VOL. II NO. 5
THE
MAGAZINE OF HISTORY
WITH
NOTES AND QUERIES
NOVEMBER, 1905
WILLIAM ABBATT
281 FOURTH AVENUE, NEW YORK
Published Monthly $5.00 a Year 50 Cents a Number
THE MAGAZINE OF HISTORY
WITH NOTES AND QUERIES
VOL. II NOVEMBER, 1905. NO. 5
CONTENTS
MONUMENT WHERE WAS CLINTON’S COOPERSTOWN
DAM _Frontispiece_
PAGE
SULLIVAN’S GREAT MARCH INTO THE INDIAN REV. W. E. GRIFFIS,
COUNTRY (_First Paper_) L.H.D. 295
THE BRITISH NAVY IN THE REVOLUTION
(_Second Paper_) REGINALD PELHAM BOLTON 311
THE LIBERTY OF THE PRESS (_Seventh Paper_) REV. LIVINGSTON ROWE
SCHUYLER 315
REMINISCENCES OF ROBERT FULTON J. B. CALHOUN 326
DOMINIE SOLOMON FROELIGH AND HIS GREAT
SCHISM REV. J. R. DURYEE, D.D. 330
A DAY IN THE GREAT DISMAL SWAMP LOUISE E. CATLIN 339
MISCELLANEA OF AMERICAN HISTORY EUGENE F. MCPIKE 346
EDITORIAL 352
MINOR TOPICS: The Fate of the Pigeons 353
INDIAN LEGENDS: _III._ THE LONE BUFFALO (The Late) CHARLES
LANMAN 356
ORIGINAL DOCUMENTS
Agreement Between Edmund Munro and
John Sellon 359
Letters (three) of Lieut. Edmund Munro
to His Wife 360
Original MS. of Abraham Lincoln’s
Speech, 1859 362
Letter of Major James McHenry to Gen.
Greene 362
Letter of Washington to the Citizens
of Savannah 364
Letter of Martha Washington to Mrs. F.
Washington 364
Entered as a second-class matter, March 1, 1905, at the Post Office at
New York, N. Y., under the Act of Congress of March 3, 1879.
_Copyright, 1905, by William Abbatt_
[Illustration:
MONUMENT MARKING SITE OF GEN. CLINTON’S DAM
COOPERSTOWN, N. Y.
]
THE MAGAZINE OF HISTORY
WITH NOTES AND QUERIES
VOL. II NOVEMBER, 1905 NO. 5
SULLIVAN’S GREAT MARCH INTO THE INDIAN COUNTRY
_PREFACE_
Two great flank attacks on the British forces were made by the Americans
during the war of the Revolution. One, in winter, against Quebec, in
1775–76, failed nobly; the other, in summer, into the Iroquois country,
against Tories and Indians, in 1779, was superbly successful. Yet while
Montgomery and Arnold have had their meed of fame, but scant and tardy
justice has been done to Sullivan.
Twelve years’ residence in the lake country of the Empire State, amid
the scenes of the march that destroyed savagery and opened the forests
to civilization, has made its story a most fascinating study. After
repeated examination, on the ground, of the camps, battlefields, scenes
of bridge-building and road-making, of topographical and engineering
difficulties, of marchings and of rest, and even of feasting, along
nearly the whole of the routes of the main army and right wing, I have
learned to appreciate more the magnitude of Sullivan’s task and the
completeness of his successful enterprise. One can more readily
understand why Congress and Washington first ordered the campaign, and
then realized the importance and value of its victories and happy issue.
Critical analysis and comparison of local legends, study of the
mythology—that grows around picturesque scenery and striking names as
naturally as moss on a damp stone—and, most of all, of the original
journals and documents of the men of 1779, have but added to the
pleasure of the narrator. A knowledge of the march of Sullivan’s
Continentals in 1779 makes the landscape between Easton and the Genesee
Valley glow, kindling at once memory, imagination and patriotism.
May art glorify history and the tablet, boulder, and memorial line the
pathway of the Revolutionary patriots with beacon lights of grateful
remembrance.
W. E. G.
CHAPTER I
CONGRESS VOTES TO CHASTISE
After the awful massacres at Wyoming and Cherry Valley in 1778, Congress
passed a vote on the 27th of February, 1779, authorizing Washington to
break the power of the Iroquois Indians by desolating their country.
Only thus could the American frontiers be protected from Tories and
Indians and the rear and flank attacks be stopped.
Until the Revolutionary War the Iroquois had been friends of our fathers
against the French in Canada, with whom the Algonquin Indians had acted
as allies. How did it come to pass that the Iroquois turned to be our
enemies? Lifting up the hatchet and scalping knife against us, they left
at Cherry Valley, and Wyoming, great blood spots, and along the frontier
a line of fire and death. To answer this question, we must go back more
than a century and a half. At that time the North American continent was
divided between two quite different sorts of Indians, the Five Nations
of the Iroquois, who were united in a confederacy, and the much more
numerous Algonquins, who lived all around them.
