Prelude to Glory, Vol. 4

by Ron Carter

  Both men stood and sprinted forward, dodging through the trees, shouting as they came in behind the swarming Mohawk. They tore into them headlong, firing their musket and rifle at point-blank range to knock the first two rolling, then swinging their weapons like scythes, smashing red men to either side, leaving them unconscious or dying. They did not slow as Eli swung his tomahawk left and right, and Billy used his rifle butt like a battering ram, leaving a trail of downed red men behind, moaning with broken arms and cracked skulls. The nearest warriors spun around, surprised, not knowing who or what or how many were coming in like demons from their rear. Those nearest to Billy and Eli broke clear of the fighting, pausing to peer into the trees, certain there had to be more men attacking from the rear. Those farther away saw the lull, and within seconds the Mohawk cry, “Oonah,” began to spread.

  Billy and Eli did not slow. They continued their headlong plunge through the startled Mohawk, slamming into and then breaking free of the melee into the place where Herkimer was seated against the tree, trying to rally his men. For a few seconds the Indians hesitated, unsure of what had happened, dumbstruck that two men had cut a path through them to reach Herkimer. In those few seconds, Eli and Billy turned back toward the Mohawk, shouting to Herkimer’s men, “Rally here! Their ranks are open!”

  For the first time the Americans heard an order they could understand, and they saw the slightest breach in the wall of Indians. Twenty of the militiamen came charging, more following, and Billy and Eli led them back into the breach they had opened coming in, twisting, turning, driving the wedge deeper.

  “Oonah! Oonah!” The sound rose once again, and began to swell. Gradually the Indians disengaged themselves and began fading back into the forest, unsure, hesitant, waiting for someone to give them direction. Eli spun and sprinted back to Herkimer.

  “General, you better order your men back to the east while you can. Three more minutes and Brant and Blacksnake will be back in full force.”

  Instantly Herkimer shouted his orders. “Form a battle line! Fall back to the east! Bring the wounded if you can!”

  The order was passed on, and within minutes the Americans had come together in a line, and settled into a rhythm, every other man firing while every other man reloaded. Those on the west end began the retreat, and the column followed. They paused only to gather the wounded they could find, leaving their dead on the field as they worked their way east on the high, flat land, then down the slope of the ravine to the road to continue their retreat.

  “Etow! Etow!” Eli heard it from the three hundred warriors as the red hoard crested the lip of the ravine and came running down to once again engage the retreating Americans. Herkimer saw them coming and shouted his orders.

  “Do not break the battle line! At all costs, stay in line!”

  This time the Americans were not taken by surprise. They held their line, and kept their rotation in firing, loading, firing, loading, as they worked eastward in a controlled retreat. They held their fire until their target was clear, and close enough that they could not miss, and this time it was the Indians who slowly fell back.

  “Oonah. Oonah.”

  The shooting slowed, then became sporadic, and finally stopped. For the first time in five hours of the bloodiest fighting any man among them had ever seen, Herkimer’s shattered militia dared pause to stare back at the trail of dead behind them. This day would remain in their memories forever as something unreal, a nightmare filled with screams and blood and a forest littered with men butchered and scalped and dead. Surveying the horrific scene, they drank from their canteens, wiped sweat and blood from their faces, and stared with flat eyes and expressionless faces, waiting for their next order.

  Herkimer turned to Eli. “What will they do next?”

  “If Brant’s still alive, he’ll try one more time to catch you, and kill you all. Keep moving. I’ll go back. If he’s coming, I’ll report to you.”

  Herkimer reached for Eli’s arm. “Who are you?”

  “Private Eli Stroud. I’m a scout. This is Corporal Billy Weems. We were sent by General Washington.”

  “You dress like an Indian.”

  “That’s a long story. I’ll tell it later.”

  Back at the head of the ravine, Brant quickly sought out the war chief, Sayehqueragha. “We have them in our hands. We must follow them now, while they are beaten, and destroy them all. It will leave nothing between here and Albany to stop us.”

  Sayehqueragha nodded, then joined Brant as he hurried to find Claus. Claus listened, agreed, and sent a man to bring Sir John Johnson. Johnson watched Brant’s eyes as the war chief unfolded his plan.

