Joseph-François Hertel de la Fresnière ( fr, baptised 3 July 1642 - buried 22 May 1722) was a military officer of

New France New France (french: Nouvelle-France) was the area colonized by France in North America, beginning with the exploration of the Gulf of Saint Lawrence by Jacques Cartier in 1534 and ending with the cession of New France to Great Britain and Spa ...

. Born in

Trois-Rivières Trois-Rivières (, – 'Three Rivers') is a city in the Mauricie administrative region of Quebec, Canada, at the confluence of the Saint-Maurice and Saint Lawrence rivers, on the north shore of the Saint Lawrence River across from the city of ...

when it was a small frontier town to Jacques Hertel, Lord Hertel and Marie Marguerie, he grew up with the constant threat of military action against the

Iroquois The Iroquois ( or ), officially the Haudenosaunee ( meaning "people of the longhouse"), are an Iroquoian-speaking confederacy of First Nations peoples in northeast North America/ Turtle Island. They were known during the colonial years to ...

. Captured by the Iroquois in 1661, he was adopted by an old Iroquois woman, and spent as long as two years among them, learning their language and ways. He managed to escape and make his way home, where his family had thought him dead. He participated in numerous expeditions against the Iroquois, and assisted in the construction of

Fort Frontenac Fort Frontenac was a French trading post and military fort built in July 1673 at the mouth of the Cataraqui River where the St. Lawrence River leaves Lake Ontario (at what is now the western end of the La Salle Causeway), in a location traditio ...

. He was briefly imprisoned by French authorities on allegations of illegal fur trade in 1678. Upon the outbreak of

King William's War King William's War (also known as the Second Indian War, Father Baudoin's War, Castin's War, or the First Intercolonial War in French) was the North American theater of the Nine Years' War (1688–1697), also known as the War of the Grand All ...

in 1689, he was chosen by Governor Frontenac to lead an expedition in 1690 that successfully raided Salmon Falls on the Maine-New Hampshire border, and then contributed to the successful destruction of a settlement on Falmouth Neck (site of present-day

Portland, Maine Portland is the largest city in the U.S. state of Maine and the seat of Cumberland County. Portland's population was 68,408 in April 2020. The Greater Portland metropolitan area is home to over half a million people, the 104th-largest metropo ...

). Upon his return to Canada, he participated in the defense of

Quebec Quebec ( ; )According to the Canadian government, ''Québec'' (with the acute accent) is the official name in Canadian French and ''Quebec'' (without the accent) is the province's official name in Canadian English is one of the thirtee ...

when it was attacked by New England colonists under Sir

William Phips Sir William Phips (or Phipps; February 2, 1651 – February 18, 1695) was born in Maine in the Massachusetts Bay Colony and was of humble origin, uneducated, and fatherless from a young age but rapidly advanced from shepherd boy, to shipwright, s ...

. He married Marguerite de Thavenet on September 22, 1664, and had 15 children. Some of his sons, most famously

Jean-Baptiste Hertel de Rouville Jean-Baptiste Hertel de Rouville (26 October 1668 – 30 June 1722) was a colonial military officer of New France in the French Marines in Canada. He is best known in North America for leading the raid on Deerfield, in western Province of Mass ...

, followed him into military service, and the name Hertel became notorious in the English colonies because of their exploits. In 1716, after many years of requests by New France's governors on his behalf, he was elevated to local nobility. One of Hertel's sisters was Marguerite (b. August 26, 1649), who married Jean Crevier de Saint-François, in 1663.

References

''Biography at Dictionary of Canadian Biography''

{{DEFAULTSORT:Hertel de la Fresniere, Joseph Francois 1642 births 1722 deaths French military personnel of the Nine Years' War Military history of Acadia Military history of Canada Military history of New England Military history of Nova Scotia People of New France