quota to cut off the rebels at Post St. Vincents (Vincennes), but as they are under the management of two chiefs, the one a drunkard and the other an avaricious trader, I meet with difficulties in bringing it about. Thirty Saginah warriors are here in readiness to join them, and the island band can furnish as many more."

Sinclair's announcement of the preliminary successes of his campaigns reveals how St. Louis was cooperating with the American rebels: "During the time necessary for assembling the Indians at La Prairie du Chien, detachments were made to watch the river to intercept craft coming up with provisions and to seize upon the people working in the lead mines. Both one and the other were effected without any accident. Thirty-six Minominies have brought to this post a large armed boat, loaded at Pencour, in which were twelve men and rebel commissary. From the mines they had brought seventeen Spanish and rebel prisoners, and stopped fifty tons of lead ore. The chiefs Machiquawish and Wabasha have kindled this spirit in the western Indians."

In a postscript, after the several parties were well on the way to St. Louis and the Illinois country, Sinclair unfolds his plans for permanent possession: "Phillips, of the Eighth Regiment, who has my warrant to act as lieutenant during your excellency's pleasure, will garrison the fort at the entrance of the Missouri. Captain Hesee will remain at Pencour. Wabasha will attack Misere (Ste. Genevieve) and Kacasia (Kaskaskia). All the traders who will secure the posts on the Spanish side of the Mississippi during the next winter have my promise for the exclusive trade of the Missouri during that time. The two lower villages are to be laid under contributions for the support of their garrisons, and the two upper villages are to send cattle to be forwarded to this place to feed the Indians on their return. Orders will be published at the Illinois for no person to go there, who looks for receiving quarter-and the Indians have orders to give none to any without a British pass. This requires every attention and support, being of utmost consequence."

An Account by an Eye Witness.

The Canadian archives preserve a version of the attack on St. Louis by an eye witness. This account written down as soon as the defeated expedition returned to Mackinaw is titled "Information of a William Brown." Although a prisoner of the British, Brown talked willingly. He owned up to having served as a hunter for the British lieutenant-governor, Hamilton, before Vincennes was taken by George Rogers Clark in 1778. Then he volunteered with Clark to fight the Shawnees, but deserted and went to Misere (Ste. Genevieve). In March preceding the attack, Brown reached St. Louis, or Pencour, as his statement to Sinclair has it. Brown was taken prisoner by the British allies about three hundred yards from the hastily constructed defenses of St. Louis. This is what he told Sinclair:

"About the latter end of March John Conn, a trader, went down the Mississippi with the report of an attack against the Illinois by that route. Upon the arrival of Conn, the Spaniards began to fortify Pencour. The report was afterwards confirmed by a French woman who went down the Mississippi. The woman mentioned was the wife of Monsignor Honroe. The post at the entrance of the Missouri was evacuated and the fort blown up, all the outposts called in, and the videttes of their cavalry (for all are mounted except the garrison) were

placed around the village of Pencour. Platform cannon with a parapet were placed over a stone house. An intrenchment was thrown up and scouts sent out. Two days before the British detachment appeared before Pencour, Colonel Clark (George Rogers Clark) and another rebel colonel, we believe named Montgomery, arrived at Pencour, it was said, with a design to concert an attack upon Michilimackinac, but whether with that design or to repel the expected attack by the Mississippi it was agreed that one hundred from the west side and two hundred from the east side should be equipped and in readiness to march when ordered. We believe Clark and Montgomery to have been in the village of Cahokia when the Indians were beaten off. Colonel Montgomery, or some rebel officer, was killed with a private of the rebel troops who wore a bayonet marked 42nd Regiment. They imagined that no others were killed at the Cahokias as they filed off early to a rising ground lower down the river than the village where all of the rebels were concealed in a stone house and could not be drawn out. Indeed, few stratagems were used, owing to Canadian treachery.

"In the Spanish intrenchment numbers were killed, as the Indians occupied a ground which commanded the greatest part of it and made several feints to enter it in order to draw the Spanish from such part of the works as afforded them cover. Thirty-three scalps were taken on the west side and about twenty-four prisoners, blacks and white people. Great numbers of cattle were killed on both sides of the river. The inhabitants were very much spared by all of the Indians excepting the Winipigoes and Scioux. They only scalped five or six who were not armed for the defense of the lines."

This is the story of eye witness Brown, as taken down for the British official records of the expedition against St. Louis.

Acknowledging Sinclair's bad news and accepting his version of the unsuccessful "attacks upon Pencour and the Cahokias" General Haldimand wrote from Quebec the 10th of August, 1780: "It is very mortifying that the protection Monsieur Calve and others have received should meet so perfidious and so ungrateful return. The circumstances of his and Monsieur Ducharme's conduct, you are best acquainted with and to you I leave to dispose of them as they deserve. If you have evident proof of their counteracting or retarding the operations committed to their direction, or in which they were to assist, I would have them sent prisoners to Montreal.

