Guy Carleton, 1st Baron Dorchester.
,
KB (
Strabane,
Co. Tyrone, Ireland, September 3, 1724 – November 10, 1808 Stubbings,
Maidenhead, Berkshire), known between 1776 and 1786 as
Sir Guy Carleton, was an
Irish-
British soldier and administrator. He twice served as
Governor of the
Province of Quebec, from 1768 to 1778, concurrently serving as
Governor General of British North America in that time, and from 1785 to 1795. He commanded British troops in the
American Revolutionary War, first leading the defense of Quebec during the
1775 rebel invasion and the 1776 counteroffensive that drove the rebels from the province, and then in 1782 and 1783 as the
commander-in-chief of all British forces in North America. The military and political career of his younger brother
Thomas Carleton was interwoven with his own career.
Early career
Guy Carleton was born to a Protestant military family that had lived in Ireland since the 17th century, and was one of four brothers that served in the British military. In 1742, at the age of 17, he was commissioned as an ensign in the
25th Regiment of Foot and in which in 1745 he was made a lieutenant. He saw action in the
War of the Austrian Succession, at which time he became a friend of
James Wolfe; he may also have served with Wolfe in the
Battle of Culloden. In 1751 he joined the
1st Foot Guards as a Captain and in 1752 a Captain and in 1757 was made a lieutenant colonel. In 1758 he was made the lieutenant colonel of the newly formed
72nd Regiment of Foot.
Seven Years War
Wolfe selected Carleton as his aide in the 1758
attack on Louisburg.
King George II declined to make this appointment, possibly because of negative comments he made about the soldiers of Hanover during his service on the Continent. In December 1758 Wolfe, now a Major General was given command of the upcoming campaign against the city of Quebec, and he selected Carleton as his
quarter-master general. King George refused to make this appointment also until Lord Ligonier talked to the king about the matter and the king changed his mind. When
Lieutenant-Colonel Carleton arrived in Halifax he assumed command of six hundred grenadiers. He was with the British forces when they arrived at Quebec in June 1759. Carleton was responsible for the provisioning of the army and also acting as an engineer supervising the placement of cannon. Carleton received a head wound during the
Battle of the Plains of Abraham and he returned to England after the battle in October 1759.
On March 29, 1761, as the lieutenant colonel of
72nd Regiment of Foot he took part in the attack on Belle-Ile-en-mer, an island of the coast of the northern part of the
Bay of Biscay, ten miles off the coast of France. Carleton led an attack on the French, but was seriously wounded and prevented from taking any further part in the fighting. After four weeks of fighting, the British captured the rest of the island.
He was made colonel in 1762 and took part in the
British expedition against Cuba, which also included
Richard Montgomery, who went on to oppose him in 1775. On July 22, he was wounded leading an attack on a Spanish outpost.
In 1764 he transferred to the
93rd Regiment of Foot.
Governor of Quebec
thumb|Sir Guy CarletonOn April 7, 1766, he was named acting Lieutenant Governor and Administrator of Quebec with
James Murray officially in charge. He arrived in Quebec on September 22, 1766. Carleton had no experience in public affairs and his appointment is hard to explain. The
Duke of Richmond had in 1766 been made Secretary of State for the North American colonies and fourteen years earlier Carleton had been the Duke's tutor. The Duke was also the colonel of the
72nd Regiment of Foot while Carleton was its Lieutenant Colonel. He was also appointed
commander-in-chief of all troops stationed in Quebec.
The government consisted of a Governor, a council, and an assembly. The governor could veto any action of the council, but London had also given Carleton instructions that all of this actions required the approval of the council. Most officials of the province at this time did not receive a salary and received their income through fees they charged for their services. Carleton tried to replace this system with a system in which the officials instead received a salary, but this position was never supported in London. When Carleton renounced his own fees, Murray was furious.
After Murray resigned his position, Carleton was appointed
Captain General and Governor in Chief on April 12, 1768. Carleton took the oath of office on November 1, 1768. On August 9, 1770 he sailed for England for what he thought was for a few months. During his absence
Hector Theophilus de Cramahé, the lieutenant governor, ran the provincial government.
He married Maria Howard, daughter of the
second Earl of Effingham, who was twenty-nine years his junior, on May 22, 1772. He was promoted to
Major-General in May 25, 1772. The
Quebec Act of 1774, which determined how the province was to be administered, was based upon Carleton's recommendations. Carleton arrived back in Quebec on September 18, 1774, and began implementing the provisions of the act. While the clergy and the seigneurs (landowners) were happy with provisions favorable to them, British merchants and migrants from the
Thirteen Colonies were unhappy with a number of its provisions, which they saw as undemocratic and pro-Catholic. Many of the
habitants were unhappy with the provisions reinstating the
tithe, as well as seigneurial obligations like the
corvée.
