HEROISM OF STARK AND WARNER. 351 of the British government had scoured two continents to raise. Men who had been spoiled by civilization on the one side, and savages who had no conception of civilization on the other, were no match for those hardy settlers who owned the soil they cultivated, unwilling though it was to have even a scanty subsistence wrung from it by honest labor. Four days after St. Clair's retreat, Stark had marched out into the village of Hoosick, five miles from Bennington, where, by one of those irresistible assaults, which neither Hessians, nor Tories, nor Indians, ever withstood, the marauders were swept from the field-scattered and pursued in all directions. Towards sunset, however, Colonel Breyman with another strong German party, suddenly appeared to renew the attempt to capture the stores. But every step they took was disputed by Colonel Seth Warner's Green Mountain boys, who, 'with their stalwart courage, deadly aim, and breathless activity, repelled the attack so successfully, and followed it up with such desperation, that of the two large bodies who had joined in the day's conflict, not a man but fell dead, or wounded, or a prisoner, except those who escaped by flight. The whole nation rang with the victory. The disproportion of loss on the two sides was almost unprecedented; it had cost the Americans less than two hundred in wounded and dead, and there were no prisoners that day, except of the invaders. The moment Congress received the news, a vote of thanks was passed to the Green Mountain boys and the New Hampshire militia, and Stark was made a brigadier-general in the regular army. Burgoyne's Loss.-The expedition had cost him a thousand men, but this alone might not have proved fatal; it shattered his whole plan for the campaign; it was the beginning of the end of his military career in America, as the decisive struggle, now imminent and inevitable, was so soon to prove. A bloody Raid along the Mohawk.-While these scenes were being en his old age with one of the most brilliant events of his life, and it was like robbing him to take away the monuments of his fame. He longed once more for the energy of youth to take the field again, but the thread of life was drawing to its last span, and his battles were all over. Still he lived ten years longer, and at the age of ninety-four rested from his labors. HIS CHARACTER. 'General Stark was a man of strong character, frank even to bluntness, and both stern and kind. Independent, yet fearless, he yielded neither to friend nor foe. In youth, an adventurous woodsman-in manhood, a bold ranger, and in maturer years an able and skilful commander, he passed through his long career without a spot on his name. Few lives are marked by greater adventure, yet amid all his perils through two long wars, and in many battles, though exposing himself like the meanest soldier in the fighthe never received a wound. He was a good commander, and showed himself in every position equal to its demands. He loved action, and was at home on the battle-field. Charles XII. was his favorite hero, and he always carried his life with him in his campaigns. The stern and resolute character of this chivalric king harmonized with his own. and he made the history of his deeds his constant companion. He possessed, to a great degree, one of the most important qualities of an efficient and successful officer-wonderful power over his troops. We never hear of the militia fleeing from him in battle, At Bunker's Hill, at Bennington, at Trenton, and Princeton, they followed him without hesitation into any danger, and were steady as veterans beneath the most galling fire. This moral power over troops is the battle half gained before it is fought, and shows a character possessed of great strength or some brilliant, striking quality. His eccentricities and bluntness no doubt pleased his men, but it was his determined courage, confidence in his own resources, and amazing power of will, that gave him such unbounded influence over them. But his greatest eulogy is, he was an incorruptible patriot. No neglect or wrong could swerve his just and noble soul from the path of duty, and though honor forbade him for a while from serving in the army, he fitted out his sons, one after another, and sent them into the field! How different from the conduct of Arnold! He was borne to the grave with military honors, and now sleeps on the shores of the Merrimac, where the river takes a long and steady sweep, revealing his tomb for miles up and down the quiet valley. He was buried here at his own request, and it seems a fit rest ing-place for the bold and independent patriot. As his glance was free and open in life, so his grave is where the winds of his native land have full play, and the vision full scope. A plain granite obelisk stands above his remains, on which is inscribed simply, MAJOR GEN ERAL STARK.' 