He therefore sent back his son Jean, together with the most active of his Canadian voyageurs and the Jesuit missionary, in order that they might meet the heavily laden canoes and hurry them up country as fast as possible.

But this party was met by the Sious on Rainy River, who massacred them to a man.

They were afterwards found lying in a circle on the beach, decapitated and mutilated.

The heads of most of them were wrapped ironically in beaver skins, and La Verendrye's son, Jean, was horribly cut and slashed, and his mutilated, naked body decorated with garters and bracelets of porcupine quills.
Meantime, during his absence in Lower Canada, two of his sons in charge of Fort Maurepas, on Lake Winnipeg, had been very active.

They had discovered the great size of this lake, and also the entrance of the Red River on the south.