The remaining gun brought up the rear of the
detachment, who marched with fixed bayonets and two balls
in each musket; the whole presenting a front of sections,
that completely filled up the road along which they
passed. Colonel de Haldimar, Captain Wentworth, and the
Adjutant Lawson followed in the extreme rear.
An event so singular as that of the appearance of the
English without their fort, beset as they were by a host
of fierce and dangerous enemies, was not likely to pass
unnoticed by a single individual in the little village
of Detroit. We have already observed, that most of the
colonist settlers had been cruelly massacred at the very
onset of hostilities. Not so, however, with the Canadians,
who, from their anterior relations with the natives, and
the mutual and tacit good understanding that subsisted
between both parties, were suffered to continue in quiet
and unmolested possession of their homes, where they
preserved an avowed neutrality, never otherwise infringed
than by the assistance secretly and occasionally rendered
to the English troops, whose gold they were glad to
receive in exchange for the necessaries of life.
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