Military Events at the Head of Lake George: Oswego and Montcalm

After a sharp fight in the forest near the Oswego River, Bradstreet dispersed his motley foe, and hastened to Albany with the startling news just mentioned. Meanwhile the more active French had been preparing for an attack on Oswego. So early as March, three hundred Frenchmen, led by Indian guides, had made their way on snow-shoes along the bases of the Adirondack Mountains, on the north and west, to the vicinity of Oneida Lake, destroyed a small English stockade there, called Fort Bull, and returned with thirty prisoners. Late in May, eight hundred men under De Villiers, pushed forward to Sandy Creek, at the eastern end of Lake Ontario, and from that party went the detachment that assailed Bradstreet. At about the same time, Field Marshal the Marquis de Montcalm arrived at Quebec as governor-general and commander-in-chief. He was small in stature, but very energetic in mind and body. He instantly surveyed the field of his future operations. By journeying night and day, he penetrated to Ticonderoga, where the French had built Fort Carillon. He saw the value of that position, as well as Crown Point, and hastening back to Quebec, he prepared an expedition, secretly, against Oswego. At the head of three regiments, he ascended the St. Lawrence to Fort Frontenac, and was joined at Montreal by a large body of Canadians and savages. With this force, about five thousand in number, he crossed the lake in bateaux and canoes, and anchored in what is now Sackett's Harbor, early in August.

Fort Oswego, on the west side of the river, was a strong work. Fort Ontario, on the east side, was weaker, and was considered an outpost to the other. Against Ontario, Montcalm led his forces. Behind Four-Mile Point, a long wooded cape eastward of Oswego, he landed his troops, unobserved by the English scouts, and was in full march through the woods before he was discovered. Colonel Mercer, the commander of the little garrison of one thousand men, at Ontario, prepared to receive the foe, who invested the fort in full force, with thirty pieces of cannon, some of which had been taken from Braddock the year before. Finding sharp resistance, Montcalm began a regular siege, and on the 14th of August, when he was about to storm the works, Colonel Mercer, who saw that further resistance would be useless, agreed to surrender the post to the French. One hundred and twenty pieces of artillery, six vessels of war, three chests of coin and a large quantity of ammunition and stores, were the spoils of victory. To allay the jealousy of the Six Nations, Montcalm destroyed both forts; and the priests who accompanied him erected a cross, on which they placed the words, "THIS IS THE BANNER OF VICTORY." Close by it they raised a wooden column, on which was placed the arms of France and the inscription: "BRING LILIES WITH FULL HANDS." Then Montcalm descended the St. Lawrence, with his prisoners, and sent the captured English flags to decorate the churches of Montreal and Quebec. The destruction of the forts at Oswego was an admirable stroke of policy on the part of the French commander. It pleased the savages, and, as he hoped, caused them to assume a position of neutrality toward the belligerents. French emissaries soon seduced the Oneidas, Onondagas, Cayugas and Senecas from the British interest.

Loudon arrived just in time to hear of the loss of Oswego, as the first military news that reached him. He congratulated the country because of its escape from greater disasters. "If the attack had been made on the provincials alone," he said, "it would have been followed with fatal consequences." He would not allow any merit in the character of a provincial soldier. For them he had nothing but contemptuous words. Notwithstanding the provincials had saved the remnant of Braddock's army, in spite of the cowardice of the regulars and the obstinacy of their general; had conquered Acadia; defeated Dieskau, and had performed nearly all of the really useful military service against the French, he praised the British regulars and disparaged the Americans. Pleading the danger of another attack from the French, in greater force, as an excuse for his imbecility, he left the enemy to build a stronger work at Ticonderoga, dismissed the provincials to their homes, and placed the regulars in winter-quarters.

Under his instructions, Lord Loudon demanded of the city of New York, free quarters for himself, his officers, and a thousand men. "Your demand is contrary to the laws of England and the liberties of America," said the mayor of the city. "Free quarters are everywhere usual; I assert it on my honor, which is the highest evidence you can require," answered the haughty earl. The mayor was firm, and Loudon determined to make New York an example for the rest of the continent. When the citizens, by the lips of the mayor, pleaded their rights as Englishmen, his lordship, with a vulgar oath, said to the magistrate: "If you don't billet my officers upon free quarters, this day, I'll order here all the troops under my command, and billet them myself upon the city." A subscription for the purpose was raised, the officers were billeted on the city, and Loudon won his first victory. A similar contest, with a similar result, occurred in Philadelphia, and there Loudon won his second victory.