Fort Edward (Nova Scotia)

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Military history of Nova Scotia
Citadel Hill in Halifax
Notable events Battle of Port Royal 1690 Siege of Port Royal 1710 Battle of Winnepang 1722 Northeast Coast Campaign 1745 Battle of Grand Pré 1747 Dartmouth Massacre 1751 Bay of Fundy Campaign 1755 Siege of Louisbourg 1758 Royal Naval Dockyard, Halifax 1758 Halifax Treaties 1760–1761 Battle of Fort Cumberland 1776 Raid on Lunenburg 1782 Establishment of New Ireland 1812 Capture of USS Chesapeake 1813 ‪Battle of the Great Redan 1855 ‪Siege of Lucknow 1857 CSS Tallahassee escape 1861 ‪Halifax Provisional Battalion 1885 ‪Battle of Witpoort 1899 ‪Battle of Paardeberg 1899 Imprisonment of Leon Trotsky 1917 Jewish Legion formed 1917 Sinking of Llandovery Castle 1918 Battle of the St. Lawrence 1942–1944 Sinking of Point Pleasant Park 1945 Halifax VE-Day riot 1945
Notable regiments Mi'kmaq militias 1677–1779 Acadian militias 1689–1761 40th Regiment of Foot 1717–1757 Louisbourg Garrison 1717–1758 Gorham's Rangers 1744–1762 Danks' Rangers 1756–1762 84th Regiment of Foot 1775–1784 Royal Fencible American 1775–1783 Royal Nova Scotia Volunteers 1775–1783 King's Orange Rangers 1776–1783 1st Field Artillery from 1791 Royal Nova Scotia 1793–1802 Nova Scotia Fencibles 1803–1816 Halifax Rifles from 1860 Princess Louise Fusiliers from 1867 78th Highland 1869–1871 Cape Breton Highlanders from 1871 Nova Scotia Rifles 1914–1919 No. 2 Construction Battalion 1916–1919 West Nova Scotia from 1916 Nova Scotia Highlanders from 1954
Related topics Captivity narratives Impressment
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Fort Edward by Capt. John Hamilton (1753)

Despite the British Conquest of Acadia in 1710, Nova Scotia remained primarily occupied by ethnic French Catholic Acadians and Mi'kmaq. Father Le Loutre's War began when Edward Cornwallis arrived with 13 transports on June 21, 1749 to establish Halifax.[4] The British were largely confined to Halifax; having attempted to establish a settlement to the east near present-day Lawrencetown Beach, they quickly abandoned the effort due to the threat of Mi'kmaq attacks. Four years after the founding of Halifax, Lunenburg was established. To guard against Mi'kmaq, Acadian, and French attacks on the new British Protestant settlements, the latter erected fortifications in Halifax (1749), Bedford (Fort Sackville) (1749), Dartmouth (1750), Lunenburg (1753), and Lawrencetown (1754).[5]

Map of Fort Edward 1757 (the remaining blockhouse is located within the walls of the fort and is marked with an "A")

Within 18 months of establishing Halifax, the British took firm control of peninsular Nova Scotia by building fortifications in all the major Acadian communities: present-day Windsor (Fort Edward); Grand Pre (Fort Vieux Logis) and Chignecto (Fort Lawrence). (A British fort - Fort Anne - already existed at the other major Acadian centre of Annapolis Royal, Nova Scotia. Cobequid was not fortified.)[6]

Fort Edward was the site of the Acadian church for the parish of l'Assomption (established 1722).[7] After initially failing to take the settlements of Chignecto, Major Charles Lawrence ordered his New England Rangers to control Pisiquid by having the Acadians destroy their church so that Fort Edward could be built in its place (1750).[8][7] In early March 1750, the Acadians and Mi'kmaq took three English prisoners.[9] Gorham was ordered to Fort Edward. On Gorham's march to Pisiquid to secure the area prior to building Fort Edward, the Rangers engaged the Mi'kmaq in the Battle at St. Croix (1750).

The Fort is named after Edward Cornwallis, who established Halifax, Nova Scotia.

On 9 May 1750, Phillips was fired on by French and Indians.[10] Capt. John Rous was in a skirmish off Fort Edward at the same time, where he killed two native people, whose comrades took their bodies.[11]

At first Alexander Murray commanded at Fort Sackville. In September 1751 he was given command of Fort Edward, where he remained for most of the ensuing seven years, except for a tour of duty at Halifax in 1753. On 12 December 1752, Murray was charged by the Nova Scotia Council with exploiting the local Acadian community by paying unfair prices for supplies and randomly imprisoning some of the men.[12]

On November 1, 1753, Captain Hale was relieved by Commander Floyer as the commander of Fort Edward.[13]

Fort Edward, Fort Lawrence, and Fort Anne were all supplied by and dependent on the arrival of Captains Cobb, Jeremiah Rogers or John Taggart, in one of the government sloops. These vessels took the annual or semi-annual relief to their destination. They carried the officers and their families to and from, as required.[14]

