Guy had also become Sir William’s son-in-law by marrying Johnson’s daughter Mary. Like the Indians, Sir William believed in kinship as a way of holding power. At Sir William’s funeral, an Indian delegation hailed Guy and told him, “Continue to give good advice to the young men as your father did: … Follow his footsteps; … as you know very well his ways and transactions with us.”23
Guy, a militia colonel, did follow those footsteps—just in time for the Revolution. The lieutenant colonel of Guy’s militia regiment was John Butler, who also served both Sir John and Guy as an Indian interpreter.24 The three began rallying fellow Loyalists in the Mohawk Valley, hoping to mobilize a major frontier force against the Rebels. Working with the Johnsons, especially among German immigrants like himself, was Christian Daniel Claus, an Indian agent married to
Sir William’s daughter Ann.25 They plotted an armed stand at Johnson Hall, the mansion-fortress that dominated the Johnson realm. Word that Johnson was creating a Loyalist stronghold quickly reached the Patriots’ Committee of Safety for Tryon County, which encompassed an immense swath of New York west of Albany, including the Mohawk Valley and the Johnson fiefdom. “We are informed that Johnson Hall is fortifying …,” the committee reported to Patriots in Albany in May 1775. “Besides which, we are told that about 150 Highlanders (Roman Catholics) in and about Johnstown, are armed, and ready to march.” The committee also told of a report that Indians, “whom we dread most … are to be made use of in keeping us in awe.”26
Both sides were maneuvering in a fog of rumors. Guy Johnson, aware of the local Patriots’ appeal for aid from Albany, believed that Rebels were plotting to kidnap him and attack his followers. He fled to Canada with his pregnant wife, Mary; his children, other family members; and about 170 supporters, including Joseph Brant and ninety other Indians. Along the way, Johnson won from more than fourteen hundred Indians a promise that they would “assist His Majesty’s Troops in their operations.”27 At Oswego, on the southeastern shore of Lake Ontario, after an exhausting journey, Mary Johnson died, an early casualty of the frontier war.28
When the Revolution began, many New York Tories, including John Butler and his sons Thomas and Walter, had fled to Canada. Butler had left behind his wife and other children. The Rebels seized them, giving Butler a motive for vengeance. (The family would not be reunited until a prisoner exchange in 1780.) Johnson, like Butler, did not intend to languish in Canada. Johnson wanted to muster an all-Indian military unit that would fight the Rebels in frontier settlements in western New York and Pennsylvania. But Sir Guy Carleton, royal governor of Quebec refused, saying he wished to use Indians only as scouts or in defense.29
Guy Johnson and his two young daughters, along with Brant and several others, sailed to England to put their dependents safely intothe hands of Loyalists in London and to gain official endorsement of the Indian mobilization that Carleton had rejected. Johnson’s vision of the British-Loyalist-Indian alliance was captured in a painting he commissioned by Benjamin West, who had left America years before and was the king’s court painter. West created an allegorical portrayal of British-Indian relations. West put moccasins on Johnson and added to his British Army uniform a Mohawk cap, an Indian blanket, and a wampum belt. Hovering behind Johnson is the shadowy figure of an Indian, who points to a peace pipe while Johnson holds a musket. Deeper in the background is an Indian family near a British Army tent.30
Brant became a star of London society. The king presented him with a silver gorget* bearing the inscription The Gift of a Friend to Capt. Brant—royal notice of Brant’s military commission in Canada’s Loyalist corps. In his portrait, by George Romney, a leading portaitist of English nobility, Brant wears the gorget and a plumed headdress. He looks grim and he carries a tomahawk—a portent of the future, when Brant and the Butlers would lead Loyalists and Indians in bloody battles.31
Carleton sent Butler to Fort Niagara with orders to keep the Six Nations off the warpath but loyal to Britain. He was inadvertently aided by the Reverend Samuel Kirkland, a Christian missionary from Connecticut who preached neutrality to Six Nations Indians while trying to preserve the allegiance of those who supported the Rebels.32 Kirk-land, who lived among the Oneidas and spoke their language, succeeded in keeping them on the side of the Patriots throughout the war.
