George Bancroft, History of the United States from the Discovery of the American Continent, Vol. 10

[195] and from what we now call East Tennessee,

Chap. VIII.} 1778.

and Kentucky. On the twenty-fourth of June, the day of an eclipse of the sun, his boats passed over the falls of the Ohio. After leaving a small garrison in an island near them, his party consisted of four companies only; but the men were freeholders, each of whom had self-respect, and confidence in every one of his companions. Their captains were John Montgomery, Leonard Helm, Joseph Bowman, and William Harrod. An attack on Vincennes was the first object of Clark, but he learned that its garrison outnumbered his forces.

In the north-west, Detroit was the central point of British authority. There Hamilton, the lieutenant-governor, summoned several nations of Indians to council; and from that post he sent abroad along the American frontier parties of savages, whose reckless cruelty won his applause as the best proofs of their attachment to British interests.¹ Sure of their aid, he schemed attempts against the ‘rebel forts on the Ohio,’ relying on the red men of the prairies, and the white men of Vincennes. The reports sent to Germain made him believe that the inhabitants of that settlement, though ‘a poor people who thought themselves cast off from his Majesty's protection, were firm in their allegiance to defend Fort Sackville against all enemies,’ and that hundreds in Pittsburgh remained at heart attached to the crown.²

On the invasion of Canada in 1775, Carleton, to