So far as the regions north of the Ohio were
concerned, the war developed two phases. The first began with
General William Hull's expedition from Ohio against Fort Malden
for the relief of Detroit, and it ended with the humiliating
surrender of that important post, together with the forced
abandonment of Forts Dearborn and Mackinac, so that the Wabash
and Maumee became, for all practical purposes, the country's
northern boundary. This was a story of complete and bitter
defeat. The second phase began likewise with a disaster--the
needless loss of a thousand men on the Raisin River, near
Detroit. Yet it succeeded in bringing William Henry Harrison into
chief command, and it ended in Commodore Perry's signal victory
on Lake Erie and Harrison's equally important defeat of the
disheartened British land forces on the banks of the Thames
River, north of the Lake. At this Battle of the Thames perished
Tecumseh, who in point of fact was the real force behind the
British campaigns in the West. Tradition describes him on the eve
of the battle telling his comrades that his last day had come,
solemnly stripping off his British uniform before going into
battle, and arraying himself in the fighting costume of his own
people.
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