The eight days intervening between the arrival of the order to evacuate the fort and the actual departure of the garrison were filled with forebodings and anxiety. The inmates of the fort, which now included not only the garrison but the civilian inhabitants of the neighborhood as well, believed that an appalling fate--death at the hands of a savage foe--inevitably awaited them. The one exception was Captain Heald, who still had faith that the Indians would be true to their promise and furnish an escort on the "march through." He was convinced that he had succeeded in creating an amicable feeling among the savages, and that the safely of all was assured. The officers of the garrison, finding that Captain Heald failed to call a council with them and that he had expressed an intention of abandoning the fort and proceeding to Fort Wayne with an Indian escort, drew up and presented a remonstrance to him in which it was recited that it was highly improbable that the command would be permitted to pass through the country in safety to Fort Wayne. For although it had been said that some of the chiefs had opposed an attack upon the fort, planned the preceding autumn, yet it was well known that they had been actuated in that matter by motives of private regard to one family, that of Mr. Kinzie, and not to any general friendly feeling toward the Americans; and that at any rate it was hardly to be expected that these few individuals would be able to control the whole tribe, who were thirsting for blood. In another clause of the remonstrance it was added that the march of the troops must be necessarily slow, as their movements must be accommodated to the helplessness of the women and children, of whom there were a number with the detachment; and that their unanimous advice was to remain where they were and fortify themselves as strongly as possible. The reply made by Captain Heald to the remonstrance was that his force was totally inadequate to an engagement with the Indians;--that is, in withstanding a siege;--that he should unquestionably be censured for remaining when there appeared a prospect of a safe march through; that, upon the whole, he deemed it expedient to assemble the Indians, distribute the property among them, and then ask of them an escort to Fort Wayne, with the promise of a considerable reward upon their safe arrival;--and that he had "full confidence in the friendly professions of the Indians."