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From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Louisbourg_(1745)_
The Siege of Louisbourg took place in 1745 when a New England colonial force aided by a British fleet captured Louisbourg, the capital of the French province of Île-Royale (present-day Cape Breton Island) during the War of the Austrian Succession, known as King George's War in the British colonies.
1745, the governor of the Province of Massachusetts Bay, William Shirley, secured by a narrow margin the support of the Massachusetts legislature for an attack on the fortress. He and the governor of the Province of New Hampshire, Benning Wentworth, sought the support of other colonies. Connecticut provided 500 troops, New Hampshire 450, Rhode Island a ship, New York ten cannon, and Pennsylvania and New Jersey funds. .. The expedition set sail from Boston in stages beginning in early March 1745 with 4,200 soldiers and sailors aboard a total of 90 ships.
Except for a small party led by Pierre Morpain, the fortress' naval commander, the landing on May 11 of the New England colonial forces and advance on the fortress went unopposed. The French were not helped by the fact that the government in Paris had advance knowledge of the New Englanders' intentions to attack, but the decision was made not to augment defences or send reinforcements. The French defenders were seriously outmanned, and Duchambon's distrust of his troops and fears that they would desert led him to keep his soldiers within the walls of the fortress rather than confronting the colonial forces at the landing site. The French defenders of the strategically important Island Battery successfully stopped several assaults, inflicting heavy losses on the New England troops. However, the New Englanders eventually established gun batteries at Lighthouse Point that commanded the island, leading to its abandonment by its defenders.
On June 15, French and native reinforcements led by Paul Marin were prevented from reaching Louisbourg in the Naval battle off Tatamagouche.[7] The New Englanders' landward siege was supported by Commodore Warren's fleet and, following 47 days (6 weeks and 5 days) of siege and bombardment, the French capitulated on June 28, 1745.
News of the victory reached Governor Shirley in Boston on July 3 which, coincidentally, was commencement day at Harvard (usually a day of celebration in itself). All of New England celebrated the taking of France's mighty fortress on the Atlantic.