Bombardment became the order of the day with "Cannons B[ombs] Cohorns &c Continually roaring on Boath Sides[.] Women and Children heard to Screach and Cry out . . . when our B[ombs] Came amongst them." Shortages of powder provided frequent interruptions in the New England barrage, and inexperienced gunners blew up no fewer than nine cannon and a large mortar.

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On May 31, the New Englanders opened a fifth battery against the west end of the town where they mounted 42-pounders moved from the Royal Battery. Its fire across the southwest corner of the harbor proved particularly effective against the Dauphin Demi-bastion and adjoining Circular Battery.

Few New Englanders were casualties of the French return fire, but within two weeks of landing many had taken ill. Seth Pomeroy thought the reasons were plain: "ye ground here is Cold and weet[.] ye water . . . a Redish Coaller and stagnated[.] . . . no beds To Ly on nor Tents To Keep off ye Fogs & Dews[.] our Provision is Chiefly Poark and Breaad withou[t] Sauce." Many came down with dysentery–known as the "bloody fluxes"–although few died from its effects.

As the siege dragged on and the New England bombardment continued, Louisbourg looked desperately to the sea for relief. Like all European-style fortresses of the period, Louisbourg was not intended to hold out indefinitely against a besieging force. But distance and supply lines were crucial factors for survival, and in 1745 both worked against Louisbourg. The French in Quebec did not learn of the New England assault until mid-June, and France learned even later of the town's dire straits.

The first French warship to depart for Louisbourg in 1745 was the thirty-two-gun frigate Renommée. The vessel sailed from France in February, but was unable to enter Louisbourg harbor and eventually returned to France, arriving back there in late June.

The French man-of-war Vigilante, which left France in April, posed a much greater threat to the New England siege because she carried a five-hundred-man crew and badly needed supplies. Arriving off Louisbourg on May 31, the Vigilante fought a desperate battle that ended with her capture–a major loss to the French effort.

As the New England cannon slowly opened a breach in Louisbourg's fortifications, the besiegers considered how to eliminate the batteries protecting the harbor so that the British fleet might join in a combined land and sea assault on the town. An attempt on the night of June 6 to take the Island Battery, whose guns kept the fleet at bay, seemed likely to succeed. After a fierce fight, however, the New England troops were compelled to withdraw with casualties numbering almost half their force. The next day the disheartened siege batteries fell silent.

Checked by this disastrous amphibious assault, the New Englanders turned to Lighthouse Point. There they constructed a battery whose fire swept the Island Battery, but was so placed that return fire had little effect. On June 24, the New Englanders moved a large mortar to the Lighthouse Point battery, and the next day saw seventeen of nineteen shells hit inside the Island Battery. "When the French saw a bomb coming," said one witness, "they would jump out of the ambuseers [embrasures] into the sea."

With the British fleet now massing at the harbor entrance, the French assessed their situation. What they found was not good. The Royal Battery had been captured, and the Island Battery was largely silenced. Only three guns were still mounted at the Circular Battery, and the Dauphin Gate and the adjoining wall had been breached. Little gunpowder remained. The soldiers, continually laboring to repair the fortifications, were exhausted. The townspeople, huddled during the bombardment in bomb-proof casemates beneath the barracks, petitioned for surrender negotiations to commence.

One June 26, as Pepperrell and Warren–who was now able to sail his ships into the harbor–prepared for a last, massive land and naval assault, Duchambon initiated a capitulation.* Under the surrender terms, the military garrison would be able to march out with the honors of war, and the inhabitants were to be repatriated to France with their movable property. This provision angered the New Englanders who, in return for their service, had been promised plunder and booty.

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