Frontenac, the Courtier Governor 9780773595095

Table of contents :
Cover
Title
Copyright
Contents
Preface to the Carleton Library Edition
Preface
1. Canada and the Canadians under Louis XIV
2. The Background of Louis Buade, Comte de Frontenac
3. High and Mighty Lord
4. Frontenac and the Clergy
5· The Fur Trade
6. The Struggle for the West
7. Frontenac and the Sovereign Council 1675-1682
8. La Barre's Abortive War
9. Denonville's Limited War
10. The Iroquois' Total War
11. Frontenac Returns
12. Military Organization in New France
13. Frontenac's Border Raids
14. The American Assault on Canada
15. The Little War
16. Western Expansion and the Fur Trade
17. Tartuffe
18. The Feudal Governor's End
19. War's End
20. Conclusion
Select Bibliography
Index

Citation preview

' FRONTENAC THE COURTIER GOVERNOR / w.

J. ECCLES

The Carleton Library No. 14 / McClelland alld Stewart Limited

Copyrig/u in Canada , 1959 by W. 1. Eccles

Frontenac: the Courtier Governor, by W. J. Eccles was fi rst published by McC lelland and Stewart Limited, Toron to, in 1959.

The Canadian Publishers McClelland and Stewart Limited, 25 Hollinger Road, Toronto 16.

PRINTED AND BOUND I N CAN A.DA

BY T. H. BEST PRINTING COMPANY LIMITBD

fc 3bJ. t=:: 3:) t

9"5

c, / 0

CONTENTS Preface to the Carleton Library Edition Preface. VII

VI

I. Ca nada and the Canadians under Louis XIV. I 2. The Background of louis Buade, Comte de Frontenac, 18

3. Higb and Mighty Lord, 31 i. Frontenac and the Clergy, 51

5· The Fur Trade, 75 16. The Struggle for the West, 99 \" 7. Frontenac and the Sovereign Council 16]5-1682, 127

8.

l;'a

Barre's Abortive War, 157

9. Denonville's Limited War, 173

10. The Iroquois' Total War. r 86 II.

Frontenac Returns. 198

12. Military Organiz:llion in New France, 212 13. Frontenac's Border Raids. 223 H. The American Assault on Canada, 230

15. The Little War, 244

16. Western Expansion and the Fur Trade. 273 17. Tartuffe, 295

18. The Feudal Governor's End, 309 19. War's End, 328

20. Conclusion, 33" BiblioRraphy.342 Index. 349

P R E F ACE TO THE CAR L ETON

LIBRARY

E D I T I ON

SINCE this book W;;)S first pu bl ished. six years ago, a considerable amount of research on the period has been do ne, but nothing has so far come to light that appea red to make any major revision either necessary or desira ble. Republication in the Carleton Library has. however , afforded an opportuni ty to correct a few minor errors of fact and also to be more speci fic on one or two poinrsthe Marq uis de Denonville's request that he be replaced as governorgeneral of the colony being an exam ple of this last. I would have liked to have added more detai ls and been more specific on some points concern ing Denonvill e's capture of certain Iroq uois during hi s Seneca ca mpa ign and their bei ng se nt to ser ve as oarsmen in the French ga lleys. but the cost of resetting several pages was prohibitive. In any event, the question has been thoroughly investigated in three articles, one by myself and two by Father Jea n Leclerc. 5.] .. in Revue d' Histoire de I' Ameriq ue Fran~a ise. vol. XIV. decembre 1960. mars 196 1, and vol. XV. juin 1961. 1 am particularly grateful to Professor A. L. Burt for poi nting out to me an error in the interpretation of a phrase in a document concerning La Salle's concession in the south-west. As revised. La Salle is no longer said to have received a monopoly on the trade in buffalo hides (cibola); but instead permission. and no monopoly, to trade in the furs of the area then sometimes referred to as Cihola. To red uce costs in order to ma ke republicatio n in this series reasible it was necessary to omit the reference notes. Si nce, however. the vast bu lk of these notes referred to doc uments in various archives. mostly in France. it was felt that students and general readers wou ld not thereby be too disconcerted. In their place a note has bee n added listing the main archives where material on thi s period in Canad,,'s history may be fou nd. J. ECCLES University of To ronto.

\v .

