The Siege of Fort Sackville, also known as the Siege of Fort Vincennes or the Battle of Vincennes, was an American Revolutionary War frontier battle fought in present-day Vincennes, Indiana. In February 1779, an American militia led by Lieutenant Colonel George Rogers Clark defeated the British garrison of Fort Sackville commanded by Lieutenant Governor Henry Hamilton. Clark surprised the fort after a gruelling march from Kaskaskia, and following the execution of four Odawa captives, forced Hamilton's surrender.
In January 1778, Lieutenant Colonel George Rogers Clark of the Kentucky militia was authorized by Virginia Governor Patrick Henry to lead an expedition to seize the British outposts of Kaskaskia and Cahokia on the Mississippi River. Despite having recruited only 175 men, Clark captured Kaskaskia on July 4 and Cahokia two days later. The decrepit stockade of Fort Sackville, located in Vincennes on the Wabash River 180 miles east of Kaskakia, was occupied by the end of the month by a small detachment led by Captain Leonard Helm.[1] In response, British Lieutenant Governor Henry Hamilton set out from Fort Detroit on October 7 with 40 Detroit Volunteers led by Captain Guillaume LaMothe, 85 militia led by Major Jehu Hay, a small Royal Artillery detachment, and 60 Odawa and Ojibwe warriors. He was later joined by a 33-man detachment from the 8th Regiment of Foot, and roughly 200 Miami, Potawatomi, and Shawnee warriors accompanied by British Indian Department officers. Hamilton surprised Fort Sackville's small garrison and retook Vincennes on December 17. Work began immediately on restoring the fort. Hamilton decided to winter at Vincennes with the British regulars, while most of the militia and Indigenous warriors returned home.[2]
It was several weeks before Clark learned that Vincennes had been retaken. His informant was Francis Vigo, a St. Louis trader who had briefly been held prisoner by the British. Vigo provided Clarke with information about the strength of Fort Sackville's garrison and Hamilton's plan to retake Kaskaskia and Cahokia in the spring.[3]
Clark decided that he needed to launch a surprise winter attack on Vincennes. He explained his reasons in a letter to Governor Henry:
I know the case is desperate; but, sir, we must either quit the country or attack Mr. Hamilton. No time is to be lost. Were I sure of a reinforcement, I should not attempt it. Who knows what fortune will do for us? Great things have been affected by a few men well conducted. Perhaps we may be fortunate. We have this consolation that our cause is just, and that our country will be grateful and not condemn our conduct, in case we fall through; if so, this country as well as Kentucky, I believe, is lost.[4]
Expedition
Clark's march to Vincennes has been depicted in many paintings such as this illustration by Frederick Coffay Yohn.
On February 5, 1779, Clark set out for Vincennes with Captain Joseph Bowman and 170 men, nearly half of them French volunteers from Kaskaskia. Later, in a letter to his friend and mentor George Mason, Clark described his feeling for the journey as one of "forlorn hope," as his men were faced with a long trek over land that was "in many parts flowing with water."[5] The day after Clark and Bowman began their march, 40 men under Captain John Rogers departed Kaskaskia in the armed keelboatWilling. They headed upriver towards Vincennes along the Ohio and Wabash rivers but failed to arrive in time for the attack.[1]
Clark led his men east from Kaskaskia to Vincennes, a journey of about 180 miles (290km). Clark later recalled that the weather was "wet, but, fortunately, not cold for the season" but found "a great part of the plains under water several inches deep." This made the men's march "difficult and very fatiguing."[5] Provisions were carried on pack horses supplemented by wild game shot by hunting parties. They reached the Little Wabash River on February 13 and found it had burst its banks, flooding an area about 5 miles (8.0km) wide. They built a large canoe to shuttle men and supplies across the river. The next few days were especially trying. Provisions were running low, and the men were continually forced to wade through water. They reached the Embarras River on February 17. They were now only 9 miles (14km) from Fort Sackville but the river was too high to ford. They followed the Embarrass downstream to the Wabash. Spirits were low. They had been without food for the last two days, and Clark struggled to keep men from deserting.[1] Clark later wrote that: "I conducted myself in such a manner that caused the whole to believe that I had no doubt of success, which kept their spirits up."[5] Even so, a February 20 entry in Captain Bowman's journal describes the men in camp as "very quiet but hungry; some almost in despair; many of the creole volunteers talking of returning." By February 22, Bowman reports that they still have "No provisions yet. Lord help us!" and that "those that were weak and famished from so much fatigue went in the canoes" as they headed towards toward Vincennes.[6]
On February 20, a hunting party from Vincennes was captured. They told Clark that the British were unaware of Clark's presence and that the inhabitants of Vincennes were sympathetic to the American cause. The next day, Clark and his men used the hunters' canoe and an abandoned canoe to cross the Wabash, leaving their pack horses behind. They proceeded towards Vincennes, sometimes in water up to their shoulders. The last few days were the hardest. They encountered a flooded plain about 4 miles (6.4km) wide, and used the canoes to shuttle exhausted men across. Shortly before reaching Vincennes, another hunter was captured who informed Clark that the British remained unaware of the American presence. Clark sent the man ahead with a letter to the inhabitants of Vincennes, warning them that everyone should stay in their homes unless they wanted to be considered an enemy. The message was read in the public square. No one went to the fort to warn Hamilton.[7]
Siege
Lieutenant Governor Henry Hamilton surrenders to Colonel George Rogers Clark, February 25, 1779, painting by Hugh Charles McBarron Jr.
