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Canadian Historic Sites: Occasional Papers in Archaeology and History No. 12
by Charles S. Lindsay Part I Guardhouses: Their Construction and UseThe guardhouses that existed at Louisbourg between 1713 and 1768 can be divided into three functional types. The first includes six guardhouses and guardrooms directly associated with barracks. The second consists of four pairs of guardhouses situated at the town gateways. The third consists of three guardhouses, not directly associated with any specific building or fortification that were used to house the guard responsible for general sentry duty throughout the town.
The Buildings In almost every instance each guardhouse (or, as at the gateways, each pair of guardhouses) contained quarters for officers and soldiers, and often subsidiary rooms such as an armoury, a cell, latrines or a coal shed. Armouries were built at the Queen's and Maurepas gate as part of the officers' guardhouses, but apparently were soon converted to cells (Fig. 24). Cells were part of the original design of guardhouses at the Royal Battery and Battery Island which were isolated from the town. In the early barracks, near what later became Block 17, the guardhouse contained both a cell and a cachot (a windowless cell or dungeon). All three gateway guardhouses had latrines, in all cases attached to or incorporated with the soldiers' quarters. A toisé describes a soldiers and an officer's latrine at the Maurepas Gate but indicates no differences between them.1 Two of the guardhouses had wooden lean-tos along the back for storing coal. Some of the French guardhouses, as in Figure 3, had part of the porch along the front blocked off to create a petit magasin. The lean-tos seem to have been removed around 1753, since Franquet noted in that year that they were no longer in use, and they do not appear on any plans or views after that date.2 Peculiar to Louisbourg was the arrangement of rooms whereby, in all cases except one, the soldiers' quarters were on the left and the officers' on the right when viewed from the front of a building containing both rooms; or, when viewed from inside the fortifications, as in the case of the gateway guardhouses where separate buildings flanked the roadways inside the gates. There was no such standardization in French guardhouses, and no functional advantage can be discerned. Possibly it was merely a personal preference of Verrier, the engineer in charge of the king's buildings between 1724 and 1745, when all of the guardhouses whose room plans are known were being constructed. It maybe significant that the ground plan of the one exception to this arrangement, the King's Bastion barracks guardrooms, was already laid out when Verrier arrived at Louisbourg. The only guardhouse where quarters for an officer were not provided was at the island battery. In the Dauphin Demi-bastion an influx of troops in 1755 apparently caused the officer's quarters to be turned over to the soldiers and a separate building for the officer was erected in front of the main guardhouse. Except for the guardhouse associated with the early wooden barracks near Block 17, all the Louisbourg guardhouses were masonry buildings. The walls, usually about 2 pieds thick, were set in lime mortar and most were covered with crépis-sage à pierre apparente (roughcasting with the stones showing through). In one case, the island battery, the walls were protected with a sheathing of one-pouce-thick Boston boards.3 Evidence from all excavated guardhouses and from historical elevations shows that the corners of the buildings consisted of dressed sandstone quoins, usually finished with a rough-pointed face surrounded by a flat-tooled border, a finish commonly used on cut-stones throughout the fortress. The roofs of most of the free-standing guardhouses were hipped and shingled. The two exceptions were at the Maurepas Gate where two layers of Boston boards were originally used and shingles added some years later, and at the Queen's Gate where slate was used, with shingles being added as repair patching. Of the three roofs for which we have any significant information, all had the same basic frame of trusses (principal rafters, king post and tie-beam), hip rafters, ridge, purlins and common rafters. In only one instance, the island battery, was furring (accoyeau)4 mentioned, but since this was a common feature of Louisbourg roofs in general, it probably also existed on the other guardhouses. In all documented cases the wood used for roof framing was pine.
