Washington Answers the Pioneer's Plea

In 1779 George Washington answered the frontier farmer's desperate plea for aid, resolving to accomplish, "the total destruction and devastation of the Iroquois camps."

Washington called on General John Sullivan and an army of 2500 from eastern Pennsylvania.  They made camp at Tioga Point on the New York- Pennsylvania border.  He was to await a second force of 1500 under General James Clinton.  Clinton would move from the Mohawk Valley southwest along the Susquehanna River.  When the two joined, they would drive deep into Iroquois country.

After many delays, the combined American force began moving west.  After only 12 miles,  the entrenched Tory-Indian force near Newton, New York challenged them.  After defeating them, the rest of the American campaign was more pillage than combat.  Forty Iroquois towns were destroyed, along with 160,000 bushels of corn, crops of vegetables and acres of apple, peach and pear orchards.

Although the Iroquois country was a smoking ruin, Sullivan made a serious error.  Assuming he had beat the Iroquois, he failed to push on and destroy the British supply base at Niagara on Lake Ontario.  Stripped on their possessions and homes (but not their will to fight), the Indians provisioned and armed themselves.  For the next two years, they joined the Tories.

Meanwhile another large chunk of western wilderness fell to the patriots. In  1778-1779 a small force of Kentucky sharpshooters led by George Rogers Clark fought the British in the Ohio Valley region.

Next time.. we'll look at Mr. Clark
______________________________

On this Day in Pioneer History: On October 8, 1871, flames spark in the Chicago barn of Patrick and Catherine O’Leary, igniting a two-day blaze that kills between 200 and 300 people, destroys 17,450 buildings, leaves 100,000 homeless and causes an estimated $200 million. ($4 billion in today's dollars)