One of the most remarkable men of Revolutionary times was George Rogers
Clark, and his exploits read more like those of the hero of some novel
than like the deeds of a simple soldier and patriot.
In early boyhood and youth he acquired the rather scanty education which
was then considered necessary for a child of fairly well-to-do parents,
but he never applied himself so closely to his books as to lose his love
for the woods and streams of the wild country that surrounded him. He
became a surveyor, and among the wonders and trials of the wilderness
lost much of the little polish he had acquired. But he learned the
woods, the mountain passes and the river courses, and became fully
acquainted with the wild human denizens of the forests. His six feet of
muscular body, his courage and his fierce passions fitted him to lead
men and to overawe his enemies, red or white. He had "red hair and a
black penetrating eye," two gifts that marked him among the adventurous
men who were finding their way across the Alleghanies. He tried farming,
but succeeded better as a fighter in those fierce conflicts with Indians
and border desperadoes which gave to Kentucky the name of "Dark and
Bloody Ground."
In 1777, after the breaking out of the Revolution, there were several
French settlements lying to the north of the Ohio and scattered from
Detroit to the Mississippi. Among these were Mackinac, Green Bay,
Prairie du Chien, Vincennes, Kaskaskia and Cahokia. The English were in
possession of all these and held them usually by a single commanding
officer and a very small garrison. The French inhabitants had made
friends with the Indians, and in many instances had intermarried with
them. Moreover, while they were submissive to the British they were by
no means attached to them and were apparently quite likely to submit
with equal willingness to the Americans should they succeed in the
struggle. This was what Clark understood so thoroughly that he early
became possessed of the idea that it would be a comparatively simple
matter to secure to the United States all that promising land lying
between the Alleghanies, the Ohio and the Mississippi.
The jealousy that existed between Pennsylvania and Virginia over an
extension westward made it extremely difficult for Clark to get aid from
the Colonies or even from Virginia, his native state. However, he
succeeded in interesting Patrick Henry, then governor of Virginia, and
preserving the greatest secrecy, he set about recruiting his forces.
It was a desperate undertaking, and the obstacles, naturally great, were
made infinitely more trying by the fact that he could tell none of his
men the real purpose for which they were enlisting. By May, 1778,
however, he had secured one hundred and fifty backwoodsmen from the
western reaches of Virginia. With these he started on his venturous
undertaking.
Reuben Gold Thwaites, in his _How George Rogers Clark Won the
Northwest_, describes the volunteers as follows:
"There was of course no attempt among them at military uniform, officers
in no wise being distinguished from men. The conventional dress of
eighteenth-century borderers was an adaptation to local conditions,
being in part borrowed from the Indians. Their feet were encased in
moccasins. Perhaps the majority of the corps had loose, thin trousers of
homespun or buckskin, with a fringe of leather thongs down each outer
seam of the legs; but many wore only leggings of leather, and were as
bare of knee and thigh as a Highland clansman; indeed, many of the
pioneers were Scotch-Irish, some of whom had been accustomed to this
airy costume in the mother-land. Common to all were fringed hunting
shirts or smocks, generally of buckskin--a picturesque, flowing garment
reaching from neck to knees, and girded about the waist by a leathern
belt, from which dangled the tomahawk and scalping-knife. On one hip
hung the carefully scraped powder horn; on the other, a leather sack,
serving both as game-bag and provision-pouch, although often the folds
of the shirt, full and ample above the belt, were the depository for
food and ammunition. A broad-brimmed felt hat, or a cap of fox-skin or
squirrel-skin, with the tail dangling behind, crowned the often tall and
always sinewy frontiersman. His constant companion was his home-made
flint-lock rifle--a clumsy, heavy weapon, so long that it reached to the
chin of the tallest man, but unerring in the hands of an expert
marksman, such as was each of these backwoodsmen.
