Raid on Haverhill
Encyclopedia
The Raid on Haverhill was a military engagement that took place on August 29, 1708 during Queen Anne's War
Queen Anne's War
Queen Anne's War , as the North American theater of the War of the Spanish Succession was known in the British colonies, was the second in a series of French and Indian Wars fought between France and England, later Great Britain, in North America for control of the continent. The War of the...

. French
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

, Algonquin, and Abenaki warriors under the command of Jean-Baptiste Hertel de Rouville
Jean-Baptiste Hertel de Rouville
Jean-Baptiste Hertel de Rouville was a colonial military officer of New France. He is best known in North America for leading the raid on Deerfield, Province of Massachusetts Bay against English settlers on 29 February 1704...

 descended on Haverhill
Haverhill, Massachusetts
Haverhill is a city in Essex County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 60,879 at the 2010 census.Located on the Merrimack River, it began as a farming community that would evolve into an important industrial center, beginning with sawmills and gristmills run by water power. In the...

, then a small frontier community in the Province of Massachusetts Bay
Province of Massachusetts Bay
The Province of Massachusetts Bay was a crown colony in North America. It was chartered on October 7, 1691 by William and Mary, the joint monarchs of the kingdoms of England and Scotland...

. In the surprise attack, 16 people were killed and another 14 to 24 were taken captive. A rapid militia muster gave chase, and in a skirmish later in the day, nine of the French and Indian party were killed and some of their prisoners escaped.

Haverhill was not the original target of the raiders. Expecting a larger Indian contingent, French authorities planned to engage in a series of raids on the communities of the Piscataqua River
Piscataqua River
The Piscataqua River, in the northeastern United States, is a long tidal estuary formed by the confluence of the Salmon Falls and Cocheco rivers...

. However, the unwillingness of some Indian tribes to participate in the expedition forced the French to reduce the scope of the operation and choose an easier target. The raid was more costly to the French than previous frontier raids like that in 1704 on Deerfield, Massachusetts
Deerfield, Massachusetts
Deerfield is a town in Franklin County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 4,750 as of the 2000 census. Deerfield is part of the Springfield, Massachusetts Metropolitan Statistical Area in Western Massachusetts, lying only north of the city of Springfield.Deerfield includes the...

 because the province had been warned of the raiders' advance.

Background

When Queen Anne's War
Queen Anne's War
Queen Anne's War , as the North American theater of the War of the Spanish Succession was known in the British colonies, was the second in a series of French and Indian Wars fought between France and England, later Great Britain, in North America for control of the continent. The War of the...

 (as the War of the Spanish Succession
War of the Spanish Succession
The War of the Spanish Succession was fought among several European powers, including a divided Spain, over the possible unification of the Kingdoms of Spain and France under one Bourbon monarch. As France and Spain were among the most powerful states of Europe, such a unification would have...

 was called in the colonies of British America
British America
For American people of British descent, see British American.British America is the anachronistic term used to refer to the territories under the control of the Crown or Parliament in present day North America , Central America, the Caribbean, and Guyana...

) broke out in 1702, it sparked war on the already tense frontier between the English colonies of New England
New England
New England is a region in the northeastern corner of the United States consisting of the six states of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut...

 and the colonies of New France
New France
New France was the area colonized by France in North America during a period beginning with the exploration of the Saint Lawrence River by Jacques Cartier in 1534 and ending with the cession of New France to Spain and Great Britain in 1763...

, including Acadia
Acadia
Acadia was the name given to lands in a portion of the French colonial empire of New France, in northeastern North America that included parts of eastern Quebec, the Maritime provinces, and modern-day Maine. At the end of the 16th century, France claimed territory stretching as far south as...

 and Canada
Canada, New France
Canada was the name of the French colony that once stretched along the St. Lawrence River; the other colonies of New France were Acadia, Louisiana and Newfoundland. Canada, the most developed colony of New France, was divided into three districts, each with its own government: Quebec,...

. French military officers from the troupes de la marine
Troupes de la marine
See also Troupes de Marine for later history of same Corps.The Troupes de la Marine , also known as independent companies of the navy and colonial regulars, were under the authority of the French Minister of Marine, who was also responsible for the French navy, overseas trade, and French...

, the defense force of New France, often led parties of Indians from their settlements along the Saint Lawrence River
Saint Lawrence River
The Saint Lawrence is a large river flowing approximately from southwest to northeast in the middle latitudes of North America, connecting the Great Lakes with the Atlantic Ocean. It is the primary drainage conveyor of the Great Lakes Basin...

 south to the northern frontiers of New England
New England
New England is a region in the northeastern corner of the United States consisting of the six states of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut...

