II. ARKANSAS POST AND THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR

C. Captain Colbert Intervenes

3. Captain Colbert Strikes

d) An Alarm Rouses the British

The bateau ascended Wolf River about one-fourth of a league, where she was pulled into the bank. Here the prisoners were sent ashore, the boatmen and slaves being bound by pairs. They were then escorted to a prison about three-quarters of a league from the landing. The route led through the woods and brambles, across several streams, and into the rugged bluff country.

Mindful of Madame Cruzat’s station, Captain Colbert had her, her four young sons, her four slaves, and Labadie placed in a pirogue. Escorted by four Englishmen they were taken “through a deep creek . . . to a hut which served as a habitation of Captain Colbert.”

Madame Cruzat recalled that Colbert’s camp consisted of one large and two small huts, in addition to the men’s prison. The latter was built of “trees placed one upon the other after the limbs had been cut off.” It might have been two stories, and was covered with bark, with no other opening beyond a kind of wicket, which was “closed with a board, and then a log.” There was no light, except that entering through “a breathing hole in the top.”

The cabin occupied by Madame Cruzat, Labadie, and their companions was between the prison and the cabin Colbert shared with Francisco la Grange.

About 9 A.M., on May 3, the day after their capture, there was an alarm. Several unidentified pirogues were sighted coming down the Mississippi. Captain Colbert rushed to the cabin, shouting that Labadie and Fropé, the captain of his bateau, should be “taken with the rest of the prisoners,” who had been rousted out of the prison. As they and their guards were disappearing from the clearing, Colbert cautioned Madame Cruzat to keep her children quiet. He soon returned and announced that he was going to send her and her children aboard the bateau. Madame Cruzat protested, complaining of “the difficulties that would confront her by being alone and without any knowledge of the region, that he should give her the proprietor and the patron.” Colbert was agreeable, and he ordered Labadie and Fropé to accompany her. On reaching the landing, they went aboard the bateau.

Here, after several hours, they were rejoined by Colbert. He explained that the American boats were on a peaceful mission, because they had “left a white banner” on Lafon’s boat. Nevertheless, Captain Colbert and nine or ten of his men spent the night on the bateau, guarding Madame Cruzat her children and slaves, Labadie, and Fropé.

It was almost daybreak on the 4th when the rest of the prisoners returned from their forced march into the rugged bluff country.[50]