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

On July 25 we find Swearingen at "Kinzie's improvement" on the St. Joseph. The site today is occupied by the sleepy hamlet of Bertrand, a short distance south of Niles, and the highway that crosses the river here is still called the Chicago Road. Here the party was detained for a day while boats were being procured. On July 27 the expedition proceeded down the river, the baggage and seventeen of the men in the boats, the remainder of the men marching by land. From July 28 to August 12 the troops were encamped at the mouth of the St. Joseph, awaiting the arrival of the "Tracy" with needed provisions. Swearingen estimated the distance from Detroit to the mouth of the St. Joseph at two hundred and seventy-two miles. The distance by rail today is considerably less, but the expedition had followed the tortuous Indian trail and then the course of the meandering St. Joseph. The remainder of the march around the lake to Chicago was accomplished in three days, the troops marching along the lake shore. The distance according to Swearingen's estimate was ninety miles, and in this he was not far astray. Probably the rapidity of the march, averaging thirty miles each day, may be explained by the supposition that the baggage continued to be transported by boat, for the journal records that the start from St. Joseph was delayed two days by the roughness of the lake. Unless the boats continued on to Chicago this would, apparently, have been of no concern to the expedition.

CAPTAIN JAMES STRODE SWEARINGEN

As a youthful lieutenant of twenty-one he led the troops to Chicago in 1803

(By courtesy of the Chicago Historical Society)

While the land detachment was thus marching across the wilderness of southern Michigan and northern Indiana, the "Tracy" was conveying the artillery, provisions, and heavy baggage around the lakes. A short stop was made at the mouth of the St. Joseph where the troops were supplied with provisions. Here the Whistlers, father and son, disembarked, and continued their journey to Chicago in a row-boat.[300] We have several accounts, each of them more or less fragmentary, of what happened upon the arrival of the troops at Chicago. Some of them are of contemporary origin, while two which will demand consideration were written over half a century later by two surviving participants in the founding of the first Fort Dearborn.[301] Of these Swearingen's Journal is easily the most authoritative, but unfortunately it confines itself largely to describing the physical situation. The other reports help out the story by the addition of various details. The troops reached the Chicago River at two o'clock on the afternoon of August 17, after a march of twenty-four miles from their last camping-place on the Little Calumet. They found the Chicago a sluggish stream thirty yards in width at the bend where the fort was to be constructed. The river was eighteen feet or more in depth, but a sand bar at its mouth rendered the water dead and unfit for use. The existence of the bar made it possible for the troops to cross the river "dry shod" and encamp on the other side a short distance above its mouth. The river bank was eight feet high at the point where the fort was to be built, a half-mile above the mouth of the stream. The opposite bank was somewhat lower, while farther up the stream both banks were very low.

[300] This circumstance was related over seventy years later by the wife of Lieutenant William Whistler (Hurlbut, Chicago Antiquities, 25). The reason for such a proceeding is not apparent.

[301] Swearingen's Journal, Appendix I; his statements made in 1863 preserved in the Chicago Historical Society, Proceedings, 1856-64, 348; letter from Mackinac, September 6, 1803, printed in Relf's Philadelphia Gazette, November 19, 1803; letter of Dr. William Smith from Fort Dearborn, December 9, 1803, to James May of Detroit, MS in Detroit Public Library; story of the wife of Lieutenant Whistler in 1875, Hurlbut, Chicago Antiquities, 23-28.

Swearingen's Journal says nothing of the Indians, but in the sketch of his life written sixty years later he records that the troops were greeted on their arrival by many Indians, all of whom were friendly. The wife of Lieutenant Whistler, who came a matron of sixteen summers to the site of the future metropolis, relates that while the schooner was here some two thousand natives gathered to see the "big canoe with wings." Doubtless their souls were stirred at the sight by emotions even stronger than those which today animate their more sophisticated successors at sight of the schooners of the air. Three weeks later a Mackinac letter-writer reported to the eastern press that the natives opposed the commander's design of building a fort and threatened to collect their warriors and prevent it.[302] The writer's source of information was evidently someone on board the "Tracy," which touched at Mackinac on its return voyage to Detroit.[303] Since a hostile attitude on the part of the Indians is not mentioned by Mrs. Whistler, and is expressly denied by Swearingen, we may safely ascribe the statement to the desire of someone to tell an interesting story.

[302] Relf's Philadelphia Gazette, November 19, 1803.