Butler, anticipating the frontier civil war to come, began enlisting Indians as spies, not only along the Mohawk River but also as far west as the Mississippi. Ever since the Revolution began, Loyalists had been fleeing to Canada. Butler also aided them, knowing that theable-bodied men among them would be potential recruits for future Tory militias.
In January 1776, responding to a new round of reports that Sir John Johnson was arming his Loyalist tenants and supporters, Washington sent a force of some four thousand men to Johnson Hall, where they confronted about six hundred armed Loyalists, most of them Highlander immigrants. The Continentals disarmed Johnson’s private army and ordered him to post a sixteen-hundred-pound bond that backed his promise to essentially remain under house arrest.33 In May, Sir John broke his parole, fleeing to Montreal with about 170 tenants and followers, guided by Mohawks. Lady Johnson, who was seven months pregnant, was left behind. Rebels took her to Albany as a hostage. She appealed in vain to Washington.34
Once in Canada, with Carleton’s approval, Sir John soon began raising the King’s Royal Regiment of New York. He drew on his own followers, along with Loyalist refugees who had abandoned their homes and farms in the Mohawk and Schoharie valleys. They would return armed and ready to die to get back their land, which the Rebels had seized.35
In the spring of 1777 John Butler received a letter from Carleton, recently the heroic defender of Quebec against American invaders. Carleton had changed his mind. He ordered Butler to recruit as many Indians as possible for an invasion of New York.36 Johnson’s raising of the King’s Royal Regiment and Carleton’s Indian mobilization order to Butler were preparatory moves for the launching of a three-prong invasion of New York. Lt. Gen. Sir John Burgoyne, who developed the strategic plan, believed that the invasion would inspire a Tory uprising and ascendancy in New York, making the entire colony as loyal as New York City. The invasion would also drive a wedge between the colonies, reflecting the belief of British officialdom that the firebrands in New England were of a different revolutionary breed from Americans elsewhere. Isolating New England would begin the process of snuffing out the Revolution.
Burgoyne did not include the Royal Highland Emigrants among the Loyalists in his force. His decision not to take the Highlanders along may have stemmed from the distrust that many British officers felt toward erstwhile supporters of Bonnie Prince Charlie. Lt. Col. Allan Maclean, commanding officer of the Emigrants, had been pardoned and was officially regarded as a trusted Loyalist officer. But Burgoyne decided that Maclean’s men would better serve as garrison troops, left behind as a home guard.37
Burgoyne proposed leading an army of about seven thousand men—Regulars, Loyalists, Hessians, and Indians—from Canada via the Richelieu River—Lake Champlain waterway to Fort Ticonderoga, then down the Hudson River Valley to Albany. A smaller force of two hundred Regulars, three hundred Hessians, eight hundred Indians, and two hundred Tories—including Butler’s recruits—was to advance overland from Lake Ontario to Lake Oneida, march eastward along the Mohawk Valley and destroy Fort Stanwix, the only Patriot obstacle in the valley. That unit, commanded by Lt. Col. Barry St. Leger, would then head for Albany to link up with Burgoyne. The third force would head out of New York City and up the Hudson to block any Rebel attempt to move against Burgoyne from the south.
When Burgoyne presented his plan in London, he won approval from British officials in London and from King George III, who said in an endorsement written in his own hand: “The outlines of the plan seem to be on a proper foundation… . Indians must be employed, and this measure must be avowedly directed, and Carleton must be in the strongest manner directed to furnish as many Canadians as possible.”38 The k
ing’s command led to Butler’s enlisting both Indians and white Loyalists. But they were mostly Americans, not the Canadians the king had expected.
