Fall of Montreal
Montreal surrendered on 8 September 1760 and French rule in Canada ended. Quebec had fallen the previous September on the Plains of Abraham, where Wolfe and Montcalm both died, but the colony had not. The French under Lévis wintered at Montreal, marched back down the St Lawrence in April 1760, and beat the British garrison at Sainte-Foy in a bloodier battle than the one on the Plains. They then besieged Quebec and waited to see whose fleet came up the river first when the ice cleared. British ships arrived in May, and that settled the campaign and arguably the continent — French naval power had been broken at Quiberon Bay and Lagos in 1759, and no relief was coming. Amherst then converged on Montreal from three directions with some 18,000 men against about 2,000, and Vaudreuil surrendered without a fight to spare the town. He asked for the honours of war and Amherst refused, citing French conduct alongside Indigenous allies; the French officers burned their colours rather than hand them over. The articles of capitulation guaranteed property, and the free exercise of the Catholic religion in practice, which is the thread running to the Quebec Act of 1774 and to the survival of French Canada as a distinct society. The Treaty of Paris in 1763 confirmed the cession. France kept two small islands off Newfoundland and chose Guadeloupe over Canada. The Treaty of Paris in 1763 confirmed the cession. France kept two small islands off Newfoundland and chose Guadeloupe over Canada, on the reasonable commercial judgement that sugar was worth more than fur. Removing the French threat also removed the American colonies' reason to need British protection, and the debts of the war produced the taxes they revolted over twelve years later.
- Year: 1760 CE
- Category: Political
