defended and a privateering refuge so secure
that it was called the strongest fort in America. It was also called a danger to New England. 

Military historian Fairfax Downey described it this way: 

     Guardian of the approaches to the St. Lawrence River, gateway to the heart of French
     Canada, Louisbourg also stood sentinel over the immensely valuable cod fisheries of the
     Banks. Mean (?) hailed it as another Gibraltar and as a worthy successor to Dunkirk ...
     As Dunkirk had been "a pistol held at England's head," so the guns of Louisbourg
     menaced the lifelines of the New England colonies. 
 
 

So, when border warfare erupted gain in North America, the colonists of Massachusetts decided that
Louisbourg was too strong and too dangerous to be left in French hands. 

Governor William Shirley invited colonists from as far south as Pennsylvania to join an expedition against
Acadie, but only New Englanders showed up. William Pepperell of Kittery, Maine, a merchant and
lumberman with practically no military experience, was named commander. He brought 90 ships and 4,200
men to Louisbourg on the morning of April 28, 1735. But even these would not be enough without a little
luck and the combination of French folly and British trickery. 

Bad weather delayed the British, and the delay took away the element of surprise. But even when the
French knew that the attack was coming, Jean Frederic Phelippeaux, Comte de Maurepas, France's
Minister of Marine, doubted that the fort was seriously threatened. He delayed sending vital naval aid that
might have made the difference when battle was joined. 

And Downey reports: "High also on the list of fortune's gifts to the enemy was the gross incompetence of
Governor (DuPont) du Chambron, in whose hands rested the safety of Louisbourg." 

As the attack loomed, his garrison was in mutiny over lack of pay and poor provisions. He was outmanned
even if the garrison would fight, and--despite all--he turned down reinforcements from Quebec (which
instead were used in an unsuccessful attack on Annapolis. ) 

Even as the British sailed into sight and prepared to land troops the Governor and his key lieutenants were
dancing the night away at a ball at du Chambron's palace. 

The Governor counted on the protection of powerful batteries that commanded the entrance to Louisbourg.
And the British respected them as well. They knew that to enter Louisbourg basin would have been suicide.
Not even the British warships that had joined the colonists would attempt it. 

To the east of the town itself was a small strait, barely a half-mile wide, and commanded by the Island
Battery, mounted on a rocky island. Directly ahead of the entrance was the Grand Battery. Ships
attempting to force the harbor would be raked port and forward. So General Pepperell decided to put his
troops ashore at Flat Point, three miles west of the fort. 

Du Chambon sent 120 men to block him. Although Du Chambon had 560 regulars and 1,400 militia he did
not send a larger force because he could not rely on untrained draftees or soldiers ready to mutiny. So
Captain Louis Morpain led his handful of trusted defenders to Flat Point. They dug in, awaiting the English
rowing towards them. 

But, suddenly, the English veered away, as though they would not risk the surf boiling over Flat Point's
rocky coast. Captain Morpain relaxed--until he saw the trick. More English boats had been lowered and
were rowing hard for Fresh Water Cove, two miles to the west. 

Morpain got there too late. The English were already ashore, and ore boats came bobbing through the surf.
General Pepperell soon had a firm beachhead. Louisbourg had been flanked. Now it was only a matter of
time until she fell. 

News of the fall of the Great Fortress reached Boston at one o'clock on the morning of July 3, 

1745. Clanging bells and booming cannon awoke the town and, long before dawn, townsfolk had begun a
day-long celebration that would spread across New England with the good news. 

The English immediately began transporting the Cape Breton population to Brest, France. 

Pierre Lewis Allain was apparently among them. He died at Brest that year, one of the earliest Acadians to
be departed. His widow, Marguerite LeBlanc apparently remained in Acadie and eventually turned up as a
refugee at St. Pierre de Miquelon with many of her children in 1766 after the wholesale exile of the Acadian
people a decade earlier. 

The Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle in 1748 ended the War of Austrian Succession, and, much to New
England's dismay and disgust, Louisbourg was returned to the French. The treaty commissioners could still
not agree on a definitive boundary for Nova Scotia, and, in 1749, the governor of Canada sent troops to
protect French claims in Beaubassin, Baie Verte and at the mouth of the St. John River. Indians, allied with
the French attacked British outposts regularly. There was bound to be more fighting. 

