Renumbering the 57th Foot

The creation, and the almost immediate renumbering, of the 57th Regiment of Foot to the 55th Foot, has its origins in war in North America. And in particular the actions of George Washington and dishonour for the 50th and 51st Foot.

Washington’s attack on the French in1754 led to, open warfare in North America that merged into a global War. Britain needed more troops. Amongst the regiments raised were the 57th Foot in Scotland. In 1881 the 55th Foot would become the 2nd Battalion of The Border Regiment.

British & French Rivalry

The population of the British colonies was growing. With both Britain and France claiming ownership of the same land conflict was inevitable. The flash point came in the area around the Ohio River. The French began to build forts south from Lake Erie. Attempts to expel the French from Fort Dusquesne (now Pittsburgh) by Colonel George Washington failed. But the attempt led to full-scale war with France that rapidly merged into a global conflict, with Prussia and Britain ranged against France, Austria and Russia – the 'Seven Years War'.

In 1755 General Braddock was sent to command the Army in North America, to capture Dusquesne and eliminate the French threat once and for all. Governor William Shirley of Massachusetts persuaded Braddock to include an assault on Fort Niagara that sat between Montreal and Dusquesne . The Niagara expedition would use the Hudson and Mohawk Rivers for most of the way from Albany to the shore of Lake Ontario at Oswego, before sailing the along the coast to Niagara. But the French also had a new commander, the Marquis de Montcalm de Saint-Veran. And he too had his mind set on Oswego as the gateway to the state capital at Albany.

New regiments in North America

Shirley was given command of the Niagara expedition. His forces included two new regular army regiments, and several companies of Colonel Schuyler's Colonial militia 'The Jersey Blues'.

The two new regular regiments were the 50th of which Shirley was Colonel and the 51st raised by Sir William Pepperrell. Shirley and Pepperrell were successful soldier politicians, veterans of wars with the French. Pepperrell was known as 'The Lion of Louisbourg' for his part in its capture in 1745. Although raised in America, they had English officers and were on the British Army establishment. Whilst raising his regiment Pepperrell was promoted to Major-General and he did not accompany the expedition.

The regiments had been raised as part of the British Government”s plan to send Braddock to America and remove the French from North America. The third paragraph of his orders from the King began:

“And Whereas, there will be wanting a number of men to make up ye designed complements of our said Regiments, from 500 to 700 each: And Whereas, it is our Intention yt Two other Regiments of Foot, to consist of 1000 men each, shall be forthwith raised & commanded by Govr Shirley and Sr Wm. Pepperrell …”

Braddock ignored his other instructions from the Commander in Chief of the British Army, the Duke of Cumberland that required him to post the new units away from combat:

“As soon as Shirley's and Pepperel's regiments are near complete, his Royal Highness is of opinion you should cause them to encamp, not only that they may sooner be disciplined, but also to draw the attention of the French and keep them in suspense about the place you really design to attack.”

New regiments in Britain

Soon after the decision to create the 50th and 51st the Government raised ten more new Regiments in Britain. War in America and fears of invasion by France made it imperative that the size of the Army was increased. In December 1755, Charles Perry, Esquire, of the Foot Guards was given a commission to raise one of the new regiments. Perry's Regiment was to be raised at Stirling, though not as a Highland Regiment, as the 57th Regiment of Foot.

Half-way to Niagara

Meanwhile in North America in July 1755 Braddock's army had been routed at Monongahela on the road to Fort Dusquesne and Braddock killed. The following month Shirley's expedition reached the shore of Lake Ontario. Oswego was a small trading post, with an old fort. Facing it on the other side of the lake 80 miles away, was the bigger French Fort at Frontenac. Frontenac is now Kingston-upon-Ontario.

Shirley’s Niagara expedition stalled when it reached Oswego. They were half-way to their objective, but incapable of further movement. By the time Shirley joined them in early September the troops had little food. They had not been paid, so nor could they buy provisions from local merchants.

Three hundred men were sick. There had been a mutiny and frequent desertions. Courts martial had sentenced men to death and lashings. In September the senior officers of the 50th and 51st wrote to Shirley complaining that their muskets were "almost unfit for service." Shirley blamed the food and equipment shortage on the men contracted to transport it. Shirley decided that they should overwinter at Oswego; build larger boats to carry them westwards along the lake the next year; and that they should improve the local defences.

A report from the garrison sent to the Duke of Cumberland's described the defences as:

"The old Fort, or Trading House; which was in a ruinous Condition, nor designed at first or ever capable of resisting Artillery, built several years ago ... and two New Forts, erected on the aforementioned Eminences; The Fort Ontario to the Eastwd unfinished and the other to the Westwd scarcely begun."

God’s elbow

Shirley returned to Albany. He had been promoted Commander‑in‑Chief in North America to replace Braddock. The Niagara Expedition's new commander was Lieutenant Colonel John Mercer of the 51st Foot. Mercer described Oswego as the “back of God’s elbow.” He wrote to his brother:

“Our campaign in this corner has proved inactive; the navigation of these immense lakes is impracticable with the Batteaus we use, and the long way we have to bring our provisions, the want of roads, the scarcity of carriages and horses, is the cause we could not proceed...”