"I am glad to find," continued Haldimand, "that although our attempts proved unsuccessful, they were attended by no inconsiderable loss to the enemy." The congratulation is over the following which appears in Sinclair's report: "The rebels lost an officer and three men killed at the Cahokias and five prisoners. At Pencour sixty-eight were killed and eighteen black and white people made prisoners, among them several good artificers. Many hundreds of cattle were destroyed and forty-three scalps were brought in."

Thus St. Louis received a baptism of blood in the war for American independence. Intimations that this British movement against St. Louis and the Mississippi Valley were directed from London appear in the correspondence. Sinclair speaks of "a copy of My Lord George Germain's letter" as having relation to the expedition. He says "the Winnipigoes and the Scioux would have stormed the Spanish line at St. Louis if the Sacks and the Outgamies under their treacherous leader, Mons. Calve, had not fallen back so early."

Concluding his narrative of defeat, Sinclair adds: "A like disaster cannot happen next year, and I can venture to assure your excellency that one thousand Sioux without any admixture from neighboring tribes will be in the field in April under Wabasha."

The Capture of St. Joseph.

St. Louis did not wait for Sinclair's April campaign. On the second day of January, 1781, Captain Beausoliel, with sixty-five St. Louisans and the same number of Indian allies, left St. Louis to strike a return "coup." Beausoliel was not the captain's real name. Eugene Pouree he had been christened. But he was a bold man, a born leader, who followed the dangerous vocation of operating a bateau between New Orleans and St. Louis. A man who amounted to something in those days, who was admired by his fellow citizens, was likely to be known by a nickname. It came about that Eugene Pouree as a tribute to his popularity was called Captain Beausoliel. The home of the captain was on Market Street. By reason of his qualities of leadership, Pouree had been made commander of the militia company organized among the men of St. Louis. The expedition made its ways up the Illinois Valley, encountering severe winter weather and suffering hardships. Some distance south of the present Chicago, Pouree led his command to the eastward, passed around the head of Lake Michigan and reached the British post at St. Joseph. The attack was a surprise. The capture was complete. The St. Louis expedition took what furs and other property could be transported, raised the Spanish flag and marched back to St. Louis, delivering the British flag to Governor Cruzat. The expedition was well managed. Leaving St. Louis Pouree carried goods with which he successfully bought his way through the Indian tribes encountered. The route took the expedition near the present city of Danville, where years afterwards bullets of Spanish manufacture were found by American settlers. Pouree's force turned northward near South Bend. The gifts made to the Indians not only secured a peaceful journey, but insured the surprise of St. Joseph, which was complete. The St. Louisans assaulted the fort and took the traders and British soldiers prisoners. They found a considerable stock of furs, which they divided with the Indians. The return was made to St. Louis in March. Sinclair attempted no April campaign. The honors of both defense in 1780 and offense in 1791 were with the St. Louisans.

CHAPTER XXV.

UNTOWARD EVENTS.

The New Madrid Earthquake-Descriptions by Eye Witnesses-Effect on the Mississippi— Two Months of Terror-Senator Linn's Report-Investigations by Scientists—Congressional Act of Relief-The Mormon War-Joseph Smith's Revelations-City of Zion and Land of Promise-Expulsion from Jackson County-Conferences at Liberty-Arrival of a Mormon Army-The Ferry Tragedy-Appeals to Governor Dunklin-A Legislative Investigation-Segregation Planned-A County Set Apart―The Mormon Regiment— Captain Fear Not-The Danites-Battle of Crooked Creek-Militia Ordered Out -Governor Boggs' Instructions—Extermination or Exodus The Surrender at Far West-Execution of Leaders Proposed-General Doniphan's Refusal to Shoot ThemThe Fight at Haun's Mill-John D. Lee's Confession-Eighteen Bodies Buried in a Well-Gen. John B. Clark's Ultimatum—Midwinter Exodus from Missouri—The Slicker War-A Custom Brought from Tennessee-Recollections of Uncle Nattie McCracken -Removal of Tom Turk-The Flood of 1844—Conditions Along the Missouri--The "Head Disease"-Data Preserved by the Government-American Bottom Submerged— The Gasconade Disaster-Recollections of G. B. Winston-Grasshopper Visitation of 1875-The Peralta Claim.

The people of Missouri,

Like a whirlwind in its fury,

And without judge and jury,

Drove the saints and spilled their blood.

-By a Mormon Poct.

