SA M UEL DE CHAMPLAIN THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY’

A COMPILATION OF FACT A ND TRADITION E G E E E M COV RIN LAK G ORG , LAKE CHA I THE DI D CK M T I S PLA N, A RON A OUN A N , A ND OTHER SECTION S REACHED BY THE RAIL A ND STEAMER LINES OF THE DELAWARE AND HUDSON COMPANY

BY WARWICK STEVENS CARPENTER

PA SSEN GER DEPA RTMEN T THE DELAWARE AND HUDSON COMPANY ALBANY r ht 1 14 Copy ig , 9

by

A . E D A . H AR

! 0LA 3 7 1 3 9 6 K

A MERICA N BA NK NOTE COMPA NY T0 the Members of THE NEW YORK STATE HISTORICAL

A SSOCIATION a nd THE LAKE CHAMPLAIN ASSOCIATION

To W hose eff orts are so largely due the cherishing of old landmarks and the recording of history and tradition in the territory here covered

THIS BOOK. IS DEDICATED t ! Great islands appeared, leagues in ex ent Isle ala

l s Motte, Long Island , Grande Isle . Channe s where ship might float and broad reaches of expanding water stretched before them, and Champlain entered the lake which preserves his name to posterity . Their goal was the rocky promontory where Fort i Ticonderoga was long afterward bu lt . Thence, they would pass the outlet of Lake George, and launch their i canoes again on that Como of the w lderness, whose

i - d waters, l mpid as a fountain hea , stretched far south

nkin ward between their fla g mountains . Landing at ll the future site of Fort Wi iam Henry, they would carry

h the R their canoes t rough the forest to iver Hudson , and , descending it, attack, perhaps , some outlying town

In of the Mohawks . the next century this chain of lakes and rivers became the grand highway of savage d li l k an civi zed war, a bloody debatable ground in ed to memories of momentous conflicts . — Franci s Parkman. FORE WORD

HIS volume is the direct outgrowth of the Literary and Historic i Note Book , cover ng the same territory, written for the Pas senger Department of the Delaware and Hudson Company by Mr .

1907 a Henry P . Phelps, and published in . It appeared as booklet i of eighty pages , and at once met with an appreciation wh ch has in no degree abated during the seven years of its circulation . Since that date the interest which had already developed in the historic country reached by the Delaware and Hudson lin es has been trem en

sl dou y augmented , a fact well evidenced by the attention that

ni historical societies and other orga zations are giving to the subject . Am ong the latter may be mentioned the Glens Falls Insurance

C an mi e ompany, which for m y years has com ssioned som of the leading American artists to make paintings of the more striking

c events . These pictures have been reproduced in original olors and widely distributed . The Champlain Tercentenary Celebration brought popular attention to a clearer focus, and it has been further sustained by the subsequent completion and dedication of the memorials at Crown Point and at Plattsburg, and by the restoration and preservation of the two old forts at Ticonderoga and Crown “ Point . This interest resulted in continued requests for the Literary ” hi and Historic Note Book, w ch was out of print, and indicated the

hi t need for t s larger and more comple e and permanent volume . Even briefly to describe every event of romantic or historic moment in this territory would have required many times the m space here available . Much has been necessarily eli inated, but an attempt has been made to include every really important inci dent and those mi nor ones whi ch are of particular interest to that large class of visitors who wish to know the history of their Summer

Paradise . The style of the text , that of separate paragraphs for

’ “ n Lossin s - n wn C clo mdi each event , after the ma ner of g well k o y p a of ” i w as i s Un ted States History, determ ned by the need of uch vaca tionists for much data that could not well be put into connected

l . c form in a sma l volume A synoptical narrative introduction , ov ering the great campaigns for the control of the Champlain Valley,

hr together with the C onology which follows, are designed as a background against which each paragraph may be thrown into l re ief to show its proper relation to the times and to other events . “ ” In the preparation of the Summer Paradise in History part of “ ” h in t e text the Literary and Historic Note Book has been used, though largely revised to meet the requirements of the present h volume . W ile no original research has been made, many authorities

dr have been consulted , and material awn from them . A list of these

s i e appear in the bibl ography, and acknowledgment of indebt dness to them is hereby made .

W. S . C . anuar 1 1 14 J y , 9 ILLUSTRATIONS Cover Design from Detail of Champlain Memorial at b Carl A u ustus Heber Plattsburg, y g Samuel de Champlain Restoration of Fort Ticonderoga Ruins of Fort Ticonderoga Embarkation of Abercrombie ’ s Expedition Plan of Abercrombie ’ s Attack on Carillon Battle of Lake Champlain Grave of Captain Downi e Monument on Crab Island Bloody Morning Scout Statue on Site of Cooper ’s Tablet to Commemorate D am at Otsego Lake Scene of the Battle of Lake Champlain The Stourbridge Lion

Fort St . Frederic Lake George Battle Monument Ruins at Crown Point Plan of Investment of Fort William Henry

’ Jogues s Island High Rock Spring in 1845

Saratoga a s It Is Today Two Early Steamers on Lake Champlain Champlain Memorial at Crown Point The Black Watch at Storming of Carillon Champlain Memorial at Plattsburg The Deep Cleft of Split Rock CHRONOLOGY — 1609 July 4th. Samuel de Champlain discovered Lake Champlain . — h ’ w July 30t . Champlain s battle ith the Iroquois near Fort

Ticonderoga . — September . Henry Hudson sailed up the Hudson River to l near the present site of A bany, and went in a small boat

to the falls at Troy . — 1614 . Dutch built Fort Nassau on Castle Island, opposite Albany — 1624 D utch b uilt Fort Orange on mainland where Albany now

stands . 1 — 629 Dutch West India Company established the Patroon System , under whi ch much of the country about Albany was settled

1641— Fort Richelieu built at mouth of Richelieu River . — 1642 . August Father Jognes first white man to see Lake George . 1646— J Father ognes , on eve of Corpus Christi, May 30, named Lake

George Lac da St . Sacrement . l — 664 . u Fort Richelieu rebuilt , and Forts St Lo is, at Chambly, and

St . Theresa built . — English obtained possession of New Netherland and changed

its name to New Y ork . 1 — 66 . 5 Fort St . Anne built on Isle La Motte

— 1 t 1666 January . s and unsuccessful expedition of the French

under De Courcelles against Iroquois . — 2d October . and successful expedition of the French under

De Tracy against Iroquois . - C rl r Arendt Van o ea , returning through Lake Champlain w n off ith De Tracy, drow ed Split Rock, in memory of l ’ which the lake was long called C or ear s Lake . — 1673 Dutch again gained control of New Y ork . — 1674 New York passed permanently into possession of England .

— ’ 1689 King William s War began . — 1690 February 8th . Schenectady Massacre . — ’ August . Winthrop s expedition against the French proceeded

to Lake Champlain and returned .

- Augus t . Expedition of Capt . John Schuyler against French w Fort La Prairie on the St . La rence . — i . 1 1 . 69 June . Capture of Fort La Prairie by Maj Phil p Schuyler — 1693 January and February . Expedition of French against r i Mohawk towns , du ing wh ch battle of Wilton was fought

near Saratoga . — 1697 Treaty of Ryswick .

— ’ 1702 Queen Anne s War began . 1709—Nicholson ’ s expedition against the French advanced as far i W as site of Fort Anne, build ng a road through the ilderness

from Schuylerville to mouth of Wood Creek, along route

now occupied by the Delaware and Hudson lines , and

Fort Ingoldsby, Fort Miller , Fort Saratoga , Fort Schuyler

and Fort Nichols on . It returned wi thout delivering a

blow after destroying forts as far south as Saratoga . — 1713 Treaty of Utrecht . — w . 1731 Fort St . Frederic built at Cro n Point

— ’ 1744 King George s War began . — 4 . 17 5 November 17th . Saratoga Massacre — 1746 Fort Clinton rebuilt on site of old Fort Saratoga . — 1747 Fort Clinton abandoned and burned .

— - — 1748 Treaty of Ai x la Chapelle . 1754—First Colonial Congress met in Al bany to consider plans of .

un1on . — 1755 Fort Carillon begun by the French . — July . Old Fort Nicholson rebuilt and renamed Fort Edward . — i ll August . Fort Hardy bu lt on the site of Schuylervi e by

Gen . Phinehas Lyman . — li August 28th. Gen . Wil am Johnson changed name of Lao

du St . Sacrement to Lake George . — September 8th. Battle of Lake George . - Fort William Henry begun by Johnson . — i 1756 Great Britain declared war aga nst France . — Fort William Henry completed . — l l Fort Cari lon , afterward cal ed Ticonderoga, completed . — 1757 March 18th . Vaudreuil advanced over the ice on Lake

George and attacked Fort William Henry, burning every of thing outside the walls . — 26th. July Harbor Island Massacre. — August l oth. Fort William Henry taken by Montcalm and

garrison massacred by Indians .

— — ’ 1758 July 5th 9th. Abercrombie s unsuccessful expedition against .

Tl conderoga . — 1759 Fort George built by General Amherst near site of Fort

William Henry . — r July 27th. Ticonderoga abandoned by the F ench in face of ’ Amherst s advance . - 1 July 3 st . Fort St . Frederic destroyed by retreating French .

- di . August . Amherst commenced rebuil ng St Frederic, now

called Crown Point . — ’ 14 . l September th Montcalm died at Quebec, following Wo fe s

capture of the city . — 13th. fi October Captain Loring, in rst naval battle on Lake r Champlain , defeated a French schooner and th ee sloops off Valcour Island . — 1760 September 8th . Montreal surrendered by Vaudreuil to

English . — 1763 First attempt at settlement of Wyoming Valley . — l 0th. February By treaty signed at Paris , France ceded B l in all her possessions in North America to Great r ta . 1 — l 771 First hotel in Saratoga bui t near High Rock Spring . — 1775 Revolutionary War began . — May l oth. Ticonderoga captured by Ethan Allen . — 2 1 th. May Crown Point captured by Seth Warner , and Fort

George by Bernard Romans . — September 4th. General Montgomery embarked at Crown

Point on expedition against Canada . — 3d . n November Montgomery, advancing agai st Montreal,

captured St . John on the Richelieu River . — 1 1776 June 4th . American troops in Canada began to withdraw

up the Richelieu River and reached Crown Point July 3d . — 11th. October Battle of Valcour Island , between fleets of

Benedict Arnold and Capt . Thomas Pringle . l 7 — ’ 77 Burgoyne s Campaign . — ’ July 6th. Ticonderoga evacuated before Burgoyne s advance . — 7th. July Battle of Hubbardton . — 24th . July . Battle of Diamond Island on Lake George ’ - ul 2 th J y 7 . Jane M cCrea murdered by Indians of Burgoyne s

army . — l th ’ September g . Battle of Freeman s Farm or Bemis i fi He ghts, the rst important engagement about Saratoga , w s kno n al o as First Battle of Saratoga . — October 7th. Second Battle of Saratoga . — October 17th . Surrender of Burgoyne at Saratoga . 177 — 8 3 h. May 0t Cobleskill Massacre . — July 3d . Wyoming Massacre . — 1 . November 1 th. Cherry Valley Massacre — ’ 1 9 . li 77 July, August and September Sul van s expedition against

Indians and Tories of western New Y ork . — i m 1783 Gen . Ph lip Schuyler built first su mer residence at Saratoga

Springs . m epte b er 3d . Treaty of peace signed at Paris between

England and the United States .

— ’ 1 07 5th. 8 September Fulton s steamboat , the Clermont, arrived

Al r u . in bany, after fi st successf l trip 1809— Steamer Vermont began regular service on Lake Champlain , being the second regularly and successfully operated steam .

boat 111 the world . 12— 1 17 . 8 June th War declared against Great Britain . 1813— k Lake Champlain Steamboat Company , nown later as Cham

plain Transportation Company, chartered by New York

Legislature, thus making the Champlain Transportation

Company the oldest steamboat corporation in the world . — June 3d . Sloops Growler and Eagle sunk by British in the

Richelieu River . 1814— British, under Sir George Prevost . invaded the United States and advanced to the vicinity o f Plattsburg by September 4th dr r , while the British squa on unde Captain Downie , M advanced up the lake to Isle La otte . - m September 1 1th. Battle of Lake Cha plain between Com m odor M acD onou h i e g and Captain Down e, and Battle of

Plattsburg on l and . — December 24th. Treaty of Ghent signed by United States

and Great Britain .

— - 1839 Anti Rent Agitation began in New York State . 1846—C onstitutional Convention in New York State ado ted

amendments abolishing feudal tenure, thus ending ti

Rent Agitation . — — 1909 July 4th l oth. Tercentenary celebration of the discovery

of Lake Champlain .

— — s 1912 July 5th 6th. Dedication of Champlain Memorial at ur Crown Point and Plattsb g .

INTROD UCTION

THE GATE OF THE COUNTRY

’ E SID E s n earth s oldest waterway the oldest mountain sta d . a r Far back in the eons of un ecorded time , beside which the i longest periods of h story and tradition are as fleeting moments, the great crest of the Laurentian system of rocks, the Adirondacks, thrust its bold peaks above the primordial ocean . From their cul mination they extended northward and eastward to Labrador and ran out into the northwest . Long afterward another convulsion up h reared the ridges of the Appalachians, a slim spur of which, t e

. In Green Mountains , shot parallel to the Adirondacks the tremem s i dous strain wh ch accompanied this second disturbance, long faults, or rifts , appeared at the edge of the Laurentian rocks . The greatest of these rifts ran northeasterly and southwesterly to form the valley of the St . Lawrence and continued more southerly beside the base of the Adirondacks, through the Champlain Valley . There, e l o on the eastern edge of th va ley, the substrata of the cean were lifted gentlyupward , while on the western edge they sunk precipitately to form the rugged cliff s which sweep in dizzying lines from Port hr Henry to Bluff Point . T ough the valley thus created the waters of the ancient inland sea of North America were still united with the ocean . Subsequently the floor of the valley was upheaved until the salt water of the sea drained out and left a fresh water lake, but

. o little smaller than today It flowed sometimes north int the St . s n Lawrence and ometimes south into the great interior sea, or dow l in through the Hudson Val ey, accord g to the tilting of the land . r Then came the long age of ice, when the whole northe n country n hi was subjected to the gri ding of the glaciers , w ch brought down vast quantities of rock and other deposits . The retreating ice left ll a great body of fresh water in the Champlain Va ey, reaching back di into Lake George and the depressions of the A rondacks, the out a let of which was down the Hudson . As the ice receded northw rd s s the land subsided, until at la t, in place of glacier and fre h water in the valley, the ocean again rolled, extending southward as far as r Port Hen y , followed a gradual downward tilt of the long Champlain l ni the d and Hudson Va leys at the south, drow ng Hudson a hundre miles below Manhattan and raising the northern end of the lake until the waters of the sea ran out . In the basin that remained lay Lake valle ff Champlain , its ancient y intact , bordered by its primitive cli s, a hi and m king natural ghway from the great seaport on the south, where once it flowed, to the sister port at the north, to which its waters were nowturned . Thus in the earliest paroxysms of the earth were formed the conditions which have made this great route the fi c most ercely ontested and historic highway of the continent .

Of the dark ages of aboriginal strife we know practically nothing . It does not appear that the long lakeside from Fort William Henry to the foot of Champlain was then the permanent home of Indian r hi tribes, but rather that they made it thei ghway for maraud ing expeditions, with frequent clashes when war parties met along hi 1609 the shores . Certainly t s was the condition in , and had been i long previous , when Samuel de Champla n and his barbarian allies r T paddled up the lake on thei memorable voyage of discovery . hey had reached almost to the carry between Lake Champlain and Lake T George, which wound around the chiming waters of iconderoga, when the first of those savage and chance encounters to be recorded in history occurred . With the help of their French supporters, the

Algonquins of the north were triumphantly victorious, but in their success on the still unnamed lake, before even Henry Hudson had l ascended his river, was decided one of the a most forgotten and ap r ntl e pa e y unimportant events which, it is hardly xaggeration to say, f determined the whole aftercourse o history in North America . By it was incurred the deadly enmity of the powerful tribes of Y central New ork, and by it the French occupation of the valley of the St . Lawrence and of Lake Champlain was hindered and set u to back . Thus, while the French were str ggling establish their a infant colony in the hostile wilderness, settlement developed at the farther end of the long valley which should ultimately gain the ascendency .

w al n It as re ized in the begi ning that the struggle must come . and During Dutch rule at Fort Orange New Amsterdam , punitive French expeditions pushed southward to the Indian villages along and e fi the Mohawk, adventurous xplorers and trappers, the rst ureurs de bots r co , who have spread such glamou over the pages of i American history, had penetrated nto every recess of the country,

mi . and knew well what it pro sed Similarly the Dutch , in the security first- of their friendship with the Iroquois, had acquired hand knowl

of . edge the territory But France and the Netherlands were at peace , and their far-flung outposts were still deeply occupied in securing their first precarious foothold . that had yet been raised in America was rolled back from the walls . i of Carillon . But the flood of Engl sh determination rose higher in 9 175 , sweeping the lilies of France from their southern ramparts and i ending forever their dom nion on the inland sea . The same summer 1760 Quebec fell before the forlorn attack of Wolfe , and in Montreal surrendered to the English, thus closing the reign of France in

Canada .

fi w ar For fteen years peace brooded over the northern trails . 1 5 When the banners were again unfurled , in 77 , they heralded a new object . Here was no thought of territorial aggrandizement . But though the War of Independence had a far diff erent purpose than ' w the old struggles ith the French , the same strategy remained . Of paramount importance was the control of the Gate of the Country . Who held this his toric gateway could decide the fate of the colonies n a d of dominion upon the American continent . With proper prep aration and support it could be defended at many points . At Ticonderoga the French had built Fort Carillon in the fond hope that it would secure them against the northward advance of the

British . But they had been forced to retire by the generalship of

Amherst . A few miles to the north the British had expended

upon extensive works on the site of old Fort St . Frederic . l The location was well chosen, and had Crown Point been fu ly armed and garrisoned it might have proved impregnable against any attack . Again at Saratoga was a strong strategic point for checking an ad vancing army . At the dedication of the Saratoga Battle Monu 1 7 r ment , in 87 , Horatio Seymou related that once, as General Scott overlooked from an elevated point the ground on which the battle “ a was fought, the old warrior, with kindling eye , stretched out his ‘ arm , and said ! Remember, this has been the great strategic point in all the wars waged for the control of this continent! ’ In 1775 Ethan Allen and Seth Warner seized Ticonderoga and n Crown Point, possessing without bloodshed the Gate of the Cou w di try , which was held the follo ing year by Bene ct Arnold and his little flotilla against the first southward advance of the British . a s But a ye r later Crown Point was evacuated by the coloni ts, and

his s . fi . when Burgoyne placed gun upon Mt De ance, St Clair retreated from Ticonderoga . A single determined stand remained A to the Patriot rmy . With Burgoyne defeated at Saratoga, unable to go forward or retreat , and with no help in sight , his advance down the historic highway ended in failure and cast its influence over the whole subsequent trend of world history .

Another similar campaign , following the same old strategy, was 1 14 M cD onou h launched in 8 , but a g , with his hastily assembled and

nondescript fleet m anned by quickly trained levies from the land “ ” d in forces , sol iers and sailors too, nipped the plans of the British the bud and turned back the last armed expedition at the very threshold of the door w u n Today, the gate which has s ng both ways to the conqueri g armies of two p eoples and three nations stands wide and unguarded , s while through it, forgetful of the peril of ambuscade and war , the citizens of all three nations pass unhindered . The war routes are

not . still used , but for war or the passage of armed fleets Over ff ff ll th them and along the blu , archaic cli s of the oldest va ey , from e li metropolis of one great country to the metropo s of the other, upon glistening bands of steel, or the unchanged expanse of the at lakes , ply gre steam shuttles , weaving stronger , as in a loom, the bonds of continued peace and prosperity .

THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

BE RCROM BIE ’S EXPE D ITION was commanded by Maj

Gen . James Abercrombie, who, with a combined army of l ni Eng ish and Colo al troops, marched against Ticonderoga in July, 175 8 . His advance from the present site of Fort William Henry

Hotel down through the long vista of mountains, islands and blue lake was as inspiring and spectacular as his retreat was pathetic . “ ” m Here, says Park an , on the ground where Johnson had beaten

Dieskau (see Battle of Lake George) , where Montcalm had planted nl his batteries, and Monro vai y defended the wooden ramparts of Fort William Henr y were now assembled more than fifteen thousand men ; and the shores , the foot of the mountains, and the broken plains between them were studded thick with tents . Of regulars there were six thousand three hundred and sixty-seven officer — s and soldiers and of provincials, nine thousand and thirty four . To the New England levies , or at least to their chaplains , the expedition seemed a crusade against the abomin ation of Babylon ; and they discoursed in their sermons of Moses sending forth Joshua li against Amalek . Abercrombie, raised to his place by po tical ‘ ’ influence, was little but the nominal commander . A heavy man , ‘ nfi said Wolfe in a letter to his father ; an aged gentleman , i rm in ’ n k body and mi d , wrote William Par man , a boy of seventeen , who carried a musket in a Massachusetts regiment and kept in his knapsack a dingy little notebook in which he j otted down what fif - t . passed each day . The age of the aged gentleman was y two ni r On the eve ng of the fou th of July, baggage, stores and ammunition all were on board the boats , and the whole army embarked on the ” Y morning of the fif th . It is this embarkation which F . C . ohn i 17 “ has painted , as shown in the illustration fac ng page The arrangements were perfect . Each corps marched without confusion to its appointed station on the beach, and the sun was scarcely above the ridge of French Mountain when all were afloat . A spec tator watching them from the shore says that when the fleet was i three m les on its way, the surface of the lake at that distance was completely hidden from sight . There were nine hundred bateaux, -five a hundred and thirty whaleboats , and a large number of heavy flatb o ts l a carrying the arti lery . The whole advanced in three divisions—the regulars in the center and the provincials on the i . r . flanks Each co ps had its flags and its music The day was fa r,

( 1 9 1 THE SUMMER PARAD ISE IN HISTORY

’ fli ers and men and o c were in the highest spirits . Before ten o clock they began to enter the Narrows ; and the boats of the three divisions extended themselves into long files as the mountains closed on either hand upon the contracted lake . From front to rear the line — was six miles long . The spectacle was superb the brightness of the summer day ; the romantic beauty of the scenery ; the sheen u and sparkle of those crystal waters ; the countless islets, t fted with fir w pine, birch, and ; the bordering mountains, ith their green summits and sunny crags ; the flash of oars and glitter of weapons ; nn n and the ba ers, the varied u iforms, the notes of bugle, trumpet, bagpipe, and drum, answered and prolonged by a hundred wood ‘ ’ . so a o land echoes I never beheld delightful pr spect, wrote a wounded officer at Albany a fortnight after . i They landed where Montcalm , w th less than a fourth of their - o . di number, awaited the attack . L rd Howe (q a briga er general ff attached to the sta of Abercrombie, had a far greater grasp upon

f . P the situation than Abercrombie himsel revious to the expedition, m attired in the si me uniform of the rangers, he had reconnoitered

wi . and the vicinity of Ticonderoga th Lieut John Stark others , and it is a tradition in the Stark family that he had even stood with fi hi m Stark upon the top of Mt . De ance and had remarked to that a i small battery upon that eminence would turn the trick n cely .

Chief adviser of Abercrombie, he was thus in position to materially influence the plan of attack . As the English advanced in three e fir n w as parallel columns from the foot of Lake G orge, i g heard in the woods to one side, and Howe rushed up to learn its cause . It came from an outpost of French , one of whom shot him as he broke

u . through the b shes His loss was irreparable, and thenceforth the fi attack proceeded in utter de ance of reason . ’ M ontcalm s r men were almost enti ely regular troops, and they were posted on high ground at the neck of the peninsula on which un the fort stands . They were sheltered behind a breastwork of tr ks of trees, protected in front by a vast and tangled abattis . Aber a ll n e crombie had powerful arti ery trai , but, hearing that his nemy o would soon be reinf rced, he did not wait to bring it into action, and ordered an attack with musketry alone . The battle raged from one ’ n o clock till eveni g of July 8 . The English displayed desperate ul s hi courage, but co d not force the breastworks and abatti , w ch, in s a themselve lmost impregnable, were defended with the utmost gallantry . At night the assailants withdrew in disorder, with the s r d los of two thousand men . Though the English we e defeate , [ 20 ]

THE SUMMER PARA DISE IN HISTORY

w has inspired more prose and verse ith forest , lake or mountain di setting than the A rondacks, though much of it is not definitely localized there .

AIKE N ’S VOLUNTEERS were composed of seventeen young mi men , who , though too young to be liable for litary duty, fought at the battle of Plattsburg (q . A resolution of Congress, passed 1826 in May, , twelve years after the battle, authorized the delivery to each of one rifle promised to them by General Macomb, while m n com andi g the Champlain Department , for their services as a volunteer corps, during the siege of Plattsburg in September, A LA POCAHONTAS . The green in the center of the village of

Sandy Hill, nowHudson Falls , is said to have been, during the French n and Indian War, the scene of an i cident not unlike that which befell Captain Smith in Virginia . A young man named Q uacken Al boss , of bany, on the very eve of his marriage , was impressed into the public service as a wagoner to carry provision to Fort William

G . Af Henry, at Lake eorge ter passing Fort Edward he and his M c innis escort of sixteen men, under Lieutenant G of NewHampshire, di were surprised by Indians under Marin , sarmed, bound, seated in a row, and deliberately tomahawked, one by one, all but the wagoner, who seemed to have found favor with one of the squaws during a brief interval preceding the execution . She arrested ’ “ ’ fi ’ ! ” hi s slayer s arm , pleading, He s no ghter ; he s my dog Loaded k down with plunder li e a packhorse, he was then marched towards Canada ; at the first Indian encampment on Lake Champlain being k n . compelled to run the gau tlet, by which he was nearly illed But his Indian angel bound up his wounds , and nursed him to recovery .

Subsequently he was ransomed by the governor of Canada, and Al after several years returned to bany, married his original sweet - heart, and lived to the good old age of eighty three .

