James Wolfe
James Wolfe took Quebec and died doing it. Born in 1727 in Kent to an army family, he was commissioned at fourteen, fought at Dettingen at sixteen, and was at Culloden in 1746 at nineteen — where he is said to have refused an order to shoot a wounded Highlander, though the story is not well evidenced. He was thin, red-haired, chronically ill with tuberculosis and probably kidney stones, and was regarded as odd. When someone told George II that he was mad, the king reportedly hoped he would bite some of his other generals. He distinguished himself at the taking of Louisbourg in 1758 and was made a major general at thirty-one and given the Quebec expedition. The city sat on a cliff above the St Lawrence with Montcalm's army entrenched below it, and Wolfe spent the summer of 1759 failing to draw him out. He bombarded the town, burned farms along the river, and was repulsed with heavy loss at Montmorency in July. By September the fleet had to leave before the ice, and he was dying. He landed some 4,500 men before dawn on 13 September at a cove where a path ran up the cliff, and formed a line on the Plains of Abraham. Montcalm attacked rather than waiting for reinforcements, and the British line held its fire to about forty yards. Wolfe was shot three times and died as the French broke. Montcalm died the next day. Canada passed to Britain at the peace of 1763, and Benjamin West's painting of his death became the most reproduced image of the age.
- Lived: 1727 CE – 1759 CE
- Nationality: British
- Roles: major_general, commander_of_the_quebec_expedition