In fact, Louisbourg would be retaken by the British in 1758. But by then, the die would be cast in Acadie.
With the fall of Louisbourg the first time, the Acadians, bound to peace by their oath, but reading the
handwriting on the wall, had begun to leave their ancestral lands. Thousands went to Prince Edward Island,
others to southeastern New Brunswick. Some few may have traveled to Louisiana. They would be the first
of many to come. 

From the time of the settling of Acadie, and well before, France and Great Britain were either at war, just
ending a war, or getting ready to fight each other once again. So there is no surprise that the Treaty of
Aix-la-Chapelle solved next to nothing. It gave the two rivals a breathing spell, and brought a shaky peace
to the New World, but, whichever tongue they spoke, the American colonists knew that peace wouldn't
last. There was too much at stake. 

France claimed all of North America from the Alleghenies to the Rockies, from Florida and Mexico to the
North Pole. She held the St. Lawrence and the Mississippi--and controlled these waterways from
Montreal to New Orleans. 

The English, meanwhile, were penned behind the Alleghenies, and France wanted to keep them there. If
they spread west, they would cut New France in two, dividing Louisiana from Canada. To prevent this, the
French began to seal off the passes to the west--and the English began to push harder to get through them.
The result was constant skirmishing that led eventually to the French and Indian War. And the tensions
grew in Acadie as elsewhere. 

By now the Acadians had been refusing to take an unconditional oath for nearly 50 years. They wanted
assurances that they would have freedom of religion, and that they would not be forced to fight against
France or against their cousins in Canada and Cape Breton. The English had accepted the conditional oath,
and the Acadian status as French Neutrals was recognized in Britain, in the English colonies in America,
and in Nova Scotia and Canada. 

But now things began to change. The Acadians who stayed in Nova Scotia believed they could be loyal
British subjects while staying neutral. They thought the British would recognize their good faith. They
wanted to be left alone, to live in peace on their farms, according to the guarantees they'd received. 

But they were nervous. One-third of the Acadian population, about 6,000 people, had left Nova Scotia by
1752, taking refuge in New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island and other French territories. But they soon
found out that that wasn't the best idea. At first, these refugees had been more-or-less supplied with food
and clothing from Quebec and Louisbourg, but in October 1753 a missionary would write, "Many are in
such a state that they cannot work in winter, having nothing to cover themselves against the cold day or
night." 

Those who stayed on the old lands fared better, for awhile. In August 1752, Governor Cornwallis returned
to England and was replaced by Captain Peregrine Hopson, a much more moderate man. The Acadians
saw a glimmer of hope. But Hopson got sick and had to resign after only 15 months in office. He was
replaced by Charles Lawrence, a man both hated and feared by the Acadians. It turned out they had good
cause. 

Not only was Lawrence influenced by politics, he was influenced by greed. Just as the Acadian populations
had begun to swell, so had the populations in New England. These English colonies needed a place to
grow. And there were no better lands to grow than those in Acadie. 

In the beginning of June 1755, British troops were ordered to seize the arms of the Acadians in the Grand
Pre area. The soldiers pretended to be on a fishing trip. Instead of sleeping in barns, as they usually did,
they went two-by-two into the Acadians' houses. At midnight, each pair, quietly and without resistance,
gathered all the arms and ammunition in each house. The weapons were shipped to Fort Edwards. A few
days later, Acadians living in other areas of Nova Scotia were ordered to turn in their weapons or be
treated as rebels. Their boats were also confiscated. 

On June 10 the Acadians sent a protest to Governor Lawrence: 

     We hope that your Excellency will be pleased to restore to us the same liberty that we
     enjoyed formerly, in giving us the use of our canoes, either to transport our provisions
     from one river to another, or for the purpose or fishing, thereby providing for our
     livelihood. 

     Moreover, our guns ... (are) absolutely necessary to us, either to defend our cattle which
     are attacked by wild beasts, or for protection of our children and ourselves ... 

     Besides, the arms which have been taken away from us are but a feeble guarantee of our
     fidelity. It is not the gun which an inhabitant possesses that will induce him to revolt, not
     the privation of the same gun that will make him more faithful; but his conscience alone
     must induce him to maintain his oath ... 
 
 

Lawrence found the petition "arrogant and insidious." He hauled in 15 of the men who had signed it and
tried to force them to swear allegiance immediately. They said they needed time to think about it and
discuss it among themselves. Lawrence gave them the time, in jail. 

The governor and his advisors, thought the Acadians' refusal to take an unconditional oath meant that they
intended to fight with the French and the Canadians against the English--and they knew that war was about
to break out again. Bloody raids by the French and Indians and French piracy out of Louisbourg made
them even more nervous. Adding to it all, constant war and bickering had fueled a growing hatred for
anyone of French blood and Catholic faith. 