Y ALBANY is the capital of the State of New ork, and seat of the fl‘i operating o ces of the Delaware and Hudson Company . 0 0 Albany, Albany, Sweet is the tender melody

Of thy old Latin name to me . —M onaltan .

fi n It was rst visited by French fur traders, who , followi g the discovery of the mouth of the Hudson River by Verrazano , in 1524 , made expeditions to the head of navigation for the purpose of [ 2 2 ] THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

1540 bartering with the Indians . About they began the construo fi n tion of a forti ed tradi g post on Castle Island, which then stood on the east side of the river near Rensselaer, though it has since become a part of the mainland . The post was seriously injured by a

. r a freshet, however, and abandoned Hen y Hudson rrived in his “ ” i i l - 1609 1615 l ttle sh p , the Ha f Moon , in , and he was followed in by “ a party of Dutch traders , who rebuilt the old stone castle of the

French, on Castle Island, and named it Fort Nassau . It was well

trafli c . l located to secure the of the Iroquois The fa ls of the Mohawk , s near its mouth at Cohoes , made that river impa sable for the canoes i n chene of the Ind ans , and accordi gly a carry from the Mohawk at S c Al Al tady ran overland to the Hudson at bany . Thus bany in the earliest times was the junction of the great routes of travel to the north and west, as it is today . Fort Nassau was damaged by high 1 1 water in 6 8 and was not restored . 1624 o In the Dutch West India Company, which had been m or

r - n po ated in 1621 for the special purpose of tradi g in America, l sent out thirty families , who bui t Fort Orange on the mainland l where A bany now stands . Its site is now marked by a bronze tablet in Steamboat Square , just east of the bend in Broadway, upon whi ch the following inscription appears !

“ a Upon this spot , w shed by the tide , stood the North East

1623 . bastion of Fort Orange , erected about Here the powerful Iroquois met the deputies of this and other coloni es in con

i fi . ference to establ sh treaties . Here the rst courts were held 1643 i n Here m , under the direction of Dom nie Johan es Mega olensis li p , a learned and estimable minister , the ear est church

was erected North West of the fort, and to the South of it ’ ’ stood the dominie s house .

n i Findi g the send ng of settlers too expensive , the Dutch West India Company in 1629 adopted the method of granting manorial Kili en Rensse rights , known as the Patroon System (q . a Van

fir a laer secured the st concession , purchased from the Mohawks n long tract upon the Hudson , includi g the present site of Albany,

i 1 0 Rensselaerw ck. and began its colon zation in 63 , naming it y In 1652 Pieter Stuyvesant named the district immediately surrounding “ Fort Orange Dorpe Beverswyck (Beaver District Village) . In 1664 , upon the transfer of New Netherlands to the English , the name was changed to Albany . Nine years later , when the Dutch again obtained possession of the province, it was rechristened Willem stadt 1 4 , but the following year, 67 , it passed back to the

English and was again called Albany .

[ 2 3 ] THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

a 1 6 Albany was chartered as city by Governor Dongan in 68 , the

first mayor being Peter Schuyler . (See Schuyler Family . ) During the French and Indian War the city was a military storehouse and

a . place of refuge, made secure by fort and a stockade The stockade hi took up a large section, reac ng from the head of State Street, below 1 676 . . the present Capitol, where about Fort Frederic (q v ) was built, to the bank of the river, and from the site of the Union Depot as far south as a point near the present junction of South Pearl and i li Beaver Streets . Thus th s old ne of defence, which was completed 1660 ll in the spring of , included nearly a the present business section r of Albany . At no time, however, was it captu ed or even assaulted . in 1754 fi Here, , was held the rst General Continental Congress , com missioners of seven colonies meeting to consider a plan of permanent 1797 Al w as union . In bany made the capital of the State, and as such a political center of activity and importance . The celebration in 1886 of the b i—centennial of the city’ s incor oration p brought into prominence many events of historical interest , and also resulted in the erection of a number of bronz e tablets at nf the more important points, on which much historical i ormation in is concisely and vividly recorded . A tablet front of the Van Benthuysen Building on Broadway marks the site of the Southeast l Gate in the old stockade . Here a so stood the second City Hall , “ in which the Congress of 1754 met and prepared a Union of the r several Colonies for mutual defense and secu ity . On this fir ground was the house where lived Pieter Schuyler , the st and for ” eight successive years mayor of this city . A tablet on North Pearl n Street, opposite the Delaware and Hudson Buildi g, marks the w Northwest Gate, and also the spot where Governor De itt Clinton,

E di 11 1828 . t father of the rie Canal, ed on February , On the nor h west corner of the Union Passenger Station a tablet commemorates ! the Northeast Gate . It bears the following inscription “ A little to the East of this spot stood the North East Gate five of the city . Here it was that Symon Schermerhorn at ’ ‘ ’ n Sab b ithi 9 1690 o clock in the morni g, Die , February , , after a hard ride by the way of Niskayuna in the intense cold and

deep snow, shot in the thigh and his horse wounded, arrived with just enough strength to awaken the guard and alarm the people of Albany with the news ‘ Yt ye French and Indians ’ ’ have murthered ye people of Skinnechtady! Symon s son

and negroes were killed on that fatal night . Symon died in

1 . Y . New ork , 696 To the north was the road to the Canadas Through this gate passed many of the tr00ps at various times

rendezvoused at Albany . The remains of Lord Howe were ” u ur . bro ght back this way, and B goyne returned a prisoner [ 24 1 THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

After the lapse of more than two hundred and fif ty years since l “ ” the bui ding of the Northeast Gate, the road to the Canadas

l hi n . T i stil leaves from t s poi t he log pal sade is gone, and the wooden gate has crumbled to dust . In its place stands an impressive stru c ture of steel and stone, the Northeast Gate as of old, through which pass now in a single summer more vacationists bound for the his toric country to the north than the number of all the armies that fought for its possession . On the southeast corner of State Street and South Pearl Street a i tablet commemorates the site of the oldest build ng in Albany .

. n s E Here Gen Philip Schuyler was bor , and al o lizabeth Schuyler, l m “ who became the wife of A exander Ha ilton . Adjoining on the west was the famous R wis Tavern . South Pearl Street was for merly Washington Street, and was but twelve feet wide, having a gate at this place . This house was called the Staats House, and was s e more elaborately furni hed than other houses of the tim , being wainscoted and ornamented with tiles and carvings . It was the ” house of Mayor John Schuyler . Many other tablets are scattered f n m in di ferent parts of the city, testifyi g to the i portant position which Albany has always held in the aff airs of the Colonies and of the nation .

ALGONQUINS w eref a group of Indian tribes living north of

fir . the St . Lawrence river when Champlain st entered its mouth They were closely related to the Hurons and other tribes extending f ar hi arra ansetts into the northwest, and to the Mo cans, Pequots , N g , l and other New England tribes , and to stil others occupying a part

of as i . southe tern New York, Virginia, Pennsylvan a and New Jersey

They had long been at deadly war with the Iroquois (q . of l u Al centra New York, who were disting ished from the gonquins and related tribes by a radical diff erence of language . Thus they allied themselves readily with the French in their campaigns against the English , as the Iroquois fought with the English against the Al French . Remnants of the gonquin tribes are still to be found, mostly in the provinces of Quebec and Ontario .

ET ALLEN , HAN , , was one of the most picturesque heroes of ’ “ 1766 the days of 76 . In he went to the then almost unsettled domain between the Green Mountains and Lake Champlain , where he was a bold leader of the settlers on the New Hampshire Grants in their bitter controversy wi th the authorities of New Y ork . Dur l his ing the controversy several pamphlets were written by A len, in [ 25 ] THE SUMMER PARA DISE IN HISTORY

peculiar style, which forcibly illustrated the injustice of the action

Y . of the New ork authorities The latter declared Allen an outlaw, ff fi and o ered a reward of one hundred and fty pounds for his arrest . fi He de ed his enemies , and persisted in his course . Early in May, 1775 , he led a few men and took the fortress of Ticonderoga by ‘ ’ surprise . His followers were called Green Mountain Boys . His success as a partisan caused him to be sent twice into Canada during the latter half of 1775 to win the people over to the republican cause . In the last of these expeditions he attempted, with Colonel

r . 25 B own , to capture Montreal (Sept , but was made a h lf prisoner imse and sent to England in irons , whence, after a con finem ent of some weeks, he was sent to Halifax . Five months

Y . 6th 1778 later he was removed to New ork On the of May, , he a was exchanged, after captivity of about two years, for Colonel l Campbel , and returned home, where he was received with joy and honors . He was invested with the chief command of the State i militia . Congress mmediately gave him the commission of lieu

- tenant colonel in the Continental army . When, in the course of the n war, Vermont assumed and maintai ed an independent position , a fruitless attempt was made by Beverly Robinson to bribe Allen to lend his support to a union of that province with Canada . He was ff supposed to be disa ected towards the revolted colonies , and he fostered that impression in order to secure the neutrality of the

British towards his Mountain State until the close of the war . As a member of the legislature of Vermont , and as a delegate in Con b f — gress, e secured the great object of his e forts namely, the ulti of mate recognition Vermont as an independent State . He removed n to Be nington before the close of the war, thence to Arlington , and ” ’ “

di . i n clo ae a o . S H s finally died in Burlington . (Lossi g s Cy p f U i His most memorable utterance, upon demand ng the sur “ render oi Fort Ticonderoga (q . In the name of the Great ” Jehovah and the Continental Congress, has been otherwise i reported, as In the name of the Cont nental Congress , and by ’ “ I ll have it . A more likely version is Surrender, you rat , quoted by one of his followers .

ANTI-RE N TISM grew out of an attempt to enforce certain — provisions of the old Patroon System Albany, Rensselaer and

Delaware, among other counties, being greatly excited for a number of years following the death of the last of the patroons in 1839 .

Bands of men disguised as Indians tarred and feathered, and , in fi several instances , murdered of cers of the law, and two men were [ 26 1 THE SUMMER PARA DISE IN HISTORY

sentenced to death and twenty more to State prison , only to be Y - pardoned by Governor oung , who was elected on the anti rent issue . The matter was finally settled by the Constitutional Convention of 1 4 fi 8 6, which adopted amendments de nitely abolishing all feudal n tenures, and forbiddi g leases of agricultural lands for a period of ’ “ ” Satanstoe more than twelve years . A number of Cooper s novels, , “ ” “ ” - s The Chain Bearer, The Red kins, are concerned with the

- anti rent issue .

’ D Am ARMORE R S E RRAN . ong the messengers sent out by Ethan Allen to collect forces for hi s attack on Ticonderoga was

Maj . Gershom Beach , a blacksmith , who went on foot to Rutland,

Pittsford, Brandon, Middlebury, Whiting and Shoreham, making i - a circuit of sixty m les in twenty four hours . This is one of the remarkable episodes of the American Revolution, and one that has i never received the recogn tion that it deserves . The ride of Paul Revere was a holiday excursion compared with the journey of “ Gershom Beach . Every step had to be taken on foot through a country practically without roads, an expanse of forest broken n only at long intervals by a little cleari g . The messenger must ll r climb steep hi s , thread his way th ough the valleys, avoid swamps,

. ll and cross unbridged streams As night fell, sti he must hold to a b course not easily followed y daylight, and pause to arouse each ” tt . r ke . l C oc . i . fam ly from sleep ( ) Mrs Ju ia C R Dorr, the Ver mont poet, has written of the journey of Beach in a poem entitled “ The Armorer ’ s Errand ” m Blacks ith and armorer stout was he, fi fi First in the ght and rst in the breach , in And first the work where a man should be .

l He threaded the val eys , he climbed the hills,

He forded the rivers , he leaped the rills . l While sti l to his call, like minute men , r Booted and spu red, from mount and glen , l The settlers ral ied . But on he went ,

Like an arrow shot from a bow, unspent , Down the long vale of the Otter to where The might of the waterfall thundered in air ;

Then across to the lake, six leagues and more, ’ Where Hand s Cove lay in the bending shore .

The goal was reached . He dropped to the ground .

In a deep ravine, without word or sound ;

And sleep , the restorer, bade him rest , ’ Like a weary child, on the earth s brown breast . [ 27 ] THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

D a hi ARNOL , BENEDICT, whose n me is written in the story of

America with letters of infamy, might well have been remembered ’ as one of the nation s greatest patriots and benefactors . It seems evident, however, that the honorable part of his career in the Revo lution is traceable more to personal bravery, to ambition, and to l spontaneous reaction to the conditions in which he found himse f,

- than to deep rooted attachment to the cause of independence . His services to the country, nevertheless, were no less valuable on this c account . He claimed to have conceived the idea of apturing

Ticonderoga, and was commissioned a colonel by the Massachusetts i n Committee of Safety for the accomplishment of th s object . Findi g and a l Ethan Allen others already embarked upon simi ar mission, he deferred to Allen and joined the expedition as a volunteer . Later he c ommanded an expedition against Quebec, which marched northward through the entire extent of the Maine wilderness, after which he went up Lake Champlain to Ticonderoga, where he was placed in command of a fleet on the lake . His engagement with the British under Carleton (see Battle of Valcour) was the first naval conflict with the mother country . He was largely responsible for n the defeat of Burgoy e in the battle of Saratoga (q . where he i was severely wounded . After a reprimand by Wash ngton , ordered by the Continental Congress because of fraudulent transactions l whi e he was military governor of Philadelphia, he plotted to betray all the country, his plans being but consummated at West Point in 1780 September, . AUSABLE RIVE R rises in Indian Pass but a short distance from the source of the Hudson, and takes its tumultuous course northward and eastward, passing near its mouth through a tre m endous rocky chasm which has become world-famous as one of the natural wonders of this continent . It takes its name from its he sabl sandy bed near its mouth t French word for sand being e.

E . AK R, CAPT REMEMBER, one of the most prominent

and daring leaders of the Green Mountain Boys , was killed by

Indians near the mouth of the Lacolle River, a tributary of the ’ Richelieu , while on scout service in connection with Montgomery s

. . 1775 . Expedition (q v ) to Canada in August, He is said to have been the first American killed on Canadian soil during the Revolu sl tionary War . A tablet to his memory has been erected on I e

La Motte . (See Commemorative Boulder on Isle La Motte .)

[ 28 ]

THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

Capt . George Downie and an American squadron under Commodore D n u h Thomas M ac o o g . In August a British army of about under Sir George Prevost advanced along the western shore of the lake to Plattsburg, which was held by General Macomb with about 1 500 men, the object being to penetrate to the Hudson as Burgoyne ff had attempted to do in 1777 . To e ect this movement it was necessary to dispose of the American fleet, consisting of fourteen 6 5 8 8 0 . vessels of all classes, carrying guns and men

M acD onou h Anticipating the arrival of the British , g had ext ended his fleet across the entrance of Cumberland Bay, from Crab Island on the south to near Cumberland Head on the north . They were all at anchor , this being the one naval battle of consequence in which the vessels of either side remained at anchor during the entire engage acD onou h ment . M g , however, had taken the precaution to drop auxiliary anchors astern of each ship, with cables running to their

a w . bows , by which they could be re dily s ung around It was this hi brilliant maneuver w ch decided the action . When the British M acD onou h a appeared around Cumberland Head, g ssembled the

- crew of his flagship on the quarter deck, where he knelt and com m mended his men, his cause and hi self to the Leader of Hosts . The t 95 British fleet consisted of six een vessels, carrying guns and 937 men . Fire was opened by the Americans, but not returned until the “ ’ Confiance British flagship , the , had reached a position opposite the head of the American column . Both fleets were then anchored in l fi “ long lines, para lel to each other . The rst broadside of the Con ” “ ’ ’ l acD onou h fiance ki ledor woundedfortymen onthe Saratoga, M g s — n -fif t flagship nearly o e h of her force . The engagement at once “ ” became general . On the Saratoga a hencoop was shot away and a. rooster, released, flew into the rigging, where he remained flapping his wings and crowing until the action ceased . Within an hour the “ ” di e starboard batteryof the Saratoga was sabled, wher uponthe cable to her auxiliary anchor was manned and the ship sw ung around “ C nfi until her port battery was brought to bear upon the o ance . The remainder of the fleet executed the same maneuver and raked the “ ” f ni C onfiance Britishvesselswith galling ef ect . Captain Dow e of the was killed, and all of the ships in the British squadron were so badly i di Af shot to pieces that they were in a sink ng con tion . ter two and a half hours of this desperate fighting the British flag was struck .

The Americans, however, were in no condition to press their victory

ur fit . f ther . Not a mast in either fleet was to carry sail The British fi m ff nally managed to li p o , while the Americans remained at anchor . [ 30] THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

Immediately upon the cessation of the battle, the land attack of the

British , which had begun with the appearance of the fleet around

Cumberland Head , was abandoned . (See Plattsburg . ) Thus ended the second attempt of the British arms to control the Champlain l Val ey . The soldiers and sailors of both fleets who were killed in the fight were later buried on Crab Island (q . where a monument has been erected to their memory . In the Plattsburg cemetery, across the fi bay, Captain Downie and the British and American of cers who fell with him were interred, where, after the lapse of a hundred years , l k lie friend and foe a i e , a flag with the emblem of the Grand Ar my of the Republic marking the graves of each .

The British loss was about two hundred, including prisoners ; the killed and wounded Americans numbering one hundred and

- twelve . The British lost all but twenty of the ninety five guns they fi M n brought into action . During most of the ght acD o ough pointed hi s a favorite gun , and was twice knocked senseless . For services he was made captain , received a gold medal from Congress, and was presented by the legislature of Vermont with an estate on Cumber oi land Head, overlooking the scene the engagement . At the time ffi of the action his o cial rank was that of master commandant , though l he was then popularly called commodore . It was not unti later mi that he was regularly com ssioned a commodore in the navy .

The last eye-witness of the Battle of Lake Champlain was prob 25 ably Benajah Phelps , who died in Colorado Springs , November ,

dr . 1903, at the age of one hun ed and three His story of the engage

. E . Outloo ment , as related to J Tuttle, was printed in the k for

2 1901. November ,

TT E E GE E as 8 1755 BA L OF LAK ORG w fought September , , in three distinct engagements . Baron Dieskau , in command of six hundred Indians, as many Canadians , and two hundred French l n regu ars , ascended Lake Champlain intendi g to attack Fort Lyman , afterwards Fort Edward (q . but for some reason turned towards li ’ Lake George , where Gen . Sir Wil am Johnson s army of colonists on an expedition for the capture of Crown Point were encamped . In the Vicinity of the present Willi ams Monument (q . the French surprised and engaged New England militia, under Colonel l Williams , and their a lies , two hundred Mohawks . Colonel Williams was killed and his men put to flight . As they retreated towards the h lake t ree hundred were sent out to succor them , and the fighting

[ 31 ] THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY was resumed near the English camp ; General Johnson being in com

a l n . i s m nd ti l wou ded, when Gen Ph neha Lyman succeeded him . The llies k savage a of the French were inclined to skul , the Canadians ’ D iesk u s u were frightened, and a reg lars had to bear the brunt of the b all attle . Nearly of them were killed, and Dieskau was wounded

and . n taken prisoner The same day at su set a party of French, a who had h lted at Bloody Pond, were surprised and routed by a detachment from Fort Lyman with such results as gave this b it of water its sanguinary name . In all, the casualties of the day were , of of E n lish the French, nearly four hundred ; the g , two hundred - s and sixty two . For this victory General Johnson received the thank and of Parliament, was voted five thousand pounds and created a baronet, but General Lyman was not mentioned in the report, and received no honors . te 1903 The battle monument, erec d in , stands in the State reserva -five tion of thirty acres, at the head of the lake . BATTLE OF LACOLLE was an indecisive engagement between

' s f ou ht the Americans and Briti h, g at Lacolle, north of Plattsburg,

30 18 14 . March , It was one of the preliminaries in the defence of the Champlain Valley against the southward advance of the British .

(See Plattsburg and Battle of Lake Champlain . )

G TWO s BATTLE OF SARATO A . important battle of the

Revolution are known by this name, because fought on nearly the same ground and by practically the same forces ; the one September 19 7 1 t , the other October , 777 . The firs is also known as the ’ fi fi battle of Freeman s Farm, rst battle of Stillwater, and rst battle of Bemis Heights ; the second also as that of Bemis Heights and of r fi Stillwate . The rst, in which each side lost from six hundred to se one thousand , was indecisive ; the cond was followed ten days ’ later by the surrender of Burgoyne and his army . (See Burgoyne s

n At Bemis Heights , ni e miles south of old Saratoga, now Schuyler ville, Burgoyne encountered the entrenched Americans under Gates,

and . September 19th attempted to turn their left In this, after ’ tw o fi . hours desperate ghting, he was frustrated by Gen Benedict

Arnold , assisted by Gen . Dan Morgan, and would then , perhaps , have been disastrously defeated had Arnold been properly sup

. T i ported his not be ng done, a quarrel arose between Gates and

Arnold, and the latter asked and received permission to return to e Philadelphia . He finally yielded, however, to the wish s of many

[ 32 ]

GRAVE OF CAPTAIN DOWNIE AND BRIT ISH AND AMERICAN OFFICERS WHO FELL IN BATTLES OF LAK E CHAMPLAIN AND PLATTSBURG

MONUMENT ON CRA B ISLAND T O THE SOLDIERS AND SAILORS WHO FELL IN BATTLES OF PLATTSBURG AND LAK E CHAMPLAIN THE SUMMER PARAD ISE IN HISTORY

ffi i o cers , who knowing a decisive battle was mminent, and having no fi con dence in Gates, begged him to remain . At the decisive moment , 7th b e fi on October , rushed upon the eld without orders , and together with Gen . Dan Morgan (q . v . ) and Gen . Enoch Poor (q . in a ’ of fi e series magni cent charges, broke through the enemy s lin s, n putti g them to flight and winning the victory . Just at the close of the battle Arnold was severely wounded and was taken on a l s i itter to Albany, where he remained di abled till the follow ng spring . During the night Burgoyne retreated and took up a strong posi tion about twelve miles from Saratoga Springs (at Schuylerville) , i ff where, entirely surrounded , his suppl es cut o , with no hope of hi relief, w ch he had expected from the south and west, and the

American army every day growing stronger, he surrendered to

General Gates on October 17th . The victory roused the wildest r un w enthusiasm th oughout the co try, and as the determining event l that led France to her al iance with the United States . (See Saratoga

Battle Monument . ) “ We are told that , during more than twenty centuries of war and

l . bloodshed , on y fif teen battles have been decisive of lasting results

The contest of Saratoga is one of these . From the battle of Marathon fi to the eld of Waterloo , a_ period of more than years , there was no martial event which had greater influence than that whi ch took ” fi Horati o S e mour. place on the battle eld of Saratoga . y

BATTLE ON SNOWSHOES is one of the inexact designations ’ which has often been applied to the engagement between Rogers s

13 1758 . rangers and the French on March , It was one of the brushes which the uncompromising outposts of the British army, the backwoodsmen of the ranger corps, were continually having, which had no decisive results whatever save as a check to French n raids , and which are worth recording and treasuri g in memory simply because of the indomitable determination with whi ch they ar were carried through . On this p ticular occasion Rogers had been dispatched with one hundred and eighty men to attack a French outpost at Ticonderoga . He proceeded up Lake George to near the vicinity of the mountain which now bears his name , where he crossed over to the western side of the range and marched his men down Trout Brook . He observed every precaution in his advance

t . and kept a por ion of his men in the rear as a reserve The French, however, had warning of his approach, and instead of encountering [ 33 1 THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

n fi a outpost, he met rst a small detachment and was immediately thereafter attacked by a force of upward of six hundred . In the ’ - Ro ers s pitched battle which ensued, ninety nine of g little command l — were ki led, or more than one half, and many others were wounded . l The detai s of this fight in the deep snow and bitter cold, as drawn ’ Ro ers s ur f from g own report in his private jo nal, a ford one of the most vivid pictures of the desperate fighting of the times of which we have record . “Rogers retreated with the remainder of his party in the best manner possible . Several men, who were wounded and fatigued, were taken by the savages who pursued his retreat . He reached L ake George in the evening, where he was joined by several wounded men . From thisplace an expresswas dispatchedto Colonel Havilandfor assistance to bring in the wounded . The party passed the night with out fire or blankets, which were lost with their knapsacks . The x ff night was e tremely cold, and the wounded su ered much pain , but behaved in a manner consistent with their conduct in the action . “ in In the morn g the party proceeded up the lake, and at Hoop

Island met Capt . John Stark bringing to their relief provisions, s d blankets and sleighs . They encamped on the island , and pas e fi 15th the night with good res . On the evening of March they ’ — leb tar arrived at Fort Edward . Ca S k.

E fi BATTL OF VALCOUR . The rst naval conflict between Great Britain and the Colonies was fought off the southwestern

s 11 1776 . hore of Valcour Island in Lake Champlain on October ,

The American fleet under Benedict Arnold consisted of one sloop,

a . two schooners, four galleys and eight gondol s Preparatory to an attempt to seize Fort Ticonderoga and gain command of the lake, the British had built a fleet at St . Johns, on the Richelieu River, -ni which was far superior, consisting of twenty ne vessels in all . Arnold had taken up a position between Valcour Island and the a i mainland . The British wore round the southern end of the sland “ fi in the face of a heavy wind and engaged rst the Royal Savage, ’ r A nold s flagship , which had advanced to meet them . Finding the fire too heavy, Arnold attempted to return to the line, but his vessel grounded on Valcour Island and was abandoned . The remains of l the hull are sti l to be seen, when the water is clear, but a short distance from the shore . The battle continued all day, the heavy wind from the northwest making it difficult for the English vessels k Ar to work within range . Under cover of dar ness and storm nold [ 34 ]

THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

i a . the royal standard, becom ng spy He was once saved from the ’ is gallows by Washington, who l tened to the intercession of the spy s

his e . d aged parents, on promis to be loyal But he rejoine the enemy,

- and for a long time his cold blooded murders . his plundering and his di incen arism made him a terror to the whole region about Albany, ill 1782 in a t , in , he was caught and hanged that city as spy and a traitor .

BLACK WATCH ME MORIAL is a Library and Historical

ni . Building in Ticonderoga Village, and is u que as a memorial in a “ ” Yankee village to a British Regiment . The Black Watch , black b “ ” from its som er tartan, and watch because formed to keep order l s n 42d R in the High and , otherwise k own as the oyal Highlanders, is the oldest Highland Regiment in the British Army It was em bodied in 1739 from independent companies , and no British Regiment has a more honorable record for di stinguished service performed ffi in every part of the globe . It sustained a loss of seven o cers and re n fil e ffi three hund d and six ra k and killed, and seventeen o cers and fil e of three hundred and sixteen rank and wounded, out a total strength “ of one thousand engaged in the desperate assault on the ’

8 1758 . French lines at Fort Ticonderoga, July , (See Abercrombie s

Expedition . ) The extent of this casualty can be better comprehended when it is realized that it is twice as high a percentage as the loss of L i T the ight Brigade at Balaklava, mmortalized by Tennyson . he Black Watch assisted in the capture of Fort Ticonderoga by Am herst 1759 in . A Bronze Tablet in the reading room of the Memorial Building was presented in 1906 by the officers of the regiment and unveiled by Maj . D . L . Wilson Farquharson, who came from

Scotland to make the presentation .

