When the French Were Here
Champlain Quadricentennial
Samuel de Champlain, A Life
Fighting the English
In 1628, English privateers captured a French fleet bringing colonists and supplies to Quebec and warned Champlain to surrender. England and France were at war. Champlain refused. He had only fifty pounds of gunpowder for his cannons and enough peas for a seven ounce a day ration for the inhabitants but, as “commander of New France,” he was determined to hold out. In 1629, after a yearlong siege, when no help came, he was forced to surrender.
Taken prisoner to England, he arranged to take with him two Huron girls, Charity and Hope, he had also adopted, and the Recollet and Jesuit missionaries he had brought with him. In London, he proved to the French ambassador that Quebec had surrendered after a peace treaty between the two countries had been signed. It took three more years before England handed back Quebec under the treaty of St. Germain-en-Laye.
Living again with Hélène as he waited to return to Canada, Champlain sold his inherited houses in Brouage and exchanged assets with Hélène, giving her a sizable shareholding in the Company of One Hundred Associates, the trading company chartered by the king to invest in developing trade with New France. Champlain was a full partner.
After four years’ absence, Champlain returned to Quebec. He ordered the dilapidated fort and government buildings rebuilt and founded a new settlement at Trois-Rivières. Many families now were arriving each year, starting farms on the rich soil lining the Saint Lawrence. The French colony had survived.
But by 1635, Champlain, at least 65 years old, was in poor health. In November, in the care of a Jesuit priest, he made out a new will, leaving everything to the Virgin Mary. In December, 1635, just days short of his 25th wedding anniversary, he suffered a stroke and died. He was buried at an undisclosed spot. In France, a first cousin broke his will and took away Hélène’s share. But she remained the heiress of a well-to-do court family.
A large monument to Samuel de Champlain overlooks the city he founded. A much smaller stone stands in front of the parish church in Brouage. Inside, like a saint, Samuel de Champlain looks down from a stained glass window.
