Chicago and the Old Northwest, 1673-1835 / A study of the evolution of the northwestern frontier, together with a history of Fort Dearborn

by Milo Milton Quaife

[211] Winsor, Westward Movement, 142.

[212] For a statement of this project see James, "Significance of the Attack on St. Louis," in Mississippi Valley Historical Association Proceedings, II, 199 ff.

[213] Ibid., 203-4.

Meanwhile, ignorant of the successes of Galvez in the South, the British forces stationed in the Northwest began, early in the year 1780, the execution of their part of the general plan of operations. The campaign was initiated by Sinclair, who early in February sent a body of Indians to engage the noted Sioux chief, Wabasha, to descend the Mississippi to Natchez with his two hundred warriors.[214] About the middle of the same month Sinclair ordered Emanuel Hesse, a trader who had formerly served in the British army, to assemble the Sacs, Foxes, and other Wisconsin Indians at the Fox-Wisconsin Portage and proceed with them to the mouth of the Wisconsin, where the Indians from the upper Mississippi would join them in a descent upon St. Louis.[215] The services of Matchekewis, who had massacred the garrison at Mackinac in 1763, but who now was zealously serving the British, were also enlisted,[216] and it was planned that Langlade with a chosen band of Canadians and Indians should join a party gathered at Chicago and lead them down the Illinois River. Another party was to "watch the Plains" between the Wabash and the Mississippi,[217] while still another and larger expedition from Detroit under the command of Captain Henry Bird was to descend the Wabash to "amuse" Clark at the Falls of the Ohio.[218] Sinclair believed St. Louis could easily be surprised and taken, and that the traders who would profit by the English thus gaining control of the rich "furr Trade" of the Missouri River would give their assistance to the enterprise.[219]

[214] For a secondary account of this campaign see ibid. For the original documents pertaining to it see Wisconsin Historical Collections, III, XI, XVIII; Michigan Pioneer Collections, IX; Missouri Historical Collections, II, No. 6.

[215] Wisconsin Historical Collections, XI, 147-48.

[216] Ibid., 151.

[217] Ibid.

[218] Winsor. Westward Movement, 171; Michigan Pioneer Collections, X, 372, 377, 395.

[219] Wisconsin Historical Collections, XI, 148.