The military history of the Mi'kmaq consisted primarily of Mi'kmaq warriors (smáknisk) who participated in wars against the English (the British after 1707) independently as well as in coordination with the Acadian militia and French royal forces. The Mi'kmaq militias remained an effective force for over 75 years before the Halifax Treaties were signed (1760–1761). In the nineteenth century, the Mi'kmaq "boasted" that, in their contest with the British, the Mi'kmaq "killed more men than they lost". In 1753, Charles Morris stated that the Mi'kmaq have the advantage of "no settlement or place of abode, but wandering from place to place in unknown and, therefore, inaccessible woods, is so great that it has hitherto rendered all attempts to surprise them ineffectual". Leadership on both sides of the conflict employed standard colonial warfare, which included scalping non-combatants (e.g., families). After some engagements against the British during the American Revolutionary War, the militias were dormant throughout the nineteenth century, while the Mi'kmaq people used diplomatic efforts to have the local authorities honour the treaties. After confederation, Mi'kmaq warriors eventually joined Canada's war efforts in World War I and World War II. The most well-known colonial leaders of these militias were Chief (Sakamaw) Jean-Baptiste Cope and Chief Étienne Bâtard.
16th century
Battle at Bae de Bic According to Jacques Cartier, the Battle at Bae de Bic happened in the spring of 1534, 100 Iroquois warriors massacred a group of 200 Mi'kmaq camped on Massacre Island in the St. Lawrence River. Bae de Bic was an annual gathering place for the Mi'kmaq along the St. Lawrence. Mi'kmaq scouting parties notified the village of the Iroquois attack the evening before the morning attack. They evacuated 30 of the infirm and elderly and about 200 Mi'kmaq left their encampment on the shore and retreated to an island in the bay. They took cover in a cave on the island and covered the entrance with branches. The Iroquois arrived at the village in the morning. Finding it vacated, they divided into search parties but failed to find the Mi'kmaq until the morning of the next day.
The Mi'kmaq warriors defended the tribe against the first Iroquois assault. Initially, after many had been wounded on both sides, with the rising tide, the Mi'kmaq were able to repulse the assault and the Iroquois retreated to the mainland. The Mi'kmaq prepared a fortification on the island in preparation for the next assault at low tide. The Iroquois were again repulsed and retreated to the mainland with the rising tide. By the following morning, the tide was again low and the Iroquois made their final approach. They had prepared arrows that carried fire which burned down the fortification and wiped out the Mi'kmaq. Twenty Iroquois were killed and thirty wounded in the battle. The Iroquois divided into two companies to return to their canoes on the Bouabouscache River.Cartier, second voyage, CL, IXÎle du Massacre, Rimouski, QC : Battle between Mi'kmaq and Iroquois c. 1534
Battle at Bouabouscache River
Just prior to Battle at Bae de Bic, the Iroquois warriors had left their canoes and hid their provisions on the Bouabousche River, which the Mi'kmaq scouts had discovered and recruited assistance from 25 Maliseet warriors. The Mi'kmaq and Maliseet militia ambushed the first company of Iroquois to arrive at the site. They killed ten and wounded five of the Iroquois warriors before the second company of Iroquois arrived and the Mi'kmaq/Maliseet militia retreated to the woods unharmed.
The Mi'kmaq/Maliseet militia had stolen most of the Iroquois canoes. Leaving twenty wounded behind at the site, 50 Iroquois went to find their hidden provisions. Unable to find their supplies, at the end of the day they returned to the camp, finding that the 20 wounded soldiers that had stayed behind had been slaughtered by the Mi'kmaq/Maliseet militia. The following morning, the 38 Iroquois warriors left their camp, killing twelve of their own wounded who would not be able to survive the long journey back to their village. Ten of the Mi'kmaq/Maliseet stayed with the stolen canoes and provisions while the remaining 15 pursued the Iroquois. The Mi'kmaq/Maliseet militia pursued the Iroquois for three days, killing eleven of the wounded Iroquois stragglers.
Battle at Riviere Trois Pistoles
Shortly after the Battle at Bouabouscache River, the retreating Iroquois set up camp on the Riviere Trois Pistoles to build canoes to return to their village. An Iroquois hunting party was sent to hunt for food. The Mi'kmaq/Maliseet militia killed the hunting party. The Iroquois went to find their missing hunting party and were ambushed by the Mi'kmaq/Maliseet militia. They killed nine of the Iroquois, leaving 29 warriors who retreated to their camp on Riviere Trois Pistoles. The Mi'kmaq/Maliseet militia divided into two companies and attacked the remaining Iroquois warriors. The battle left 3 Maliseet warriors dead and many others wounded. The Mi'kmaq/Maliseet militia was victorious, however, killing all but six of the Iroquois, whom they took prisoner and later tortured and killed. (Cartier, second voyage, CL, IX)
Kwedech–Mi'kmaq War Tradition indicates that there was war in the 16th century between the Kwedech (the St. Lawrence Iroquois) and the Mi'kmaq. The great Mi'kmaq chief Ulgimoo led his people. The conflict was eventually settled through a peace treaty after the Mi'kmaq were successful in removing the Kwedech out of the Maritimes.p.46 p.51
17th century A subgroup of Mi'kmaq who lived in New England were known as Tarrantines. The Tarrantines sent 300 warriors to kill Nanepashemet and his wife in 1619 at Mystic Fort. The remaining family had been sent off to safe haven. Nanapashemet's death ended the Massachusetts Federation.
