Fort Beauséjour
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| Fort Beauséjour | |
|---|---|
| Aulac, New Brunswick | |
 View of Fort Beauséjour showing the foundation of the Officers Quarters in the foreground, the modern (1930s)museum in the middle ground, and Cumberland Basin in the background |
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| Type | Fortress |
| Built | 1751 |
| In use | 1751- |
| Controlled by | France, United Kingdom |
Fort Beauséjour, also referred to as Fort Cumberland, is a National Historic Site located in Aulac, New Brunswick, Canada. It is approximately eight kilometres east of the town of Sackville on a ridge overlooking the Tantramar Marshes.
The region comprising the Tantramar Marshes on the Isthmus of Chignecto had been settled by French colonists during the 17th and 18th centuries - giving the name Beaubassin to this part of Acadia. Following the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713, the part of Acadia which is known today as peninsular Nova Scotia changed from French to British control, becoming the fourteenth British colony on the eastern seaboard and reverting to the name Nova Scotia used during British occupation.
The western limits between Nova Scotia and Acadia were not clear, although it was generally understood to be in the vicinity of Beaubassin. As tensions between France and Britain escalated in the 1740s, the territorial dispute over colonial limits became an important issue.
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[edit] Construction of Fort Lawrence
- See main article at Fort Lawrence.
Recent scholars (see Hand for example) suggest that the French were entrenched on Beauséjour Ridge (present-day Aulac Ridge, site of Fort Beausejour) as early as 1750. In June of that year, a British Army expeditionary force under Major Charles Lawrence arrived below the ridge to survey matters. Finding a landing impossible, given the presence of French troops, the flotilla moved further up the basin to Beaubassin, immediately south of the Missaguash River. When it was clear that Lawrence intended to land, the village was ordered burnt by the local priest, Abbé Jean-Louis le Loutre, to ensure that the British could not profit from its seizure. The displaced Acadians took refuge with the French.
Finding his troops too few and ill-prepared to build a fort or to launch an attack on the French, Lawrence ordered a retreat but returned in September 1750. Now in greater numbers, the British troops began construction of a palisade fort near the site of ruined Beaubassin. It overlooked the Missaguash River, which they believed to be the historic dividing line between Acadia and Nova Scotia following the Treaty of Utrecht. The work on the fort proceeded rapidly and the facility was completed within weeks.
[edit] Construction of Fort Beauséjour
France responded to the construction of Fort Lawrence in November 1750 when the Governor of New France, Jacques-Pierre de Taffanel de la Jonquière, Marquis de la Jonquière, issued new orders that a star-shaped fortress be built on Beauséjour Ridge.
Work on the French fortress did not begin until the following spring, but by April 1751 construction was underway. Construction was slow, and it was incomplete when attacked in 1755 (Hand, 22) , but it was also a more substantial construction then Fort Lawrence, given its earthworks. At about the same time, two satellite forts, Gaspareaux and Menagoueche, were established to shore up the French defenses of Acadia. For four years, Fort Beauséjour and Fort Lawrence watched one another across the frontier between French and British territory on the Isthmus of Chignecto until the outbreak of the French and Indian War.
[edit] Attack on Fort Beauséjour
- See main article at Battle of Fort Beauséjour.
Fort Beauséjour was among the northernmost and easternmost of a series of French forts in North America which were built along the Mississippi and Ohio valleys and in the Great Lakes to contain British expansion into French territory. These defensive works are believed to have developed the "claustrophobic feeling"[citation needed] that American colonists on the eastern seaboard felt in being prevented westward expansion from the Appalachian Mountains, leading to the French and Indian War, and the downfall of France's colonial ambitions in North America.
On June 4, 1755 the British conquest of all of France's North American territory began when a force of British regulars and New England militia attacked Fort Beauséjour from Fort Lawrence under command of Lt. Col. Robert Monckton. The British-led force took control of Fort Beauséjour by June 16, 1755, after which they changed the name to Fort Cumberland.
[edit] Role in the Great Upheaval
In the ensuing months, British forces attempted to get Acadians living in the region to sign an oath of allegiance to the British Crown, however the Acadians refused, preferring to stay neutral. Though it was their duty (Hand, 50), Acadians had reluctantly participated in the defense of Fort Beausejour. The British used this fact against them, and in August 1755, they began expelling Acadians under the orders of Charles Lawrence, now Governor of Nova Scotia, the same military officer who had presided over construction of Fort Lawrence in 1750.
This event was the start of what would come to be known as the Great Upheaval (le Grand Dérangement) of Acadian society and it commenced with those remaining settlers in Beaubassin. Acadian homes at Beaubassin and elsewhere in the vicinity of the fort were burnt by British forces to prevent their return. As the British army was now using the more substantial facility at Fort Cumberland, the abandoned Fort Lawrence was burned on October 12, 1756 for this very reason.
[edit] Fort Cumberland
- See main article at Battle of Fort Cumberland.
Under its new name of Fort Cumberland, the Beauséjour Ridge facility became a strategically important British facility, guarding the overland route to peninsular Nova Scotia, as well as the upper reaches of the Bay of Fundy. Following the Seven Years' War, all of Acadia was renamed Nova Scotia until parts were split off as separate colonies prior to and following the American Revolutionary War.
In 1776, during the American Revolutionary War, Fort Cumberland and its British garrison repelled rebel attacks from local guerillas led by the American sympathizer Jonathan Eddy.
[edit] Further reading
- Chris M. Hand, The Siege of Fort Beausejour 1755, 2004, Fredercton: Goose Lane Editions and the New Brunswick Military Heritage Project. ISBN 0-86492-377-5.
- Bernard Pothier, Battle for the Chignecto Forts, 1995, Toronto: Balimuir.
- Dr. John Clarence Webster, The Forts of Chignecto, 1930, self published.
- Dr. John Clarence Webster, Thomas Pynchon: The Spy of Beausejour, 1937, Sackville: Tribune Press.
- Dr. John Clarence Webster, The Building of Fort Lawrence in Chignecto, 1941, Saint John: New Brunswick Museum.
- Fred Anderson, Crucible of War: The Seven Years' War and the Fate of Empire in British North America, 1754-1766, 2000, New York: Knopf. ISBN 0-3754-06425.
- Ernest Clarke, The Siege of Fort Cumberland, 1776, 1995. Montreal: McGill-Queen's Press. ISBN 0-7735-1323-X.
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