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Pemaquid was no sooner destroyed, than Iberville sailed for Newfoundland, with the eighty men he had taken at Quebec; and, on arriving, he was joined by as many more, sent him from the same place. He found Brouillan, governor of Placentia, with a squadron formed largely of privateers from St. Malo, engaged in a vain attempt to seize St. John, the chief post of the English.
Iberville was trained in the French navy, and was already among its most able commanders. The capture of Pemaquid was, for him, but the beginning of greater things; and, though the exploits that followed were outside the main theatre of action, they were too remarkable to be passed in silence.
They were uniformly treated well, and often with such kindness that they would not be exchanged, and became Canadians by adoption. Villebon was still full of anxiety as to the adhesion of the Abenakis. To the capture of Pemaquid, therefore, the French government turned its thoughts. One Pascho Chubb, of Andover, commanded the post, with a garrison of ninety-five militia-men.
Arthur Stanhope found M. de Valette at Pemaquid, according to the information of father Gilbert; for the priest had, in fact, left him there on the preceding evening, and it was from him that he learned the tidings of La Tour's imprisonment.
Rebecca, or Lady Hale, as she is now called, had invited Robert Pike to her wedding, but he sent her an excuse for not coming, to the effect that urgent business did call him into the eastern country as far as Monhegan and Pemaquid.
And I want to be there to see and hear. I got to, that's all. What's shows and museums and ridin' in the subway, compared to a storm on Pemaquid? No, Sir, I can't stand it any longer. I'm goin' back on the Boston boat to-night, and before it's calmed down at the point I'll be there. I'm goin' to stay there too; that is, if I don't move over to the Neck." "With Cynthy?" says I.
The second party, proceeding from Three Rivers and numbering twenty-six French and twenty-nine Indians under the command of François Hertel, aimed at Dover, Pemaquid, and other settlements of Maine and New Hampshire. The Quebec party, under Portneuf, comprised fifty French and sixty Indians. Its objective was the English colony on Casco Bay, where the city of Portland now stands.
The massacre of women and children is another matter, not to be excused on any grounds, even though Schenectady and Salmon Falls are paralleled by recent acts of the Germans in Belgium. Still, we should not forget that European warfare in the age of Frontenac abounded with just such atrocities as were committed at Schenectady, Dover, Pemaquid, Salmon Falls, and Casco Bay.
The rival English post of Pemaquid was destroyed, as we have seen, by the Abenakis in 1689; and, in the following year, they and their French allies had made such havoc among the border settlements that nothing was left east of the Piscataqua except the villages of Wells, York, and Kittery.
A strong fort of stone was built, the abandoned cannon of Casco mounted on its walls, and sixty men placed in garrison. The keen military eye of Frontenac saw the danger involved in the re-establishment of Pemaquid. Lying far in advance of the other English stations, it barred the passage of war-parties along the coast, and was a standing menace to the Abenakis. It was resolved to capture it.
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