Montcalm.

In May 1756, as the hostilities in America were about to flare into a European war, Louis-Joseph de Montcalm-Gozon, Marquis de Montcalm de Saint Veran, arrived in Canada with reinforcements from France. He found a difficult situation. The governor, Pierre de Rigaud, Marquis de Vaudreuil, was the commander of fourteen thousand Canadian militia men and of the fifteen hundred marines in the colony. Montcalm directly commanded only six regiments of regulars, a total of about four thousand men. In this situation of divided military command, the two men found it increasingly difficult to deal with one another. Vaudreuil was jealous of Montcalm's power, and Montcalm was contemptuous of the corruption of the government of New France. Nevertheless, they managed to agree on an offensive against Oswego. As a trading post Oswego had cut into what the French regarded as...