, which then included small communities in what is now northern Massachusetts
Massachusetts
The Commonwealth of Massachusetts is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. It is bordered by Rhode Island and Connecticut to the south, New York to the west, and Vermont and New Hampshire to the north; at its east lies the Atlantic Ocean. As of the 2010...

 and southern New Hampshire
New Hampshire
New Hampshire is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. The state was named after the southern English county of Hampshire. It is bordered by Massachusetts to the south, Vermont to the west, Maine and the Atlantic Ocean to the east, and the Canadian...

 and Maine
Maine
Maine is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States, bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the east and south, New Hampshire to the west, and the Canadian provinces of Quebec to the northwest and New Brunswick to the northeast. Maine is both the northernmost and easternmost...

.

The largest and most successful raid of the war occurred in February 1704, when Jean-Baptiste Hertel de Rouville
Jean-Baptiste Hertel de Rouville
Jean-Baptiste Hertel de Rouville was a colonial military officer of New France. He is best known in North America for leading the raid on Deerfield, Province of Massachusetts Bay against English settlers on 29 February 1704...

 led about 250 men, principally Indians on a raid against the frontier town of Deerfield
Deerfield, Massachusetts
Deerfield is a town in Franklin County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 4,750 as of the 2000 census. Deerfield is part of the Springfield, Massachusetts Metropolitan Statistical Area in Western Massachusetts, lying only north of the city of Springfield.Deerfield includes the...

 in the Province of Massachusetts Bay
Province of Massachusetts Bay
The Province of Massachusetts Bay was a crown colony in North America. It was chartered on October 7, 1691 by William and Mary, the joint monarchs of the kingdoms of England and Scotland...

. Hertel de Rouville's band killed or took prisoner many of the townsfolk, returning to Canada on a difficult trek in which a number of the prisoners died; many of the surviving captives were adopted into Indian communities afterward. Massachusetts fortified its frontier with militia in response to this raid, and launched a raid against Acadia
Raid on Grand Pre
The Raid on Grand Pré was the major action of a raiding expedition conducted by New England militia Colonel Benjamin Church against French Acadia in June 1704, during Queen Anne's War...

 in retaliation.

The Massachusetts village of Haverhill
Haverhill, Massachusetts
Haverhill is a city in Essex County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 60,879 at the 2010 census.Located on the Merrimack River, it began as a farming community that would evolve into an important industrial center, beginning with sawmills and gristmills run by water power. In the...

 was also subjected to smaller-scale raids in 1704, but it was not originally the target of the ambitious expedition planned by New France's Governor-General Philippe de Rigaud Vaudreuil
Philippe de Rigaud Vaudreuil
Philippe de Rigaud, Marquis de Vaudreuil was a French politician, who was Governor-general of New France from 1703 to 1725....

 in 1708. In the aftermath of the failed English siege
Siege of Port Royal (1707)
The Siege of Port Royal in 1707 was two separate attempts by English colonists from New England to conquer Acadia by capturing its capital Port Royal during Queen Anne's War. Both attempts were made by colonial militia, and were led by men inexperienced in siege warfare...

 of Port Royal
Port Royal, Nova Scotia
Port Royal was the capital of Acadia from 1605 to 1710 and is now a town called Annapolis Royal in the western part of the Canadian province of Nova Scotia. Initially Port Royal was located on the north shore of the Annapolis Basin, Nova Scotia, at the site of the present reconstruction of the...

, Acadia
Acadia
Acadia was the name given to lands in a portion of the French colonial empire of New France, in northeastern North America that included parts of eastern Quebec, the Maritime provinces, and modern-day Maine. At the end of the 16th century, France claimed territory stretching as far south as...

 in 1707, Vaudreuil was criticized by French Marine Minister the Comte de Pontchartrain
Jérôme Phélypeaux
Jérôme Phélypeaux , comte de Pontchartrain, was a French politician, son of Louis Phélypeaux.He served as a councillor to the parlement of Paris from 1692, and served with his father as Secretary of State of the Maison du Roi and Navy Minster from 1699 onwards...

 for failing to apply sufficient pressure on the New England colonies. Vaudreuil was also concerned over the increasing tendency of Indians that were under French influence to engage in illicit trade with the Province of New York
Province of New York
The Province of New York was an English and later British crown territory that originally included all of the present U.S. states of New York, New Jersey, Delaware and Vermont, along with inland portions of Connecticut, Massachusetts, and Maine, as well as eastern Pennsylvania...

, cutting into New France's economic activity. Vaudreuil decided to address these issues by organizing a major raid into New England that was intended to be even larger in scope than the Deerfield raid.

Vaudreuil's plan was to amass a force of as many as 400 men for attacks on the towns of New Hampshire on the Piscataqua River
Piscataqua River
The Piscataqua River, in the northeastern United States, is a long tidal estuary formed by the confluence of the Salmon Falls and Cocheco rivers...

