The Esopus Indian Nation’s Revolutionary War Experience

Editor's Note: This series of blog posts recounts the dramatic story of the Esopus Indian Nation’s Revolutionary War exodus. The original inhabitants of Ulster County, the Esopus Indians successfully maintained their sovereignty and traditional way of life in the face of overwhelming odds for over a century. These blog posts are summaries of a much fuller story that will be published in 2027.

Map: Sauthier, Claude Joseph (1776) "A map of the Province of New-York" Library of Congress Geography and Map Division G3800 1776 .S3 Medal: 1766 Peace Medal, American Numismatic Society Raymond.1925.929; Fuld,Tayman.HWU12; Stahl.Scully.28

Part 5. Refugees: 1779

Raids by Rebel ranging companies and Continental Army soldiers over the course of 1778 turned the Esopus Indians and their neighbors into refugees. In late December of 1778, with their towns destroyed, Loyalist Mohawks, Oneidas, Tuscaroras, and Mohicans of Onaquaga moved to the British outpost of Fort Niagara for safety.[1] Censuses taken by the British Indian Department at Fort Niagara over the winter of 1779 note that the Esopus Indians had also temporarily moved to Fort Niagara, where their leaders were present at councils. With the arrival of springtime, they dispersed to the Genesee Valley, where they were given land to plant corn by the Senecas near Gandagaro.[2] Their preemptive move to Seneca Country – close to the British Indian Department and forces at Fort Niagara, but far from Rebel strongholds on the East Coast – was badly timed, for in the winter and spring of 1779, George Washington was helping to plan an expedition for later that year that would destroy virtually every town in Indian Country.

In the meantime, Esopus men began to trek back to their Ulster County homeland in warparties. These were not simply retaliatory attacks: records from the British Indian Department reveal that the Esopus Indians acted in special operations and intentionally sought to capture high-ranking Rebel officials for information and for ransom. They also acted as spies and were paid for bringing back information.[3] However, these expeditions often incorporated traditional raiding tactics, especially when warriors were able to inflict retribution on individuals who had abused them in the past. On May 4th, they led a violent raid at Fantinekill, burning several houses and killing six.[4] Two weeks later, Governor Clinton was informed that a large Loyalist and Indian raiding party, likely the same one, was in the environs of Shandaken; he was also informed that Esopus Indian warriors had built a blockhouse (a small fortification) somewhere on the West Branch of the Delaware River, and that they were being supplied with food by isolated Loyalist settlers in the Catskill Mountains.[5]

On July 23rd, Esopus Indian leader John Runnupe returned to Fort Niagara with a number of Rebel newspapers that he had taken in Ulster County. He also reported some major news: eighteen days earlier, from a lookout on the Catskill Escarpment – likely Overlook Mountain – he had “heard the firing and saw the smoke of two armies engaged [down the Hudson River] at Fish Kill… and it was afterwards told that General Washington had been defeated and was pursued twenty miles…. He also says that on his return he met, a little beyond Schoharie, fourteen days ago, a man who had come from the rebel army and was told by him that two days before that, the time the man came away, the British Forces were taking up the chain that the rebels had fixed across the river at the Highlands.”[6] Amazingly, based on the usual route taken by the Esopus Indians and their allies to reach Fort Niagara from the Catskills, John Runnupe would have traversed well over 300 miles in less than three weeks.
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Simultaneously, George Washington’s massive expedition – known as the Sullivan Campaign – was making its way through Indian Country, destroying every house, every stalk of corn, and every fruit tree in their path until October. The Esopus Indian refugees who had temporarily resettled in the Genesee Valley a few months earlier were uprooted once again. Thousands of Native and Loyalist refugees fled to Fort Niagara for protection, just in time for one of the coldest winters on record. Many would not survive the frigid months that spanned 1779 and 1780, but most did; the British Indian Department’s ability to feed and shelter so many refugees of so many nations is nothing short of miraculous. When winter thawed to spring in May of 1780, the Esopus Indians who had camped outside Fort Niagara shifted to Buffalo Creek to the south near Lake Erie (near what is now Buffalo, NY), where the women could plant corn and survive for another year.[7] The warriors of the Six Nations and their allies prepared for revenge.
                                                                To Be Continued…

Citations:
[1] Correspondence with Officers at Niagara, 1777-1784. Haldimand Collection, Microfilm Reel number A-682. National Archives of Canada.
[2] “Major General Philip Schuyler to George Washington, 3 April 1779,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/03-19-02-0684. [Original source: The Papers of George Washington, Revolutionary War Series, vol. 19, 15 January–7 April 1779, ed. Philander D. Chase and William M. Ferraro. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2009, pp. 729–734.
[3] Haldimand Papers, 21767 Pt 4. National Archives of Canada.
[4] Public Papers of George Clinton, Vol IV. Albany, NY: 1900. 798-799; "The Story of Fatine Kill" in Olde Ulster, Vol. II. Benjamin Myer Brink, Kingston: 1906. 105-112.
[5] Sparks, Jared. Correspondence of the American Revolution. 299-301
[6] Correspondence with Officers at Niagara, 1777-1784. Haldimand Collection, Microfilm Reel number A-682. National Archives of Canada.
[7] Haldimand Papers, Reel h1448.1304. National Archives of Canada.

Author

Author Justin Wexler is an ethnoecologist who has spent the last 25 years conducting archival and ethnographic research to better understand the history, culture, and land management practices of the Native Peoples of the Hudson and Delaware Valleys. He has a BA in History and Anthropology from Marlboro College and an MA in Teaching History from Bard College. He and his wife Anna Plattner run Wild Hudson Valley, a forest farm and educational organization focused on Hudson Valley and Catskill Mountain history, ecology, wild foods, and land stewardship practices.

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