Landmarks of Oswego County, New York, Part 12

Author: Churchill, John Charles, 1821-1905; Smith, H. P. (Henry Perry), 1839-1925; Child, W. Stanley
Publication date: 1895
Publisher: Syracuse, N.Y. : D. Mason
Number of Pages: 1410

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Nine Mile Point, Aug. 2, 1777. Sir,

I this instant received your letter containing the account of your operations since you were detached, which I with great pleasure tell you have been sensible and spirited ; your resolution of investing Fort Stanwix is perfectly right; and to enable you to do it with greater effect, I have detached Joseph (Thayendanegea) and his corps of Indians to reinforce you. You will observe that I will have nothing but an investiture made ; and in case the enemy, observing the discretion and judgment with which it is made, should offer to capitulate, you are to tell them that you are sure I am well disposed to listen to them: this is not to take any honor out of a young soldier's hands, but by the presence of the troops to prevent barbarity and carnage, which will ever obtain

1 Stone's Life of Brant, vol. I, p. 211.

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DESTRUCTION OF FORT ONTARIO.

where Indians make so superior a part of a detachment ; I shall move from hence at eleven o'clock, and be early in the afternoon at the entrance of the creek.

I am, Sir, your most obt. and humble ser't.

BARRY ST. LEGER.

Lieut. Bird, 8th Reg't.

Fort Schuyler had been considerably strengthened early in the year and placed under command of Col. Peter Gansevoort, who was joined early in June by Col. Marinus Willett and his regiment. The invest- ment of the fort was made by Bird according to his instructions, with the valuable aid of Brant and his Indians. It was most gallantly de- fended by its heroic garrison of about 600 men. The determined defense of the fort, the movement of General Herkimer up the valley to its relief, and the ensuing bloody battle of Oriskany; the relief of the garrison by Arnold and Larned, and the raising of the siege, can only be touched upon here ; their details illumine some of the most interest- ing pages of our history, and the events themselves were especially important to the success of the American armies.

The remnant of the discomfited Brirish soldiery, that had left Oswego a few weeks before full of confidence in approaching victory, now hurried down the turbulent stream, frustrated and disappointed, their artillery left in the trenches before Schuyler, and their red allies bewailing the slaughter of their brethren. The halt at Oswego was a brief one. St. Leger proceeded with his regulars to Montreal; Butler and Brant returned to Niagara ; and Sir John Johnson took his Royal Greens to Oswegatchie. Burgoyne's surrender on the Hudson, October 17, closed the military operations of the year. Oswego was again silent and deserted.

Fort Ontario was unoccupied, excepting possibly by passing parties for a day or a night, until early in July, 1778, when Colonel Gansevoort sent a squad under Lieutenant McClellan to destroy the work, a measure adopted to prevent its possible re-occupation and retention by the British. McClellan found there only a woman and her children, and a boy of fourteen years. These he placed in an outbuilding and humanely supplied them with provisions. The boy he carried away on his return. All the buildings, excepting the one left for the woman, were burned, and as far as possible the fortification was destroyed. The destruction of Fort Ontario was displeasing to the Indian allies of the

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British; they, perhaps, appreciated its importance better than the English officers,1 In 1779 they sent a delegation of chiefs to Montreal, who petitioned General Haldimand to grant, among other things, the re- establishment of the fort. Their request was not approved.

To chastise the Iroquois in some measure for their bloody atrocities against the Americans, an expedition was made against the Onondagas in the spring of 1779, under Colonels Van Schaick and Willett. With their troops they left Fort Schuyler April 19, penetrated to the heart of the Onondaga's country (a little south of the site of Syracuse), sur- prised the Indians, destroyed their villages, burned their provisions and slaughtered their live stock. The consequences were not what was anticipated. Instead of terrorizing the Indians, it only exasperated them to further savagery. Another similar, but more extensive expe- dition, and one which had perhaps a more powerful effect upon its victims, was made in the summer of the same year. General Washington placed Gen. John Sullivan in command of about 3,000 Continental soldiers, gathered in the Wyoming valley, with orders to march into the country of the Senecas and leave nothing but desolation in his path. Sullivan arrived at Tioga Point August 22, and was there joined by Gen. James Clinton with 1,600 men. The expedition was slow in its movements, giving the British in Canada time to send a force to the aid of the Indians. The latter fortified themselves near the site of Elmira, and a battle was fought resulting in victory for the Americans. The expedition pushed forward and repeated in the rich Genesee valley the operations of Van Schaick and Willett in Onondaga. The destruction was complete and overwhelming; but while it temporarily awed the Indians, it did not by any means crush them. One result of this raid was an appeal to the English government to re establish Fort Ontario in the following spring (1780). No record appears to show that this was done.

