Just as the little French Colony on Saint-Christophe was beginning to stabilize, on September 6, 1629, the Spanish Fleet, under the command of Don Fadrique de Toledo, arrived off shore at Basse Terre, Saint-Christophe, with 15 war frigates.
The Spanish fired a salvo to salute the French and then sent an emissary under a flag of truce. Du Roissey, the French Commander at Basse Terre, believing that the Spanish were attacking, replied by firing on the fleet.
Don Fadrique de Toledo had first stopped at Nevis, where he had captured all the English ships, burning and sinking them. He had accomplished this with such ease that he had felt the French on Saint-Christophe would not resist either.
After firing on the Spanish Fleet, Du Roissey sent to Edward Warner and to d'Esnambuc for reenforcements. From d"Esnambuc, 100 men were sent and from Warner, about 800 men were sent. All during the night barricades were set up.
A young nephew of d"Esnambuc, Simon Dyel du Parquet, asked permission to attack the Spanish. Du Parquet was soon wounded gravely. Young du Parquet was rescued by a Spanish Officer and taken to the flagship of Don Fadrique, where he was given medical assistance by the ship's doctor. However his wounds were so severe that he died within a short time.
When du Parquet died, he was buried with military honors by the Spanish, who greatly admired the young man's courage and bravery.
Du Roissey and all his officers abandoned the attack, got into a boat and hurried to safety, leaving the rest of the men to save themselves as best they could.
The Spanish ordered both the English and the French to vacate the island. To avoid a massacre of his people, d'Esnambuc, the French governor of Saint-Christophe, made an agreement with Don Fadrique whereby he, d'Esnambuc would leave Saint-Christophe with all his colonists, in two ships. The French settlers now numbered about 400 persons, total.
The English also agreed to leave but when the time came to leave, many of the English fled to the hills. The Spanish captured about 700 of the English, men and boys whom they took as prisoners to Cartagena. The Spanish also captured some of the English ships.
The rest of the English were able to sail away. The men and boys, who escaped, hid in the hills until the Spanish left.
The Spanish Admiral, Don Fadrique, expressed his regrets to d'Esnambuc over the death of young du Parquet. D'Esnambu, noble that he was, respected the agreement, which he had signed with Don Fadrique and he set sail for the island of Antigua.
It was September the time of the hurricanes and it happened that a terrible storm beset the two ships of d'Esnambuc and drove them to the island of Saint-Martin. The French had left in a hurry and had not taken sufficient supplies. What supplies they did take were damaged in the storm. On Saint-Martin, they waited out the storm.
As soon as the weather was somewhat more calm du Roissey,in a panic, seized one of the ships and forced the captain to sail to France. When the seized ship arrived in France, the captain reported to the authorities about the seizure of the ship and about the condition of the colony and its inhabitants. Du Roissey was ordered put in the Bastille and that was the end of his career.
On Saint-Martin, seeing that his 400 colonists could not fit in one ship, d'Esnambuc left some of them on Saint-Martin, took some others to the island of Anguilla and others he left on the tiny island of Saint-Barthelemy, promising to return for them as soon as possible.
D'Esnambuc then sailed to Antigua with the rest of the colonists. He wanted to see if there was any possibility of starting a settlement on that island. On Antigua, d'Esnambuc met Captain Giron, who had come to the islands with Cahuzac. Captain Giron agreed to help d'Esnambuc with the refugees and promptly helped them get to Montserrat, where they remained while Giron went to Saint-Christophe to survey the situation.
That is how it happened that in September, 1629, for the very first time, a group of French settlers was established on the island of Saint-Barthelemy.
