From the beginning of the siege Pontiac had hoped that the French traders and settlers would join him to force the surrender of the fort.  The arrival of the reinforcement under Cuyler made him despair of winning without their assistance, and early in July he sent his Indians to the leading inhabitants along the river, ordering them to a council, at which he hoped by persuasion or threats to make them take up arms.  This council was attended by such settlers as Robert Navarre, Zacharie Sicotte, Louis Campau, Antoine Cuillerier, Francois Meloche, all men of standing and influence.  In his address to them Pontiac declared:  ’If you are French, accept this war-belt for yourselves, or your young men, and join us; if you are English, we declare war upon you.’

The Gladwyn had brought news of the Peace of Paris between France and England.  Many of the settlers had been hoping that success would crown the French arms in Europe and that Canada would be restored.  Some of those at the council said that these articles of peace were a mere ruse on the part of Gladwyn to gain time.  Robert Navarre, who had published the articles of peace to the French and Indians, and several others were friendly to the British, but the majority of those present were unfriendly.  Sicotte told Pontiac that, while the heads of families could not take up arms, there were three hundred young men about Detroit who would willingly join him.  These words were probably intended to humour the chief; but there were those who took the belt and commenced recruiting among their fellows.  The settlers who joined Pontiac were nearly all half-breeds or men mated with Indian wives.  Others, such as Pierre Reaume and Louis Campau, believing their lives to be in danger on account of their loyalty to the new rulers, sought shelter in the fort.

By July 4 the Indians, under the direction of French allies, had strongly entrenched themselves and had begun a vigorous attack.  But a force of about sixty men marched out from the fort and drove them from the position.  In the retreat two Indians were killed, and one of the pursuing soldiers, who had been a prisoner among the Indians and had learned the ways of savage warfare, scalped one of the fallen braves.  The victim proved to be a nephew of the chief of the Saginaw Chippewas, who now claimed life for life, and demanded that Captain Campbell should be given up to him.  According to the ‘Pontiac Manuscript’ Pontiac acquiesced, and the Saginaw chief killed Campbell ’with a blow of his tomahawk, and after cast him into the river.’  Campbell’s fellow-prisoner McDougall, along with two others, had escaped to the fort some days before.