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376 SPAIN IN THE MISSISSIPPI VALLEY Rogers, who had the misfortune to be killed on the way by the Indians, Your Honor will have been informed of the steps I have taken and what I have written to the court upon the matter. The present state of the war has naturally been the cause of its not having yet replied. As soon as I receive a reply I shall communicate it to you through the said Mr. Oliver Pollock. I hope Your Honor will give me opportunities of showing the perfect consideration with which I desire to please you, so far as lies within my power. May God etc. DELAVILLEBEUVRE TO MIRO April 25, 1780 307 Copy of the letter of the commandant of Natchez. My Dear Sir: I have had the pleasure of receiving, through Don Carlos de Grand-Pre, the gratifying news of the taking of Mobile, which he tells me you had communicated to him. At the same time an Englishman arrived from the Choctaw nation with the same - information and also news that the Indians of that nation had robbed the families who went from here to Tombecbe, Mobile, and Pensacola. It seems that they had killed some of them. These reports have made such an impression that those who were to have gone are now working their lands, and those who had started are returning, some of them having already arrived. Not having any hope of retiring to the Chickasaw nation, because they had been assured by the English merchants that our flag had been raised in that nation, and not knowing where to go, they have decided to return. The benevolence of our governor toward the English militia who were in the fort of Mobile, which was divulged by the Englishman who came here from the Choctaw nation, appears to have satisfied the citizens, for the Englishman referred to says the people of Mobile and Tombecbe, and the merchants of the nations are well pleased, and give our governor the praises that he deserves. . . On the 23rd, nine American families arrived with passports from the commandant of Arkansas. It is now more than two months since they had departed from the two Carolinas, but they have nothing to report except that they were attacked on the Ohio River by a party of Cherokee and Shawnee Indians. In tho attack the Americans lost forty persons. They come with the intention of settling here, to which I have consented. Fort Panmure, April 25,1780. (DELAVILLEBEUVRE) _________________________ 307 BL. A Pinart transcript marked AG Cuba, Fl. Occ. 3-1219