The Conquest: The True Story of Lewis and Clark

  XV

  _THE ATTACK ON ST. LOUIS_

  Scarce had Clark time to set his men to work on Fort Jefferson, on theChickasaw Bluffs overlooking the Mississippi, before he received twoother expresses, one from Montgomery, one from the Spanish Governorhimself,--"Haste, haste to our relief."

  Not wishing to alarm his men, Clark picked out a strong escort,--"Ishall be gone a few days. Finish the fort. Keep a constant guard."

  They thought he had gone to Kentucky.

  All through the year 1779 the Frenchmen remembered Clark's warning. Atlast, so great became the general apprehension, that the peoplethemselves, directed by Madame Rigauche, the school-mistress, erecteda sort of defence of logs and earth, five or six feet high, and posteda cannon in each of the three gates.

  "Pouf! Pouf!" laughed the Governor. But he did not interfere.

  But so many days elapsed, so little sign of change appeared in theaccustomed order of things, that the reassured Frenchmen went on asusual digging in their fields, racing their horses, and clicking theirbilliard balls. Night after night they played their fiddles and dancedtill dawn on their footworn puncheon floors.

  And all the while the Lake Indians of the North were planning andcounselling. All through the Spring they were gathering at rendezvous,paddling down Lake Michigan's shore into the Chicago River, and thenby portage into the Illinois, where they set up the cry, "On to St.Louis!"

  So long had been the fear allayed, so much the rumour discredited,that when old man Quenelle came back across the river, white withexcitement, the people listened to his tale as of one deranged.

  "What? Do you ask? What?" His teeth chattered. "Ducharme, Ducharme theabsconder, meet me across te river an' say--'Te Injun comin'!' Fifteenhuntert down te river of te Illinois!"

  Terrified was the old man. Hearers gathered round plying him withquestions. The incredulous laughed at his incoherence. "What? What?"he gasped. "You laugh?" Some believed him. Dismay began to creep overthe more timid ones.

  "What is it?" inquired the burly Governor De Leyba, bustling up."What? That same old yarn to frighten the people? Quenelle is an olddotard. Take him to prison." Thus reassured, again the people went onwith work, games, festivity.

  But now the people of Cahokia became excited. Early in March ColonelGratiot sent a boatload of goods for trade to Prairie du Chien. It wascaptured by Indians on the Mississippi. Breathless half-breed runnersreported the apparition upon the waters,--"All te waves black withcanoes. A great many sauvages."

  "Clark," was the spoken and unspoken thought of all. "Clark, theinvincible, where is he?"

  Some said, "He is camped with his Long Knives in the American Bottom."

  "No, he is building a fort at the Chickasaw Bluffs."

  Hurriedly the villagers prepared an express for Clark. Charles Gratiotwas sent, the brainiest man in Cahokia, one who could speak English,and, moreover, a great friend of Clark.

  On the swiftest canoe Charles Gratiot launched amid the prayers ofCahokia. Down he swept on the Mississippi with the precious paperscalling for succour. Safely he passed a thousand snags, safely reachedthe bluffs of Chickasaw, and saw the fort. Toiling up he gave hismessage.

  "Colonel Clark? He is gone. We think he left for Louisville." Withoutdelay a messenger was dispatched to follow his supposed direction.

  Meanwhile, Clark and his soldiers, joining Montgomery by land, hadhurried to Cahokia. Immediately he crossed to St. Louis. It was thefeast of Corpus Christi, May 25. Service in the little log chapel wasover.

  "Come," said the people in holiday attire, "Let us gather strawberrieson the flowery mead."

  From their covert, peeped the Indians. "To-morrow!" they said,"to-morrow!"

  Out of the picnic throng, with lap full of flowers, the beautifulDonna ran to greet her lover.

  "So long"--she drew a sigh--"I haf watched and waited!" Love hadtaught her English. Never had the Donna appeared so fair, with shiningeyes and black hair waving on her snowy shoulders.

  With tumultuous heart Colonel Clark bent and kissed her. "Vengeance Iswear on any Indian that shall ever mar this lovely head!" Thencrushing her hand with the grip of a giant,--"Wait a little, my dear,I must see your brother the Governor."

