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  Researching the Fortress of Louisbourg National Historic Site of Canada
  Recherche sur la Forteresse-de-Louisbourg Lieu historique national du Canada

The Administration Of Justice At The Fortress Of Louisbourg (1713-1758)

1722

• C11B, Vol. 6, fols. 79-96v., July 7, 1722

Enseignes Dupont Du Vivier and Denis Bonnaventure were dispatched to capture two deserters, Etienne Nobelin dit Tourangeau of Dangeac's Company and Pierre Petit dit St. Pierre of Du Chambon's Company, whom they found at Gabarus. Tourangeau testified that he had deserted at 6 A.M. on 15 February while on guard duty because the garçon major, La Chaume, had indicated that he knew that Tourangeau was responsible for the theft of 800 nails from Daccarette's storehouse. He hid in the woods until 4 March when he met St. Pierre, who was also planning to desert because a theft he had committed had been discovered and his accomplice arrested. 

The two men decided to go together to Port Toulouse. Before leaving the area, St. Pierre, who lodged with a former soldier named La Chesne, went to a neighbour and asked to borrow his snowshoes. He explained he needed them to go hunting for two partridges which he had promised someone. The man got his snowshoes back when he happened to meet the two officers returning the deserters to Louisbourg. Both men had apparently been involved in other thefts, and St. Pierre even had a previous desertion, from Port Dauphin in 1718, on his record. Why he was not punished at that time was not stated, although he claimed to have deserted then due to mistreatment at the hands of Captain De Renon, who died in 1720. 

Both soldiers professed ignorance of the fate which awaited deserters, with St. Pierre stating that he believed that Bellegrade and La Brie had been executed because of the thefts that they had committed and their escapes from prison. Both St. Pierre and Tourangeau were sentenced to be shot.[Source: Margaret Fortier, Fortress Security and Military Justice at Louisbourg, 1720-45, Unpublished Report H E 14 (Fortress of Louisbourg, 1980), pp. 70-71]