Battle of Pointe-aux-Trembles

The Battle Pointe-aux-Trembles was a naval and land engagement that took place on 16 May 1760 during the French and Indian War on the north shore of the Saint Lawrence River, near the present day village of Neuville, in New France, during the French siege of Quebec. A relief force of the Royal Navy, having forced a passage down the Saint Lawrence, managed to destroy the French ships led by Jean Vauquelin assisting in the siege. The British victory forced the French under Chevalier de Lévis to raise the siege and to withdraw attempts to retake Quebec City.[2][3]

Battle of Pointe-aux-Trembles
(Part of the Siege of Quebec)
Part of Seven Years' War

Pomone fighting two British frigates during the Battle of Pointe-aux-Trembles. Painting by Auguste Étienne François Mayer.
Date16 May 1760
Location
Pointe-aux-Trembles, Saint Lawrence River, present day Neuville
46.4200°N 71.5833°W / 46.4200; -71.5833
Result

British victory

  • Relief of Quebec
Belligerents
Great Britain France
Commanders and leaders
Robert Swanton Jean Vauquelin  (POW)
Strength
Ship of the line
2 frigates		 2 frigates
2 schooners
2 armed ships
Casualties and losses
1 frigate damaged (later wrecked) All sunk, captured or burnt[1]

Background

After the capture of Quebec in 1759, the defeated French forces positioned themselves on the Jacques-Cartier River west of the city. Pack ice had closed the mouth of the river forcing the British Royal Navy to leave the Saint Lawrence River shortly after. The Chevalier de Lévis, General Montcalm's successor as French commander, marched his 7,000 troops to Quebec and besieged it. James Murray, the British commander, had experienced a terrible winter, in which scurvy had reduced his garrison to only 4,000.[4]

On 28 April 1760, Lévis' forces met and defeated the British at the Battle of Sainte-Foy, immediately west of the city, but the British were able to withdraw within the walls of Quebec. Combined with British improvements to the fortifications and the lack of heavy artillery and ammunition meant that the French were unable to take the city quickly.[5] A siege by Lévis began but the success of the French army's offensive against Quebec in the spring of 1760 depended on the dispatch of a French armada, with fresh troops and supplies.[6] The British too were anxious to get a fleet into the Saint Lawrence River in the spring before supplies and reinforcements could arrive from France.[6]

On 9 May, a ship arrived off Pointe-Lévis; the French shouted Vive Le Roi believing the ship to be theirs while the anxious British expected the worst.[4] The ship however turned out to be HMS Lowestoffe, detached from a squadron under Lord Colville who were just outside the Saint Lawrence ready to force the passage themselves. A twenty-one-gun salute and the hoisting of the Union flag turned British fears into sudden joy. Lévis and the French were in despair and Quebec had to be bombarded into submission as quickly as possible before the main British force arrived. The bombardment was heavy causing damage to the city's walls but casualties were light and as it turned out this was mere frustration on Lévis' part.[4] Colville's ships were soon navigating down the Saint Lawrence already made easy by James Cook's mapping the previous year.[7]

Battle

During the night of 15 to 16 May, Lévis was informed of the appearance of two British vessels between Île d'Orléans and Pointe-Lévis.[3] Dishearteningly, he immediately sent orders to the French vessels transporting the supplies of his army to retire and to his two frigates to be on alert and to be also ready to retire.[8] Bad weather caused his orders to the vessels to be delayed.[2]

On 16 May at daybreak, in response to the expressed wishes of Murray, Commodore Robert Swanton gave orders to HMS Diana and Lowestoffe, soon followed by HMS Vanguard, to pass the town and to attack the French vessels in the river above.[7]

At 5:00 a.m, the six French vessels (two frigates, two smaller armed ships, and two schooners), commanded by Captain Jean Vauquelin, had set sail when the British vessels appeared.[9] The French vessels immediately cut their cables; Pomone in the confusion forced herself too close to shore and ran aground. The two British frigates meanwhile sailed past blasting away at her but instead of stopping, they ignored her and pursued Atalante, which joined the French transport vessels at Cap-Rouge.[2] Atalante's commander, seeing that the British frigates were catching up with the French transport vessels, ordered them to beach so that Lévis could salvage the provisions they transported.[8] Atalante then sailed upstream but was forced to run aground at Neuville, then called Pointe-aux-Trembles.[3]

