Page:Acadiensis Q5.djvu/387

This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
CONQUEST OF ACADIA.
281

dia," who was shot through the body, and M. Marson, the Seigneur of Jemseg, torn from his wife and babe, they were locked up for ransom, by the Boston Puritans, just as if they had got into the hands of real brigands.

In order to secure the ransom Chambly had been permitted to despatch his ensign, Baron St. Castin, with Indian guides, to Quebec, bearing a letter to Count Frontenac, informing him of what had befallen Acadia and his officers there. Frontenac, upon receipt of this news, at the end of September, sent an expedition with canoes to the St. John river, to ascertain the condition of Fort Jemseg and whether any attack had been made on Port Royal, also to bring to Quebec M. Marson's lately–wed wife and her infant daughter[1] as well as others remaining on the River St. John. Frontenac furnished, from his private resources, the amount of ransom required, which he sent in bills of exchange on Rochelle, by the same expedition, to be forwarded to Boston, with a letter to the Governor of Massachusetts, protesting against the unfriendly actions of the Boston people and authorities at a time when Great Britain and France were at peace. In a communication to Colbert, the minister of Louis XIV, under date of November 14, 1674, Frontenac reports the capture of these forts "by buccaneers who came from St. Domingo and who had gone to Boston," and that the French commandants were held for ransom in Boston.

There seems to have been considerable delay in procuring the release of the French seigneurs, and they appear to have been kept prisoners by the Massachu-


  1. This infant daughter was Louise Elizabeth de Joibert, goddaughter of Frontenac, who was born on the River St. John, August 18, 1673, and married at Quebec, November 8, 1690, the Marquis de Vaudreuil. See Acadiensis, IV, 261.