D I ir n BLOO Y MORN NG SCOUT . Gen . S William Joh son, while in camp at the head of Lake George, close to the present site l of Fort Wil iam Henry Hotel, learned that Dieskau had left Ticon a i deroga and was dvancing w th a strong partytowards Fort Edward . l f He thereupon sent Col . Ephraim Wil iams with rein orcements towards the fort . They were ambushed en route by Dieskau and dr iven back . Fighting continued through the day, at the end of which the French were routed . Much of it occurred near a small pond south of Fort William Henry Hotel, from whi ch it received its name of Bloody Pond, and the engagement in which Williams was killed that of the Bloody Morning Scout . (See Battle of Lake

[ 36 1 THE SUMMER PARAD ISE IN HISTORY

BLOODY M ORN IN G SCOUT (From an Old Print)

[ 37 ] THE SUMMER PARAD ISE IN HISTORY

BOULD E R TO THE HEROE S OF THE FOUR NATIONS is a boulder in Academy Park at Ticonderoga Village, erected by the a ch l late Joseph Cook as a memorial to the Indian, , Eng ish and

A merican heroes who fought at Ticonderoga . The bones which were found interred with the Lord Howe Stone are buried under

s . this boulder . (See Howe, Lord George Augu tus )

T SE Tha endane ea BRAN , JO PH ( y g ) , the Mohawk chief, a é é ll prot g , when young, of Sir Wi iam Johnson , was present with him 1 . . ur at the Battle of Lake George (q v ) when only 3 years old . D ing the Revolution he was active against the Americans . After the w war, however, his influence ith the Indians was for peace, and in later years he raised funds to build the First Episcopal Church in m Upper Canada, and translated into Mohawk the Book of Com on 65 1886 Prayer . He died at the age of , and in , at Brantford , Ontario , “ ! a monument was erected to his memory . John Fiske says He was, ” perhaps, the greatest Indian of whom we have any knowledge .

N E i BROWN, JOHN, is buried at orth lba , in the Ad rondacks, a short distance from Lake Placid , on a plot of ground which the “ old abolitionist chose for the northern terminus of his underground ” railroad and as a colony for runaway slaves . It was his home for ten years . Some ten years after his burial there, the farm, which t was abou to be sold under foreclosure, was redeemed, largely f 1896 n through the e forts of Kate Field, and, in , tra sferred to the

State of New Y ork, the gift being formally accepted . A monument

2 1 1896 . was unveiled there July , The grave is near a great boulder which Kate Field said looked as if it w ere cast for the purpose ’ ” 1 . 6 from God Almighty s foundry On it, in 8 6, was carved the inscription, JOHN BROWN 1859 At the head of the grave is an old-fashioned stone originally ’ e . rected to the memory of Brown s grandfather , Capt John Brown , a “ fi s ! h Revolutionary soldier . Under the r t inscription are the lines Jo n 1 9 800 . Brown, born May , , was executed at Charleston, Va , Decem 2 s ber , It bears also the names of his three son , Frederick , ’ at Ossaw atomie i killed , and Ol ver and Watson, killed at Harper s

Ferry . The bodies of Frederick and Oliver have never been recov ered ; but the bones of Watson, after being used for twenty years as mi a an anato cal specimen in a Southern hospital, were bought by physician and restored to the family . [ 38 ] THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

“ ’ ” wn The tune to which John Bro s Body , the northern war song u of the great fratricidal conflict, was s ng was originally an old

Methodist revival air, and the words appear to have been f orm u 1861 c ui lated one evening in May, , by a ompany of recr ts quartered at Fort Warren, Boston harbor . It was more by chance than other s d fi ns wi e, and referre in the rst i tance to a recruit by the name of

Brown, who was made sport of . The boys began singing and march ing to the refrain, and that night the bandmaster, P . S . Gilmore, l arranged the music for his ful band, and the next day it was played l 25 1861 at dress parade . The fol owing day, May , it was heard in public, as the soldiers, headed by the band, marched through the

. wr streets of Boston Later, the same year, Julia Ward Howe ote her “ ” Battle Hymn of the Republic , which was sung to the same tune, b ut interfered not a whit with the popularity of the old refrain ,

“ ’ B bod i - u d rave John rown s y l es a mo l ering in the g , ” But his soul is marching on.

G E ’ BUR OYN S CAMPAIGN, as stated elsewhere (see Hud son River) , was undertaken in accordance with a plan to cut the coloni es in two by the advance of General Clinton up the Hudson and fir of General Burgoyne from Montreal southward to Albany . The st re- event of importance was the taking of Fort Ticonderoga, which

6 1777 . r wi was accomplished on July , , when General St Clai thdrew his with garrison . Crown Point had already been evacuated with out resistance . Burgoyne thereupon continued his advance toward r r Fo t Edward, going by way of Wood Creek and the Great Ca rying

Place, rather than the easier route over Lake George . His progress was continually obstructed by the Colonial troops , who felled trees is in his way and harassed his forces in every possible manner . It “ said in Ramsey’s Am erican Revolution” that it was by Skene ’ s advice (see Whitehall) that Burgoyne made the fatal mistake of n i taki g th s course, and that his advice was given solely to enable the wily Skene to have a good road cut out for him to the lower se ttlements .

a o At the battles of S ratoga (q . known als as the battles of ’ F meman s Bemis Heights and Farm, he met defeat , until his sur fi l is render was na ly forced on October 17th . It related that after the surrender at Saratoga Burgoyne was entertained with so much grace and hospitality at the Schuyler mansion in Albany that he “ ff s was a ected to tears , exclaiming, Indeed , thi is doing too much for the man who has ravaged their lands and destroyed their dwell [ 39 1 THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

ings, having in mind, no doubt , the rather disquieting reflection nl hi s that o y a few weeks before, by command , the mills and mansion of General Schuyler, at Saratoga, had been burned to the ground . hi “ Creasy, the English historian, said of t s campaign ! With out question the plan was ably formed, and had the success of the u execution been equal to the ingen ity of the design, the reconquest or submission of the thirteen Uni ted States must in all human proba b ility have followed, and the independence which they proclaimed in 1776 would have been extinguished before it existed a second 7, year .

AA ff . BURR, RON, was at di erent times a resident of Albany 1782 his He began the practice of law there in , soon after marriage i to the Widow Prevost, and there h s beloved daughter Theodosia f . ll was married Sti later in li e after his duel with Hamilton , i the fa lure of his scheme to become Emperor of Mexico, his trial il for treason, and his return from ex e, he resided in the house now occupied by the Fort Orange Club, on Washington Avenue .

A M PBE LL J D C . U , MA OR UN AN In the nion Cemetery between Fort Edward and Hudson Falls is a gravestone with the following inscription ! “ u Inveraw e E s Here lyes the Body of D ncan Campbell of , q ,

' Major of the Highland Regiment, aged 55 years, who died the i 7th 1758 of July, , of the wounds he received in the attack of the Retrench

ll 8th 1758 . ment of Ticonderoga, or Cari on, on the of July, “ In Legendary Tales of the Highlands , by Sir Thomas Dick Lau hi n der , it is related at considerable length that t s same Du can Camp at Inveraw e a who bell had once given shelter, , to stranger came to him il besmeared with blood, said that he had k led a man, and that

his . T pursuers were on track, and begged for shelter his Campbell , s his L through pity, promi ed, and swore it on dirk . ater it appeared ’ that the murdered man was Campbell s own cousin , but he kept his oath ; whereupon that night he saw the ghost of the murdered “ ! Inveraw e cousin, who pronounced in sepulchral tones the words , ” Inveraw e r ! , blood has been shed . Shield not the mu derer Still he would not give up the man whom he had sworn on his dirk to harbor, but took him to a cave, from whence he subsequently “

. ! escaped Then the ghost appeared again and exclaimed Farewell, ” Inveraw e ll ! , ti we meet at Ticonderoga a name and place of which Invera e w had never before heard . Subsequently he came to America

[ 40] THE SUMMER PARAD ISE IN HISTORY

42d as major of the regiment (see Black Watch Memorial) , and in due time learned to his consternation that the army was to attack l a fort so cal ed . His spirits fell at once . Nothing could convince him that his earthly end was not at hand . His brother ofli cers ’ knew how he felt, and on the way down the lake (see Abercrombie s Expedition) conspired together to call the point of their attack i Fort George . But on the morn ng of the battle he said to them !

. I You have deceived me t is not Fort George ; it is Ticonderoga . He came to my tent last night and I shall di e He was mortally wounded in the attack and died ten days later;

ui . Robert Lo s Stevenson (q . v ) has given permanent literary embodiment to this old legend in his ballad of Ticonderoga, naming hi the c ef actor Cameron, however, rather than Campbell, a poetic “ l u fi icense which he j sti ed in a note to the ballad Two clans, the hi Camerons and the Campbells, lay claim to t s bracing story; and they do well ! the man who preferred hi s plighted troth to the commands and menaces of the dead is an ancestor worth disputing . But the Campbells must rest content ; they have the broad lands and the broad page of history ; this appanage must be denied them ; l for between the name of Cameron and that of Campbe l, the muse ” will never hesitate .

The Cameron in the b allad went seeking the place of the name throughout all Scotland, and then having joined the celebrated hi s r fi Black Watch regiment , continued inqui ies wherever that ghting organization went . It was not until they had encamped before ll ’ E d m Cari on, on Abercrombie s xpe ition, that its un istakable accents fell upon his ears .

’ And it fell on the morrow s morning, fi fi In the ercest of the ght, That the Cameron bit the dust As he foretold at night ; f And ar from the hi lls of heather,

Far from the isles of the sea, He sleeps in the place of the name

As it was doomed to be .

- L E i CARIGNAN SA IER S was a veteran French reg ment , brought

T 1664 . to America by the Marquis de racy, Viceroy of Canada, in It was largely instrumental in first Opening Lake Champlain to the

French and in subduing the Iroquois, for which purposes it built and garrisoned a string of forts . Many of the French names from Montreal south through Lake Champlain attest the exploits of its

[ 41 ] THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

- i ff . C R adventure lov ng o icers (See Fort hambly, Chazy iver, Sorel,

. Mothe, Fort Richelieu, Fort St Anne, Fort St . Theresa . ) I CAR LLON , the French name for Ticonderoga, was so given i because the rapids near by sounded l ke the musical peal of bells .

(See Fort Ti conderoga . )

’ E T S I! E . 13 1776 CARL ON PR On the morning of October , , after the fleet commanded by Benedict Arnold had escaped from the

British and was proceeding toward Crown Point, the English, under

Carleton, mistook a rock near Providence Island for one of the

American vessels and fired U pon it . It has since been known as ’ Carleton s Prize . (See Battle of Valcour . )

E ’ D ’ CARL TON S RAI . Carleton s raid was undertaken in the autumn of 1780 in accordance with the policy of the British to ni harass and devastate the colo es at every possible point . Major

Carleton , with a considerable force of regulars, Tories and Indians , set out from Canada and proceeded up Lake Champlain to Crown ure An Point and Ticonderoga . He capt d and burned Fort ne, and d i sent out marau ing parties in the d rection of Fort Edward . He marched across country to the head of Lake George, took possession r of Fort George, and captu ed and burned Fort Amherst , which stood - near Half Way Brook (q . v . ) just outside the city of Glens Falls . A portion of Carleton ’ s forces had been dispatched to advance through the wilderness and attack Schenectady, but they contented them at selves with devastating the settlement Ballston .

I S E CHAMPLA N, AMU L DE, was born at Brouage, France , in

1567 d 25 1635 . , and die at Montreal, December , He came of a long line of fis hermen and mariners and had been educated as a navigator .

He had served in the army of France, and was accordingly well fitted by his training and experience for the lif e of scientific explora tion and adventure which he led in the new world . Prior to his discovery of the lake which bears his name, he had made several to fir 1603 voyages Canada, the st in , when he was commissioned - 1604 lieutenant general of the new province by Henry IV . In n he came again and landed in Nova Scotia, planni g a settle 0 r ment and exploring the neighboring territory . In 16 7 he retu ned 1608 to France, to come back again in for the purpose of founding a permanent settlement on the St . Lawrence . He had thus had ample Opportunity to learn of the great lake to the south before he r lli s emba ked with his savage a e , the Montagnais , the Hurons and

[ 42 ]

THE SUMMER PARAD ISE IN HISTORY

and n 1 12 by the people of France, u veiled in May, 9 . The delegation present at the ceremony of the unveiling was in all probability the most distinguished assemblage of H enchmen ever ' on this s brought together continent, consisting of Amba sador J . J . m ss and . a . é Ju er , M Gabriel Hanotaux, Marquis de Ch brun , MM Ren

n C orm on . C orm on Bazin, Etienne Lamy, and Ferna d , Mlle , Count ’ m . d E stour and Countess de Rocha beau, M Louis Barthou , Baron

. Lab lache D u e nelles de Constant , General Lebon , MM Vidal de ,

é . a . de Choiseul, MM . L on Barthou , J Dal Piaz Gir rd , Mlle Girard ,

. ] MM . Gabriel Louis Jaray, E Lane , Louis Bleriot and Madame

s m . Bleriot, and M . Gaston De cha ps IN TE CE TE E E TI CHAMPLA R N NARY C L BRA ON, in com memoration of the three hundredth anniversary of the discovery ar 4 of the lake, was held at v ious points along the lake from July

1 909. I to 0, 1 t included a general observance of Champlain 4th Sunday, July , in most of the churches bordering the lake and d elsewhere in New Y ork an Vermont ; a sham battle, pageants and

‘ u m exercises at the Crown Point forts on J ly 5th ; a sha battle , 6th and pageants and exercises at Ticonderoga on the ; parades , exercises and pageants on successive days thereafter at Plattsburg , ’ Burlington , Isle La Motte, and Rouse s Point . The Celebration was under the joint direction of the Lake Cham plain Tercentenary Commissions of the States of New York and

Vermont . The Government of the United States rendered valuable - nd ffi cc operation, a o cial representation by France, Great Britain and Canada contributed in large measure to the success of the cere monies . The two beautiful and permanent memorials to Champlain at Plattsburg and Crown Point were erected by the New Y ork State co— Commission , the Vermont Commission operating in the one at

Crown Point . The memorial at Crown Point is specially noteworthy n because of the bust of La Fra ce, by Rodin , which was presented r u by the people of France . (See Champlain , Samuel de . ) Th o gh the attendance at the ceremonies of President Taf t and the dis tinguished offi cials of all of the countries whose troops participated in the campaigns in the Champlain Valley, the Celebration thus acquired a far deeper significance than that of mere national self felicitation . ’ The Dominion of Canada sent over the Governor-General s Foot and f li Guards the Fi th Royal Canadian Highlanders , whose bril ant uniforms and faultless maneuvers added color and impressiveness to the Celebration .

[ 44 ] THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

l His Excel ency, J . J . Jusserand, French Am bassador to the U i fi n ted States , was the of cial representative of France, while the m Right Honorable James Bryce, British A bassador, appeared for fi Great Britain . The Canadian of cials present were the Honorable - Rodolphe Lemieux, Postmaster General of the Dominion of Canada ;

Sir Lomer Gouin , Premier of the Province of Quebec ; and Sir Adolphe l - Pe letier, Lieutenant Governor of the Province of Quebec . The fi s attendance of these of cial , as well as of others from other countries, brought wide comment in the press of the entire world and contributed largely to the general recognition of the ceremonies, both here and abroad, as one of the most important commemorative celebrations of the century . I T S T TI C CHAMPLA N RAN POR A ON OMPANY, the oldest steamboat company in the world in operation today, has been a continuous carrier on the picturesque highway of the lake for nearly a hundred years , although it was not always operated under “ ” fi a the same name . The rst steamer on the l ke was the Vermont , ’ u 1808 n b ilt in , the year followi g Fulton s memorable sail up the fi 1809 Hudson . She made her rst regular trip in June, , and was thus the second steamboat in the world to be put into successful “ m ” operation . She was twenty feet longer than the Cler ont, and was n - n u of a hu dred and sixty seven to s b rden, with an engine of twenty - five mi an horse power . In pleasant weather her speed was les r as hou , but at other times she was readily p sed by the sloops of the fi he . nevert lake, which still carried the bulk of the traf c She was , ul less, a decided success , in spite of much ridic e from the sailing ’

u . n craft . She was sched led to leave St Joh s at eight o clock every n Saturday morni g, to pass Cumberland Head about five in the l n afternoon , and to arrive at Burlington the fo lowi g morning , ’ which she left at ni ne A . M arri ving at Whitehall at twelve o clock

Sunday night . Her scheduled time from St . Johns to Whitehall w as - m thus thirty nine hours, though she seldo kept to it on account s of accidents to her machinery and ad verse winds . Pa sengers were warned that the time might vary a few hours according to the weather and were advised to be on hand at least two hours ahead “ ” l T rm n . he Ve o t of the schedu e had two cabins, one for ladies , which accommodated twelve, and one for gentlemen, with room for twice as many . Servants were required to sleep on the floor, and it was a rule of the boat that passengers were entitled to entrance to the hr was oom in the order in which they paid their fare, no one to “ 1 1 ” remain longer than ten minutes . In October, 8 5, the Vermont

[ 45 ] THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

w as wrecked near Isle aux Noix, her connecting rod becoming detached and knocking a hole in her bottom . Two years before this , fi however, she had satis ed several enterprising men of the feasibility

‘ a n of steam navigation on L ke Champlai , and they had obtained a charter from the New Y ork Legislature in 18 13 for the Lake Cham plain Steamboat Company . They began work on a steamer in the 1 -14 winter of 18 3 , at Vergennes, on Otter Creek, but before it could M acD onou h b e completed it was taken over by Commodore g , to form one of the fleet of warships which contested the right of the i lake w th the British at the battle of Lake Champlain (q . He “ ” called it the Ticonderoga, a name which the latest steamer of the 1 company has now worthily perpetuated . In 814 the keel of another “ oeni 1815 steamboat, the Ph x, was laid , and in she began regular

. 1 33 trips between Whitehall and St Johns . In 8 the Lake Cham plain Steamboat Company was consolidated with the Champlain i a Transportat on Company, corporation chartered by the State of

Vermont . Since that date a long list of steamers bearing names well known in the annals of American inland shipping have plied r the waters of the lake without inter uption .

CHA! Y RIVER was so named from the fact that a captain of the

- Salieres . . Carignan (q v ) regiment , de Chasy, and several com panions were killed near its mouth by a party of Iroquois in 1666 . CHE RRY VALLEY MASSACRE occurred in 1778 at the little i v llage of the same name, when sixteen hundred Indians and two hundred Tories under Maj . Walter Butler of the British army fell i upon it unawares . Sixteen of the garrison and th rty inhabitants, di k - inclu ng women and children , were illed, and seventy one persons r were taken captive and put to the cruelest tortu e . One of those

- was Col . Ichabod Alden, the great grandson of John and Priscilla

Alden of the Mayflower company . On the site of the old fort n a s sta ds a monument to the victims, and stone mark the burial place of Colonel Alden .

hi F CHIMNEY POINT . W le the rench were in possession of e Crown Point th y built settlements outside the fort , one of these being located almost immediately across the lake . After the capture s 1759 s of the fort by the Engli h , in , it was destroyed , but for year its blackened chimneys remained to give the spot its name .

C E d OBL SKILL . This settlement of nineteen families was attacke

0 1 . by Brant and three or four hundred Indians, May 3 , 778 Nine

[ 46 ] THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

ur houses were b ned, and a party of Continental troops who came t to the rescue were defeated, with a loss of six een . A num ber of the inhabitants were also killed . The surviving settlers escaped to

Schoharie, but the Indians took away all the cattle and provisions . COMME MORATIVE BOULD E R ON ISLE LA MOTTE was 1909 dedicated in , during the Champlain Tercentenary Celebration . It bears a bronze tablet with the following inscription ! IN HONOR OF THE FIRST WHITE MEN WHO FORTIFIED THIS ISLAND IN 1666 IN ME MORY OF THE SACRIFICE S AND VALOR OF COLONE L SE TH WARNE R AND CAPTAIN RE ME MBE R BAKE R EMINE NT GRE E N MOUNTAIN BOYS AND PATRIOTS AND TO C OMME MORATE THE CAMPAIGN OF GE NE RAL MONTGOME RY WHO ENCAMPE D NE AR THIS SPOT WITH 1200 MEN IN” I775 THIS TABLE T IS ERE C TE D BY THE PATRIOTIC SOCIE TIES OF VERMONT WOMEN 1909

hi CONGRE SS OF 1754 . While to Philadelp a remains the honor fi of being the seat of the rst Continental Congress , it was in Albany, “ 1 54 W o Of fi fi in 7 , to quote the rds President Gar eld, that the rst ” germ of the American union was planted by Benjamin Franklin . s The colonies of New York , Massachu etts , New Hampshire, Con n icut re ect , Rhode Island, Pennsylvania and Maryland were pre -fi 19 1754 sented by twenty ve commissioners , who , on June , , met in

Albany to consider some plan of union . For twelve days they de fin bated the one presented by Benjamin Franklin, which was ally 11th a adopted without material change, on July , subject to the p proval of the king and of the several Colonial assemblies . But it — was everyw here rejected b y the assemblies because it gave too much power to the general government ! by the king because it did not give enough . C E E E OHO S FALLS, AS S EN BY TOM MOOR . Tom Moore 1779 s ( the Irish poet , author of Lalla Rookh , visited thi 1 04 t country in 8 . He had been appoin ed to a government position l in Bermuda ; but dis iking the job , entrusted it to a deputy and traveled in the United States . Among the literary products of the tour were the lines written at the Cohoes , or Falls of the Mohawk

River, which may be found in his works .

( 47 1 THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

i a Mr . Moore thought the country mmediately bout the falls of a r dreary and savage cha acter, much more in harmony with the wild ness of the scene than the cultivated lands in the neighborhood of “ fine is Niagara . The rainbow which continually forming and l ” dissolving as the spray rises into the ight of the sun is, he said, “ perhaps , the most interesting beauty which these wonderful ” cataracts exhibit .

J E E COOPER, AM S FENIMOR , one of the best known of

s . 1 American noveli ts , was born at Burlington, N J September 5 ,

. Y . 14 1 1789, and died at Cooperstown , N , September , 85 1 . He was ” “ - the author of The Leather Stocking Tales , and nearly seventy “ ’ other stories andpublications . The Last of the Mohicans, one of the ll s most popular of a of his novel , has many of its scenes in the vicinity n of Glens Falls and Lake George duri g the French and Indian War . A cave in the Hudson near Glens Falls is easily identified as the place where the heroes of the novel were besieged by the Indians . Part of the action ext ends back into the remoter sections of the A diron a dack Mountains . The story also contains vivid picture of the ’ Massacre of Fort William Henry (q . Cooper s most important “ ” works began with The Spy, a story of the Revolution , which proved “ ” the greatest seller the country had ever known . This was followed “ two years later by The Pioneers , or the Sources of the Susque ” fi i hanna, which was the rst to be publ shed of what are known as ” - The Leather Stocking Tales . In it the novelist describes with ’ minuteness the scenery which surrounded his father s residence on L - in Otsego ake, and introduced the famous Leather Stock g , or “ “ . 182 Natty Bumppo, the chevalier of the woods In 6, the Last 1757 s - of the Mohicans, a narrative of , was publi hed, Leather Stock his ing appearing in an early age of career, and with him the Indian “ ” 1 2 heroes that made Cooper famous . In The Prairie ( 8 7) Leather

Stocking becomes a trapper in the West, where he closes his career . “ ” ‘ In The Pathfinder (1840) and The Deerslayer ( 1841) many of the “ ” s old personages reappear . The scene of The Deer layer is laid on L ” “ ” Otsego ake, many incidents taking place in the ark of Tom l hi u s Hutter, the so itary w te man who constr cts thi floating fortress n agai st the Indians .

’ In Spite of Mark Twain s definition of the Cooper Indians as s an extinct tribe that never exi ted, these novels remain one of the most vitally interesting literary products born of the storm and s s tre s of our Colonial history .

[ 48 ] THE STATUE OF AN INDIAN HUNT ER MARK S T HE SIT E OF COOPER ’ S RESIDENCE AT OTSEGO LAK E

A MORTAR A N D TABLET COMMEMORA TE THE DAMMING OF OTSEGO LAK E GENERA L CLINT ON OF SULLIVAN ’ S EXPEDITION IN 1778

THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

- hi wagon loads of anthracite w ch, in order to introduce what he ff called a new fuel, he o ered to give away, he was very nearly mobbed “ for trying to impose on the people with a lot of black stones . 1806 1 12 l In some mining was done at Mauch Chunk , and in 8 Wi liam ur i i s r W ts , a Philadelph a merchant, and h brother Mau ice, after months of prospecting up and down the valley of the Lackawaxen

THE STOURBRIDGE LION

and Lackawanna, managed to raft a few tons to that city, where it was still thought to be of little or no value . But the brothers went a on buying coal lands at from fifty cents to three dollars an cre, which subsequently formed the first holdings of the Delaware and

Hudson Company . The original charter was gran ted to the Delaware and Hudson 2 Canal Company by the legislature of the State of New Y ork in 18 3 . hi hi Two years later ground was broken for a canal, w ch, reac ng from n Rondout , on the Hudson, to Honesdale, Pen sylvania, one hundred e m 2 and ight iles, was completed in 18 8, at a cost of

This was within the estimates , and less than had been calculated the e i r by ng neers . The canal was intended almost solely for ca rying [ 50] THE SUMMER PARA DISE IN HISTORY

w i coal, which was first mined ithin the present lim ts of Carbondale . l 1827 It was carried over a gravity rai road, begun in and completed

2 . i il a in 18 9, to the canal at Honesdale It was on th s ra ro d that the “ ” fir Stourbridge Lion , the st locomotive engine that ever turned a

i . wheel on any railroad on th s continent, was used It was imported E from ngland by the Delaware and Hudson Canal Company, taken

- Pa . by canal boat from New York to Carbondale, , and the fir st trip 1829 Seele ville made August 8 , , from Honesdale to y and return . -fi e nl The first boats carried twenty v tons each , but, by e argements 44 862 s of the canal in 18 and in 1 , boat carrying from one hun dred -fi fif u fin and twenty ve to one hundred and ty tons were sed . The al capacity of the canal, with its equipments, in ordinaryboating seasons , 1 was tons annually . The canal was abandoned January , 1 i s 899, since wh ch time the entire coal and freight carrying busine s of the company has been done by rail . CE E X E D DE COUR LL S , E P ITIONS OF . The first armed French expedition from the forts at the foot of Lake Champlain 1666 i started southward in January, , to pun sh the Iroquois for their depredations against the French settlements . It consisted of three hundred of the Carignan regiment and two hundred habitants . i They lost their way through the ncompetence of guides, and on

February 9th reached of what is now Schenectady . Here they were led into an ambush by the Indians and many were k Ar C orlear illed . But for the intercession of endt Van , an influential

Al . settler of bany, they would doubtless all have been massacred On October l st of the same year De Courcelles commanded the u vang ard of another expedition into the Mohawk country, under i l l De Tracy, wh ch was entirely successfu . The vi lages were ravaged and large stores of corn and other provisions were burned, as the result of whi ch the French settlements enjoyed several years of comparative peace . D T I GE GE OWNIE , CAP A N OR , commanded the British squad ron in the battle of Lake Champlain (q . He was killed in the ffi action and buried , with the other British and American o cers who fell in the same engagement, in the Plattsburg cemetery .