  Outside the maiden waited while Clark entered the Government House.

  At last Don Francisco De Leyba was come to his senses: "I fear, but Iconceal from de people. I sent for Lieutenant Cartabona from de Ste.Genevieve. He haf arrived with twenty-five soldier. Will you notcommand of both side de river? I need you. You promised."

  De Leyba wore a long scarf of crape for his lately deceased wife.Clark had never seen him look so ill; he was worn out and trembling.The ruffle at his wrist shook like that of a man with palsy.

  Clark took the nervous hand in his own firm grasp.

  "Certainly, my friend, I will do everything in my power. What are yourdefences?"

  "We haf a stockade, you note it? De cannon at gates? I assure depeople no danger, de rumour false; I fear dey scarce will believenow." Together they went out to review Cartabona's soldiers and theworks of defence.

  "Le Colonel Clark! Le Colonel Clark!" the people cheered as he passed."Now we are safe!"

  De Leyba had sent out a hunter to shoot ducks for the Colonel'sdinner. And while the Governor and Clark were in discussion, thehunter met a spy.

  "Who commands at Cahokia?" inquired the stranger.

  "Colonel Clark; he has arrived with a great force."

  "Colonel Clark! Oh, no," answered the spy in amazement, "that cannotbe! Clark is in Kentucky. We have just killed an express withdispatches to him there."

  "I don't know about that," answered the hunter, in his turn surprised."Colonel Clark is at this moment in St. Louis, and I have been sent tokill some ducks for his dinner."

  The stranger disappeared.

  Clark was in St. Louis about two hours. "Cartabona is here. I shall beready to answer his slightest signal. Be sure I shall answer." Heturned to go.

  "Going? No, no, Senor Colonel, I cannot permit--" The hands ofGovernor De Leyba shook still more. "I expect you to dine,--haf sent ahunter for ducks."

  But when did George Rogers Clark ever stop to eat when there wasfighting on hand? Hastily recrossing the river, he put Cahokia intoimmediate defence.

  The next day dawned clear and bright, but the people, wearied withall-night dancing, slumbered late. Grandfather Jean Marie Cardinal hadnot danced. He was uncommonly industrious that morning. Hastening awayin the dewy dawn, he went to planting corn in his slightly plowedfields. Gradually others strolled out on the Grand Prairie. It washigh noon when an Indian down by the spring caught the eye ofGrandfather Jean Marie Cardinal.

  "He must not give the alarm," thought the savage, so on the instant heslew and scalped him where he stood.

  Then all was tumult. The people in the village heard the sound offirearms. Lieutenant Cartabona and his garrison fired a gunshot fromthe tower to warn the scattered villagers in the fields. Erelong theycame stumbling into the north gate half dead with fright andexhaustion.

  "The Chippewas! The Chippewas!"

  They had crossed the river and murdered the family of FrancoisBellhome.

  "_Sacre Dieu! le Sauvage! la Tour! la Tour!_" cried the frantichabitants, but the tower was occupied by Cartabona and his cowardsoldiers.

  Every man rushed to the Place des Armes, powder-horn and bullet-pouchin hand.

  "To arms! To arms!" was the terrified cry.

  "Where is the garrison? Where is the Governor?"

  But they came not forth. Cartabona and his men continued to garrisonthe tower. The Governor cowered in the Government House with doorsshut and barricaded. Women and children hid in the houses, tellingtheir beads.

  It was about noon when the quick ear of Clark, over in Cahokia, heardthe cannonading and small arms in St. Louis. He sent an express.

  "Here, Murray and Jaynes, go over the river and inquire the cause."

  Slipping through the cottonwood trees, the express met an old neg
rowoman on a keen run for Cahokia. She screamed, "Run, Boston, run! Agreat many salvages!"

  All together ran back, just in time to meet Colonel Clark marching outof the east gate. In the thick woods of Cahokia Creek he caught a viewof the foe. "Boom!" rang his brass six-pounder,--tree-tops and Indiansfell together.

  Amazed at this rear fire the Indians turned in confusion. Oneterrified look,--"It is the Long Knife! We have been deceived. We willnot fight the Long Knife!" With one wild whoop they scurried to theirboats. The handful of traders, deserted, raised the siege and retired.

