George Rogers Clark, like Washington a Virginian land surveyor, was a strong, reckless, brave frontiersman.

Early in 1778 Virginia gave him a small sum of money, made him a lieutenant colonel, and authorized him to raise troops for a western adventure.

He had less than two hundred men when he appeared a little later at Kaskaskia near the Mississippi in what is now Illinois and captured the small British garrison, with the friendly consent of the French settlers about the fort.

He did the same thing at Cahokia, farther up the river.

The French scattered through the western country naturally sided with the Americans, fighting now in alliance with France.