Taking advantage of the desire for vengeance aroused in the Iroquois by Sullivan's campaign, Sir John Johnson made a raid into the Mohawk valley from Crown Point in May, 1780. Arriving at Johnstown, he burned every house in that region excepting those of tories; slew many

1 It seems unaccountable that this post should have been left thus wholly unprotected .- [Stone's Life of Brant, vol. I, p. 360.

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UNSUCCESSFUL ATTEMPT TO CAPTURE FORT ONTARIO.

people ; recovered his buried plate at Johnson Hall ; took twenty of his former slaves, and with his booty and a few prisoners, fled to Canada.

The baronet, late in the same year (1780), planned and executed another expedition, the history of which we need not follow further than to state that he assembed his troops at Lachine, near Montreal, and thence took them up the river and across the lake to Oswego. From this point they crossed the country to the Susquehanna, where they were joined by a body of Indians and tories. Their mission was the destruction of all the settlements of the Schoharie and Mohawk valleys. The season had been a plentiful one; barns were filled with early grains and many fields with later produce ; cellars were full and live stock was fattening. The torch was applied to everything that would burn ; settlers were slaughtered or driven to flight and the whole region left desolate. Sir John and his followers escaped to Canada by way of Oswego.

The war of the Revolution continued with its succession of memorable events, all slowly but inevitably tending towards the establishment of American freedom, for accounts of which the reader must be referred to the pages of general history. At some time between 1780 and 1782, possibly under pressure brought to bear by such appeals as that before alluded to, and to gratify the Indians, a small British garrison was placed at Oswego, and some work done to make the ruins of the fort habitable. By the year last named the cause of the patriots was ap- proaching its final triumph. Demonstrations of conciliation were made by England, and while these had their effect upon a large number of tories in America, and doubtless, too, upon Washington and his generals, no one was sanguine enough to believe that hostilities were ended. In view of this uncertainty, Washington kept his army under discipline and the country in a state of defense. In pursuance of his policy, and to abolish one avenue of communication between the British and the Indians, Washington resolved to surprise and obtain permanent posses- sion of Oswego. Accordingly, in January, 1783 (news of the signing of a treaty of peace not yet having been received), he entrusted the ex- ecution of his plan to Colonel Willett. With the utmost secrecy, that officer assembled his little force at Fort Herkimer on the 8th of Feb- ruary, began his march immediately, and on the 9th crossed Oneida -

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LANDMARKS OF OSWEGO COUNTY.

Lake and arrived at Oswego Falls at 2 P. M. the next day. His orders were imperative to make no assault unless he could take the garrison by surprise. Indeed, the smallness of his force would have prevented success by any other means. At the falls he constructed scaling ladders, after which the march was resumed, and at ten o'clock in the evening he reached a point within four miles of the fort. Here they were in the depth of the forest, in the dead of winter, and in a great depth of snow. After two hours more of the most arduous marching and not coming within sight of the fort, an investigation revealed the fact that their guide, a young Oneida Indian, had lost his way. The situation was both perplexing and perilous, It was useless to proceed farther that night, and they could not, of course, remain in that vicinity through the following day. Reluctantly, therefore, they relinquished the enterprise and began their return. The outgoing march had been one of great severity and fatigue, and the return was still more so. The snow was deep, some of the men were made lame, and the cold was so intense that the feet of some of them were frozen ; one poor fellow was frozen to death. The sad ending of this expedi- tion was somewhat relieved upon Colonel Willett's arrival at Albany by the welcome news of peace.

An agreement for the cessation of hostilities between Great Britain and the United States upon the basis of articles stipulated in Paris, No- vember 30, preceding, was signed by commissioners January 20, 1783. On March 24, 1784, a letter was received in this country from General La Fayette, announcing a general peace. Congress issued a proclama- tion April II, declaring the cessation of military operations on sea and land.

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RETENTION OF FORTS BY ENGLAND.

CHAPTER IX.

