From the surrender of the northwest posts and the founding of Cleveland to the year 1812, there is little to note in the history of the Great Lakes. The forts were gradually strengthened, the fur trade was continued, and a few settlements were made on the southern shores of Lake Erie and Lake Ontario. Travel and transportation between the Atlantic seaboard and the Great Lakes were so difficult that few settlers found their way into the lake region, and there was no market for such agricultural products as were raised. In the same period the Ohio Valley was fast filling up, and settlers were pushing westward and northward from the Ohio River into central Ohio and Indiana. The ever increasing pressure on the Indians of that region aroused their fears and resentment, and made them listen to the plans of an able chieftain, Tecumseh, who banded them together in a strong league for resistance to the whites. The natives looked for aid to the British in Canada, but how far these had gone in encouraging the Indians is unknown. In 1811 matters became so serious that General William Henry Harrison, Governor of Indiana Territory, marched against the Indians and defeated them in the battle of Tippecanoe. When the War of 1812 began, Tecumseh and many of his allies joined the British. The opening of the war found the lake frontier of the United States exposed and almost unprotected. At Fort Wayne there were eighty-five soldiers, at Fort Harrison (Terre Haute) fifty, at Fort Dearborn (Chicago) fifty-three, at Fort Mackinac eighty-eight, and at Detroit one hundred and twenty. The last-named post claimed early attention, because of its great importance, and also because of its exposed situation. Its loss to the United States would mean the loss of the upper lakes, at least temporarily. The problem was a difficult one because the United States had no war vessels on the lakes to secure communication between Detroit and the settlements on the southeastern shore of Lake Erie. William Hull, Governor of Michigan Territory, fully recognized the importance of a naval force, but he was obliged to do what he could to defend Detroit without one. In the spring of 1812, with three regiments of Ohio militia, a troop of Ohio dragoons, and a regiment of United States infantry,--in all about sixteen hundred men,--he set out from the settlements in Ohio to march overland to reënforce this important post. The route lay through the wilderness, much of the way over swampy grounds, but the soldiers cut roads and advanced with a rapidity that amazed the British. At Frenchtown, on the River Raisin, forty miles below Detroit, Hull received word that war had been declared. Before this he had sent a schooner to Detroit with supplies and a letter to the commandant apprising him of his coming. This vessel was seized by the British soldiers stationed at Malden, on the Canadian side of the Detroit River, and some distance below the American town.