Читать книгу Canada and its Provinces - Adam Shortt - Страница 18

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In September 1760 Major Robert Rogers was sent from Montreal by Sir Jeffrey Amherst to receive the surrender of the western posts included in Vaudreuil's capitulation. On November 7, as he advanced up Lake Erie to Detroit, he met Pontiac at the mouth of a stream called by him Cahogage. He explained the situation to the Ottawa chief, and that wily savage professed himself ready to smoke the pipe of peace with him. Pontiac's ambition was to be a sort of Indian prince with authority over many confederated tribes. If the French could no longer support him in his ambitious plans, their conquerors might be of service to him. The meeting was a friendly one, and had Pontiac been treated at this period with proper tact the destructive Indian war might have been avoided. However, little consideration was given to him or other chiefs. In the eyes of the British they were all brutal savages, to be treated with contempt. Johnson and Rogers were exceptions, and, due to the influence of the former, the Iroquois, on the whole, were to remain neutral during the war.

Rogers sent a messenger in advance to Captain Belêtre, in command at Detroit, informing him of the capitulation and preparing him to surrender the fort. But Belêtre refused to credit the news and exerted himself to rouse the Indians along the Detroit River to resist Rogers's force. When Rogers arrived at his destination he sent Captain Campbell to Belêtre with a copy of the capitulation and a letter from Vaudreuil. Belêtre could only yield, and the fleur-de-lis was pulled down from Fort Detroit and the British ensign raised in its stead. There were seven hundred Indians present on the occasion, and their savage yells of joy seemed to augur well for the new government. Pontiac was playing his part. This change might mean greater power for him, and he cared not who occupied the posts so long as he benefited. He would have preferred the French, but their sun had suffered eclipse, and an Indian has little use for an impotent ally.

Storm and the lateness of the season prevented the British from taking over the other lake posts for the time being, but Forts Miami and Ouatanon, to the south, were occupied and preparations made, with the return of spring, to take possession of the other forts. When the rivers and lakes were once more clear of ice a detachment of the 60th regiment, the Royal Americans, was sent to the West, and soon all the forts claimed by the British, save Fort Chartres on the Mississippi, were grudgingly handed over by their commanders, and the entire region yielded by Vaudreuil passed for ever from French rule.

In 1761 the British flag flew over Fort Niagara, at the mouth of the Niagara River; Fort Schlosser, immediately above the Falls; Fort Presqu'Isle, on the southern shore of Lake Erie; Forts le Bœuf, Venango and Pitt, directly south of Presqu'Isle; Fort Miami, on the Maumee; Fort Ouatanon, on the Wabash; Fort Detroit, on the Detroit River; Fort Sault Ste Marie, at the entrance to Lake Superior; Fort Michilimackinac, between Lake Huron and Lake Michigan; and Forts l'Arbre Croche and St Joseph, on the eastern shore of Lake Michigan. Fort Chartres alone continued to fly the French flag.

The troops, small in number and badly supplied, at all these points were living in a false security. All about them was growing discontent among the savages. The happy days of gifts, kindly treatment and abundant ammunition were at an end. Many of them were brought to the verge of starvation, and, to add to the unrest, unscrupulous traders from the British colonies were flocking into the country, and land-grabbers were crossing the Alleghanies and settling on their lands. The Shawnees and Delawares, and even a portion of the friendly Six Nations, were assuming a warlike attitude, and the French among them were keeping their enmity against the intruders at fever heat.