The Reign of Peace-England Retains Possession of American Forts-Provision Made for the Indians-State Reservations-Causes Contributing to Early Settlement -Formation of New Counties-The Romance of Frenchman's Island-Settlement in Constantia-Explorations in Oswego County-Agents of the "Castorland Company " -- Formation of Onondaga County -- War with the Western Indians -- A Block-House at Brewerton-Conditions at Fort Ontario -- Organization of Mexico -- Final Surrender of Fort Ontario to Americans -- Progress of Settlement in Oswego County-Assess- ment Roll of Mexico.

We now come to a period in the history of Oswego County which was characterized by pleasanter scenes and events than those described in the foregoing chapters-a period during which the rude reign of war, with its unnumbered terrors, gave place to the gentle sway of peace.

England submitted to defeat with bad grace. By the treaty of peace the boundary between the possessions of the two countries was to run along the 45th parallel, and in the middle of the St. Lawrence River, Lake Ontario, Niagara River and Lake Erie. But when, in 1783, the Americans attempted to occupy the several posts on the northern fron- tier south of this line (including Oswego), England objected. Baron Steuben was charged by the American government with the duty of taking formal possession of these posts. Arriving at Sorrel, he there met General Haldimand; made known his business, and was informed that the British commander had received no orders to evacuate the forts or to take any other action except to cease hostilities. Great Britain also set up the claim that the United States government had not suffi- cient power to enforce the observance of a commercial treaty, and therefore refused to join in the execution of one-a position that was undoubtedly justified by the facts, but unwarranted on every political ground. Payment of debts to British subjects by Americans, provided for in the treaty of peace, was also neglected in many instances ; and con- fiscated property was not restored as recommended by the treaty, to royalists from whom it had been taken. These matters were made the 15

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LANDMARKS OF OSWEGO COUNTY.

basis of the astonishing condition that existed thirteen years after the peace, during which period a nation unsuccessful in war occupied and held fortified military posts within the lines of the victorious country.

Contrary to the course followed by Great Britain, which made no provision whatever for her Iroquois allies, a council was held by repre- sentatives of the United States (Oliver Wolcott, Richard Butler and Arthur Lee) with the Indians, at Fort Schuyler in October, 1784, at which the western boundary of the Six Nations was fixed at the merid- ian of Buffalo, and they were guaranteed peaceable possession of the lands eastward of that boundary, excepting a reservation six miles square around Fort Oswego. This reservation was never claimed by the general government. From time to time after 1785 the State and individuals by cession or by direct purchase, procured lands from the Indians. The Tuscaroras and the Oneidas, in 1785, first parted with some of their territory. March 1, 1788, an act was passed appointing commissioners to treat with the Indians for the purchase of their lands by the State, and a council was held at Fort Schuyler, which was at- tended by Governor Clinton, the commissioners, and the chiefs of the Onondagas, Oneidas, and Cayugas. The Onondagas and the Oneidas then arranged for the cession of all their lands' excepting some small reservations. In the reservations made by the Oneidas was a half mile square at intervals of each six miles along the north shore of Oneida Lake, and " a convenient piece at the fishing-place on the Onondaga · River, three miles below where it issues from Oneida Lake." The con- sideration of the cession by the Oneidas was $2,000 cash, $3,000 worth of goods, $500 towards building mills, and $600 in silver annually there- after. In the following year the Cayugas also completed the cession of their territory, exceping 100 square miles. The Senecas parted with most of their territory in 1797, and in the same year the Mohawks, most of whom had fled to Canada at the close of the war, relinquished all their lands to the State for a consideration. From the State were afterwards derived the great tracts of Macomb (1791), Scriba (1794), and the military lands described in an earlier chapter, which comprised all the territory of Oswego county. Besides these there were other large purchases made in other parts of the State for speculative purposes, with which we are not specially interested.

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FIRST SETTLERS.

The reservations made by the State in the law of 1784 have been described in an earlier chapter. At the same time another reservation was provided for at "the falls, commonly called Oswego Falls, on the the Onondaga River," the boundaries of which are given as beginning " twenty chains above where the bateaux were usually taken out of the said river to be carried across the portage, and extending down the said river twenty chains below where the bateaux were usually put into the said river, after having been transported over the said portage, and extending northeasterly in every part between the said two places ten chains from the said river."

