While the frontiers of New York and Pennsyl vania were thus suffering the calamities incident to savage warfare, a fate equally severe seems to have been destined for Virginia. The western militia of that state had made some successful incursions into the country north-west of the Ohio, and had taken some British posts on the Mississippi. These, by an act of the legislature, were erected into a county, called the county of the Illinois; and a regiment of infantry, with a troop of cavalry, to be commanded by Colonel George Rogers Clarke, a gentleman whose great courage, uncommon hardihood, and capacity for Indian warfare, had given him repeated success in enterprises against the savages, were ordered to be recruited for its protection.

This corps was divided into several detachments, the principal of which remained with Colone Clarke at Kaskaskias. Colonel Hamilton, the governor of Detroit, who was understood to have been extremely active in fomenting Indian hostility, was at St. Vincent's, with about six hundred men, principally Indians, projecting an expedition, first against the post at Kaskaskias, and then up the Ohio to Pittsburgh; after which he proposed to desolate the frontiers of Virginia; when Clarke anticipated and defeated his design by one of those bold and decisive measures which, whether formed on a great or a small scale, with many thousand

VOL. IV.

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or

or a few hundred troops, mark the military and enterprising genius of the man who plans and exe cutes them.

Clarke was too far removed from the inhabited country to hope for support, and was too weak to expect to maintain Kaskaskias and the Illinois against the regular force, aided by the whole body of Indians from the lakes to the mouth of the Ohio, by whom he was to be attacked at the first commencement of the season for action; yet he made every preparation in his power for defence. While thus employed, he received unquestionable information from a Spanish merchant, that Hamilton, who supposed himself to be in a state of perfect security at St. Vincent's, had detached his Indians to block up the Ohio, and to harass the frontiers; reserving at the post he occupied only about eighty regular troops, with three pieces of cannon, and some swivels mounted. Clarke at once resolved to seize this favourable moment for preserving himself from the impending danger. He detached a small galley which he had fitted out, mounting two four-pounders and four swivels, manned with a company of soldiers, and having on board stores for his troops, with orders to force her way up the Wabash, and take her station a few miles below St. Vincent, permitting nothing whatever to pass her. Having made this arrangement, he set out in the depth of winter with one hundred

hundred and thirty men, the whole force he could collect, to march across the country from Kaskas kias to St. Vincent's. On this march through the woods, and over high waters, sixteen days were employed. They were five days crossing the drowned lands of the Wabash, in the neighbourhood of the fort; and were under the necessity of wading about five miles in water, frequently up to the breast. After subduing these difficulties, which had been supposed insurmountable, this little party appeared before the town, which was completely surprised, and readily consented to change its master. Hamilton defended the fort for a short time, and then surrendered himself and his garrison prisoners of war. With a few of his immediate agents and counsellors, who had been instrumental in the savage barbarities he had encouraged, he was by order of the executive of Virginia put in irons and confined in a jail.

This small expedition was very important in its consequences. It entirely broke the plan which threatened to pour destruction, the ensuing campaign, on the whole country west of the Alleghany mountains; it detached from the British interest very many of those numerous tribes of Indians south of the waters immediately communicating with the great lakes; and had, most probably, a material influence in fixing the western boundary of the United States.

We have already seen that Congress, actuated by their wishes, rather than governed by a temperate calculation of the means in their possession, had, in the preceding winter, without consulting the commander in chief, planned a second invasion of Canada, to be conducted by the Marquis de la Fayette, and that, as the generals only were got in readiness for this expedition, it was necessarily laid aside. The design however seems to have been suspended, not totally abandoned. The alliance with France, by rendering success rather more possible, revived the latent wish to annex that extensive territory to the United States. Ambition, though an essential motive, was by no means the single one which persuaded the government to this enterprise. By obtaining possession of Canada, not only the dominions of the United States would be greatly extended, and other considerable advantages secured, but the cause of a perpetual and terrible savage war would be entirely removed, and a lasting peace to their northern and western frontiers completely secured. The conquest of Canada, therefore, was an object at all times contemplated with extreme solicitude.

After the war had commenced between France and Great Britain, that favourite subject was again taken up in Congress; and, towards autumn, plan was completely digested for a combined attack to be made by the allied forces of France and

the

the United States on all the British dominions on the continent, and on the adjacent islands of Cape Breton and Newfoundland. This plan was matured about the time the Marquis de la Fayette obtained leave to return to his own country; and was ordered to be transmitted by that nobleman to Doctor Franklin, the minister of the United States at the Court of Versailles, with instructions to induce, if possible, the French cabinet to accede to it. Some communications were also made respecting this subject to the marquis, whose influence in securing its adoption by his own government was greatly relied on; and in October, it was for the first time transmitted to General Washington, with a request that he would inclose it by the Marquis de la Fayette, with his observations on it, to Doctor Franklin.

This very extensive plan for the military operations of the ensuing campaign, prepared entirely in the cabinet, without consulting, so far as is known, a single military character, consisted of a variety of parts.

It was resolved to march, as early as the first of June, two separate detachments, consisting each of fifteen hundred infantry, and one hundred cavalry, from Pittsburgh and Wyoming, against Detroit and Niagara. The object of these corps was to be openly avowed, and they were to destroy the towns belonging to the hostile tribes of Indians