[584] Appendix VI.
[585] According to Mrs. Kinzie the order was "to evacuate the fort, if practicable, and in that event, to distribute all the United States' property contained in the fort, and in the United States' factory or agency, among the Indians in the neighborhood." Wau Bun, 162.
GENERAL HULL'S ORDER FOR THE EVACUATION OF FORT DEARBORN
(By courtesy of the Wisconsin State Historical Society)
The evacuation order closed with the expression by Hull of the hope, destined never to be realized, of being able to announce in his next communication the surrender of the British at Maiden. Instead of this, on August 8 he abandoned Sandwich and recrossed the river to Detroit. The next day the Indian runner. Winnemac, delivered to Captain Heald at Fort Dearborn his order for the evacuation.[586] Hull also sent word of the intended evacuation to Fort Wayne, ordering the officers there to co-operate in the movement by rendering Captain Heald any information and assistance in their power.[587] In consequence of this Captain William Wells, the famous Indian scout, set out for Fort Dearborn at the head of thirty Miami warriors to assist in covering Heald's retreat.
[586] Heald's Journal, Appendix III; his report of the massacre, Appendix IV; Lieutenant Helm's narrative of the massacre, Appendix VI.
[587] Heald's report, Appendix IV; Brice, History of Fort Wayne, 206.
The days following the ninth of August were, we may well believe, filled with care and busy preparation for Captain Heald and all the white people in and around Fort Dearborn. Their situation in the heart of the wilderness was an appalling one, well calculated to tax the judgment and abilities of Heald, on whose wisdom and energy the fate of all depended, to the utmost. Apparently Kinzie sought to dissuade Heald from obeying Hull's order to evacuate. There must be powerful reasons to justify him in taking this step, yet if sufficiently convincing ones pertaining to the safety of the garrison existed, it is clear that Heald should have assumed the responsibility on the ground that the order had been issued in ignorance of the facts of the situation confronting the Fort Dearborn garrison.
There were several reasons to be urged against an evacuation. The fort was well situated for defense. With the garrison at hand it could probably be held indefinitely against an attack by Indians alone, providing the supply of ammunition and provisions held out. The surrounding Indians outnumbered the garrison ten to one, it is true, but success against such odds when the whites were sheltered behind a suitable stockade was not unusual in the annals of border warfare. The red man possessed little taste for besieging a fortified place, and if the first assault were beaten off, his lack both of artillery and of resolution to persevere in such a contest rendered his success improbable, unless the odds were overwhelmingly in his favor, or the provisions of the besieged gave out. Moreover, whatever the odds might be at Fort Dearborn, the probability of making a successful defense behind the walls of the stockade was immeasurably greater than it would be in the open country. Both Governor Edwards of Illinois and Harrison of Indiana were vigorous executives, and if the fort were held, relief might reasonably be expected before long from the militia which was then being collected in southern Illinois and Indiana, or even from Kentucky.