Walter Butler’s Journal of an Expedition Along the North Shore of Lake Ontario, 1779

NOTES AND· DOCUMENTS WALTER BUTLER'S JOURNAL OF AN EXPEDITION ALONG THE NORTH SHORE OF LAKE ONTARIO, 1779.1 381 Walter N. Butler was the son of Colonel John Butler, commander of Butler's Rangers, the Loyalist corps which so distinguished itself in· the border warfare of the American Revolution .2 He accompanied his father and Guy Johnson in their flight from the Mohawk Valley in the summer of 1775, and served with some distinction in the defense of Canada against the American invasion of that aubiinn. John Butler, who was an officer of the Indian Department, became acting Superintendent of Indian Affairs when Guy Johnson sailed for England in November, 1775. Governor Carleton, compelled to abandon the greater part of Canada to the Americans and retire to the fortress of Quebec, sent Butler to Niagara. There he remained throughout the following year, working hard to hold the Indians in allegiance to the Crown and to collect loyalist recruits from th~ western settlen1ents of New York. His wife and the other members of his family, except Walter, had remained at their home at Johnstown. In the spring or summer of 1776, they were removed to Albany by the revolutionary party and detained as hostages. In 1777 the elder Butler brought a large number of Indians and Loyalists to assist in an expedition under Colonel St. Leger against Fort Stanwix (now Rome, N.Y.), an expedition which served as a support to Burgoyne's contemporary invasion qf New York state. Walter Butler was sent on to the German Flats, in the upper Mohawk Valley, to raise recruits for the royal service. Here he was captured, court-martialed, and sentenced to death as a spy. His life was spared-at the instance, it is said, of certain American officers who had known him when he was a law student in Albany -but he was placed in rigorous confinement in that town. Because of the injury to his health some friends of his family obtained, in the following year, his transfer to a pt;'ivate house. Thence he escaped, and rejoined his father, who was now leading his newly organized battalion of Rangers against the border settlements of New York and Pennsylvania. Walter was given the rank of lBritish Museum, Addit. MSS. 21,765. Transcript in the Public Archives of Canada at Ottawa, B. 105, pp. 100-112. 2 Regarding Colonel Butler and the Rangers, see the careful study by Ernest Cruikshank , The Story of Butler's Rangers and the. Settlement of Niagara (Lundy's Lane His;" torical Society: WeIland, 1893). 382 THE CANADIAN HISTORICAL REVIEW captain and the command of one of the companies, but did not immediately take up duties in the field. He was sent to Quebec, and consequently was absent from the stirring events of the earlier part of the campaign of 1778, including the destruction of the settlements in the Wyoming valley, popularly known as "the Massacre of Wyoming." Late in August Captain Walter Butler rejoined his corps on the borders of New York. His father had been compelled by ill health to return to Niagara, and the son took command of the Rangers. His most important undertaking was an expedition against Cherry Valley, which was surprised on the morning of November 11. The attack on the fort failed, but the settlement was completely destroyed. Unfortunately, the Indians, who formed a large part of the expedition, broke from all restraint and massacred many of the inhabitants. The survivors became prisoners." Before beginning his retreat Butler released the greater part of the women and children and gave them a letterl to General Schuyler, whom he believed to be in command of the Continental forces in the Northern department. In consideration, he requested that an equal number of prisoners on the other side, including his mother and her family, should be released, but offered, if this were not acceptable, to effect an exchange from the prisoners whom he still held. An answer, dated Albany, Jan. 2, 1779, was written by Brigadier-General James Clinton, at the command of Governor Clinton of New York.2 The proposal of an exchange was accepted, and a further communication as to the method of...