While employed in preparing for his defence, he received unquestionable information that Hamilton had detached his Indians on an expedition against the frontiers, reserving at the post he occupied only about eighty regulars, with three pieces of cannon and some swivels.

Clarke instantly resolved to seize this favourable moment.

After detaching a small galley up the Wabash with orders to take her station a few miles below Vincennes, and to permit nothing to pass her, he marched in the depth of winter with one hundred and thirty men, the whole force he could collect, across the country from Kaskaskia to Vincennes.

This march, through the woods, and over high waters, required sixteen days, five of which were employed in crossing the drowned lands of the Wabash.

The troops were under the necessity of wading five miles in water, frequently up to their breasts.