358 A BLOODY RAID ON THE MOHAWK. acted around the battle-grounds of the old French war among the sources of the Hudson, St. Leger with his murderous savages had been joined by Brant with his Mohawk Indians, and a large body of Tories under Johnson.' Their first point of attack after leaving Oswego, was Fort Stanwix. The garrison, under the command of Colonel Gansevoort, made a brave and persistent defence. General Herkimer, with the militia he had hastily mustered, pressed forward to the relief of the fort. Falling into an ambush a bloody conflict followed, and the brave general was mortally wounded. During the same hour, Colonel Willett with a corps of the garrison, made a daring sortie, 1 From a letter of Lord Germain to Sir Guy Carleton, March 26, 1777, and a further letter of LieutenantGovernor Hamilton, Detroit, of July 27, of the same year-both quoted by Bancroft from the oirginal manuscript-we find that Hamilton, the Lieutenant-Governor of Detroit, in obedience to orders from the Secretary of State, sent out fifteen several parties, consisting in the aggregate of two hundred and eighty-nine red braves with thirty white officers and rangers, to prowl on the frontiers of Pennsylvania and Virginia.Bancroft, vol. ix., p. 377. It was in this fiendish spirit that George III. determined in the confidential councils of his secret closet to carry on the war. No distinction was made between rebels in arms, and mothers and children and old men. A messenger from Brant's sister brought word that Herkimer and the militia of Tryon County were marching to its relief. A plan was made to lay an ambush of savages for this party, which encamped on the fifth at a distance of twelve miles. During the evening the savages filled the woods with yells. The next morning, having carefully laid aside their blankets and robes of fur, the whole corps of Indians went out naked, or clad only in hunting-shirts, armed with spear, tomahawk, and musket, and supported by Sir John Johnson, and some part of his loyal Yorkers, by Colonel Butler and his rangers, by Claus and his Canadians, and by Lieutenant Bird and a party of regulars. "The patriot frecholders of the Mohawk Valley, most of them sons of Germans from the Palatinate, seven or eight hundred in number, misinformed as to the strength of the besieging party, marched through the wood with security and carelessness. About an hour before noon, when they were within six miles of the fort, their van entered the ambuscade. They were surprised in front by Johnson and his Yorkers, while the Indians attacked their flanks with fury, and after using their muskets rushed in with their tomahawks. The patriots fell back without confusion to better ground, and renewed the fight against superior numbers. There was no chance for tactics in this battle of the wilderness. Small parties fought from behind trees or fallen logs; or the white man born on the banks of the Mohawk, wrestled single-handed with the Seneca warrior, like himself the child of the soil, mutually striking mortal wounds with the bayonet or the hatchet, and falling in the forest, their left hands clenched in each other's hair, their right grasping in a gripe of death the knife plunged in each other's bosom. [Gouverneur Morris in N. Y. Hist. Coll., ii., 133.] 'Herkimer was badly wounded below the knee, but he remained on the ground giving orders to the end. In his Field Book of the Revolution, vol. i., p. 246, Lossing says: "A musket-ball passed through and killed the horse of the general, and shattered his own leg just below the knee. With perfect composure and cool courage, he ordered the saddle to be taken from his slaughtered horse and placed against a large beech-tree near. Seated, there, with his men falling like autumn foliage, and the bullets of the enemy, like driving sleet, whistling around him, the intrepid general calmly gave his orders, and thus nobly rebuked the slanderers who called him coward. It is stated that during the hottest of the action, the general, seated upon his saddle, quietly took his tinder-box from his pocket, lighted his pipe, and smoked as composedly as if seated at his own fireside.]' 'Thomas Spencer died the death of a hero. The battle raged for at least an hour and a half, when the Americans repulsed their assailants, but with the loss of about one hundred and sixty killed, wounded, and taken, the best and bravest people of Western New York. The savages fought with wild valor; three and thirty or more of their warriors, among them the chief warriors of the Senecas, lay dead beneath the trees; about as many more were badly wounded. The British loss, including savages and white men, was proba bly about one hundred. Three men having crossed the morass into Fort Stanwix to announce the approach of Herkimer, by Gansevoort's order two hundred and fifty men, half of New York, half of Massachusetts, under Lieutenant-Colonel Marinus Willett, made a sally in the direction of Oriska. They passed through the quarters of the Yorkers, the rangers, and the sava ges, driving before them whites and Indians, chiefly squaws and children, capturing Sir John Johnson's papers, five British flags, the gala fur-robes and the new blankets and kettles of the Indians, and four prisoners. Learning from them the check to Herkimer, the party of Willett returned quickly to Fort Stanwix, bearing their spoils on their shoulders. The five captured colors were displayed under the Continental flag. It was the first time that a captured banner had floated under the stars and stripes of the Republic. The Indians were frantic with grief at the death of their chiefs and warriors; they suffered in the chill nights from loss of their clothes; and not even the permission in which they were indulged of torturing and killing their captives-conformable to the Indian custom-could prevent their returning