Toward the spring, receiving reinforcements, Hepecourt caught Rogers and a hundred and eighty men in an ambush, and killed almost all of them; Rogers himself, and some twenty or thirty men, alone escaping.

In the spring there was a fresh change of plans.  The expedition against Ticonderoga was given up, as another attempt at Louisbourg was about to be made.  The English government were determined that the disastrous delays, which had caused the failure of the last expedition, should not be repeated.  Loudon was recalled, and to General Abercromby, the second in command, was intrusted the charge of the forces in the colonies.  Colonel Amherst was raised to the rank of major general, and appointed to command the expedition from England against Louisbourg, having under him Brigadier Generals Whitmore, Lawrence, and Wolfe.  Before the winter was ended two fleets put to sea:  the one, under Admiral Boscawen, was destined for Louisbourg; while the other, under Admiral Osborne, sailed for the Straits of Gibraltar, to intercept the French fleet of Admiral La Clue, which was about to sail from Toulon for America.

At the same time Sir Edward Hawke, with seven ships of the line and three frigates, sailed for Rochefort, where a French squadron with a fleet of transports, with troops for America, were lying.

The two latter expeditions were perfectly successful.  Osborne prevented La Clue from leaving the Mediterranean.  Hawke drove the enemy’s vessels ashore at Rochefort, and completely broke up the expedition.  Thus Canada, at the critical period, when the English were preparing to strike a great blow at her, was cut off from all assistance from the mother country, and left to her own resources.

As before, Halifax was the spot where the troops from the colonies were to meet the fleet from England, and the troops who came out under their convoy, and here, on the 28th of May, the whole expedition was collected.  The colonies had again been partially stripped of their defenders, and five hundred provincial rangers accompanied the regulars.  James Walsham’s corps was left for service on the frontier, while the regiments, to which they belonged, sailed with the force destined for the siege of Louisbourg.

This fortress stood, at the mouth of a land-locked bay, on the stormy coast of Cape Breton.  Since the peace of Aix la Chapelle, vast sums had been spent in repairing and strengthening it, and it was, by far, the strongest fortress in English or French America.  The circuit of its fortifications was more than a mile and a half, and the town contained about four thousand inhabitants.  The garrison consisted of the battalions of Artois, Bourgogne, Cambis, and Volontaires Etrangers, with two companies of artillery, and twenty-four of colonial troops; in all, three thousand and eighty men, besides officers.  In the harbour lay five ships of the line and seven frigates, carrying five hundred and forty-four guns, and about three thousand men, and there were two hundred and nineteen cannons and seventeen mortars mounted on the ramparts and outworks, and forty-four in reserve.