The Rogue Isles: The Colonial Period

During the French & Indian War period, the islands became home to a number of settlers. At first, the French used the islands to house prisoners or for barracks for their soldiers and sailors. By 1756, thousands of settlers fleeing both Europe and the Americas came to the island to avoid the French and Indian / Seven Years War.

A decade later, the people of the Rogue Isles rebelled and claimed independence. In a move that stunned the French authorities, the Rogue Islanders signed a treaty of protection with England and effectively ended France’s claim.

And so the Rogue Isles became a haven, first for English privateers against the French, then privateers in general, and eventually for any pirate who was willing to pay the Gouverneur (the head of state). Close to the Americas, pirate trade and smuggling became the principal industries of the islands. The gouverneurs played a careful political game with one eye blind to the pirates while the other was perfectly willing to watch the hanging of an “example” – captains and crews whose deaths would satisfy an indignant England, France or Spain. With England as their original protector but French blood in their veins, the islands essentially became neutral, making whatever deal or agreement best left them to their own devices.

As the great age of piracy waned, the Enos regained strength. In 1810, the scattered survivors of the sect returned and revived their practices, though far more secretly. Using their esoteric skills they quickly moved into positions of power. It seemed there was no dark secret they couldn’t uncover or weak mind they could not dominate. In their hands, knowledge truly was power.

It is perhaps fortunate for the rest of the world that disaster struck before the Children of Enos could turn their attention to the outside world. On April 3 rd, 1833 an eruption shattered the nighttime calm. Over the course of the next few weeks, the previously un-volcanic main island of Grandville recoiled from ash, thunder, and fire as a mountain grew where none had been before. When it was all done, much of the old city was half-buried in ash. Lava flows had destroyed farmland and choked the harbor. Even more dramatic, Grandville was broken into four islands now known as Cap Au Diable, Port Oakes, Bloody Bay, and Grandville.

With the harbor half-choked and many of the island’s elites dead or fled, the islands sank into poverty and squalor. During the Civil War a small fleet of Confederate blockade-runners passed through the remains of the port, but other than that little changed in the Rogue Isles for almost 70 years.