Each room in the guardhouses had its own outside door, except for some of the cells. In most cases the surround for this door was of dressed sandstone finished similarly to the quoin stones. The jambs commonly had a 6-pouce reveal and a 2-pouce check for an inward-opening door. In addition, in 1749 the doorways to the officer's room of the Dauphin Demi-bastion, the Place d'Armes and the Pièce de la Grave guardhouses were furnished with storm doors one pouce thick. The one-pouce check for such a door was found during excavation on the jamb stones of the officer's doorway in the Dauphin Demi-bastion guardhouse (Fig. 28). Except for these doors, which were made of Boston boards, most others were 2 pouces thick and made of pine planks. The common method of door construction at Louisbourg consisted of vertical pine planks tenoned at top and bottom into hardwood horizontal rails.5 The doors were held in position by a pair of strap hinges, usually 2 pieds long, pivoting on pintles set in the sandstone jambs. Most doors were secured with rim-locks (serrures Bernades).6
With the exception of sash windows in the Royal Battery guardrooms, all the windows were casements, usually with two leaves (Fig. 7). As with the doors, most of the surrounds were dressed sandstone with a one-pouce shutter check, a 6-pouce reveal, and a 2-pouce frame check. In the documents the window frame and the sash are rarely distinguished since the term châssis is normally used alone. This word can mean either a frame or a sash. Occasionally the terms châssis de croisée (a sash), and châssis dormant (a frame), are used. Most châssis were approximately 4 pieds high by 3 pieds wide. Hardware lists include jamb anchors for holding the frame in position. These anchors were driven into the masonry surrounding the window opening and nailed to the frame through a flat terminal. Most sashes pivoted on loose-butt hinges (fiches à vase) morticed into frame and sash, two on each leaf. The windows were fastened with spring-bolts (verrouils à ressorts) which were vertical bolts at top and bottom of the inner edge of one leaf.
The shutters were all one pouce thick, often were constructed similar to the doors and were made of a variety of woods including fir, oak and pine. Hardware for shutters is nowhere mentioned in the documents, but presumably they were supported in the same manner as the doors with strap-hinges and pintles (Fig. 8). Most guardhouses had wooden floors and ceilings. The floors consisted of pine joists, usually 6 pouces by 7 pouces and spaced from 3 pieds to 5 pieds apart, overlain by a single or double thickness of 2-pouce or one-pouce pine planks or boards. The ceilings were similar, though in some cases (e.g., at the Maurepas Gate), the joists were lighter, being 4 pouce by 5 pouce pine. In two instances cobble floors were used: in the King's Bastion barracks soldiers' quarters and in the Dauphin Demi-bastion guardhouse when it was originally built as a barracks.
All but one of the gateway guardhouses and the two town guard-houses had porches (galleries) along the front wall. The one exception was the officer's guardhouse at the Dauphin Gate, where a porch would have obstructed traffic through the gateway. Also, the first design of the guardrooms in the passageway of the King's Bastion barracks incorporated an arcaded walkway along the front wall that would have functioned as a porch. Evidence from France indicates that these porches were a common feature of guardhouses (Figs. 5, 6). One document describes the purpose of porches as providing cover for the arms and a walkway for the guards on duty.7 Some of the illustrations show arms racks along the porch and benches attached to the wall. The majority of the porches on French guardhouses (Figs. 2, 4) were constructed with masonry posts and arches, yet most of the Louisbourg porches and some of those surviving in France used wooden framing. At Louisbourg all the porches were 6 pieds wide with the exception of that at the Pièce de la Grave, which was 9 pieds. The posts were spaced at intervals of between 5 pieds and 6 pieds. The specific type of framing and bracing was shown only on the porch at the Dauphin Gate (Fig. 19). In those instances where documentary and archaeological evidence has survived, the posts were set into a sleeper unlike most of the French examples, which rested on low masonry plinths. Most of the porches on drawings of French guardhouses had a cobbled floor, as did the interiors. At Louisbourg the porch flooring at the Pièce de Grave was gravel, but at the Dauphin Gate it may have been a cobble continuation of the roadway, and there is some evidence to suggest that the Place d'Armes porch floor was also cobbled. All Louisbourg evidence points to a ceiling under each porch roof, and the surviving guardhouse at Briançon also has one. It is not clear what function such a ceiling served. By 1753 the porches cease to be shown on historical plans, which could mean that they had been removed. The Interiors As might be expected, the interiors of the officers' quarters were noticeably more comfortable than those of the soldiers. The walls of most of the officers quarters were plastered, and most had a fireplace, usually set in the dividing wall (Fig. 9). Most of the fireplaces were replaced with brick stoves when the French returned to Louisbourg in 1749.8
