II. ARKANSAS POST AND THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR

D. Captain Colbert Raids Arkansas Post

1. Colbert’s Band Renews its Attacks on Shipping

Little was heard of Captain Colbert and his band during the summer and autumn of 1782. Acting-Governor Miró general amnesty, and his and Colonel Cruzat’s negotiations with the Indians, succeeded in bringing in some of the Natchez refugees, but they did not destroy Colbert’s command. Fugitives returning to Natchez told Miró that Colbert’s force was disbanding; that there had never been more than 100 British among the Chickasaws capable of bearing arms; and that news of the evacuation of Savannah by the British army had sapped their morale and satisfied them that they could expect no reinforcements. Forty of the partisans had accordingly left the Chickasaw Nation to settle on Cumberland River, and others planned to collect what peltry they could and make for St. Augustine in East Florida.

Of the 100 whites in the Chickasaw Nation, only about 30, Miró’s informants stated, belonged to Colbert’s band; the others were traders who did not want to participate in his schemes. Following the harvest, Captain Colbert had sought to rally 200 Chickasaw warriors to join his band in a raid on Arkansas Post, or to resume attacks on boats ascending the Mississippi. The chiefs, desirous of peace, had discouraged the young firebrands, and Colbert had to forego his plans, because with whites alone he lacked necessary manpower.[89]

By December 1782 Captain Colbert and his band were back at their old haunts. An American bercha was captured. At the beginning of the new year, they seized an American flatboat, whose crew joined them, and attacked a boat commanded by Benito Vásquez.[90]

2. Captain Dubreuil Takes Command

Meanwhile, Acting-Governor Mir had satisfied himself that Arkansas Post had little to fear from Captain Colbert, and nothing to worry about from the Chickasaws. In accordance with Miró’s orders, Lieutenant de Villars dispatched the riverman Lejeunesse to St. Louis to ask Captain Dubreuil to send down a bateau-load of flour and cornmeal for the garrison. Miró reinforced the garrison with 33 men, drawn from those he had brought with him to Natchez in July. These soldiers of the Louisiana Regiment would replace the militiamen called out by de Villars following the alarm caused by the capture of Labadie’s bateau and the word brought by Labadie and his companions that Colbert planned an early descent on Arkansas Post.[91]

Colonel Miró was distressed to learn that the carriages of three of the four cannon at the post had rotted, and that the stockade had not been pierced for embrasures. He accordingly shipped up from Natchez four naval carriages for the cannons. With the carriages went Antonio Soler, an ex-sergeant in the artillery, to cut embrasures in the stockade, mount the cannons, and instruct the garrison in their use.[92]

Captain Dubreuil reached Arkansas Post from the Ilinueses on January 5, 1783, and within 48 hours, having completed the necessary paperwork and inventories, assumed command of Fort Carlos III.[93]