The Hair-Buyer's Surrender

Henry Hamilton had a nickname that followed him to his grave: 'the Hair-Buyer.' British policy on the frontier paid Indigenous allies for American scalps, and Hamilton administered that policy from Fort Sackville with bureaucratic efficiency. When Clark's half-frozen men appeared out of the February floodwater, Hamilton couldn't believe it. The attack was impossible — everyone knew you didn't move an army through chest-deep floodwater in February. Hamilton had sent most of his garrison out on raids, expecting no threat until spring. Clark let the fort's defenders watch, from a distance, as he executed four of the captured raiders in full view of the walls. Hamilton surrendered the next morning.