In 1609, two men, each representing a different civilization, penetrated
the inland waters of America. Henry Hudson, an English captain in a
Dutch ship and with a Dutch crew, sailed up the river that now bears his
name and made the friendly acquaintance of the tribes of Northern New
York. Samuel Champlain, from France, came down the lake that bears his
name, acting not only as friend, but as ally to the Algonquins, who were
ever at war with the Iroquois. The boundary line between these two kinds
of Indians was drawn at Rock Regio, in Lake Champlain, near Burlington,
Vermont.
It happened at this time that hostile parties from the North and South
were out seeking each other. Dressed in bark armor, with bows and
arrows, and stone hatchets, they met in combat, not in ambush, but in
the open field. The Frenchmen, taking sides with the Algonquins, killed
several Iroquois with their firearms. Forthwith, vowing vengeance
against these white men who had interfered, the Indians of the South
resolved to seek Dutch aid. A few years later they appeared at Fort
Orange, near Albany, bringing their beaver and other skins in exchange
for arms and ammunition. Thus armed, they were able to go forth on equal
terms with the Algonquins to the slaughter of the French and their
allies. With them the age of stone was over and the new era of iron and
gunpowder had come.
Arendt Van Curler, whom the red men call “Corlaer,” a well-educated
Hollander, who lived in America from 1630 to 1667, was superintendent of
the Dutch settlement where Albany now stands and later became the
founder of the city of Schenectady. He saw at once the value of a league
of peace with the Iroquois. He traveled among them, learned their
language, won their friendship and held them ever faithful, first to the
Dutch, and then after 1664 to the English. “The covenant of Corlaer”
became with the Iroquois a holy sacrament, and the policy of all English
governors was to “brighten the silver chain” of mutual friendship. Van
Curler was drowned near Rock Regio in Lake Champlain in 1667. Sir
William Johnson from 1738 to 1774 continued, expanded and strengthened
the work of Van Curler. On the other hand the Five Nations became the
Six Nations, when in 1722 the Tuscaroras, driven from the Carolinas in
1713, were formally admitted into the confederacy.
For a century and a half the Indian was a political factor in
determining the question whether the Anglo-Saxon or the Latin
civilization should dominate North America. This question was settled on
the heights of Quebec, in 1763, when England became mistress of the
Continent. During all this time the French were never able, in war or in
peace, by their money or other gifts, by threats or smiles, by political
envoys or religious emissaries, to break the “silver chain” or to shake
the loyalty of the Iroquois to English-speaking men. To this day the
Indians call the governor of New York “Corlaer,” and Queen Victoria,
their ruler, “Kora Kowa,” or the Great Corlaer.
When, under King George, the colonists in America and the corrupt
British parliament and court quarreled and began war, Congress hoped to
keep the friendship or neutrality of the red men. In August, 1775, the
first conference and treaty was made at Albany. Later General Schuyler
was sent into the Mohawk Valley to treat with the Iroquois and met a
council of chiefs at German Flats. “This is a family quarrel,” he said,
“and we want you to keep out of it,” and the red men promised to do so.
General Herkimer also met a great gathering of warriors from the Six
Nations at Unadilla.
On the other side, the British agents at Oswego tried to win over the
savages, and succeeded. The Tories and British were able to present much
more convincing arguments in the shape of abundance of rum, hatchets,
beads, mirrors and guns and powder. Moreover the Indian is always a
conservative. He holds fast to tradition. Hence he was most deeply
touched by the adroit appeal to “the covenant of Corlaer,” and, being
told that the Americans were “rebels,” he sided with the British. The
Iroquois expected, in making this new alliance, that King George would
govern all the whites, while they should conquer and rule all the red
men in North America. It was a great day when General Burgoyne and his
officers in their glittering uniforms confirmed with splendid presents
the decision of the Iroquois to side with the King.
Active in the campaign of 1777, these confederate red men fought with
the Tories and British soldiers against the Americans, especially at the
battle of Oriskany. For a while they were broken and demoralized by
Burgoyne’s defeat at Saratoga, when the whole British army surrendered.
When in 1778, the red men were rallied by Brant, Butler, McDonald and
Sir John Johnson, they made the head of Seneca Lake, where Geneva now
stands, their headquarters. Here they planned to attack Wyoming, a
settlement, chiefly of Connecticut people, from which most of the able
bodied men were absent in Washington’s army, only old men, boys, women
and children being at home. After the battle and massacre of July 3
another skillfully planned attack on Cherry Valley in New York was made,
and on the 11th of October this settlement was reduced to ashes and the
people murdered or taken prisoners to Canada.
These atrocities decided Congress and Washington to chastise the
savages, desolate their country and paralyze the activity of the Tories.
It was especially necessary to do this, because the British were
encouraging their white and red allies to make the great maize lands of
Central and Western New York a granary from which they could feed their
very mixed army, made up of English, Irish, Scotch, Welsh, Hessians,
Canadians and Iroquois, besides keeping up a continual fire in the rear
upon the American forces.
But they had Washington, Sullivan, and the American riflemen to reckon
with.