Pontiac (Ottawa leader) On May 9, he laid siege to the fort, and was eventually joined by more than 900 warriors from a half-dozen tribes. While Pontiac was besieging Fort Detroit, messengers spread word of his actions. Indians made widespread attacks against British forts and Anglo-American (but not French) settlements, and at one point controlled nine of eleven British forts in the Ohio Valley. They destroyed Fort Sandusky. In July 1763, Pontiac defeated a British detachment at the Battle of Bloody Run, but he was unable to capture the fort. In October, he lifted the siege and withdrew to the Illinois Country, where
Siege of Fort Mackinac communities such as the Wyandots near Detroit, who had been friendly to the Americans or neutral, to rally to the British cause. Their hostility influenced the U.S. surrender at the Siege of Detroit shortly afterwards. Lieutenant Hanks was killed by a cannon shot at Detroit shortly before the surrender, while awaiting a court martial for cowardice. British control of Fort Mackinac and northern Michigan was not seriously challenged until 1814 when a large American force was dispatched to retake control of the area. However, the American force was defeated in the Battle of Mackinac Island and the Engagements on Lake