But there------tears will flow-------there, when within the grasp of victory, he first received a ball through his wrist, which immediately wrapping up, he went on, with the same alacrity, animating his troops by precept and example: but, in a few minutes after, a second ball, through his body, obliged him to be carried off to a small distance in the rear, where roused from fainting in the last agonies by the sound of they run, he eagerly asked, “Who run?” and being told, the French, and that they were defeated, he said, “Then, I thank God; I die contented;” and almost instantly expired.
The Annual Register, or a View of the History, Politics, and Literature, for the Year 1759. (London: J. Dodsley, 1760) 282.
On 13 September 1759, French and British forces met in battle on the Plains of Abraham near Québec City. It was a decisive episode in the Seven Years’ War and changed the course of history in North America. The two military leaders, French General Marquis de Montcalm (1712-1759) and British General James Wolfe (1727-1759), both died from wounds suffered in the conflict. That the British prevailed and power in North America subsequently shifted has echoed down through history.
This exhibition features the last major painting of the subject, James Barry’s Death of General Wolfe (1776) and offers for comparison a number of other versions. All the works are selected from the New Brunswick Museum’s unparalleled collection of Wolfiana formed by Dr. John Clarence Webster.
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Death of General Wolfe, 1776
oil on canvas
Signed lower right, James Barry Pinxt.
Webster Canadiana Collection, W1987
© New Brunswick Museum, 2003 / Credits / Copyright