Clarke entered Vincennes on the evening of February 23. While most of Clark's men secured the village, small detachments stealthily approached the fort, took cover behind nearby fences and buildings and opened fire.[3]
The attack on Fort Sackville came as a surprise to Hamilton even though the day before a patrol had captured two Virginians and had seen campfires 12 miles south of the fort. He initially believed that the gunfire was caused by a "drunken frolic of the inhabitants" but after a sergeant was slightly wounded realized the fort was under attack and ordered his men to return fire.[1]
British artillery fire was able to dislodge some of Clark's men from their position near the village's church but was otherwise ineffective. The Americans responded by firing through the fort's open portholes, wounding some of the gunners. Shooting continued through the night but slacked off in the hours before dawn. A scouting party that Hamilton had sent out on February 22 to investigate the report of campfires was able to infiltrate through enemy lines to the fort, however, two were captured.[1]
Young Tobacco, a Piankeshaw chief, reportedly offered to assist in the attack. Clark rejected the offer, likely due to his well-known hatred of Indigenous people. He did, however, accept help from the villagers when they supplied dry gunpowder.[1]
About mid-morning on February 24, Clark sent a demand for unconditional surrender to Hamilton under a flag of truce. Hamilton was warned that should the fort's supplies or papers be destroyed, he could "expect no mercy, for by Heavens you shall be treated as a Murtherer.” Hamilton refused to surrender. Although the British regulars enthusiastically supported their commander's decision, the militia who were inside the fort were unwilling to continue fighting since many of their relations were openly assisting Clark. With seven of his regulars wounded, little hope for reinforcement, and a militia who he later called "treacherous cowards," Hamilton sent out a letter offering terms; asking for a three-day truce and a meeting with Clark. Clark repeated his demand for unconditional surrender but did offer to meet Hamilton. Meanwhile, an unsuspecting Odawa scouting party that had set out from Vincennes weeks earlier were ambushed as they returned to the village. Several were killed or wounded and six or seven were taken prisoner. Clark then had four of the prisoners summarily executed within site of the fort's main gate.[3]
Clark would later justify the killings by claiming that the Indigenous warriors were carrying fresh scalps.[3] In his journal, Hamilton reported that Clark or one of his officers used a tomahawk to personally murder at least one of the four, and that Clark arrived for their meeting afterwards "all bloody and sweating... his hands and face still reeking from the human sacrifice in which he had acted as chief priest."[1] While neither Clark or Bowman provided any details, Jacob Schieffelin, a Lieutenant in the British Indian Department who witnessed the murders, stated that Clark wielded the tomahawk.[8]
Clark once again demanded unconditional surrender and swore that should he have to storm the fort, "not a single man should be spared." After Hamilton indicated his willingness to fight it out, a compromise was reached wherein the British would "deliver themselves up Prisoners of War and March out with their Arms and Acoutriments."[3] The following morning Hamilton marched his men out of the fort and formally surrendered to Clark. A total of 79 men were taken prisoner. Clark ordered the American flag raised over the fort and renamed it Fort Patrick Henry.[1]
In celebration of Clark's victory, the Americans fired a salute from a British 6-pounder gun. The salute accidentally ignited some gunpowder charges, injuring Bowman and five others. Bowman died five months later from the severe burns he suffered in the accident.[1]