’ D C I a UT HMAN S PO NT, on the isl nd of North Hero in Lake i Champlain , was the location of a British post, wh ch was maintained there for thirteen years after the close of the Revolution . It made no demonstration against the inhabitants and was finally abandoned .

Another post was held at Point au Fer at the same time .

[ 5 1 ] THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

ORTH . E E E . LLSW , COL LM R , one of the first , if not actually the fi the i is e il rst , victim of C vil War , buri d at Mechanicv le, m his birthplace, where there is a monu ent to his memory, which can n be seen from the car windows . Orga izer of a zouave regiment of Y fi - r a e n New ork City remen , though only twenty four yea s of g , ha d an l s ss r to idolatr his someas Apol o , brave tora hne , and popula y, death , 24 1 61 a a c e a fla May , 8 , fter h ving re kl sslytorn a Confeder te g from the e x his w as roof of a hot l in Ale andria as regiment entering Virginia, ild r th created the w mt excitement th oughout e North .

’ ID D LE R S E ha LBOW is a s rp bend in Wood Creek, close to the c a and tra ks of the Del ware Hudson , about a mile north of White l m a e . h r h l , wh re the strea turns abruptly to the east Here a s a p engag ement w as fought between rangers under Israel Putnam and ar fi condero a 7 a p ty of French from g under Marin , in June, 1 58, ’ while Aber crombie s army w as advancing to Lake George prepara ’ tory to the attack on Ticonderoga . (See Abercrombie s Expedition . ) Pu tnam had been ordered to scout with fifty ran gers along Wood “ ’ nd Creek a South Bay . He proceed ed down the creek to Fiddler s w m and ssi Elbow here high rocks jut into the strea , , compre ng it s k h nd d a . into narrow limit , ma e a s ort sud en curve On this he e e as e t and rect d a stone bre twork , about thirty f e long , concealed e s e s n its front by pine tr e , so plac d as to pre e t the appearance of a l O n a s . n natur growth of fore t the fourth day, at eve ing, a body of

r n e . a w as men from Ca illon , in boats , comma d d by M M rin , seen n e tering the mouth of the creek . The moon w as at its full and shed

its a ll e n . cle r, ye ow lig ht upon ev ry movement of the e emy In the s s n s dead ilence was heard the murmur of voice , a d even the ripple he t a ar s . n t hat broke round the b ge Continuing to adva ce , some of ’ s a w e d k boats had already pa sed the par pet , h n a sol ier s mus et , e r a s accid ntly st iking a stone , g ve a ring so audible, in the stillne s of

the a . n evening , th t the leading canoes stopped The others comi g — s l ff five d up , they lay upon their oars at the ba e of the c i hundre m en d s crowde together , their upturned faces di tinctly seen by the the light of the evening . They gaz ed intently at the parapet, upon h i m apex of whic , l ke a bird of prey in his eyrie, Putna was watching ‘ ’ ’ h n . his victims . The low O wis of the India stole over the water ‘ ’ and Fir l ar A moment more, the word e . broke upon their e s in startling clearness from the lips of the provincial commander . At th h and once e flash of musketry gleamed from the bus es , a shower

[ 52 ] THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

of balls sent death into the mass beneath . All was confusion ; and while some moved out from the thickest of the crowd, others replied by a volley of bullets whi ch cut through the trees and struck harm fi lessly against the rocks . The ght, such as it was, was continued during the entire night . The French detached a body of men to effect a landing and charge upon the rear of the provincials . Lieut .

Robert Durkee, with a detail of twelve men, was sent to oppose them in this design, in which he succeeded . In the morning , his ammunition being exhausted, Putnam retreated, leaving two wounded soldiers . As he was falling back, the commander was met by a party who had come out to his assistance . Before they could be recognized, they received a volley, which, however, was harmless . ‘ ’ ‘ Friends or foes , said Putnam, you deserve to perish for doing so ’ — Butler. little execution . I T E E I F RS NAVAL BATTL ON LAK CHAMPLA N . Following the capture of Fort Ticonderoga and Fort St . Frederic by General 1759 Amherst in , a small fleet was hastily constructed by the British under the direction of Captain Loring , who set sail for the north on 1 13 October 1 th. On the th he encountered a schooner and three sloops, which he forced aground on Valcour Island, thus winning fi the rst naval battle on the inland sea .

T s elled r k a FOR ANN , formerly p Fort Anne, was at fi st nown s

Fort Schuyler in honor of Col . Peter Schuyler, who commanded the ’ vanguard of Nicholson s Expedition (q . v . ) against the French in 1709 . Fort Schuyler was destroyed by Colonel Nicholson when his ’ a army retreated to Albany, but two years l ter, when Nicholson s ’ second expedition reached that spot , was rechristened Queen s Fort , 1 5 n . 7 7 and then Fort An e It was rebuilt in , and the following year

Capt . Robert Rogers fought an engagement near here with a force 7 of French and Indians under Marin . In 1 77 General Schuyler made it his headquarters for a time ; but when Burgoyne reached the ’ head of Lake Champlain (see Burgoyne s Campaign) , the Americans li l retreated to Fort Edward , fel ng trees across the old mi itary road , l s demo i hing the causeways over the great Kingsbury marshes, and destroying bridges to obstruct the progress of the invader . Later the fi British occupied the partly burned forti cations . FORT BLUND E R was the name by which for a time Fort ’ Montgomery, one mile north of Rouse s Point on the Canadian frontier , was known , because of the fact that after a large amount of work had been expended thereon, it was discovered to be on

[ 53 1 THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

‘ Canadian territory . It was thereupon abandoned till a change f rtifi of boundary gave the land to the United States , when the o ca tion was completed at a cost of It commands the Riche r t - lieu River and was designed for one hund ed and six y four guns .

It was never garrisoned, however, and though now in excellent preservation , and a point of much interest to the traveler, is entirely l out of date . The top of its wa ls may be seen to the east from the ’ car windows , just north of Rouse s Point .

T l FOR CHAMBLY was built at the foot of the fal s of Chambly, l in the present va ley of Chambly , by Captain de Chambly of the

- alieres . . 1664 . Carignan S (q v ) regiment in He called it Fort St .

ui . Lo s, but it was later known as Fort Chambly It was one of the lin e of forts built by the French as bases for their expeditions against the Iroquois .

i FORT CLINTON was Fort Saratoga, as it was rebu lt a year

N 16 1745 . after the Saratoga Massacre of ovember , The location was somewhat changed, however, to avoid interfering with some

- wheat fields which were then growing . During the night of the 17th 1 47 “ of June, 7 , it was approached by a band of French and Indians under the command of La Corne St . Luc . While the main body i m of the French were ly ng in conceal ent near by, La Corne sent forward six scouts with orders to lie in ambush within eight paces fire ul fi of the fort , to upon those who sho d rst come out of the fort the next morning , and , if attacked, to retreat, pretending to be wounded . At daybreak in the morning two Englishmen came out t fi of the for , and they were at once red upon by the French scouts , who thereupon fled . Soon after the firing began , a hundred and ff twenty Englishmen came out of the fort , headed by their o icers, i and started in hot pursuit of the French scouts . The Engl sh soon fell in with the main body of the French, who, rising from their li fir e lis . ambuscade, poured a gal ng into the Eng h ranks The English at first bravely stood their ground and sharply returned the fire . The guns of the fort also opened upon the French with

- grape and cannon shot . But the Indians soon rushed upon the l in d Eng ish with terrible yells , and with tomahawk hand rove them n into the fort, givi g them scarcely time to shut the gates behind

. s them Many of the Engli h soldiers, being unable to reach the fort , ran down the hill into the river, and were drowned or killed with - the tomahawk . The Indians killed and scalped twenty eight of the [ 54 1 THE SUMMER PARA DISE IN HISTORY

li -five Eng sh , and took forty prisoners , besides those drowned in the ’ — lvester. river . Sy In the fall of 1747 Fort Clinton was abandoned and burned by l order of Governor C inton , on the ground that the As sembly did not furnish enough troops and supplies to protect it from northern attacks . T INT i FOR CROWN PO was originally an Engl sh trading station, 1731 i but about , when Louis XV was k ng and the nations were at ll peace, theFrench erected here afortwhich was ca ed Fort St Frederic , s i i con isting of a wall of limestone, h gh and th ck, enclosing stone l - barracks, a church and a ta l bomb proof tower , the armament con

- sisting of sixty two cannon . The shores were then much more thi ckly settled than now ; a town of inhabitants being near the fort, with gardens, vineyards, stores and paved streets . It was the intention of the French to make this the capital of the new v n n R pro ince extendi g from the Co necticut iver to Lake Ontario . Ro al M a azin 1760 An article in the y g e for January, , accompanying “ i . ! a v ew of the original Fort St Frederic , says Here the French col lected their whole force, and from hence those shoals of scalping i parties, those foes to human ty, and scandal to the Christian name, issued to plunder and destroy the innocent inhabitants of the ” adjacent country . h l s The French held t is fort , in spite of hosti e Engli h expeditions 1755-56 ll 1759 against it in , ti , when the garrison , with that of Fort

Ticonderoga, retreated down the lake . General Amherst then took in ‘ 1759—60 fi possession , and began work on forti cations the ruins of l i hi which sti l rema n, and w ch, although never completed , are said to have ultimately cost the incredi ble sum of The -fi in ramparts wer e twenty ve feet thick, and nearly the same height,

li 853 . faced with so d masonry . The whole circuit was yards A broad ditch surrounded the works , and from the northeast bastion 1773 fir e a covered way led to the water . In the barracks took and

li n . the magazine exploded, partly demo shi g the fortification The fort was for a time known as Fort Amherst . 1 7 On May 1 , 17 5 , Seth Warner, at the head of a company of r Green Mountain Boys , captu ed the fort , then garrisoned by only 1 7 . 7 5 twelve men . (See Fort Ticonderoga ) In , on the approach of

General Burgoyne, it was temporarily abandoned by the Americans , and has never since resumed military prominence . The ruins occupy B l a the promontory between the lake and u w agg Bay, six miles t north of the present town, and are reached by ferry from Por

[ 55 ] THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

1 10 the Henry . Prior to March, 9 , they were property of F . S . and

W . C . Witherbee of Port Henry, who presented to the State of

New Y ork , by deed of gift, both the ruins and the land upon which “ i they stand, upon condition that they be forever ded cated to the i purpose of a publ c park or reservation , the people of the State of New York agreeing to protect the fort ruins on said land from spolia n to tion and further disi tegration, the end that they may be ”

o . preserved for all time , s far as may be They were accepted by 1910 the legislature in , since which time the walls of the buildings that still stan d within the earthworks have been strengthened and preserved by forcing a thin solution of concrete into the cracks of n T the stonework, where the origi al mortar had decomposed . he c n character of the structures has been in no way hanged, a d no attempt has been made to restore them to the form in which they m originally stood, but si ply to preserve them against the further action of the elements . On the site the State of New York will maintain a mus eum containing relics and other objects of interest recovered from the ruins . On the point to the east of the fort stands l c the Champlain Memorial , a ighthouse topped with a giganti bronz e figure of the discoverer of the lake . The Champlain Memorial and the ruins of Fort Amherst and Fort St . Frederic thus constitute one of the most interesting objectives for visitors in the whole h extent of the lake . Many t ousands of them cross each season on the little ferry from Port Henry to cli mb the mammoth works which were designed to hold the power of Great Britain secure forever upon the inland sea . D fi fi FORT ED WAR . The rst forti cation to be established on the present site of Fort Edward , at the Hudson River end of the C l Great arrying Place (q . was Fort Nicho son . It was built by ’ Col . Peter Schuyler, the commander of the vanguard of Nicholson s

Expedition (q . v . ) against Crown Point in 1709 . Upon the retreat ’ s of Nichol on s army from Lake Champlain it was abandoned . In 1732 John Henry Lydius purchased from the Indians a large section c a of land covering the Great Carrying Place, onstructed block l house and a sawmil , and established a c olony which he named i and Fort Lyd us . His settlement was destroyed by the French

Indians on their way to the Massacre of Schenectady in 1745 . In ’ 1755 . m ffi n E Gen Phinehas Ly an, an o cer in Joh son s xpedition

(q . built another fortification at the end of the Great Carrying L Place, which he called Fort yman . It was a strong , irregular, fi q uadrangular forti cation, and was not fairly completed when the [ 56 ]

THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

[ 58 ] THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

’ Har er s M a azine ! p g , said Fort George, although in a most dilapi i di u dated cond tion , due in part to the sgracef l conduct of neighbor ll ing farmers , who burned part of its wa s for lime, yet remains a

— - r o ne . pictu esque ruin of the few we still possess It is star shaped, and stands on a slight eminence in a valley surrounded by lofty ffi hills . It must have been a di cult position to carry by assault in those days . A few years ago the lake could be distinctly seen from t the for , but the pines have since grown up and formed a massive screen , as if to shelter it from further damage from the elements or i man . It is a charming spot towards even ng , a scene of extraordinary beauty and repose . The purple shadows slowly creep up the hill on lln -off sides ; the sti ess float the far crow of the barnyard fowls , and the tinkle of their bells as the cattle wend homeward ; and oe nearer by are heard the plaintive , monotonous peep of the ph be ’

l . bird , the buzz of the locust, and the cricket s creaking so iloquy

What does he care what happened at Fort George last century, if you but leave him to chirp at his own sweet will?

12 1775 C . n Fort George was captured on May , , by ol Ber ard l E ’ Romans , who had originally enro led as a member of than Allen s ll ’ Pitt fi ld expedition against Ticonderoga . He left A en s party at s e , ’ r Massachusetts, appa ently to everybody s satisfaction, and pro c eeded and alone to Fort Edward, where he enlisted sixteen men went on to Fort George; Fort George at this time was occupied hi s only by a caretaker, whose c ef duty was to assi t in the forwarding n of expresses to and from Can ada . The fort contai ed some stores,

n . however, which Romans took possession of for the Conti ental army

D 1755 . FORT HAR Y was built in August , , by Gen Phinehas

Lyman, at the mouth of Fish Creek , on the Hudson , now Schuyler t Y ville . I was named for Sir Charles Hardy, Governor of New ork , and was intended primarily as a supply post for Johnson ’ s Expedi

hi . tion (q . w ch was then advancing against Crown Point (See

Fort Saratoga and Fort Clinton . ) D ’ FORT INGOL SBY was built during Queen Anne s War, in 1709 ll ll , near the present vi age of Sti water, on the Hudson , by

C 01. Peter Schuyler . It was named in honor of the lieutenant governor of the province, and was intended as a supply post in ’ in . Nicholson s Expedition (q . v . ) against the French Canada FORT LA PRAIRIE marked the site of a French settlement on the south bank of the St . Lawrence River, above the mouth of the

Richelieu . An expedition against it was conducted by Capt .

[ 59 ] THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

1690 John Schuyler in August, , following the abandonment of ’ Winthrop s Expedition (q . as a retaliation for the Massacre of

Schenectady . The inhabitants were surprised as they were at work fi w l in the elds , but retreated to the fort ith the loss of six kil ed and fif nineteen taken prisoners . One hundred and ty head of oxen were slaughtered and all of the houses and barns outside the fort were l 1691 ’ burned . The fo lowing year, June, , Schuyler s brother, Maj . l Philip Schuyler, surprised the fort again , captured it , ki led many Al fi fi of its defenders , and withdrew to bany, after rst ghting an engagement with the French in the woods, in which about two ’ hundred of them were killed or wounded . Schuyler s loss was trifling . (See Battle of Wilton . ) FORT LY D IUS was built on the ruins of old Fort Nicholson by L dius 1732 John Henry y , who in purchased from the Indians a n large section of land covering the Great Carryi g Place, constructed a blockhouse and sawmill , and established a colony . The settle ment was destroyed by the French and Indians on their way to the

1745 . Massacre of Schenectady in November, FORT LYMAN was built at the beginni ng of the Great Carrying

175 . hi Place in July, 5, by Gen P nehas Lyman , who commanded a n ’ body of provincial troops and Indians , formi g part of Johnson s army for the attack upon Fort St . Frederic . Johnson later changed ’

n di . the name to Fort Edward . (See Joh son s Expe tion )

’ T I E u 1709 FOR M LL R was built d ring Queen Anne s War , in , at the rapids in the Hudson between Schuylerville and Fort Edward, 1 C 0 . by Peter Schuyler , who commanded the vanguard of Nichol ’ son s Expedition (q . It was designed to defend the landing at that point , and was thus an important link in the chain of posts established to relay supplies for the expedition . FORT NASSAU was the first fort built on the present site of w as 1614 Albany . It erected by Hendrick Christensen in , on Castle

Island, near the end of the old Indian Carrying Place to the Mohawk at Schenectady . Castle Island was on the east side of the river below ’ Rensselaer and was for a long time known as Patroon s Island . It has nl since been joined with the mai and and has entirely lost its identity . FORT RICHE LIE U was the first fort built by the French to r protect thei settlements on the St . Lawrence from the expeditions of the Iroquois down Lake Champlain . It w as erected at the mouth l 1641 of the Riche ieu River, in , by De Montagny , who succeeded and Champlain as governor of New France, was named after Cardinal [ 60] THE SUMMER PARA DISE IN HISTORY

Richelieu , then at the height of his power in France . It was later in 1664 abandoned , but was again rebuilt by order of Marquis de

- Salieres . Tracy . (See Carignan ) T S T G 1709 FOR ARA O A was built in , on the Hudson , nearly opposite the mouth of Fish Creek , by Col . Peter Schuyler, who ’ commanded the vanguard of Nicholson s Expedition (q . on the ’ spot where he had built a blockhouse in 1690 (see Winthrop s Ex n peditio ) , and about which since that date a little settlement had grown up . It was planned as one of the chain of supply posts in ’ E . Nicholson s xpedition against the French (See Fort Clinton . )

FORT ST . ANNE , the fourth in the chain of French forts in the

Champlain Valley, was built by Captain de La Mothe on Isle La

Motte in 1665 . It was the last outpost from which the French made their raids into the territory of the Iroquois and from which their Shenectad exp editions for the Massacres of y and Saratoga set out .

- (See Carignan Salieres . )

FORT ST . JOHN, on the Richelieu River, was occupied as a

British post during the Revolution . It was besieged by Montgomery 1775 in his advance on Montreal in , and surrendered to him Novem ’

i . ber 3d. (See Montgomery s Exped tion )

E E A n FORT ST . TH R S was the third in the chai of forts on the 1664 i Richelieu River, erected in by order of Marqu s de Tracy, f i Viceroy of Canada, to o fset the Iroquois . It was located n ne miles - . li south of the present village of Chambly (See Carignan Sa eres . )

fi FORT TICONDEROGA . The rst fort built on the promontory which so perfectly commands the southern extremity of Lake Champlain was erected by the French in 1755 to prevent the l English from entering Canada, and was called by them Fort Cari lon -b ll . (a chime of be s) , in recognition of the music of near y waterfalls 1757 Here, in , Montcalm assembled a force of men, with i E n lish wh ch, sweeping up Lake George, he captured the g fort at its head . (See Fort William Henry . ) In July of the following year the English general, James Abercrombie, unsuccessfully ill stormed Fort Car on with men , of whom were killed, ’ including Lord Howe (See Abercrombie s Expedition . ) 1759 ’ In , however, Abercrombie s successor, General Amherst, was more fortunate, investing the fort with men . The French, Bourlam ar u e under General q , by this time too weak to do other wise, dismantled and abandoned both this fort and Fort St . Frederic,

[ 6 1 ] THE SUMMER PARAD ISE IN HISTORY

. A and retired permanently to Canada fter they had gone, three deserters came into the English camp reporting the fact of the embarkation and that a match was burning in the magazine that would soon blow the fortress to atoms . General Amherst off ered a hundred guineas to any one of them who would point out the all match so that it could be cut , but shrank from the perilous ’ hi . venture . T s was at ten o clock All was silent till eleven, when a ni broad, fierce glare burst on the ght and a roaring explosion shook a the promontory ; then came few breathless moments, and frag ments of the old fort fell with clatter and splash on the surrounding

. S land and water But one bastion had thus been hurled kyward .

The rest of the fort was little hurt, though the barracks were on “ ” fire. T fi hus ended the rst act in the eventful drama of Old Ti . Af ter the cession of Canada to Great Britain , the name of the as fort was changed to Fort Ticonderoga . It w weakly garrisoned ; n and the War of the Revolution bei g well under way, one morning 1775 l at daybreak , in May, , it was surprised by Ethan Al en “ ” 5 . s with his Green Mountain Boys The garri on promptly yielded , and the fort and its armament came quietly into the possession of d the Americans . Cre it for inspiring this attack has been claimed not only by Allen, but also by Benedict Arnold , Col . Samuel Holden lil Parsons, of Connecticut, and William Gil and . It is probable that it occurred to many at the same time .

177 hi s In the summer of 7, General Burgoyne, on way down from

Canada, or perhaps, more exactly speaking, his second in command, ll i ll ffi Gen . Wi iam Phill ps , an arti ery o cer of skill and energy, placed , in spite of tremendous natural obstacles, a battery on Sugar Loaf

l . fi Hil , or Mt De ance and so compelled the bloodless evacua

fi . tion of the old forti cation , General St Clair retreating without resist i ance . Later in the same year Gen . Benjam n Lincoln recaptured fi n Mt . De ance, releasing one hu dred American prisoners and taking in - hr li two hundred and n ety t ee of the Eng sh , but failed to recover f the fort itsel . After Burgoyne surrendered at Saratoga, the English d 1780 garrison was removed and the fort ismantled, although in another English force under General Haldim and was stationed there for a time . r Today, in all this fai and happy land, no more peaceful scene lls presents itself than these old ruined wa and their environment, tw o where thousands of the brave men of great nations have died, k and human blood has flowed li e water . They have been partly restored and preserved agains t further despoliation at the b ands [ 62 ] THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

m d cend nt e a s . l of time by the Pell fa ily, of William F Pe l, who 1 acquired the property in 18 8 .

FORT WILLIAM , a blockhouse erected near the mouth of

Otter Creek, witnessed part of the bitter strife between the settlers i under the New Hampsh re grants; and those from New York . A New York grant gave to John Reid a tract four miles wide on both sides of Otter Creek , from its mouth to Sutherland Falls . Settlers hir n under a New Hamps e patent , after havi g cleared the land and ’ made roads , were driven out by Reid . Ethan Allen s Green Moun tain Boys thereupon ejected Reid and hi s party and destroyed their gristmill . Reid returned with a party of Scotch settlers and w once more expelled the original o ners and repaired the mill . Again ’ i v off the Green Mountain Boys v sited Reid s settlement , dri ing b k n mi the Scotch immigrants, burning their crops and rea i g the ll h stones, w ich they threw over the falls . The Green Mountain

Boys thereupon erected Fort William to clinch their advantage .

T FOR WILLIAM HENRY, built at the head of Lake George lli 1755 w as by Gen . Sir Wi am Johnson in , named in honor of William u I Henry, D ke of Gloucester, grandson of George I and brother of George III . It was well placed to command one of the most strategic locations on the war trails from Lake Champlain to l A bany . Here began the long portage from Lake George to the

Hudson at Fort Edward, and from here could be launched attacks over the mountain-hemmed waters of the lake against the French in Canada . The fort was of pine logs banked with sand, had four bastions , and was surrounded by a deep ditch . It stood upon a slight eminence overlooking the lake and was admirably planned to resist assault . After the battle of Lake George (q . which 8 1755 was fought September , , before the fort was built, General Johnson made no further demonstration against the French during

fi . that season, occupying his time upon the forti cations The fol 175 lowing year, 6, the works were materially strengthened and hi completed, w le the French were completing Fort Carillon, later called Fort Ticonderoga by the English . 1757 d u l w In March , , Chevalier Pierre Francois de Vau re i , ith

French and Indians, made a night attack over the ice, which was unsuccessful, though they burned everything outside of the fort , including bateaux, quantities of lumber, provisions and houses . This was the forerunner of a more determined attack conducted by

Montcalm in August of the same year, who invested the fort with [ 63 ] THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

six thousand men and two thousand Indians . The works were

held by only men under command of Colonel Monroe, though

Colonel Webb with large reinforcements was at Fort Edward , only fi ’ l fteen miles away . Monroe s appea s for assistance were ignored

his . l 9 by Webb , who cravenly kept to defences Final y, on August , ’ Monroe surrendered under M ontcalm s promise that his garrison

would be given safe escort to Fort Edward . They were scarcely ll outside the wa s , however, before the Indians set upon them and massacred a large number of the defenceless men , women and chil dren , and carried others into captivity . This single blot upon the l bright record of Montca m has never been satisfactorily explained . “ ” vi Cooper, in the Last of the Mohicans , has vi dly described the

hi s . scene with the characteristic vigor of imagination Parkman, t “ however, has given a more trustwor hy account . On the morning s after the massacre, the Indian decamped in a body and set out for i Montreal, carry ng with them their plunder and some two hundred

r . prisoners, who , it was said , could not be got out of thei hands The French soldiers were set to the work of demolishing the English n fort , a d the task occupied several days . The barracks were torn down , and the large pine logs of the rampart thrown into a heap .

The dead bodies that filled the casemates were added to the mass,

fire all and was set to the whole . The mighty funeral pyre blazed

- 1 . night . Then on the 7th the army re embarked The din of combatants, the rage, the terror, the agony were gone, and no living thing was left but the wolves that gathered from the moun ” — M ontca lm and ol e Vol. 1 . tains to feast upon the dead . W f ,

Fort William Henry was never again rebuilt , though the follow ing year saw the brilliant army of Abercrombie encamped about

- the ruins in preparation for its ill fated attack upon Ticonderoga . The site of the old fort is now occupied by the beautiful Fort William

Henry Hotel, the grounds of which include the entire area of the fi in old forti cation . The outl es of the works may be traced in the mounds of earth under the pine grove which has grown up on the

. ll spot In their center is a well, its stonework sti in excellent pres ervation , though its waters have gone dry . Standing within the

a e rthworks , it requires little imagination to picture the besieging l army of Montca m as it drew closer and closer to the walls , to hear the exchange of cannon and musketry between the fort and the

- trenches of the French, or the frightful war cry of the Indians,

e s echo d a thousand time from the surrounding mountains, as they

[ 64 ]

THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

n fell upon their helpless victims , on the lowla d to the south, Where the trail ran out to Fort Edward .

