Volume II Part 3 (1/2)
They eagerly took the peace belt, but he declined to smoke the calumet, and told them he would not enter into the solemn ceremonies of the peace treaty with them until the following day. He likewise declined to release all his prisoners, and insisted that two of them should be put to death. They even yielded to this, and surrendered to him two young men, who advanced and sat down before him on the floor, covering their heads with their blankets, to receive the tomahawk. [Footnote: I have followed the contemporary letter to Mason rather than the more elaborate and slightly different account of the ”Memoir.” The account written by Clark in his old age, like Shelby's similar autobiography, is, in many respects, not very trustworthy. It cannot be accepted for a moment where it conflicts with any contemporary accounts.] Then he granted them full peace and forgave the young men their doom, and the next day, after the peace council, there was a feast, and the friends.h.i.+p of the Indians was won. Clark ever after had great influence over them; they admired his personal prowess, his oratory, his address as a treaty-maker, and the skill with which he led his troops. Long afterwards, when the United States authorities were endeavoring to make treaties with the red men, it was noticed that the latter would never speak to any other white general or commissioner while Clark was present.
After this treaty there was peace in the Illinois country; the Indians remained for some time friendly, and the French were kept well satisfied.
CHAPTER III.
CLARK'S CAMPAIGN AGAINST VINCENNES, 1779.
Hamilton, at Detroit, had been so encouraged by the successes of his war parties that, in 1778, he began to plan an attack on Fort Pitt [Footnote: Haldimand MSS. Hamilton to Carleton, January, 1778.]; but his plans were forestalled by Clark's movements, and he, of course, abandoned them when the astounding news reached him that the rebels had themselves invaded the Illinois country, captured the British commandant, Rocheblave, and administered to the inhabitants the oath of allegiance to Congress. [Footnote: _Do_. Hamilton's letter of August 8th.] Shortly afterwards he learned that Vincennes likewise was in the hands of the Americans.
Hamilton Prepares to Reconquer the Country.
He was a man of great energy, and he immediately began to prepare an expedition for the reconquest of the country. French emissaries who were loyal to the British crown were sent to the Wabash to stir up the Indians against the Americans; and though the Piankeshaws remained friendly to the latter, the Kickapoos and Weas, who were more powerful, announced their readiness to espouse the British cause if they received support, while the neighboring Miamis were already on the war-path. The commandants at the small posts of Mackinaw and St. Josephs were also notified to incite the Lake Indians to hara.s.s the Illinois country.
[Footnote: Hamilton to Haldimand, September 17, 1778.]
He led the main body in person, and throughout September every soul in Detroit was busy from morning till night in mending boats, baking biscuit, packing provisions in kegs and bags, preparing artillery stores, and in every way making ready for the expedition. Fifteen large bateaux and pirogues were procured, each capable of carrying from 1,800 to 3,000 pounds; these were to carry the ammunition, food, clothing, tents, and especially the presents for the Indians. Cattle and wheels were sent ahead to the most important portages on the route that would be traversed; a six-pounder gun was also forwarded. Hamilton had been deeply exasperated by what he regarded as the treachery of most of the Illinois and Wabash creoles in joining the Americans; but he was in high spirits and very confident of success. He wrote to his superior officer that the British were sure to succeed if they acted promptly, for the Indians were favorable to them, knowing they alone could give them supplies; and he added ”the Spaniards are feeble and hated by the French, the French are fickle and have no man of capacity to advise or lead them, and the Rebels are enterprising and brave, but want resources.” The bulk of the Detroit French, including all their leaders, remained staunch supporters of the crown, and the militia eagerly volunteered to go on the expedition. Feasts were held with the Ottawas, Chippewas, and Pottawatomies, at which oxen were roasted whole, while Hamilton and the chiefs of the French rangers sang the war-song in solemn council, and received pledges of armed a.s.sistance and support from the savages. [Footnote: _Do_. Hamilton to Haldimand, September 23, October 3, 1778.]
He Starts against Vincennes.
