e party was
sent by the creoles to plunder St. Josephs, and that there was not a
Virginian in all the Illinois country, including Vincennes.(70)

In the very midst of winter, on January 2, 1781, an expedition commanded
by Eugenio Pierre, a Spanish captain of militia, set out from St. Louis
against St. Josephs. According to a Spanish account, the party consisted
of sixty-five militia men and sixty Indians, while an American account
declares it to have contained thirty Spaniards, twenty men from Cahokia,
and two hundred Indians.

The purpose of the expedition was to retaliate upon the British for the
attack on St. Louis and for the defeat of La Balme. On the march, severe
difficulties incident to the season were encountered. The post was easily
taken, the Indians were conciliated by a liberal proportion of the booty,
the Spanish flag was raised and the Illinois country with St. Josephs and
its dependencies was claimed for the crown of Spain. The British flag was
given to Commandant Cruzat, of St. Louis. These proceedings made some
prominent Americans fear that Spain would advance claims to the region at
the close of the Revolution.(71)

In the summer of 1781, a party of seven men was sent out by the commandant
at Michilimackinac with a letter to the inhabitants of Cahokia and
Kaskaskia asking them to furnish troops to be paid by the king of England,
and to assume the defensive against the Spaniards. The men reached St.
Louis before visiting Cahokia or Kaskaskia, and were arrested by the
Spanish commandant, who sent a copy of the letter to Major Williams,
knowing no officer in Illinois superior to him. This created jealousy at
Cahokia and Kaskaskia, each of several officers claiming superiority.
Charles Gratiot, a man of some ability, who had removed from Cahokia to
St. Louis because unable to endure the lawlessness at the former place,
wrote that he did not know what course the Illinois people might have
taken if Cruzat had not intercepted the British agents. Illinois was a
country without a head where everyone expected to do as he pleased.(72)

In noting the operations of the medley of military forces in the County of
Illinois, it is easy to conceive how the result might have been different,
but the fact is that as the county ceased to exist, no nation had
established a better title to the region than that of the Americans.

CHAPTER II. THE PERIOD OF ANARCHY IN ILLINOIS.(73)

Illinois was practically in a