“The fort of the Miamis was in a very bad condition when we reached it. Most of the palisades were decayed and fallen into ruin. There were eight houses, or, to speak more correctly, eight miserable huts which only the desire of making money could make endurable. The French there number twenty-two; all of them including the commandant, had the fever. Monsieur Raimond did not approve the situation of the fort and maintained that it should be placed on the bank of the St. Joseph a scant league from the present site. He wished to show me the spot, but the hindrances of our departure prevented me from going hither. All I could do for him was to trace the plan for his new fort. The latitude of the old one is 41 degrees and 29 minutes.” Captain Raimond lost little time in relocating his fort. The site he chose is the high ground near the present intersection of St. Joe Boulevard and Delaware Avenue. The old buildings of the original French fort served as a nucleus for a settlement and were now occupied by the few Miami Indians who still remained on friendly terms with the French. The little village came to be known as Coldfoot’s village, in honor of Miami Chief Coldfoot. In the face of waning prestige, the French made one spirited attempt to check the English. Under the leadership of Charles Langlade, a few Frenchmen and two hundred Chippewas and Ottawas moved down from Detroit to attack Fort Pickawillany. Assembling their forces at the portage near Kekionga, they turned into the St. Mary’s River, and thence marched overland unheralded toward Pickawillany. After a surprise attack the fort was reduced. In celebration of the victory, and in vengeance for his friendship with the British, the Indians enjoyed a cannibal feast on the body of La Demoiselle, chief of the Piankeshaws. This victory temporarily restored the prestige of France with the Miamis at the portage. The defeat of Braddock in 1755 still further diminished the influence of the English among the Indians. Thus, the battle of propaganda and bribery for the favor of the Indian tribes seesawed back and forth. The pendulum, however, was swinging in favor of the British. During the next few years British political emissaries and traders made ever-increasing trouble for the French; these machinations foreshadowed the destruction of French power in the Ohio Valley. The small French garrison, and French half-breed families living in the present Spy Run Avenue neighborhood, led a precarious existence. The local Indians, aided and abetted by the English, and well-fortified with whiskey (hitherto denied them by the French) now liberally dispensed by the British, increasingly harassed their former French allies.