FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   108   109   110   111   >>  
k of its own. But no study of Canada's maritime interests, however short, can close without a passing reference to her naval history. When the Kirkes, with their tiny flotilla, took Quebec from Champlain's tiny garrison in 1629 the great guiding principles of sea-power were as much at work as when Phips led his American colonists to defeat against Frontenac in 1690, or as when Saunders and Wolfe led the admirably united forces of their enormous fleet and little army to victory in 1759. In the same way the decisive influence of sea-power was triumphantly exerted by Iberville, the French naval hero of Canada, when, with his single ship, the _Pelican_, he defeated his three British opponents in a gallant fight; and so, for the time being, won the {180} absolute command of Hudson Bay in 1697. Again, it was naval rather than political and military forces that made American independence an accomplished fact. The opposition to the war in England counted for a good deal; and the French and American armies for still more. But the really decisive anti-British force consisted of practically all the foreign navies in the world, some--like the French, Spanish, Dutch, and the Americans' own--taking an active part in the war, while the others were kept ready in reserve by the hostile armed neutrality of Russia, Sweden, Denmark, Prussia, and the smaller sea-coast states of Germany. Once again, in the War of 1812, it was the two annihilating American naval victories on Lakes Erie and Champlain that turned the scale far enough back to offset the preponderant British military victories along the Canadian frontier and prevent the advance of that frontier beyond Detroit and into the state of Maine. There were very few people in 1910 who remembered that the Canadian navy then begun was the third local force of its kind in Canada, though the first to be wholly paid and managed locally. From the launch of La Salle's _Griffon_ in 1679 down to the Cession in 1763 there was {181} always some sort of French naval force built, manned, and managed in New France, though ultimately paid and directed from royal headquarters in Paris through the minister of Marine and Colonies. It is significant that 'marine' and 'colonies' were made a single government department throughout the French regime. The change of rule did not entail the abolition of local forces; and from 1755, when a British flotilla of six little vessels was launched on Lake Onta
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   108   109   110   111   >>  



Top keywords:

French

 

American

 

British

 
Canada
 
forces
 

decisive

 
frontier
 

Canadian

 

military

 

victories


single
 

managed

 

flotilla

 

Champlain

 

remembered

 
people
 

Detroit

 

Germany

 

states

 
smaller

Russia

 
neutrality
 

Sweden

 

Denmark

 

Prussia

 

offset

 

preponderant

 
prevent
 

annihilating

 

turned


advance

 

marine

 

significant

 

colonies

 

government

 

department

 

minister

 

Marine

 

Colonies

 

regime


vessels

 

launched

 

abolition

 

change

 

entail

 

headquarters

 
launch
 

Griffon

 

locally

 

wholly