  “I believe you are right,” Johnson said. “When we arrive back at the fort, we’ll lay it before Colonel St. Leger. If he agrees, you can rest your men for a few hours and catch them by morning.”

  It was late in the afternoon before the weary Johnson and Butler and their exhausted command arrived back at the breastworks surrounding Fort Stanwix. Half an hour later they were in the command tent of Colonel St. Leger, where Brant and Sayehqueragha made their statement and waited for St. Leger’s response.

  After listening to the Indians’ proposal, St. Leger slowly shook his head. “The siege starts tomorrow. I cannot reduce my forces here to track down and finish Herkimer’s command when they are already so soundly beaten they will never again be a threat. We will all remain here to storm Fort Stanwix when the time comes.”

  The Battle of Oriskany was over.

  Notes

  The first week of August 1777, Colonel Barry St. Leger and his fourteen hundred soldiers arrived at Fort Stanwix to put it under siege and take it, prior to proceeding on east down the Mohawk River valley to join General Burgoyne. St. Leger was badly surprised to discover the fort, which he had been told was in terrible condition and manned by but sixty men, was in fact in good condition and defended by six hundred fifty men under the able leadership of Colonel Peter Gansevoort.

  Billy and Eli are fictional characters, hence, their arrival at the fort and their bringing a captured Indian are fictional, however, the information given by their captive Indian is accurate. The troop count of St. Leger’s army, including British, Hessians, Indians, Canadians, and loyalists, and their cannon count, position, and plans, are accurate.

  An Indian woman named Gonwatsijayenni, whose Christian name was Mary Brant, and who was of high standing among the Iroquois people, sent a message to St. Leger, informing him that General Nicholas Herkimer of the New Hampshire militia was proceeding from Oriskany to Fort Stanwix to join Gansevoort’s men inside. Thereupon Brant proposed an ambush by four hundred of his Mohawk in a ravine. St. Leger agreed, and Sir John Johnson offered to join them, was put in command, and the force left.

  Herkimer sent three men ahead to Fort Stanwix: Adam Helmer, John Demuth, and John Kember, to tell Gansevoort they were coming to his aid and asking him to fire three spaced cannon shots when he got the message and to send a force out to meet him to guide him in. The three men came into the fort from the south, through a swamp that was thought to be impassable, and delivered their message.

  Thereupon Gansevoort sent out two hundred men under command of Lieutenant Colonel Marinus Willet, to meet Herkimer and bring him in. However, Willet’s command never reached Herkimer. Rather, they happened onto a British camp that was nearly deserted, killed or captured the few who were there, loaded themselves with cooking kettles and blankets and other supplies that were needed back at the fort, and returned.

  With his usual skill in the forest, Brant stationed the British at the head of a ravine four miles from Fort Stanwix, lined both sides with his Mohawk, and waited. Herkimer heard the three cannon shots that were the arranged signal, but wondered why the guide party never arrived.

  The British also heard the three cannon shots, concluded it was some sort of a signal, and waited for Herkimer’s column to walk into the trap. Herkimer led his men into the mile-long ravine and proceeded; however, the Mohawk Indians, who
were rumored to have been drinking rum just before the battle, became overanxious and sprung the trap a few minutes too early, before the wagons at the rear of the column reached the ravine. The blasting muskets and screaming Indians from both sides caught the column by total surprise, and in seconds the fight was hand-to-hand, in near total chaos. Herkimer’s left leg was badly injured by a musketball, and he did in fact have his men sit him with his back to a tree while he lit his pipe and continued shouting orders, directing his men. The battle raged on, then the Americans fought their way out of the ravine, up an incline to their left, onto level ground, where it ended when the Americans retreated. Herkimer lost half his men, a terrible blow to the militia. Ebenezer Cox, who had been with Herkimer at Unadilla and had insulted Joseph Brant there, was killed in the battle. Ten days later, following an unsuccessful surgery to remove his leg, General Herkimer died.