The
First Continental Congress in late 1774 sent
letters to Montreal denouncing the Quebec Act for being undemocratic and for promoting Catholicism by allowing Catholics to hold civil service positions, and reinstating the tithe.
John Brown, an agent for the
Boston Committee of Correspondence, arrived in Montreal in early 1775 as part of an effort to persuade the inhabitants to send delegates to the
Second Continental Congress, scheduled to meet in May 1775. Carleton, while aware of this activity, did nothing to prevent it, beyond discouraging publication of the Congressional letter in the province's only newspaper.
Early American Revolution
Carleton received notice of the start of the rebellion in May 1775, soon followed by the news of the rebel
capture of Fort Ticonderoga and
Fort Crown Point, and the raid on
Fort Saint-Jean. He had previously sent two of his regiments to Boston and he had only about eight hundred regular soldiers left in Quebec. His attempts to raise a militia met with limited success at first, as neither the French nor the English were willing to join. Area Indians were willing to fight on the British side, and London wanted them to fight, but Carleton turned their offer down because he was worried about the Indians attacking non-combatants.
Carleton directed the preparation of provincial defenses, which were focused on Fort Saint-Jean, during the summer of 1775. In September, the
Continental Army began its invasion,
besieging the fort. When it fell in November, Carleton was forced to flee from Montreal to Quebec City, only escaping capture by disguising himself as a commoner.
In December 1775 he directed the city's defenses in the
Battle of Quebec and the ensuing siege, which was broken by the arrival of British troops in May 1776 under command of
Allan Maclean who was appointed Second-in-Command. He then launched a counteroffensive against the rebels, which included repelling an attempted rebel attack on
Trois-Rivières. In June 1776, he was appointed a
Knight of the Bath. The next month he commanded British naval forces on the Richelieu River, culminating in the
Battle of Valcour Island on
Lake Champlain in October 1776 against a rebel fleet led by General
Benedict Arnold. The British, with a significantly superior fleet, won a decisive victory, destroying or capturing most of the rebel fleet, but the delay prevented Carleton from continuing on to capture Fort Ticonderoga that year. His brother,
Thomas Carleton, and nephew,
Christopher Carleton, both served on his staff during the campaign.
Late American Revolution
On July 1, 1777, Carleton resigned his post as Governor, but London required him to remain in his post until June 1778 when his replacement,
Frederick Haldimand, had arrived. Carleton then left for England, where he had been appointed governor of Charlemont in Ireland. One of Haldimand's first acts was to have Buck Island in the
St. Lawrence River fortified and renamed
Carleton Island. After the
Battle of Yorktown and the capitulation of
Lord Cornwallis in October 1781, Sir Guy Carleton was appointed
Commander-in-Chief, North America on February 22, 1782, and he arrived in
New York City on May 6 of that year, succeeding
Sir Henry Clinton.
In August, Carleton was informed that Britain would grant the United States its independence. Carleton asked to be relieved of his command. With this news, there came an exodus of
Loyalists from the
Thirteen Colonies. Carleton did his best to have them resettled outside the United States. He also resettled former slaves over the objections of the rebels who wanted all former slaves returned. In all, he resettled about 30,000. On November 28, the evacuation was finished, and Carleton returned to England.
In 1783,
John Campbell of Strachur succeeded him as Commander-in-Chief, North America.
Quote: 'Remain on duty until every man, woman and child who wanted to leave the
United States is safely moved to
British soil.'
Post-war years
He recommended the creation of a position of Governor General of all the provinces in
British North America. Instead he was appointed Governor-in-chief and positions as Governor of Quebec, Governor of
New Brunswick, Governor of
Nova Scotia, and Governor of
Prince Edward Island. He arrived in Quebec on October 23, 1786. His position as Governor-in-chief was mostly ignored and he only was the governor of the other provinces while he was in them.
He was raised to the
Peerage in August 1786 as Lord Dorchester, Baron of
Dorchester in the
County of Oxford.
The
Constitutional Act of 1792 split Quebec into Upper and Lower Canada, with Sir
Alured Clarke named as the lieutenant governor of
Lower Canada and
John Graves Simcoe the lieutenant governor of
Upper Canada. In August 1791 Carleton left for England and on February 7, 1792 took his seat in the
House of Lords. He left for Canada again on August 18, 1793.
His replacement,
Robert Prescott arrived in May 1796 and on July 9, 1796 Carleton sailed from Canada to England never to return.
He lived mostly at
Greywell Hill, adjoining
Nately Scures, in
Hampshire and after about 1805 Stubbings House at
Burchett's Green, near Maidenhead, in Berkshire. On November 10, 1808, he died suddenly at Stubbings. He was buried in
Nately Scures parish church.
Legacy
- Guy's Restaurant in his birthplace of Strabane is also named after Guy Carleton. The restaurant was formerly known as the Carleton Club.
See also