But still the Acadians refused to take the unconditional oath. The people of Annapolis Royal met on July
16,1755 and those of Grand Pre, Pisiquid and Cobequid on July 22, to draft an answer to Governor
Lawrence: 

     We, and our fathers, having taken an oath of Fidelity which was approved many times, in
     the name of the British King ... and under the privileges of which we remained faithful
     and subject to His British Majesty ... will never commit the inconstancy of taking an oath
     which changes so much the conditions and privileges in which our Sovereign and our
     fathers places us in the past... 
 
 

They said they had no intention at fighting aghast the British and asked Governor Lawrence to free the 15
delegates still being held in jail in Halifax harbor. 

Lawrence rejected all. The Acadians were told they would no longer be considered British subjects, "but
as subjects of the King of France, and as such they must be hereafter treated." 

In July 1755, Col. John Winslow, one of the British officers in Nova Scotia, wrote this in his journal: 

     We are now hatching the noble and great project of banishing the French Neutrals from
     this province; they have ever been our secret enemies and have encouraged the Indians
     to cut our throats. If we can accomplish this expulsion, it will have been one of the
     greatest deeds the English in America have ever achieved; for, among other
     considerations, the part of the country which they occupy is one of the best soils in the
     world, and, in the event, we might place some good farmers on their homesteads. 
 
 

In fact, Governor Lawrence had been planning the Acadian deportation for some time. He had broached
the idea in London at least by 1754. Early in 1755 he had asked Judge Morris, the provincial surveyor, to
prepare a report on how to go about it. Governor Shirley of Massachusetts had promised enough ships to
carry away the 7,000 Acadians still in Nova Scotia. 

(Of an approximate population of 18,000 Acadians, about 6,000 had left Nova Scotia between 1749 and
1752. Many more fled after 1752, and were continuing to flee even on the eve of their exile.) 

On July 31, 1755, Lawrence sent instructions to Colonel Moncton commanding officer in the Beausejour
region: 

     The ... Acadians of the District of Annapolis Royal, Mines and Pisiquid have ... refused to
     take the oath of allegiance ... and it is ... determined that they shall be removed out of the
     country as soon as possible ... 

     For this purpose, orders are given for a sufficient number of transports to be sent up
     (Chignecto Bay) ... for taking them on board, by whom you will receive particular
     instructions as to the manner of their being disposed of, the place of their destination,
     and every other thing necessary for that purpose. 

     In the meantime it will be necessary to keep this measure as secret as possible to prevent
     their attempting to escape and to carry off their cattle. In order to effect this, you will
     endeavor to fall upon some strategy to get the men, both young and old--especially the
     heads of families--into your power, and detain them till the transports should arrive, so as
     they may be ready to be shipped off; for, when this is done, it is not much to be feared
     that the women and children will attempt to go away and carry off the cattle. 

     As their whole stock of cattle and corn forfeited to the crown by their rebellion must be
     secured and applied toward a reimbursement of the expense the Government will have
     incurred in transporting them out of the country, care must be taken that nobody make
     any bargain for purchasing them under any color or pretext whatsoever; if they do the
     sale will be void, for the inhabitants have now no property in their name, nor will they be
     allowed to carry away the least thing save their ready money and household furniture ... 
 
 

On August 9, the Acadians of the Chignecto Isthmus were ordered to meet at Fort Cumberland, to hear
"the reading of orders of His Excellency, the Governor." 

Suspicious, they refused to go. The meeting was postponed to the next day. Then, some 400 Acadians
went to the fort after being assured that the gathering was only about "arrangement of the Governor of
Halifax for the conservation of their farms." 

Every Acadian who attended was taken prisoner. 

Detachments of soldiers then went through the countryside to arrest the rest of the population. But most of
the Acadians hid in the woods, and, in fact, nearly two-thirds of the area residents escaped immediate
deportation. But those who went to Fort Cumberland and had been taken prisoner were placed on ships to
be sent into exile. 

"One hundred and forty women threw themselves hopelessly and blindly onto the English ships to rejoin
their husbands," wrote the parish priest, Father LeGuerne. 

Winslow, in charge of the Grand Pre region, called the Acadians together there on September 5. His
proclamation ordered all men and boys over the age of ten to gather in the church to hear "His Majesty's
intentions." Those who didn't show up would forfeit their goods, cattle and real estate. 

