The Saratoga campaign in 1777 was an attempt by the British high command for North America to gain military control of the strategically important Hudson River valley during the American Revolutionary War. It ended in the surrender of the British army, which historian Edmund Morgan argues, "was a great turning point of the war, because it won for Americans the foreign assistance which was the last element needed for victory."
Barrimore Matthew "Barry" St. Leger was a British Army officer. St. Leger was active in the Saratoga Campaign, commanding an invasion force that unsuccessfully besieged Fort Stanwix. St. Leger remained on the frontier for the duration of the war; after its conclusion, he served briefly as commander of British forces in Quebec.
The Battle of Oriskany was a significant engagement of the Saratoga campaign of the American Revolutionary War, and one of the bloodiest battles in the conflict between Patriot forces and those loyal to Great Britain. On August 6, 1777, several hundred of Britain's Indigenous allies, accompanied by Loyalists of the King's Royal Regiment of New York and the British Indian Department, ambushed a Patriot militia column which was marching to relieve the siege of Fort Stanwix. This was one of the few battles in which the majority of the participants were American colonists. Patriots and allied Oneidas fought against Loyalists and allied Iroquois and Mississaugas. No British regulars were involved; however, a detachment of Hessians was present.
Brigadier General Nicholas Herkimer was an American Palatine military officer who fought during the Revolutionary War. He died of wounds after the Battle of Oriskany.
John Butler was an American-born military officer, landowner, merchant and colonial official in the British Indian Department. During the American Revolutionary War, he was a prominent Loyalist who led the provincial regiment known as Butler's Rangers on the frontiers of New York and Pennsylvania. Born in Connecticut, he moved to New York with his family, where he learned several Iroquoian languages and worked as an interpreter in the fur trade. He was well-equipped to work with Mohawk and other Iroquois warriors who became allies of the British during the rebellion.
Butler's Rangers (1777–1784) was a Loyalist provincial military unit of the American Revolutionary War, raised by American loyalist John Butler. Most members of the regiment were Loyalists from upstate New York and northeastern Pennsylvania. Their winter quarters were constructed on the west bank of the Niagara River, in what is now Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario. The Rangers fought principally in New York and Pennsylvania, but ranged as far west as Ohio and Michigan, and as far south as Virginia and Kentucky.
Fort Stanwix was a colonial fort whose construction commenced on August 26, 1758, under the direction of British General John Stanwix, at the location of present-day Rome, New York, but was not completed until about 1762. The bastion fort was built to guard a portage known as the Oneida Carry during the French and Indian War. Fort Stanwix National Monument, a reconstructed structure built by the National Park Service, now occupies the site.
Drums Along the Mohawk is a 1939 American historical drama western film based upon a 1936 novel of the same name by American author Walter D. Edmonds. The film was produced by Darryl F. Zanuck and directed by John Ford. Henry Fonda and Claudette Colbert portray settlers on the New York frontier during the American Revolution. The couple experiences British, Tory, and Native American attacks on their farm before the Revolution ends and peace is restored.
Adam Frederick Helmer, also known as John Adam Frederick Helmer and Hans Adam Friedrich Helmer, was an American Revolutionary War hero among those of the Mohawk Valley and surrounding regions of New York State. He was made nationally famous by Walter D. Edmonds' popular 1936 novel Drums Along the Mohawk with its depiction of "Adam Helmer's Run" of September 16, 1778, to warn the people of German Flatts of the approach of Joseph Brant and his company of Indians and Tories.
Brigadier-General Sir John Johnson, 2nd Baronet was an American-born military officer, magistrate, landowner in the British Indian Department who fought as a Loyalist during the American Revolutionary War. He was the son of Sir William Johnson, 1st Baronet, who was the first British Superintendent of Indian Affairs. He inherited his father's baronetcy and estate in 1774.
Johannes Justus Schuyler was a Tory with patriot roots, who was used by American General Benedict Arnold to repel the British and Indian forces of Colonel Barry St. Leger and Joseph Brant from their siege of Fort Stanwix following the Battle of Oriskany during the American Revolution.