  It was the period of the spring rise of the powerful and turbulentMississippi, which, undermining its shores, dumped cottonwood treesinto the river.

  "The whole British army is coming on rafts!" In terror seeing thesupposed foe advancing, Cartabona's soldiers began firing at thewhite-glancing trees on the midnight waters. On, on came the ghostlyflotilla.

  "Cease firing!" demanded De Leyba emerging from his retreat.

  "De cowardly, skulking old Goffner! hide heself! abandon de people!"In wrath they tore toward him, sticks and stones flying. The Governorfled, and the daft Spaniards, watching the river, spiked the cannon,preparing to fly the moment the British landed.

  Cahokia trembled all night long. There were noises and howls ofwolves, but no Indians. Clark himself in the darkness made the roundsof his sentinels. Even through the shadows they guessed who walked atnight.

  "Pass, grand round, keep clear of my arms and all's well," was thesuccessive cry from post to post in the picket gardens of old Cahokia.

  With the first pale streak of dawn the sleepless habitants looked out.All was still. The Indians were gone, but over at St. Louis seven menwere found dead, scalped by the retreating foe. Many more were beingcarried off prisoners, but Clark's pursuing party rescued thirty.

  The prisoners, dragged away to the north by their captors, sufferedhardships until restored at the end of the war, in 1783.

  When Clark heard of the incompetence of De Leyba he was furious. Onhis way to the Government House, he saw the lovely Donna at hercasement. Her hair was dishevelled, her eyes wet with tears. Sheextended her hand. Clark took one step toward her, and then pridetriumphed.

  "Never will I become the father of a race of cowards," and turning onhis heel he left St. Louis forever.

  In one month De Leyba was dead, some said by his own hand. He knewthat Auguste Chouteau had gone to complain of him at New Orleans,--thepeople believed he had been bribed by Great Britain; he knew that onlydisgrace awaited him, and he succumbed to his many disasters and theuniversal obloquy in which he was held. He was buried in the littlelog chapel, beneath the altar, by the side of his wife, where his tombis pointed out to this day.

  And the beautiful Donna De Leyba? She waited and wept but Clark camenot. Then, taking with her the two little orphan nieces, Rita andPerdita, she went down to New Orleans. Here for a time she lingeredamong friends, and at last, giving up all hope, retired to theUrsuline convent and became a nun.

  Presently Auguste Chouteau returned from New Orleans with the newGovernor, Don Francisco de Cruzat, who pacified fears and fortifiedthe town with half-a-dozen circular stone turrets, twenty feet high,connected by a stout stockade of cedar posts pierced with loopholesfor artillery. On the river bank a stone tower called the Half Moon,and west of it a square log tower called the Bastion, still stoodwithin the memory of living men.

  "Next year a thousand Sioux will be in the field under Wabasha," wroteSinclair to Haldimand, his chief in Canada.

  But the Sioux had no more desire to go back to "the high walled houseof thunder," where the cannon sounded not "Hail to great Wabashaw!"

  Their own losses were considerable, for Clark ordered an immediatepursuit. Some of the Spaniards, grateful for the succour of theAmericans, crossed the river and joined Montgomery's troops in hischase after the retreating red men.

  "The Americans are coming," was the scare-word at Prairie du Chien."Better get up your furs."

  With Wabasha's help the traders hastily bundled three hundred packs oftheir best furs into canoes, and setting fire to the remaining sixtypacks, burned them, together with the fort, while they hurried away toMichilimackinac. Matchekewis went by the Lakes. "Two hundred Illinoiscavalry arrived at Chicago five days after the vessels left," is therecord of the Haldimand papers.

  The watchfulness and energy of Clark alone saved Illinois;nevertheless, De Peyster felt satisfied, for he thought that diversionkept Clark from Detroit.

  After the terror was all over, long in the annals of the fireside, theFrench of St. Louis related the feats of "_l'annee du coup_."

  "Auguste Chouteau, he led te defence, he and he brother."

  "No, Madame Rigauche, te school-meestress, she herself touch tecannon."

  "Well, at any rate, we hid in te Chouteau garden, behind te stonewall."