HISTORY OF DETROIT, &c.
Detroit has long been regarded as the limit of civilization towards
the north-west--and to tell truth, there is even yet but little of the
character of civilization beyond it. As may be seen from the map, it
rests upon the west side of the strait, or river, which connects Lake
Huron with Lake Erie; about ten miles below that small extension of the
strait, called Lake St. Clair; and twenty miles above the north shore
of Lake Erie, towards its western extremity. This town, or commercial
port, is dignified with the name, and enjoys the chartered rights,
of a city; although its population at present does not exceed three
thousand. The banks of the river above and below the city are lined
with a French population, descendants of the first European traders
among the Indians, in that quarter; and extending from Lake Erie to
Lake St. Clair, increasing in density, as they approach the town, and
averaging perhaps one hundred per mile.
The city of Detroit dates its history from July 1701. At that time M.
de la Motte Cadillac, with one hundred men, and a Jesuit, carrying
with them every thing necessary for the commencement and support of
the establishment meditated, reached this place. “How numerous and
diversified,” says a public literary document, “are the incidents
compressed within the history of this settlement! No place in the
United States presents such a series of events, interesting in
themselves, and permanently affecting, as they occurred, its progress
and prosperity. Five times its flag has changed--three different
sovereignties have claimed its allegiance, and since it has been held
by the United States, its government has been thrice transferred. Twice
it has been besieged by the Indians, once captured in war, and once
burned to the ground.”
It should be observed, that the French trading ports, on the Upper
Lakes, preceded the settlement of Detroit by nearly fifty years; that
as early as 1673 they had descended the Mississippi, as far as the
Arkanses; and that in 1679 Robert de la Sale penetrated through the
Delta of the Mississippi, and saw its waters mingle with the Gulf
of Mexico. Then was the interesting and vast conception formed and
matured, of establishing a cordon of posts from Quebec, by way of the
Upper Lakes and the Mississippi, to the Mexican seas--an enterprise,
which, considering the age and the obstacles, both physical and moral,
may proudly take rank with any thing done in later days.
What child, whose vernacular tongue is English, has not listened to
Indian story with an intensity of interest, which he can never cease
to cherish; and with expectation of something new and newer still,
from the wildness and fierceness of savage enterprise? Where is the
man, however grave with philosophy and bowed with the weight of years,
however accustomed to things prodigious, whose ear will not bend to
the promise of him, who announces an untold page of Indian warfare? He
who is read in the strifes of civilized nations, can easily anticipate
the modes and the results, even of Napoleon’s campaigns. But he who
follows the track of the savage, thirsting for blood, expects some new
development of stratagem and cruelty, at every turn.
Like _Tecumseh_, whose name signifies _a tiger crouching for his prey_,
a man great in council and in war; and who bore the commission of chief
of the Indian forces, in the British army in the late war;--like
him, the _Ottawa_ chieftain, of the middle of the last century, gave
demonstration of a spirit, which in other circumstances, might have
left him a name, not inferior to Alexander, or Cesar, or Napoleon. It
is sufficient to say, that in 1763, a time of profound peace, _Pontiac_
had attained such influence and supremacy over all the Indian tribes,
spread over those extensive regions, as to have united them in a grand
confederacy for the instantaneous extinction of all the European posts
along a thousand miles of frontier; and that he actually succeeded, so
far as to cut off, almost simultaneously, _nine_ out of _twelve_ of
these military establishments. The surprise of Michillimackinack, one
of these stations, is narrated in the following manner, by the document
above quoted:
“The fort was then upon the main land, near the northern point of the
peninsula. The Ottawas, to whom the assault was committed, prepared
for a great game of ball, to which the officers of the garrison were
invited. While engaged in play, one of the parties gradually inclined
towards the fort, and the other pressed after them. The ball was
once or twice thrown over the pickets, and the Indians were suffered
to enter and procure it. Nearly all the garrison were present as
spectators, and those on duty were alike unprepared, as unsuspicious.
Suddenly the ball was again thrown into the fort, and all the Indians
rushed after it. The rest of the tale is soon told. The troops were
butchered, and the fort destroyed.”
