D'Aulnay, learning in 1645 that La Tour…
April 1645 CE
D'Aulnay, learning in 1645 that La Tour had taken a journey to Boston to drum up more support for his cause, had again laid siege to the fort; but Marie Jacquelin La Tour, la Tour’s second wife, directs from the bastions the cannonade on the enemy's ships, and compels d'Aulnay to retire.
The aid of a treacherous sentry, enables d’Aulnay, on his third attack, to enter the fort, but the resistance led by Madame La Tour is so fierce—he has lost thirty-three men—that he proposes terms of capitulation, pledging life and liberty to all in the garrison.
His terms being accepted on April 17, d’Aulnay breaks his agreement, hangs every member of the garrison, and compels Madame La Tour to witness the execution with a rope around her own neck.
She dies a prisoner few weeks later; her husband has meanwhile taken refuge at the Chateau Saint-Louis in Quebec.
Nicolas Denys' letters and journals give vivid descriptions of the drama.
D'Aulnay, seizing all of La Tour’s possessions and outposts, especially Fort La Tour at St. John and Cape Sable, now has the whole of Acadia to himself as provisional governor-general and seigneur, and improvements are made, marshes are diked, mills erected, and ship building begun.
He goes later in 1645 to France, and receives honors from the king.