Background
British General Jeffrey Amherst made plans for the 1759 military campaigns of the French and Indian War that included an expedition to capture Fort Niagara, a major French military and supply point between the French province of Canada and their forts in the Ohio Country. Amherst chose Brigadier General John Prideaux to lead the expedition, which was accompanied by Sir William Johnson, the British Indian agent who led the expedition's Iroquois forces. Prideaux arrived at Fort Niagara on July 6 and immediately began siege operations. On July 20, Prideaux was killed when struck by a shell fragment thrown from one of his own guns, and Sir William took over the siege operations.
Fort Niagara had been largely constructed under the direction of Captain Pierre Pouchot of the French Army. In early 1759, General Louis-Joseph de Montcalm and New France's Governor, the Marquis de Vaudreuil, sent him with about 2,500 men to fortify Niagara. About 500 men had wintered there. Pouchot, under orders from Vaudreuil, sent many of those men south to Fort Machault (later Fort Venango) in mid-June as part of a plan to reinforce the French forts of the Ohio Country and attack the British at Fort Pitt. When the British arrived on July 6, he immediately dispatched messages to the south, requesting support.
Captain Le Marchand de Lignery was organizing the French expedition against Fort Pitt from Fort Machault when Pouchot's appeal for help arrived on July 12. On that day, Lignery was trying to convince nearly 1,000 Indians to join in the planned attack against Fort Pitt. Johnson had sent messages to Fort Pitt, urging Indians there to join the British in attacking the French forts, and many Indians were unsure about which side to take. Lignery was able to rally support; when combined with forces under Charles Phillip Aubrey, a large force left Fort Machault for Niagara. Messengers he sent to Pouchot also leaked news of their advance to the besieging British, who prepared an ambush.
Before the action, the British native allies told their French counterparts that they intended to remain neutral in the upcoming clash. They wished that the French native allies would do likewise. This induced many of the French-allied Indians to desert.
Read more about this topic: Battle Of La Belle-Famille
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