Editing Samuel de Champlain (section)

==Founding of Quebec==
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[[File:Plaque commemorative samuel de champlain honfleur.jpg|thumb|Plaque in [[Honfleur]] commemorating Champlain's departures]]
[[File:Samuel de Champlain arrive à Québec - George Agnew Reid - 1909.jpg|thumb|Painting by [[George Agnew Reid]], done for the third centennial (1908), showing the arrival of Samuel de Champlain on the site of [[Quebec City]].<ref group=Note name="ships" />]]

In the spring of 1608, Dugua wanted Champlain to start a new French colony and fur trading centre on the shores of the St. Lawrence. Dugua equipped, at his own expense, a fleet of three ships with workers, that left the French port of [[Honfleur]]. The main ship, called [[Don de Dieu|''Don-de-Dieu'']] (French for ''Gift of God''), was commanded by Champlain. Another ship, ''Lévrier'' (''Hunt Dog''), was commanded by his friend Du Pont. The small group of male settlers arrived at [[Tadoussac, Quebec|Tadoussac]] on the lower St. Lawrence in June. Because of the dangerous strength of the [[Saguenay River]] ending there, they left the ships and continued up the "Big River" in small boats bringing the men and the materials.<ref group=Note name="ships">Only at his last arrival (in 1633), Champlain did not leave the ships at Tadoussac but sailed them directly to Quebec City.[[#Trudel|Trudel (1979)]]</ref>

Upon arriving in Quebec, Champlain later wrote: "I arrived there on the third of July, when I searched for a place suitable for our settlement; but I could find none more convenient or better suited than the point of Quebec, so called by the savages, which was covered with nut-trees." Champlain ordered his men to gather lumber by cutting down the nut-trees for use in building habitations.<ref name=":0">{{cite web|title=Founding of Quebec {{!}} Early Americas Digital Archive (EADA)|url=http://eada.lib.umd.edu/text-entries/founding-of-quebec/|access-date=2021-02-20|website=eada.lib.umd.edu|archive-date=2021-04-21|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210421050806/http://eada.lib.umd.edu/text-entries/founding-of-quebec/|url-status=live}}</ref>

Some days after Champlain's arrival in Quebec, Jean du Val, a member of Champlain's party, plotted to kill Champlain to the end of securing the settlement for the Basques or Spaniards and making a fortune for himself. Du Val's plot was ultimately foiled when an associate of Du Val confessed his involvement in the plot to Champlain's pilot, who informed Champlain. Champlain had a young man deliver Du Val, along with 3 co-conspirators, two bottles of wine and invite the four worthies to an event on board a boat. Soon after the four conspirators arrived on the boat, Champlain had them arrested. Du Val was strangled and hung in Quebec and his head was displayed in the "most conspicuous place" of Champlain's fort. The other three were sent back to France to be tried.<ref name=":0" />