Part 35 (1/2)

In their forlorn condition Hazen, Simonds and White were obliged to furnish them with provisions and supplies in order to keep them from plundering their houses and stores. All that the trading company obtained in return was a bill of exchange on the Ma.s.sachusetts congress, which probably was never paid:

”Gentlemen,--At sight of this our second Bill (first of same tenor and date not paid) please to pay to Messrs. William Hazen, James Simonds and James White, or order, forty-one Spanish milled Dollars for value received of them.

EZEKIEL FOSTER, Lt., EDMUND STEVENS, Capt., DAVID PRESCOTT, Lt., DANIEL MESERVY, Lt.

Portland, Nova Scotia, December 14th, 1776.

To the Honorable Council of Ma.s.sachusetts State.

[102] A pretty full account of the siege of Fort c.u.mberland will be found in the Canadian Archives for 1894, pp. 355-366. Other particulars are to be found in Kidder's Military Operations in Eastern Maine and Nova Scotia, pp. 67-74.

James White says the supplies furnished to Prescott & Co., were regarded as for the common cause and benefit to get rid of a needy lawless banditti.

On the 10th February ensuing General Ma.s.sey wrote to the secretary of State that Eddy, Rogers, Allen and Howe were at the River St. John preparing with the Indians for attacks on various points in the Spring. To counteract the designs of Eddy and his a.s.sociates Colonel Michael Francklin was appointed Superintendent of Indian affairs about this time.

Early in May, 1777, a serious attempt was made by John Allan to establish a trading post for the Indians on the River St. John. James Simonds proceeded via Windsor to Halifax, and reported the matter to the civil and military authorities. Lieut.-Governor Arbuthnot at once sent Colonel Arthur Goold and an armed party, commanded by Major Studholme, to investigate, and on their arrival at St. John the Machias rebels promptly decamped. On the 9th May Goold wrote a letter to the inhabitants of the towns.h.i.+ps up the river stating that the government of Nova Scotia was well informed of their treasonable doings, and that the tenure of their present possessions was due to the clemency of ”the most just, generous and best of Princes.” He informed them that his object was to effect a reconciliation for them with Government, and added that while he came to them with the olive branch of peace, in the event of a refusal of his overtures an armed force would follow and employ a very different argument.

A meeting was immediately held at Maugerville, and in reply to Goold a letter was sent ”by order of the body of the inhabitants a.s.sembled,”

written and signed in their behalf by Israel Perley. In this letter the inhabitants aver ”that their greatest desire hath ever been to live in peace under good and wholesome laws,” and they declare themselves ”ready to attend to any conditions of lenity and oblivion that may be held out to them.”

Colonel Goold in his reply expresses his pleasure at the unanimity of their resolution to observe loyalty and obedience to the government under which they lived and his surprise that they should suffer a few incendiaries to disturb the public tranquillity. He hoped the word ”Committee” had nothing so terrible in its sound as to frighten a majority of the loyal people. ”Why not,” he says, ”form a Committee in favor of Government and see which is strongest? I will throw myself into your scale and make no doubt but we shall soon over balance these mighty Law-givers.”

On the afternoon of May 13, two of John Allan's lieutenants, William Howe and John Preble, arrived at Manawagonish Cove[103] in a whale boat, not knowing of the presence of a British sloop of war at St.

John. Captain Featus, the commander of the ”Vulture,” promptly dispatched a boat to the place and took their whale boat, but Howe and Preble and their party fled to the woods and eventually got back to Machias. The captain of the ”Vulture” also intercepted two schooners laden with supplies for the proposed Indian ”Truck House.”

[103] Commonly called Mahogany Cove, about three miles to the west of the harbor of St. John.

Evidently there was a lack of harmony and mutual confidence among the inhabitants of Maugerville at this time, for on the 16th May they wrote to Colonel Goold a letter in which, after representing their recent conduct in the best light they could and admitting that they had acted in opposition to this Majesty's Government, they say: ”As your honor is pleased to tell us that you bring the Olive Branch of Peace we humbly crave the benefit, and as we were jointly concerned in the first transgressions we now humbly request that no distinction may be made as to a pardon, there being in this place as in all others private prejudices and contentions, and perhaps some persons may avail themselves of this opportunity to got revenge by representing their private enemies as the greatest enemies of Government. We earnestly request no such complaint may prevail upon your Honor to make any distinction with regard to any person, on the River, and we beg your Honor's answer to this pet.i.tion from your Honor's most humble servants.

[Signed]. Israel Perley, Seth n.o.ble, Jonathan Burpee, Elisha Nevers, junr.”

