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Captain Gillis, as might be assumed, was not a native of the province of Quebec, but merely a carpet-bagger, who moved north in the summer and returned in early autumn about the time the wild geese went south, and all for reasons known only to himself. He hailed from down East, and voted in a small town not many miles from the historic shell-heaps and the ancient city of Pemaquid.
Major Church's design was to make a raid on the settlement of Baron St. Castin and his Indians at Penobscot by way of retaliation for the destruction of Fort William Henry at Pemaquid, but as he was sailing down the bay he met a small squadron having on board a reinforcement of 100 men under Colonel Hawthorne.
Croix to Pemaquid; Sir Ferdinando Gorges, the province of Maine from Penobscot to Piscataqua; Captain John Mason, New Hampshire and part of Massachusetts as far as Cape Ann, while the coast from Cape Ann to Narragansett Bay fell to Lord Edward Gorges, and the portion from Narragansett Bay to the Connecticut River to the marquis of Hamilton.
The people at Pemaquid fled on board their vessels; some sailed for Boston; others crossed over to the island of Monhegan, where they strongly fortified themselves. They had hardly left their flourishing little village of Pemaquid ere dark columns of smoke informed them that the savages were there, and that their homes were in a blaze.
The settlements were chiefly by agricultural communities, planted near the seaside, from New Haven to Pemaquid. The beaver trade, more than traffic in lumber and fish, had produced the village beyond the Piscataqua; yet in Maine, as in New Hampshire, there was "a great trade in deal boards."
D'Iberville sent the garrison to Boston in the vessel belonging to the Sieur de Chauffours which he had brought from the St. John river. The people of New England were greatly vexed at the destruction of Pemaquid and enraged at the cowardly conduct of its commander. Father Simon got back to Fort Nachouac on the 29th August bringing the news of d'Iberville's success.
La Tour had not thought necessary to provide for such an exigence, as he never admitted the possibility of falling a prisoner into the hands of D'Aulney. His lieutenant, therefore, determined to sail for Pemaquid, to seek assistance, which would enable him, at least, to recover the liberty of La Tour.
Four years before, a projected attack on Quebec by a British fleet, under Admiral Wheeler, had come to nought from analogous causes. The French spared no pains to gain accurate information as to the strength of the English settlements. Among other reports on this subject there is a curious Memoire sur les Etablissements anglois au dela de Pemaquid, jusqu'a Baston.
Captain Waldron, unwilling to exasperate the Indians by useless bloodshed, and finding that no captives could be recovered, sailed to the mouth of the Kennebec, then the Sagadahock. Here he established a garrison on the eastern bank of the river, opposite the foot of Arrowsic Island. With the remainder of his force he proceeded in two vessels to Pemaquid.
It was the end of June when Villieu and Thury, with one Frenchman and a hundred and five Indians, began their long canoe voyage to the English border. On the ninth of July, they neared Pemaquid; but it was no part of their plan to attack a garrisoned post.
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