A half-century of conflict. France and England in North America. Part ...

96 LOUISBOURG BESIEGED. [1745.boring settlements. ^ The regulars were in bad condition.About the preceding Christmas they hadbroken into mutiny, being discontented with theirrations and exasperated with getting no extra pay forwork on the fortifications.The affair was so seriousthat though order was restored, some of the officerslost all confidence in the soldiers ; and this distrustproved most unfortunate during the siege. The governor.Chevalier Duchambon, successor of Duquesnel,who had died in the autumn, was not a man tograpple with a crisis, being deficient in decision ofcharacter, if not in capacity.He expected an attack. "We were informed ofthe preparations from the first," says the Habitant deLouishourg. Some Indians, who had been to Boston,carried to Canada the news of what was going onthere;but it was not believed, and excited no alarm.^It was not so at Louisbourg, where, saysthe Frenchwriter just quoted, "we lost precious moments inuselessdeliberations and resolutions no sooner madethan broken. Nothing to the purpose was done, sothat we were as much taken by surprise as if theenemy had pounced upon us unawares."1 " On fit venir cinq ou six cens Miliciens aux Habitans desenvirons ; ce que, avec ceux de la Villa, pouvoit former treize kquatorze cens hommes." — Lettre d'un Habitant de Louisbourg. Thiswriter says that three or four hundred more might have been hadfrom Niganiche and its neighborhood, if they had be n summonedin time. The number of militia just after the siege is set by Englishreports at 1,310. Parsons, 103.2 Shirley to Newcastle, 17 June, 1745, citing letters captured onboard a ship from Quebec.