[JAMES] WILLIAM DUMMER POWELL 219 
contents; yet there was an active enmity in the vicinage, which 
had gratification in stirring up the savages by going into their 
villages, explaining the horrors of this hellish libel insomuch that 
his life was thought in danger beyond the Posts, and he decided to 
seek protection of the Commander-in-Chief at Quebec.” 
Here then we have Judge Powell’s own statement of what took place 
and out of which the “gentleman of veracity from Canada” or the 
enterprising editor of The United States Gazette evolved the somewhat 
startling news item with which we opened our narrative. 
At Quebec, Judge Powell met John Graves Simcoe, the new Lieu- 
tenant-Governor of Upper Canada, who had arrived the previous year 
and who was awaiting a quorum of his new Executive Council. Simcoe 
had not been idle for the past few months. He had been learning all he 
could of Upper Canada and of her principal men. He had visited Mont- 
real. Heat once told Judge Powell that the authors of the libel were two 
officers under the Judge’s official protection who had accompanied him 
from Montreal. Simcoe introduced him to the Duke of Kent, the 
Commander of the Forces, and to Sir Alured Clarke, the acting Gover- 
nor-General, who assured him of their confidence. It soon became 
apparent that the matter traced back to some trouble at Montreal of 
some years standing, something in connection with the Indian depart- 
ment “and that threats had then been held out of future revenge. ” 
Judge Powell presided at a session of the Court of Common Pleas at 
L’Assomption (Sandwich) on March, 1792, and on the 3rd of September 
of the same year presided at the Court of Oyer and Terminer for the 
District of Hesse. It will be seen therefore that, after clearing himself 
of the serious charge, he returned to his duties in the western part of the 
Province apparently with enlarged powers of administration. Simcoe 
left Quebec for Upper Canada on the 7th of June, 1792. The Judge 
therefore must have made his hurried trip to Quebec at some time 
during the months of April and May. 
And now let us have the story back of it all which links Detroit and 
Montreal. 
There lived in North Carolina at the outbreak of the revolutionary 
troubles a well-to-do planter named La Force. He was of French de- 
scent, but of British sympathies. Being disturbed and harassed by his 
neighbours on account of hisloyalty, he collected his flocks and herds 
and all his slaves, and with wife and family struck out westward into 
the wilderness to seek a new home. Having proceeded beyond the 
settled area, a day of rest and thanksgiving was decided upon. An ox 
was shot and while the sons prepared the carcass, the parents retired to 
their tent to sleep. The work was completed and the sons picked up 
their rifles to put them away. A tent cord caught the trigger of one of 
