Actual operations in this last struggle between the French and the English for the possession of the Lakes began in 1756, when De Lery and De Villier set out with some six hundred men to capture Oswego and other forts. On the Onondaga River, De Villier encountered Bradstreet and his English and was completely defeated, more than a hundred of his men being killed. Meanwhile, from Fort Frontenac, General Montcalm was preparing to descend upon Oswego, and on the ninth of August, 1756, he arrived in sight of the English stronghold with three thousand men under his command. On the twelfth the battle began. From the beginning it was a surprise to both combatants. The victory of the French was comparatively easy and complete. The English loss was one hundred and fifty killed and wounded. Nearly two thousand prisoners were taken, one hundred and twenty cannon and mortars, six war vessels, and an immense amount of stores and ammunition. The blow was a terrific one for the English. Oswego had been their Gibraltar. In it were their shipbuilding yard, nearly all of their heavy ordnance, and a large part of the stores that were to supply them during the war. For the first time, the English realised what a terrible loss they had sustained in the breaking of the power of the Five Nations.
[Illustration: Monument at Put-in-Bay in Memory of the British and Americans who Died in the Battle of Lake Erie.]
It was not until 1758 that the English regained a little of their lost prestige. Everywhere the French had been victorious. But, in the summer of this year, Colonel Bradstreet attacked Fort Frontenac with thirty-five hundred men, and after two days of battle the garrison surrendered. This was as decisive a blow to the French as was the loss of Oswego to the English. Ten thousand barrels of supplies, nearly a hundred cannon, and five vessels were destroyed. The French now saw that the beginning of the end was at hand. Little Fort Niagara was burned the following year to keep it from falling into the hands of their enemies, and a little later Fort Niagara surrendered. At this time French reinforcements were on their way to Niagara, but hearing of the fall of this last stronghold the ships which bore them were destroyed at the northern end of Grand Island, in a bay which from that time has been known as Burnt Ship Bay, and at the bottom of which, until a comparatively short time ago, the remains of the old vessels were plainly to be seen. With the fall of Montreal in 1760, the last flag of the French passed from the Great Lakes. Their warships were scuttled, their forts in the North surrendered, and within a few months England was everywhere supreme along the Inland Seas.