General John Winslow The father of Winslow, Maine

General John Winslow

The father of Winslow, Maine

by Charles Francis

One of the saddest tales in the history of North America. has its origins in the year 1755. It is the tale made famous by Longfellow in his epic poem Evangeline. It is the removal of the Acadians from Grand Pre, an event which John Winslow, the officer in command of the forces whose responsibility it was, regretted having to carry out.

Everyone who has read Evangeline is familiar with the little church at Grand Pre where the men of the village were told to gather for an address by an army officer. In the poem, as in the actual event, the Acadian men gather in the church as ordered. When they are all there, they are addressed by the officer, who is John Winslow. Then they are sealed inside, under guard, until it is time for them to be loaded on ships which will transport them from their homes forever.

It is a sad story. One which presents the officer in charge, John Winslow, as something of a fiend. Few know that Winslow regretted having to carry out his orders. Fewer still realize that it was this same John Winslow who had command of the Kennebec when Fort Western and Fort Halifax were built, or that the town of Winslow is named in his honor.

John Winslow was born in 1703 in Marshfield, Massachusetts, which he made his home for most of his life. He was a great-grandson of Edward Winslow, one of the Pilgrims who made the crossing on the Mayflower, and a governor of the Plymouth Colony. Winslow’s occupation was that of a professional soldier. The first action he saw was in the 1740 to 1748 War of Austrian Succession. During that conflict, Winslow was captain of a Massachusetts militia company sent to Cuba as part of a major British action against the Spanish. Following this indoctrination into the military, Winslow’s family managed to get him a commission as a regular British army officer — a rare occurrence for a “colonial.”

Winslow’s first duty as a British officer saw him stationed at Annapolis Royal in Nova Scotia from 1748 to 1751, where the Britsh were maintaining a holding action against superior French forces. In 1751 he went off active duty and returned to Massachusetts to serve as a military advisor to Gover-

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nor William Shirley, who made him a major-general.

In 1754 Winslow was placed in command of eight hundred men by Shirley and sent to the Kennebec, as it was feared that the French and their Indian allies in Quebec were about to launch a major attack. Winslow had under his command Joseph Frye, who was to found the town of Fryeburg, and William Lithgow, who would play an important role in the founding of the town of Winslow. It was at this time that Fort Western and Fort Halifax were constructed.

Early in 1755 Governor Shirley placed Winslow, as a colonel, in command of a Massachusetts expedition to fight the French in Nova Scotia. Winslow raised most of the two thousand men himself, a fact which stands as a tribute to his reputation in Massachusetts at that time. Arriving in Nova Scotia, Winslow fell under the orders of British Governor Lawrence.

On September 5, 1755 Winslow issued the infamous order for all of the male inhabitants of Grand Pre to gather in the village church. Winslow’s address to the Acadian men went, in part, as follows:

“The duty I am now upon, though necessary, is very disagreeable to my natural make and temper...” He then went on to say, “I deliver to you His Majesty’s instructions and commands which are that your lands and tenements and cattle and livestock of all kinds are forfeited to the crown, with all your other effects, except money and household goods, and that you yourselves are to be removed from this province.”

Five days later the first of the Acadians were loaded onto ships for transport from Nova Scotia.

Following the expulsion of the Acadians from Nova Scotia, Winslow returned to Massachusetts. In 1757 he led a Massachusetts force in the campaign to gain control of Crown Point in New York. When the overall expedition failed due to the ineptitude of British commanders, Winslow left the military. He went on to serve several terms in the Massachusetts Legislature and as Chief Justice of the Court of Common Pleas for Plymouth County. He died in 1774 in Hingham.

Permanent settlers began coming to what would become the town of Winslow in 1764. Originally the town was known as Kingfield, and included what is now Waterville as well as a part of Oakland. The town was incorporated as Winslow in 1771. In 1802 Waterville was set off from it, mainly because there was no bridge across the Kennebec to connect the two sections of the town.

Today the town of Winslow stands as a tribute to General John Winslow, the man who fortified the upper Kennebec from attack. Winslow’s own words at the time of the expulsion of the Acadians from Grand Pre stand as a testament to his character.

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