On October 7th the expedition left Detroit; before starting the venerable Jesuit missionary gave the Catholic French who went along his solemn blessing and approval, conditionally upon their strictly keeping the oath they had taken to be loyal and obedient servants of the crown.
[Footnote: Haldimand MSS., Series B., Vol. 123, p. 53. Hamilton's letter of July 6, 1781, containing a ”brief account” of the whole expedition, taken from what he calls a ”diary of transactions” that he had preserved.] It is worthy of note that, while the priest at Kaskaskia proved so potent an ally of the Americans, the priest at Detroit was one of the staunchest supporters of the British. Hamilton started with thirty-six British regulars, under two lieutenants, forty-five Detroit volunteers (chiefly French), who had been carefully drilled for over a year, under Captain Lamothe; seventy-nine Detroit militia, under a major and two captains; and seventeen members of the Indian Department (including three captains and four lieutenants) who acted with the Indians. There were thus in all one hundred and seventy-seven whites.
[Footnote: _Do_., Series B., Vol. 122, p. 253, return of forces on Dec.
24th.] Sixty Indians started with the troops from Detroit, but so many bands joined him on the route that when he reached Vincennes his entire force amounted to five hundred men. [Footnote: _Do_. Hamilton's letter of July 6, 1781, the ”brief account.” Clark's estimate was very close to the truth; he gave Hamilton six hundred men, four hundred of them Indians. See State Department MSS., No. 71, Vol. I., p. 247. Papers Continental Congress. Letter of G. R. Clark to Gov. Henry, April 29, 1779. This letter was written seven months before that to Mason, and many years before the ”Memoir,” so I have, where possible, followed it as being better authority than either.]
Difficulties of the Route.
Having embarked, the troops and Indians paddled down stream to Lake Erie, reaching it in a snowstorm, and when a lull came they struck boldly across the lake, making what bateau men still call a ”traverse”
of thirty-six miles to the mouth of the Maumee. Darkness overtook them while still on the lake, and the head boats hung out lights for the guidance of those astern; but about midnight a gale came up, and the whole flotilla was nearly swamped, being beached with great difficulty on an oozy flat close to the mouth of the Maumee. The waters of the Maumee were low, and the boats were poled slowly up against the current, reaching the portage point, where there was a large Indian village, on the 24th of the month. Here a nine miles' carry was made to one of the sources of the Wabash, called by the voyageurs ”la pet.i.te riviere.” This stream was so low that the boats could not have gone down it had it not been for a beaver dam four miles below the landing-place, which backed up the current. An opening was made in the dam to let the boats pa.s.s.
The traders and Indians thoroughly appreciated the help given them at this difficult part of the course by the engineering skill of the beavers--for Hamilton was following the regular route of the hunting, trading, and war parties,--and none of the beavers of this particular dam were ever molested, being left to keep their dam in order, and repair it, which they always speedily did whenever it was damaged.
[Footnote: Haldimand's MSS. Hamilton's ”brief account.”]
It proved as difficult to go down the Wabash as to get up the Maumee.
The water was shallow, and once or twice in great swamps d.y.k.es had to be built that the boats might be floated across. Frost set in heavily, and the ice cut the men as they worked in the water to haul the boats over shoals or rocks. The bateaux often needed to be beached and caulked, while both whites and Indians had to help carry the loads round the shoal places. At every Indian village it was necessary to stop, hold a conference, and give presents. At last the Wea village--or Ouiatanon, as Hamilton called it--was reached. Here the Wabash chiefs, who had made peace with the Americans, promptly came in and tendered their allegiance to the British, and a reconnoitering party seized a lieutenant and three men of the Vincennes militia, who were themselves on a scouting expedition, but who nevertheless were surprised and captured without difficulty. [Footnote: _Do._ The French officer had in his pocket one British and one American commission; Hamilton debated in his mind for some time the advisability of hanging him.] They had been sent out by Captain Leonard Helm, then acting as commandant at Vincennes. He had but a couple of Americans with him, and was forced to trust to the creole militia, who had all embodied themselves with great eagerness, having taken the oath of allegiance to Congress. Having heard rumors of the British advance, he had dispatched a little party to keep watch, and in consequence of their capture he was taken by surprise.