But no one stratagem of Indian warfare is like another. We only know,
that _eight_ of the other stations were annihilated nearly at the same
instant. Detroit was one of the three stations successfully defended,
but not without the shedding of much blood. _Pontiac_ himself appeared
before it. And so unsuspected was his stratagem, that nothing would
have prevented its triumphant execution, but for the informations of
a friendly Indian woman. Pontiac had negotiated a great council to be
held in the fort, to which himself and warriors were to be admitted,
with rifles sawed off and hid under their blankets; by which, with
the tomahawk and knife, at a concerted signal from their chieftain,
they were to rise and massacre the garrison. But in consequence of the
advice from the woman, the garrison were prepared. Pontiac and his
warriors being rebuked, were too generously dismissed, and in return
for this kindness commenced and waged a most bloody war.
Pontiac, unsuccessful in his wars against these posts, notwithstanding
the great advantages he had gained, and after committing numberless
and untold cruelties, (though he was not without his fits of
generosity, and of what are called the noble traits of Indian
character),--implacable in his hatred and resentments; finally retired
to the Illinois, in the south-west, and was there assassinated by the
hand of an Indian. “The memory of this great Ottawa chief,” says the
document used above, and from which this account is abridged, “is still
held in reverence among his countrymen. And whatever be the fate, which
awaits _them_, _his_ name and deeds will live in their traditionary
narratives, increasing in interest, as they increase in years.”
Detroit, originally, and for ages a post for trade, and a garrison
for its protection--having enjoyed and suffered alternately peace and
war, with the aborigines and between rival civilized powers, for such
a long series of years--has now become the beautiful and flourishing
metropolis of a wide and interesting territory--a territory destined
soon to make at least _two_ of the most important states of the
American Union. The city looks proudly across one of the noblest rivers
of the continent, upon the territory of a great and rival power, and
seems to say, though in such vicinity, in reference to her former
exposure and painful vicissitudes:--“Henceforth I will sit in peace,
and grow and flourish under the wing of this Confederate Republic.”
And this place, but a little while ago so distant, is now brought
within four days of the city of New York--the track pursued being seven
hundred and fifty miles. Here, at Detroit, some of the finest steamers
in North America, come and go every day, connecting it with the east,
and have begun already to search out the distant west and north.
The peninsula of Michigan, lying between the lake of the same name on
the west, and Huron on the east, is one of the greatest beauties of
the kind in America, if not in the world. Where can be found such a
tongue of land, and of so great extent, skirted by a coast of eight
hundred miles, of the purest fresh-water seas, navigable for ships of
any burthen? The climate mild and healthful, the country ascertained
to be the best of land--with streams and rivers sufficient for all
useful purposes--and the upland level, between the two great lakes,
chequered with innumerable small lakes, or basins, of one, three, five,
and ten miles in circumference, pure and clear as the fountains of
Eden, and abounding with fish, as do the rivers. There is something in
the character of these basins of water, and in the multitude of them,
which imparts a charm to this region, altogether unrivalled. They
are the sources of the rivers and smaller streams, which flow into
either lake--themselves and their outlets pure as crystal. How many
gentlemen of large estates, and noblemen of Europe, have undertaken to
create artificial lakes, and fill them with fish--which after all their
pains are doomed to the constant deposits of filth and collections of
miasmata; and which maybe clouded by the plunge of a frog? But in the
territory of Michigan is a world of lakes, created by the hand of God,
of all dimensions and shapes, just fitted for the sports of fancy, of
childhood, and of youth--for the relaxations of manly toil--for the
occupation of leisure;--the shores of which are overhung with beautiful
and wholesome shades--and the waters deep, and so clear, that the fish
cannot play in their lowest beds, without betraying their motions
to the observer, floating in his bark upon the surface. The common
processes of nature maintain the everlasting and perfect purity of
these waters, independent of the care of man. The transparency of the
waters, in those upper regions, and in the great lakes, is a marvel--an
incredible wonder to those, who have been accustomed only to turbid
lakes and turbid rivers.