  Immediately after the fight, Brant and a second war chief, Sayehqueragha, came quickly to Claus and requested permission to follow the fleeing Americans and finish killing them all. Claus took the request to St. Leger, who refused, stating he would need all his forces to begin the siege of Fort Stanwix, which was to commence in the morning (see Graymont, The Iroquois in the American Revolution, pp. 128–36).

  In support, see also Leckie, George Washington’s War, pp. 391–93.

  The Iroquois word oonah connotes disapproval, negative, retreat, leave (see Graymont, The Iroquois in the American Revolution, p. 139). The Iroquois word etow connotes approval, positive, move forward, attack (see Ketchum, Saratoga, p. 145).

  East of Oriskany

  August 6, 1777

  CHAPTER XXVIII

  * * *

  In late dusk Billy and Eli found Herkimer’s camp. There were no fires. Quiet men moved about cutting strips of cloth from the shirts of the dead, to bind up the wounds of the living. None spoke of the horror they had survived back at the ravine. Though many heroic deeds had been done in the fevered heat of the jumbled, chaotic battle, there were no heroes among them. None boasted. None preened. They quietly did what they could for their wounded comrades, while the officers moved about taking a silent count of the survivors. A silent General Herkimer bowed his head and said nothing as they delivered the truth to him. Half his command was missing. He could only hope that some of those toward the rear had escaped when the Mohawk sprang the trap too soon and they ran.

  Billy and Eli held their weapons high as they approached camp, calling out, “Friendly,” until they were past the outer pickets. They found Herkimer seated with his back against a stump, left leg splinted and bandaged. In the gloom of dusk, great black blotches of blood grew on the white cloth as Herkimer clenched his pipe in his teeth. The two men dropped to their haunches and Eli spoke.

  “Brant’s not coming. It’s over for now. You can light small fires if you need to.”

  Herkimer turned to a nearby captain and gave orders, and low fires began to appear. He turned back to Eli and Billy.

  “What command are you with?”

  Billy answered. “General Washington sent us to help at Fort Stanwix. Eli speaks Iroquois, knows their ways.

  Herkimer nodded, then shifted the pipe in his teeth. “Are you going back?”

  “Yes. St. Leger’s going to put the fort under siege today or tomorrow.”

  Eli interrupted. “It’s my guess that’s why Brant didn’t come back to get you. St. Leger needs him at the fort.”

  Herkimer winced at the pain in his broken leg. “I was on my way to the fort when I walked into the ambush. My own fault—no scouts out. I have to get my wounded back to the settlement for help.” He shook his head. “I’ve lost half my command.”

  Billy looked into Herkimer’s face as he spoke. “Don’t fault yourself too much. Your men fought well in one of the worst battles I’ve seen. Brant and the British lost a lot of warriors, a few regulars. St. Leger won’t have as many men to take Fort Stanwix. Maybe not enough. Hard as it was, you may have saved the fort after all.”

  For a moment Herkimer stared, then bowed his head. The two men waited until he spoke. “I was expecting a column to come from the fort to meet me. Do you know what happened to them?”

  Eli answered. “I think we heard them. There was a brief fight a little north and west of us that moved toward the fort, and then maybe ten cannon shots. I think the column you expected walked into a British camp and had to make a run for it.”

  Herkimer nodded. “I heard the cannon. I hoped they were coming our way, not going back to the fort.” He paused for a moment, then continued thoughtfully. “It was strange, seeing our Indians fighting theirs. Strange.”

  Eli swallowed before he answered. “What you saw today was the end of the Iroquois Confederacy—the start of a war between the six Iroquois tribes. I saw Blatcop out there fighting like a panther against Honyery Doxtater. Blatcop was on our side, Doxtater the British. Blatcop nearly took Doxtater’s hand off with his tomahawk. They’re both Oneida.” A look of sadness came over Eli’s face. “Oneida against Oneida. Brother against brother. The great confederacy is dead. What has been for two hundred years, is no more. The Mohawk River valley is going to be filled with war and bloodshed between the Indians, after what happened here today.”

  Herkimer’s eyes widened as he listened. “I didn’t know. I wish it weren’t so.”

  Eli said nothing.

  Herkimer sighed. “Can you tell me one thing? What were those words I heard today? Sounded like Oonah. Etow.”