Henry Simmons, a New Yorker, for example, left his wife and children and headed north when he heard about Burgoyne. “The Six-teeth Day of August, 1777,” Simmons wrote in his journal, “I left my house at Claverack and Sat out with a Compiny of Seven and twenty Men and officers to go to General Burguins armey Which was at the time at Fort Miller.” Claverack, New York, was about seventy milessouth of Fort Miller on the Hudson. They traveled for eleven days “through enemy country, likely at night along untrodden paths, fording streams, and hiding in thickets by day” until they caught up with “the flyeing arme” and enlisted in the King’s Royal Regiment.39
A Mohawk Valley Tory, brother of a Rebel leader, raised a company of sixty-three Loyalists and led them to Canada. Another Tory from that area, a captain of Rebel militia, changed sides and left New York with several relatives he had enlisted. More recruits came from the efforts of Adam Crysler, a friend of Joseph Brant and a prominent landowner in Schoharie, a settlement near Butler’s mansion. Three of his brothers were known Tories. A fourth brother claimed to be a Patriot. But, suspected of lying, he was arrested by Rebel raiders and taken to Albany, where he was reportedly hanged.40
Crysler wrote in his journal that he had recruited seventy white men and twenty Indians from that area. He was instructed by Brant to hold his recruits in the valley for what was expected to be a Tory uprising. Crysler knew that a civil war was simmering in the valley and that recruiters risked their lives. Earlier in 1777 a party of Rebels, searching for a Tory recruiter, “levied a tax upon his poultry yard and ate up his chickens.” Then they tracked him down and found him with twenty recruits. The captured Tories were delivered to Albany “for safe keeping.” The recruiter was hanged, a fate that became common for others with the same mission.41
Unlike short-time Rebel militiamen and Continentals who served “for one year, unless sooner discharged,” Tories enlisted for the duration of the war. Rebels typically signed up for months at a time because they had farms or businesses to run. Tories typically had forfeited their homes, land, and way of life, for they knew that if they returned they would be prosecuted under state confiscation and treason laws. Their only hope for return was a British victory. Washington envied the ability of the British and Loyalists to field permanent forces while he often had only “the throngs of militia, which at certain periods have been, not in the field, but in their way to and from the field,” creating “two sets of men to feed and pay; one coming to the army, and the other going from it.”42
• • •
On his way southward, up Lake Champlain toward Fort Ticonderoga, Burgoyne enlisted about four hundred Indians in his force and addressed them through an interpreter: “The great King, our common father and the patron of all who seek and deserve his protection, has considered with satisfaction the general conduct of the Indian tribes from the beginning of the troubles in America.” He was diplomatically endorsing the Six Nations’ neutrality. But now, Burgoyne said, “You are free. Go forth in might and valor of your cause, strike at the common enemies of Great Britain and America, disturbers of public order, peace and happiness, destroyers of commerce, parricides of state.”
He pointed to the German and British officers with him and continued, “The circle round you, the chiefs of his Majesty’s European forces and of the Princes his allies, esteem you as brothers in the war… . Be it our task, from the dictates of our religion, the laws of our warfare and the principles and interest of our policy, to regulate your passions … to suspend the uplifted stroke.”
He then introduced the Indians to a new etiquette of battle: “Aged men, women, children and prisoners must be held sacred from the knife or hatchet, even in the time of actual conflict. You shall receive compensation for the prisoners you take, but you shall be called to account for scalps… . You shall be allowed to take the scalps of the dead when killed by your fire and in fair opposition; but on no account, or pretence, or subtilty, or prevarication, are they to be taken from the wounded or even dying.” They could, however, show “less reserve” toward “base, lurking assassins, incendiaries, ravagers and plunderers of the country, to whatever army they may belong.”
The Indians cried “Etow! Etow! Etow!”—a way of showing affirmation—and the leading chief, at the end of a much shorter speech, declared: “With one common assent we promise a constant obedience to all you have ordered and all you shall order.”43 More Indians would join Burgoyne on his way to Albany.
