Your letter of the 4th instant, enclosing the proceedings of the executive council of the 3d.; Captain Glegg's letter of the 5th instant, transmitting copies of letters from Colonel Proctor to you of 26th and 30th July, with the correspondence between Brigadier-General Hull and Lieut.-Colonel St. George, and the intercepted correspondence of the former, together with your letter to Colonel Baynes, of the 4th instant, were all delivered to me on my arrival at this place yesterday. The information they contain is highly interesting, and I lose no time in dispatching to you Brigade Major Shekleton, as the bearer of this letter, and for the purpose of receiving whatever communication you may have to make in return. Being fully aware of the necessity of affording you such reinforcements as the exigencies of the service in other parts of the two provinces would permit, I had, previous to the receipt of your letter, made arrangements for that purpose.
Major Ormsby, with three companies of the 49th regiment, protecting a considerable supply of ordnance and ordnance stores, left La Chine on the 6th instant for Kingston and Fort George, taking with him £2,500 for the payment of the regular and militia forces. Major Heathcote, with one company of the 49th regiment, about 110 men of the Newfoundland regiment, and 50 picked Veterans, are to leave La Chine on the 13th instant. With this detachment, an additional supply of ordnance stores and camp equipage for 500 men will be forwarded for Upper Canada; and as soon as a sufficiency of bateaux can again be collected at La Chine, Colonel Vincent is under orders to proceed to Kingston with the remainder of the 49th regiment, and a subaltern of the royal artillery and ten gunners, with two 3-pounders.
When these reinforcements reach you, they will, I trust, enable you successfully to resist the internal, as well as external, enemies opposed to you, and materially aid the able measures you have adopted for the defence of Upper Canada.
With regard to the queries you have submitted to me on the subject of martial law, I have to observe, that it has not fallen within my experience to see martial law proclaimed, except in those places where it has been declared under the authority of a provincial legislature, which of course regulated the mode in which it was to be executed. As the martial law which you purpose declaring is founded on the king's commission, and upon the extreme case of invasion alluded to in it, I am inclined to think that whatever power is necessary for carrying the measure into effect, must have been intended to be given you by the commission, and consequently, that the power of assembling courts martial and of carrying their sentence into execution, is included in the authority for declaring martial law. The officers of militia becoming themselves subject to martial law when it is declared, I conceive they may sit upon courts martial with officers of his majesty's regular forces; but upon both these points I desire not to be understood as speaking decisively—extreme cases must be met by measures which, on ordinary occasions, would not perhaps be justified. Your situation is such as to warrant your resorting to any step which, in your judgment, the public safety may require. I should therefore think, that after taking the best opinions you can obtain from the first law characters you have about you respecting the doubts you entertain on this subject, you need not hesitate to determine upon that line of conduct which you shall think will best promote the good of the service, trusting, if you do err, to the absolute necessity of the measures you may adopt, as your justification for them to his majesty's government.
Your letters of the 26th, 28th and 29th July, with the several enclosures and papers accompanying them, were received by me shortly previous to my leaving Quebec; the last containing Captain Roberts' official account of the capture of Fort Michilimakinack. Great credit is certainly due to that officer for the zeal and promptitude with which he has performed this service; at the same time I must confess, my mind has been very much relieved by finding that the capture took place at a period subsequent to Brigadier-General Hull's invasion of the province, as, had it been prior to it, it would not only have been in violation of Captain Roberts' orders, but have afforded a just ground for the subsequent conduct of the enemy, which, I now plainly perceive, no forbearance on your part would have prevented. The capture of this place will, I hope, enable the Indian tribes in that quarter to co-operate with you in your present movements against the enemy, by threatening his flanks, a diversion which would greatly alarm him, and probably have the effect of compelling him to retreat across the river.
I send you enclosed a copy of the official repeal of the orders in council, which I received last night by express from Quebec. Although I much doubt whether this step on the part of our government will have any effect upon that of the United States, the circulation of the paper evincing their conciliatory disposition may tend to increase and strengthen the divisions which subsist amongst the people upon the subject of the war. I therefore recommend to you to have a number of copies struck off and distributed.
Colonel Baynes is still absent upon his mission to the enemy's camp. Your letter to him of the 29th ultimo was received at the same time with those I have last acknowledged. Colonel Lethbridge I have directed to return to Montreal.
The issue of army bills has taken place at Quebec, and I hope to be able shortly to send you a supply of them.
We have previously alluded (page [206]) to that part of the preceding letter which relates to the capture of Michilimakinack. This capture appears to have been effected contrary to Sir George Prevost's orders, as Fort St. Joseph being nearly 350 miles from Detroit and Sandwich, and as the expedition left the fort only four days after Hull's invasion, it was scarcely possible that Captain Roberts was then aware of that circumstance. Neither in his letter to the adjutant-general, announcing the capture, does he excuse himself by stating that he had heard of the invasion. In his dispatch to Earl Bathurst, written exactly a fortnight after the preceding letter, and dated Montreal, August 26, Sir George Prevost, in communicating the surrender of Detroit, expressed himself in very altered language, as he said: