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NOVA SCOTIA DOCUMENTS. |
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PRESENT —
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| His Excellency the Governor |
| John Horseman | John Salusbury |
| Charles Lawrence | Hugh Davidson |
| Benj. Green | Wm. Steele |
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M. Girard Priest & the four Deputies of Cobequid, viz. Jean Hebert, Jean Bourg, Joseph Robichaux & Pierre Gaudrot, were brought before the Council & examined with regard to Pierre Aucoinh being stop'd when he was sent by the Governor with Letters, & Loutres being there in Winter, & the Deputies not coming to Halifax to make their Submission as usual —
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Their Examinations were ordered to be kept on File —
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Jean Bourg having answerd plainly & honestly & to the Satisfaction of the Council, & having come volutarily instead of a Deputy that was Sick. He was immediately set at liberty.
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The three Deputies were to be recommitted to Custody during His Excellency's Pleasure.
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The Council were of Opinion that Girard should remain here till the Courier be sent back by Loutre.
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ED : CORNWALLIS.
try for Canada; and threatened them with an Indian massacre unless they obeyed his injunctions.
He is said to have caused the death of Edward How, one of Cornwalls’s Council, by the most horrible treaehery. Having deceived that gentleman by protestations of friendship. he clothed in a French officer's uniform John Cope, the Indian Chief before mentioned, and laying an ambuscade of Indians near the English fort at the Isthmus, he sent Cope to it, carrying a white handkerchief, which was the usual token for a conference. Captain How, supposing him to be a French officer, came out, when the Indians from the bush immediately fired a volley and shot him through the back. His object in perpetrating this bloody deed, is supposed to have been jealousy of How's influence with the French and Indians. — See Capt. Cotterell's letters to Capt. Murray; Letter from, Louisburg in subsequent pages; French Doc. relating to Acadia, N. S. Archives. He at length became so obnoxious to the British authorities, that a reward of £100 was offered by Governor Cornwallis for his head. — Letters to Board of Trade.
An article in the Collections of the Historical Society of Quebec says: "Pride and vanity were his predominant failings. Afer ruining the Acadian French by his unwise counsels, he abandoned them in the moment of their distress. For fear of falling into the hands of the British, he left Fort Beausejour in disguise, before it surrendered to Monckton — crossed to the River St. John, and went thence to Quebec, where, instead of a welcome, he received bitter reproaches from his Bishop." He embarked for France the following August; but on the passage the ship was captured by the British, and the Abbe de la Loutre was taken prisoner and sent to Elizabeth Castle, in Jersey, where he remained eight years in confinement. He returned to France at the conclusion of the peace in 1763, and probably died in obscurity, as nothing further is known of him. — Proceedings of the Hist. Society of Quebec; Knox's Journal, vol. 1, p.144, quoted by Dr. O’Callaghan in his notes to the N.Y. Col. Doc.
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