January 1965 vi

PREFACE THERE have been to date only two studies made of Frontenac and

his regime, based on original source material. The onc by the American historian, Francis Parkman. entitled Count Frontenac and New France under Louis XIV, was first published in 1877; the other, by the French historian, Hen ri Lorin, entitled Le comte de Frontenac-and more a panegyric than a critical historical study -appeared in 1895. Their versions of this period in Canadian history, and more particularly Francis Parkman's version, ha ve been accepted almost wi thout questi on by all but a very few later historians and writers. Thus, the lapse of t ime and the advances made in historical methods during these interven ing years seemed to be justification enough for a new study of Frontenac and New France in the late seventeenth century. It will quickly be apparent to the reader that the prese nt work is not a full-scale biography of Frontenac. nor is it a complete study of the history of New France under his gove rn ment. Not enough evidence deal ing with the first fifty years o[ Frontenac's lire is available to write his biograp hy; moreover, very little original work has been done on this period by modern scholars. Thus, in order to explain clearly Fronte nac's actions, some aspects of the general history of New France in the age of Louis XIV had to be treated in detail, but limitations of space made it impossible to O"eat of them all. I have, then , been obliged almost to write two books rather than one, and this work pretends to be a reapprajsa l and a point of departure for fut ure studies, nothing more. I freely extend my apologies to schol arly critics [or the deplorable fact that the reference notes are placed at the back of the book and not at the foot of the page, but their number and present-day costs of publication made this unavoidable. Explanatory notes. as distinct from references to source material, have, however, been placed at the foot of the page. These notes are indicated by an asterisk. In the text no attempt has been made at consistency in the use of the particle de; instead, I have tried to adhere to seventeenth-ce ntury usage and modern euphony. For example, de Fronvii

PREFACE

tenae has an awkward ring to the English attuned ear, but Meulles without the de seems equally awkward; Duchesneau is used rather than Chesneau, but Vaudreuil and Callieres seemed better without the particle. Wherever English documents are cited in the notes. old-style dates during the months January to March inclusive are cited thus: 1689/90. In the preparation of this work many people and institutions have been of great assistance in many ways. Had it not been [or a scholarship granted me by the French government, it would have been impossible for me to spend a year in France consulting the original documents in the various archives. Grants in aid of research from the Humanities Research Council of Canada. and [rom the Staff Research Fund and the Ewart Foundation Fund of the University of Man itoba enabled me to consult the documents in the archives at Ottawa. Quebec. Boston and Albany. A generous grant by the Canada Council was of great assistance in making the publication of this work possible. The staff of the Public Archives o[ Canada were always exceedi ngly helpful to me in my research; in particular I would like to thank Miss Norah Story. Mr. W. G. Ormsby. Miss Juliette Bourque. Mr. L. Croteau. Mr. T. E. Layng and Mr. R. La Roque de Roquebru ne. the Canadian archivist resident in Paris. In France, the officials of the Archives Nationales, Bibliotheque Nationale. Archives du Ministere de la Guerre. Archives du Ministere des Affaires Etrangeres and the Bibliotheque Mazarine, once they had satisfied themselves that I could be trusted to handle the documents in their keeping with due care. were all most obliging. I must also thank M. Pierre Thilliez, chief archivist of the deparrement of Indre and M. Jean Massiet du Biest. chief archivist of the departement of Indre-et-Loire. for the trouble they took in searching for certain elusive documents on my behalf. Mr. C. M. Cross, Chief of the Tidal and Current Survey. Canadian Hydrographic Service, Ottawa. was of great assistance and went to much trouble to supply me with information concerning the time and rate of rise and fall of the tide at Quebec in October 1690. M. Jules Turcot of the Quebec Seminary Archives, Mr. Leo Flaherty of the Massachusetts State Archives, Dr. Albert B. Corey, State Historian of New York , and Miss Edna Jacobsen of the manuscript room at the New York State Archives provided every assistance during my researches viii

PREFACE

among the documents in their charge. One of the pleasures of this craft is to have associations with such obliging and courteous people. The book has been read in manuscript by Mr. A. M. Terroux. Professor W. L. Morton. Mr. Robert M. Dawson. Colonel C. p. Stacey. Professor Marcel Trudel and Dr. Wallace Farnham. Their comments and criticism have greatly improved the quality of this work and have saved me from innumerable errors of omission and commission; for this I am deeply grateful. University of Alberta. October 1958.

ix

,

The French Empire in the West, 1663-170 1.

