War of 1812
Bailly attempted to avoid involvement in the War of 1812, but found that he could not maintain neutrality. He was a Canadian citizen, and had a huge business headquartered in Montreal. Bailly was appointed a Lieutenant in the Michigan Fencibles, a regiment of Canadian militia, in January 1813. He was seized as a prisoner of war in January 1814, while visiting his post at Parc Aux Vaches (very near the site of today's campus of the University of Notre Dame), by United States militia. He was taken to Fort Detroit and held for two months until March. Bailly was on Mackinac Island when it was invaded by US forces in July, and was deported with the other Canadian Loyalists to Drummond Island, Canada (now Chippewa County, Michigan), though the Battle of Mackinac Island ended in the retreat of American forces. He sent his eight year old daughter Sophia to live with her adopted brother, trader Joseph LaFramboise in Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin; but the war theater soon expanded westward to that village.
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Famous quotes containing the word war:
“There is great fear expressed on all sides lest this war shall be made a war for the negro. I am willing that it shall be. It is a war to found an empire on the negro in slavery, and shame on us if we do not make it a war to establish the negro in freedom—against whom the whole nation, North and South, East and West, in one mighty conspiracy, has combined from the beginning.”
—Susan B. Anthony (1820–1906)