Early in June Clark had reached the falls in the Ohio at the present city of Louisville, and here on an island commanding the falls he built a block house and planted some corn. Here he left the weak and dissatisfied members of his company, and having been joined by a few Kentucky volunteers, he resumed his journey down the river. His first goal was Kaskaskia on the Mississippi, and after a long and perilous journey, the latter part across the country, he captured the post by surprise, seizing the French commandant of the English garrison in an upper room of his own house. He had little difficulty in winning the confidence of the French settlers, who then willingly transferred their loyalty to the new Republic that claimed to be their friend. A different situation developed with the Indians, but after skilful treatment and a long interview with representatives of the many tribes he succeeded in winning their friendship, or at least a quiet neutrality. In the meantime, Father Gibault, an active, friendly French priest, had crossed the country and induced the inhabitants of Vincennes to raise the American flag. Clark sent Captain Helm to take charge of the fort and to lead the French militia. Clark's ambition was to capture Detroit, but so great were the difficulties besetting him that he was compelled to winter at Kaskaskia with insufficient forces, struggling to keep peace and to hold the country he had so successfully seized. In January, a month after the event happened, Clark heard that Hamilton had recaptured Vincennes for the British and was preparing to advance on Kaskaskia. Had Hamilton been prompt in his actions and proceeded at once against Clark he might easily have driven the latter from Kaskaskia and secured to the British the wonderful Northwest territory. His delays, however, gave Clark time to gather a larger force and to show his wonderful power as a leader and his skill as a military campaigner. Few men could have accomplished what Clark did, for few have either the ability or the devotion. "I would have bound myself seven years a Slave," he says, "to have had five hundred troops." Nothing, however, deterred him. He built a large barge or galley, mounted small cannon upon it and manned it with a crew of forty men. This was dispatched to patrol the Ohio, and if possible to get within ten leagues of Vincennes on the Wabash. It was Clark's determination not to wait for attack from the British but to surprise Hamilton in his own fort. It required almost superhuman power to gather the men necessary from the motley crowds at Kaskaskia and from other posts on the river, but the day after the "Willing" (for so he named his barge) sailed, he moved out of Kaskaskia, with a hundred and seventy men following him, to march the two hundred and thirty miles across the wintry wilderness to Vincennes. How he fared and how he accomplished his desire you may read in the selection from his journal.