 |
 |
||||||||||||||
|
|
Canadian Historic Sites: Occasional Papers in Archaeology and History No. 12
by Charles S. Lindsay Part II: A Gazetteer of Louisbourg GuardhousesTown GuardhousesThere were two guardhouses that fall into the category of town guard posts, one on the townside Place d'Armes of the King's Bastion and one at the west end of the Pièce de la Grave. Place d'Armes Guardhouse The first town guard post was situated on the Place d'Armes on the right as one approached the bridge to the central passageway of the barracks (Fig. 30. a). It was built in 1740 to replace the passageway guard rooms. Franquet described the guardhouse as "constructed in masonry 34 pieds 4 pouces long by 20 pieds 3 pouces wide, . . . and divided into two parts of which one 9 pieds 6 pouces serves the officer and the other of 20 pieds [serves] the soldiers."1 Excavation revealed little beyond the foundations of the building and ts dividing wall, but did show that Franquet's measurements were accurate (Fig. 31). The masonry walls varied between 1.5 ft. and 2.0 ft. thick.2 The outside surface of parts of the walls was covered with rough-casting in 1750. The position of the partition wall showed that the smaller officer's quarters was on the right when facing the front of the building, and the soldiers' on the left. The 1758 view shows a doorway at each end of the front, or south wall and two windows equidistantly spaced, one for each room (Fig. 30, b). In addition there was another window in the east wall of the officer's room. In 1749 the officer's doorway was furnished with an extra storm door made of Boston boards, tongued and grooved and strengthened with battens.3 The roof of the guardhouse was hipped and covered with shingles.4 Inside, the officer's quarters was whitewashed in 1749.5 Other officers' guardhouse quarters would indicate the whitewash was probably applied on a plastered surface rather than directly on the stones. The floor of both rooms was replaced in 1750 with a double floor of Boston boards.6 The officer's room contained a fireplace set in the dividing wall. All that remained of it when excavated were two masonry pillars set 2.5 ft. apart on which the hearth was supported. The mantlepiece and chimney-breast of this fireplace was repaired in 1749. At the same time a stove was installed.7 The room was furnished with a table with a drawer, an armchair, a straw chair and a half-sized armoire.8 Since no bed is mentioned in the 1753 list of furnishings, the officer may have slept in the nearby barracks. An armoire de consine was installed complete with shelves in 1749.9 As far as is known, the soldiers' quarters was not plastered nor did it have a fireplace. Instead there was a large brick stove which was removed in summer.10 Other furnishings in the room included a lit de camp, a table, two benches, three arms racks and a fixed armoire.11 This room also had an armoire de consine.
Along the front of the guardhouse there was a porch 6 pieds wide. This is often shown on historical plans with six posts supporting it, which would be in accord with post spacing on other porches. All that survived of this porch when excavated were three masonry pillars be low grade. approximately 6 ft. from the front wall, which may have been the seating for a sill supporting the posts. Before excavation there was a shallow depression occupying the area of the porch. Records of restoration in 1935 note that cobbling was being restored somewhere on this Place d'Armes, and since the floor of the porch is the area that would have reason to be cobbled we may assume that these records were referring to this feature. Nothing of it was found during excavation so presumably the restoration got no farther than removing the stones. Pièce de la Grave Guardhouse The second town guard post was situated at the foot of the rampart at the west end of the Pièce de la Grave. It apparently was not completed until 1744 when a toisé for certain parts of this and the Maurepas Gate guardhouse was drawn up.12 Unfortunately no large-scale plans of it survive and little is said of the guardhouse until 1767, when it was described as "almost in ruins." In 1751, Franquet stated that the guardhouse was a masonry building 42 pieds long by 22 pieds wide, divided internally into a room 12 pieds long for the officer, and a room 24 pieds 10 pouces long for the soldiers.13 Excavated remains revealed almost exactly the same dimensions (Fig. 32). All the walls were approximately 2 ft. thick and sat on foundations 2.5 ft. wide with the ledge on the inside. Around the outside of the walls the construction trench dug through the gravel beach could be readily observed. As with other guardhouses the walls were covered with rough-casting in 1750.14 All four corners of the building had cut-stone quoins in various stages of decay (Fig. 34).
