civil and military officer; born in Stra-
bane,
Ireland, Sept. 3, 1724; entered the Guards at an early age, and became a lieutenant-colonel in 1748.
He was aide to the
Duke of
Cumberland in the German campaign of 1757; was with
Amherst in the siege of
Louisburg in 1758; with
Wolfe at
Quebec (1759) as quartermaster-general; and was a brigadier-general at the siege of
Belle Isle, where he was wounded.
He was also quartermaster-general in the expedition against
Havana in 1762, and in 1767 he was made lieutenant-governor of
Quebec.
The next year he was appointed governor.
In 1772 he was promoted to major-general, and in 1774 was made governor-general of the Province of
Quebec.
In an expedition against the forts on
Lake Champlain in 1775 he narrowly escaped capture; and at the close of the year he successfully resisted a siege of
Quebec by
Montgomery.
The next
spring and
summer he drove the
Americans out of
Canada, and totally defeated the
American flotilla in an engagement on
Lake Champlain in October.
Sir John Burgoyne had been in
England during the earlier part of 1777, and managed, by the help of
Sir Jeffrey Amherst, to obtain a commission to take command of all the
British forces in
Canada.
To do this he played the sycophant to
Germain, and censured
Carleton.
When Sir John arrived at
Quebec (May 6, 1777),
Carleton was amazed at despatches brought by him rebuking the governor for his conduct of the last campaign, and ordering him, “for the speedy quelling of the rebellion,” to make over to
Burgoyne, his inferior officer, the command of the
Canadian army as soon as it should leave the boundary of the Province of
Quebec.
The unjust reproaches and the deprivation of his military command greatly irritated
Carleton, but, falling back on his civil dignity as governor, he implicitly obeyed all commands and answered the requisitions of
Burgoyne.
As a soothing opiate to his wounded pride,
Burgoyne conveyed to the governor the patent and the jewel of a baronet.
Governor Carleton was a strict disciplinarian, and always obeyed instructions to the letter.
When
Burgoyne, after the capture of
Ticonderoga (July, 1777), pushing on towards the
valley of the Hudson, desired
Carleton to hold that post with the 3,000 troops which had been left in
Canada, the governor refused, pleading his instructions, which confined him to his
[
58]
own province.
This unexpected refusal was the first of the embarrassments
Burgoyne endured after leaving
Lake Champlain.
He was compelled, he said, to “drain the life-blood of his army” to garrison
Ticonderoga and hold
Lake George.
No doubt this weakening of his army at that time was one of the principal causes of his defeat near
Saratoga.
If
Carleton wished to gratify a spirit of retaliation because of
Burgoyne's intrigues against him, the surrender of the latter must have fully satisfied him.
Carleton was made lieutenant-general in 1778; was appointed commander-in-chief of the
British forces in
America in 1781; and sailed for
England Nov. 25, 1783.
In 1786 he was created
Baron Dorchester, and from that year until 1796 he was governor of
British North America.
He died Nov. 10, 1808.