The continued checks excited the anger of the Eastern people, and the dismay and derision of the Westerners.

They were keenly felt by the officers of the army; and they furnished an excuse for those who wished to jeer at regular troops, and exalt the militia.

Jefferson, who never understood anything about warfare, being a timid man, and who belonged to the visionary school which always denounced the army and navy, was given a legitimate excuse to criticise the tactics of the regulars; [Footnote: Draper MSS., G.R.Clark Papers.

Jefferson to Innes, March 7, 1791.] and of course he never sought occasion to comment on the even worse failings of the militia.
Shortcomings of the Regulars.
The truth was that the American military authorities fell into much the same series of errors as their predecessors, the British, untaught by the dreary and mortifying experience of the latter in fighting these forest foes.

The War Department at Washington, and the Federal generals who first came to the Northwest, did not seem able to realize the formidable character of the Indian armies, and were certainly unable to teach their own troops how to fight them.