According to the Ordonnance du Roy of 25 June 1750, an officer's quarters should contain a leather armchair and a wooden table and nothing else.9 At Louisbourg, however, this was generally ignored, and officer's quarters contained considerably more furniture. In most officer's quarters there was a lit de camp, or plank bed (Fig. 10). The frames of these beds consisted of short vertical posts at the foot with a plate to which were attached "rafters," sloping gently upward, either set into the wall at the head or into another plate anchored to the wall. On top of this framing, planks or boards were laid to form the bed. Most of those at Louisbourg were made of pine, although a few were of fir. They were between 6 pieds and 7 pieds long by 3 pieds to 4 pieds wide and were approximately 3 pieds to 4 pieds above the floor at the head. In 1750, a document states that the officers in barracks were not supplied with mattresses or blankets, but by 1755, a list of furnishings for officers' rooms in the barracks and guardhouses included mattresses, blankets, a box mattress and bolster.10 Most information on other furnishings comes from marginal notes made in a report on guardhouses drawn up by Franquet in 1753.11 The list includes cupboards (armoires and demi-armoires), tables, a table with drawers, armchairs, and a straw chair. In 1749 and 1750, most of the repair lists for officers' quarters included refurbishing the armoires de consine which were cabinets designed for keeping or displaying the orders of the day.12 The repairs enumerated mention doors and shelves of the armoires de consine which may be interpreted as meaning that the orders were kept inside rather than displayed there. One document describes the armoires as made of pine, and at least one is mentioned as having a glass front. By the Ordonnance du Roy of 25 June 1750,
One document of 1734 describes a corporal of the guard receiving a thief to be placed in the cell and being ordered to note in the consines for the benefit of the next guard on duty that the man was not to be let out.14 In 1755, Franquet wrote to France requesting 50 copies en placards of the Ordonnance du Roy of 1 July 1727 to be posted in all the guardhouses and barracks.15 This ordonnance was concerned with military offences and punishments, and as printed in the second edition of the Code militaire, is 15 pages long.16 The soldiers' quarters were more sparsely furnished. The walls were not plastered and, except for the soldiers' quarters in the Royal Battery, none had fireplaces. Instead all had brick stoves except the King's Bastion barracks guardroom, which had an iron stove that was later replaced with a brick one.17 These stoves were removed each spring and the site covered with temporary flooring. An account of fuel used in the King's Bastion barracks soldiers' guardroom shows that they used 30 cords of wood "in the eight months of winter between the month of October and the end of May."18 Sleeping accommodation consisted of a lit de camp similar to the ones in the officers' quarters but up to 28 pieds long and designed to hold a large number of men at one time. Bedding was similar to that found in the soldiers' rooms in the barracks. Soldiers were issued a straw tick and woollen blankets with embroidered fleurs-de-lis. In the barracks at least, and probably also in the guardhouses, the soldiers slept with their clothes on in winter.19 Apart from the bed the only other common furniture was a table with as many as six benches around it. The rather plain construction of the furniture in contrast to that in the officers' quarters can be seen in Figure 11.
The only soldiers' quarters with a cupboard was in the Place d'Armes guardhouse where it was described as a fixed cupboard (armoire à demeure). Almost all the soldiers' quarters contained arms racks. The amount was given either by number (Franquet's 1753 list) or by running length (1750 repair estimates). The repair estimates sometimes mention pegs for the racks,20 presumably similar to those shown in Figure 11. The illustration shows that the rack consisted of two uprights held to the wall by masonry anchors, with matching rows of holes in each post. Pegs were placed in these holes and the guns laid horizontally across them. Figure 4 shows these racks attached to the walls in the plan view of a guardhouse. In addition one is shown, with guns on it, in the elevation of the front of the guardhouse, attached to the outside of the wall. Arms placed on the rack outside present a problem, however. The Code militaire stated that each sentry should carry his gun already charged, and enough powder and shot for three rounds.21 This degree of preparedness seems to be in conflict with placing the arms on a rack. Possibly, since the illustrated guardhouses were all situated at gateways, the racks may have been temporary resting places for the arms of the sentries while they checked incoming and outgoing traffic.
