Battle of Oriskany

Battle of Oriskany
Part of the American Revolutionary War
Herkimer at the Battle of Oriskany, August 6, 1777
Date August 6, 1777 Location Oriskany, New York Result Tactical British victory Strategic American victory
Belligerents
Tryon County militia 40 Oneida Indians	Hanau Jägers King's Royal Regiment of New York Butler's Rangers Seneca, Mohawks, Abenakis, Algonquins, Nipissings and Hurons
Commanders and leaders
Nicholas Herkimer †	Sir John Johnson John Butler Chief Joseph Brant
Strength
800	450
Casualties and losses
465 killed or wounded	150 killed or wounded (includes casualties at the Siege of Fort Stanwix)

The Battle of Oriskany, fought on August 6, 1777, was one of the bloodiest battles in the American Revolutionary War and a significant engagement of the Saratoga campaign. Early in the siege of Fort Stanwix, an American relief force from the Mohawk Valley under General Nicholas Herkimer, numbering around 800 men of the Tryon County militia and a party of Oneida Indians, approached in an attempt to raise the siege. British commander Barry St. Leger authorized an intercept force consisting of a Hanau Jäger detachment, Sir John Johnson's King's Royal Regiment of New York, Native allies from the Six Nations, and Indian Department Rangers totaling at least 450 men.

The Loyalist and Native force ambushed Herkimer's force in a small valley about six miles (10 km) east of Fort Stanwix. During the battle, Herkimer was mortally wounded. The battle cost the Patriots approximately 450 casualties, while the Loyalists and Natives lost approximately 150 dead and wounded. The Loyalist victory was tarnished when a sortie from Fort Stanwix sacked their camp, spoiling morale among the Indians.

This was one the few battles in the war where almost all of the participants were North American: Loyalists and Native Americans fought against Patriots in the absence of British soldiers. For the Natives, the battle marked the beginning a civil war, as Oneidas under Colonel Louis allied with the American militia fought against members of the other Iroquois nations.

Background

Further information: [[:Saratoga campaign and Siege of Fort Stanwix]]

In June 1777, the British Army, under the command of General "Gentleman Johnny" John Burgoyne, launched a two-pronged attack from Quebec. Burgoyne's objective was to split New England from the other colonies by gaining control of New York. The main thrust came south across Lake Champlain under Burgoyne's command; the second thrust was led by Lieutenant Colonel Barry St. Leger, and was intended to come down the Mohawk River valley and meet Burgoyne's army near Albany.

St. Leger's expedition, about 2,000 men that were a mix of British regulars, Hessian jägers from Hanau, Loyalists, Indians, and rangers, reached Fort Stanwix on August 2, and began besieging it. As word of St. Leger's movements had preceded him, Nicholas Herkimer raised a force of 800 from the Tryon County militia to support the fort's 750-strong garrison. This force, mostly poorly trained German-American farmers, but also including 40 Oneida Indians, left Fort Dayton on August 4.

When St. Leger learned from a messenger sent by Molly Brant that Herkimer and his relief expedition were on their way, he sent Joseph Brant, a Mohawk chief, with more than 400 natives, and Sir John Johnson, with the light infantry company of his King's Royal Yorkers to intercept them.

Battle

The site of the ambush at Bloody Creek, New York.

General Herkimer and his men marched up the wilderness road toward Fort Stanwix. About 10 miles (16 km) from the fort, near the village of Oriskany, the road dipped more than fifty feet (15 m) into a marshy ravine where a stream about three feet (1 m) wide meandered along the bottom. Sayenqueraghta and Cornplanter, two Indian war chiefs, chose this place to set up an ambush of the approaching relief column. While the King's Royal Yorkers waited behind a nearby rise, 400 natives concealed themselves on both sides of the ravine. On the morning of August 6, Herkimer's militiamen approached the ravine, and then halted.

On August 5, Herkimer had sent a few men toward Fort Stanwix to notify Colonel Peter Gansevoort of his column's approach and to request that a force be sent from the fort to meet them. When the militia reached the ravine he had not yet received a response from the fort, and proposed to wait until he received confirmation. His officers, however, interpreted Herkimer's hesitancy as cowardice and publicly rebuked him as a Loyalist spy. Faced with mutiny by his officers, Herkimer then led the militia column into the ravine at about 10 am. The militia officers who followed him into the ravine were Colonel Ebenezer Cox, Colonel Jacob Klock, Colonel Peter Bellinger and Colonel Frederick Visscher. (Herkimer's message was not received at the fort until 11 am.)

Exhausted from the heat of their march, many of General Herkimer's men broke ranks and ran to the stream for water. Although Johnson had instructed the Indians not to attack until all of Herkimer's militia had entered the ravine, they could not resist such an opportunity. As the militiamen laid down their muskets and placed their heads to the water, the Native Americans attacked.

Monument marking location of tree to which Herkimer was taken

In the opening volleys of the battle, General Herkimer's horse was shot from beneath him, and he received a wound in the leg. He was carried by several of his officers to a beech tree. Herkimer was urged by his militiamen to retire from further danger, but that he defiantly replied: "I will face the enemy." Historians interpret Herkimer's reply not only as a testament to his valor, but also his bitterness towards those officers who—having earlier branded Herkimer a coward for his caution and goaded him into the ravine—now urged him to retreat for his own safety.

