In accordance with this Colonel Monckton was instructed to prepare for an expedition against Beausejour and St John in the spring of 1755. He was given for the purpose a letter of unlimited credit on Boston; and every regiment in Nova Scotia was brought up to the strength of one thousand men. By May the expedition was ready. Monckton, with two thousand troops, embarked at Annapolis Royal, and by June 1 the expedition was at Chignecto. In the meantime Vergor, the French commandant at Beausejour, had not been passive. He had strengthened his defences, had summoned the inhabitants of the surrounding districts to his help, had mounted cannon in a blockhouse defending the passage of the river, and had thrown up a strong breastwork of timber along the shore. On June 3 the British landed. They had little difficulty in driving the French from their entrenchments. The inhabitants had no heart in the work of defence; and the French, unable to make a stand, threw their cannon into the river and burned the blockhouse and other buildings. They then retired to the fort, together with about two hundred and twenty of the Acadians; the rest of the Acadians threw away their arms and ammunition, asserting that they did not wish to be hanged. The British took up a position in the woods about a mile and a half from the fort; and on the 13th they succeeded in establishing a battery on a hill within easy range. The bombardment of the place, which began the next day, was at first ineffective; and for a time the British were driven back. But, in the meantime, news reached the French that no reinforcements could be expected from Louisbourg; and such disaffection arose among the Acadians that they were forbidden by a council of war to deliberate together or to desert the fort under pain of being shot. When the British renewed the attack, however, the Acadians requested Vergor to capitulate; and he feebly acquiesced. The British offered very favourable terms. So far as the Acadians were concerned, it was proposed that, since they had taken up arms under threat of death, they were to be pardoned and allowed to return to their homes and enjoy the free exercise of their religion. The soldiers of the garrison were sent as prisoners to Halifax. After the fall of Beausejour, which Monckton renamed Fort Cumberland, the British met with little further resistance. Fort Gaspereau on Baie Verte, against which Monckton next proceeded, was evacuated by the commandant Villeray, who found himself unable to obtain the assistance of the Acadians. And the few Acadians at the river St John, when Captain Rous appeared before the settlement with three ships, made an immediate submission. Rous destroyed the cannon, burned the fort, and retired with his troops up the river. The Indians of the St John, evidently impressed by the completeness of the British success and awed by their strong force, invited Rous to come ashore, and assured him of their friendliness.