Guardhouses at Louisbourg contained a number of tools and utensils, though the documents do not normally assign them specifically to officers' or soldiers' quarters. Tools included axes, picks, crowbars, shovels, cross-cut saws, sawhorses and barrows. The axes and saws were presumably for cutting firewood; the purpose of the other tools is not so clear. Utensils present in the rooms can be divided into those for the convenience of the occupants and those connected with guard duties. In the first category are iron cooking pots, coal shovels and pokers, candles and copper candlesticks, copper snuffers with their trays and iron-framed lamps. In the second category are lanterns for the rampart patrols, blue capes and partisans for the sentries, half-hour glasses, and boxes for the marons des rondes (tokens for marking the progress of the rampart patrols). While the documentary evidence does not make the contrast explicitly, it would appear that lighting for the officer's quarters was by candle (specifically stated in the documents), and for the soldiers' quarters by lamps. The lamps were iron-framed with horn windows and were normally either square or rectangular.22 One request to France asked for lanterns made of tin with cylindrical bodies 16 pouces high and 9 pouces in diameter. They were described as lanternes claires, which may mean that they had glass windows as replacements.23 In 1742 and subsequent years, orders were sent to France for half-hour glasses for the guardhouses.24 These glasses were to be filled with sand and mounted on strong frames. According to Diderot, half-hour glasses were commonly used on board navy ships to measure the passage of time for the watch. The half-hour glass was standard and consequently sailors thought of the day as divided into 48 major units. Thus a three-hour watch was expressed as six horloges.25 A list of material in the king's storehouse included at least one box for the marons des rondes.26 These marons were wood or copper tokens, with the hour of the patrol marked on them, carried by the rampart patrols and deposited in the locked boxes which were located at various points and guardhouses along the patrol route as proof that the patrol had been carried out. The boxes were marked with the name of the guardhouse or point on the patrol route where they were situated.27 Last, but for the guard by no means least, at various times of day the guardhouse contained the beer ration, brought to the guardhouse in "watercasks with iron bands and two handles for passing a bar through."28 The above description of tools and utensils in the guardhouses comes exclusively from historical sources. Archaeological evidence adds the more transient material not considered worthy of mention in the documents. From a rubbish dump immediately outside the north wall of the Pièce de la Grave guardhouse a range of artifacts was recovered that indicates the type of replaceable goods present in the guardhouse. These included wine bottles, clay pipe stems and bowls, coarse earthenware dishes and bowls including some English slipware cups, a few pieces of finer wares such as a faience coffee pot, and a carved bone handle. Specific evidence of the military nature of the occupation was provided by the presence of gunflints and musket balls as well as part of a leg shackle. In addition the dump, which consisted mostly of cinders and charcoal, contained two small iron pintles and a cotter pin, no doubt all that remained in the bottom of the stove after the burning of an old door or cupboard for warmth at a time when firewood was in short supply, as it usually was at Louisbourg. The Guard Since Louisbourg was a responsibility of the Ministry of the Marine it was regulated by marine ordinances. Unfortunately we do not possess a complete list of these ordinances which were concerned with, among other things, the posting of guards. We do know, however, that at Louisbourg in those areas not covered by marine ordinances the ordinances of the Code militaire were to apply. We have copies of the Code militaire dating to 1728, and other Ordonnances relating to guards dating to 1750.29 Consequently, the following description of the guard is no more than an outline based primarily on the Code militaire. More detailed description will have to await the compilation of marine ordinances since they may supplant the Code militaire in specific instances. The security of a fortified town was the responsibility of three types of guard: sentries, rampart patrols and town patrols. Of these only the sentries were posted around the clock, the patrols being confined to night duty between retreat and reveille. The rampart patrols were performed only by officers and sergeants. Normally the officer, a lieutenant or captain, would be chosen from among those not assigned to other duties, except when manpower shortages necessitated the use of the officer actually on guard duty that night. The sergeant performing these patrols, however, was normally taken from the guard on duty, except where he was the ranking member of a guard post. The town patrol, according to the Code de la marine, was a detachment of six men from the guard of the arsenal.30 Since there was no major arsenal at Louisbourg, these patrols were probably drawn from whichever guardhouse was the "town guard" at the time—either the Pièce de la Grave or Place d'Armes guardhouse. The responsibilities of the town patrols included "the quays, beaches, storehouses, streets and inside the arsenal, to stop all those whom they found after the retreat, and to take them, without mistreatment, to the main guardhouse."31 A document from the year 1741 contains a list of guards and sentry posts which were to be established the following year.32 The list includes two guardhouses, that were not in fact built until 1744, at the Maurepas Gate and the Pièce de la Grave (the latter was described as Corps de garde de la place; the temptation to link this with the Place d'Armes guardhouse must be resisted since the list includes a guard for the Bastion du Roi which must have occupied that guardhouse, the one in the barracks passageway already having been converted to a prison). The reason for the inaccurate prediction of guard posts was quite simply that Governor DuQuesnel, who drew up the list, was overly optimistic about the time needed to build these guardhouses. Nonetheless we are probably safe in assuming that the disposition of sentries given in this list is what eventually occurred when all the guardhouses were completed in 1744. The relevant sections of the list are as follows:
for this post 30 men for twenty-four hours which is 90 men for three days.
