The St. John River campaign occurred during the French and Indian War when Colonel Robert Monckton led a force of 1150 British soldiers to destroy the Acadian settlements along the banks of the Saint John River until they reached the largest village of Sainte-Anne des Pays-Bas (present day Fredericton, New Brunswick) in February 1759.

Then they moved up the river and raided Grimross (Arcadia, New Brunswick), Jemseg, and finally they reached Sainte-Anne des Pays-Bas.

During this time period Acadians participated in various militia operations against the British and maintained vital supply lines to the French Fortress of Louisbourg and Fort Beausejour.

[11] After the Conquest of Acadia (1710), Acadians migrated from peninsula Nova Scotia to the French-occupied Saint John River.

[11] On October 28, 1748, at the end of King George's War, the Acadians and Mi'kmaq prevented John Gorham from landing to acquire an oath of allegiance.

[13][14][15][16][17] In 1749, at the beginning of Father Le Loutre's War, Boishebert rebuked British naval officer John Rous at St.

In April 1755, while searching for a wrecked vessel at Port La Tour, Cobb discovered the French schooner Marguerite (Margarett), taking war supplies to the Saint John River for Boishebert at Fort Menagoueche.

De Boishebert knew that he faced a superior force so he burned the fort, however, he maintained control of the river through guerrilla warfare.

During the expulsion, the Saint John River valley became the center of the Acadian and Wabanaki Confederacy resistance to the British military in the region.

"[26] On February 8, 1756, Acadians ambushed a British vessel at the mouth of the Saint John River, forcing it to return to Port Royal.

As a result, Acadians fled these areas for the villages along the banks of the Saint John River, including the largest communities at Grimross (present day Arcadia, New Brunswick) and Sainte-Anne des Pays-Bas.

While Fort Menagoueche had been destroyed (1755), when the British arrived, a few militia members fired shots from the site and fled upstream in boats.

[28] Establishing Fort Frederick allowed the British to virtually cut off the communications and supplies to the villages on the Saint John River.

[29] Monckton was accompanied by the New England Rangers, which had three companies that were commanded by Joseph Goreham, Captain Benoni Danks and George Scott.

Boishébert directed Acadians to go to Quebec City, but many militiamen under Major Joseph Godin (Bellefontaine) chose to remain in Ste-Anne to defend their lands despite the English advances and numerical superiority.

[3] Monckton did not continue on to Sainte-Anne des Pays-Bas (present day Fredericton, New Brunswick) because of the impending winter.

Then, afraid of being trapped by the frozen river, he turned around at Maugerville and went back to Fort Frederick, and afterwards sailed for Halifax with thirty Acadian families as prisoners.

When the Acadians realized the British were going to continue their advance, most of them retreated to the Maliseet village at Aukpaque (Ecoupag) for protection.

[38] Godin's official statement to the French Crown states: The Sieur Joseph [Godin] Bellefontaine [Sieur de] Beauséjour of the Saint John River, son of Gabriel (officer aboard the king's vessels in Canada (in Acadie) and of Angélique-Roberte Jeanna), was major of all the Saint John River Militia by order of Monsieur de la Galissonnière, from the 10 April 1749 and always was in these functions during the said war until he was captured by the enemy, and he owns several leagues of land, where he had the grief to have seen the massacre of one of his daughters and her three children by the English, who wanted, out of cruelty and fear to force him to take their part ... he only escaped such a fate by his flight into the woods, carrying with him two other children of the daughter.

[46] The command at Fort Frederick was not convinced the village was totally destroyed and sent at least three more expeditions up river to Ste Anne between July and September 1759.

At present-day French Lake on the Oromocto River, on 8 September the Acadian militia ambushed the British rangers.

During this same winter, Quebec also suffered a famine and a smallpox epidemic broke out, killing over 300 Acadian refugees in the region.