Hamilton Captures Vincennes.
From Ouiatanon Hamilton dispatched Indian parties to surround Vincennes and intercept any messages sent either to the Falls or to the Illinois; they were completely successful, capturing a messenger who carried a hurried note written by Helm to Clark to announce what had happened. An advance guard, under Major Hay, was sent forward to take possession, but Helm showed so good a front that nothing was attempted until the next day, the 17th of December, just seventy-one days after the expedition had left Detroit, when Hamilton came up at the head of his whole force and entered Vincennes. Poor Helm was promptly deserted by all the creole militia. The latter had been loud in their boasts until the enemy came in view, but as soon as they caught sight of the red-coats they began to slip away and run up to the British to surrender their arms. [Footnote: _Do._ Intercepted letter of Captain Helm, Series B., Vol. 122, p. 280.]
He was finally left with only one or two men, Americans. Nevertheless he refused the first summons to surrender; but Hamilton, who knew that Helm's troops had deserted him, marched up to the fort at the head of his soldiers, and the American was obliged to surrender, with no terms granted save that he and his a.s.sociates should be treated with humanity.
[Footnote: Letter of Hamilton, Dec. 18-30, 1778. The story of Helm's marching out with the honors of war is apparently a mere invention. Even Mann Butler, usually so careful, permits himself to be led off into all sorts of errors when describing the incidents of the Illinois and Vincennes expeditions, and the writers who have followed him have generally been less accurate. The story of Helm drinking toddy by the fire-place when Clark retook the fort, and of the latter ordering riflemen to fire at the chimney, so as to knock the mortar into the toddy, may safely be set down as pure--and very weak--fiction. When Clark wrote his memoirs, in his old age, he took delight in writing down among his exploits all sorts of childish stratagems; the marvel is that any sane historian should not have seen that these were on their face as untrue as they were ridiculous.] The instant the fort was surrendered the Indians broke in and plundered it; but they committed no act of cruelty, and only plundered a single private house.
Measures to Secure his Conquest.
The French inhabitants had shown pretty clearly that they did not take a keen interest in the struggle, on either side. They were now summoned to the church and offered the chance--which they for the most part eagerly embraced--of purging themselves of their past misconduct by taking a most humiliating oath of repentance, acknowledging that they had sinned against G.o.d and man by siding with the rebels, and promising to be loyal in the future. Two hundred and fifty of the militia, being given back their arms, appeared with their officers, and took service again under the British king, swearing a solemn oath of allegiance. They certainly showed throughout the most light-hearted indifference to chronic perjury and treachery; nor did they in other respects appear to very good advantage. Clark was not in the least surprised at the news of their conduct; for he had all along realized that the attachment of the French would prove but a slender reed on which to lean in the moment of trial.
Hamilton had no fear of the inhabitants themselves, for the fort completely commanded the town. To keep them in good order he confiscated all their spirituous liquors, and in a rather amusing burst of Puritan feeling destroyed two billiard tables, which he announced were ”sources of immorality and dissipation in such a settlement.” [Footnote: _Do._]
He had no idea that he was in danger of attack from without, for his spies brought him word that Clark had only a hundred and ten men in the Illinois county [Footnote: _Do._ ”Fourscore at Kaskaskia and thirty at Cahokia.”]; and the route between was in winter one of extraordinary difficulty.
He Goes into Winter Quarters.
He had five hundred men and Clark but little over one hundred. He was not only far nearer his base of supplies and reinforcements at Detroit, than Clark was to his at Fort Pitt, but he was also actually across Clark's line of communications. Had he pushed forward at once to attack the Americans, and had he been able to overcome the difficulties of the march, he would almost certainly have conquered. But he was daunted by the immense risk and danger of the movement. The way was long and the country flooded, and he feared the journey might occupy so much time that his stock of provisions would be exhausted before he got half-way.