As the fighting continued, Herkimer rallied his men, fighting his way out of the ravine to the crest just west of it. Directing the battle while leaning against a beech tree there and smoking his pipe, Herkimer observed that the natives were watching the puffs of smoke from his militiaman's muskets. The natives exploited the delay caused by the need to reload muzzle-loading flint locks and rushed in and attack the militiamen with tomahawks and knives.

A violent thunderstorm caused a one-hour lull in the battle. Herkimer regrouped his militia on the higher ground. He instructed his men to fight in pairs: while one man fired and reloaded the other waited and then only fired if attacked. Firing in relays, both were to attempt to keep at least one weapon loaded at all times. This tactic kept the Indians at bay and stabilized the remains of Herkimer's command.

After the thunderstorm, Johnson's King's Royal Yorkers joined the battle. They had turned their coats inside out to disguise themselves as a relief party coming up the valley from Fort Stanwix, but one of the Patriot militiaman, Captain Jacob Gardinier, recognized the face of a Loyalist neighbor. In the confusion, the King's Royal Yorkers succeeded in investing the militia's position, but as casualties mounted, they withdrew.

File:Oneidas at Oriskany.jpg

Oneidas at the Battle of Oriskany—August 6, 1777, as depicted by artist Don Troiani.

At about 2 pm the garrison of Fort Stanwix sortied from the fort to sack the nearly-empty British and Native camp. The Native forces withdrew from the action with cries of "Oonah, oonah!", the Seneca signal to retire.

Upon the withdrawal of the Natives and Loyalists, the Patriots who had not fled the scene attended to the evacuation of wounded, some of whom were taken by boat downriver to safety. Many wounded Patriots were left on the field. The dead were not buried for several years.

Aftermath

Patriots

The battered remnant of Herkimer's force, with Herkimer seriously wounded and many of its captains killed, retreated back to Fort Dayton. The wounded Brigadier General Nicholas Herkimer was carried by his men from the battlefield. His leg was amputated, but the operation went poorly and he died on August 16.

When General Philip Schuyler heard of the retreat from Oriskany, he immediately set about sending additional relief to the area. The siege at Fort Stanwix was eventually lifted on August 21 when a relief column led by General Benedict Arnold approached. While still at Fort Dayton, Arnold sent messengers into the British camp that were able to convince the British and Indian besiegers that his force was much larger than it actually was.

Because of the small population of settlers in the Mohawk Valley, the Patriot losses sustained at the Battle of Oriskany were almost overwhelming to the community; some families lost all their male members, and few families escaped unscathed. Furthermore, combatants often found themselves fighting relatives who happened to choose the opposing side. Germans, Indians and English died on both sides.

Loyalists

Loyalist John Butler commanded an Indian detachment in the battle. Butler was promoted to Lieutenant Colonel and awarded command of Butler's Rangers for his role in the battle.

Natives

The Indians tortured and ate some of their prisoners. Sayenqueraghta, the principal chief, proposed to continue the fighting by pursuing the Colonials down river toward German Flatts, but St. Leger turned their proposal down. This battle marked the beginning of the civil war in the Iroquois confederacy. Brant's Mohawks burned the Oneida settlement of Oriske, while the Oneidas plundered Tiononderoge and Canajoharie. The Fort Hunter Mohawks were later subject to the same treatment, prompting most of the remaining Mohawks to flee to Quebec.

Legacy

According to historical accounts, an hour into the battle, the creek ran red with the blood of the fallen. The Battle of Oriskany was more commonly termed the Battle of Bloody Creek by local inhabitants in the decades that followed. Much of the battlefield is now preserved in the Oriskany Battlefield State Historic Site, which was recognized as a National Historic Landmark in 1962, and added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1966.

The battle is known in British records as Herkimer's engagement out of respect for the American general's sacrifice and victory. Herkimer was also honored when the town of Herkimer and Herkimer County, New York were named for him.

American Revolutionary War activities in the Mohawk Valley, including the Battle of Oriskany, were memorialized by Walter D. Edmonds in his 1937 novel, Drums Along the Mohawk.

See also

• Media related to Battle of Oriskany at Wikimedia Commons
• Adam F. Helmer

Gallery

• 
  Monument to Nicholas Herkimer erected by the Daughters of the American Revolution, July 14, 1912.
• 
  The Mohawk leader Chief Joseph Brant.
• 
  Monument to the unknown Tryon County patriots who followed Nicholas Herkimer and his militia officers into the ambush at Bloody Creek.
• 

References

• Isabel Kelsay, Joseph Brant 1743-1807 Man of Two Worlds, 1984, ISBN 0-8156-0182-4
• Nelson Greene; History Of The Mohawk Valley, Gateway To The West, 1614-1925; 1925, Reprint Services Corp., ISBN 0-7812-5180-X.
• Alice P. Kenney; Stubborn for Liberty: The Dutch in New York; 1975, Syracuse University Press, ISBN 0-8156-0113-1.
• Gavin K. Watt, Rebellion in the Mohawk Valley: The St. Leger Expedition of 1777, Toronto: Dundurn, 2002. ISBN 1-55002-376-4
• Allan D. Foote, Liberty March, The Battle of Oriskany; 1998, North Country Books. ISBN 0-925168-72-6
• William B. Stone, Life of Joseph Brant, 1865

Further reading

• Walter D. Edmonds; Drums Along the Mohawk; 1937, Little, Brown and Company, ISBN 0-8156-0457-2.

External links

• The King's Royal Regiment of New York
• The Battle of Oriskany: "Blood Shed a Stream Running Down", a National Park Service Teaching with Historic Places (TwHP) lesson plan