For New France—Louis XV’s colonial dominion in North America—1759 had been a disaster, a year marred by crushing losses to British-led forces amid the French and Indian War, a sideshow of the broader Seven Years’ War. To the west, Fort Niagara was taken after a 20-day siege, cutting communications to Illinois Country, Louisiana and the western Great Lakes. In the central Champlain Valley, threatened by an advancing Anglo-American force under General Jeffery Amherst—commander-inchief of the British army in North America—the French had blown up Forts Carillon and Saint-Frédéric and retreated north to Île aux Noix, in the midst and near the headwaters of the Richelieu River. Without doubt, however, the crowning blow came with the British conquest of Quebec, which effectively blocked the St. Lawrence River, severing Canada’s communications with France. By early 1760 the French dominion had shrunk to a tenuous strip along the banks of the St. Lawrence from Trois-Rivières in the east to Lake Ontario in the west. Almost everything from men to materials was wanting, food was short, and the populace was exhausted.
“The winding up of the last campaign,” reflected New France Governor General Pierre de Rigaud, Marquis de Vaudreuil, “reduced the colony to the most critical circumstances and most melancholy condition.”
In April 1760, hoping to reestablish the lifeline to France, Vaudreuil tasked General François Gaston de Lévis—the latter of whom had assumed command of the army after Lt. Gen. Louis-Joseph de Montcalm’s death the previous fall at the Battle of the Plains of Abraham—with recovering Quebec. Lévis managed to defeat Brig. Gen. James Murray’s army at Sainte-Foy on April 28, but he was unable to keep the British from retreating within the city walls. The French commander laid siege to Quebec, but with only a handful of heavy guns and little in the way of powder, he was forced to withdraw when British warships sailed upriver a few weeks later.
With Quebec once again secure, British focus shifted back to Montreal,for all three prongs to arrive simultaneously at Montreal, Amherst’s army, which had more moving parts and much farther to travel, was given a six-week head start. The other two armies would wait until mid-August before setting out.