  “Mohawk. Etow means approval, move forward, attack. Oonah means disapproval, back away, retreat.”

  Herkimer knocked the tobacco from his pipe. “When will you be leaving?”

  “Now. If we pass any of St. Leger’s men coming this way, we’ll get back to tell you.”

  “I appreciate it.”

  “We have to go. Gansevoort needs to hear what happened out here.”

  “Anything we can do for you? After what you did, we owe you.”

  The two men shook their heads. “Good luck with your men.”

  With the morning star fading in the east, Billy and Eli raised their weapons high over their heads and came dripping out of the swamp south of Fort Stanwix. The gates opened and they walked in, filthy, weary, unshaven. They stopped at a horse trough long enough to rinse the swamp muck from their clothes with buckets of water, then followed their escort to the office of Colonel Gansevoort, to stand with a puddle of water growing at their feet, spreading on the dry floor planking. Two minutes later the colonel appeared, fully dressed.

  “Be seated. We’ve been waiting. What is your report?”

  For twenty minutes they spoke, describing the battle, answering his questions, watching the concern on his face when he learned Herkimer’s column was half destroyed and had turned back for the sake of his wounded. He brightened at learning the heavy losses suffered by the British forces, and his eyes narrowed as he made calculations of how many men St. Leger had remaining to assault the fort. Their report finished, Billy and Eli fell silent, waiting.

  “When did you two last sleep, or eat?”

  Billy shrugged. “Two days ago.”

  “Go to the enlisted men’s quarters and clean up. Take breakfast with them, then tell them I said you were to be given a cot to sleep on. If St. Leger begins the siege today, you’ll know it when the cannon begin. I commend you both for your work. Dismissed.”

  * * * * *

  The deep boom and the slight ground vibrations came at the same instant, and Billy and Eli stirred, then settled. Thirty seconds later a second volley of distant cannon blasted, and the ground tremors reached their cots. The tiny voice in the center of their consciousness awakened to quietly whisper, “It’s time.”

  The two men stirred, brushed at the flies, and swallowed sour as their eyes fluttered open and they returned from deep, dreamless sleep. For a few seconds they lay on their sides to stare at the gray, unpainted wall of the enlisted barracks, trying to understand where they were and how they had gotten th
ere. Slowly the remembrance came to them, and they turned away from the wall to wipe at the light sweat on their faces. In muggy, humid heat they swung their legs off the cot and their bare feet hit the floor. Both turned up their toes as they looked out the west windows and realized the sun was lowering toward the horizon.

  The first cannon salvo from the guns on the walls of the fort boomed, and both men flinched.

  “What time is it?” Billy asked. He stretched, feeling the stiffness in the muscles of his shoulders and arms.

  “I don’t know. The sun’s going down. I’d guess close to six o’clock.”

  They heard and felt a volley of eight cannonballs rip into the walls of the fort an instant before they heard the cannon blasts that fired them, and both men stood, waiting for a moment while their legs took their weight. They scratched unceremoniously, then shrugged out of borrowed trousers, picked up their own clothes from the chairs on which they had dried, and put them on.

  “It’s begun,” Billy said quietly.

  For a time the men jerked, and some involuntarily ducked, each time St. Leger’s cannonballs slammed into the walls of the fort, followed quickly by the sound of the British cannon as it rolled past the fort into the forest. They jumped each time their own cannon on the walls of the fort thundered out a reply. The evening mess was quiet, subdued, as the men interrupted their meals to listen and feel as the cannonade continued.

  In the early dusk they fell into rank and file while the drummer rattled the snare drums to retire the colors. For a brief moment the men raised their eyes, suddenly awed, startled, at the sight of their flag, red, white and blue. It had caught the last rays of a sun already set, to glow brightly in the sky like something alive. With a will of their own, the thoughts of the men turned to wives, children, hearth, home. In an unexpected reverie they yearned to be there, surrounded by all they treasured in life. Then a feeling came welling from within. They knew they were where they belonged, doing what must be done, and it stirred their souls. They stared in silence until the flag had been lowered and folded and the last of the sun’s rays were gone. Then each man walked away in silence. Most paused to glance back for a moment, then walk on, while the cannon blasted.