The northern theater of the American Revolutionary War after Saratoga consisted of a series of battles between American revolutionaries and British forces, from 1778 to 1782 during the American Revolutionary War. It is characterized by two primary areas of activity. The first set of activities was based around the British base of operations in New York City, where each side made probes and counterprobes against the other's positions that sometimes resulted in notable actions. The second was essentially a frontier war in Upstate New York and rural northern Pennsylvania that was largely fought by state militia companies and some Indian allies on the American side, and Loyalist companies supported by Indians, British Indian agents, and occasionally British regulars. The notable exception to significant Continental Army participation on the frontier was the 1779 Sullivan Expedition, in which General John Sullivan led an army expedition that drove the Iroquois out of New York. The warfare amongst the splinters of the Iroquois Six Nations were particularly brutal, turning much of the Indian population into refugees.
The Battle of Klock's Field was an engagement during the American Revolutionary War in the Mohawk Valley region of New York between British, Loyalist and Iroquois forces led by Lieutenant Colonel Sir John Johnson, and New York Levies and militia led by Brigadier General Robert Van Rensselaer. The battle occurred on the north side of the Mohawk River in what is now St. Johnsville in Montgomery County. The result was inconclusive with neither side able to claim a clear victory.
The creation of the Tryon County, New York militia was authorized on March 8, 1772, when the Province of New York passed a bill for the establishment of organized militia in each county in the colony. By 1776, the Tryon County militia had in effect become an army of rebellion under the control of the Tryon County Committee of Safety. The Tryon County militia would go on to fight at the important battles of Oriskany and Johnstown during the war.
Brant's Volunteers, also known as Joseph Brant's Volunteers, were an irregular unit of Loyalist and indigenous volunteers raised during the American Revolutionary War by Mohawk war leader, Joseph Brant, who fought on the side of the British on the frontier of New York. Being military associators, they were not provided soldiers' uniforms, weapons, or pay by the British government, and survived by foraging and plundering.
Captain John Deserontyon, U.E.L was a Mohawk war chief allied with the British during the American Revolutionary War. He led his people to Upper Canada after the war, settling on land granted by the Crown at the Bay of Quinte in present-day Ontario. This reserve, initially settled primarily by Mohawk loyalists from the Lower Castle, is known as Tyendinaga Mohawk Territory, Ontario. Deseronto, Ontario is named for him.
The siege of Fort Stanwix began on August 2, 1777 and ended on August 22, 1777. Fort Stanwix, at the western end of the Mohawk River Valley, was a primary defense point for the Continental Army against the British and indigenous forces aligned against them during the American Revolutionary War. The fort was occupied by Continental Army forces from New York and Massachusetts under the command of Colonel Peter Gansevoort. The besieging force was composed of British regulars, Loyalist soldiers, Hessians, and indigenous warriors, under the command of Brigadier General Barry St. Leger. St. Leger's expedition was a diversion in support of Lieutenant General John Burgoyne's campaign to take control of the Hudson River Valley to the east.
Johan Jost Herkimer was a Loyalist born in 1732, the second of five sons of Johan Jost Herkimer and Anna Catherine Petri of German Flatts, Province of New York. He was the younger brother of the American Patriot General Nicholas Herkimer.
Colonists who supported the British cause in the American Revolution were Loyalists, often called Tories, or, occasionally, Royalists or King's Men. George Washington's winning side in the war called themselves "Patriots", and in this article Americans on the revolutionary side are called Patriots. For a detailed analysis of the psychology and social origins of the Loyalists, see Loyalist.
John Ross (1744–1809) was a British Army officer in the French and Indian War and the American Revolution. He is best known for commanding a mixed force of approximately 600 regulars, Loyalists, and Indians in a raid into upstate New York on October 24, 1781 that culminated in the Battle of Johnstown, one of the last battles in the northern theater of the American Revolution. After the war, Ross was instrumental in settling Loyalist refugees in what is now the Kingston area of eastern Ontario.
Great Britain 