47th Regiment of Foot by David Morier, 1751

Captain Alexander Murray

Signature of Alexander Murray, Fort Edward, Nova Scotia

Fort Edward played an important role in the Bay of Fundy Campaign (1755) of the Acadian Expulsion. Shortly after the Battle of Fort Beauséjour on the eve of the Expulsion, the commander at Fort Edward Captain Alexander Murray wrote his wife saying, the Acadians "are in as great anxiety as I am about their fate".[15] A month later, at exactly the same time as Lieutenant Colonel John Winslow read the expulsion orders in Grand Pré; September 5 at 15:00 hrs, Captain Murray read the order to the 183 Acadian males he had imprisoned at Fort Edward.[16] On October 20, 920 Acadians from Pisiquid were loaded on to four transports.[17] Unlike at the neighbouring community of Grand Pré, the English did not burn and destroy the buildings at Pisiquid. As a result, when the New England Planters arrived, many houses and barns were available for use.[18][lower-alpha 1] Fort Edward was one of four forts in which Acadians were imprisoned over the nine years of the expulsion (the others were Fort Frederick, Saint John, New Brunswick; Fort Cumberland; and Fort Charlotte, Georges Island, Halifax). On average, over a period of nine years, 350 Acadian prisoners at a time were held at the garrison.[19][20]

During the American Revolution the 84th Regiment of Foot (Royal Highland Emigrants), 2nd Battalion were stationed at Forts throughout Atlantic Canada. Fort Edward was the headquarters for the 84th Regiment in Atlantic Canada. The 84th Regiment moved from Halifax to Fort Edward to guard against a land assault on Halifax. Throughout the war, Fort Edward housed prisoners taken from American Privateering ships.

The Jacobite heroine Flora MacDonald spent the winter of 1778 - 1779 at the Fort with her husband, Alan Macdonald, before she returned alone to Scotland.

Fort Edward was also active during the War of 1812. During this time, the Fort continued to protect Nova Scotia against assault by American Privateers.

Fort Edward remained part of the British defenses in Nova Scotia until 1858.

David Ben-Gurion, future prime minister of Israel, in his Jewish Legion uniform, 1918

Jewish Legion, Fort Edward, Nova Scotia (Yom Kippur, 1918) - Inset (Whole Image here)

During World War I, it was utilized as a training depot for Canadian and British soldiers. The site became known informally as "Camp Fort Edward" for the duration of the war. Among the recruits passing through the camp was the ill-fated Hollywood film director William Desmond Taylor.

During World War I the British Army used the fort to establish a training depot for Jewish men training to fight against the Ottoman Turks in Palestine and ultimately help Great Britain, France and America defeat Germany. Known as The Jewish Legion, this unit, was "stood up" for service in 1917 manned by Jews from around the world who came to Windsor for training on the slopes of the fort with Major W.F.D Bremner. The Legion was made up of Battalions 38-42. At Fort Edward was the 39th Battalion, 1100 Jewish troops led by Lt Colonel Eliezer Margolin. Bremner lived in Castle Fredericks and is an ancestor of Falmouth's James J. Bremner (See Halifax Provisional Battalion). Pictures and first-hand accounts of the time indicate that the men lived in tents on the hillside below the blockhouse.[38]

Many of these recruits came with Zionist ideals and dreams of a restored Palestinian homeland for the Jews. In Windsor, Nova Scotia 1100 non-commissioned officers were trained. Founders of the legion included David Ben-Gurion, who became the first prime minister of Israel, and Ze'ev Jabotinsky, both men were trained at Fort Edward. At age 70, David Ben-Gurion reported on his time at Fort Edward: "I will never forget Windsor where I received my first training as a soldier and where I became a corporal."[39]

Fort Edward c. 1900

The fort was designated a National Historic Site in 1920.[40] The blockhouse was additionally designated a Classified Federal Heritage Building in 1994.[41]

The Windsor Agricultural Fair is the oldest continuous agricultural fair in North America, beginning with the first generation of New England Planters at Fort Edward (1765).[42]

• List of oldest buildings in Canada
• Military history of Nova Scotia
• Military history of the Mi'kmaq people
• Military history of the Acadians

Endnotes

Citations

Texts

• Issac Deschamps - diaries
• Orderly book kept by Nathaniel Bangs at Fort Edward, 10 May-18 Nov. 1759; and at Halifax, 7 Feb.-May 1760. Bangs was a sergeant in a company led by Captain Jotham Gay of Hingham, Mass. of John Thomas's Regiment of Mass. Provincials.
• Faragher, John Mack (2005). A Great and Noble Scheme: The Tragic Story of the Expulsion of the French Acadians from Their American Homeland. W.W Norton & Company. ISBN 978-0-393-05135-3.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
• Grenier, John (2008). The Far Reaches of Empire: War in Nova Scotia, 1710-1760. University of Oklahoma Press. ISBN 978-0-8061-3876-3.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
• Griffiths, N.E.S. (2005). From Migrant to Acadian: A North American Border People, 1604-1755. McGill-Queen's University Press. ISBN 978-0-7735-2699-0.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
• Murdoch, Beamish (1866). A History of Nova-Scotia, Or Acadie. Vol. II. Halifax: J. Barnes.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
• Silas Rand. Attack on Fort Pemaquid by the Indians. Micmac Indian Legends. 298-299
• Wicken, William C. (2002). Mi'kmaq Treaties on Trial: History, Land and Donald Marshall Junior. University of Toronto Press. ISBN 978-0-8020-7665-6.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
• Young, Richard. "Blockhouses in Canada, 1749-1841: a Comparative Report and Catalogue." Occasional Papers in Archaeology and History, Canadian Historic Site, 1980.

• "Fort Edward National Historic Site". Parks Canada. 29 June 2018.
• Photos and history
• West Hants Historical Society