With the virtual control by the State of such immense tracts of land, and the readiness of the authorities to award the bounty lands in the Military Tract and to sell its other lands, Oswego county, as well as other localities, was ready for settlement. The Revolutionary war, while impoverishing the nation and ruinous to many individuals, was not barren of beneficent results. A large part of the Continental army, drawn from other States, was often encamped in, or marched through, this State. The officers and soldiers thus became familiar with the lands and mingled with the people, married wives among them, and, returning to their homes, gave glowing accounts of the many attractions of New York, thus early exerting an influence to bring hither the adventurous New Englanders. As early as 1784 Hugh White, with his own and other families, moved into and founded Whitestown (near Utica), whose population was increased between 1788 and 1790 to several hundred persons. In 1786 Ephraim Webster first settled in Onondaga county, to be followed two years later by Comfort Tyler and Asa Danforth, the original salt boilers ; while at about the same time other sections of the State were welcoming the sturdy and hopeful spirits who were to make the wilderness blossom.

In 1789 the great county of Montgomery was reduced in area by the erection of Ontario county, embracing all the western part of the State, and in 1791 both Tioga and Herkimer counties were erected, the latter including all the territory from the west line of Montgomery to the east line of Ontario and from Tioga county north to the St. Lawrence. It embraced, of course, what is now Oswego county. On the 10th of April, 1792, the town of Mexico was erected from the town

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LANDMARKS OF OSWEGO COUNTY.

of Whitestown, in Herkimer county, and still retains its name and its position as one of the prominent towns of Oswego county, as fully de- scribed in the later town histories in this volume.

Meanwhile the bounty lands of the Military Tract were rapidly taken up, but in a very large majority of cases the claims were sold to speculators and settlement proceeded very slowly.

The earliest deed of Oswego county lands, recorded in the Oswego county clerk's office, was dated August 18, 1790; was made by William Cockburn and Isaac Davis as attorneys for Dennis McCarthy and Matthew Whalen; and conveyed lots 42 and 53 of the Military town- ship of Hannibal to Thomas Tillotson, of Rhinebeck, N. Y. The deed is found at page I, vol. I, of Onondaga Transcribed Records, and describes McCarthy and Whalen as soldiers of the Revolutionary army, and the lots as having been patented to them for their services as such.

In the year 1791 a young Frenchman and his wife took possession of an island in Oneida Lake, about eight miles from Fort Brewerton, from him still known as Frenchman's Island. Johnson, in preparing his history of Oswego county, had access to original sources of information respecting this family, and from him (p. 44) is transcribed the following :

The man's name was De Vatine or Desvatines; the latter is the form used by most of the witnesses, and will be adopted in this narrative. He claimed to have been a seigneur near Lisle, France, and that his father had squandered a large part of the estate. The young man sold the remainder for a sum variously estimated at from five thousand to forty thousand dollars, and came to America with his newly wedded wife in 1786, several years before the French Revolution. Unused to the country, and of a volatile disposition, he wasted half his fortune in traveling and buying worth- less land, and then, to recuperate, engaged in trade in New York with a partner, who ran away with nearly all their joint property. Desvatines gathered up the remaining pittance, and, disgusted with civilization, determined to make his home in the wilder- ness. He sold the most of his furniture, but retained his library and a little silver for the table.

It was in the spring or summer of 1791 that the exiles with their two children first located on "Frenchman's Island," where Desvatines began to make a clearing with his own hands. He was unable to complete a building in which it was possible to pass the winter, and when the season approached he took his family to live with the Oneida Indians at the east end of the lake, while he spent his time hunting with the warriors. The Oneidas treated the unfortunate family very kindly, and Desvatines always spoke of them with grateful warmth.

In the spring of 1792 they returned to the island, where Madame Desvatines gave birth to a child, Camille Desvatines, probably the first white child born in Oswego

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THE DESVATINES.

county outside the military establishments. Notwithstanding his somewhat frivolous disposition, Desvatines seems to have done a great deal of hard work for a man who had been reared in ease. Unaided, and without a team, he cleared a tract of six acres, planted it with corn, built a cabin in which his family could live, and a still ruder one which served as a kitchen.

In 1793 the French family, for some unrecorded reason, left their island home, and purchased of Mr. Scriba 100 acres of land on the north lake shore near Mr. Scriba's settlement. There they built a house in which they lived several years, dispensing to all travelers such hos- pitality and aid as they were able. The last authentic account of the family is found in the writings of the Duke de la Rochefoucauld- Liancourt in about 1795.

