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MICHIGAN CHAPTER 15 Michigan Under British Rule
The cost of it was the chief obstacle. But Virginia stood ready to carry a large share of the financial burden and to see to it that if congress should refuse to aid, Virginia herself would stand the brunt of it. Clark, in whose hands was to be given the task of reducing Detroit, appealed to Washington to furnish supplies, while he himself should undertake to raise and equip the men for the service. But he found it extremely difficult to enlist men for so arduous an undertaking at such a great distance from their homes, in a wild and untraversed country, infested with Indians. Just then the invasion of Virginia by Cornwallis concentrated the energy and resources of that commonwealth within her own borders and the western project was abandoned. It is probable that if such an enterprise had been undertaken its issue would have been doubtful and in any event its success could have had little influence upon the great contest then going on between the colonies and the mother country.
General Haldimand was profoundly earnest in his efforts to suppress the encroachments of the Americans in the Ohio valley. At large expense he fitted out an expedition which was sent out from Detroit under Captain Bird. This expedition was made up of a company of regulars to which was attached a large body of Indians and was accompanied by Detroit militia, commanded by
Chabert De Joncaire, Jonathan Schiefflin, Isidore Chene and others. They went as far as Licking, Kentucky, which they assaulted and captured. The excesses of the Indians in murdering and scalping all the whites who could be found and looting their homes could not be restrained by Bird and were so repulsive to him that he determined to proceed no further.
MICHIGAN
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