Brock's force, according to his own testimony, numbered 1330 men, including 600 Indians, and he had also two ships of war. Hull had present for duty about 1000 men. * Brock sent a large body of Indians across the river that night, at a point five
* It is impossible to reconcile the conflicting statements as to the numbers on either side.
miles below the fort, and early in the morning crossed with the remainder of his troops, and at once marched on the place. Hull had posted his regulars in the fort, and his militia in the town, where the stout palings that surrounded the little kitchen gardens gave them an admirable shelter. The two twenty-four pounders were loaded heavily with grape and placed so as to command the road by which the enemy was approaching, in close order, twelve deep. Never was there a better opportunity to do wholesale execution by a single discharge. Everybody was watching in breathless expectation to see the match applied and the murderous iron go surging through those beautiful ranks, when, to the astonishment cf friend and foe alike, a white flag was hung out upon the wall of the fort. Brock himself was surprised, when, sending to know what it meant, he learned that Hull had determined to surrender. The articles of capitulation were drawn up, and the American general surrendered not merely the fort and its garrison, but the whole Territory of Michigan, of which he was Governor. Thus ended this miserable campaign.
Hull's officers were incensed at his action, and he was subsequently court-martialled, convicted of cowardice, and condemned to death; but the President pardoned him, in consideration of his age and his services in the Revolution. The points of his defence were: that an army in a situation like his, cut off from its supplies, must surrender sooner or later; that if he had given battle, it would have exposed all the inhabitants of the Territory to Indian barbarities; that his situation was the fault of the Administration, rather than his own; that his force was inferior to Brock's; and that his provisions were nearly exhausted. Benedict Arnold himself was hardly held in greater contempt by the American people than was General Hull for years after his trial. Many believed him to be more traitor than coward. This state of feeling was largely due to Colonel Lewis Cass—nearly forty years later a candidate for the Presidency—who hurried to Washington with the news, and greatly exaggerated the circumstances that bore against Hull. Cass's action in this matter was exceedingly discreditable. On one point, the important question of supplies, a letter written by him two days before the surrender was flatly contradicted by his testimony at the trial. Subsequent investigations, if they do not exonerate General Hull, have at least greatly modified the blame attached to him.
CHAPTER III. FIGHTS WITH THE INDIANS.
Tecumseh's Scheme—Harrison's March to Fort Wayne—Defence of Fort Harrison—Defence of Fort Madison—Ball's Fight.
The great Indian leader, Tecumseh, cherished a design similar to that of Pontiac in the previous century. He wanted to unite all the northwestern tribes in an effort to drive the white man out of the country, or at least out of the Northwestern Territory. For the prosecution of this design the disasters which the Americans had sustained in the fall of Michilimackinac, Fort Dearborn, and Detroit seemed an auspicious opening, and Tecumseh endeavored to follow it up promptly with attacks on the other frontier posts held by United States troops. The most important of these were Fort Wayne, on the present site of Fort Wayne, Indiana, and Fort Harrison, on the Wabash, above Terre Haute.