Landing during the night of 5/6 January, a French force of 700 men under the Baron de Rollecourt marched the four kilometers to St Helier, arriving between six and seven in the morning on 6 January. When they entered the market, later to be called the Royal Square, with its recently erected statue to King George II, they killed a sentry and surprised the guard. The first division set up defensive positions in the market while most of the town was asleep. At about eight o'clock a French patrol surrounded Government House, then situated at Le Manoir de La Motte on the east of the town; there they surprised the island's governor, Major Moses Corbet, in bed.