home. Meanwhile, Willett, with Lieutenant Stockwellboth good woodsmen-made their way past the Indian quarter at the hazard of death by torture, in quest of a force to confront the savages; and Arnold was charged with the command of such an expedition. Long be fore its approach, an Indian ran into the camp, report ing that a thousand men were coming against thein; another followed, doubling the number; a third brought in a rumor that three thousand men were close at hand; and deaf to Saint Leger and to their Superintendents, the wild warriors robbed the British officers of their clothes, plundered the boats. and moved off with the booty, Saint Leger, in a panic, though Arnold was not within forty miles, hurried after them before night-fall, leaving his tents standing, and abandoning most of his artillery and stores.'-Bancroft, vol. ix., pp. 379-381. Washington entertained the highest admiration and respect for Herkimer :-'He it was,' were his words, who first reversed the gloomy scene of the Northern campaign. The hero of the Mohawk Valley served from love of country, not for reward. He did not want a Continental command, or money.' Dying of his wound before Congress could reward him, they de creed him a monument. Lossing pays Herkimer the following tribute :"The Continental Congress, grateful for his services, resolved to erect a monument to his memory, of the value of $500. But till 1847, no stone identified his grave. Then a plain marble slab was set up with the name of the hero upon it; and when I visited it in 1848, it was overgrown with weeds and brambles. It was erected by his grandnephew, W. Herkimer, consecrated spot is in the possession of strangers. The "Nine days after the battle when his wound had be come gangrenous, an amputation was thought neces INDIAN ATROCITIES-MISS M'CREA MASSACRED. 359 and broke through the line of the besiegers. He was soon after joined by an effective force under Arnold-who carried consternation and death to every battle-field he ever entered-whom Schuyler had sent for the relief of the fort. St. Leger's force was routed. He abandoned his camp after being robbed and deserted by a part of his Indian allies, and was compelled by the rest to retreat into Canada. His design was utterly defeated, and tranquillity was once more restored to the lovely vale of the Mohawk. The Employment of Indian Allies begins to be considered a Failure.-An incident which occurred about this time, began to open the eyes of our enemies, and worked serious injury to the British arms. It was the massacre of Miss M'Crea of Fort Edward. This beautiful girl was betrothed to Captain Jones, of Burgoyne's division. Uniting her fortunes with those of her English lover, she put herself under the protection of Indian scouts, who had been sent by Captain Jones, and started through the forest. A second party of Indians despatched by the lover to aid the first, quarrelled with those they met, and a rivalry sprang up. A quarrel ensued on the question which party should deliver the lady. When the second party were likely to get her in their possession, those who had taken her in the beginning, tied her to a tree and shot her. This incident revealed more clearly than any preceding event had done, the atrocity with which the British commanders were determined to carry on this war; for it was evident that they would call into requisition the wild and unfettered passions of savage tribes, to deepen the tide of blood which they had set flowing through the devoted Colonies. The reaction was immense. For many miles around the neighborhood, the people rose and rushed to the American encampment. The massacre of Miss M'Crea was no more atrocious than multitudes of others. But it came nearer to our enemies, and began to open their eyes to the savagery of employing such infernal instruments in warfare. Bancroft sums it up as follows: "The employment of Indian allies had failed. The king, the ministry, and in due time, the British Parliament were informed officially that the wild redmen 'treacherously committed ravages upon their friends;' that 'they could not be controlled;' that they killed their captives after the fashion of their tribes; that there was infinite difficulty in managing them;' that they grew more and more unreasonable and importunate.' Could the government of a civilized state insist on courting their alliance? returning to their lodges, told the story of the villages rang with the howls of mourners, the yells of rage. We shall see interested British emissaries, acting under the orders of Germain and the king, make the life of these savages a succession of revenges, and lead them on to the wreaking of all their wrath in blood." sary; but it was performed by a drunken surgeon, who neglected it till it was evident that he was dying of the unstaunched hemorrhage. Seeing that he must soon die, he called for the Bible, and read composedly, in the presence of his family and others, the thirty-eighth Psalm, applying the deep, penitential confessions of the poem to his own case. He closed the When the Seneca warriors, slaughter of their chiefs, their book, sank back upon his pillow and expired. Stone justly observes :- If Socrates died like a philosopher, and Rousseau like an unbelieving sentimentalist General Herkimer died like a CHRISTIAN HERO.'"Field-Book, vol. i., pp. 260-261. 1 Bancroft, vol. ix., pp. 381-382. |