1 8 NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 



keenly when they found the Iroquois a barrier between them and 

 the trails to central New York and down the Ohio river. To break 

 the power of the Iroquois Confederacy, expedition after expedition 

 was sent out against them, notably those of Champlain in 1615, of 

 Courcelles in 1655, of De Tracy in 1666, of De la Barre in 1684, 

 of Denonville in 1687 (whose work was particularly destructive to 

 cornfields), and of Frontenac in 1692 and 1696. All these gallant 

 commanders failed to accomplish the destruction of Iroquois power 

 perhaps for reasons such as given by Denonville in the following : 



I deemed it our best policy to employ ourselves laying the Indian 

 corn which was in vast abundance in the fields, rather than to follow 

 a flying enemy to a distance and excite our troops to catch only 

 some straggling fugitives. . . We remained at 'the four Seneca vil- 

 lages until the 24th ; the two larger distant four leagues and the others 

 two. All that time was spent in destroying the corn which was in 

 such great abundance that the loss including old corn which was in 

 cache which we burnt and that which was standing, was computed 

 according to the estimate afterwards made at 400 thousand minots 

 (about 1,200,000 bushels) of Indian corn. . . A great many both 

 of our Indians and French were attacked with a kind of rheum 

 which put everyone out of humor. 1 



The quantity of corn here destroyed by Denonville is claimed by 

 some authorities to be overestimated and perhaps this is true, as 

 being " out of humor," the amount may have seemed larger than 

 it really was. 



The corn-destroying habit of the invaders of the Iroquois dominion 

 was still active when later, in 1779, Maj. Gen. John Sullivan made 

 his famous raid against the Iroquois. The accounts of his officers 

 and soldiers which have come down to us in their journals are most 

 illuminating, when aboriginal corn statistics are sought. " The 

 Indians," said Gen. Sullivan in discussing the subject, " shall see that 

 there is malice enough in our hearts to destroy everything that con- 

 tributes to their support." How well he fulfilled his threat may be 

 known by reviewing the record of his campaign. 



The journals of Sullivan's campaign through the Iroquois country 

 are replete with descriptions of the Iroquois cornfields and the fre- 



words : " Had our forefathers spurned you from it (the Iroquois " Long 

 House ") when the French were thundering at the opposite end, to get a 

 passage and drive you into the sea, whatever had been the fate^of other 

 Indians, the Iroquois might still have been a nation and I too might have 

 had a country." 



1 Doc. Hist, of the State of N. Y. i :328-2Q. Albany 1849. Cf. Charle- 

 voix. Nouvelle France, 2 :355 ; Lahontan. Voyages, I, p. 101. 



