These proceedings were closed by the following speech from one of the Delawares to Colonel Brodhead:--
"Brother: We now let you know the result of our council respecting the Maquichees.
"Brother: Listen. This is the way I have considered the matter, and if I am mistaken I am very sorry for it Brother, let us both consider of it. I thought when I looked in his eyes that he was sincere.
"Brother: I think the Maquichees are honest In former times they were the best of the Shawanese nation. I think we may take them by the hand; and you know you told me that any nation I took by the hand, you would also receive."
The conference appears to have been satisfactory to Colonel Brodhead. But if the Maquichee clan of the Shawanese preserved their fidelity, the main body of the nation became none the less unfriendly by their means. And although Colonel Brodhead had admonished them that he would not countermand the orders to Colonel Clarke to strike them, it so happened that the first and severest blow was struck by the Shawanese themselves. It was but a short time after the closing of the council at Fort Pitt, that a detachment of seventy men from the Kentucky district of Virginia, under the command of Major Rodgers, was surprised while ascending the Ohio, and nearly exterminated. The Kentuckians were drawn ashore by a stratagem. At first a few Indians only appeared, standing upon a sand-bar near the mouth of the Licking river, while a canoe, with three other Indians, was paddling toward them as though to receive them on board. Rodgers immediately put in to the Kentucky shore, and having made fast his boats, went in pursuit. Only five or six Indians had been seen, and Rodgers, presuming that the whole party would not probably exceed fifteen or twenty at farthest, felt perfectly sure of an easy victory--having seventy men, well armed and provided. Proceeding cautiously toward the point where he supposed he should surround the enemy, and having adjusted his movements with that design, at the very moment when he was preparing to rush forward and secure them, he found himself with his whole force in the midst of an ambuscade! The Indians rose in a cloud of hundreds on all sides of him, and pouring in a close and deadly fire upon the Americans, rushed upon the survivors tomahawk in hand. Major Rodgers, and forty-five of his men were killed almost instantly. The residue ran for the boats, but the guard of only five men who had been left in charge, had sought security by putting off in one of them, while the Indians had already anticipated the fugitives by taking possession of the others. The possibility of retreat being thus cut off, the brave fellows now turned furiously upon the enemy; and as night was approaching, after a sharp fight for some time, a small number, aided by the darkness, succeeded in effecting their escape to Harrodsburgh.