^5^ TRANSACTIONS OF THE CANADIAN INSTITLTE. [Vc>L. V. 



All the Nations are in good spirits and more united now than they have 

 been since the trouble began, except the Oneidas and some few others." 



A few days later Butler reported that Brant was then preparing to go 

 to the frontier villages to repel an attack threatened against them from 

 Wyoming. " Mr. Brant," he said, " is very deserving of the character of 

 an active and intelligent man, and very willing to do everything in his 

 power for the public good. * * * He is very deserving of your 

 favour." In the following May he announced that he had detached 

 Brant and Lieut. Barent Frey, of the Rangers, to bring away the 

 remainder of the Mohawks from the " rebel country," after which the 

 Indians meant " to strike in a body." When this was acomplished. 

 Brant returned to his old quarters at Oquaga and Unadilla, where he soon 

 after received a contemptuous message from the inhabitants of Cherry 

 Valley challenging him to leave his fastness in the woods and meet them 

 in the open where they would quickly change him from a "■Brant into a 

 goose." 



The struggle had now become a war of unsparing retaliation. Many 

 loyalists had been plundered of everything they possessed, and driven 

 into the woods to perish or find their way in a starving condition to the 

 nearest British post. Nameless indignities had been practised even upon 

 their helpless women and children. Those who survived, burned for 

 revenge, and opportunities were not long wanting. 



Brant replied to the taunt by leading a foray, not upon Cherry Valley, 

 but upon the more distant and seemingly secure settlements on the 

 Cobus Kill and Schoharie River, while Butler was at the same time 

 engaged in his famous raid upon Wyoming. Accounts of his move- 

 ments are rather vague and incoherent. Several American writers 

 mention the disastrous defeat of two detachments of their troops with 

 the usual circumstances of surprise and ambuscade, followed by the dis- 

 truction of several outlying hamlets, and name Barent Frey as still 

 being associated with Brant in command of the Indians. Brant's own 

 account does not appear to have been preserved, and Butler, possibly 

 owing to the agonizing disease which drove him to seek relief at Niagara, 

 did not allude to his operations in detail. Guy Johnson and Claus 

 agreed in considering them very important. Johnson said in a despatch 

 to Lord George Germain, " Another division under Mr. Brant cutoff 294 

 men near Schoharie and destroyed the adjacent settlements with several 

 magazines, from whence the rebels derived great resources, thereby 

 affording encouragement and opportunity for many of the friends of the 

 government to join them." Claus enters into further detail, and is even 



