A few miles south of the present city of Lafayette, on the south-east side of the Wabash, at the mouth of Wea Creek, stood the little wooden fort of Ouiatanon.  It was connected with Fort Miami by a footpath through the forest.  It was the most westerly of the British forts in the Ohio country, and might be said to be on the borderland of the territory along the Mississippi, which was still under the government of Louisiana.  There was a considerable French settlement, and near by was the principal village of the Weas, a sub-tribe of the Miami nation.  The fort was guarded by the usual dozen of men, under the command of Lieutenant Edward Jenkins.  In March Jenkins had been warned that an Indian rising was imminent and that soon all the British in the hinterland would be prisoners.  The French and Indians in this region were under the influence of the Mississippi officers and traders, who were, in Jenkins’s words, ’eternally telling lies to the Indians,’ leading them to believe that a great army would soon arrive to recover the forts.  Towards the end of May ambassadors arrived at Ouiatanon, either from the Delawares or from Pontiac, bringing war-belts and instructions to the Weas to seize the fort.  This, as usual, was achieved by treachery.  Jenkins was invited to one of their cabins for a conference.  Totally unaware of the Pontiac conspiracy, or of the fall of St Joseph, Sandusky, or Miami, he accepted the invitation.  While passing out of the fort he was seized and bound, and, when taken to the cabin, he saw there several of his soldiers, prisoners like himself.  The remaining members of the garrison surrendered, knowing how useless it would be to resist, and under the threat that if one Indian were killed all the British would be put to death.  It had been the original intention of the Indians to seize the fort and slaughter the garrison, but, less blood-thirsty than Pontiac’s immediate followers, they were won to mercy by two traders, Maisonville and Lorain, who gave them presents on the condition that the garrison should be made prisoners instead of being slain.  Jenkins and his men were to have been sent to the Mississippi, but their removal was delayed, and they were quartered on the French inhabitants, and kindly treated by both French and Indians until restored to freedom.

The capture of Forts Miami and Ouiatanon gave the Indians complete control of the route between the western end of Lake Erie and the rivers Ohio and Mississippi.  The French traders, who had undoubtedly been instrumental in goading the Indians to hostilities, had now the trade of the Wabash and lower Ohio, and of the tributaries of both, in their own hands.  No British trader could venture into the region with impunity; the few who attempted it were plundered and murdered.