[siebert] loyalists AND SIX NATION INDIANS 91 



lands and improvements, and with some other local conditions. 

 In a petition which they presented to Butler a little later they ex- 

 plained that they had received only a part of the year's provisions 

 that had been promised them, and that they were still without a black- 

 smith; they declared their willingness to dispose of their produce to 

 the garrison at a reasonable price, but pointed out that they were now 

 selling at prices fixed by the commanding officer and were sufïering 

 a disadvantage in being prevented from selling to the traders from 

 whom they bought their goods. They asserted that they were liable 

 to eviction at the will of the commandant, who was changed frequently, 

 and preferred a lease system, being willing to pay rent after a term of 

 eight years. Butler himself thought that should a small rental be 

 required of the settlers some of them, even among those owning pro- 

 perty in the States, would no longer think of leaving the settlement.^ 



Although the definitive treaty of peace contained an article on 

 behalf of the Loyalists, it was by no means reassuring to those who 

 had been inclined to return to their former homes; and when in June, 

 1783, the settlers had an opportunity to read and discuss the resolu- 

 tions adopted by inhabitants of the district of Saratoga, which were 

 printed in an Albany newspaper of May 26th, they must have realized 

 that their return would be anything but welcome to their old neigh- 

 bors in the States. These resolutions declared that any person who 

 had voluntarily joined the British, and should hereafter return to the 

 district, would be treated with the severity due to his crimes and in- 

 famous defection; that any person who had returned since Januray 1, 

 1783, and failed to depart before June 10, would be dealt with in like 

 manner with those who might presume to return later; that the 

 militia officers of the district make diligent inquiry in their beats for 

 defected persons who might have come back, and report such, if any, 

 to the inhabitants in order that they might be expelled, and, finally, 

 that any resident of the district who should countenance a former 

 adherent of the enemy would be held in comtempt. The American 

 intolerance for Tories was demonstrated in actions as well as in words, 

 for they sent back deserters from Butler's Rangers and Sir John 

 Johnson's corps, while allowing those from the regular regiments to 

 remain among them. The efifect of these things was noted by Major 

 Potts of the King's or 8th Regiment in his report, after inspecting the 

 battalion of the Rangers in August: he said that the men no longer 

 contemplated seeking their old localities, but were now chiefly con- 

 cerned with Butler's promises to promote their settlement on the 

 neighboring lands of Lake Erie and the Niagara River, that they 

 hoped to obtain grants there, and that he believed most of them were 



1 Niagara Hist. Soc, No. 17, 9-11; Cruikshank, Butler's Rangers, 110, 111. 