A colony from New Jersey came into Upper Louisiana as early as 1788. They laid out the city of New Madrid with wide streets and parks on plans which aroused the astonishment of the French fur traders. Immigrants came from the Atlantic Coast. New Madrid was in a fair way to become the chief city of the Mississippi Valley. Colonel George Morgan of New Jersey was the moving spirit. At a time when the Spanish governor general was encouraging immigration, Morgan went to New Orleans and obtained a large grant of land. General James Wilkinson of the United States Army, who was carrying on secret negotiations with the Spanish officials, made charges against Morgan and prompted the governor general to cancel the concession. Spanish soldiers were sent to New Madrid. Morgan went back to the States.

General Firman A. Rozier said that the New Madrid earthquake followed immediately after the appearance of a great comet. Perhaps the most accurate description of the earthquake was given by S. P. Hildreth.

"The center of its violence was thought to be near the Little Prairie, twenty-five or thirty miles below New Madrid, the vibrations from which were felt all over the valley of the Ohio, as high up as Pittsburg. The first shock was felt on the night of the 16th of December, 1811, and was repeated at intervals, with decreasing violence until some time

in the month of February following. New Madrid having suffered more than any other town on the Mississippi from its effects was considered as situated near the focus from whence the undulation proceeded. From an eye witness, who was then about forty miles below that town in a flatboat, on his way to New Orleans with a load of produce and who narrated the scene to me, the agitation which convulsed the earth, and the waters of the river, filled every living creature with terror. The first shock took place in the night, while the boat was lying at the shore in company with several others. At this period there was danger apprehended from the southern Indians, it being soon after the battle of Tippecanoe; and for safety several boats kept in company for mutual defense in the case of an attack. In the middle of the night there was a terrible shock and jarring of the boats, so that the crews were all awakened, and hurried on deck with their weapons of defense in their hands, thinking the Indians were rushing on board. The ducks, geese and other aquatic birds whose numberless flocks were quietly resting in the eddies of the river, were thrown into the greatest tumult, and with loud screams expressed their alarm in accents of terror. The noise and commotion became hushed, and nothing could be discovered to excite apprehension, so that the boatmen concluded that the shock was occasioned by the falling of a large mass of the bank of the river near them. As soon as it was light enough to distinguish objects, the crews were all up, making ready to depart. Directly loud roaring and hissing was heard, like the escape of steam from a boiler, accompanied by the most violent agitation of the shores and tremendous boiling up of the waters of the Mississippi in huge swells, and rolling the waters below back on the descending streams, and tossing the boats about so violently that the men with difficulty could keep on their feet. The sandbars and points of the island gave way, swallowed up in the tumultuous bosom of the river; carrying down with them the cottonwood trees, crashing and cracking, tossing their arms to and fro as if sensible of their danger while they disappeared beneath the flood. The water of the river, which the day before was tolerably clear, being rather low, changed to a reddish hue, and became thick with mud thrown up from its bottom, while the surface, lashed violently by the agitation of the earth beneath, was covered with foam, which, gathering into masses the size of a barrel, floated along on the trembling surface. The earth opened in wide fissures and closing again threw the water, sand and mud in large jets higher than the tops of the trees. The atmosphere was filled with a thick vapor, or gas, to which the light imparted a purple tinge, altogether different in appearance from the autumnal haze of Indian summer, or that of smoke.

"From the temporary check to the current, by the heaving of the bottom, the sinking of the banks and sandbars into the bed of the stream, the river rose in a few minutes five or six feet, and impatient of the restraint again rushed forward with redoubled impetuosity, hurrying along the boats now set loose by the horror-struck boatmen, as in less danger on the water than at the shore where the banks threatened every moment to destroy them by the falling earth, or carry them down in the vortex of the sinking masses. Many boats were overwhelmed in this manner and their crews perished with them. It required the utmost exertion of the men to keep the boat, of which my informant was the owner, in the middle of the river, as far from the shores, sandbars, or islands as they could. Numerous boats were wrecked on the snags and old trees thrown up from the bottom of the river where they had quietly rested for ages, while others were sunk or stranded on the sandbars or islands.

"At New Madrid several boats were carried by the reflux of the current into a small stream that puts into the river just above the town and left on the ground by the returning water, a considerable distance from the river. A man who belonged to one of the company boats was left for several hours on the upright trunk of an old snag in the middle of the river, against which his boat was wrecked and sunk. It stood with the roots a few feet above the water, and to these he contrived to attach himself; while every fresh shock threw the agitated waves against, and kept gradually settling the tree deeper in the mud at the bottom, bringing him nearer and nearer to the deep, muddy waters which to his terrified imagination seemed desirous of swallowing him up. While hanging here calling with piteous shouts for aid, several boats passed by without being able to relieve him, until finally a skiff was well manned, rowed a short distance above him, and dropped down close to the snag from which he tumbled in as she passed by.