T 1756 l -on- - FOR WINSLOW was built in at Sti lwater the Hudson, on the site of Fort Ingoldsby, which had been erected there by 1 709 . Colonel Schuyler in It was named after Gen . John Winslow , who succeeded General Johnson in command of Fort William

Henry in 1756 . Fort Winslow was designed as a supply station on the road northward from Albany .

TS S IE Y . FOR IN CHOHAR COUNT During the Revolution , s Schoharie county was frequently overrun by Briti h and Indians, under Sir John Johnson , Brant and the notorious Walter Butler

Three forts were erected by the Colonists . The Upper Fort stood near the bank of Schoharie Creek , in the present limits of the town of Fulton , the Middle Fort was a short distance from Middleburg i Village , on the pla n east of the road to Schoharie Village , while the Lower Fort was the old stone church, about a mile north of

- n . Schoharie Court house, and still standi g (See Old Stone Fort . ) The settlement of Schoharie was burned and the valley devastated

1780 . in October, , but the three forts were never taken

1 2 . 7 9 n FRASER, GEN SIMON ( in comma d of the right ’ wing of Burgoyne s army a t Sar atoga, w as mortally wounded in the action of October 7 by Tim Murphy one of Morgan ’s rifi m n s e e , in obedience , it is said , to special instruction from that

fi . ! s 500 of cer Lossing says General Fra er, at the head of picked

i . men , was the directing sp rit of the British troops in action When of n the lines gave way , he brought order out co fusion ; when regi nf ments began to waver , he i used courage into them by voice and - d example . He was mounted upon a splendid iron gray gel ing and ” dressed in full uniform of a field offi cer .

Morgan , seeing how much the fate of the battle depended upon him this man , gave orders to his sharpshooters to make their target , five off and minutes afterwards he fell and was taken the field , shot l through the stomach . At sunset the fo lowing day he was buried , at his own request , in a redoubt on a hill overlooking the Hudson , li fi in full sight of both armies . Contemporary mi tary writers af rm that had he lived , the British would have made good their retreat into Canada .

1672 FRONTENAC, COUNT DE , Viceroy of New France from

‘ 169 s f firmness to 8, admini tered the a fairs of the new country with a ( 65 )

THE SUMMER PARAD ISE IN HISTORY and decision which were largely responsible for the hold which the arms of France had gained upon the northern part of the continent 17 before the end of the th century . Throughout its entire last quarter his mind and hand were behind every move of importance that was taken by the French in the historic country from Montreal southward to Albany .

’ S a FULTON STEAMBOAT, the Clermont , rrived at the foot 5 1 0 of Madison Avenue, Albany, September , 8 7 , thus completing the fi Am rst steamboat trip of any length ever made in erica, and for the first time establishing the system of steam navigation as a practical success .

FOUR BROTHE R ISLANDS lie in Lake Champlain just east of Willsborough Point , and may be clearly seen from the car windows as the train rounds the rocky and picturesque side of Willsborough as Bay . They were known an important landmark to both French and English, the French calling them by the more poetic name of sle de uatre ents I Q V . They are now owned by a New York gentle man who has made a refuge and breeding ground of them for the gulls which frequent the lake .

D 1856 l i FREDERICK, HAROL ( journa ist and novel st ,

‘ E venin Journal for a time resided in Albany, as editor of the g . “ ” His l 1777 r a t In the Val ey , a story of , has some of its most impo t n scenes in that city .

E E 1749 A N SEVOORT GEN . P T R ( a native of

Albany, for twenty days successfully defended Fort Schuyler,

l . previously cal ed Fort Stanwix (at what is now Rome, N co- against British and Indians under St . Leger, whose operation ’ with Burgoyne he prevented . (See Burgoyne s Campaign . ) His grandfather in 1677 bought the land on whi ch Stanw ix Hall in f Albany now stands . General Peter, who in early li e also served a under Montgomery in Canada, died in ctive command at the 1812 beginning of the War of , and is buried in the Albany Rural

Cemetery . A station on the Delaware and Hudson , just north of

a e a him . Saratoga, where he resided for many ye rs , is nam d fter

GATES, GEN . HORATIO, to whom Burgoyne surrendered at hi s a Saratoga, although for services presented by Congress with

hi . has gold medal, does not stand well in the full light of story It [ 67 1 THE SUMMER PAR ADISE IN HISTORY been shown that he intrigued to supersede both Schuyler and Washington ; that at the very battle of which he was nominally his u the winner , while antagonist, B rgoyne, was in the thickest of fi the ght , receiving three bullets through his clothes, Gates was two miles away getting the’ wagon trains ready for a run in case of r him l defeat ; and that the lau els worn by were rea ly won by Morgan ,

Poor and Arnold . (See Battle of Saratoga . )

E D E a C G RTRU OF WYOMING, poem by Thomas p ell 1 ( 777 the English poet, has for its subject the Wyoming

Massacre Gertrude was the daughter of Albert, patriarch di of the valley . One day an In an brought to Albert a lad of nine, Walde rave the named Henry g , and told old man that he had prom ’ i i s sed the boy s mother, at her death , to place her son under h care .

The lad remained at Wyoming three years, and was then sent to m his friends . When grown to anhood he returned and married Gertrude ; but three months afterwards the massacre took place in which both the old man and Gertrude were killed . Henry then n joined the army under Washingto . hi Campbell, in his poem, w ch is accompanied with many notes, says that Brant led the forces who perpetrated the massacre ; but hi hi t s was explicitly denied, both by Brant mself and by his biog

ra her il . . l . p , W liam L Stone (See Stone, Wil iam L )

GILLILAND, WILLIAM , was one of the most remarkable persons concerned in the early settlement and cultivation of the n shores of Lake Champlai , as distinguished from their military 1 64 s i conquest . In 7 he purcha ed several large tracts of land, wh ch had been granted under royal authority to officers and soldiers who had served in the Canadi an campaigns . These tracts extended from near Split Rock to north of the Bouquet River . Here he estab lished a settlement , and from then until the Revolution labored unceasingly to found a manorial estate . The tide of the Revolution, di however, destroyed his colony ; and he ed at last, after having sub se been in prison for years in New York City for debt, and ff e- i hi quently making unsuccessful e orts to r establ sh mself , a broken and discouraged old man . Nevertheless many of the names along — Lake Champlain commemorate hi s project the best known being l n his w Wi lsborough , after himself ; Elizabethtow , named after ife ;

B s b oro his . and e s , an early name for Westport , in honor of daughter GRE AT CARRYING PLACE was the short interval of only eleven miles between the Hudson at Fort Edward and the forks of

[ 68 ] THE SUMMER PARAD ISE IN HISTORY

A nn Wood Creek at Fort . It constituted the sole break of con sequence in the long water route through Lake Champlain, Wood

Creek, and the Hudson . During the long years of aboriginal oc cu ation -k p it was one of the best nown trails in the east, and for the same strategic reasons which made it the highway of the Indians it has been used ever since by the white men for war and commerce . ’ Colonel Schuyler, who commanded the vanguard of Nicholson s

. 1709 Expedition (q . v ) in , traversed the trail, and broadened and improved it considerably . Thereafter it alternately fell into disuse di and was reopened as the conten ng armies of France, England and the colonies surged backward and forward . Indeed, it has been ’ advanced as one of the causes for the failure of Burgoyne s Campaign l n hi l (q . v . ) that Maj . Phi ip Skene, the fou der of W teha l, advised Burgoyne to advance by way of the Great Carrying Place instead mi of Lake George, in order that Skene ght have a better road cut for himself to the southern settlements . The smooth, level stretches of the Great Carrying Place are now crossed by the tracks of the

Delaware and Hudson, a highway of trade and travel, the users of which are little concerned with the fortunes of war, save as they are called to mind by the historic landmarks whi ch line the route from end to end .

GREE N MOUNTAIN BOYS w as the name given to soldiers of Vermont originally organized in 1770 by Ethan Allen to oppose the claims of New York State to Vermont territory . When li hosti ties with Great Britain began , they distinguished themselves

n Skenesb orou h. by seizi g Fort Ticonderoga, Crown Point and g (See “ ” Whitehall . ) Thereupon the Boys were granted by Congress the r same pay as soldiers of the Continental A my, and allowed to choose their own offi cers . For a while they were practically the masters of Lake Champlain .

G E G 100 ROWL R AND EA LE, two s ps under the command of Lieut . Sidney Smith , were captured by the British in a severe

3 1813 . engagement in the Richelieu River on June , Receiving inf ormation that the British gunboats were making sorties out of n the river into the lower end of the lake and harassi g small craft, M acD onou h i Thomas g , then a lieutenant in the Un ted States Navy, in command of operations on Lake Champlain , ordered Lieutenant “ ” “ ” Smith to proceed with the Growler and Eagle to the vicini ty of the Richelieu to attack the gunboats . Smith discovered three of

[ 5 9 ] THE SUMMER PARA DISE IN HISTORY

3d the British on the morning of June , and pursued them down the Richelieu until he came within sight of the British works at

Isle aux Noix . He then turned and began to beat back against a - i head w nd and an adverse current into the open lake . “ As soon as the British were aware of the advantages these

- circumstances gave them, three of their row galleys came out from under the works at Isle aux Noix and opened a brisk fir e upon the

- sloops . As the galleys carried long twenty fours, while the largest guns on the sloops were eighteens, the former were able to select their own distance, nor could the latter come to close quarters without running within range of the fire of the batteries on the island . To render the situation of the sloops still more critical, the

British now lined the woods on each side of the river, and opened fir upon them with musketry . This e was returned with constant discharges of grape and canister, and in this manner the contest was continued for several hours, with gallantry on both sides . About r fou hours after the commencement of the action , a shot from one of the galleys struck the “Eagle” under her starboard quarter and n off k passed out on the other side, rippi g a plan under water . The sloop went down almost immediately, but fortunately in shoal water, and her crew were taken off by boats sent from the shore ; soon after “ - this accident , the Growler had her forestay and main boom shot ’ — Pal r . me away, when she became unmanageable and ran ashore . “ ” “ ” r The British repai ed the Growler and Eagle, changing their “ ” ” names to the Finch and Chubb , and they subsequently formed part of the British squadron under Downie in the battle of Lake

Champlain (q . where they were so badly injured that both vessels fell into the hands of the Americans .

- ALF WAY BROOK, at Glens Falls, was one of the important stopping-places on the portage from the Hudson at Fort Edward to the head of Lake George . During the Colonial and Revolutionary fi Wars there were frequent forti cations in these few miles, of which

- the one at Half Way Brook was the most important , as it stood about midway between Fort Edward and Fort Willi am Henry . The New Y ork State Historical Association has erected a large bronze tablet i a at the corner of Glen Street and Glenwood Avenue, mark ng H lf mh inscri Way Brook, Fort A erst , and the Seven Mile Post . The p tions on this tablet are as follows

[ 70]

THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

DRICK a l HEN , KING, Mohawk chief, was kil ed near the 17 Williams Monument September 8 , 55 . (See Battle of

Lake George . ) He was very eloquent, and had great influence over n his people . On the morni g of the engagement in which he was i hi s killed the old ch ef made a speech to warriors, which was so anim M ed and his gestures so expressive that Massachusetts ffi m o cers listened in ad iration , although they could not understand a word . He rode at the head of the column ; but almost at the a first onsl ught his horse was shot, and the old man was killed with a b ayonet as he attempted to rise . Hendrick was a great debater, and at the Congress of 1754 (q . where part of the business was to conclude a treaty with the Six Nations, he made a famous speech, upbraiding the British generals for overcautious tardiness and

i . lack of m litary spirit . A statue of himself and Gen Sir William n Johnson , his close friend, surmou ts the Lake George Battle Monu

ll Hotel. ment, a short distance south of Fort Wi iam Henry E I E ’ D E GE E H RK M R S OR R, N RAL , for troops to go to Fort

Edward , has thus been handed down , indicating that the gallant hero of Oriskany could much better fight the English than he could spell their language “ Ser you will orter yur b odellyen do merchrs Immiedietlih do ford edward weid for das b rofiesen and am oni eschen fied for

on b ettell . D is yu will disb en yur berrell from f rind Nicolas

li rc ci er. ieder li ochdob er h m To Carnel p bel nger, ad de plats, l gfizé (Sir ! You will order your battalion to march immediately ’ i to Fort Edward, with four days provision and ammunit on

l . fit for one battle . This you wil disobey at your peril From H s hh r er c eim e . your friend , Nicholas To Colonel Peter Bel

linger, at the Flats, October “ r HIAWATHA, the chief, of whom the Great Spi it was an nf ancestor, was the founder of the Co ederacy of the Five Nations . hi s if hi s fi He devoted long l e to the good of people, and nally was borne in the flesh to the Happy Hunting Grounds . The writer is

- - - indebted to As que sent wah , a member of the Onondaga tribe, an di and hi authority upon In an local lore, well known among w te men t as Edward Winslow Paige, for an accoun of the tradition which fi i xes the home of Hiawatha at Schonowe (Schenectady) . Mr . Pa ge owns the lot at the west end of Union Street on the banks of the Brunekill , upon which the castle and residence stood . He points out ” — udson S . andon to visitors existing traces of Indian occupation . J L , “ ” n i s r c i H to i Towns of the M iddle States .

[ 72 ] THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

E D ALE PA . HON S , , was named after Philip Hone, Mayor of 2 — New York in 18 5 26 . He was also first president of the Delaware s and Hudson . His bu t stands in the hall of the New York Mercantile

hi . Library, of w ch he was one of the founders G G G D HOWE, EOR E AU USTUS LOR VISCOUNT, a brigadier general attached to the staff of General Abercrombie (see Aber ’ ne f m n crombie s Expedition) , holds o o the ost u ique positions in the is w m history of the Colonial wars. H as the master ind of that ill r t e i Ar starred enterp ise, and in his death h Br tish my received a handicap from which it did not recover until Lord Jeff rey Amherst

1759 . . assumed command in (See Fort Ticonderoga ) In Howe alone, ffi nk ofall the British o cers of ra during the French and Indian War, do we find any appreciation of the Colonial troops and of the methods of e and border warfare . How had accompanied Rogers Stark upon i if a scout ng expeditions, leaving behind his gaudy un orm of British officer and wearing the less conspicuous dress of the Rangers . Con tr r un ff ul a y to the iversal custom of the o icers of the reg ar army, he gave up those luxuries with which they endeavored to surround mi ffi themselves in the dst of the wilderness, in spite of di culties of hi un transportation . He adapted mself to the conditions of the co try, and worked at all tim es to have the regular troops conf orm to those - conditions and co Operate with the provincials . By both sides he hi s th was respected and loved for ability and personality, and by e Colonial troops he was especially idolized as the only officer who realized their value . Lord Howe fell at the first fire in Abercrombie’ s advance against ul 6 1 Ticonderoga, J y , 758 . The place of his burial has been much u s Th disc ssed by hi torians . e view c ommonly accepted is that his

w as c n . body onveyed to Albany by his you g friend, Gen Philip l ’ o . Schuyler, and buried in d St Peter s Church, that stood in the e e - e middl of Stat Street . Forty four years later, when that difice his was demolished, remains were supposedly deposited under the ’ c 1 hancel of the second St . Peter s . In 859 this building gave way ’ e fi o to the present structur , and a cof n,believed to be L rd Howe s , was then enclosed within a brick wall that forms part of the f ounda tion of the vestibule . Another version is that he was buried near fi find the eld of battle at Ticonderoga . Color is lent to this by the in g of what is known as the Lord Howe Stone, which was discovered D uShane a n a by Peter , a l borer, while diggi g trench in Ticonderoga a 3 188 Vill ge, October , 9, and now pres erved in the Black Watch “ Memorial (q . The inscription on it reads ! M E M OF LO [ 73 1 THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

” HOWE K ILLED TROUT BROOK . This has led many to believe that Lord Howe w as buried at Ticonderoga . Bones found interred L with the ord Howe Stone are now buried in Academy Park, at

Ticonderoga Village . (See Boulder to the Heroes of the Four

Nations . ) HUD SON RIVER was “ The Great North River of the New M anhattes Netherlands, by some called the , from the people who s dwelt near its mouth ; by others al o Rio de Montagne, or River of the Mountain ; by some also Nassau ; but by our own countrymen —D e Laet ie er rda . ! N uwe W elt A mste m generally the Great River , , 1625 i . Its h ghest sources are found in Indian Pass, in the heart of the Great Peaks, and in Lake Tear of the Clouds , a tiny body of water nestlin g in a hollow alm ost at the summit of Mt . Marcy . In its southward journey it receives nearly every water flowing on r the eastern and southern slope of the Adi ondacks , until below Glens Falls it has swelled to form an important link in that wonderful water route from New Y ork to Montreal . From its mouth north ward it off ered during the early stru ggles of the Revolution a strategic belt , which , if held in connection with the historic highway at the

t nd i . nor h, would cut the united Colonies in two a end the rebell on The plan of the British to control the Hudso n was practically con i s e summated , but the r reverse came along the bitterly conte t d northern lakes .

NDIAN OCCUPATION . Though history and tradition hold no record of any permanent Indian settlements along Lake Cham s plain , there are, nevertheless, abundant evidence to be found that at times far antedating the advent of Champlain in 1609 the Indians for brief periods occupied camp sites beside the lake and along the hi shores of some of the streams w ch flow into it . These evidences i consist of the remains of stone mplements, bits of pottery and pipes,

- - arrow heads, and spear heads . Few graves have been found, and

- t k . there are no ear hwor s or mounds A few copper spear heads, d hatchets and gouges have been discovere , but these were all ur fi fin d s face or eld ds, no copper relics having been obtaine from any of the camp sites .

Farther south , along the Susquehanna Division of the Delaware and Hudson , chiefly in Albany, Schoharie and Otsego counties, the e Indian occupation was more permanent . A large number of sit s k has been discovered there, some with earthwor s and mounds , and many of them have yielded abundant relics .

[ 74 1 THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

Relics are still to be found by careful search at many of the places

Where camps were located . These sites, as recorded by Beauchamp “ Y ” in Aboriginal Occupation of New ork , are as follows CLINTON COUNTY L 1 . At the north end of Upper Chateaugay ake, on the east

side of the outlet . ’ On L s 2 . the west shore of ake Champlain , north of Rou e s

Point . the C a a 3 . At Coopersville, in town of h mpl in and east of

Chazy River . 4 Two sites on the lake shore at the commencement and end

of Point au Fer .

5 . r Fou sites on the lake shore in the town of Champlain, ’ i from King s Bay to the south l ne of the town . 6 On the lake shore near the north line of the town of

Chazy, north of the mouth of Little Chazy River . N o 7 sites on the south shore of Monty Bay, in Beekman

town .

8 On the north shore of Tredwell Bay, in Beekmantown .

9 A site north of East Beekmantown . ff 10 A site west of Woodru Pond , and two between it and l Lake Champlain , near the north ine of the town of

Plattsburg .

11 . Four sites at the head of Cumberland Bay in the town of

Plattsburg . C 12 . A site about half way along the outside shore of um

berland Head .

13 . One in the city of Plattsburg on the shore of Cumberland

Bay, north of the Saranac River .

14. wn One in the to of Plattsburg , a mile east of Morrisonville,

and on the northeast side of Saranac River .

l . 15 . One south of the Sa mon River at Fredenburg Falls in 1 . 6 On the shore of Lake Champlain , the town of Platts r a ff bu g, is site south of a small creek and north of Blu f Point . There are also two sites between Blu f Point

and a small stream on the south .

17 . A site is on the lake shore at the mouth of Salmon River,

close to the south line of the town of Plattsburg .

18 . A site on the west shore of Valcour Island, south of a

projecting pom t .

l . 1 . 9 A site in the town of Saranac , near the east ine It is - f south of the Saranac River, and one and one hal miles

southwest of Elsinore . - m es 20. In the town of Schuyler Falls, one and one half il

southwest of Morrisonville . [ 75 1 THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

1 l 2 . On the Sa mon River, near the south line of the town of ls s i l Schuyler Fal , a mile ea t of the v l age of Schuyler l Fal s .

2 . 2 . On the lake shore, near Valcour in Peru

23 . In the town of Peru, near the mouth of Little AusableRiver . 4 L e . 2 . Thre between the ittle Ausable River and the Ausable

25 . On the end of Ausable Point in Peru .

26 . u n On the Little A sable, half a mile north of Hark ess, near

the north line of the town of Ausable . S Ferrona 27 . outheast of in the town of Ausable, north of the

river and east of the railroad . Another south of Arnold

F errona . Hill, west of t m 28 . There is a workshop , a half an acre in ex ent , a ile north

and l . of the Little Ausable, west of Arnold Hil

ESSEX COUNTY Beauchamp states that there were no important sites in Essex county, but many traces of early and late passage . He mentions but three locations , with his authority for them .

1 . The vestiges of Indian occupation in North Elba and the territory around the interior lakes leave no doubt that at some former time they congregated there in great — nt numbers Watson ! History of E ssex Cou y . A sup t posed recent village has been reported at Nor h Elba . — ! t r oun Smith His o y of E ssex C ty.

- 2 . t E to n . Arrow heads, etc , were abundan at lizabeth w mit i stor sse ount S h! H y of E x C y.

- ni 3 . Large arrow heads , pestles , mortars , chisels , gouges , k ves ,

axes and pottery occur in the north part of Ticonderoga, “ along the creek , the flats of Trout Brook, and espe ” cially near the rapids at the head of the outlet . Recent — articles were also abundant Smith! History of E ssex

WARREN COUNTY

Warren county w as mainly a land of pas sage with many camps and few villages .

’ 1 . Toward the head of Lake George, on Dunham s Bay, was ’ a small camp, and another was located on Van Wormer s

Bay, though with but few relics . Most of these sites are Hi stor o the Town o u een bur mentioned in the y f f Q s y, l A . o n H de . by W . ’

2 . ll s Abundant relics occur at Old Bi Harri s Camp , Harri

sena . There are several small sites along the creek lead ’ mg to Dunham s Bay . [ 76 ] THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

3 . l t a and Several sma l sites ex ending over square mile, includm u l i n g Ro nd Pond and a sma l creek near it , the

town of Queensbury . Early relics and an unexplored h mound in t e creek bottom . Several sites in an area of one and one-half miles east

along the outlet of Glen Lake, in Queensbury One

small site on the south side of the lake . " L hi n . 9 arge site on gh ground, beside the i let of Glen Lake 9 A large and early village site with some smaller ones along m. the brook flow g into Glen Lake . c Two sites, historic and prehistoric, overing about six

acres and havin g many relics, are located on both sides

of the big bend at the rifts of the Hudson River . Frag m ents of pottery are scattered all over the county on . i both s des of the Hudson . SARATOGA COUNTY

A cemetery is reported on the south bank of the Sacandaga, in wn in the—town of Edinburg, but is really the to of French azetteer o e York. Day . ! G f N w N Near the mill pond on Snookkill in Wilton were early camps — or a vill age French! Gazetteer of N ew York. R F There was a site at Saratoga Village with early relics . P Early relics are found on the camp sites on the flats at — tone em nis ce o arato a . i Saratoga Lake S ! R cen s f S g . ‘ ’ P South of Staff ord s bridge on the south side of the outlet w as —t i i s . e e n a grave with pottery S on ! R m cences of Saratoga . ’ P A supposed pottery kiln was south of Fish Creek between “ ll — t the bridge and the Old Mi igan Place . S one! s r Remini scence of Sa atoga . There were camp sites along Fish Creek from Saratoga is Lake to Schuylerville . One very large one near the

mouth . There was a large camp four miles from the mouth of

Fish Creek . “ A recent camp or village site was located on Arrowhead ” is i . ll Farm This on a hi west of Saratoga Lake, a m le

south of the north end .

10. There is a large and long occupied site at Round Lake, with

early relics . There are smaller sites on the inlet . 11 flints . There was a cache of in Charlton on the east side of

C onsalus Vlaie . Pottery is found on most sites . Arrow heads occur on all plowed land from Bemis Heights to ’ Wilber s Basin . WASHINGTON COUNTY

as e Like Warren county this was a land of p sage, and many scatter d w l ! implements have been found . The kno n sites are as fol ows fi s ne . 1 . Site ea t of Cossayuna Lake with relics [ 77 ] THE SUMMER PARA DISE IN HISTORY

2 . A similar small site near Cambridge . ’

3 . Several interesting sites near Smith s Basin , south of Fort deb ris Ann , with much and some large caches of chipped

im plements . ALBANY COUNTY

Trails led from the Hudson to the western streams, and along these scattered relics are found, but there were no villages of impor

- tance . In the State Museum are arrow heads from Bethlehem, il i Gu derland, Loudonville and Watervl et, and ceremonial objects a from Albany and Bethlehem . The princip l trail was from Sche nectad l fin y to A bany, and surface ds have been made in the sand n r fields between Schenectady and K ar e s . 1 . An Iroquois castle was on an island at the mouth of the ’ s Mohawk, as shown on Van Ren selaer s map of 1630.

2 . a A large camp site is ne r the arsenal at Watervliet , one . - r1ver . hundred rods from the Thick spears , arrow heads , sm kers scrapers, net and a few ceremonial stones are

found .

Al . 3 . There was much cleared land at bany Father Jogues wrote in 1664 that the Dutch “ found some pieces of all ground ready, which the savages had formerly ” prepared . fi 4 . The Mohawks afterward had a shing place at Cohoes,

according to De Vries .

SCHOHAR IE COUNTY

- A stone heap near Sloansville was noticed by Rev . Gideon

1753 . Hawley, in Every Indian cast a stone on it in

passing and his guide did the same . The heap was four fi rods long , one or two wide , and from ten to fteen feet — mm i . Si s o high . It has been obl terated ! Hist ry of

Schohari e County. ’ A mound on Shingler s land , near the cemetery south of ll Sloansvi e, was on the east side of the road to Central s Bridge . A work hop extended into the cemetery . There s is al o a recent Indian cemetery on the same side, on ’ Albert L . Fisher s farm . This has headstones . A vil s lage site and work hop are on the east toward the creek . There was a workshop at the base of the lower Helderberg

fif . group , ty rods west of the bridge over Schoharie Creek In this are perfect and unfinished knives and arrow and — mit oni a ort 1 . spear heads S hs n Rep , 879 There w as also a workshop north and west of the depot at i Schoharie , and another west of the creek and fa r grounds . At Grovenor Corners was a recent camp by a ledge of - t o t . rocks Smi hsoni an Rep r , 1879 [ 78 1

THE SUMMER PARA DISE IN HISTORY

U 1778 as u of 6 . The ancient nadilla was burned in , a res lt ’ Sullivan s Expedition (q . and was at the junction f ll u on o the Unadi a with the S squehanna, both sides of

tl1e river . 7 . It is stated upon very good authority that an ancient — earthwork once existed near Unadilla Squi er! A n ork is tiquiti es of N ew Y . It als o stated that an Indian a monument of conical form , ten feet high , once stood — in this town B arber! Historica l Collecti ons of N ew

Y rk. . o Mr Halsey also mentions this , a mile below as a Unadilla, on the north side of the river , heap of

stones on which the Indians cast a stone as they passed . s 8 . Hal ey says that there was also a mound in which relics hi were found, but w ch was probably natural, on the

north side of the Susquehanna .