Aftermath
1929 American postage stamp designed by Frederick Coffay Yohn commemorating the 150th anniversary of the siege.
Clark ordered Hamilton, Hay, LaMothe and 25 others from the Indian Department and 8th Regiment escorted to Williamsburg, Virginia. The other prisoners were paroled and allowed to return to Detroit.[9]
Hamilton was treated as a criminal rather than a prisoner of war due to false claims that he paid Britain's Indigenous allies for scalps. The Virginia Council, headed by Thomas Jefferson, ordered Hamilton and LaMothe placed in irons and confined to the Williamsburg jail. These harsh measures were relaxed several weeks later due to the intervention of George Washington. Lamothe was paroled in October 1779. Hamilton and Hay accepted parole to New York in October 1780 and were officially exchanged in the spring of 1781.[9]
The capture of Fort Sackville without loss of life was Clark's most significant military achievement during the war and became the source of his reputation as a military hero. Early historians proclaimed him "Conqueror of the Northwest," but tended to overemphasize his accomplishments.[10][11] William Hayden English, among others, attributed Britain's ceding of the territory northwest of the Ohio Country in the Treaty of Paris to Clark's exploits.[4], however, most historian agree that Clark's successes were not a factor in the negotiations.[12][13]
Clark had high hopes after his recapture of Vincennes. "This stroke", he wrote "will nearly put an end to the Indian War. Had I men enough to take advantage of the present confusion of the Indian nations, I would silence of the whole in two months." The capture of Kaskaskia, Cahokia and Vincennes, however, did little to curtail Indigenous raids. Clark viewed his victory at Vincennes as a step towards the capture of Fort Detroit. He knew that if Fort Detroit was taken, the British ability to supply its Indigenous allies would be severely limited. Clark repeatedly attempted to organize campaigns against Detroit, but even with the support of Virginia's governor he was never given sufficient men and supplies.[10]
Following Clark's victory, the Virginia General Assembly gave official status to the region northwest of the Ohio River and named it Illinois County. John Todd, who had been with Clark at Vincennes, was appointed as the county's administrator even his authority was effectively limited to Vincennes and the settlements along the Mississippi River. In 1784, Virginia relinquished their claim to the region to the Congress of the Confederation. Three years later, Congress passed the Northwest Ordinance, creating the Northwest Territory.[12]
Vincennes is a city in, and the county seat of, Knox County, Indiana, United States. It is located on the lower Wabash River in the southwestern part of the state, nearly halfway between Evansville and Terre Haute. It was founded in 1732 by French fur traders, including the namesake François-Marie Bissot, Sieur de Vincennes. It is the oldest continually inhabited European settlement in Indiana and was its longest serving territorial capital. It is one of the oldest settlements west of the Appalachians. The population was 16,759 at the 2020 census.
The Illinois Country, also referred to as Upper Louisiana, was a vast region of New France claimed in the 1600s that later fell under Spanish and British control before becoming what is now part of the Midwestern United States. While the area claimed included the entire Upper Mississippi River watershed, French colonial settlement was concentrated along the Mississippi and Illinois Rivers in what is now the U.S. states of Illinois and Missouri, with outposts on the Wabash River in Indiana. Explored in 1673 from Green Bay to the Arkansas River by the Canadien expedition of Louis Jolliet and Jacques Marquette, the area was claimed by France. It was settled primarily from the Pays d'en Haut in the context of the fur trade, and in the establishment of missions from Canada by French Catholic religious orders. Over time, the fur trade took some French to the far reaches of the Rocky Mountains, especially along the branches of the broad Missouri River valley. The "Illinois" in the territory's name is a reference to the Illinois Confederation, a group of related Algonquian native peoples.
The Illinois campaign, also known as Clark's Northwestern campaign, was a series of engagements during the American Revolutionary War in which a small force of Virginia militia led by George Rogers Clark seized control of several British posts in the Illinois Country of the Province of Quebec, located in modern-day Illinois and Indiana in the Midwestern United States. The campaign is the best-known action of the western theater of the war and the source of Clark's reputation as an early American military hero.
George Rogers Clark was an American military officer and surveyor from Virginia who became the highest-ranking Patriot military officer on the northwestern frontier during the Revolutionary War. He served as leader of the Virginia militia in Kentucky throughout much of the war. He is best known for his captures of Kaskaskia in 1778 and Vincennes in 1779 during the Illinois campaign, which greatly weakened British influence in the Northwest Territory and earned Clark the nickname of "Conqueror of the Old Northwest". The British ceded the entire Northwest Territory to the United States in the 1783 Treaty of Paris.
Henry Hamilton was a British Army officer and colonial administrator. He served in North America as Lieutenant Governor of the Province of Quebec and later as Deputy Governor after the American Revolutionary War. He later served as Governor of Bermuda and lastly, as Governor of Dominica, where he died in office.
Leonard Helm was an American frontiersman and military officer who served during the American Revolutionary War. Born around 1720 probably in Fauquier County, Virginia, he died in poverty while fighting Native American allies of British troops during one of the last engagements of the Revolutionary War around June 4, 1782, in Jefferson County, Virginia.
The western theater of the American Revolutionary War (1775–1783) was the area of conflict west of the Appalachian Mountains, the region which became the Northwest Territory of the United States as well as what would become the states of Arkansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Missouri, and Tennessee. The western war was fought between American Indians with their British allies in Detroit, and American settlers south and east of the Ohio River, and also the Spanish as allies of the latter.
