"What for?" they begged to know.
"Your old father, the King of France, has come to life again. He is mad at you for fighting for the English. Make peace with the Long Knives, they are friends of the Great King."
The alarmed Indians listened. Word went to all the tribes. From the Wabash to the Mississippi, Clark, absolute, ruled the country, a military dictator.
But the terms of the three-months militia had expired.
"How many of you can stay with me?" he entreated.
One hundred re-enlisted; the rest were dispatched to the Falls of the Ohio under Captain William Linn.
"Tell the people of Corn Island to remove to the mainland and erect a stockade fort." Thus was the beginning of Louisville.
Captain John Montgomery and Levi Todd (the grandfather of the wife of Abraham Lincoln) were dispatched with reports and Governor Rocheblave as a prisoner-of-war to Virginia.
On arrival of the news the Virginia Assembly immediately created the county of Illinois, and Patrick Henry appointed John Todd of Kentucky its first American Governor.