The Battle of Quebec
Monday, July 13, 2020
Great Britain participated in many military campaigns in North America prior to the American Revolutionary War of 1776. One of these was the French and Indian War (1754-1763, so-called because both sides had American Indian allies) which was the North American branch of Europe's larger Seven Years' War between Great Britain and her allies on one side, and France and hers on the other.
France had significant holdings in what is now Canada; Quebec is still predominantly a Francophone province. The British also had interests in Canada, in addition to the American colonies. And so colonials on both sides, called "British America" and "New France," battled each other with the assistance of troops from their respective mother countries. The American colonists, of course, mostly considered it their war, with little concern for what was happening in Europe.
A decisive battle in that conflict was the Battle of Quebec, also called the Battle of the Plains of Abraham, which took place on September 13, 1759. It was fought on a plateau on farmland that had once belonged to a farmer named Abraham Martin, just outside the walls of Quebec City. There, a total of roughly 8,000 troops (around 4,400 British, including army and navy, and 3,400 French army) fought at the culmination of a three-month British siege of the city. For such an important battle, it was surprisingly short: about an hour.
The leaders on both sides--the British General James Wolfe and the French General Louis-Joseph, Marquis de Montcalm--died of mortal wounds. Wolfe was shot three times and died shortly after the battle began; Montcalm died the next morning from a single wound.
The battle led to a French evacuation of the city. The tried to retake the city the following spring, at one point forcing the British to retreat inside the city's walls. But they never succeeded in retaking it, and in the 1763 Treaty of Paris--which concluded the Seven Years' War--most of eastern North America was ceded to Great Britain.
This victory of the British over the French was just one of many that caused the British to call 1759 the "Annus Mirabilis"--the "miraculous year."