The careful historian of Onondaga county, J. V. H. Clark, who wrote nearly fifty years ago, gives some interesting particulars of this family, and especially of the wife. He says :

About the year 1800 it [the island] became the abode of a Frenchman and his wife, named Devitzy. The lady was one of the noblest and wealthiest in France; she be- came attached to a French gentleman, far below her rank, and for this, had incurred her father's displeasure, who refused his assent to their alliance. An elopement and marriage were the consequence ; and being pursued by her angry parent, they fled to this country, and still fearing his pursuit and vengeance, they left the city of New York, where they at first landed, and resolved to bury themselves, far away from the haunts of busy men, in some dreary and uninhabited forest. Following the usual channels of communication, they ascended the Mohawk River, and thence along the Oneida Lake in a canoe, until they arrived at this beautiful island, upon which they encamped for the night. So pleased were they with the solitude which everywhere surrounded them, and with the grandeur of the scenery which here presented itself, they at once resolved to make it the place of their abode. He soon erected a com- fortable hut; and subsequently, with the assistance of some boatmen, put up a log house, in which they spent several summers. His winters he usually spent in Albany. His cabin was graced with books and musical instruments, and his beautiful garden was cultivated by his own hands. The remains of this house and some fruit trees of his planting are still to be seen.

At length, the day of their deliverance arrived -- the angry father had relented. Un- willing to relinquish his only daughter, he had continued his search; and after an absence of some seven years from her friends, he sought and found, and forgave his child; and taking her, her husband and three little ones, returned with them rejoicing to his home, settled upon them his immense fortune, and shortly afterwards died. Those children, born upon that island (which has ever since been known as "Frenchman's Island"), are said to be at this day among the most distinguished personages of France.

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LANDMARKS OF OSWEGO COUNTY.

This version of the story is, perhaps, as reasonable as any that has been given.

· In 1791 or 1792 a Mr. Bruce, formerly a merchant of Connecticut, came in and built a cabin on the site of Constantia, where he subsisted by hunting, fishing, and growing vegetables. It was from him that the creek now known as Scriba's Creek, first bore the name of Bruce's Creek.

Early in 1792 Major Lawrence Van Valkenburgh arrived at Oswego Falls, where he had acquired an interest in lot 75, on the west side of the river. He was accompanied by two laborers named Valentine and Schermerhorn, and a slave boy. The major set his men at work and returned east. About the same time two men named Olcott and Fowler came there to trade with the Indians. During the major's absence Schermerhorn died and was buried by his companions. In the course of trade Valentine contracted a warm intimacy with a squaw, which gave offense to her Indian husband. A quarrel followed between Valentine and the Indian, in which the latter was struck by Valentine with a hoe and killed. This event caused intense excitement and anger among the Indians, and the few white persons there feared for their lives. Valentine took his employer's oxen and gun to Oswego, sold them there to members of the English garrison, and fled to Canada. A reward was offered by the governor for his capture, and he was caught, brought back, and tried for his crime at Whitestown and acquitted. Olcott and the slave boy started east after the murder of the Indian, but were met at Three Rivers by Major Van Valken- burgh, and returned with him to the Falls, where he, with a detach- ment of British soldiers, sent up from Fort Ontario, finally succeeded in conciliating the Indians.

In 1792 Francis Adrian Vandercamp, a distinguished Hollander, who had fled from his own country for political reasons, and had come to America in company with Baron De Zeng, a German nobleman, made an exploration of the great Roosevelt purchase with a view to settlement. In June they entered Oneida Lake in a canoe and paddled to the mouth of Bruce (now Scriba) Creek, on the site of Constantia village. From there they made a visit to the exiles on Frenchman's Island, of whose home and life Vandercamp wrote a

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Landmarks of Oswego County, New York, Part 12

Author: Churchill, John Charles, 1821-1905; Smith, H. P. (Henry Perry), 1839-1925; Child, W. Stanley Publication date: 1895 Publisher: Syracuse, N.Y. : D. Mason Number of Pages: 1410

Author: Churchill, John Charles, 1821-1905; Smith, H. P. (Henry Perry), 1839-1925; Child, W. Stanley
Publication date: 1895
Publisher: Syracuse, N.Y. : D. Mason
Number of Pages: 1410