9 . A rather large village with an apple orchard was at the o - m u h of Otego Creek . Arrow heads and sinkers are f ountl

u r 10. A large site between Schenev s C eek and the Susquehanna

T . . s River reported by L Bi hop , is thought by him to b T ow anoendalou h fir have een g , the st Mohawk town on

s . the Susquehanna, vi ited by Rev Gideon Hawley in as li It is near, and a little e t of Col ersville . The

prehistoric relics far outnumber the recent, so that

there were at least two occupations . It is on the north side of Schenevus Creek and covers from ten to fif teen - acres . On the west side of the river arrow heads, - hamm er stones and flint chips occur . 1 1 . A camp site is two miles north of Colliersville and east of - the r1ver . Triangular arrow heads and broken and per e fe t earthenware are found .

- 12 . A recent site is one fourth mile south of Portlandville,

as . e t of the river . It has rude and early implements

13 . il a A small site three miles north of Portlandv le, e st of the i river, has also early rel cs . 4 1 . Early relics are scattered about near the confluence of nn Cherry Valley Creek and the Susqueha a, a mile east i of M lford . fi 15 . Early relics are also found on a camping ground of ve

i r1ver . acres, a m le north of Milford, west of the 1 - - l i 6 . Arrow heads are found on camps one ha f m le below

Phoenix Mills, east of the river . 17 . Niskayuna Rock is a large boulder two miles north of

M iddlefi l l . e d, on the west side of Cherry Val ey Creek

It is a reputed rendezvous , with some relics .

- 18 . C l An early camp is on the oats farm , one half mi e south of

R . oseboom, on the west side of Cherry Valley Creek [ 80]

HIGH ROCK S PRING IN 1845

SA RA TOGA A S IT I S TODA Y THE SUMMER PARAD ISE IN HISTORY

- 19. C M w n s a p site ith abu dant arrow head at Schenevus L ke,

a mile southwest of Schenevus . i 20. s a A small camp site l es a mile we t of Maryl nd, north of

the creek .

21 . e A camp is located on the w st side of the river, two miles li ll below Col ersvi e . Rude implements and an engraved n ban er stone have been found . i 22 . s o A large camp , three m le above One nta, on the west side,

was an early site . A similar cam p is opposite . These

are above the camp at No . 5 .

s m 23 . An early and exten ive camp is found two iles below - Oneonta, north of the river . Arrow heads and pestles a occur as on most loc l early sites . h 4 . as 2 Perfect pottery been found near Otsego, on the east

bank of Otsdawa Creek . il 25 . s A large camp has been located two m es north of Ot ego, n east of a d near the creek . T n - 26 . here is a camp on the Matli farm , one and one half miles s r north of Garrettsville, ea t of Butternut C eek, whi ch

contains early relics . 27 A camp with early relics on the west side of Butternut ’ r l M orr1s C eek, two mi es south of , is on Jerome Lull s s e n r all farm . Pe tl s are fou d on nea ly the above sites .

in INDIAN PASS is cut _deep the chain of the Great Peaks ,

M cInt re W allf ace. us s . ha between Mt y and It is a tremendo c m, upward of a mile in length, from the bottom of whose gorge the per pendi cular side oi W allf ace towers a thousand feet into the blue of us the sky . From its northern side the water of the A able takes its ’ s start for the St . Lawrence . But a few minute walk on its southern slope are found the fir st faint trickles of the Hudson . They flow m ar downward along the bottom of the gorge, for the ost p t out of sight beneath the mass of titani c boulders that have been hurled from the mountain-sides or dropped there by the grinding glaciers that once covered the country . Here and there one may reach them m by cli bing into dark and chilly caverns . They are icy cold to the

. s hand and clear as crystal To the superstitious mind of the Iroquoi , i as al w a d Ind an P s appe ed ith tremendous force . No warrior d re to be af - - caught there ter dark, for it was the home of the Go nos gwah , is the ston h giants of Iroquois fable, who lived upon hum an flesh . “ - - e—a—o There also was Da yoh j g g , The Pla ce Where the Storm Clouds in ” Meet Battle with the Great Serpents . Another designation w as “ - - — - He no w af s T I da da, Pa s of the hunders . n spite of its terrors , the s s Pa s was largely used by the Indians , as it offered ready tran it

[ 8 1 ] THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

between favorite sections of their hunting ground . Today it is one of the most beautiful and unspoiled sections of the Adirondack forest, and an objective for wilderness travelers up the valley of the Hudson from North Creek or southward from Lake Placid .

a INDIAN TRAILS . Two trails led from Lake Champl in into l the MohawkVa ley . One started at Ticonderoga and passed through s Lake George . Thence it ran acro s country, passing the Hudson not far west of Glens Falls , and proceeded through the towns of

Moreau and Wilton , turning west through the pass south of Mt . i ’ cGre or . M g , at St le s Tavern , over near Lake Desolation It con inued s t southwe t through Galway, and thence into the Mohawk

l s . hi Va ley, a little we t of Amsterdam T s was called the Kaya drosseras Trail .

l r The other started at Whiteha l , and led thence to Fo t Edward, l down the Hudson to Schuylervi le, up Fish Creek to Saratoga K dr ak a a osser M urnin kill. L e , and then up the y as River to o g From ls L there was a carry to Bal ton ake, and another to Eel Creek , as down which the route ran to the Mohawk . This w called the

Saratoga Trail .

Everywhere through the Adirondack Mountains ran other trails, some of them scarcely perceptible from little use , while others were worn deep into the soft covering of the forest floor . They followed the banks of streams or cut through the wilderness from lake to

. m r lake Probably the most i portant was that th ough Indian Pass, connecting , as it did , the whole territory of the upper Hudson i ls with the beaut ful Keene Valley . Some of these trai have become i modern highways and State roads . Others are the logg ng roads of i l lumbermen , following l nes of least resistance and ending usua ly n upon some waterway . Even the hunti g trails are still kept open ini in some places , their twists and turns marked for the un tiated ’ - by blazes upon the trees . The abrasions of steel studded campers shoes make them eas ier to follow than of old .

s IRON DAM . The scene of one of the earlie t attempts to wrest fortunes from the heart of the Adirondack wilderness is located at the foot of Indian Pass , between Lake Henderson and nf 1 2 n s Lake Sa ord . In 8 6 an old Indian of the Sai t Franci tribe, Sab ele named , approached David Henderson , one of the proprietors

- of an iron works at North Elba, on the Ausable, and showed him - a a lump of high grade iron ore, saying that he obt ined it where e water ran over an iron dam . He thereupon took Mr . H nderson

182 1 THE SUMMER PARA DISE IN HISTORY

n r and a party to a poi t just below Lake Hende son, where the outlet of the lake ran over a dam of rich iron ore on its way to Lake Sanford . his s Mr . Henderson and a sociates subsequently erected extensive - ffi iron works at the spot . The di culties of transportation, however, fif l ty miles through the wi derness to Lake Champlain, were too great , and upon the death of Mr . Henderson , the moving spirit, who accidently shot himself at Calamity Pond on the shoulder M s w as of Mount arcy some years later, the enterpri e abandoned , ll M cInt re though the property is sti held by the y Iron Works . in lif i hi - Now the ru ed furnaces t the r c mneys above the tree tops, objects of wonder and surprise to every traveler in that remote section of the woods .

IROQUOIS, or Five (afterward Six) Nations, consisted of the s u a Mohawks , Oneidas , Onondaga , Cay g s and Senecas , to which in

1715 were added the Tuscaroras from the south . Under their traditional leader, Hiawatha, these tribes formed a league which exists among their remnants to the present day . They occupied Y central New ork , and were surrounded on all sides by tribes chi efly of Algonquin stock , against whom they waged con l li tinual war . In the French and Eng ish wars they were al ed with the English . At the outbreak of the Revolution , while the league, al as such , declared for neutr ity, each tribe was allowed to act for itself . With the exception of the Oneidas , and part of the Tuscaroras , they sided against the Americans . The Mohawks and Cayugas

l i d . fol owed their great ch ef, Brant , to Canada, where they settle

(See Unadilla . )

a ISLE LAC DU ST . SACREMENT, the l rgest of the Mother Bunch group and the most northern of the large islands in Lake has George, been delivered into the custody of the New York State

Historical As sociation by the State of New Y ork . Originally known by another name, it now perpetuates the original designation which

Father Isaac Jogues applied to Lake George in 1646 . The Association has planned untim ately to erect a suitable memorial to fi the martyred missionary, who was the rst white man to behold the “ ” n - - - — f — mou tain framed loveliness of the Lake That Shuts Itsel In .

TTE u i s r ISLE LA MO , b lk ng impre sively in the northern wate s n has a as of Lake Champlai , just west of the Hero Islands , record thrilling with vital human interest as one will find anywhere in the a s b eside p ges of our national history . Lying quarely the highway s m through the Gate of the Country , it witne sed every pa ing expedi [ 83 1 THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

tion, and received most of them upon its shores for longer or shorter d periods . Its strategic and most frequente spot was Sandy Point, whi ch projects into the lake near the northwestern corn er of the

n . island . Here was located Fort St . An e (q and here the Jesuits 1 erected the Shrine of St . Anne and celebrated mass in 666 . Thus Isle La Motte was the seat of the first organi zed Christian eff ort in the Champlain Valley . Isle La Motte was the convenient stopping place for military and naval expeditions as well as a port for pas a hr senger steamers, for many ye rs running t ough the lake, and has and ffi been visited by civil, military naval o cers of three nations and as K a 1749 such distinguished personages Peter lm in , and q uite 1842 li likely by Charles Dickens in , and later by President Wil am — 1. M cKinl ey and C 0 Theodore Roosevelt while Vice President, and many others . Viceroy de Tracy, M . de Chazy, Bishop de Laval and others were here at various times in the Seventeenth Century . Capt . h m i r di C Jo n Schuyler, on his return from his il ta y expe tion to anada, 4 2 1 M . spent here the night of August , 690. aj Peter Schuyler in his journal describes his trip through the lake with his flotilla of 266 1691 canoes manned by whites and Indians in the year , and his ‘ ’ advance to Fort La Motte several years deserted on the 26th of

n . August, where he remained over ight Capt . John Schuyler 1 stopped near this fort on his mission to Canada in September, 698 .

This island was included in the grant by the Governor of Canada,

. m M de Beauharnois, to Sieur Pean, ajor of the town and castle of 1 1 0 733 . t Quebec, on April , I was also included in the French s d s eignory granted to Sieur Be ou, Coun ellor in the Superior Council of Quebec in 1752 . Canadians were attacked on this point (Sandy 1694 1695 Point) by the savages in or , and French settlers were put 1746 o to death here in and thers were taken prisoners by the Indians . We know not the extent of the m artyrdom nor of the savage persecu tion that has been suff ered on this soil which has been made sacred by the shedding of human blood . “ - 1775 . i In Gen Ph lip Schuyler and Brig Gen . Richard Mont r to gomery met here on thei way Quebec, where the brave ’ r o i 177 Montgomery afte ward l st his l fe . In 6 Arnold s fleet lay at off 8 19th anchor this island, from August th to August , from which ffi he made an o cial report . “ o au i w as Over at yonder P int Fer, with n view of this Point , 1775 a a o stationed , in , large body of Americ ns, and that p int was fi l s forti ed by General Sul ivan in 1776 . It fell into the posses ion of in 1777 w as General Burgoyne , and occupied by the British until [ 84 1

THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

m P e I XI c m m fro op nnocent to elebrate the ass with utilated hands, came back to Montreal . It was while on a mission to the Mohawks n that he passed through Lake George again, nami g it Lac du Saint wa at Sacrement, and stopping on the y Fort Orange (Albany) to thank the Dutchmen who had succored him . This time he was kindly received by the Mohawks ; but on his return in the following 1 46 a October ( 6 ) he was charged with being sorcerer, the Indians attributing a scourge of caterpillars and an epidemic to a chest of vestments he had left with them . They began his execution and a r by slicing flesh from his arms back , tortu e that he bore ff with such calm remonstrance as to have some e ect . While a i counc l was being held to decide his fate, he was invited to supper, di f when in the darkness an In an struck him li eless at a single blow . c m His faithful ompanion , a young French an named Lalande, w as l fi a also kil ed . Their heads were xed on palisade and their bodies thrown into the Mohawk . Since his death miracles have been o s attributed to Father J gue , and the site of his martyrdom having fi w as been identi ed , a chapel erected there, at Auriesville, on the

1884. Mohawk, in

’ of -la JOHNSON S EXPEDITION . Following the treaty Aix 1748 l Chapelle in , the French proceeded systematical y to strengthen Al their position on the frontier of New France . armed by these i s dis activities, Colon al troops from several of the province were patched against Fort St . Frederic at Crown Point in the summer lli of 1755 . They were commanded by Gen . Sir Wi am Johnson l Massachusetts had most men en isted in the venture, but out of policy it was thought wise to appoint a commander from some

w as . other colony, and Johnson of New York selected At that t time Johnson had never seen service and knew little abou war, e but he was highly steemed by the Five Nations, many of whom ni d accompa ed him on this expe ition . “ h us In July says Parkman, about t ree tho and pro

inci e v als were encamped near Albany, some on the flats abov the town, and some on the meadows below . Hither , too, came a swarm ’ — n . of Joh son s Mohawks warriors, squaws and children They ’ - n war adorned the general s face with war pai t, and he danced the dance ; then with his sword he cut the first slice from the ox that ‘ ’ r . had been roasted whole for thei entertainment I shall be glad, ‘ t wrote the surgeon of a New England regiment, if they figh as ’ eagerly as they eat and drink .

[ 86 1 THE SUMMER PARAD ISE IN HISTORY

’ in m m Johns on s second com and was Gen . Phinehas Ly an of C n on ecticut, who proceeded up the Hudson to the present site of E Fort dward, where he erected defences, which he named Fort s him Lyman . There John on joined in August and advanced to

n w r Lake George, leavi g Lyman ith a part of the troops at Fo t l Lyman . Meanwhi e Baron Dieskau had come up Lake Champlain n from Mo treal with a considerable force, landing at the further i end of the Great Carry ng Place on South Bay in Lake Champlain .

From there he advanced towards Fort Lyman , but at thelast moment changed his plans and dir ected hi s course to the head of Lake ’ . D ieska s George, where Johnson had encamped Learning of u advance from South Bay towards Fort Lyman, Johnson dispatched

hr l s Col . Ep aim Wi liams with a detachment, and the Mohawk

n . under Ki g Hendrick, to the aid of the fort They had scarcely

u left the head of Lake George, however, when they were amb shed n ni by Dieskau , and the encou ter known as the Bloody Mor ng Scout fli ur (q . v . ) took place . Other con cts occ red throughout the day , the whole series of engagements being known as the Battle of Lake

. i George (q The French forces were badly beaten, and ret red, ’ leaving Dieskau wounded and a prisoner in Johnson s camp . With u v e out following p his ad antag s, Johnson devoted the remainder i of the summer to building Fort Will am Henry, thus giving the French an Opportunity to strengthen their defences at Crown

Point and to begin the construction of Fort Ticonderoga . John son was succeeded in command by Gen . John Winslow . Thus his exp e i dition had served but to draw closer the lines of French and Engl sh , s in preparation for the campaign of Montcalm, Abercrombie and

the n . Amherst, which followed during four succeedi g years It was upon hi s arrival at the site of Fort William Henry that Johnson changed the name of Lac du Saint Sacrement to Lake “ George, not only in honor of His Majesty, but . to ascertain his ’ undoubted dominion here .

E l s JOHNSON , SIR WILLIAM , who commanded the ng i h ’ colonists in an expedition agains t Crown Point (see Johnson s 1755 Expedition) in , was one of the most picturesque characters

in a of the period preceding the Revolution . He was born Irel nd 1715 n 1738 in , comi g to America in as superintendent of the property of his uncle, Sir Peter Warren, located in the Mohawk Valley . [ 87 1 THE SUMMER PARAD ISE IN HISTORY

w Dealing honestly ith the Indians and learning their language, a he became great favorite with them . He conformed to their n manners, and, in time, took Mary, a sister of Bra t, the famous

Mohawk chief, to his home as his wife . When the French and Indian War broke out Johnson was made sole Superintendent of Aff Indian airs, and his great influence kept the Six Nations steadily from any favoring of the French . He kept the frontier from injury — until the treaty of Ai x-la Chapelle In 1750 he was a mem i ber of the Prov ncial Council . He withdrew from his position i ff 1753 of Superintendent of Ind an A airs in , and was a member of n the Convention at Albany in 1754. He also attended grand cou cils of the Indians, and was adopted into the Mohawk tribe and made ” di n a sachem . The year following his expe tion against Crown Poi t i he was knighted, and the k ng gave him the appointment of Super intendent of Indi an Affairs in the North ; he was also made a in r Colonial agent . He continued the military service du ing the n remai der of the war , and was rewarded by his king with the gift of one hundred thousand acres of land north of the Mohawk River, n which was known as Kingsland , or the Royal Grant . Joh son

first introduced sheep and blooded horses into the Mohawk Valley . ll Sir Wi iam Johnson married a German girl, by whom he had a son and two daughters ; also eight children by Mary (or Molli e) l l . li Brant , who ived with him until his death Sir Wil am ived in ’ ’ “ —Lossin s C clo baronial style and exercised great hospitality . g y t ” paedia of United S ates History.

The Indians in particular were recipients of his generosity . They were constantly feasted at his residence, and he frequently attended - i their pow wows and celebrations, where he jo ned in their dances , s f took part in their gluttonous orgie , and conducted himsel so thoroughly in Indian fashion that he earned and held their very i h ghest admiration .

J 1 k w UMEL, MADAME ( 769 as she was most widely no n, was for some time a conspicuous resident of Saratoga Springs . at m Born sea, her mother dying at the ti e, she was adopted by

. w Mrs Thompson, a Ne port lady . She eloped at seventeen to fli o cer . f s marry a British , Col Peter Croix . A ter many imprudence and indiscretions with distinguished men in New York and else

w m el where, on idowhood she married Stephen Ju , a wealthy e French win merchant . Removing to Paris, she became a leader t a of fashion under the patronage of Lafayette, spent a grea p rt

[ 88 1

THE SUMMER PARA DISE IN HISTORY

TWO OF THE EARLIEST STEAM ERS ON LAKE CHAM PLAIN

LAU CHED IN 1815 THE PHOENIX, N

“ HE IN 1825 THE GENERA L GREENE, LAUNC D

[ 901 THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

r George Prevost at thei head , to take possession of that door, only ” to be turned back at its northern threshold .

Since then , the Great Recorder of the Days Thousands has scrolled upon his golden book ; Y et still a sheet of shimmering chrysoprase ’ The great lake spreads for whom soe er may look . Behind the peaks that panoply the west Still burn the sunsets like a mighty forge ;

Still, with its voice of wandering unrest ,

The swift Ausable rushes through its gorge .

n a Slope capping slope, the awakeni g e st along ’ Vermont s broad ranges show then emerald dye ; ll r And sti , thei meadows opulent with song

s . And glad with grain , the Hero Island lie

Across the water, as it breaks or broods ,

In twilight purple, or in dawning gold, Majestic from their airy altitudes

Mansfield and White Face signal as of old .

’ ’ how soe er i For man s gen us bares or drapes,

Or cleaves or curbs by frowning height or shore, Nature ’ s sequestered elemental shapes Preserve their primal grandeur evermore!

b eaut l— Grandeur and y here the twain combine, d Clothing the—landscape with a varie veil ; Our And while before eyes their splendors shine, Let the grave Muse of History breathe her talel

— linton S collard at Cham lain Tercentenar C , p y Celebration.

K Am LA E GEORGE, the most beautiful lake in erica, is also

. o ue one of the most interesting historically Father Isaac J g s (q . is h the Jesuit m sionary and martyr, passed t rough it in 1646 while on a mission of peace from the French in Canada to the Mohawks , and having entered the north end on the eve of the festival of Corpus

Lao du . . 7 Christi gave it the name of St Sacrement In 17 5 Gen . Sir l ns h Wi liam Joh on changed the name to Lake George , in honor of t e

K . English ing , George II Cooper, with doubtful Indian authority, his fi hi renamed it Horicon , but outside of ction t s designation was A n- - - - - . l di not adopted By the Iroquois it was cal ed a ta roc te , “ ” a There Where The L ke Is Shut In, in reference to its mountain bordered shores . The fact that its thirty-two miles of smiling loveliness formed an important section of the great waterway between the English possessions on the south and the French on the north explains the location of the sanguinary events that took place in its vicinity [ 91 1 THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

- during the French and Indian War . Every mile of its mountain sides have echoed the merciless whoop of savages, and over its cool bosom s glittering armies have passed, to return crushed by defeat or flu hed i r with victory . Today its procession of vacation sts far outnumbe the armies of the past . LAKE GE ORGE BATTLE GROUND PARK comprises the di u land imme ately surrounding the Lake George Battle Mon ment, and includes the ruins of old Fort George . It was set aside as a public park by the Legislature of the State of New York, and is in the custody of the New York State Historical Association . The a and association has laid walk to the Battle Monument, has cleared hi fi n brush and opened paths in the park, thus making t s old ghti g l s and camping ground easi y acce sible to the public .

C D ON O GH Y m A U NATIONAL MILITAR PARK . I L mediately following the Battle of ake Champlain (q . v . )

r . 1 14 and the Battle of Plattsbu g (q on September 1 , 18 , a hospital was established on Crab Island , about a mile from the main ff lan d at Blu Point, to which the soldiers and sailors wounded in both engagements were taken . Both the British and American u of fi dead were b ried on this island, with the exception the of cers, the latter being interred in the Plattsburg cemetery . (See. Downie, as r Capt . George .) The island w recently conve ted into a National

Military Park, and a monument has been erected to commemorate l 1 1 1814 the and and naval engagements of September , , and the ’ battle between Benedict Arnold s fleet and the British in 1776 . nl (See Battle of Valcour . ) The shaft is plai y visible from the windows of the trains just south of Plattsburg , from the steamers of the Champlain Transportation Company, and from the porch of

Hotel Champlain .

RE e cC A . i M , JANE In the Un on Cemetery, betwe n Fort Edward and a Sandy Hill, on a spot near the entrance, marked by plain six M cCrea marble stone feet high , repose the remains of Jane , whose tragic fate has not only been a subject of many a poem, song and in romance, but, in the opinion of grave historians, had immense

fluence upon the determination of national events . Although the accounts have always been varied and contradictory, the facts appear to be as follows ! 1777 w as n w a In the summer of , Jane livi g ith her brother ne r

Fort Edward, her father, a clergyman, being dead . She was beauti [ 92 1

THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

’ 29 1813 . 184 the British at Sackett s Harbor, May , In 3, his body fi was removed from Watertown , where at rst it was buried, to

Albany, permission having been granted by the legislature to deposit the remains in Capitol Park . Its transfer was accom h l ’ plis ed amid appropriate mi itary honors at Sackett s Harbor, l Oswego, Syracuse, Schenectady, Troy and Albany, the mi itary , masonic and civic parade in the latter city being the largest that had ever been seen there . For nearly forty years the grave in

Capitol Park w as left unmarked, neglected, not to say dishonored ; 30 1883 but on May , , with another great parade, the dust of the old herowas taken to the Rural Cemetery , where the Mills Memorial , a bronze eagle perched on thirty feet of towering granite, stands as a suitable memorial to his services .

. E . w as MONTCALM DE ST V RAN, St Joseph, Marquis de, a 28 born at the Ch teau Candian , near Nismes , France, February ,

17 12 14 1759 . , and died at Quebec September , He entered the

French army when only fourteen years of age, when his unusual In 1756 as ability won him rapid promotion . he w given command ai of the troops in Canada, where he labored unce s ngly , and at fir st with considerable success, for the more stable foundation of

French authority in the New World . The tide of English deter e mination , however , had reached its flood , and the troops of Franc

9 . retreated before it at Ticonderoga in 175 A few months later , 13 1 9 l in on September , 75 , Montca m was mortally wounded the desperate assault of Wolfe upon Quebec and died the following “ ” “ day . I am happy, he said, that I shall not live to see the sur ” render of Quebec . He was buried under the floor of the chapel ’ a l of the Ursuline Convent in Quebec, where shell from Wo fe s victorious besiegers had made a cavity which had been hollowed “ ” “ r into a grave . In his funeral, said Parkman, was the fune al of New France .

