The Campaign of 1760 in Canada | Page 9

had eighty men killed or wounded during the siege--a very inconsiderable loss for a cannonade of sixteen days' duration, from five batteries, besides a bomb battery, without an instant's intermission. Had it been a stony instead of a sandy ground, we must have lost above one-half of the garrison, and could not have resisted so long.
So soon as everyone had passed the river, we set out for Montreal, crossing through the woods, which, in a straight line, is only eight leagues from Isle aux Noix, always half running one after the other, after having marched in this manner, from midnight until twelve at noon, over fens, swamps, mosses, and sinking often up to the waist in marshy ground, without reposing or halting one minute. Instead of being near Montreal, as we imagined, we were thunderstruck on finding ourselves, by the fault of our guides, to be only at the distance of half a league from Isle aux Noix: our guide, not knowing the road through the woods, had caused us to turn round continually for twelve hours without advancing!
We were so near an English post at the Prairie de Boileau, that a grenadier of the Regiment de Berry, seeing his commander, Cormier, sink down with fatigue, and not in a condition to go any further, carried off a horse from them which was upon the borders of the wood, and mounted his commander on it; otherwise he would have been left aside and taken prisoner by the English, or scalped by the Indians.
Having lost all hopes of going to Montreal through the woods, we took the road to Fort St. Jean, on the River Chambly, four leagues lower than Isle aux Noix, and five leagues by land to Montreal. My strength was so entirely spent, that it was with great difficulty I could draw one leg after the other. Nevertheless the fear of falling into the hands of the Indians, the idea of the horrible cruelties which they practice on their prisoners, which shock human nature, prevented me from sinking down with pain, and gave me strength to push on.
Arrived at a settlement at four in the afternoon, about a league and a half from St. John's Fort, where De Bougainville caused his detachment to halt and repose themselves for the first time since midnight, that they left Isle aux Noix. I perceived there a boat going off to St. Jean, and I had only strength enough remaining to throw myself into it. We lost in this march about eighty men: those who could not hold out were left behind, victims to the Indians. Arriving at St. John's Fort, the first person I saw there was Poularies, on the river side, who told me they had news of our retreat, and that he was sent with his regiment to sustain us in case we had been pursued by the English.
We were now shut up in the island of Montreal on all sides. The English were masters of the River Chambly by the possession of Isle aux Noix. General Amherst approached with his army from Lake Ontario; and General Murray was in march, coming up from Quebec, with six thousand men that had passed through the winter there, and with some men-of-war, one of which of about forty guns, on its arrival in sight of the town of Montreal, greatly astonished, and excited the admiration of, the inhabitants, who, from the ignorance and negligence of those persons charged with the sounding of the St. Lawrence, had never seen vessels arrive there of above sixty or seventy tons.
General Murray conducted himself as an officer of great understanding, knowledge and capacity, and left nothing to do for General Amherst; he employed five weeks in coming from Quebec to Montreal, which is only sixty leagues, and did us during his march more harm by his policy than by his army. He stopped often in the villages; spoke kindly to the inhabitants he found at home in their houses--whom hunger and famine had obliged to fly from our army at Montreal; gave provisions to those unhappy creatures perishing for want of subsistence. He burned, in some cases, the houses of those who were absent from home and in the French army at Montreal, publishing everywhere an amnesty and good treatment to all Canadians who would return to their habitations and live there peaceably. In short--flattering some and frightening others--he succeeded so well, that at last there was no more possibility of keeping them at Montreal. It is true we had now only need of them to make a good countenance. The three English armies amounting to above twenty thousand men, it was impossible to make any further resistance.
Amherst's army appeared in sight from the town of Montreal, towards the gate of Lachine, on the 7th