Schoharie County is a county in the U.S. state of New York. As of the 2020 census, the population was 29,714, making it the state's fifth-least populous county. The county seat is Schoharie. "Schoharie" comes from a Mohawk word meaning "floating driftwood." Schoharie County is part of the Albany-Schenectady-Troy, NY Metropolitan Statistical Area. The county is part of the Mohawk Valley region of the state.
Thayendanegea or Joseph Brant was a Mohawk military and political leader, based in present-day New York and, later, Brantford, in what is today Ontario, who was closely associated with Great Britain during and after the American Revolution. Perhaps the best known Native American of his generation, he met many of the most significant American and British people of the age, including both United States President George Washington and King George III of Great Britain.
The 1779 Sullivan Expedition was a United States military campaign during the American Revolutionary War, lasting from June to October 1779, against the four British-allied nations of the Iroquois. The campaign was ordered by George Washington in response to Iroquois and Loyalist attacks on the Wyoming Valley, and the Cherry Valley. The campaign had the aim of "the total destruction and devastation of their settlements." The Continental Army carried out a scorched-earth campaign in the territory of the Iroquois Confederacy in what is now central New York.
The Mohawk Valley region of the U.S. state of New York is the area surrounding the Mohawk River, sandwiched between the Adirondack Mountains and Catskill Mountains, northwest of the Capital District. As of the 2010 United States Census, the region's counties have a combined population of 622,133 people. In addition to the Mohawk River valley, the region contains portions of other major watersheds such as the Susquehanna River.
The Battle of Oriskany was a major engagement of the Saratoga campaign during the American Revolutionary War. On August 6, 1777, an American column of Tryon County militia and Oneidas marching to relieve the siege of Fort Stanwix was ambushed by a contingent of Britain's Indigenous allies and Loyalists. It was one of the few battles of the war in which most non-Indigenous participants were settlers born in the Thirteen Colonies. The Americans suffered heavy casualties during the battle.
Lieutenant-Colonel John Butler was a British Indian Department officer, landowner and merchant. During the American Revolutionary War, he was a prominent Loyalist who commanded Butler's Rangers. Born in New London, 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-prepared to work with the Mohawk and other Iroquois nations 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.
The Cherry Valley massacre was an attack by British and Iroquois forces on a fort and the town of Cherry Valley in central New York on November 11, 1778, during the American Revolutionary War. It has been described as one of the most horrific frontier massacres of the war. A mixed force of Loyalists, British soldiers, Senecas, and Mohawks descended on Cherry Valley, whose defenders, despite warnings, were unprepared for the attack. During the raid, the Seneca in particular targeted non-combatants, and reports state that 30 such individuals were killed, in addition to a number of armed defenders.
Drums Along the Mohawk is a 1939 American historical drama film based upon a 1936 novel of the same name by American author Walter D. Edmonds. The film stars Henry Fonda and Claudette Colbert, was produced by Darryl F. Zanuck, and directed by John Ford.
Adam Frederick Helmer, also known as John Adam Frederick Helmer and Hans Adam Friedrich Helmer, was an American Revolutionary War soldier 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.
Walter Butler was an American-born Loyalist military officer during the American Revolutionary War. He was born near Johnstown, New York, the son of John Butler, a native agent who worked for Sir William Johnson. Walter Butler studied law, and became a lawyer in Albany, New York prior to the American Revolution. He was killed in battle in 1781.
The King's Royal Regiment of New York, also known as Johnson's Royal Regiment of New York, King's Royal Regiment, King's Royal Yorkers, and Royal Greens, were one of the first Loyalist regiments, raised on June 19, 1776, in British Canada, during the American Revolutionary War.
The Battle of Cobleskill was an American Revolutionary War raid on the frontier settlement of Cobleskill, New York on May 30, 1778. The battle took place in what is now the hamlet of Warnerville, New York, near the modern Cobleskill-Richmondville High School. The raid marked the beginning of a phase in which Loyalists and Iroquois, encouraged and supplied by British authorities in the Province of Quebec, attacked and destroyed numerous villages on what was then the western frontier of New York and Pennsylvania.
The Battle of Johnstown was one of the last battles in the northern theatre of the American Revolutionary War, with approximately 1,400 engaged at Johnstown, New York on October 25, 1781. British regulars and militia, commanded by Major John Ross of the King's Royal Regiment of New York and Captain Walter Butler of Butler's Rangers, had raided the border area. Local American forces, led by Colonel Marinus Willett, blocked the British advance. As the British withdrew northwards Willett and his men marched to German Flatts to try to cut them off. The British managed to escape, but Walter Butler was killed.
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.
Schoharie Crossing State Historic Site, also known as Erie Canal National Historic Landmark, is a historic district that includes the ruins of the Erie Canal aqueduct over Schoharie Creek, and a 3.5-mile (5.6 km) long part of the Erie Canal, in the towns of Glen and Florida within Montgomery County, New York. It was the first part of the old canal to be designated a National Historic Landmark, prior to the designation of the entire New York State Barge Canal as an NHL in 2017.
The Battle of Klock's Field was an engagement during the American Revolutionary War in the Mohawk Valley region of New York between British and Loyalist forces led by Lieutenant Colonel Sir John Johnson, and New York militia and levies 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.
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. Brant's Volunteers fought on the side of the British on the frontier of New York and in the Ohio Country. As associators they were not provided uniforms, weapons, provisions, or pay by the British government, and survived by foraging and plundering.
The attack on German Flatts was a raid on the frontier settlement of German Flatts, New York during the American Revolutionary War. The attack was made by a mixed force of Loyalists and Iroquois under the overall command of Mohawk leader Joseph Brant, and resulted in the destruction of houses, barns, and crops, and the taking of livestock for the raiders' use. The settlers, warned by the heroic run of Adam Helmer, took refuge in local forts but were too militarily weak to stop the raiders.
The Raid on Unadilla and Onaquaga was a military operation by Continental Army forces and New York militia against the Iroquois towns of Unadilla and Onaquaga in what is now upstate New York. In early October 1778, more than 250 men under the command of Lieutenant Colonel William Butler of the 4th Pennsylvania Regiment descended on the two hastily abandoned towns and destroyed them, razing most of the buildings and taking or destroying provisions, including the inhabitants' winter stores.