In reply to the letter, from which the foregoing is taken, Colonel Goold said that his ears would be shut to all insinuations as to the honesty of their submission, that their letter ”seems to breathe the sentiments of a sincere repentance for inconsiderate follies past” and that he had not the least doubt it would meet with as favorable a reception as they could desire.

In spite of Goold's tact and diplomacy there were a few irreconcilables, and on the 19th of May he wrote from Maugerville to Major Studholme, who had remained with the troops at the mouth of the river:

”As notwithstanding every measure which I have taken to reclaim some of the princ.i.p.al people concerned in the late defection, amounting to rebellion, on this river has proved fruitless, and they still continue obstinately bent on quitting their houses and families rather than submit to his Majesty's gracious offers of clemency, I think it my duty to give you their names--Seth n.o.ble, Elisha Nevers, Jacob Barker--that you may act upon the occasion agreeable to the orders you may have received from Major General Ma.s.sey.”

Colonel Goold administered the oath of allegiance to all but a few of the people and, as his last word, charged them on no account to suffer those who inconveniently absented themselves from accepting the proposals of the Lieutenant Governor to return to their habitations without first proceeding to Halifax to beg pardon for their past behaviour. ”I have nothing more to observe to you,” he adds, ”but that you are not to pay any more respect to those Gentlemen, who lately styled themselves your rulers, than to every other common member of the community.”

On his return to Halifax, Col. Goold reported to Lt.-Gov'r Arbuthnot that the inhabitants at the River St. John had cheerfully taken the oath of allegiance, after delivering up two pieces of ordnance, formerly concealed by the French inhabitants.

While he was at the River St. John Goold had an interview with the Indians and made a speech to them in French, which seems to have produced a strong impression. Eight of the chiefs and captains swore allegiance to King George the Third in the name of their tribe, and had they been let alone by Allan it is probable the Indians would have given no further trouble to the Government or Nova Scotia. Colonel Goold regarded his arrival as opportune as Allan, Howe and others from Machias were a.s.sembled ”to play the same game as last year.” Before he left the river he addressed a letter to the Indians in French, promising that he would represent to Lieut. Governor Arbuthnot their great desire to have a priest, and expressing his confidence that they might have Mons'r. Bourg, then stationed at the Bay of Chaleur, who would be put on the same footing as their late missionary Bailly.

John Allan was altogether too determined a man to abandon the struggle for supremacy on the St. John without another attempt. He learned on the 29th of May that the ”Vulture” had returned to Annapolis and he set out the very next day from Machias with a party of 43 men in four whale boats and four birch canoes. At Pa.s.samaquoddy he met with some encouragement and thirteen canoes joined the flotilla, which proceeded on to Musquash Cove, where they arrived on the evening of the 1st of June. Having ascertained that there were no hostile vessels at St.

John harbor, Allan sent one of his captains named West with a party to seize Messrs. Hazen, Simonds and White. The party landed at Manawagonish Cove and marched through the woods to the St. John river above the falls, crossing in canoes to the east side of the river and landing at what is now Indiantown. Proceeding on through scrubby woods and over rough limestone they reached Portland Point undiscovered and took William Hazen and James White prisoners. James Simonds and Israel Perley had accompanied Col. Goold to Halifax, and in this way Mr.

Simonds escaped capture, but it seems that a little later he was not so fortunate. There was now no good will between the people of Portland Point and their neighbors to the west. Allan states in his journal ”Hazen and Simonds jeered our officers, saying that they made breastworks of women and children.” Tradition has it that on one occasion James Simonds told a party of marauders who had come to pillage that they would never dare to face the King's soldiers for their blood was nothing but mola.s.ses and water.

Leaving a guard of sixty men at the mouth of the river under Capt.

West, the rest of the invaders proceeded up the river taking their prisoners with them. West and his party took possession of Woodman's store and buildings opposite Indiantown and occupied them for barracks. Allan directed them ”To range the woods from Hazen's across the river above the falls round to the Old Fort,” and in accordance with his instructions, the party came over every day to the Portland sh.o.r.e in order to capture any vessel that might enter the harbor and to prevent the landing of marines or seamen from any British man of war.

Allan in his diary gives an account of his trip up the St. John, which is of much local interest. He claims that the majority of the settlers, despite their late submission to Colonel Goold, were friendly to the American cause, although some were ”great Zealots for Britain.” Gervas Say and Lewis Mitch.e.l.l are said to have been instrumental in bringing Col. Goold to the river, and Allan endeavored to seize them. Mitch.e.l.l's influence was feared on account of his being of ”an insinuating turn, particularly among the French and Indians.”

Mitch.e.l.l was captured by strategy at his house above Grimross, but a few days later he ”made his elopement” and with the a.s.sistance of other loyalists was not long in bringing a hornet's nest about the ears of his captors.