When the news of this sudden Indian uprising reached General Amherst he ordered Colonel Bouquet to march with a detachment of 500 men to the relief of the besieged forts. This force was composed of regulars and six companies of Provincial Rangers.
Bouquet established his rendezvous in Carlisle, where he arrived the latter part of June, 1763. Here he found every building, every house, every barn, every hovel crowded with terrified refugees. He wrote to General Amherst, July 13, as follows:
“The list of people known to be killed increases every day. The desolation of so many families, reduced to the last extremity of want and misery; the despair of those who have lost their parents, relations and friends, with the cries of distracted women and children who fill the streets, form a scene painful to humanity and impossible to describe.”
Strange as it may seem, the Province of Pennsylvania would do nothing to aid the troops who gathered for its defense. Colonel Bouquet, in another letter to General Amherst, said: “I hope we shall be able to save that infatuated people from destruction, notwithstanding[notwithstanding] all their endeavors to defeat your vigorous measures.”
While Bouquet, harassed and exasperated, labored on at his difficult task, the terror of the frontier people increased, until at last, finding they could hope for but little aid from the Government, they bestirred themselves with admirable spirit in their own defense. They raised small bodies of riflemen, who scoured the woods in front of the settlements, and succeeded in driving the enemy back. In many instances the men dressed themselves in Indian fashion, painted their faces red and black, and adopted the savage mode of warfare.
Forts Pitt, Niagara and Detroit were saved. Colonel Bouquet relieved Fort Pitt; Niagara was not attacked, and Detroit, after a long siege by Pontiac in person, was relieved by Colonel Bradstreet in 1764.
The Indians were speedily subdued, but Pontiac remained hostile until his death in 1769.
Meschianza, Stupendous Entertainment for
Sir Wm. Howe, May 18, 1778
