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General Eyre Massey felt that a more rigorous policy should be adopted against the privateers, and in a letter to Lord Germaine expresses regret that Arbuthnot (the lieut-governor of N. S.) did not still command the navy. "If he did," he says, "these trifling pirates could not appear on the coast without meeting their deserved fate." In the following summer Captain Fielding, of the navy, succeeded in the course of three weeks in destroying six privateers out of nine that infested the shores of the Bay of Fundy, an event that afforded unbounded satisfaction to General Massey. The General evidently had every confidence in Major Studholme. In his letters to Lord Germaine, the Secretary of State, he says, although Allan has 500 men at Machias, he is under no apprehension as to Studholme's keeping his post; he hears from that officer every fortnight and is confident that Fort Howe is perfectly secure. However, on learning in the spring of 1778 that a large force was assembling at Machias, General Massey sent a reinforcement to Studholme, which arrived safely.

Lieut. Governor Arbuthnot writing to Lord Germaine speaks of the establishment of the fortified post at the mouth of the River St. John as an absolute necessity, it being "a place coveted by the rebels who wished to settle the river with people of rebellious principles after removing the present inhabitants who are chiefly loyal subjects." In his reply the Secretary of State fully approves of the establishment of Fort Howe as "a judicious me asure." With the exception of an occasional alarm created by the restlessness of the Indians the settlers at St. John continued unmolested during the remainder of the war.