’ Y fi s MONTGOMER S EXPEDITION . One of the rst plan of i in the colon sts in the Revolution was the capture of Canada, and accordance with this scheme an exp edition was fitted out under h l 7 Gen . P i ip Schuyler in 1 75 . Schuyler was taken ill, however, and the command devolved upon Gen . Richard Montgomery, an officer of long experience in the French and Indian and other l Eng ish wars . Proceeding down Lake Champlain, he captured

18 . Fort Chambly on October , and laid siege to St Johns on the

R . a a ichelieu River Carleton, with thousand troops, dvanced to [ 94 1 THE SUMMER PARAD ISE IN HISTORY

C 01. the relief of St . Johns , but was defeated by Seth Warner and a r n force of th ee hundred men , mostly Green Mou tain Boys, who had taken up a position on the bank of the Richelieu . Warner there upon erected a fort at the mouth of the Richelieu to prevent the an arrival of reinf orcements at St . Johns , d on November 3d the fortress was surrendered to Montgomery . Montreal was taken fi on the 13th, and about the rst of December Montgomery joined

Benedict Ar nold under the walls of Quebec . On the last day of the year 1775 an attack was launched against all ni Quebec . A blinding snowstorm raged day, and towards ght Montgomery approached a battery which he had failed to see in l d the blizzard, and was mortal y wounded . The army with rew up w n f the St . La rence, where it passed the wi ter, su fering with the cold, with lack of provisions and with illness . The siege of Quebec i r was continued under the leadersh p of Benedict A nold , but without avail . In the early spring of 1776 a Congressional Commission , mi consisting of Benja n Franklin , Samuel Chase and Charles Carroll was dispatched to Canada ; but being unable to accomplish any

it . thing, returned to Ticonderoga Early in June, Gen . John

Thomas arrived and took command of the army before Quebec , hi inf w ch, with re orcements that were soon received , numbered three thousand . At this juncture, however , appeared that greatest

— - scourge of the armies of former days the smallpox rendering all but nine hundred out of the three thousand men unfit for duty at n o e time . General Thomas thereupon retired to the mouth of the i a . Richel eu River, where he himself died of the dreaded dise se

li . The command thereupon devolved upon Gen . John Sul van About this time the garrison at Quebec w as reinf orced by the i i arrival of Burgoyne with th rteen thousand men , and accord ngly on June 14th Sullivan retreated with his entire army up the Richelieu

River and reached Ticonderoga early in July . di The Cana an expedition had ended disastrously, and the army off that had been brought was in terrible condition , being described “ s ed by John Adam as disgraced, defeat , discontented , dispirited , u i wi n t ndiscipl ned, eaten up th vermi , no clothes , beds, blanke s ,

di l . nor me cines, and no victua s but salt pork and flour Surely their desperate condition was poorly calculated to withstand the advance of the British southward into the Champlain Valley . w as l This advance actually begun that same summer , but the ittle

flotilla of Benedict Arnold at the Battle of Valcour (q . though itself defeated, administered such a drubbing to the English fleet

[ 95 1 THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

n n w n that the i vadi g forces retired for the i ter, until they could ’

r a u m . . 17 perfect thei pl ns for B rgoyne s Ca paign (q v ) of 77 .

. fi MORGAN , GEN DAN, and his regiment of ve hundred New iflem en l r 6 . Jersey , joined General Gates at Stil water, August 1 , 1777 19th In the bloody battle of September , in which Arnold frustrated ’ Burgoyne s attempt to dislodge the American left wing from Bemis

Heights, Morgan and his men played a principal part ; and in the fi a 7th i n l conflict , October , in wh ch the British army went to wreck, v their ser ices were equally eminent . It is said that when Morgan e was introduc d to Burgoyne after the surrender, the British general “ n took him by the hand, exclaimi g ! My dear sir , you command fi ” the nest regiment in the world! (See Battle of Saratoga . ) ’

. C . Morgan s subsequent achievement at Cowpens, S , where, with u ll - nine h ndred men and a loss of twelve ki ed and sixty one wounded, ll h he ki ed and disabled two hundred and t irty of the enemy, and took six hundred prisoners with a thousand stand of arms, is one of the brilliant chapters in the history of the Revolution . (See

E C . L MOTH , APTAIN DE LA, erected Fort St Anne on Isle a l - 1665 eavin his s a . Salieres . Motte in , g nameforthe i l nd (See Carignan ) E “ ” MOTH R ANN LEE , the lady elect , founder of the Shakers, i 1784 is buried in Watervl et , where she died in , and where the sect i a still owns a large acreage . They were the first to establ sh com h 173 munistic settlement in t e United States . Ann Lee ( 6 whatever else she was , must have been a remarkable woman . Born in f Manchester, England , daughter of a blacksmith hersel , at an infirm ar early age a factory employee and cook in an y , she married, all when a mere girl, a blacksmith by whom she had four children, nf n wn n of whom died in i ancy . Joini g a sect kno as the Shaki g

Quakers, she became subject to visions and revelations, among the latter being one that she was the second appearance of Christ “ ” Ann, the Word . Utterly without education , she began a crusade “ n agai st marriage as the root of human depravity, was forthwith

n . sent to prison, a d subsequently to a madhouse Receiving a wi divine command to emigrate to America, she did so th seven of 1774 1776 i “ her followers in , and in , at Watervliet , establ shed The ’ ” r hi Church of Ch ist s Second Appearance, of w ch , after formally dissolving her marriage relation , she became the recognized head .

But even in the wilds of Watervliet she did not escape persecution . a s She was ccused of witchcraft and , probably becau e she was

[ 96 1

THE SUMMER PARA DISE IN HISTORY

in opposed to all war, of being secret correspondence with the British . During the summer of 1776 she was imprisoned in Albany on the charge of high treason , and subsequently placed in the Poughkeepsie

1777 . i jail, where she was pardoned in by Gov George Cl nton . 1 n In 780 the society i creased largely, and branches were established Pittsfield at New Lebanon , West and other places in the East , all n i u der the inspiration and leadersh p of Mother Ann . She had declared that when she left this world, it would be to ascend to heaven k i i in the twin l ng of an eye, but th s programme was not carried out . n i i Returni g to Watervl et , she d ed a natural death, and was buried there, her grave, in accordance with the custom of the sect , being unmarked except by the plainest of monum ents .

. a d ll MT DEFIANCE, originally c lle Sugar Hi , was the key to

r . r Fo t Ticonderoga Its steep sides rise on the west of the rail oad, just south of the station for Montcalm Landing , and are in clear view from the trains . It commanded the defences of the old fort from the southwest, and made them absolutely untenable in the

ll fire . presence of an arti ery from its summit Nevertheless, it was unf ortified as left by Montcalm when he completed the fort , and w in 1 not taken advantage of by Abercrombie his attack of 758 . It was not fully recognized as a great strategic point until Burgoyne

" e 1777 occupied it in his investm nt of Ticonderoga in , and thus ’

. n . compelledtheretreat of GeneralSt Clair . (SeeBurgoy e s Campaign ) Around this mountain might be written a chapter of error and incompetency which , in the perspective of time, would seem almost unbelievable . (See Fort Ticonderoga . )

MT . INDEPENDENCE forms a point projecting into Lake

Champlain from the eastern shore , directly opposite Fort Ticon 1776 r deroga . It was so named by the troops in July, , when a cou ier Of arrived with a copy of the Declaration Independence, which was read to the troops Of the garrison by Colonel St . Clair . It was fi 1 forti ed in 777 by St . Clair .

M cGRE GOR MOUNT , about twelve miles north of Saratoga, was i made historical by the death there of General U . S . Grant , wh ch occurred July 23 1885 . It is now the site of a sanatorium maintained by the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company for the use of its agents . Y MURPH , TIM , THE BENEFACTOR OF SCHOHARIE , ’ i riflem en . was a Virgin an , who came north with Morgan s After the capture of Burgoyne, his company was ordered to Schoharie,

Murphy remaining there after their term of service had expired .

[ 97 ] THE SUMMER PARAD ISE IN HISTORY

Although acting without authority, he was practically the leader l in the desultory warfare that fol owed . He fought Indians in the

Indian way, wherever circumstances would permit . His double barreled rifle was unerring in its aim, and he boasted after the war f l that he had killed orty redskins, ha f of whom he had scalp ed . He ’ loved danger for danger s sake, yet , strange to say, never received a F a wound or bore a scar . The shooting of the British General r ser i m . . h (q at Saratoga, is attributed to His bravery at the defense r in of the Middle Fo t at Middleburg (see Forts Schoharie County) , 1780 against Sir John Johnson , in the fall of , is said to have prevented its surrender .

ICHOLSON ’S EXPEDITION of 1709 was the first important ’ move against the French in Queen Anne s War . A joint attack Al upon Montreal was proposed , one party to proceed from bany up

Lake Champlain and the other to go by sea to Quebec, when they would advance upon the French from both directions . The land

‘ force was under command of Col . Francis Nicholson, with C 01. i Peter Schuyler command ng the vanguard . The army proceeded to the present site of Fort Ann and there awaited news of the arrival of the fleet at Quebec . It was during this advance that Fort Ingoldsby (q . Fort Saratoga (q . Fort Miller (q . Fort Nicholson (see Fort Edward) and Fort Schuyler (see Fort

Ann) were built . At Fort Schuyler, Nicholson made a hundred bark canoes and a hundred and ten bateaux for his journey down

Lake Champlain . The fleet never reached Quebec, being sent to hr Portugal instead, and accordingly, after waiting t ough many hi hi s discouraging delays, w le army was decimated by sickness , s n Nichol on retreated to Albany, destroyi g all of the canoes and the forts as far southward as Fort Saratoga . 1711 Two years later , in , a similar joint expedition against Canada i was planned by the Colonies, and the land forces were aga n placed ’ in command of Nicholson , who now held a general s commission .

He proceeded as before up the Hudson to the site of Fort Ann, but had scarcely arrived when news was received that the fleet with which he was to co-operate had been w recked at the mouth of the

St . Lawrence . Accordingly he at once withdrew to Albany . Thus ’ these two attempts to invade Canada during Queen Anne s War fi ended without ring a shot .

Ro al M a azine NORTH AMERICAN PRODUCTS . The y g , 1 60 London, January, 7 , in an article describing the original forti

[ 98 1

THE SUMMER PARA DISE IN HISTORY

ns i the State to the county . It contai an nteresting collection of relics, etc . , the property of the Schoharie Historical Society. (See

C 01. David Williams Monument and Peter Vrooman . )

OTSEGO LAK E has been called Lake of the Haunting Shadows l -ni by Miss Constance Fenimore Woo son, a grand ece of James

Fenimore Cooper, in reference to the people of his virile imagin a tion, who, in his novels , frequented its shores . In an article in ’ r a a ine 1871 Ha per s M g z , in December, , appeared the following verses by her “ 0 ns Haunted Lake, from out whose silver fountai The mi ghty Susquehanna takes its rise ; 0 - n Haunted Lake, among the pine clad mou tains, Forever smiling upwards to the skies ’ A master s hand hath painted all thy beauties , A master ’ s mind hath peopled all thy shore With wraiths of mighty hunters and fair maidens

Haunting thy forest glades forever more . A master ’ s heart hath gilded all thy valley

With golden splendor from a loving breast , And in thy little churchyard ’ neath the pine trees ’ A master s body sleeps in quiet rest . 0 Haunted Lake, guard well thy sacred story,

Guard well the memory of that honored name,

Guard well the grave that gave thee all thy glory, ” And raised thee to enduring fame .

RA Y 180 fi ALMER, REV . ( 8 the rst , and for sixteen years ( 1850—66) pastor of the Congregational Church in hi Albany, holds gh place among American hymnologists . His f first e fort in that line to attract any notice, My Faith Looks Up to

Thee , has been translated into more than twenty languages . Dr .

Palmer is buried in the Rural Cemetery .

1823 - PARKMAN , FRANCIS ( stands pre eminent as the in historian of the rise, decl e and fall of the French power in America . His books relating to the struggles of France to establish her power permanently in this country have never been surpassed for their vivid and fascinating descriptions of men, events and scenes . The absolute accuracy of their data is unquestioned , for Parkman was above everything else a most painstaking historian , before whose searching inquiry no fact was too insignificant to receive the most fi minute investigation and veri cation . He went seven times to Europe to examine documentary evidence not elsewhere available ;

[ 100] THE SUMMER PARA DISE IN HISTORY he repeatedly visited the remnants of the Indian tribes still in x e e istence ; and personally xplored the country of which he wrote . e e Never robust, h becam a victim to the rare enthusiasm with which he pursued his researches, until he was compelled at last to o to im and t rely upon thers read to h , amanuenses o write from is dictation the last pages of h work . His struggle to complete the task which he had set hims elf is one of the most heroic in the history of literature . In his “Historic Handbook of the Northern Tour Parkman drew from his several his tories such narratives as are connected with n of L e an L poi ts interest on ak Champlain d ake George . There, in the beautiful style whi ch has given him unquestioned place in r r l l di literatu e as in histo y, he tel s in detai the stories of the scovery

of the two great lakes, the Battles of Lake George and, Fort Ticon e c r l r deroga, the sieg and aptu e of Fort Wi liam Hen y, and much m c e fi other atter overing the sam ercely contested region . To those who are without either the time or inclin ation to read his “ ” r r f longer works, the Historic Handbook of the Northe n Tou o fers a welcome acquaintance with one of the most delightful historians of the country .

Y PATROON S STEM , under which a large part of the region

a s 1629 . bout Albany was settled, w a established in Under its provisions any member of the Dutch West India Company who planted a colony of fif ty souls over fif teen years of age was granted land for sixteen miles along the shore of a navigable river, or eight

mi . miles on both sides, the extent into the interior being unli ted to l i Title the soi was absolute in the patroon , and colon sts were Al n s little better than serfs . though the origi al provision were fi greatly modi ed, many characteristics of the old feudal tenure i were continued till the middle of the Nineteenth Century, g ving

- — - R entism . rise to the anti rent agitation of 1839 47 . (See Anti )

1784 1812 PLATTSBURG, settled in , was, during the War of , headquarters for the United States forces on the northern frontier, and here Gen . Alexander Macomb successfully withstood a vastly superior land force of British, under General Prevost, at the time of the naval battle of Lake Champlain (q . ’ 4 General Prevost s advance on Plattsburg was begun September , 1814 6th , and the following day halted at West Chazy ; on the the i r fire British entered the village l mits , but were d iven back by the of the Americans, who were entrenched on the southern bank of the

[ 101 ] THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

. The e a two mi Saranac British then ncamped bout les distant, waiting for the approach of their fleet, which swung into view the ni 11 h mor ng of September t . While the fight on the water was r raging, the British made thei assault by land, approaching in three columns, one by the principal bridge, one by the bridge in the ll a vi age, while third, which was to cross at a ford three miles above , was led astray by a false road planned by General Macomb . The a ll ssault was successfu y resisted, and, hastened by the signal defeat v of their navy, the next day the British, lea ing behind the dead , s v ni ick and wounded, vast quantities of pro isions, ammu tion, tents , entrenching tools and ordinance stores, were in full flight for Canada .

At Plattsburg is now located one of the posts of the U . S . Army . l A beautifu monument to Samuel Champlain , surmounted by an c fi e i heroi gur of the explorer , stands in the city, overlook ng the broad waters of Cumberland Bay .

a POOR, ENOCH , at the head of New Hampshire regiment , ’ 1775- 17 6 w as in Montgomery s Canadian expedition of 7 . On the n retreat the Am ericans concentrated near Crown Poi t (q . and Colonel Poor was actively occupied in strengthening the defence at ll c ffi that post, ti a ouncil of general o cers recommended its evacua

i . fi tion, whi ch was accord ngly ordered In the rst Battle of Saratoga ’ - l (q . Poor s brigade sustained more than two thirds of the who e

s n . s American los in killed, wou ded and missing At the econd

t . battle, Poor, wi h Arnold and Morgan, led in the attack

A 1718 our strenu TN . I PU AM , GEN SR EL ( perhaps most - i 175 - 8 ous old time hero, distinguished h mself, and three times , in 5 5 , came very near hi s own death in the territory here considered . As c - aptain under Maj Gen . Phinehas Lyman, he was present at the L Battle of ake George, and afterwards became one of the leading ’ members of Rogers s famous band of Rangers that annoyed the n enemy duri g the next two years . l ’ E At Mi ler s Falls, seven miles south of Fort dward, where the a fi Hudson f lls fteen or twenty feet in eighty rods, it is recorded that f i hi s Putnam so astonished a party o Ind ans hot in pursuit, by steering hi s boat directly down the current amid ragged rocks and hi l him w r ing eddies to safety in the pool below, that they regarded - ff as God protected , and believed it would a ront the Great Spirit to further attempt his life . ’ Ro ers l While stationed upon g s Is and, opposite Fort Edward , the s fir barrack in the town took e, placing the powder magazine in

[ 102 ]

THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

ANGERS were a corps of adventurous spirits raised by Robert di Rogers during the French and In an War, to perform scout d duty, make rai s against the French, and harass them in every way l s possible . The organization was continual y on duty, both a a ffi whole and in detachments, and rendered a service as e cient as it ul i li was spectac ar . Among h s eutenants Rogers numbered John

- Stark and Israel Putnam , two names which in after years took foremost rank during the Revolution .

S A w RENS EL ER, formerly kno n as Greenbush, and by the Dutch Al as Het Greene Bosch, across the river from bany, was in two wars the rendezvous for troops . It was here that both the unfortunate General Abercrombie and the extravagant General A mherst col lected in 1758- 59 their respective armies for the capture of the ak n m French forts on L e Champlai . About a ile away from the ferry is the site of the barracks erected by the Uni ted States Govern 1812 l ment in , with accommodations for soldiers marshal ed to a defend the frontier, or invade C nada, as circumstances might ni - al require . General Dearborn , Se or Major Gener of the United

States Army, and in command of the Northern Department , had his l headquarters here for some time . Here, a so, was the birthplace of

Yankee Doodle (q .

RIEDESEL, BARON AND MADAME , were both with Bur ’ goyne (see Burgoyn e s Campaign) at the time of hi s surrender . The

Baron was in command of the Hessian troops, which formed an i a ccom important part of the expedition, and she, with her ch ldren , anied p her husband . For six days , during the active hostilities of i the Battle of Saratoga, she and her compan ons remained in the cellar of what was afterwards called the Riedesel House, opposite

Battenkill the mouth of the , on the Hudson . It was she who ten

derl l . y nursed the mortally woun ded British genera , Fraser (q hi s Af and recorded last words and wishes . ter the surrender , both she and her husband were hospitablyentertained byGeneral Schuyler, at the Schuyler Mansion in Albany, due acknowledgment of which 1800 is made in her letters , published in Berlin , in , and translated by W . L . Stone . ROCK DUNDER lifts its bare surface above the level of Lake l Champlain just southeast of Juniper Island . It is sma l in extent and at times of high water or storm is hi dden from view . From a di mi ak stance it is easily st en for a boat , and this has led to many amusing incidents which have become traditions of the locality . It

[ 104 1 THE SUMMER PARA DISE IN HISTORY is a continual object of interest to passengers on the steamers of the Champlain Transportation Company, which pass close by it u on entering and leaving B rlington at the south .

1727 ROGERS, CAPT . ROBERT ( a native of New ’ Hampshire, raised and commanded Rogers s Rangers , which acquired a great reputation in the vicinity of Lake George during the French 1756 l and Indi an War . During , with Fort Wi liam Henry as a base i of operations, he made th rteen daring raids into the country around 1757 hi s Ticonderoga . In January, , band of one hundred and i seventy, wh le scouting north of that place, met with one hundred ix i s French and s hundred Ind an , and lost one hundred men, though fi they killed one hundred and fty of French and Indians . In

August he repulsed an attack of the French, under Marin , near 1759 ff Fort A nn . In he was sent by Sir Je rey Amherst from Crown l l . wr Point to destroy the vi age, near the St La ence , of the Abenakis , or St . Francis Indians, who had long been the scourge of the frontier .

This service he performed , killing two hundred Indians, although in getting back to the English outpost his force was alm ost ann ihilated . 1758 On one of his scouting expeditions, in March, , he was pursued by Indians from Ticonderoga, and coming to the crest of a moun tain at the lower end of Lake George, at a point where it sloped w off almost precipitately do n to the ice, he took his pack and allowed n it to slide down through the snow . Then putti g his snowshoes on di i backwards, he descended by another route . The In ans on com ng i m up, bel eved he had been met by another on the su mit , and that iff e they had fought and rolled down the cl together . S eing Rogers un unharmed on the ice below, they concluded that he was der the protection of the Great Spirit , and gave up the chase . The precipice ’ o r s has since been known as R ge s s Rock . His name is al operpetuated in an island in the Hudson, opposite Fort Edward, where a block house once stood and troops were encamped . ’ Rogers s latter career was badly clouded . As commandant of

M ichilim ackinac . , Mich , he was accused, although not convicted, of plottin g to plunder his own fort and deliver it to the French . During the Revolution he was suspected by the Americans of being a British spy ; and afterwards violated his parole , accepting a com 1778 mission in the British Army . In he was proscribed and ban l ished hi . w , after which date his story is lost He was a riter as wel

fi . difl erent n as ghter His Journal has had editors, one being Frankli

B . Hough, of Albany

[ 105 ] THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

Y Y RURAL CEMETER , THE ALBAN , for which there is a special station on the Delaware and Hudson , is the resting place of n ’ i many men emi ent in their country s h story . Am ong them are

hi i . Gen . P l p Schuyler , Gen Solomon Van Rensselaer, Gen . Peter

. ls l Gansevoort, Col John Mil , Pres . Chester A . Arthur, Wi liam and L . Marcy, Daniel Manning, Thurlow Weed, many heroes of the Civil War .

ANDY HILL, probably originally named Kingsbury, was at first so nicknamed from the long sandy hill on the main high way leading north from the village . It was said to have been fas l ’ tened to the beautiful vi lage by Burgoyne s teamsters . It was 1 1 incorporated in 18 0 and the name changed to Hudson Falls in 19 0. Sandy Hill in the first half of the last century was the most promi ll nent vi age north of Troy and was noted for its distinguished men . i Among many could be named Gov . Silas Wright , Gov . Nathan el li Pitcher, Wil am L . Lee, Chief Justice and Lord High Chancellor of

- . l r . . the Sandwich Islands, Gen Orvi le Cla k, Atty Gen . John H

. C Martindale, and Hon harles Rogers . S m ARATOGA BATTLE MONUMENT, erected to com emorate ’ u the surrender of Burgoyne (see B rgoyne s Campaign) , is in the

a l i . vill ge of Schuylervi le, wh ch w as formerly known as Old Saratoga ’ n on ff It sta ds within the lines of Burgoyne s intrenchments, a blu fif three hundred and ty feet above the Hudson, and from a height of one hundred and fif ty-five feet overlooks the grounds of the r surrender . A stai case of bronze leads from the base to the top, i where can be seen the ent re region between Lake George, the Green

Mountains and the Catskills . On each of three sides of the monu ment is a niche containing heroic statues of Generals Gates, Schuyler r e o f and Morgan , while the fou th is left vacant, with the nam Ar n and li nold i scribed underneath . With the monument, ning its tw o are z i and stories, decorations in bron e representing h storical allegorical scenes connected with the campaign of Burgoyne . The - ai 7 77 corner stone was l d on October 1 , 18 , when poems and addresses m ll C were delivered by Horatio Sey our, George Wi iam urtis, James

L . Grant Wilson, Alfred B . Street and William Stone . (See Battle d Y of Saratoga . ) It was formally de icated by the State of New ork

1912 il c r . in October, , with impressive civil and m itary e emonies SARATOGA LAK E is three and a half miles east of the village of

. fi mi in t Saratoga Springs It is about ve les leng h , with an average width of one mile . Here have taken place some of the most brilliant

[ 106 ]

THE SUMMER PARA DISE IN HISTORY

George Washington, Alexander Hamilton and Gov . George Clinton visited the Springs together . The list of distinguished personages who have since enjoyed its benefits and pleasures would more fill than this book of notes to overflowing .

to Next the original Indian occupants, the ground on which the l and hi vi lage of Saratoga stands, through w ch the mineral waters of

Saratoga percolate, belonged to Rip Van Dam, who received it by l 1770 is o i un to al otment in , but therw se known fame . The first cou hten 1771 hotel was built by Dirck S g in , near the High Rock s Spring, and was occupied three year later by John Arnold of at e Rhode Island . The surroundings that tim included sixteen

Indian cabins in plain sight . Wolves howled and panthers screamed by night, black bears were out for berries in the daytime, wild deer and and moose drank from brook and lake, overhead eagles soared and built their nests in the lofty pines .

. 17 3 The first cottage owner was Gen Philip Schuyler, who, in 8 ,

- built a summer house near the Springs . At the time Sir William is Johnson visited the High Rock Spring, it said that the waters had c ff eased to flow over the top, and there is a legend to the e ect that it was because some squaws had washed themselves there that the off ended waters shrank from their polluting touch into the b osom of ll 6 fi the rock . It was not ti 18 6 that a little scienti c tubing induced Kn them to resume their original channel . owledge of the other S prings , of which there are many, has come in some cases by careful

. di searching, in others by chance Congress Spring was scovered in

1792 . hi a by Gov John Taylor Gilman , of New Hamps re, Revo lutionar in y soldier and member of the Continental Congress, honor u fir 1 of which it was named . Col mbian Spring was st tubed in 805 by Gideon Putnam, who two years before had opened the Union i Hotel, wh ch was much larger than any that had preceded it, but l ifi u t h smal , indeed, compared with the magn cent str ctures of e fi confla ratio present day . Saratoga has had many res, each g n n l resulti g in more commodious and palatial accommodations, ti l , l ike the health and pleasur e attractions which surround them , they ni are without an equal in the U ted States . The erection of an c l 1893 a adequate onvention hal , in , perfected rrangements by — l al— which the largest assemblages political, re igious, or fratern can b be admira ly housed, and many of the most important and inter esting national gatherings are now regularly held at Saratoga . All of the important springs in Saratoga have been taken over h by the State, and many of those that had failed have been broug t

108 ] THE SUMMER PARA DISE IN HISTORY

fic back to their former liberal flow by scienti treatment . They are fi now controlled by the State for the bene t of all the people , with a conservatism which will forever maintain the supremacy of Saratoga among American watering places .

SCA LPIN G was practiced by both French and English through nl out the Colonial wars . They took not o y the scalps of Indians but l those of white men as wel , and at some of the more atrocious massa cres it also appears that women and children were scalped in true of fi Indian fashion . Some the early writers justi ed the taking of scalps from Indians on the ground that it increased Indian respect

fi . for white men as ghters The custom might better be attributed, hi however, to the thoroughness with which the first w te invaders of the wilderness copied all of the methods of warfare of their savage opponents and allies . Rogers in his journal repeatedly tells of the scalps that he or his rangers took in their skirmishes with the French . fin a diflerent With a e sense of propriety, however, he adopted tone when explaining in England how the Indians waged war in Am erica . “ ” “ Theyalways scalped their victims, he said, for such is their barbar ” Am ’ ous custom . During herst s Campaign of 1759 against Ticon deroga the scalping of women and children was expressly forbidden “ ’ in General Orders of June 12th. It is the General s orders that no others i a c scouting parties or ___ n the rmy under his ommand shall, ni an or c i whatsoever opportu ty they have, scalp y women h ldren belonging to the enemy . They may bring them away if they can ; n i but, if not, they are to leave them u hurted ; and he is determ ned l that, if they (the French) shou d murther or scalp any women or l children who are subjects of the king of England , he wi l revenge it by the death of two men of the enemy, whenever he has occasion, ” for every man , woman, or child murthered by the enemy .