Four hundred and eighteen men gathered at the church. They were apprehensive. The British now held the
upper hand, and the Acadians knew it. 

When all of the men were in the church, the doors were closed and locked. The men were placed under
arrest and told that their lands and goods were no longer theirs. They and their families were to be put
aboard ships and sent elsewhere. 

"They were greatly struck," Winslow wrote in his journal, "although I believe they did not imagine that they
were actually to be removed. Thus ended the memorable 5th of September, a day of great fatigue and
trouble." 

The transports arrived at Grand Pre on September 10. Winslow wrote: 

     ... the inhabitants, sadly and with great sorrow, abandoned their homes. The women, in
     great distress, carried their newborn or their youngest children in their arms. Others
     pulled carts with their household effects and crippled parents. It was a scene of
     confusion, despair and desolation... 
 
 

Winslow did make an attempt to keep families together, but he didn't have enough ships. Women were
loaded onto ships other than the ones that carried their husbands and children. Entire families, believing that
they were separating for only a few days, would be so widely dispersed that they would never meet again. 

When all was done, some 7,000 Acadians had been gathered up, sent from their homes aboard 24
crowded ships, and scattered along the Atlantic Seaboard and elsewhere. Some 2,000 Acadians would go
to Massachusetts, 700 Acadians to Connecticut, more than 300 to New York, 500 to Pennsylvania, nearly
a thousand to Maryland, 400 or more to Georgia, another thousand to the Carolinas. 

Their tragedy fell just short of genocide. Lord Jeffrey Amherst, one of the British commanders (who got a
college named in his honor) was all for it. In a letter to a Col. Bouqet, he urged: "You will do well to try to
spread smallpox by means of blankets and by every other means which might help exterminate that
abominable race." 

Twelve hundred Acadians reached Virginia in the fall of 1755, but were not allowed off the ships. Nobody
had told the Virginians that the Acadians were coming. They had no room for them. Particularly after
smallpox did infect the ships. Finally, these Acadians were sent to England in the beginning of 1756, and
imprisoned there. Many of them died in prison. Some would one day make it to France, but these would
fare little better. They were foreigners there, too. Their families had been in North America for 150 years.
Their ways, customs, even speech, were already far different than that of the motherland. 

Some historians believe that a number of the Acadians deported to Maryland, the Carolinas and Georgia
reached Louisiana in 1756. We know, for example, that the Acadians who were sent to South Carolina
had no difficulty in getting permission to leave. A number of those sent to other American colonies headed
for the Mississippi. Others escaped from the Virginia transports before they were sent on to England. 

We know that scores of Acadian exiles from New York and some of the New England colonies headed
for the West Indies. But the tropical climate did not agree with them, and they soon considered the move to
French Louisiana. 

And what would happen to their old lands in Acadie? 

In 1758, after the capture of Louisbourg, a proclamation by the Nova Scotia government appeared in the
Boston Gazette, offering free land grants in the once-Acadian province. A second proclamation, in 1759,
described the wonderful attractions of the land and offered liberal terms to settlers. 

In April 1759, a five-man committee was sent from Connecticut to "spy out the land." They met with
Governor Lawrence and his council at Halifax and were assured that the lands were all that they had been
advertised to be. Even more, ships from Nova Scotia would be put at their service to transport the im
migrants, their stock, and their furniture. 

To help them decide, the council sent them to visit the lands along the Bay of Fundy. By the time they
arrived in the Minas Basin, the orchards were budding, dikes growing green and rich uplands were waiting
for the plow. Compared to the rocky soil of New England, the fertile valley was very attractive. 

Completely sold on the proposition, the agents agreed to settle one township at Minas and another one at
Canard (today Horton and Cornwallis, respectively). 

On May 21, 1760, a fleet of 22 ships set sail for the new Promised Land. The New England planters
planted their feet on the soil of Acadie on June 4, 1760, five years after the Acadian dispersion. 

An old ballad, Puritan Planters tells the tale: 

     Five years in desolation the Acadia land had lain. 
     Five golden Harvest Moons had wood the fallow fields in vain. 
     Five times the winter snows had slept and summer sunsets smile 
     On lonely clumps of willow and fruit trees growing wild. 
     There was silence in the forest and along the Minas shore 
     And not a habitation from Canard to Beausejour, 
     But many a blackened rafter and many a broken wall 
     Told the story of Acadia's prosperity and fell. 
     But the simple Norman peasant folk shall fill the land no more,&n