Hudson Bay expedition

Hudson Bay expedition
Part of the American Revolutionary War
A French illustration of Prince of Wales Fort (1782)
Date August 8, 1782 Location Prince of Wales Fort and York Factory, Rupert's Land 58°47′49.77″N 94°12′48.34″W / 58.7971583°N 94.2134278°W / 58.7971583; -94.2134278 (Hudson Bay Expedition 1782: Prince of Wales Fort) Result French victory
Belligerents
France	Hudson's Bay Company
Commanders and leaders
Comte de Lapérouse	Samuel Hearne
Strength
1 ship of the line 2 frigates	2 trading posts 3 merchantmen
Casualties and losses
15 drowned ~85 died of illness	~100 captured 2 trading posts captured

The Hudson Bay expedition was a series of military raids on the fur trading outposts and fortifications of the British Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) on the shores of Hudson Bay by a French Navy squadron under the command of the Comte de Lapérouse. Setting sail from Cap-Français, Saint-Domingue in 1782, the expedition was part of a series of globe-spanning naval conflicts between France and Great Britain during the American Revolutionary War.

Operating under secret orders from Charles Eugène Gabriel de La Croix, the French Secretary of State of the Navy, Lapérouse and his squadron set sail from Cap-Français in May 1782, and arrived in the Hudson Bay in early August. Both Prince of Wales Fort and York Factory, two trading posts of the Hudson's Bay Company, surrendered without a fight to the French, though a HBC merchantman that evaded the French fleet spirited away some of the furs stored at York Factory.

Some of captured British prisoners were put on a company sloop and allowed to sail back to England, while others were pressed into service aboard the French squadron. Those serving on Lapérouse's squadron, which had sailed with minimal winter provisioning to maintain secrecy, suffered numerous hardships including scurvy and other diseases. The finances of the Hudson's Bay Company suffered due to the raid, which also indirectly contributed to the deaths of up to half of the Chipewyan fur traders who conducted business with the HBC.