. In order to maintain some secrecy over the size and target of the expedition, forces from several points along the Saint Lawrence River
Saint Lawrence River
The Saint Lawrence is a large river flowing approximately from southwest to northeast in the middle latitudes of North America, connecting the Great Lakes with the Atlantic Ocean. It is the primary drainage conveyor of the Great Lakes Basin...

 would descend to Lake Winnipesaukee
Lake Winnipesaukee
Lake Winnipesaukee is the largest lake in the U.S. state of New Hampshire. It is approximately long and from wide , covering — when Paugus Bay is included—with a maximum depth of ....

, where they would rendezvous with Abenaki and Pennacook
Pennacook
The Pennacook, also known by the names Merrimack and Pawtucket, were a North American people that primarily inhabited the Merrimack River valley of present-day New Hampshire and Massachusetts, as well as portions of southern Maine...

 tribal parties. The main French party departed from Trois-Rivières
Trois-Rivières, Quebec
Trois-Rivières is a city in the Mauricie region of Quebec, Canada, located at the confluence of the Saint-Maurice and Saint Lawrence Rivers. It is situated in the Mauricie administrative region, on the north shore of the Saint Lawrence River across from the city of Bécancour...

, and consisted of about 100 men, drawn from Canadian militia and the troupes de la marine
Troupes de la marine
See also Troupes de Marine for later history of same Corps.The Troupes de la Marine , also known as independent companies of the navy and colonial regulars, were under the authority of the French Minister of Marine, who was also responsible for the French navy, overseas trade, and French...

, under the command of Hertel de Rouville. This party included a number of veterans from the Deerfield raid, and they were accompanied by bands of Abenaki and Nipissing
Nipissing
Nipissing may refer to the following places in Ontario, Canada:* Lake Nipissing* The Nipissing First Nation** Nipissing 10, reserve of Nipissing First Nation* Nipissing District, a census division...

. A band of 220 Iroquois
Iroquois
The Iroquois , also known as the Haudenosaunee or the "People of the Longhouse", are an association of several tribes of indigenous people of North America...

 from the Kanehsatake
Kanesatake, Quebec
Kanehsatake is a Mohawk settlement on the shore of the Lake of Two Mountains at the Ottawa River in southwestern Quebec, Canada, near Montreal. The Doncaster 17 Indian Reserve also belongs to the Mohawk of Kanesatake. The population of the community is 1700.The community was formally founded...

 and Kahnawake tribes was to depart Montreal
Montreal
Montreal is a city in Canada. It is the largest city in the province of Quebec, the second-largest city in Canada and the seventh largest in North America...

 under the command of René Boucher de La Perrière, and additional Huron and Abenakis were to come from near Quebec
Quebec City
Quebec , also Québec, Quebec City or Québec City is the capital of the Canadian province of Quebec and is located within the Capitale-Nationale region. It is the second most populous city in Quebec after Montreal, which is about to the southwest...

.

Reports that a major expedition was being planned made their way via Indian traders to Albany, New York
Albany, New York
Albany is the capital city of the U.S. state of New York, the seat of Albany County, and the central city of New York's Capital District. Roughly north of New York City, Albany sits on the west bank of the Hudson River, about south of its confluence with the Mohawk River...

, and from there to Boston
Boston
Boston is the capital of and largest city in Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England" for its economic and cultural impact on the entire New England region. The city proper had...

. Because the expedition's targets were not known, little could be done to prepare specific defenses. A party of about 40 provincial militia were sent to Haverhill in response to these reports.

Expedition difficulties

Elements of the expedition departed in mid-July from the Saint Lawrence River. As the Quebec party ascended the Saint-François River
Saint-François River
The Saint-François River is a river in the Canadian province of Quebec.The Saint-François takes its source from Lake Saint-François in Chaudière-Appalaches, southeast of Thetford Mines...

, a Huron died in an accident. This was viewed as a bad portent by many of the Indians, and the Hurons turned back. Among the Iroquois from Montreal, who traveled via Lake Champlain
Lake Champlain
Lake Champlain is a natural, freshwater lake in North America, located mainly within the borders of the United States but partially situated across the Canada—United States border in the Canadian province of Quebec.The New York portion of the Champlain Valley includes the eastern portions of...

, some men fell sick and the rest refused to continue, in what some contemporaries thought was a ruse by the Iroquois to avoid conflict. Vaudreuil believed this was the case, and reports reached the English at Albany that the Iroquois had deliberately chosen to abandon the expedition "not to join war against New England." Despite these setbacks, Vaudreuil ordered Hertel de Rouville to press on, even if he received no further reinforcements. When his company reached Lake Winnipesaukee, he found that no eastern Indians willing to participate in the expedition had been found. Hertel de Rouville was consequently left with a band of about 160 men, which limited his options for raiding targets to places that were less fortified.

