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September 13, 2009 marks the 250th anniversary of an event that continues to shape Canadian and Quebeçois national narratives: the Battle of the Plains of Abraham. Few events in continue to cause such debate and controversy, as has recently been witnessed by the cancellation of a reenactment of the battle to commemorate the events of 250 years ago.
This hour-long battle that culminated months of siege by the British on the French city of Quebec during the Seven Years’ War has become one of the defining moments of Canadian and Quebec history. While often seen as a foundational moment for what would eventually become Canada, Stephen Manning’s new book, Quebec: The Story of Three Sieges, argues that the battle has been misunderstood and unexamined from its larger historical context. This larger context includes the fact that the Plains of Abraham was not the last time Quebec City was the site of a major conflict: it was attacked by French forces in 1760 in an attempt to recapture the city; and was then put under siege once more during the American Revolutionary War in 1776. Canadian and Quebecois perspectives often seem to indicate that there was the battle in 1759 that ended it all, even when there is much more to the story. So, it is incorrect to remember the Battle of the Plains of Abraham as a French–British conflict that led to a Canada–Quebec conflict when the importance of Quebec's military past is to North America.
Although in the mid-eighteenth century, the fort had largely tactical importance, the city of Quebec had – by the time of the American Revolution – become the bastion of British forces in North America and central to the politics that would occur throughout the continent. Manning charts the political and military history of the city throughout the Seven Years’ War, the battle of St. Foy, and the eventual siege of Quebec by American revolutionary forces, in a thrilling narrative which offers an entirely new perspective of the history of North America. Perhaps by reconsidering the larger context of these battles it will be possible to move past some of the ongoing conflict and controversy of this anniversary.
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