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360 T. C. ELLIOTT

find our Captain Carver at Mackinac, his plans well known if not inspired by the resident commandant. In the letter already referred to, he said: "I have two hundred pounds due me from the crown, which I shall have in the spring; also, the governor commandant * * has promised he will take spe- cial care to acquaint the government at home of my services." The claims he filed for the expense of travel to the Westward bore the "O. K." of the commandant, but were not paid at Headquarters because no authority had been given for such employment and these claims became the basis for much im- portunity in London later. The inquiry arises as to who furnished money for this Western adventure by a retired army officer who had been obliged to petition for relief in 1764. The prompt publication in Boston of Carver's letter and his announcement of a forthcoming book leads to the presumption that some one in Massachusetts had advanced funds for this enterprise.

Although he had written to Massachusetts from Mackinac in September, 1767, and his letter had been published there, Captain Carver did not hesitate to write in his Travels that he did not return from the West until November, just as nav- igation had closed on Lake Erie, and too late to return to Boston before the following June. But of his own life at Mackinac during those nine months he says little or nothing. He passes without mention events which might have added to the interest of his narrative, for about the 6th of December the officer in command of the military forces, under orders from Headquarters, placed Commandant Rogers under arrest, later put him in irons because of attempted escape, and, in the spring, sent him under guard to Montreal for trial by court martial. The charge against him was conspiracy ; an attempt to organize the French and the Indians of the Mississippi Val- ley in revolt, in conjunction with another officer named Hop- kins at New Orleans. The charge was changed to one of mutiny and at the trial Rogers was, for lack of evidence it is said, acquitted, but was not returned to Mackinac.