Why did Great Britain expend so many resources in 1776 to secure Quebec?

Quick question all?

Why, in 1776 when Great Britain was sending a massive invasion force across the Atlantic (one of the great logitical triumpths in that era), did they send nearly 1/3 of the army to Canada?

The US forces invading from the south were effectively beaten the previous winter of 1775 in the Battle of Quebec and were retreating to Montreal and would soon retreat back into New York. Adding 10,000 British soldiers to this northern garrison seemed to be overkill especially when the main rebellion was to the south.

Many of these soldiers would be captured a year later after the ill-planned and ill-advised Burgoyne expedition at the battle of Saratoga but why were these soldiers stationed in Canada in the first place?

The British could have used another 10K soldiers to stifle the rebellion in the south, to nip it in the bud.

Was it overconfidence, the belief that the British forces sent to New York in 1776 were adequate to force a peace?

Was it that there was some massive resources in Canada that Britain desperately wanted to protect (timber, grain)?

Was it that Quebec was a monster fortress and it was better to preserve it now than have to retake later by force?

Were they afraid of a French invasion that would receive support of the still largely French population of Canada?

Was it just because that was one of the few toeholds in North America that Britain had left and sent soldiers there for that reason?

Any ideas?
 
I've wondered on this question for years. I think your reasons are fairly good ones, but obviously that still says nothing about their decision making process.
 
The Saint Lawrence River allowed them easy access to all of the Great Lakes and it was only a short portage (south of Chicago) to the head-waters of the Mississippi River.
 
The Saint Lawrence River allowed them easy access to all of the Great Lakes and it was only a short portage (south of Chicago) to the head-waters of the Mississippi River.

Which matters very much if you think the Spanish are a greater threat than the colonists, but I don't think they did.
 
Which matters very much if you think the Spanish are a greater threat than the colonists, but I don't think they did.

Control of the Great Lakes is effective control of all of Canada to the west and can exert a great influence on control of the midwest. It is not just the Colonists that would have to take you seriously if you controlled those waters but they would be among the people who did as they have a wide open western frontier. Awkward to invade but vulnerable to raids.
 
The Saint Lawrence River allowed them easy access to all of the Great Lakes and it was only a short portage (south of Chicago) to the head-waters of the Mississippi River.

True, but this territory was still very lightly populated and the once valuable fur trade was dying off.

Was Quebec financially as valuable as the large grain producers of the northern and middle states or the tobacco and cotton producers (with the tax revenues accrued) of the south?


And note that Spain was in charge of the Mississippi at this time so it isn't as if Britain (or later America) had unrestricted use.
 
I think it was a two-fold reaction. First Quebec City was a near miss from the British perspective and they did lose Montreal however short-lived. Perhaps they did not want to suffer defeat from such a rag-tag army.

Secondly, in 1776 they had NYC and coming down through Lake Champlain and on to the Hudson they would separate New England from the other colonies. Once New England was tamed they could turn their attention south where there was more Loyalist sentiment (excepting Virgina).
 
Read up...

The History of the Hudson's Bay Company. Their fur trade kept going into the 1900s. And they traded/controlled in Oregon/Washington (The Oregon Territory) only to be evicted by a daft map draughtsman! The Washingtonians still have a wish to be Canadian, apparently...:D
 
I think it was a two-fold reaction. First Quebec City was a near miss from the British perspective and they did lose Montreal however short-lived. Perhaps they did not want to suffer defeat from such a rag-tag army.

True, but Britain had been beaten by a rag tag army in every state from Massachusetts to South Carolina in 1775-76. This doesn't seem overly different.

Secondly, in 1776 they had NYC and coming down through Lake Champlain and on to the Hudson they would separate New England from the other colonies. Once New England was tamed they could turn their attention south where there was more Loyalist sentiment (excepting Virgina).

I'm not sure if this strategy was the assumption in 1776. I think Britain believed that the rebels would surrender or get crushed by the army landing in New York. I think no one had expected there to BE a campaign of 1777 much less anything as complex as what you describe. If fact, it was Burgoyne, after he returned in winter of 1776/77 that proposed this expedition.
 
The History of the Hudson's Bay Company. Their fur trade kept going into the 1900s. And they traded/controlled in Oregon/Washington (The Oregon Territory) only to be evicted by a daft map draughtsman! The Washingtonians still have a wish to be Canadian, apparently...:D

Yes, the company was in existance but was Hudson Bay really central to it at this time in 1900?

Note that the company's fortunes were revivied partially by eventually claiming the Oregon/British Columbia trade but that came later than 1800. The company also prospered by diversifying.

I don't think the fur trade was significant in 1900.
 
Suggest you check Google...

...The Wikipedia entry for the Hudson's Bay Company indicates it had a sometimes contested fur trading monopoly up to the mid-nineteenth century, long after the seizure of Quebec and those revolting Colonials. So I think you should read the item. 1900 might be late for beaver, but fur trading in Canada was not ended. The HBC is sometimes referred to as the supermarket with a Twin Otter, but that does not decry its earlier achievements and importance.

