page_title: Battle of Fort Beauséjour
section_title: Fort Beauséjour: construction and espionage
hierarchical_section_title: Battle of Fort Beauséjour / Fort Beauséjour: construction and espionage
caption_attribution_description: English: A map depicting the Beaubassin region of Nova Scotia in 1755. The area was then on the frontier between British Nova Scotia and French Acadia. The caption reads: A plan of Chignecto (called also by the French Beau-Bassin) at the head of the Bay of Fundi upon the Istmus of Accadia shewing that harbour with its rivers, the situation of the English fort and fort possessed by the French, June 1755. The image has been cropped from the original to remove a border.
context_page_description: The Battle of Fort Beauséjour was fought on the Isthmus of Chignecto and marked the end of Father Le Loutre's War and
  the opening of a British offensive in the Acadia/Nova Scotia theatre of the Seven Years' War, which would eventually lead to the end of the French Empire in North America. The battle also reshaped the settlement patterns of the Atlantic region, and laid the groundwork for the modern province of New Brunswick.
  Beginning June 3, 1755, a British army under Lieutenant-Colonel Robert Monckton staged out of nearby Fort Lawrence, besieged the small French garrison at Fort Beauséjour with the goal of opening the Isthmus of Chignecto to British control. Control of the isthmus was crucial to the French because it was the only gateway between Quebec and Louisbourg during the winter months. After two weeks of siege, Louis Du Pont Duchambon de Vergor, the fort's commander, capitulated on June 16.
context_section_description: In 1750, the Governor of New France Jacques-Pierre de la Jonquière heard that the English were building a fort in the region of Acadia. This fort later became Fort Lawrence. In response, the French decided to build Fort Beauséjour. The building of the fort began in 1751 and the plans created by a military engineer named Jacau de Fiedmont, who became a lieutenant in 1752. Fiedmont was responsible for the construction of the fort as well as for the plans of its defence. The fort was supposed to be strong enough to withstand bombardment, but Fort Beauséjour was not completely finished in 1755, for multiple reasons. To begin with, the fort's priest Abbé Le Loutre decided to reallocate manpower to an irrigation project. Also, Louis du Chambon de Vergor, the military commander at Fort Beauséjour in 1754, was more concerned with keeping the money for himself and was therefore not putting the resources to use strengthening the defences of Fort Beauséjour. Jacau de Fiedmont's journal, The Siege of Beauséjour in 1755: A Journal of the Attack on Beauséjour, puts emphasis on the point that if the fortifications would have been completed by the beginning of the siege, the Fort would have had higher resistance against bombardment which would have increased the morale of the French and Acadian defenders. Fiedmont continually insisted on working on the defences because of the fort's weaknesses, yet this work was never completed.
  Another important figure at Fort Beauséjour at this time was Thomas Pichon, who having originally studied medicine in France, was the Commander's secretary at Fort Beauséjour. When Fort Beauséjour was affected by an epidemic of food poisoning, Pichon traveled to Fort Lawrence to discuss his medical notes with the English surgeon. The conclusion was that a poisonous herb was being used in food, instead of the parsley the French thought they were using. From this, Pichon became friendly and on good terms with the English at Fort Lawrence, visiting the fort regularly as he felt that people did not recognize his value at Fort Beauséjour. Pichon did not trust either Commander Vergor or the priest Abbé Le Loutre who, while underneath Vergor in the hierarchy, was the real figure in charge. Pichon eventually met the commander at Fort Lawrence, Captain George Scott, and was hired as a spy. Pichon stated that he agreed to become a spy because he believed that the British nation was superior to the French nation, but it is more likely that he wanted monetary gain and despised his superiors at Fort Beauséjour. For a year preceding the Siege of Beauséjour, Pichon gave crucial military information such as maps and battle plans to the English. (Some Acadians also worked as spies for the British.) After the events of 1755, Thomas Pichon began his new life as Thomas Tyrell, a subject of King George II. Later in his life Pichon came to regret his treason against the French.
caption: Map of Chignecto (1755)
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