Wolfe, James, 1727–59, British soldier. After a distinguished record in European campaigns, he was made (1758) second in command to Jeffery Amherst in the last of the French and Indian Wars French and Indian Wars, 1689–1763, the name given by American historians to the North American colonial wars between Great Britain and France in the late 17th and the 18th cent.
..... Click the link for more information. . Through his skillful siege operations, he became a hero of the capture of Louisburg (1758) from the French, and he was rewarded with the command of an expedition against the French at Quebec, which he himself had urged. After frontal attacks on the positions of General Montcalm Montcalm, Louis Joseph de (mŏntkäm`, Fr. lwē zhôzĕf` də môNkälm`), 1712–59, French general.
..... Click the link for more information. at Quebec had failed, Wolfe took 5,000 men in boats down the St. Lawrence by night and forced an open battle with the French on the Plains of Abraham Abraham, Plains of, fairly level field adjoining the upper part of the city of Quebec, Canada. There, in 1759, the English under Gen. James Wolfe defeated the French under Gen. Louis Montcalm.
..... Click the link for more information. (Sept. 13, 1759). The British were victorious, but both Wolfe and Montcalm were killed. The battle was decisive in the fall of New France to the British. Wolfe is vividly portrayed in Thackeray's Virginians.

Bibliography

See biographies by C. Hibbert (1959) and D. R. Robin (1960); F. Parkman, Montcalm and Wolfe (1884); R. Howard, Wolfe at Quebec (1965).

Wolfe, James

James Wolfe, painting attributed to J.S.C. Schaak; in the National Portrait Gallery, London

(credit: Courtesy of the National Portrait Gallery, London)

(born Jan. 2, 1727, Westerham, Kent, Eng.—died Sept. 13, 1759, Quebec) British army commander. After a distinguished military career in Europe, in 1758 he helped lead Gen. Jeffery Amherst's successful expedition against the French on Cape Breton Island. In 1759 he was appointed commander of the British army on its mission to capture Quebec from the French. In the ensuing Battle of Quebec, he defeated the French in a battle lasting less than an hour. Wounded twice early in the battle, he died of a third wound, but not before he knew Quebec had fallen to his troops.