Burgoyne also added to his force by asking John Peters, a Loyalist refugee in Montreal, to raise a regiment that Burgoyne named the Queen’s Loyal Rangers. Peters, born in Connecticut, had parted ways with his Patriot father. Peters’s uncle the Reverend Samuel Andrew Peters was such a ranting Loyalist that General Gage, as a matter of public safety, politely urged him to leave New York. He sailed to England in 1774.44
Burgoyne’s new Loyalist regiment became a magnet for Canadians, New Yorkers, and Vermonters who saw the invasion as a chance to join the winning side. Many along his battle route would fight and kill neighbors, for on this frontier the civil war became local and personal. The recruits of the Queen’s Loyal Rangers were inspired not only by loyalty to the Crown but also by their desire to drive the Rebels from this fertile land and convert it to a Loyalist domain. Within a month the Rangers had 262 men. One of them was Ensign John Peters, Jr., Lieutenant Colonel Peters’s fifteen-year-old son.45
The Queen’s Loyal Rangers were in the vanguard of Burgoyne’s army when Fort Ticonderoga came into view. As the force maneuvered for battle, Burgoyne realized that if artillery could be hauled up a mountain overlooking the fort, he could pulverize Ticonderoga. After hacking a road through the forest and hauling dismantled cannons up the slope, artillerists and pioneers placed a battery on the summit and began firing.46 With the cannons threatening devastation and the defenders outnumbered almost four to one, Maj. Gen. Arthur St. Clair, commander of Ticonderoga, ordered the fort abandoned. He and his men slipped away under cover of night. Burgoyne now had a base for his advance on Albany—and a rallying point for more Loyalist recruits.
Burgoyne’s political adviser was a powerful local Tory, Col. Philip Skene, who had acquired from British officials the title of royal governor. His realm included Crown Point, Fort Ticonderoda, and land that would eventually become part of Vermont. Skene had made afortune as surveyor of His Majesty’s woods around Lake Champlain, as landlord over tenants working thousands of acres of land, and as the owner of sawmills and forges. A wounded veteran of the French and Indian War with a distinguished British Army career, he became the Crown’s leading representative and landholder in the area, and he commanded a Loyalist militia. His son Andrew, a graduate of King’s (later Columbia) College, was a British Army officer.
Skene had made a long detour before joining Burgoyne. He was in England during the American invasion of Canada. While returning to America, his ship, as was customary, “spoke” an England-bound ship by coming close enough so that the ships could shout news to each other. From the ship out of America came the shouted news of Lexington and Concord. Skene and British officers reacted by trying to take over the ship and sail it to British-occupied Boston. But the ship’s crew and captain overpowered and confined them. When the ship reached Philadelphia, Patriots arrested Skene and transported him to Connecticut,47 where he would “still harangue the people from the prison windows.”48 Skene was exchanged in time to join Burgoyne’s invasion.49
Both Skene and his son welcomed Burgoyne as a liberator. When the elder Skene and Burgoyne conferred in Skene’s mansion at the southern end of Lake Champlain, Skene convinced the general that he would be joined by Loyalists as fervent as the Skenes, all along his march to Albany.50 Skene became Burgoyne’s principal aide, checking on the loyalty of civilians, watching over the delivery of supplies, and running a spy network. At least two of his spie
s, Continental Army deserters, were caught lurking in a Rebel camp. They both carried incriminating passes, signed by Skene, saying they were “on his Majesties Service” and had taken “the oath of allegiance.” They were tried by court-martial and condemned to death.51
Burgoyne pursued part of St. Clair’s army, whose rear guard fought a delaying action that enabled most of the men to escape. Burgoyne, with Philip and Andrew Skene at his side, continued pursuit, veering from his original plan and taking a route that led him into a dense forest laced with swamps. The decision led to a logging duel between Patriots and Burgoyne’s men: He had to fell trees to build a corduroy (log) road for his long train of artillery and supplies, and the Patriots ahead of him felled trees to block his path and dam streams, while sniping at his men as they struggled southward through sweltering heat and clouds of mosquitoes. (Because the soldiers’ labors added a new forest-to-lumber-mill road to Skene’s domain, there was some suspicion that Skene had recommended the route so he could get a road built.) Moving at about a mile a day, Burgoyne took nearly a month to reach the Hudson, giving his quarry more time to prepare for battle.52
Burgoyne’s instructions to Indians about gentlemanly warfare had been empty words to many Indian Loyalists. And British officials dealing with the Six Nations knew they could not control the way Indians traditionally fought. Guy Johnson managed to convey that reality in a letter to the Rebels that simultaneously denied British attempts to recruit Indian warriors—but warned that “if the Indians find … their Superintendent [Guy Johnson] insulted, they will take a dreadful revenge.”53
The Rebels had certainly “insulted” the Johnsons and John Butler by forcing them to flee, and so the Indians were supposedly justified in becoming allies and fighting as they customarily did, which meant scalping.
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