The family were taken prisoners, and from them Clark learned that some days before the townspeople had been alarmed at the rumor of a possible attack; but that their suspicions had been lulled, and they were then off their guard.
There were a great many men in the town, but almost all French, the Indians having for the most part left.

The account proved correct.
Rocheblave, the creole commandant, was sincerely attached to the British interest.

He had been much alarmed early in the year by the reports brought to him by Indians that the Americans were in Kentucky and elsewhere beyond the Alleghanies.

He had written repeatedly to Detroit, asking that regulars could be sent him, and that he might himself be replaced by a commandant of English birth; for though the French were well-disposed towards the crown, they had been frightened by the reports of the ferocity of the backwoodsmen, and the Indians were fickle.

In his letters he mentioned that the French were much more loyal than the men of English parentage.