Ranger Raid

The Legendary Robert Rogers and His Most Famous Frontier Battle

Phillip Thomas Tucker

• Publisher: Stackpole Books
• Year: 2021
• Topic: History
• eBook ISBN:
  9780811769716
• Subtopic: Early American History
• Index: History

A figure of legendary, almost mythic proportions, Robert Rogers is widely considered the father of U.S. Army Rangers. He gained his fame during the French and Indian War, fighting in the American and Canadian wilderness for the British colonies and the English Empire against the French and Indians, but a decade later, during the Revolution, he was almost a man without a country. During the American Revolution, George Washington didn’t trust him—indeed, he had Rogers arrested in 1776—nor did the British, who, desperate, gave him a command anyway, and Rogers was pivotal in arresting and executing American spy Nathan Hale. However, Rogers' saga begins in the French and Indian War in what was a true American Odyssey.

Ranger Raid digs deep into Rogers’ most controversial battle: the raid on St. Francis in Canada during the French and Indian War. On October 4, 1759, Rogers and 140 Rangers raided the Native American town of St. Francis, Canada, as part of British general Jeffery Amherst’s plan to gain intelligence in the St. Lawrence region. At the time, and for many decades thereafter, this was seen as a great victory—but now it seems like more of a massacre.

Phillip Thomas Tucker refreshes this story, combining the biography of Robert Rogers, the history of his Rangers, and the history of the native peoples in this region, to tell a new story of the St. Francis raid and its influence in the French and Indian War, the Revolutionary War, and ever after.

Table of contents

• Introduction
• Chapter 1: America’s First and Bloodiest Frontier
• Chapter 2: Quebec’s Infamous Jesuit Missionary Town of St. Francis
• Chapter 3: The Most Audacious Raid of the French and Indian War
• Chapter 4: Final Preparations for the Odyssey North to St. Francis
• Chapter 5: Relying on the Stealth of New England’s Sturdy Whaleboats
• Chapter 6: Rogers Determined to Fulfill His Special Destiny in the St. Francis River Country
• Chapter 7: Final Nighttime Approach to the Most Tempting of Targets
• Chapter 8: The Long Retreat That Became a Living Nightmare
• Chapter 9: Enduring Questions and Controversies to This Day
• Epilogue
• Notes
• About the Author