Canada was where the British Empire Loyalists held out against the USA, so I have a lot of respect for them and their Maple Leaf. The forces holding onto Canada may have been needed to prevent the kind of trouble that later erupted in 1812 when the USA went north and burnt Toronto. Just my tuppence-worth. I suggest Ming 777 might be worth PM.
 
was it the best spot to land?



the empire was canada (which we now consider a separate country) all the way to Georgia. the issue was NY and immediate south,. you've got a foreign population in your northern zone. the southern zone is relatively secure.

the north is your bread zone. the center another bread zone but the trouble area. the south mostly looks pretty on a map.

OTL, the northern zone stayed loyal. it's questionable whether it would have if Britain played things differently. different play of power might have lead to losing canada too Probably not, but you need hindsight to say it with certainty.

they landed troops where it was safe, and where they could psychologically dissuade further revolt.
 

Japhy

Banned
First off the Battle of Quebec was a hell of a close run thing, in addition, the defeat of the Americans at Quebec didn't immediately secure the release of territories in the colony under Patriot occupation, someone had to take back Montreal.

Secondly there is the issue of Geography. Because of the St. Lawrence and Champlain Valleys, Quebec is a major point into the interior of North America, even with the regions lightly populated there's plenty of reason to want to secure it, it only to deny it as an area of operations for your enemy, there was a big worry that a Colonial Rebellion could drag on for some time inland.

Then there's the fact that Quebec offers avenues of attack. In 1776 there was an attempt to attack the colonies from Canada via the construction of a fleet on Lake Champlain, which was only stopped due to Benedict Arnold creating the issues of a Fleet-in-Being at Whitehall, which he then threw into action and completely lost at the battle of Valcour Island, but even in defeat the result was drastic, as the delays needed in building up a fleet to beat Arnold meant that there would be no attack until the next year. That said, not sending that army to the region at all would have mean besides not liberating all of Canada that there wouldn't be the ability to apply pressure on the rebels from the north.

Its worth realizing that in 1776 because of the threat of those British troops in Canada that Fort Ticonderoga became the third largest city in the colonies, with a massive force established there that wasn't able to come to the aid of Washington in New York City and New Jersey.

Add to that the issues of the Fur Trade, the fact that the Ohio Country was then part of Quebec, the fact that holding Quebec city meant the continued holding of *all of that* in the short term, and there's a Political advantage (Building up the Loyalist base in Quebec), there's a military advantage (major pressure on one of and the continued division of the two major Patriot Armies), and there's an economic advantage (Which is true, and there are plenty of sources for it) to landing troops in Canada.

Frankly considering how the New York-New Jersey-Pennsylvania Theater of 1775-1778 went, and considering how much of Burgoyne's Army would only arrive in Canada in 1777, the deployment of troops to Quebec in '76 was probably one of the best strategic moves the British made in the whole damn war in the colonies. New York City had to be guarded at massive costs as a base of operations, Quebec would never be threatened for the rest of the war, and would allow for both the near collapse of the Colonial cause in New York in 1777 and continued pressure and losses by the United States until the end of the war in the North, at far far less a cost then the deployments in New York City or the Southern campaign.
 

Japhy

Banned
I'm not sure if this strategy was the assumption in 1776. I think Britain believed that the rebels would surrender or get crushed by the army landing in New York. I think no one had expected there to BE a campaign of 1777 much less anything as complex as what you describe. If fact, it was Burgoyne, after he returned in winter of 1776/77 that proposed this expedition.

No, even in 1776 British leadership hoped that control of the line between New York and Montreal, which is all water except for a minor portage between Lake George and the Hudson River would secure the majority of the colonies from "radical" New England.

The Howe brothers came to America hoping to oversee a Whiggish negotiation after a major victory in the New York area, yes, but it was not nearly so weak a plan as a "One hard kick and the rotten structure collapses" gig you seem to be assuming it was. Even then the thought was that defeat of the Colonial Armies needed to be a major, broad operation, thats why part of their force also headed down to Charleston to try and take that city in 1776 too.

In a way the British policy of 1776 was much the same as it would be under the "Burgoyne Plan" and under the eventual Southern Strategy: Secure Canada, Secure the Southern and Middle Colonies, and isolate New England, in the hope that Loyalists in each region would isolate the New Englanders, and under isolation and in the face of defeat the colonies of New England would see reason and negotiate.

Really the only deviation from this line in the whole war was when General Howe, decided in the second half of 1777 to go for Philadelphia.
 
OK, thanks all.

The general consensus is that the British strategy of taking the Hudson Valley had merit.

I've never been a big believer in this as I see it as geographically difficult and a huge expenditure of resources that could have been added to a general assault from New York, but most respondants have disagreed.

I'm working on a series of amateur novels and that was a sticking point.
 
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