Vauquelin had managed to turn Atalante to broadside to fight it out. He nailed his colours to the mast and engaged the two frigates that had pursued him. Vauquelin did not belie his reputation and fought his ship for two hours with persistent bravery until his ammunition was spent. He even refused to strike his flag, and it was only when his ship was a burning, dismasted husk that he was made prisoner; he was treated by the British with distinguished honour.[3] Meanwhile, Vanguard did not sail farther than Saint-Michel and returned to Anse-au-Foulon and in so doing enfiladed the French trenches with grapeshot, forcing their abandonment. Vanguard then sailed back to Québec to round up the beached French ships, taking prisoners and their stores.[7] After the engagement, the two British frigates remained at Neuville.

Aftermath
Statue of Jean Vauquelin in Vauquelin Square, Montreal

The destruction of the French vessels was a death blow to the hopes of Lévis, who thus lost his stores of food and ammunition.[8] Lévis resolved to wait for the night before he retired, and he then hastened to raise the siege, leaving behind him the whole of his material for the siege and his sick and wounded.[10] He also gave orders to throw his artillery down the cliff near Anse-au-Foulon and to distribute provisions to the troops. At 10:00 p.m, the army marched with the cannon having been sent forward. Deserters from Lévis's camp then told Murray that the French were in full retreat on which all the British batteries opened fire at random through the darkness and sending cannonballs en ricochet, bowling by scores together, over the Plains of Abraham on the heels of the retreating French army.[10]

The British naval presence was reinforced on 18 May with the arrival of Lord Colville's squadron. Lowestoffe ran aground a few days later because of strong currents, and the damage sustained in the battle left her a wreck.[8]

At the Battle of Quiberon Bay, just off the coast of France, the Royal Navy destroyed the French fleet and so France could not send a significant reserve force to save New France. A small French relief fleet, commanded by François-Chenard Giraudais, managed to get through the British blockade but did not attempt to go up the Saint Lawrence River when he learned that the British had preceded him.[1] Giraudais would later be defeated in the Bay of Chaleur at the Battle of Restigouche.[11]

With Quebec City secure, it became a staging point for the conquest of the remainder of French Canada. Montreal, the last major French stronghold of which Lévis'a forces had retreated to was now the target. Forces under Jeffery Amherst approached on 8 September 1760. Lévis was ordered by Governor Marquis de Vaudreuil to surrender the city, which he soon did.[12]

References
  1. Francis, Jones & Smith 2000, p. 143.
  2. Beatson 1804, pp. 381–85
  3. Manning 2009, pp. 113–14
  4. Manning 2009, pp. 109–11
  5. Eccles 1969, p. 182.
  6. Francis, Jones & Smith 2000, p. 142
  7. Suthren 2000, pp. 105–06
  8. Baugh 2014, pp. 487–48
  9. Parkman 2009, p. 380
  10. Manning 2009, p. 115
  11. Beattie, Judith (1996). The Battle of the Restigouche, 1760. Ottawa, Canadian Heritage/ Parks Canada. p. 124.
  12. Parkman 2009, p. 506

Bibliography
  • Baugh, Daniel (2014). The Global Seven Years War 1754–1763: Britain and France in a Great Power Contest. Routledge. ISBN 9781317895466.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Beatson, Robert (1804). Naval and Military Memoirs of Great Britain, from 1727 to 1783, Volume 2. Longman, Hurst, Rees and Orme.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Eccles, W. J. (1969). The Canadian Frontier, 1534–1760. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston. ISBN 0-03-076540-4.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Francis, R. Douglas; Jones, Richard & Smith, Donald B. (2000). Origins: Canadian History to Confederation. Toronto: Harcourt Canada. ISBN 0-7747-3664-X.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Parkman, Francis (2009). Montcalm and Wolfe: The French and Indian War. BiblioLife. ISBN 978-1117791340.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Manning, Stephen (2009). Quebec: The Story of Three Sieges. Continuum. ISBN 978-0773538719.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Suthren, Victor (2000). To Go Upon Discovery: James Cook and Canada, from 1758 to 1779. Dundurn. ISBN 9781459713062.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
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