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Lt. Governor Belcher to Lord Egremont.
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HALIFAX, 9th January, 1762.
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My LORD, —
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I have the honour to inform your Lordship that a very considerable body of Acadians, having withdrawn their allegiance from His Majesty, and retired to the Northern Part of this Province in the Gulph of the River St. Lawrence; and there having taken up Arms, and by the means of small vessels infested the navigation of that River, and committed many depredations on His Majesty's Subjects, — I thought it my duty to bestow all the attention I could to check and prevent the further progress of such great mischiefs; and therefore having received an account from Captain Roderick McKenzie of Montgomery's Highlanders, who commanded at Fort Cumberland, that an attempt of this kind was practicable, I gave directions for equipping two small Vessels, on board of which Captain McKenzie, with some of the Troops, proceeded about the end of October, to the place of their rendezvous, where be surprised seven hundred & Eighty seven persons including Men, Women & Children. Of this number, he brought away three hundred and thirty five, as many as he could in that late Season of the year remove, and the remainder have made their submission, and promised to come in when it shall be thought proper or convenient to request it. * * * *
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I beg leave to represent to your Lordship, that besides these persons, there are many others of the Acadians in this Province, who altho' they have surrendered themselves, are yet ever ready and watchful for an opportunity, either by assistance from the French, or from hopes of stirring up the Indians to disturb and distress the new settlements lately made, and those now forming; and I am perfectly well convinced, from the whole course of their behaviour and disposition, that they cannot with any safety to this Province become again the inhabitants of it. * * * *
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I am &c.
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The Right Honble.
JONATHAN BELCHER.
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The Earl of Egremont.
pension of £50 per annum was granted him by the Government at Halifax for his services in quieting the Indians and Acadians at the River St. John. In 1762 he wrote to Halifax, acknowledging the receipt of his pension, and declaring his inability to control the Indians. He finally retired to Quebec with 80 Indian families, and died at St. Francis, Canada East, in August, 1779. Rept. on Indian affairs, N.Y. Col. Doc. vol. x. Shey's Missions, 153, quoted by Ed. of N.Y. Doc. Murdoch's Hist. N.S., vol. 2, 422. N.S. Council. Minutes, 21 Sept., 1761.
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