Tecumseh was an unruly ally, because he despised Proctor. One day, provisions being scarce, salt beef was given the English soldiers, while the Indians received only horse-flesh. Angered at the outrage, Tecumseh strode to Proctor's tent and demanded an explanation. Seeing the English general about to treat the complaint with indifference, Tecumseh significantly struck the hilt of the commander's sword, touching at the same time the handle of his tomahawk, and said: "You are Proctor. I am Tecumseh." This hint at a mode of settling the difficulty brought Proctor to terms at once.
After an unsuccessful attempt to reduce Fort Stephenson, then garrisoned by one hundred and sixty men commanded by Major Croghan, Proctor and his forces retreated to Malden.
About this time, an American citizen, Captain Le Croix, was arrested by order of the British commander and confined on board a ship, to be sent to Montreal. Tecumseh had an especial friendship for Le Croix, and it may have been because of his influence with the chief that he was seized. Tecumseh, suspecting that Le Croix had been imprisoned, called on General Proctor, and asked if he knew anything of his friend. He even ordered the British general to tell him the truth, adding, "If I ever detect you in a falsehood, I, with my Indians, will immediately abandon you." The general was obliged to acknowledge that Le Croix was a prisoner. Tecumseh then demanded that his friend should be instantly liberated. General Proctor wrote a line stating that the "King of the Woods" desired the release of Captain Le Croix, and that it must be done at once. The order was obeyed. Tecumseh treated the American commander with equal contempt. A recent writer gives a challenge which that great chief sent to General Harrison at the first siege of Fort Meigs. It was as follows:
"General Harrison: I have with me eight hundred braves. You have an equal number in your hiding place. Come out with them and give me battle. You talked like a brave when we met at Vincennes, and I respected you, but now you hide behind logs and in the earth, like a ground-hog. Give me answer.
"Tecumseh."
The Americans always had great confidence in Tecumseh, though he was an enemy. Once when the English and Indians were encamped near the River Raisin, some Sauks and Winnebagos entered the house of a Mrs. Ruland and began to plunder it. She immediately sent her little daughter to ask Tecumseh to come to her assistance. The chief was in council and was making a speech when the child entered the building and pulled the skirts of Tecumseh's hunting-shirt, saying, "Come to our house, there are bad Indians there." Tecumseh did not wait to finish his speech, but walked rapidly to the house. At the entrance he met some Indians dragging a trunk away. He knocked down the first one with a blow from his tomahawk. The others prepared to resist. "Dogs!" cried the chief, "I am Tecumseh!" The Indians immediately fled and Tecumseh turned upon some English officers who were standing near: "You," said he, "are worse, than dogs, to break your faith with prisoners." The officers immediately apologized to Mrs. Ruland, and offered to put a guard around her house. She declined this offer, however, saying that she was not afraid so long as that man, pointing to Tecumseh, was near.
The ill success which attended the efforts of the British caused Tecumseh not only to lose heart, but dissipated what little faith he had felt in Proctor. He seriously meditated a withdrawal from the contest. Assembling the Shawnees, Wyandots and Ottawas, who were under his command, he declared his intention to them. He told them that when they had taken up the tomahawk and joined their father, the King, they were promised plenty of white men to fight with them; "but the number is not now greater," said he, "than at the commencement of the war; and we are treated by them like the dogs of snipe hunters; we are always sent ahead to start the game. It is better that we should return to our own country, and let the Americans come on and fight the British."
To this proposition his followers agreed; but the Sioux and Chippewas discovering his intention, went to him, and insisted that inasmuch as he had first united with the British, and had been instrumental in bringing their tribes into the alliance, he ought not to leave them; and through their influence he was finally induced to remain.
Tecumseh's last grudge against Proctor was on account of the retreat of the English from Malden, after Commodore Perry's victory on Lake Erie. The Indians did not understand the movements of a naval battle, and General Proctor, who doubtless dreaded the influence of a defeat upon them, said to Tecumseh, "My fleet has whipped the Americans, but the vessels being much injured have gone to Put-in-Bay to refit, and will be here in a few days."
The suspicions of Tecumseh were soon aroused, however, when he thought he perceived indications of a plan to retreat from Maiden. When he spoke to Proctor on the subject, that cringing coward told him that he was only going to send all his valuables up the Thames, where they would be met by a reinforcement and be safe. Tecumseh, however, felt sure that the commander was meditating a retreat. He demanded, in the name of his Indians, that he be heard by General Proctor. Audience was granted him on September 18, and the Indian orator delivered his last speech, a copy of which was afterward found in Proctor's baggage when it was captured. We can only quote two paragraphs from it here: