Three Rivers
Hudson~Mohawk~Schoharie
History From America's Most Famous Valleys

The Story of Old Fort Plain and the Middle Mohawk Valley
by Nelson Greene
O'Connor Brothers Publishers, Fort Plain, NY 1915

CHAPTER XIV.
1778-Indian Council at Johnstown March 9-Manheim, Caroga, Springfield, Andrustown, German Flats Raids-Cherry Valley Massacre.

Early in 1778 the alarming news came to the valley that the western Indian tribes were to unite with the Mohawks, Cayugas, Onondagas and Senecas in a war upon the frontier, instigated by the Johnsons, Claus and Butler. Congress thereupon ordered a council held with the Six Nations a t Johnstown in February and appointed Gen. Schuyler and Volkert P. Douw to conduct it together with a commissioner named James Duane, appointed by Governor Clinton. The Indians showed little interest in the conference and delayed coming until March 9. There were then present more than seven hundred of them, mostly friendly Oneidas and Tuscaroras and hostile Onondagas, with a few Mohawks, three or four Cayugas and not one of the Senecas, whose warriors outnumbered those of all the other Iroquois. Instead of attending the council the Senecas sent a message expressing surprise that they were asked to come while the American "tomahawks were sticking in their heads, their wounds bleeding and their eyes streaming with tears for the loss of their friends," meaning at the battle of Oriskany, which shows the extent of the damage the patriots inflicted on that fateful day.

The Oneidas and Tuscaroras expressed their allegiance to the United States and predicted the extinction of the hostile tribes. The rest of the Indians had little to say, excepting an Onondaga chief who hypocritically lamented the course of his tribe, laying It to the young and headstrong warriors. Nothing was effected by the conference, except the satisfactory expression of allegiance on the part of the Oneidas and Tuscaroras. The commissioners closed the council by warning the hostile Iroquois to look to their behavior as the American cause was just or a terrible vengeance would overtake them. The Marquis de Lafayette, who was temporarily in command of the northern department was at the Johnstown council and considerably improved the frontier defences by ordering forts built at Cherry Valley and in the Oneida country, the three Schoharie forts garrisoned and armed and other border fortifications strengthened. Learning among other Tory activities. Col. Guy Carlton, nephew of the governor of Canada, was on a spying tour in the neighborhood, efforts were made for his capture, Lafayette himself offering a reward of fifty guineas for his arrest.

Irruptions of scalping parties of Canadian Indians and Tories began in the Mohawk valley about 1778 and continued up to 1783, when a peace treaty was signed. It is impossible to tell of each of these because they were go numerous, and records of all have not been preserved. One of the first, In the settlement of Manheim, occurred on April 3, 1778, under command of Captain Crawford, two weeks after the sacking of FAirfield, Herkimer county. About 50 Indians and Tories raided the Mohawk valley in the settlement of Manheim, near Little Falls. Among the Tories were L. Casselman, Countryman and Bowers, who had gone to join the British forces in Canada from the lower Mohawk. The marauders captured the miller, John Garter and his boy John and Joseph Newman and Bartholomew Pickert, who happened to be at the mill. At Windecker's place, James Van Slyck, his son-in-law, was sick in bed and, for a wonder, was unharmed by the savages. The prisoners made here and in the vicinity were John House, Forbush, John Windecker, a boy of 13; Ganet Van Slyck, another boy; John Cypher, Helmer, Jacob Uher, George Attle. The two latter were rangers on a scout from Fort Snyder. Garter's mill was burned, but no other dwellings were destroyed and no one was killed. Four Whig's were captured in Salisbury, Herkimer county. The march to Canada was made through the snow and great hardships were suffered. Windecker's Indian captor proved very kind and carried him across several rapid streams on his back. Windecker said afterward, concerning their scarcity of food, that "An Indian would eat anything except crow." This raid was one of the earliest of the war and was not marked by the bloody ferocity which characterized the later ones.

The following, concerning the invasion of Ephratah in the Palatine district, in April, 1778, is abridged from Simms's "Frontiersmen of New York," Vol. II., pp. 146-151:

In 1773, 20 or more German families settled along Garoga creek in the present town of Ephratah and some at the present site of Kringsbush. These Germans were part of a shipload of immigrants, mostly from the district of Nassau near Frankfort-on-the-Main, which landed at Baltimore in 1773. Many of them settled in the Mohawk valley. The immigration from Germany, and even from Holland, into New York state was practically continuous from the time of first settlement up to the Revolution. On this voyage very rough weather was encountered on the Atlantic, the masts went by the board and the ship nearly foundered.

The settlement of Ephratah was so called after a place of that name in Germany. Prominent among these settlers was Nicholas Rechtor, whose father, Johannes Rechtor, came from Hesse in Germany and settled at Niskautau, six miles below Albany, These early Ephratah families all built log houses, except Rechtor, who put up a frame house and barn. Simms says this house was still standing (in 1882), "just back of a public house in Caroga, so called after the creek passing'- through it-the original name still attaching to the settlement." Rechtor was located about three miles west of the stone grist mill Sir William Johnson had built for the use of that region which was then known as Tilleborough. Within a radius of five or six miles from Nicholas Rechtor's house the following were located: Jacob Appley, Jacob Frey, John Hurtz, Conrad Hart, John Smith, Henry Smith, John Cool, Jacob Deusler, Leonard Kretzer, Henry Hynce, Flander, Phye, John Spankable (now Sponable), John Winkle.

Among the settlers in the Kringsbush section were Matthias Smith, Leonard Helmer, Joseph Davis and his brother-in-law, John Kring, after whom the settlement was named.

In 1775, a small company of militia was organized among- these settlers along the Caroga. The officers were Nicholas Rechtor, Captain; John Williams, George Smith, lieutenants; John Sholl, ensign. This company was in the Oriskany battle where Capt. Rechtor was thrown from and stepped on by his horse, disabling him.

About four in the afternoon of April 30, 1778, about 20 Indians and Tories invaded the Ephratah settlement. Most of the farmers were making maple sugar. Rechtor was drilling 20 men of his militia company about a mile from his home. Six of the enemy made their first appearance at the Harts' home and killed Conrad Hart, the father, and took captive his son Wilhelmus, a youth of 16. They plundered and burned Hart's building and from thence went to Jacob Appley's, where they destroyed all property. A daughter of Hart had, in the meantime escaped, at the time of the first attack, and ran to where the militia company was drilling. Instead of Rechtor and his men attacking the enemy in force they split up and ran singly or in small companies of three or four toward their homes. Jacob Appley, Daniel Hart and Peter Shyke went with Capt. Rechtor to his home.

The enemy had already reached Rechtor's. Here the savages, both Tory and Indian, found considerable plunder as the captain was well provided with the worldly goods for that time and locality. They were some time in packing- up and Mrs. Rechtor, objecting to the wholesale looting of her household, was struggling with a big Indian over a long-handled trying pan. The Americans came up on the run and fired at the Indian. The shot struck the pan handle, glanced down and wounded the woman in the ankle. A general melee took place. Appley shot an Indian and was himself shot down. Shyke was severely wounded and Captain Rechtor was hit in the right arm. Helmus Hart came up with his hands bound, he having been tied to a tree when the Hart house was attacked. The Americans released his hands and he joined in the fight, which soon ended in the enemy running away.

At this time few of the settlers had been killed as they were in the sugar bush distant from their dwellings. Rechtor gathered all of his family (of seven children) that he could find and set out for Fort Paris, which he reached at midnight. The two youngest girls and the youngest boy could not be found in the bush, as they evidently feared Indians and would not venture forth even in reply to the calls of their parents. Appley was so severely wounded that he had to be left and, at his request, was propped up against the oven with a gun in his hand. Rechtor's little four-year-old boy Henry now came home and got himself some bread and milk and began eating it. Just then the savages came back. Appley shot and killed one and was himself killed and scalped and left with a bayonet sticking through his heart. The little boy Henry was killed and scalped and thrown into the creek. Here the dead little body was found next day, one hand still clutching the spoon with which he had been eating. The enemy's stay was short as they were gone when, shortly after, the two youngest Rechtor girls came out of the bush. Seeing Appley's dead body they ran in fright to their neighbor Hart's house. This they found burned and Hart dead and mangled and, so in great fright, they ran back into the bush where they stayed all night. In the morning- they found neighbors and were taken to Fort Paris, where they rejoined their family.

After leaving Rechtor's the enemy captured Peter Loucks, whom they took to Canada. A company of American soldiers, from Fort Paris, started in pursuit the next morning. May 1, 1778. They had Henry Flathead, a "friendly" Indian, for a guide. Coming upon the enemy's campfire this Indian gave a yell, probably to warn his red brethren. When the company came up meat was still cooking in the fire, but the enemy had vanished and could not be found.

At the time of the Ephratah invasion, two Indians of the raiding party shot and killed a girl named Rickard, as she was driving home cows near Fort Klock in the east end of the present town of St. Johnsville. Hearing the shot, George Klock came running out with his gun and as the Indians made for the girl's body to scalp it, he tired and they made for the woods and disappeared. Going north this pair of savages made John Smith a prisoner at Kringsbush and took him to Canada. He was a son of Matthias Smith, a veteran of Oriskany.

After the Ephratah raid most of the Whig families abandoned their homes, which were left standing by the Tories to afford themselves shelter on subsequent raids. Rechtor removed to his old home below Albany until after the war, when most of the surviving Ephratah settlers came back to their lands there. The raid along the Caroga was one of the first in the Mohawk valley attended with bloodshed.

On the day of the Ephratah raid a party of Senecas ravaged a portion of the Schoharie valley.

Joseph Brant and his warriors gathered at Oghkwaga early in 1778. This place is now Windsor, in Broome county.

Brant appeared at Unadilla in the spring of 1778 and Capt. McKean was sent by the people of Cherry Valley with a small force to reconnoitre the Indian position. McKean injudiciously wrote Brant a letter violently denouncing him and asking him to come to Cherry Valley, with the taunting remark that there he would be changed from a "brant" to a "goose," Brant was enraged by this letter and answered it later with the Cherry Valley massacre.

Brant's first hostile movement of consequence, after his return to Oghkwaga in the spring of 1778, was to fall upon the little settlement at Springfield, at the head of Otsego lake. This was in the month of May and every house was burned but one, into which the women and children were collected and kept unharmed. Several men were captured and much plunder was taken but no one was murdered, probably because of no Tories being present.

At this same time, In May, 1778, Brant started out to destroy the Cherry Valley settlement. While reconnoitering the village from a distant hill he saw a company of boys drilling on the open space in front of the fort. He mistook these young patriots for soldiers and, thinking this post was strongly garrisoned, he deferred his attack until a later time. Drawing off his warriors he repaired to the deep glen northwest of the village to see if he could intercept any travellers along the road to the Mohawk and so pick up any information. Lieut. Matthew Wormuth, with a companion, started from Cherry Valley that evening to Fort Plain. The same day he had left Fort Plain to tell the Cherry Valley people that the militia would come up the next day, as Brant was known to be in the neighborhood. While Wormuth and Sitz, his companion, were riding along the edge of this glen, on their return to Fort Plain, Brant's warriors fired upon them, mortally wounding Wormuth and capturing Sitz. Lieutenant Wormuth was of Col. Klock's Palatine battalion, and that officer came up the next day with the valley militia, but Brant had fled and all that could be done was to take back Wormuth's body to Fort Plain, and thence to his father's home across the river in Palatine. Wormuth had been a personal friend of-Brant, who expressed regret at the young officer's death.

In July Brant destroyed the little settlement of Andrustown, six miles southeast of German Flats, killing its inhabitants and driving away its live stock.

In the summer of 1778, Brant's long stay at Unadilla, without striking a blow on some of the exposed points of the frontier, excited suspicion among the inhabitants of the valley that he might be planning an attack on them, and a scouting party of four men was accordingly sent out to watch his movements. These rangers fell in with the enemy and three were killed. The fourth, John Adam Helmer, the famous scout, escaped and returned to German Flatts at sundown and gave the alarm that Brant and a large force would be upon the settlements in a short time. At nightfall the enemy, numbering about 300 Tories and 150 Indians, came to the outskirts of the settlements and stopped near the house of Brant's Tory friend, Shoemaker. Here the force remained until early morning. The settlers fled to Forts Dayton and Herkimer, taking with them their most precious belongings. Brant and his red and white warriors devastated the country in the vicinity of these torts, early the next day, and the whole valley thereabouts was illuminated with the light of burning houses, barns and crops. Only two or three persons were killed in this foray, but 63 dwellings, 57 barns, three grist-mills and two saw-mills were burned, and 236 horses, 269 sheep, 229 cattle and 93 oxen were taken and driven off by Brant and his raiders. This happened about Sept. 1, 1778. No scalps or prisoners were taken and the enemy ventured no attack on the forts.

In September, Col. Klock wrote to Gov. Clinton that 150 families were left destitute and homeless in the valley by the many Indian raids of 1778 up to that month.

Walter Butler had obtained a transfer from the Albany jail to a friendly Tory's house by feigning sickness. He intoxicated his guard and escaped. In November, 1778, he, together with Brant, fell upon the Cherry Valley settlement with a force of seven hundred Tories and Indians and killed 32 people and 16 soldiers of the garrison, looted the place, burned all the buildings and took captive most of the survivors. The women and children were allowed to return, with the exception of three women and their children, one of the women being murdered a day or two after the massacre.

At the time of the Cherry Valley massacre Lieut. Col. James Gordon of the Saratoga militia, is supposed to have been in command at Fort Plain and ordered Col. Klock's regiment and the company under Capt. Van Denbergh at Fort Plank to march to relief of Cherry Valley, where they arrived two hours after the enemy had gone. Some survivors from the afflicted district fled to Fort Plain for safety and many of them remained in its vicinity for the balance of the war.

Lossing gives an account of the Cherry Valley massacre, which we here abridge:

Colonel Ichabod Alden of Massachusetts, was in command of the fort and 250 men. On the 8th of November, he had received a dispatch from Fort Schuyler saying his fort was about to be attacked, but treated it with unconcern and refused to allow the alarmed Inhabitants to move into the fort or even leave their property there. However, Col. Alden sent out scouting parties. One of these, which went toward the Susquehanna, built a fire, went to sleep, and awoke prisoners of Brant and Butler. From them all necessary information was extorted. The next day the raiders camped on a lofty hill covered with evergreens, about a mile southwest of the village and overlooking the whole settlement. From that observatory they could see almost every house In the village. From the prisoners they learned that the officers were quartered out of the fort and that Col. Alden and Lieut. Col. Stacia were at the house of Robert Wells, recently a judge of the county and formerly an intimate friend of Sir William Johnson and Col. John Butler. Early in the morning of Nov. 10, 1778, the enemy marched slowly toward the village. Snow had fallen during the night and the morning was dark and misty. A halt was made to examine the muskets, although the Indians, crazy for blood, could hardly be restrained. A settler on horseback, going toward the village, was shot, but, being only slightly wounded, galloped on and gave the alarm. The savages rushed in on the settlement. Wells's house was attacked and the whole family murdered together with Col. Alden, who escaped from a window but was struck down and scalped. The families of Mr. Dunlap, the venerable minister, and that of Mr. Mitchell were next almost wiped out, Little Aaron, a Mohawk chief, saving Mr. Dunlap and his daughter; 32 people, mostly women and children, and 16 soldiers were killed. The whole settlement was plundered and burned. The prisoners numbered nearly 40, and included the wife and children of Col. Campbell, who was then absent. They were marched down the valley that night, in a storm of sleet, and were huddled together promiscuously, some of them half naked and without shelter. The enemy, finding the women and children cumbersome, sent them all back the next day, except Mrs. Campbell and her children and her aged mother and a Mrs. Moore, who were kept as hostages for the kind treatment and ultimate exchange for the Tory family of Col. John Butler. Young Butler was the head and front of all the cruelty at Cherry Valley that day. He commanded the expedition and saw unmoved the murder of Mr. Wells, his father's friend, whom Brant hastened to save but arrived too late. Butler would not allow his rangers to even warn their friends in the settlement of approaching danger.

While Brant was collecting his troops at Oghkwaga the previous year, 1777, the strong stone mansion of Samuel Campbell (colonel of the Canajoharie militia battalion) was fortified to be used as a place of retreat for the women and children in the event of attack. An embankment of earth and logs was thrown up around it, and included two barns. Small block-houses were erected within the enclosure. This was the only fort in Cherry Valley at this time. Mrs. Cannon, the mother of Mrs. Campbell, who was captured, was very old. On the retreat of the marauders, she was an encumbrance and a savage slew her with a tomahawk by the side of her daughter. Mrs. Campbell carried an eighteen-months old baby and was driven with inhuman haste before her captors, while they menaced her life with uplifted hatchets. Arriving among the Senecas, she was kindly treated and installed a member of one of the families. They allowed her to do as she pleased and her deportment was such that she seemed to engage the real affections of the people. Perceiving she wore caps, one was presented to her, considerably spotted with blood, which she recognized as belonging to her friend, Jane Wells. She and her children, from whom she was separated in the Indian country, were afterward exchanged for the wife and family of Colonel John Butler, then in the custody of the Committee of Safety at Albany. There are many well-authenticated instances on record of the humanity of Brant, exercised particularly toward women and children. He was a magnanimous victor and never took the life of a former friend or acquaintance. He loved a hero because of his heroism, although he might be his enemy, and was never known to take advantage of a conquered soldier. The challenge of Capt. McKean to Brant has been mentioned. After the Cherry Valley massacre, he Inquired of one of the prisoners for Capt. McKean, who with his family, had left the settlement. Said Brant: "He sent me a challenge. I came to accept it. He is a fine soldier thus to retreat." The captured man replied: "Captain McKean would not turn his back upon an enemy when there was any probability of success." Brant said: "I know it. He is a brave man and I would have given more to take him than any other man in Cherry Valley; but I would not have hurt a hair of his head." Walter Butler ordered a woman and child to be slain in bed at Cherry Valley, when Brant interposed saying, "What, kill a woman and child! That child it not an enemy to the King nor a friend to congress. Long before he will be big enough to do any mischief, the dispute will be settled." When in 1780, Sir John Johnson and Brant led their raiding army through the Schoharie and Mohawk valleys, Brant's humanity was again displayed. On their way to Fort Hunter an infant was carried off. The frantic mother followed them as far as the fort but could get no tidings of her child. On the morning after the departure of the invaders, and while Gen. Van Rensselaer's officers were at breakfast, a young Indian came bounding into the room, bearing the infant in his arms and a letter from Captain Brant, addressed to "the commander of the rebel army." The letter was as follows: "Sir-I send you by one of my runners, the child which he will deliver, that you may know that, whatever others may do, I do not make war upon women and children. I am sorry to say that I have those engaged with me who are more savage than the savages themselves." He named the Butlers and others of the Tory leaders. Brant hated the cowardly white Tory fiend, Butler, and objected strongly to serving under him in the Cherry Valley expedition. The Wells family were close friends of Col. John Butler, father of Walter Butler, and the murder of this family by Butler's raiders was particularly brutal. Mr. Wells was tomahawked by a Tory while kneeling in prayer. Jane Wells, his sister, who was a beautiful and accomplished woman, attempted to hide in a woodpile. An Indian caught her. He wiped his bloody scalping knife and sheathed it deliberately in view of the terrified woman. Then he leisurely took his tomahawk from his girdle and at this moment, a Tory, who had been a servant in the family, sprang forward and attempted to interfere but the savage thrust him aside and buried his hatchet in his victim's head. It is said that Colonel Butler, professedly grieved at the beastly murderous conduct of his son at Cherry Valley, remarked concerning the Wells family: "I would have gone miles on my knees to save that family, and why my son did not do -it, God only knows."

Late in the fall of 1778, at the request of Sir John Johnson, the Canadian Governor-General Haldimand, sent fifty men to recover his and his father's papers which had been buried in an iron chest on the premises at Johnson Hall. They recovered the papers which were found to be practically worthless from dampness. A Tory, named Helmer, was captured.

The Saratoga and Oriskany campaigns have been summarized in the Oriskany chapter. The national events from the fall of 1777 through 1778 are Summarized as follows: 1777, Oct. 4, American defeat at Germantown; winter 1777-8, American army in winter quarters at Valley Forge, Pa.; 1778, February, French recognize American independence and become allies of the colonies; 1778, June, British evacuate Philadelphia and indecisive battle of Monmouth follows; 1778, July, Wyoming, Pa., massacre of settlers by British and Indians under Col. Butler; 1778, Dec., Savannah, Ga., captured by British.