Nevertheless the shadow of desperate war hung over the West. Neither the northern nor the southern Indians were yet subdued; sullen and angry they watched the growth of the whites, alert to seize a favorable moment to make one last appeal to arms before surrendering their hunting grounds. Moreover in New Orleans and Detroit the Westerners possessed two outposts which it would be difficult to retain in the event of war with England, the only European nation that had power seriously to injure them. These two outposts were sundered from the rest of the settled Western territory by vast regions tenanted only by warlike Indian tribes. Detroit was most in danger from the Indians, the British being powerless against it unless in alliance with the formidable tribes that had so long battled against American supremacy. Their superb navy gave the British the power to attack New Orleans at will. The Westerners could rally to the aid of New Orleans much more easily than to the aid of Detroit; for the Mississippi offered a sure channel of communication, and New Orleans, unlike Detroit, possessed some capacity for self-defence; whereas the difficulties of transit through the Indian-haunted wilderness south of the Great Lakes were certain to cause endless dangers and delays if it became necessary for the Westerners either to reinforce or to recapture the little city which commanded the straits between Huron and Erie.
During the dozen years which opened with Wayne's campaigns, saw the treaties of Jay and Pinckney, and closed with the explorations of Lewis, Clarke, and Pike, the West had grown with the growth of a giant, and for the first time had achieved peace; but it was not yet safe from danger of outside attack. The territories which had been won by war from the Indians and by treaty from Spain, France, and England, and which had been partially explored, were not yet entirely our own. Much had been accomplished by the deeds of the Indian-fighters, treaty-makers, and wilderness-wanderers; far more had been accomplished by the steady push of the settler folk themselves, as they thrust ever westward, and carved states out of the forest and the prairie; but much yet remained to be done before the West would reach its natural limits, would free itself forever from the pressure of outside foes, and would fill from frontier to frontier with populous commonwealths of its own citizens.
THE END OF VOL. IV.
APPENDIX
It is a pleasure to be able to say that the valuable Robertson manuscripts are now in course of publication, under the direction of a most competent editor in the person of Mr. W. R. Garrett, Ph.D. They are appearing in the American Historical Magazine, at Nashville, Tennessee; the first instalment appeared in January, and the second in April, 1896. The Magazine is doing excellent work, exactly where this work is needed; and it could not render a better service to the study of American history than by printing these Robertson papers.
After the present volume was in press Mr. Oswald Garrison Villard, of Harvard, most kindly called my attention to the Knox Papers, in the archives of the New England Historical and Genealogical Society, of Boston. These papers are of great interest. They are preserved in a number of big volumes. I was able to make only a most cursory examination of them; but Mr. Villard with great kindness went carefully through them, and sent me copies of those which I deemed important. There are a number of papers referring to matters connected with the campaigns against the western Indians. The most interesting and valuable is a long letter from Col. Darke giving a very vivid picture of St. Clair's defeat, and of the rout which followed. While it can hardly be said to cast any new light on the defeat, it describes it in a very striking manner, and brings out well the gallantry of the officers and the inferior quality of the rank and file; and it gives a very unpleasant picture of St. Clair and Hamtranck.
Besides the Darke letter there are several other manuscripts containing information of value. In Volume XXIII., page 169, there is a letter from Knox to General Harmar, dated New York, September 3, 1790. After much preliminary apology, Knox states that it "has been reported, and under circumstances which appear to have gained pretty extensive credit on the frontiers, that you are too apt to indulge yourself to excess in a convivial glass"; and he then points out the inevitable ruin that such indulgence will bring to the General.
A letter from St. Clair to Knox, dated Lexington, September 4, 1791, runs in part: "Desertion and sickness have thinned our ranks. Still, if I can only get them into action before the time of the levies expires, I think my force sufficient, though that opinion is founded on the calculation of the probable number that is opposed to us, having no manner of information as to the force collected to oppose us." On the 15th he writes from Ft. Washington about the coming expiration of enlistments and says: "I am very sensible how hazardous it is to approach, under such circumstances, and my only expectation is that the men will find themselves so far engaged that it will be obviously better to go forward than to return, at the same time it precludes the establishment of another post of communication however necessary, but that indeed is precluded also from our decreasing numbers, and the very little dependence that is to be placed upon the militia."
Col. Winthrop Sargent writes to General Knox from Ft. Washington, on January 2, 1792. He states that there were fourteen hundred Indians opposed to St. Clair in the battle, and repeats a rumor that six hundred Indians from the Lakes quarrelled with the Miamis over the plunder, and went home without sharing any part, warning their allies that thereafter they should fight their battles alone. Sargent dwells upon the need of spies, and the service these spies would have rendered St. Clair. A few days afterwards he writes in reference to a rumor that his own office is to be dispensed with, protesting that this would be an outrage, and that he has always discharged his duties well, having entered the service simply from a desire to be of use to his country. He explains that the money he receives would hardly do more than equip him, and that he only went into the army because he valued reputation and honor more than fortune.
The letters of the early part of 1792 show that the survivors of St. Glair's army were torn by jealousy, and that during the winter following his defeat there was much bitter wrangling among the various officers. Wilkinson frequently wrote to Knox giving his estimate of the various officers, and evidently Knox thought very well of him. Wilkinson spoke well of Sargent; but most of the other officers, whom he mentions at all, he mentions with some disfavor, and he tells at great length of the squabbles among them, his narrative being diversified at times by an account of some other incident such as "a most lawless outrage" by "a party of the soldiery on the person of a civil magistrate in the village of Cincinnati." Knox gives his views as to promotions in a letter to Washington, which shows that he evidently felt a good deal of difficulty in getting men whom he deemed fit for high command, or even for the command of a regiment.