Duc d ' Anville Expedition The Duc d ' Anville Expedition ( June – October 1746 ) was sent from France to recapture Louisbourg and take peninsular Acadia ( present - day mainland Nova Scotia ) . The expedition was the largest military force ever to set sail for the New World prior to the American Revolution . This effort was the fourth and final French attempt to regain the Nova Scotian capital , Annapolis Royal during King George ' s War . The Expedition was also supported on land by a force from Quebec under the command of Jean - Baptiste Nicolas Roch de Ramezay . Along with recapturing Acadia from the British , d ' Anville was ordered to " consign Boston to flames , ravage New England and waste the British West Indies . " News of the expedition spread fear throughout New York and New England . The expedition was a complete failure . It was beset by bad weather and took three months to cross the Atlantic Ocean . Many in the ships ' crews and the troops being transported fell ill before the expedition finally reached Chebucto Bay ( present - day Halifax Harbour ) , and d ' Anville died not long after its arrival . His successors in command attempted to mount an assault on Annapolis Royal , but eventually gave up and returned to France . Henry Wadsworth Longfellow immortalized the expedition with his poem " A Ballad of the French Fleet . " Historic context . The British had conquered Acadia by defeating the capital in the Siege of Port Royal ( 1710 ) . Over the next fifty years , the French and their allies made six unsuccessful military attempts to regain the capital . The Duc d ' Anville expedition , which was coordinated with Ramezay ' s expedition from Quebec , was the last French attempt to retake the capital of Acadia . After the stinging French defeat at the Siege of Louisbourg ( 1745 ) during King George ' s War , King Louis XV sent the expedition to win back Acadia by conquering the capital Annapolis Royal , Nova Scotia . Preparation . The expedition included 11 , 000 men and a fleet of 64 ships . The expedition was led by French Admiral Jean - Baptiste Louis Frédéric de La Rochefoucauld de Roye , Duc d ' Anville . The fitting - out of this fleet was slow and difficult , and it did not set sail from Île - d ' Aix , France until 22 June 1746 . A subsequent storm in the Bay of Biscay and adverse winds slowed the transatlantic crossing . Disease broke out on the ships – typhus and scurvy . The fleet ran into a long , dead calm off the Azores . This ended in a storm , during which several vessels were struck by lightning , which , in one case , caused a magazine explosion that killed and wounded over thirty men . By 24 August , the expedition had been at sea for over two months but was still three hundred leagues ( nine hundred miles ) from Nova Scotia . On 10 September , lead elements of the expedition had arrived at Sable Island . Three days later the vessels were scattered by a violent gale that seriously damaged some ships , which were consequently forced to return to France . One of the damaged vessels was " Le Mars " ( pictured above ) . She was heavily damaged and taking on water in the storm off Sable Island and decided to return to France with the " Le Raphael " . Several weeks later another gale hit , damaging the ship Le Mars further and separating her from " Le Raphael " . Twenty leagues off Ireland the HMS Nottingham severely damaged Le Raphael in an attack and took her as a prize . ( During the French and Indian War , the ship Le Mars sank in Halifax Harbour after hitting a rock - known to this day as " Mars Rock " . ) An expedition under the command of Jean - Baptiste Nicolas Roch de Ramezay was sent from Quebec to work with d ' Anville ' s expedition . French priest Jean - Louis Le Loutre was to coordinate the two expeditions . De Ramezay ' s force arrived in Nova Scotia in July 1746 . He had 700 soldiers and 21 officers . He made camp at Beaubassin , where he was met by 300 Abenaki from St . John River and about 300 Mi ' kmaq from Nova Scotia . The total French - Indian force numbered close to 1 , 300 men . De Ramezay ' s soldiers spent the summer and early fall at Chignecto and Minas waiting for the arrival of the long overdue D ' Anville expedition . ( During this time period , Ramzay sent troops to British - occupied Port - La - Joye on present - day Prince Edward Island . In a fierce battle , Ramzay ' s men killed 34 British troops and imprisoned the rest . ) Acadia . The d ' Anville expedition finally reached Nova Scotia in late September , after enduring a three - month voyage . Hundreds of sailors and soldiers had died and hundreds more were gravely ill , suffering from disease . Forty - four vessels anchored in Chebucto ( present day Halifax , Nova Scotia ) , where the expedition would spend the next five weeks . The sick were brought ashore near Birch Cove in the harbour ' s Bedford Basin . Some recovered from scurvy with the arrival of fresh supplies brought by the Acadians from Grand Pre and Pisiquid , but typhus and typhoid continued to ravage the men . Within six days of his arrival , on 27 September , d ' Anville died after suffering a stroke . ( He was buried on Georges Island in what is now Halifax Harbour . His remains stayed there for three years before being taken to Louisbourg in September 1749 during the establishment of Halifax . ) On 29 September a council of war led by d ' Anville ' s replacement , Constantin - Louis d ' Estourmel , decided to send 1 , 500 men from the expedition and 300 from the Ramezay expedition to attack Annapolis Royal . D ' Estourmel became overwhelmed and discouraged and quickly resigned after a suicide attempt . The next to assume control of the expedition was the Governor General designate of New France and passenger with the fleet Jacques - Pierre de Taffanel de la Jonquière , Marquis de la Jonquière . The plan to attack the capital Annapolis Royal intensified , even while men continued to die of disease . By mid - October , 41 percent of the men who reached Chebucto with the fleet were dead or seriously ill – 2 , 861 petty officers , seamen and soldiers . The contagion spread to the Mi ' kmaq and de Ramezay ' s men . , By mid - October 300 of de Ramezay ' s troops arrived at Annapolis Royal . The French and Indian fighters spent 21 days camped in the Annapolis area waiting for the French ships to arrive with troops and siege artillery . They cut off British land communications with Minas and attempted to stop all contact between the fort and the Acadians . On 24 October , 42 vessels left Chebucto , with almost 50 Acadian pilots from Minas . Three hospital ships set sail for France with the most critically ill . Thirteen of the ships carried 94 officers and 1 , 410 soldiers to conduct the siege . Two days later , as the fleet was off Cape Negro , Nova Scotia La Jonquiere changed his mind . He ordered his ships back to France and dispatched orders to Annapolis Royal for de Ramzay to withdraw . Aftermath . In response to the threat posed by the French expeditions , Massachusetts Bay Governor William Shirley sent Colonel Arthur Noble and hundreds of New England soldiers to secure control over Acadia and drive de Ramezay out . One of the most startling successes of de Ramezay ' s campaign , was Nicolas Antoine II Coulon de Villiers ' defeat of Colonel Noble at the Battle of Grand Pré ( 1747 ) . De Villiers attacked and defeated a superior force of Noble ' s militia who were billeted in houses in the Acadian settlement of Grand - Pré , in the Minas Basin at the top of the Bay of Fundy . The tragedy of the French expedition had serious implications for Acadian participation in the rest of the war . Any confidence that Acadians may have had that France would be victorious was shaken . After the failure of the expedition , Nova Scotia Governor Paul Mascarene told Acadians to avoid all " deluding Hopes of Returning under the Dominion of France . " One French officer noted that when de Ramezay was withdrawing from Annapolis Royal , the Acadians were alarmed and disappointed , feeling they were being abandoned to British retribution . The last major engagement in the area of Annapolis Royal was during the French and Indian War in the Battle of Bloody Creek ( 1757 ) . The site of Duc d ’ Anville ' s encampment in September 1746 was designated a National Historic Site of Canada in 1925 .