Conceived in Liberty Volume 2 - Ludwig von Mises Institute

ships carrying some eighteen thousand seamen. A hard-line militarist and
imperialist, Wolfe had nothing but the utmost contempt for Americans,
French or Indians, and he wantonly destroyed and devastated the French
settlements as he went. After three months of aimless and futile siege,
Wolfe finally assented to the plan of his brigadiers. With a force of thirtyfive
hundred men, he executed a surprise maneuver to ascend to the Plains
of Abraham near Quebec, where he routed the slightly smaller force of
Montcalm's. Quebec's surrender was a matter of a few days. By the middle
of September, the seat of French power in the New World had fallen.
Despite the loss of Quebec and of the great Montcalm, who had also
fallen at the Plains of Abraham, the amazing French fought on. The new
French commander, the Chevalier de Lévis-Leran, even administered a drubbing
to the British forces the following spring. The British, too, had a new
commander, General James Murray, for Wolfe had also been killed at the
Plains of Abraham. The French, indeed, might well have recaptured Quebec,
but once again numbers prevailed and a British relief party turned the tide.
Finally, three forces converged on Montreal: Murray from Quebec, Amherst
up the St. Lawrence from Lake Ontario, and Colonel William Haviland up
the Richelieu River from Lake Champlain. Montreal finally fell on September
8, 1760. The British had succeeded in conquering all of Canada. The
war with the French, so far as America was concerned, was over.
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