George Rogers Clark National Historical Park, located in Vincennes, Indiana, on the banks of the Wabash River at what is believed to be the site of Fort Sackville, is a United States National Historical Park. President Calvin Coolidge authorized a classical memorial and President Franklin D. Roosevelt dedicated the completed structure in 1936.
Fort Pontchartrain du Détroit or Fort Detroit (1701–1796) was a French and later British fortification established in 1701 on the north side of the Detroit River by Antoine Laumet de Lamothe Cadillac. A settlement based on the fur trade, farming and missionary work slowly developed in the area. The fort was located in what is now downtown Detroit, northeast of the intersection of Washington Boulevard and West Jefferson Avenue.
Francis Vigo, born Giuseppe Maria Francesco Vigo, was an Italian-American who aided the American colonial forces during the Revolutionary War and helped found a public university in Vincennes, Indiana.
During the 18th and early 19th centuries, the French, British and U.S. forces built and occupied a number of forts at Vincennes, Indiana. These outposts commanded a strategic position on the Wabash River. The names of the installations were changed by the various ruling parties, and the forts were considered strategic in the French and Indian War, the American Revolutionary War, the Northwest Indian War and the War of 1812. The last fort was abandoned in 1816.
Augustin Mottin de La Balme was a French soldier who served in Europe during the Seven Years' War and in the North America during the American Revolutionary War. His attempt to capture Fort Detroit in 1780 ended in defeat when he was ambushed by forces under Chief Little Turtle.
François Riday Busseron was a Canadien fur trader, general store operator, and militia captain in the American village of Vincennes. He supported the Americans during the American Revolution and funded the first American flag made in Indiana. As a U.S. citizen, he would serve as a judge in the court of general quarter sessions.
Pierre Gibault was a Jesuit missionary and priest in the Northwest Territory in the 18th century, and an American Patriot during the American Revolution.
The George Rogers Clark Flag is a red and green striped banner in the model of American Flags commonly associated with George Rogers Clark, although Colonel Clark did not campaign under these colors. The "Clark" flag was made in Vincennes, Indiana, and likely flew over Fort Sackville even before Clark arrived.
Joseph Lawrence Bowman was an American frontiersmen and military officer who fought during the American Revolutionary War. He was second-in-command during Colonel George Rogers Clark's 1778 military campaign to capture the Illinois Country, in which Clark and his men seized the key British-controlled towns of Kaskaskia, Cahokia, and Vincennes. Following the campaign, Bowman was critically injured in an accidental gunpowder explosion and subsequently died of his wounds. He was the only American officer killed during the 1778-1779 Illinois campaign. Joseph Bowman kept a daily journal of his trek from Kaskaskia to Vincennes, which is one of the best primary source accounts of Clark's victorious campaign.
Young Tobacco was the English name given to a Piankeshaw chief who lived near Post Vincennes during the American Revolution. His influence seems to have extended beyond his own village to all those along the Wabash River.
Isaac Bowman was an 18th-century American soldier and militia officer who took part in the American Revolutionary War and the Northwest Indian War. His capture and eventual escape from hostile Chickasaw led him on a two-year adventure before returning to the United States from Cuba in 1782.
LaBalme's Defeat was a military engagement which occurred on November 6, 1780, between a force of Canadien settlers under the command of French officer Augustin de La Balme and British-allied Miami warriors led by chief Little Turtle during the American Revolutionary War. La Balme had led the hastily recruited force of irregulars to attack British-held Fort Detroit, but was ambushed by a group of Miami warriors after sacking their town of Kekionga on the way. The victory led Little Turtle to become well known on the American frontier, a reputation which would develop during the Northwest Indian War.
During the onset of the Northwest Indian War (1786–1795), there were numerous skirmishes around Vincennes in 1786 between American settlers and Native Americans near Vincennes, a frontier town on the Wabash River. American pioneers had been pouring into the area after the American Revolutionary War, creating tensions with the Native inhabitants of the region.
↑ Watt, Gavin K. (2020). Treaties and Treacheries: The Early Years of the Revolutionary War on America's Western Frontiers 1775-1778. Ottawa: Global Heritage Press. ISBN978-1772401851.
↑ Schieffelin, Jacob (1877). "Narrative of Gov. Henry Hamilton: Loose Notes of the Proceedings and Sufferings of Henry Hamilton". The Magazine of American History with Notes and Queries. 1: 191–192.
↑ Sterner, Eric (2024). Till the Extinction of This Rebellion George Rogers Clark, Frontier Warfare, and the Illinois Campaign of 1778-1779. Yardley, Pennsylvania: Westholme Publishing. ISBN978-1594164255.
1 2 Philyaw, Leslie Scott (2004). Virginia's Western Visions: Political and Cultural Expansion on an Early American Frontier. University of Tennessee Press: University of Tennessee Press. ISBN978-1572333079.
↑ James, James A. (1929). The Life of George Rogers Clark. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. pp.283–285.
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