The French were in two minds about attacking Oswego. The Governor of Canada reported to Paris in February 1756 that it would be impossible. Others took the view that they could have taken Oswego in 1755, were they not pre-occupied with other "affairs." Mercer was certainly expecting the French to attack. He wrote to a friend in February in optimistic vein:

“... we are threatened here by the Enemy who the Indians report are making great preparations to attack us: I am busie putting the Place in a posture of defence..."

Mercer”s command was severely depleted by sickness and desertion. Some reinforcements did arrive, but two other line regiments ordered to Oswego, the 44th and 48th Foot were held up by lack of provisions. Boat building continued. John Cross was a ship builder from Massachusetts who had been recruited, along with others to build ships at Oswego. His journal records that on 22 June:

"the officers had a Barbacue and high frolick, though it was Something Rainy."

Whilst they were frolicking, the skirmishes and harassment grew worse. In June Colonel Schuyler's New Jersey Militia drove off a party of French and Indians that he estimated as being 1,000 strong. In July Colonel Bradstreet leading a group of boatmen, supported by the grenadiers of the 50th Foot, reported defeating a party of 400. And still the garrison was short of food and clothing. Indian activity made carriers unwilling to go beyond the 'Great Carrying Place', where merchandise was transferred to carts to cross the watershed from the Mohawk River. Despite this, in July Mercer wrote to his brother:

“I have nothing new or entertaining to write you from this forest; if anything has happened in America worth your attention it has not reach'd us...”

The storm breaks

But something was very much about to happen.

On 11 August 1756 General Montcalm crossed Lake Ontario from Fort Frontenac and arrived on the eastern side of Oswego. He had about 3,000 men. Three regular battalions, de la Sarre, Guyenne and Béarn, provided 1,300 men, the rest were militia and Indians. The French artillery, cannon and mortars, arrived the following day. Some of the artillery had been captured from Braddock's army the previous year.

Fort Ontario was garrisoned by Pepperrell”s regiment. Shirley's and Schuyler's Regiments held Fort George in the west. The French began their bombardment of Fort Ontario on the 13th. At first the garrison returned fire, but that evening the garrison withdrew to the western side of the river. The next day, the 14th, the French cannon were able to, fire directly into Fort Oswego and the settlement of Oswego.

Montcalm now sent men swimming or wading across the river to cut off the Old Fort from the other defences. Colonel Mercer ordered Colonel Schuyler to take a detachment and throw them back, but almost immediately Mercer was killed by a cannon ball and his order was not carried out. The French were now on both sides of the Oswego River.

Colonel Littlehales, Shirley's Regiment, assumed command. He held a Council of War and the Council agreed that defence was no longer possible. A truce was sought. Men present during the siege later gave this account:

“Colonel Littlehales, on whom the Command devolved, then called a Council of War and demanded of the Engeniers (sic) their opinions; they declared the place not tenable either against Cannon or a Generall Assault...”

Disgraced or Abandoned?

Some accounts of the siege of Oswego presume that the British forces at Oswego outnumbered the French and that the surrender was a needless capitulation. Using the numbers captured by the French, the garrison was not that much smaller than the attackers, but its morale was poor, men were half-starved and the defences in some places no more than timber stockades that were no match for the French artillery.

Mercer's small naval squadron had not been able to prevent Montcalm landing his artillery. And once the defenders were not able to deny the high ground to the French and their artillery could fire directly into the remaining fortifications defeat was almost inevitable.

On their surrender the 50th and 51st regiments and the New Jersey militia lost their colours, which were taken to Montreal, paraded through the streets and laid up in the Parish Church. The men were taken from Canada to France and there exchanged for French prisoners held in Britain. The 50th and 51st regiments were disbanded and the precedence of other regiments all moved up by two numbers.

Frolics or Reinforcements

Did poor moral affect the British commanders? John Cross's reference to a 'frolic' in June is puzzling as is the bored, tone of Mercer's letters. Bradstreet had warned Shirley of the poor condition of the Oswego garrison. Cumberland had asked that the Shirley's and Pepperrell's Regiments be kept away from combat. Shirley appeared to understand that the fort needed reinforcing, but failed to ensure the fort's relief.

When Oswego surrendered, reinforcements, the 44th Foot, were on the way, but had only reached Schenectady. Shirley denied being an accessory to the Oswego disaster, claiming that it had "happen'd seven weeks after the Expiration of my Command..." But the Earl of Loudoun who replaced Shirley as Commander-in-Chief complained that getting things done was hindered by Provincials “rights and privileges”. And on top of all, Shirley was then accused of corruption.

Loudoun again:

"...an Expedition, as it has hitherto been managed in this Country, has been looked on as a Rock on which particulars find very good fishing."

As it was the War that would bring the 'Year of Victories' in 1759, got off to the worst possible start: first Braddock's death during the unsuccessful assault on Fort Dusquesne, and now capitulation at Oswego.

Meanwhile in Britain

In February 1757 Lieutenant John Knox, in his journal described the arrival at Cork of Parry's Regiment. They are no longer 57th, but now, with the 50th and 51st gone, they are the 55th Foot.

The Editor

peter.castra@gmail.com

Picture ©IWM

Text from the Archive of

Cumbria's Museum of Military Life, edited by Peter Green