"They were rough in manners and in speech. Among them, we must confess,
were men who had fled from the coast settlements because no longer to be
tolerated in a law-abiding community. There were not lacking mean,
brutal fellows, whose innate badness had on the untrammelled frontier
developed into wickedness. Many joined Clark for mere adventure, for
plunder and deviltry. The majority, however, were men of good parts, who
sought to protect their homes at whatever peril--sincere men, as large
of heart as they were of frame, many of them in later years developing
into citizens of a high type of effectiveness in a frontier
commonwealth. As a matter of history, most of them proved upon this
expedition to be heroes worthy of the fame they won and the leader whom
they followed."
Early in June Clark had reached the falls in the Ohio at the present
city of Louisville, and here on an island commanding the falls he built
a block house and planted some corn. Here he left the weak and
dissatisfied members of his company, and having been joined by a few
Kentucky volunteers, he resumed his journey down the river. His first
goal was Kaskaskia on the Mississippi, and after a long and perilous
journey, the latter part across the country, he captured the post by
surprise, seizing the French commandant of the English garrison in an
upper room of his own house. He had little difficulty in winning the
confidence of the French settlers, who then willingly transferred their
loyalty to the new Republic that claimed to be their friend.
A different situation developed with the Indians, but after skilful
treatment and a long interview with representatives of the many tribes
he succeeded in winning their friendship, or at least a quiet
neutrality. In the meantime, Father Gibault, an active, friendly French
priest, had crossed the country and induced the inhabitants of Vincennes
to raise the American flag. Clark sent Captain Helm to take charge of
the fort and to lead the French militia.
Clark's ambition was to capture Detroit, but so great were the
difficulties besetting him that he was compelled to winter at Kaskaskia
with insufficient forces, struggling to keep peace and to hold the
country he had so successfully seized. In January, a month after the
event happened, Clark heard that Hamilton had recaptured Vincennes for
the British and was preparing to advance on Kaskaskia. Had Hamilton been
prompt in his actions and proceeded at once against Clark he might
easily have driven the latter from Kaskaskia and secured to the British
the wonderful Northwest territory. His delays, however, gave Clark time
to gather a larger force and to show his wonderful power as a leader and
his skill as a military campaigner.
Few men could have accomplished what Clark did, for few have either the
ability or the devotion. "I would have bound myself seven years a
Slave," he says, "to have had five hundred troops." Nothing, however,
deterred him. He built a large barge or galley, mounted small cannon
upon it and manned it with a crew of forty men. This was dispatched to
patrol the Ohio, and if possible to get within ten leagues of Vincennes
on the Wabash. It was Clark's determination not to wait for attack from
the British but to surprise Hamilton in his own fort. It required almost
superhuman power to gather the men necessary from the motley crowds at
Kaskaskia and from other posts on the river, but the day after the
"Willing" (for so he named his barge) sailed, he moved out of Kaskaskia,
with a hundred and seventy men following him, to march the two hundred
and thirty miles across the wintry wilderness to Vincennes. How he fared
and how he accomplished his desire you may read in the selection from
his journal.
Clark's activity did not end with the capture of Vincennes, but that was
the most remarkable of his long series of military achievements. No more
heroic man ever lived, and few Americans have left such a memory for
high patriotism, self-sacrifice and wonderful achievement. His
accomplishments are unparalleled in the history of the Mississippi
valley, and the youth of the region may well be proud that to such a man
they are indebted for their right to live in the United States.
Unfortunately, Clark's later years were not in keeping with his early
character. He felt that his country was ungrateful to him, the liquor
habit mastered him, he was mixed up in unfortunate political deals with
France, and at last sank into poverty and was almost forgotten. It is
said that once when in his latter years the State of Virginia sent him a
sword in token of their appreciation of his services, he angrily thrust
the sword into the ground and broke the blade with his crutch, while he
cried out: "When Virginia needed a sword I gave her one. She sends me
now a toy. I want bread!"
He lived until 1818, and then died at his sister's house near
Louisville, and was buried at Cave Hill Cemetery in that city.