THE HUGUENOT COLONY IN CANADA 110 



V 



It was oue of the reprisals of justice, one of the right- 

 eous puuishments of religious usurpation, that when the sirwiiuam 



, Alexander 



English king deternimea to contest the claim to North ciaims Nova 

 America by right of discovery, Sir William Alexander, 

 who had a royal grant to Nova Scotia, found the best 

 material for his expedition of conquest in the large num- 

 bers of Huguenot seamen and soldiers who had found 

 refuge in England from the renewed persecutions at home, 

 and were only too glad to engage in war against the 

 Jesuits, even though they were French. Hence we find 

 that the admiral who had charge of Sir Alexander's 

 squadron, fitted out for the conquest of New France, was 

 David Kirke, while his brothers were his assistants — all 

 natives of Dieppe in Normandy, and staunch Protestants Helped by 

 who had fled from their country rather than deny their "^"^"° ® 

 faith. The sailing master, Jacques Michel, was an ardent 

 Calvinist, who had been in the employ of Guillaume de 

 Caen when that strong Huguenot leader was at the head 

 of the former Canadian Company organized by de Monts. 

 Acadia was an easy prey to these bold invaders, and 

 Kirke then turned his attention to Quebec, and on July 

 20, 1629, that stronghold, under Champlain, was obliged 

 to surrender. And now the Jesuit fathers who had lately 

 come to occupy the mission field which they proposed to 

 hold forever shut against heretics, were prisoners in the 

 hands of the very heretics whose destruction at home and 

 abroad they had planned. 



That Quebec again j^assed into French possession, be- 

 cause peace had been signed between England and France 

 three months before Quebec was captured, was a fortune 

 of war ; but during the three years of negotiations a 

 Huguenot, Louis Kirk, was in command, and won the 

 confidence and respect of all by his admirable and toler- 

 ant conduct. His English name came from the fact that 

 his father was a Scotchman who lived and married in louJs Kirk at 



Ouebcc 



France. He tried to induce the French families to re- 