CHAPTER ONE

CANADA AND THE CANAD I ANS UNDER LOUIS XIV

IN the mid-seventeenth century the survival of New France was in doubt. The Company of One Hundred Associates was responsible for the adm inistration of the colony, in return for which it had been granted a monopoly on colonial trade. When;irst founded by Richelieu, the Company had begun its work with considerable enterprise and enthusiasm. No sooner had it begu n, however, than war intervened to cause the loss of most of the Company's capital. a blow from which it never fully recovered. The Associates became first discouraged, then indifferent, towards New France. And in the colony itself, cabals, intrigue, malfeasance and strife of one sort or another increasingly disrupted the administration. In add ition, the colonists were under almost continual attack from the powerful Iroquois confederacy. During most of this period the government in France was unable, even if it had been so inclined, to take any great interest in the affairs of a ha ndful of French subjects in far-off Canada; the Thirty Years War. followed by the turmoi l of the Fronde, prevented it. Then. in 1661. all this changed . Upon the death of Cardinal Mazarin, Louis XIV began to rule as well as to reign over his kingdom , and under him he had some oC the ablest administrators France has ever known. One of these-and perhaps the greatestwas Jean Baptiste Colbert. minister of marine. In 1663 Louis withdrew the charter of the Company of One Hundred Associates and made New France a royal province under the jurisdiction of Colbert's Department of Marine. Just as Louis XIV was determined to master Europe in the military and diplomatic fields, so Colbert was determined that France should match her rivals in the economic sphere. Whereas Louis XIV's main aim in liCe was to gain power and military glory, Colbert regarded wars as good only in so far as they aided in the expansion of French commerce or harmed an economic rival; military adventures which did not have these ends in view he strongly deprecated. He saw clearly that England and

FRONTENAC: THE COURT I ER GOVERNOR

the Netherlands had built their great commercial strength on colonies and overseas trade; he therefore determined that France should do likewise, and in this scheme he intended that Canada should play an important role. His first aim was to bring New France as quickly as possible to the point where it could stand on its own feet without depending on military and economic support from France. Once this had been accomplished, the colony would be able to fulfil its proper function in a mercantilist economy; that is, to supply the mother co~ntry with needed raw materials and to absorb her surplus manufactured goods. No time was lost by Colbert in reorganizing the colony's adminis· trative framework. A Sovereign Council was instituted at Quebec, modelled after the Parlement de Paris. This body. primarily a judicial coUrt of appeal, also had administrative functions, and, in some degree, legislative powers. The membership was composed of the governor, the bishop, the intendant, five councillors, an attorney-general and a recording clerk. The five councillors were at first appointed jointly by the bishop and the governor. Perhaps Colbert's most important measure was the appointment of an intendant for New France who was made responsible for the civil administration of the colony, [or ensuring that the people received swift and impartial justice, and for the disbursement of the royal funds. In France the office of intendant had proved to be an efficient instrument for the strengthening of the royal power in the provinces. The men appointed to these posts were skilled administrators, well educated and with a sound legal training; almost invariably they were recruited from among the noblesse de robe,· usually after they had given evidence of their ability in lesser posts. They were essentially career men, whose prospects in the royal service depended not so much on influence at the Court as on their ability to satisfy the minister that their past record merited their being promoted. Despite the importance of the intendant, the governor still remained the most imposing figure in the colony. He retained complete jurisdiction over military matters and foreign affairs• Noblesse de robe (nobility of the robe) was the order of nobility to which entrance was gained by the acquisition of certa in high offices. the title going with the office. The long robe of the ieg3i profession was the distinguishing mark of many of these offices. hence the name. which distinguished the members of the noblesse de robe from the descendants of the feud31 3ristocr3cy. known as the noblesse d'epee (the ~obility of the sword). 2

CANADA AND THE CANADIANS UNDER LOUIS X I V

if such the latter can be called, since they consisted of nothing more than the colony's relations with the Indi an tribes and, to a lesser extent, with the European colonies to the south. Although he was forbidden to meddle in those spheres delegated to the intendant and the Sovereign Council, these latter officials were obliged to obey the governor in all things and if he trespassed on their preserves they could merely point his offence out to him and then, if he persisted, report the matter to the minister of marine. The reason for this semi-autocratic system was that the governor represented the king's person, and Louis XIV could not tolerate any apparent check to his authority, even by proxy. In effect this meant that when a dispute arose between the governor and the intendant or the Sovereign Council they had to wait nine months to a year, and even longer. before receiving the minister's decision in the case. In the meantime the dispute someti mes had either clarified itself or else worsened to such an extent that the minister's decision, when received, was no longer appl icable. In the final ana lysis, however, all authority rested with the king and the minister of marine; it was they who de