John Gorham (military officer)

He is sometimes confused with his father, Shubael Gorham (born in Barnstable, Massachusetts, 2 September 1686; died at Louisbourg, Nova Scotia, 20 February 1746),[2] a provincial colonel during King George's War.

)[4] John Gorham II also served with Church during the fourth Eastward Expedition into Acadia, which involved the Raid on Chignecto (1696) during King William's War.

John Gorham and his Rangers arrived in Nova Scotia to move the military and political influence of the British beyond a defensive posture at Annapolis Royal and the fishing village of Canso.

[7] During King George's War, Gorham and his company of Indian rangers from New England were involved in defending Fort Anne from attacks from the French, Acadians, and Mi’kmaq.

During the Siege of Annapolis Royal (1744), on 4 October, Gorham and his rangers massacred Mi'kmaq men along with five women and three children that were in two nearby wigwams.

During the Siege of Annapolis Royal (1745), the Mi'kmaq and Maliseet took prisoner the captain of a provincial transport vessel, William Pote, as well as some of Gorham's Rangers, including four Wampanoags from Cape Cod: Jacob Chammock, Philip Will,[12] Caleb Popmonet, and Isaac Peck, as well as Peter Dogamus, a Nauset Indian from Yarmouth, Massachusetts.

[14] On July 10, Pote witnessed another act of revenge when the Mi'kmaq tortured an Indian ranger (possibly Popmonet or Dogamus) at Meductic.

In 1749, during Father Le Loutre's War, Gorham participated in the construction of Fort Sackville at present-day Bedford, Nova Scotia.

[11] While at Fort Sackville, Gorham used the fortification as a base from which he "scoured the country" for Mi'kmaq to scalp as per a proclamation issued by Cornwallis on October 1749.