My first care, on my arrival in this province, was to direct the officers of the Indian department at Amherstburg to exert their whole influence with the Indians to prevent the attack which I understood a few tribes meditated against the American frontier. But their efforts proved fruitless, as such was the infatuation of the Indians, that they refused to listen to advice. It will always be an open question how much control the responsible men, either American or British, had over their red-skinned "brothers" compared with their half-renegade, forest-running underlings who dispensed the powder, blankets, and fire-water and directed affairs much as they pleased. Before the outbreak of the war Brock wrote to his superiors concerning his province as follows: The first point to which I am anxious to call your excellency's attention is the district of Amherstburg. I consider it the most important, and, if supplied with the means of commencing active operations, must deter any offensive attempt on this province, from Niagara westward. The American government will be compelled to secure their western frontier from the inroads of the Indians, and this cannot be effected without a very considerable force. But before we can expect an active co-operation on the part of the Indians, the reduction of Detroit and Michilimakinack must convince that people, who conceive themselves to have been sacrificed, in 1794, to our policy,[36] that we are earnestly engaged in the war. The Indians, I am made to understand, are eager for an opportunity to avenge the numerous injuries of which they complain. A few tribes, at the instigation of a Shawnese, of no particular note, have already, although explicitly told not to look for assistance from us, commenced the contest. The stand which they continue to make upon the Wabash, against about two thousand Americans, including militia and regulars, is a strong proof of the large force which a general combination of the Indians will render necessary to protect so widely extended a frontier. Again, Brock was in a very different position from the British commanders during the Revolution; his province was being invaded and the Indians who had settled under the auspices of the British Government in that province were threatened with destruction as seriously as the loyalists or the native Englishmen transplanted from the mother-country. Surely, no one would expect Indians whose homes lay in the upper province to remain neutral when that province was invaded. Indeed, in February, 1812, we find Brock complaining to his superior of the lax attention that was paid by the Government to the Indians settled in the province he had been sent to govern.