“Brothers,” he wrote,[79] “this is the third year that all the white people in this country have been alarmed at your proceedings. You threaten us with war; you invite all the tribes to the north and west of us to join against us. Brothers, your warriors who have lately been here deny this, but I have received the information from every direction. The tribes on the Mississippi have sent me word that you intended to murder me, and then to commence a war upon our people. I have also received the speech that you sent to the Pottawatomies and others to join you for that purpose; but if I had no other evidence of your hostility to us, your seizing the salt which I lately sent up the Wabash is sufficient.”
Except the seizure of five barrels of salt intended for other Indians, in June, 1811, no overt act yet showed the intention to begin a war, and certainly no such immediate intention existed; but two white men were at that moment murdered in the Illinois Territory, a drunken Indian was murdered at Vincennes, and these acts of violence, together with the general sense of insecurity, caused the government officials to write from all quarters to the War Department that Tecumthe must be suppressed. Tecumthe himself seemed disposed to avoid cause for attack. July 4 he sent word that he would come to Vincennes; and to Harrison’s alarm he appeared there, July 27, with two or three hundred warriors for an interview with the governor. The act proved courage, if not rashness. Harrison’s instructions hinted advice to seize the two Indian leaders, if it could be done without producing a war, and Harrison had ample time to prepare his measures.
Tecumthe came and remained two days at Vincennes, explaining, with childlike candor, his plans and wishes. As soon as the council was over, he said, he should visit the Southern tribes to unite them with those of the North in a peaceful confederacy; and he hoped no attempt would be made to settle the disputed territory till his return in the spring. A great number of Indians were to come in the autumn to live at Tippecanoe; they must use the disputed region for hunting-ground. He wished everything to remain in its present situation till his return; he would then go and see the President and settle everything with him. The affairs of all the tribes in that quarter were in his own hands, and he would despatch messengers in every direction to prevent the Indians from doing further mischief.
Tecumthe seemed to think that his wish would prevent Harrison from further aggression for the time. A few days afterward he passed down the Wabash, with some twenty warriors, on his diplomatic errand to the Creeks; but before he was fairly out of sight, July 31, a number of citizens met at Vincennes, and adopted resolutions demanding that the settlement at Tippecanoe should be broken up. Immediate action, before Tecumthe should return, was urged by Harrison’s party, and by many frightened settlers. Harrison’s personal wish could not be doubted.
The Secretary of War had already ordered the Fourth Regiment of U. S. Infantry, under Colonel Boyd, with a company of riflemen,—making in the whole a force of five hundred regular troops,—to descend the Ohio from Pittsburg as rapidly as possible, and place themselves under Harrison’s orders; but Eustis added instructions not easily followed or understood. July 17 he wrote to Harrison,[80]—
“In case circumstances shall occur which may render it necessary or expedient to attack the Prophet and his followers, the force should be such as to insure the most complete success. This force will consist of the militia and regular troops.... If the Prophet should commence or seriously threaten hostilities, he ought to be attacked.”
Under these instructions, Harrison was warranted in doing what he pleased. Not even Tecumthe denied the seriousness of his hostile threats, and Harrison had every reason to begin the war at once, if war must be; but although Eustis spoke his own mind clearly, he failed to reckon upon the President, and this neglect was the cause of another letter to Harrison, written three days later:[81]—
“Since my letter of the 17th instant, I have been particularly instructed by the President to communicate to your Excellency his earnest desire that peace may, if possible, be preserved with the Indians, and that to this end every proper means may be adopted.... Circumstances conspire at this particular juncture to render it peculiarly desirable that hostilities of any kind or to any degree, not indispensably required, should be avoided. The force under Colonel Boyd has been ordered to descend the Ohio, ... and although the force is at the disposal of your Excellency, I am instructed to inform you that the President indulges the hope and expectation that your exertions and measures with the Indians will be such as may render their march to the Indian Territory unnecessary, and that they may remain liable to another disposition.”
Without paying attention to the President’s wishes emphatically expressed in these orders of July 20, Harrison passed the next month in raising forces for an expedition to satisfy the wishes of the Western people. No doubt was felt on the Ohio that Harrison meant to attack the Indians at Tippecanoe; and so serious a campaign was expected that Kentucky became eager to share it. Among other Kentuckians, Joseph H. Daveiss, Aaron Burr’s persecutor, wrote,[82] August 24, to Harrison, offering himself as a volunteer: “Under all the privacy of a letter,” said he, “I make free to tell you that I have imagined there were two men in the West who had military talents; and you, sir, were the first of the two. It is thus an opportunity of service much valued by me.” Daveiss doubted only whether the army was to attack at once, or to provoke attack.
Harrison accepted Daveiss’s services, and gave him command of the dragoons, a mounted force of about one hundred and thirty men from Indiana and Kentucky. The Fourth U. S. Infantry, three hundred strong according to Colonel Boyd who commanded it,[83] arrived in the Territory at the beginning of September. As rapidly as possible Harrison collected his forces, and sent them up the river to a point in the new purchase about sixty-five miles above Vincennes. The exact force was afterward much disputed.[84] Harrison reported his effectives as a few more than nine hundred men. Some sixty Kentucky volunteers were of the number.