Haverhill was chosen as the target for several reasons. The village layout was already well-known from the 1704 raids and from an earlier raid in the Nine Years' War. It was not particularly large (25 to 30 houses), its location lent itself poorly to defense, and only some of the houses were fortified. A fast-moving raiding party could be in and out of the village before the alarm could be raised. The party arrived outside Haverhill and prepared to begin the raid on Sunday, August 29. It was joined at some point on its travels by the exiled Abenaki war chief Escumbuit, who lived not far from Haverhill, and had received word of the expedition's advance.

At the time, responsibility for Haverhill's defense was divided. The local militia was under the command of Simon Wainwright, whose house had a view of the entire village. The town's defenses had been supplemented by three small (three to four man) garrisons of colonial troops under the overall command of Major Turner.

Raid

The raiders successfully sneaked past the outer garrisons of provincial militia, and were first spotted in the pre-dawn light by a villager. Firing his gun to raise the alarm, he ran for the village, with the French and Indians in noisy pursuit. The action quickly became general as the raiders descended on the houses in the village. One of the colonial garrisons was stationed in the home of the minister, Benjamin Rolfe, who had barred the door in an attempt to keep the raiders out. Raiders fired through the door, wounding Rolfe, and then broke the door down. They then slaughtered Rolfe, his wife, infant child, and the colonial militiamen, who, "paralyzed by fear", were begging for mercy. In another house, one baby was thrown through an open window by a raider but suffered no injury. A number of villagers escaped by hiding in cellars whose trapdoors were not discovered by the raiders. Captain Wainwright was preparing to organize a defense when gunfire from the raiders passed through the door to his house, killing him instantly.

The raiding and pillaging continued until the sounds of approaching militia companies reached the raiders, who quickly lit the town meetinghouse on fire and left with their accumulated prisoners and loot. The reinforcements came from neighboring communities (some from as far away as Salem
Salem, Massachusetts
Salem is a city in Essex County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 40,407 at the 2000 census. It and Lawrence are the county seats of Essex County...

) and mustered under Major Turner's command when they arrived. One party of Haverhill militiamen discovered the raiders' baggage camp several miles from the village, and took their packs. Captain Samuel Ayer's company, numbering about 20, pursued the retreating raiders. Eventually strengthened by further militia, he engaged the encumbered raiders. In a furious rear-guard action the raiders fought off the militia (killing Ayer in the action), but lost nine killed, including Hertel de Rouville's brother, and 18 wounded. Because of the skirmish, the raiders abandoned some of their loot, and some of their prisoners got away. The village recorded that 30 to 40 people were killed or captured, which included those who escaped in the later skirmish.

Aftermath

The raiders' return to Canada was difficult. Joseph Bartlett, one of their captives, described the privations suffered due the loss of the force's baggage. One day they caught a hawk, which was divided among 15 men; his share, the head, was "the largest meal I had these four days." Bartlett remained in captivity with the Indians for four years. Some of the Frenchmen, rather than attempt the journey without their supplies, surrendered themselves to Massachusetts authorities.

French accounts of the raid greatly exaggerated the numbers involved, claiming that several hundred had been killed, and that the post-raid skirmish had involved as many as 200 English colonists. The raid was more costly to the French that previous raids had been: because of better preparedness on the part of the Massachusetts militia, the French suffered a higher proportion of casualties than they had in the Deerfield raid.

The raid was the last large-scale attack the French launched against Massachusetts in the war. Minor attacks occurred along its frontier, and Wells
Wells, Maine
Wells is a town in York County, Maine, United States. Founded in 1643, it is the third-oldest town in Maine. The population was 9,400 at the 2000 census. Wells Beach is a popular summer destination.-History:...

, then part of Massachusetts but now in Maine
Maine
Maine is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States, bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the east and south, New Hampshire to the west, and the Canadian provinces of Quebec to the northwest and New Brunswick to the northeast. Maine is both the northernmost and easternmost...

, was attacked by a substantial force in 1712. Port Royal fell in 1710
Siege of Port Royal (1710)
The Siege of Port Royal , also known as the Conquest of Acadia, was conducted by British regular and provincial forces under the command of Francis Nicholson against a French Acadian garrison under the command of Daniel d'Auger de Subercase, at the Acadian capital, Port Royal...

 to an expedition that included British marines, and the British abandoned a 1711 naval expedition against Quebec
Quebec Expedition
The Quebec Expedition, or the Walker Expedition to Quebec, was a British attempt to attack Quebec in 1711 in Queen Anne's War, the North American theatre of the War of Spanish Succession...

after some of its troop transports ran aground at the mouth of the St. Lawrence with significant loss of life.
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