Tarrantine War Before 1620, the Penobscot-Tarrantine War (1614–1615) (Tarrantine being the New England term for Mi'kmaq) happened in current day Maine, in which the Pawtucket Tribe supported the former. This led later to retaliatory raids by the Tarrantines on the Pawtucket and Agawam (Ipswich) Tribes.
In 1633, Tarrantines raided the camp of Chief Masconomet at Agawam in Essex County.
King Philip's War The first documented warfare between the Mi'kmaq and the British was during the First Abenaki War (the Maine/Acadia theatre of King Philip's War), which was the Battle of Port La Tour (1677). In the wake of King Philip's War, the Mi'kmaq became members of the Wapnáki (Wabanaki Confederacy), an alliance with four other Algonquian-language nations: the Abenaki, Penobscot, Passamaquoddy, and Maliseet.
The Wabanaki Confederacy allied with French colonists in Acadia. Over a period of seventy-five years, during six wars in Mi'kma'ki (Acadia and Nova Scotia), the Mi'kmaq fought to keep the British from taking over the region. The first war where there is evidence of widespread participation of the Mi'kmaq militias was King William's War.Prins, Harald E.L. The Mi'kmaq: Resistance, Accommodation and Cultural Survival, Fort Worth (Texas): Harcourt Brace, 1996, pp.123-129.
King William's War
During King William's War, the Mi'kmaq militia participated in defending against the British migration toward Mi'kmaki. They fought, with the support of their Wabanaki and French allies, the British along the Kennebec River in southern Maine which was the natural boundary between Acadia and New England. Toward this end, the Mi'kmaq militia and the Maliseet operated from their headquarters at Meductic on the Saint John River. They joined the New France expedition against present-day Bristol, Maine (the siege of Pemaquid), Salmon Falls and present-day Portland, Maine. Mi'kmaq tortured the British prisoners taken during these conflicts and the Battle of Fort Loyal. In response, the New Englanders retaliated by attacking Port Royal and present-day Guysborough. In 1692, Mi'kmaq from across the region participated in the Raid on Wells. In 1694, the Maliseet participated in the Raid on Oyster River at present-day Durham, New Hampshire.
Two years later, New France, led by Pierre Le Moyne d'Iberville, returned and fought a naval battle in the Bay of Fundy before moving on to raid Bristol, Maine again. In the lead up to this battle in Fundy Bay, on 5 July, 140 natives (Mi'kmaq and Maliseet), with Jacques Testard de Montigny and Chevalier, from their location of Manawoganish island, ambushed the crews of four English vessels. Some of the English were coming ashore in a long boat to get firewood. A native killed five of the nine men in the boat. The Mi'kmaq burned the vessel under the direction of Father Florentine (missionary to the Micmacs at Chignectou).
In retaliation for the siege of Pemaquid that followed, the New Englanders, led by Benjamin Church, engaged in a Raid on Chignecto and the siege of the capital of Acadia at Fort Nashwaak. After the siege of Pemaquid, d'Iberville led a force of 124 Canadians, Acadians, Mi'kmaq, and Abenaki in the Avalon Peninsula Campaign. They destroyed almost every English settlement in Newfoundland, over 100 English were killed, many times that number captured, and almost 500 deported to England or France.
18th century
Queen Anne's War
During Queen Anne's War, the Mi'kmaq militias participated again in defending Mi'kmaki against the migration of the British into the region. Again, they made numerous raids along the Acadia/ New England border. They made numerous raids on New England settlements along the border in the Northeast Coast Campaign. In retaliation for the Mi'kmaq militia raids (and the Raid on Deerfield), Major Benjamin Church went on his fifth and final expedition to Acadia. He raided present-day Castine, Maine and then continued on by conducting raids against Grand Pre, Pisiquid and Chignecto. In the summer of 1705, Mi'kmaq killed a fisherman gathering "wood off Cape Sables." A few years later, defeated in the siege of Pemaquid, Captain March made an unsuccessful siege on the Capital of Acadia, Port Royal (1707). The New Englanders were successful with the siege of Port Royal, while the Wabanaki Confederacy were successful in the nearby Battle of Bloody Creek in 1711.
During Queen Anne's War, the Conquest of Acadia (1710) was confirmed by the Treaty of Utrecht of 1713. Acadia was defined as mainland-Nova Scotia by the French. Present-day New Brunswick and most of Maine remained contested territory, while New England conceded Île St Jean and Île Royale; present-day Prince Edward Island and Cape Breton respectively, as French territory. On the latter island, the French established a fortress at Louisbourg to guard the sea approaches to Quebec. In 1712, the Mi'kmaq captured over twenty New England fishing vessels off the coast of Nova Scotia.
In 1715, the Mi'kmaq were told that the British now claimed their ancient territory by the Treaty of Utrecht, in which the Mi'kmaq were not involved. They formally complained to the French commander at Louisbourg about the French king transferring the sovereignty of their nation when he did not possess it. They were only then informed that the French had claimed legal possession of their country for a century, on account of laws decreed by kings in Europe.