for this post 30 men for twenty-four hours which is 90 men for three days.
for this post 24 men for twenty-four hours which is 72 men for three days.
for this post 24 men for twenty-four hours which is 72 men for three days.
for this Post 33 men for twenty-four hours which is 99 men for three days. The post "in front of the arms" (devant les armes), since it had a sentry, a sergeant, two corporals and a drummer, must mean the guardhouse itself, and includes those members of the guard who were on duty, or at least on call, throughout the 24 hours. At the gateway guard-posts, the sentry at the gate of the covered way was posted only during the day and was withdrawn when the gate was closed for the night.33 The list shows that each guard had primary and secondary duties. The primary duties were those for which the guard was mounted: guarding gateways, public building and barracks. The secondary duties, although incidental to the specific location of the post, were not minor in terms of their importance. Every one of the guard posts in the list, including the town guard, was responsible for at least some part of the perimeter fortifications. When one considers the size of the fortified town of Louisbourg with its defensive perimeters of nearly two miles, one can appreciate the desperate appeals made to France for more troops when the guard disposition shows a total of just seven sentries posted at any time for guarding the fortifications. Although the list does not mention any officers, this does not mean that all the guards were commanded by sergeants. The list was drawn up to illustrate the shortage of men at Louisbourg and for this purpose the officers' duties were irrelevant. Another list of 1755 does include officers, showing that lieutenants commanded all posts except the town guard and the Dauphin Demi-bastion which were commanded by captains (by this time the guardhouses at the Dauphin Gate had been demolished).34 This later list also shows that the number of men at each guard post had been reduced by between one-quarter and one-third. Conclusions Since so little is known of guardhouses elsewhere in French North America, the only significant comparison for the Louisbourg guardhouses is with those in France. When comparing them one is struck by both contrast and similarity. To understand the contrast, the Louisbourg guardhouses must be seen within the context of the total scheme of fortifications around the town. Massive though its defences were in a North American context, Louisbourg was, in European terms, a poorly defended town. Fortifications, especially in France, at this time consisted of several major concentric lines of defences with numerous outworks and redoubts. Louisbourg, on the other hand, had but a single major line of fortification with virtually no outworks. Inevitably the elaborate nature of French fortifications demanded equally elaborate supporting structures and buildings. Thus, town gateways for example, were often massive structures, ornately decorated and built entirely with dressed stone, incorporating, within the massif, flanking guardrooms built in a similar manner. At Louisbourg, at the Dauphin Gate, the major entrance to the town, the guardhouses were relatively simple structures similar to those normally found in demi-lunes and other lesser positions in French fortification systems. The Louisbourg guardhouses, therefore, can be seen as homogeneous with other parts of the fortifications of the town. The similarity between the simpler French guardhouses and those at Louisbourg is strikingly apparent both in over-all design and in details of construction. Surviving examples from Mont Dauphin. Fort des Trois Têtes and Briançon, with only minor modifications, could be transported easily to a Louisbourg context. Considering the relative harshness of the Louisbourg climate, even compared with that of the French Alps, this similarity indicates a general lack of awareness of the disastrous effects of extreme cold, plentiful snow and constant dampness on French building techniques. In fairness to the engineer Verrier, however, it should be noted that both adequate building materials and skilled construction workers were in very short supply at Louisbourg. Nonetheless, leaking roofs, drafty windows and doors, and rotting floors were at least partly the result of deficient design. Some belated attempts were made in 1749 by the engineer Boucher, to offset these shortcomings by adding storm doors to the officers' entrances and by replacing their fireplaces with brick stoves which radiated heat over a wider area.35 In summary, the guardhouses can be seen as consistent with the design and construction techniques of the other fortifications and military buildings at Louisbourg, which is to say that they are comparable with simpler guardhouses in France, and, unfortunately for their users, also comparable with French construction techniques inappropriate to a Cape Breton climate.
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