Nowhere is the arrangement of doors and windows mentioned, but most logically the doors and some of the windows would have been in the front or southwest wall. By analogy with the similar guardhouse in the Place d'Armes the doors were probably at each end with three windows between them and a fourth in the southeast wall of the officer's room. The toisé describes the doors as made of 2-pouce-thick vertical pine planks tenoned into horizontal rails 6 pieds 3 pouces high by 2 pieds 9 pouces wide. They were held in place with 2-pied-long strap-hinges and secured with rim-locks.15 In 1749 an outer storm door was added to the officer's doorway similar to the one on the Place d'Armes guardhouse.16 Specifications were also given for four oak window chassis 4 pieds high by 3 pieds 3 pouces wide. The chassis were held in place by jamb anchors, two on each side. The windows themselves were double-leaf pivoting on fiche à vase hinges, two on each side, and containing glass panes 7 pouces by 8 pouces. They were held shut with two spring bolts. Lead listed in the toisé for flashing around a dormer is the only evidence for such a feature in this building.17 Unfortunately the toisé does not deal with the roof of the guardhouse. All that is known is that it was hipped and covered with shingles, and had furring at the eaves.19 The floor of the guardhouse was said to be supported on pine joists 6 pouces by 7 pouces.18 The 190 pieds of wood mentioned in the toisé would allow for approximately 4-pied spacing between joists. During excavation the remains of 11 joists. unequally spaced, were found. The remains of the wood plus the distance between the surviving surface and the nail heads, less the thickness of the floor planks, indicated that the joists were originally very close to the dimensions given in the toisé. The irregular spacing of the joists appear to have included later repairs and framing around stove and fireplace, while the basic unit of spacing was approximately 4 ft., as the toisé figures had indicated. The joists were supported at either end on the ledge of the footer, except for the joist at the northwest end of the building which was supported along its whole length on the ledge. In between the ledges the joists rested directly on the gravel on which the guardhouse had been built.
The floor and ceiling were said to be made of one-pouce pine planks.20 During excavation badly decomposed traces of the floor planking were found immediately below the destruction layer. Along the north joist there was an almost complete nailing pattern for the planking. Although there were some irregularities, many of the nails were grouped in pairs 0.5 ft. and 0.42 ft. apart, indicating a floor made of random-width planks averaging 0.92 ft. wide. The toisé describes the brick hearth of the fireplace in the officer's quarters as 4 pieds wide, 4 pieds long and 4 pouces thick, indicating that the bricks (normally, at Louisbourg 8 pouces by 4 pouces by 2 pouces) were set on edge.21 Excavation revealed a gap 4.5 ft. wide in the middle of the dividing wall. As it survived, the gap went completely through the wall, but originally it would have had either a brick or cut-stone fireback. None of the hearth bricks was found but a gap in the joists in front of the fireplace indicated that it projected out into the room, and the position of the next joist 2 ft. away from the wall would have defined the extent of this projection. This is one of the few fireplaces that is not recorded as having been replaced by a stove in 1749. In the soldiers' quarters there was apparently a stove from the beginning. Nothing is known of the original stove which was replaced by one built of brick in 1749. This was repaired in the same year and an estimate was made for constructing another of the same material.22 Excavation revealed a spread of mortar with brick impressions in ts surface about 3 ft. from the dividing wall, opposite the officer's fireplace (Fig. 35). The boundaries of the mortar were irregular but over-all it measured 4 ft. by 3.5 ft. The impressions showed that the bricks were laid on edge in four rows with stretcher courses between the rows. The most likely interpretation of this mortar is as part of a stove base. Its position would allow it to share the chimney with the officer's fireplace. What may have been the base of the original stove was found 2.5 ft. from the mortar toward the centre of the room. This consisted of a stone-lined depression open on the southeast side, with joist framing around it. Over-all, it was 5.2 ft. by 4.2 ft. with a northwest stone lining 1.5 ft. thick and thinner walls flanking it. The framing around it is evidence of the common practice of placing a temporary floor over the site of the stove in summer. If this was the base for a stove it must have been the first one, since all known later ones are said to have been of brick. The walls of the officer's quarters were covered with a mixture of sand and lime to a height of 7 pieds 9 pouces.23 Fragments of this plaster were found along the base of the dividing wall. Impressions of wood grain on the back showed that the plaster had been applied over lathing. In 1753 the officer's quarters contained a lit de camp, a table, a chair and an armchair.24 The lits de camp of this and the soldiers' quarters were 7 pieds wide and made with a framing and feet of 10 pouce by 5 pouce pine, rafters of 4 pouce by 4 pouce pine, and boards of one-pouce pine.25 The soldiers' quarters contained a lit de camp, a table, five benches, five arms racks and an armoire de consine.26 Along the front of the guardhouse there was a porch 9 pieds wide. The toisé describes the rafters of the ceiling of the porch as 4 pouce by 4 pouce pine, and the ceiling itself as made of one-pouce pine boards. A masonry fill was placed under the furring of the porch.27 All that remained of the porch when excavated was a line of decomposed wood, the remains of the sill, immediately below the surface, parallel to the front of the guardhouse and 9.5 ft. from it. Beneath the sill for half its length there was a course of flat stones providing a firm base for the sill. The floor of the porch consisted of a loose spread of gravel thrown over a grading layer of clay that stretched around the whole guardhouse. Along the back of the guardhouse there was a lean-to shed 8 pieds wide made of Boston boards that was used to store coal. In 1753 Franquet stated that this was no longer in use since the soldiers were by then using wood for firing the stove.28 Excavation revealed little trace of this shed. All that could be seen were slight traces of burning and some ash. Probably the shed was removed before the guardhouse was abandoned, as seems to be the case with the shed at the Maurepas Gate. English Guardhouse During the period of English occupation between 1758-68 a guardhouse was built at the northwest corner of Block 3, near the quay. It is marked on plans as a "mainguard."29 Nothing more is known of this guardhouse.
|
||||||||||||
|
|
|
||||||
