George Bancroft, History of the United States from the Discovery of the American Continent, Vol. 4, 15th edition.

[202] Boscawen and the Rear-Admiral Mostyn were

chap. VIII.} 1755.

present by invitation,¹ it was unanimously determined to send the French inhabitants out of the province; and after mature consideration it was further unanimously agreed that, to prevent their attempting to return and molest the settlers that may be set down on their lands, it would be most proper to distribute them amongst the several colonies on the continent.²

To hunt them into the net was impracticable; artifice was therefore resorted to. By a general proclamation, on one and the same day, the scarcely conscious victims, ‘both old men and young men, as well as all the lads of ten years of age,’ were peremptorily ordered to assemble at their respective posts. On the appointed fifth of September, they obeyed. At Grand Pre, for example, four hundred and eighteen unarmed men came together. They were marched into the church and its avenues were closed, when Winslow, the American commander, placed himself in their centre, and spoke:—

‘You are convened together to manifest to you his Majesty's final resolution to the French inhabitants of this his province. Your lands and tenements, cattle of all kinds, and live stock of all sorts, are forfeited to the crown, and you yourselves are to be removed from this his province. I am, through his Majesty's goodness, directed to allow you liberty to carry off your money and household goods, as many ’