SCHENECTADY MASSACRE . Schenectady stands on the site “ ” of the great Mohawk castle and capital of the Five Nations . It C orle r was settled by Arendt Van Curler, or a , from whom Lake ’

C orlear s . I Champlain received one of its early names, Lake n 1 90 February, 6 , a party of one hundred French and as many Indians, “ ” K r n the latter under the leadership of y , The Great Mohawk, all being sent southward from Quebec by Frontenac, approached the town at midnight, on snowshoes , in the midst of a driving snow storm , entered without being discovered, awoke the two hundred

fi - and fty inhabitants with the war whoop , killed sixty on the spot, c - aptured ninety, and of the sixty six houses burned all but six . [ 109 ] THE SUMMER PARAD ISE IN HISTORY

“ ” The following ballad of the period, according to the expressed wish of the writer, supposed to have been a member of the garrison

a . at Albany, has stayed on earth long fter he is dead “ 1s A Ballad , in which set forth the horrid cruelties practiced by the French and Indians on the night of the 8th of the last l n February . The which I did compose last night the space of am w u one hour ; and now riting, the morning of Friday, J ne

12th 1690.

God prosper long our king and queen , Our lives and saf etl es all ; A sad misfortune once there did

Schenectady befall . From forth the woods of Canada r The Frenchmen took thei way, The people of Schenectady

To captivate and slay. They marched for two and twenty daies A ll through the deepest snow; And on a dismal winter ni ght k They struc e the cruel b ow . The lightsome sun that rules the day Had gone down ln the west ; And eke the drow sie villagers

Had sought and found their reste . They thought they were in saf tie And dream pt not of the foe ; But att midnight they all awoke

In wonderment and woe . For they were in their pleasant beddes n li And sou de e sleeping, when Each door was sudden Open broke

By six or seven men .

The men and women , younge and olde,

And eke the girls and boys, f All started up in great a fright,

Att the alarming noise . ’ Theyy then were m urther d ln their beddes Without shame or remorse ; And soone the floors and street were strewed in With many a bleed g corse .

The village soon began to blaze, ’ hi shew d W ch the horrid sight, l But , O , I scarce can beare to te l ’ mi i The s r es of that night . i n They threw the infants the fire,

The men they did not spare , But killed all which they could find ’ Though aged or tho fair . [ 110]

THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY born at Albany in 1733,and active in the French and Indian War and in the Revolution . In the latter he organized the expedition n which was to proceed against Canada by way of Lake Champlai , but was forced by illness to turn overthe command to General Mont f gomery . A ter the evacuation of Ticonderoga by St . Clair, he was accused of neglect of duty and himself demanded a full and complete - al trial by court marti . He was finally acquitted of every charge fi with the highest honor, and this acquittal was con rmed by Congress . i His daughter El zabeth married Alexander Hamilton . The Schuyler mansion stood at the head of Schuyler Street in hi s Albany, and it was in t house that Lafayette, Baron Steuben , l s Benjamin Frank in , and many other notable person were enter tained , among them being Burgoyne, who came there as a prisoner s after the surrender at Saratoga . It was at thi house , in the summer

178 1 d . h of , that Canadians and Indians plotte to abduct Gen P ilip Schuyler and carry him from his home in Albany to Canada for ransom . The house was surrounded with armed men, but the

General had been warned, and barring and fastening the doors, the family rushed upstairs, only to remember at the last moment that the infant daughter had been left sleeping in her cradle in the nursery . as The mother w flying to its rescue, but the General held her back , h as the doors were giving way . Thereupon her t ird daughter (after s of - ward wife the last Patroon) rushed down stairs, caught up the o a infant and bore it ff in safety . As she ran , an Indi n hurled his ’ tomahawk , which cuther dress, within a few inches of the child s head,

- and struck the stair rail at the lower turn , the cut being visible today .

Frightened by the supposed approach of assistance from town, the off i marauders beat a retreat, carrying noth ng of greater value than ’ the General s silver .

Y ai SCHU LER ISLAND , in Lake Champl n , on the northeastern

C orlear ' side of or Douglas Bay, is in full view from the car windows as the train winds around the beautiful shores of the bay . It is i bel eved to have derived its name from the fact that Gen . Philip

Schuyler encamped there several days on an exp edition to Canada . After Arnold’ s battle with the British fleet under Carleton (see Battle of Valcour) , and when he had slipped away from Carleton in the darkness , he repaired some of his vessels, which were in sinking con dition, in the shelter of this island .

ofli cers SOREL, CAPTAIN DE , was one of the of the Carignan Salieres (q . v . ) regiment sent by Marquis de Tracy in 1660 to build

[ 1 12 1 s s Heber Sc l or lla n a nd Beo del A rc hitec ts Ca rl A u u tu , u p t D illon, M cLe , g

CHA M PLA IN M EM ORIA L A T PLA TTSBURG THE DEEP CLEFT OF SPLIT ROCK SEPA RA TED IROQUOI S FROM A LGONQUIN S A ND THE C OLONIES FROM CA NA DA

THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

Stark fir st saw active service when he became a lieutenant in ’ ers s 1755 Rog Rangers in , though he had had much experience in the hi wilderness before t s as a hunter, trapper and pioneer and as a

a . captive for short period among the St Francis Indians on the St .

Lawrence . Indeed , so quick had he been to exhibit those virtues most admired by the Indians that he was given considerable freedom his fi l by captors, and was nal y adopted into the tribe as one of its members . i Throughout the records of the French and Ind an War, from 1759 ’ 1755 to , Stark s name recurs with unusual frequency, both in di m i the reports of scouting expe tions , and in the al ost equally excit ng accounts of the fortified camps . It is recorded that the attack of

Vaudreuil on Fort William Henry (q . in the early morning of 7 March 18 , 175 , was repulsed solely because of the vigilance of ’ Stark . On the eve of St . Patrick s Day Stark had overheard members w as of an Irish regiment, with which the fort garrisoned, planning ll n their celebration for the fo owi g day . He thereupon issued orders to the sutler that no rum should be given to the Rangers under hi s ’ com mand on St . Patrick s Day without his written order . Stark r hi s then reti ed, and instructed orderly to say to all applicants that l his hand was lame and he cou d issue no orders . The Rangers were thus reluctantly obliged to look on at the celebration of the Irish

lls . regiment, and incidentally to mount guard upon the wa of the fort u his Anticipating just such a celebration, Vaudre il had planned fir attack for that night . He found the Rangers waiting at the st

all . assault, and Stark among them, lameness gone from his hand 1 57 On another occasion, in January , 7 , when a party of Rangers had retreated before a superior force of the French and had reached il l the ice on Lake George, about forty m es from Fort Wil iam ;Henry, Stark volunteered to proceed to the fort on snowshoes and return ni w ith sleighs for the wounded . All the preceding day and ght he had undergone the most severe exertion , in action and during the li retreat . Nevertheless he covered the forty miles to Fort Wil am his m Henry by evening, and returned to co rades with sleighs and a f n rein orci g party early the next morning .

’ Stark s most memorable service in the Revolution w asthe defeat of a detachment of British and Hessians under Colonel Baum, which had been sent by Burgoyne from Saratoga to seize suppli es located ni at Ben ngton . Stark rallied a strong force of volunteers and in a severe engagement defeated and captured the British and Hessian detachment . His defeat of Baum was largely responsible for the

[ 114 ] THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

’ failure of Burgoyne s Campaign (q . Stark was subsequently

- appointed a brigadier general m the Colonial army and was pla ced mm hi in co and of the Northern Department, w ch in cluded Lake ak a George and L e Ch mplain, the scene of the memorable exploits f of hi s earlier li e .

E R 18 STEV NSON, OBERT LOUIS ( 50 the best loved ” — hs 1887 88 r a writer of his time, spent several mont in at Sa an c Lake, dir m ak in the A ondacks, ing the brave fight for lif e which he kept l - up uncomplainingly ti l the end came in far away Samoa . The his close of one of most powerful and characteristic novels, The ” l ai Master of Bal antrae is l d in the country north of Albany . His ballad of Ticonderoga is one of the real literary products of

i a . C l that h storic pl ce (See ampbe l, Major Duncan . )

E . 1792 w STON , WILLIAM L ( was a ne spaper writer and historian who paid much attention to events and individuals con nected with Colonial life and the Revolution ; and to him the world is indebted for the truth in regard to many things about which i “ there had been much m sstatement . Among hi s works are ! Border ” “ ” “ an Wars of the American Revolution , Life of Joseph Br t, Life ” “ ” “ is of Red Jacket , Poetry and H tory of Wyoming, Uncas and ” M i m i nl a l antono ah. H s o y son and names ke who fo lowed ’ his closely in his father s footsteps, delivered the torical address

- at the laying of the corner stone of the Saratoga monument, and “ ” “ n i ll wrote Life a d T mes of Sir Wi iam Johnson , Letters and Jour ” “ l el . s r n s of Mrs General Riede el, Life and Mi ita y Journals of ” “ ” - al s ni Major Gener Riede el, Remi scences of Saratoga and Ballston , ” and Ballads of the Burgoyn e Campai gn . A tablet to his memory was unveiled by his family at the dedication ceremonies of the in 1 monument, October, 19 2 .

’ SULLIVAN S EXPEDITION was dispatched in 1778 to chas tise the Senecas and Tories of western New Y ork for their atrocities in n the Wyoming Valley . Gen . James Cli ton, brother of Governor

Clinton , and father of DeWitt Clinton, who had been for some time in m Al lli com and at bany, was ordered to join Su van at Tioga Point, on ul 17th the Susquehanna River . He reached Lake Otsego J y , but, fi l his nding the outlet too sha low for purpose, proceeded to dam the ai water, thereby r sing the lake at least two feet . Meantime the ad ll th t brig e remained in Cooperstown ti August 8 , when the boa s ns e were tra ferr d to the stream , and the invalids , baggage and pro a e visions lo d d thereon . The remainder of the soldiers prepared to

[ 115 1 THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

. T ff march on both sides he surplus water was cautiously drawn o , and with the overflow thus aff orded the flotilla was carried over l hin - shoa s and flats, reac g Tioga Point in time to c o operate with li and of ewtown no Sul van win the Battle N ( w Elmira) . The all Indians were defeated with great loss, resistance on their part

ru s . was c shed, and their ettlements were destroyed i SUSQUEHANNA TRAIL . The tra ls which followed the Sus q uehanna and branches formed the great route to the south and Y west from central New ork . Into the most distant regions the hi tribes of the Iroquois, from the earliest ages, have gone over t s hi i di u ghway of their own bu l ng for purposes of war, pl nder and hi pleasure . Along the banks of t s stream trails had been deeply ’ hi ’ worn by red men s feet . In many cases the w te men s roads were i i actually bu lt by widen ng the trails , as was the case with the present di l road from Sidney to Una l a, on the north side of the river, and the main thoroughf are to Oneonta . An Indi an trail was from twelve

- oi a to eighteen inches wide, and often worn to a depth foot where the soil yielded . In time of war , trained runners were employed to ” carry messages . One Indian could run one hundred miles a day . “ ” —Hal e s y, i n Old N ew York Frontier .

0

E LE GRA PH CE , BIRTHPLA OF THE . In the upper rooms 1826 1832 of the Albany Academy, Joseph Henry, from to one fi of its teachers , rst demonstrated the principle of the magnetic telegraph in transmitting intelligence by ringing a bell through a mile of wir e strung around the room . Morse subsequently invented n k a code of signals and the machi e for ma ing them, and the thing “ was done . The click heard from every joint of those mystic wires which now link together every city and village all over thi s continent is but the echo of that little bell which first sounded in the upper ” room of the A lbany Academy .

NA D ILLA was the place where the last attempt was made to prevent the Six Nations from joinin g hands with the Englis h against the Americans in the Revolution . A conference was held there 1777 w 380 in July, , between General Herkimer, who came on ith

130 . militia, and Chief Joseph Brant , at the head of warriors After a long talk Brant refused to remain at peace . He declared that r the Indi ans were in concert with the King, as thei fathers and ’ grandf athers had been ; that the King s belts were yet lodged with [ 116 ]

THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

. in ak Rock (q L e Champlain , afterward known to the Dutch ’ rl as C o ear s Lake .

VAN RENSSELAER, GEN . SOLOMON (1774 who is “ buried in the Rural Cemetery (q . was with Mad Anthony 1 4 Wayne at the Battle of Maumee Rapids, August, 79 , and was “ ” . l . Y ou shot through the lungs He refused a itter young dog, “ ? ” “ exclaimed Wayne, how are you going I am an officer of the ” “ ” “ cavalry, was the reply, and I go on horseback . You will ” “ . drop by the road , said Wayne If I do, just cover me up, and let ” me die there . He had his way, rode six miles supported on either side by a dragoon, and lived to lead the attack at Queenston Heights, 13 1812 October , , when he was again severely wounded . He w as afterwards postmaster at Albany, and served in Congress . His brother Nicholas, a colonel in the Revolution, was despatched by General Gates to carry the news of the surrender of Burgoyne to

VAN SCHA ICK ’ S ISLAND is one of the three in the Hudson 1777 at the mouth of the Mohawk , where, in the summer of , General Schuyler cast up fortifi cations to dispute with Burgoyne the passage

f ar . of that river, should he ever get that The earthworks are visible ’ from the car windows . (See Burgoyne s Campaign, and Hudson

River . )

VROOMAN, COL . PETER , commanded the Middle Fort in ’ ’ u Schoharie county d ring Johnson s and Brant s invasion in October, 1780 . He was prominent in all the border warfare of this section e throughout the Revolution, and was largely responsibl for the repulse of the Tory invaders . A monument to his memory was

. 17 1913 unveiled at the Old Stone Fort (q . v ) on October , , by the

Daughters of the American Revolution .

AR s NER, SETH, one of the leader of the Green Mountain 4 u . 17 17 3 Boys, was born at Roxb ry, Conn , May , , and died

1 4 . there December 26, 78 He was second in command at the 1775 capture of Ticonderoga by Ethan Allen, in May, , and was subsequently a colonel of Vermont militia . He performed much valuable service in the Revolution , commanding the rear guard of ’ a n St . Clair s retreating army at Hubbardton . He was promi ent ff t factor in the Battle of Bennington, which had such disastrous e ec im upon the fortunes of Burgoyne at Saratoga . A statue of h now stands beside the Battle Monument in the village of Old Bennington . [ 118 ] THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

WAR PATH OF THE NATIONS has been applied by latter-day li historians to the old mi tary road built by Gen . Sir William Johnson ’ in 175 5 (see Johnson s Expedition) , and later in constant use for military purposes throughout the French and Indian and Revo

lutionar . E r y Wars It led from Fort dwa d to Fort William Henr y, and its location practically follows the main streets of Hudson

ls . n Fal , Glens Falls and Lake George From Gle s Falls to Lake George its course has been marked by the Glens Falls Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution . Over it have passed the armies of Johnson , Webb, Abercrombie and Amherst ; the forces of Dieskau and the flying scouts of Montcalm ; the British troops under Burgoyne and Riedesel ; the American commands of Arnold,

Schuyler, Stark and Gates ; and , still later, the troops of Gen . G ’ eorge Izard hurrying to the support of Sackett s Harbor, in the ” 1 12 — old War of 8 . The Old Indian Road before written history — began it contains the strategic heart of the continent ; and while through its portals today there flow only the pulsing throngs of a s peace, so long as time endures it will rouse ju t and martial pride in the breast of every patriotic American .

un WATERVLIET ARSENAL, where great g s are cast , is one of the chief ordnance factories of the United States Army . Twelve fi fi acres were purchased , and the rst buildings erected in the rst decade of the last century . They stand between the railroad and the river in Watervliet .

WE ’ BSTER S TOAST, as given at the reception to General 1 1825 “ Lafayette in Albany , July , , is as follows The ancient and honorable city of Albany, where General Lafayette found his head in 17 quarters 78, and where men of his principles find good quarters at all times .

Skenesb orou h i WHITEHALL, formerly g , was founded by Ph lip 1759 Skene, a major in the English Army, who , in , was given a large hi grant of land on Lake Champlain , w ch he increased by purchase n to about acres . He was made governor of Crown Poi t and li Ticonderoga, judge and postmaster, estab shed sawmills and foun l dries, constructed and sailed vesse s on the lake, and opened roads to

Albany . His house, situated on William Street , was of stone, thirty - f his by forty feet, two and one hal stories high ; and barn, also of stone, was one hundred and thirty feet long . The keystone of the “ ” “ 1 . . . 770 arched doorway, bearing the letters P K S and the date , is preserved in the walls of the Baptist Church . In the Revolution he

( 119 1 THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY and hi s son acted as guides to Burgoyne from Canada ; but when the kenesb orou h British evacuated S g , their commander, General Haldi mand, fearing the settlement might be of service to the Americans, ordered it burned, and Colonel Skene saw an invested fortune and the fruits of many years labor destroyed by his own countrymen . Later n Y h he was attai ted of treason by the State of New ork, and is estate fi con scated . So he returned to England where he was given twenty

li . r the 1812 thousand pounds and a fe pension Du ing War of , the hi fort and blockhouse at W tehall were rebuilt by the Americans .

- WILKES BARRE , in Luzerne county, Pennsylvania, the southern i w as af l term nus of the Delaware and Hudson , named ter John Wi kes C 01 s and . Isaac Barre, advocates of the Coloni ts in the British i n Parl ament during and precedi g the Revolution. It was settled 1769 five u Pennam ite-Y ar in , but years later, d ring the ankee W , - - n twenty three out of twenty six buildi gs were burned, and it was rather slow in again getting started . The Wyoming Monument, -b the h near y, marks the site of one of most sanguinary episodes of t e

Revolution . (See Wyoming Massacre . )

a l WILLIAMS MONUMENT, huge bou der near Lake George, 1854 of l was placed in position in , by graduates Wi liams College, to commemorate the founder of that institution , who was instantly 8 1777 in killed while at the head of his command , September , , his

- forty second year . (See Battle of Lake George . ) It is said that, while on his way with twelve hundred New England soldiers to join

General Johnson , he had , at Albany, a presentiment of early death, and then and there made a will leaving the most of his property to l s found a free school at Wil iamstown , Mas , the funds from which, after accumulation for thirty years , became the foundation of the l co lege .

WILLIAMS MONUMENT, THE DAVID , stands in the yard

. in 18 6 near the Old Stone Fort (q Schoharie . It was erected in 7 , Y by the State of New ork, to commemorate one of the captors of A ndre 23 1780 Maj . John , who was arrested as a spy, September , , and hanged October 2 of the same year . So impressed was General Washington with the patriotism of these three men in refusing all ff A ndre bribes o ered by for his release that, although they delivered r up their prisoner without claiming any reward, or even leaving thei names , Washington sought them out, and on his recommendation Congress presented each with a silver medal bearing on one side the id t word F eli y and on the other the legend Vincet amor patri ae.

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“ 1 l ‘ August . Quartered at Stil water, so named because the water passes so slowly as not to be discovered ; while above and as a o i below it is disturbed and rageth, in great sea, ccas oned ’ by rocks and falls therein . “ 2d T Sar hto August . he General moved forward to ag ga l a fif Al a (Schuylervil e) , bout ty miles from bany, where was

di . blockhouse and some Dutch s ol ers At this place, he was i jo ned by Mr . Wessels, recorder of Albany, and a company

c . of the principal gentlemen , volunteers from that ity He the here got letters from Maj . Peter Schuyler , mayor of a Alb ny, who had preceded him with the Dutch troops , to the e f f ect that he was up to the Second Carrying Place (Fort Miller) , ‘ i a mak ng canoes for the rmy . Thus far the way had been one of very good, only four great wading rivers , them (the ’ Mohawk) dangerous for both horse and man . “ s 4t -five c Augu t h. Divided the provisions, thirty akes of nd u bread to each soldier, besides the pork, a moved p eight miles (to Fort Miller) ; the Dutch soldiers c arrying up their supplies in their birch c anoes and the Connecticut troops ‘ carrying them on horses . Here the water passeth so violently, by reason of the great falls and rocks , that canoes cannot pass, so they were forced to carry their provisions and canoes on their ’

a . backs , pretty ways to a passable part of the river “ h w 5 t . n August The soldiers marched , ith their provisio s on horses , about eight miles, to the Great Carrying Place (Fort

in . Edward) , the Dutch having gone up their canoes “ c o August 6th. The ommand marched ver the Carrying

Place twelve miles , to the forks on Wood Creek (Fort Ann) . The way was up a continual swamp abounding with tall white ’ pine . The New Y ork companies excited the General s admira tion at the vigorous manner in which, and without any repining, they carried their canoes and provisions across upon their backs . “ August 7th Having sent thirty horses back to Saraghtoga rovis1ons Thomilson for more p , under command of Ensign , the fi of General passed down the creek with two les musketeers , in bark canoes, flanked by the Indians marching by the river s i Hautkill l ide, commandedby Capta nStanton , tothe (Whiteha l) , where he encamped with Major Schuyler and the Mohawk captains, on the north side of Wood Creek . “ 9th On the of August , information c ame through Captain

Johnson, who had been sent to Albany some days since to i procure additional suppl es of provisions, that the Senecas and other Indians , whom he expected to meet at the Isle La Motte, near the north end of Lake Champlain , had not left their - country on account of the small pox breaking out among them . The expression they used was ‘that the Great God had stopt ’ - 1 . l the r way The sma l pox had also broken out in the army, and seriously reduced the available force .

In the meantime Major Schuyler had sent forward Capt . Sanders Glen with a scouting party of twenty-eight men and [ 122 ] THE SUMMER PARAD ISE IN HISTORY

five Indians (the same one who had been spared at the Schenec ‘ ’ tady Massacre) , who had proceeded as far as Ticonderoga,

where he erected some stone breastworks , and had been since fi the fth of August waiting for the expedition to come up . “ i It was now found that the t me was so far spent, the bark

would not peel, so no more canoes could be made . “ s n The provisions were al o givi g out, and it was ascertained from the commissaries at Albany that no further cons iderable

. 15th supply could be forwarded It was, therefore, on the , W i resolved in a council of war to return th the army .

’ hr i Though Wint op s Exped tion was a failure, a portion of his i i forces , under Captain John Schuyler, of that fam ly wh ch was always at the forefront in the Colonial wars (see Schuyler Family) , proceeded on down Lake Champlain , as the army turned back, and delivered the first attack upon Fort La Prairie (q .

K hi WOOD CREE , w ch flows into South Bay, at the head of

Lake Champlain , was an important portion of the water highway r between the St . Law ence and the Hudson . It was navigable for canoes to a point within eleven miles of the Hudson at Fort Ed ward . The portage between these two places was known as the

Great Carrying Place, and the route was often used by both French l and English . Today it lies on the highway between A bany and the a l Montreal, the tracks of Del ware and Hudson Railroad fol owing it mile for mile after leaving Fort Edward . The sluggish waters of the creek flow silently beside the car windows , giving never a hint to travelers and vacationists of the savage war parties and scarcely l less relentless mi itary expeditions that once plied its waters .

Y l W OMING MASSACRE . The beautiful Wyoming Val ey, - r hr hi about twenty one miles long by th ee wide, t ough w ch runs the n north branch of the Susquehan a River, was early claimed , under charter rights, by both Connecticut and Pennsylvania, although no 7 3 attempt was made at settlement till 1 6 , when the Susquehanna ur Company , of Connecticut, which had p chased the lands from the i i n . Ind ans about ten years previous , sent out colo sts But in less 1768 than twelve months they were all massacred or driven away . In l Pennsylvania also bought the land from the Indians , and estab ished a settlement the year following . About the same time another party w as arrived from Connecticut , and there continual strife between

t o ll 1771 fi n . the w , ti , in , the king con rmed the claim of Con ecticut ki On the brea ng out of the Revolution the eastern settlers, after expelling what few Tories there were in the neighborhood, resolved

[ 123 ] THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

“ that they would unanimously join our brethren of Connecticut ” u in the common cause of defending our co ntry . But in 1778 the expelled Tories and an additional white force, with seven hundred

Indians, eleven hundred in all, led by John Butler, marched against fi “ ” the settlement . At rst the settlers took refuge in the Forty Fort , - l 3 near the present Wilkes Barre, but, on Ju y , about all the males 400 l i di ( ) sa l ed forth to attack the invaders, and were sastrously - c defeated, two thirds of their number being killed, aptured or massacred . The remainder took refuge in the fort , which the next l n day surrendered . Many prisoners were kil ed a d tortured by f Indian squaws, and the su ferings of those who sought to escape “ ” hi sw am were terrible . Shades of Death isthe nameby w ch a p near

- Wilkes Barre is known, and where a hundred women perished of fatigue and starvation following the massacre .

ANKEE DOODLE . The tune itself is very old, and may have

r . originated either in Holland, F ance or Spain It was sung in E d ngland in the reign of Charles I, and words were set to it in ri icule of Cromwell Yankee Doodle came to town

Upon a Kentish pony, He stuck a feather in his cap ” Upon a macaroni .

1758 un In the summer of , while the British Army, under the fortunate General Abercrombie, lay encamped in Greenbush , now R ennselaer Rensselaer, on the grounds belonging to Jeremiah Van , w disak in anticipation of the march to Cro n Point , which ended so

r usl F ortTicon r i n t o y at de oga, reinf orcements , cons sti g of Continental

Militia, arrived from the east . Their uniforms, and the lack thereof, their accoutrements and general appearance aff orded much food m r stafi for i th among the regulars . Attached to the of the command Shu ckb ur ing general was a musical wit named Dr . Richard g, after wards appointed Secretary of Indian Aff airs by Sir William Johnson , and he, with an idea of teasing rather than pleasing, wrote down the notes of the old tune, changing the words slightly, and gave the composition to the chief musician of the Eastern troops as the a s latest marti l music of England . Greatly to his surprise and amu e ment, it was taken seriously, and the camp rang morning, noon and nk hi night with the strains of Y a ee Doodle, w ch, then and there, was a li unanimously adopted as the favorite air of the Continent l Mi tia, and served as such throughout the Revolution .

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THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

CREASY, SIR EDWARD SHEPHERD th Fifteen Decisive Battles of e World .

CROCKETT, WALTER HILL

A History of Lake Champlain.

CUTTER, WILLIAM

Life of Israel Putnam . DOCUMENTS RELATING TO THE COLONIAL HISTORY OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK are bli shed b the S tate o N ew York and constitute a These pu y f , n i nvalua ble collecti on f or those whose i nterest takes them f urther r t than the narratives of seconda y wri ers .

E EV RETT, EDWARD ’ L r ar bra o c . Life of John Stark . In Sp ks s i y f A meri an Bi ography

GRAHAM , JAMES

Life of Gen . Dan Morgan .

HALL, HENRY l Life of Ethan A len . HA LSEY

Old New York Frontier . L Y HIL , HENRY WA LAND The Champlain Tercentenary ! Report of the New York State

Lake Champlain Tercentenary Commission .

HOLDEN, JAMES AUSTIN New Historical Light on the Real Burial Place of George n Transacti on o w Augustus Lord Viscount Howe . I s f N e X 1 91 1 r tate i t ri cal A ssoci ati on ol. . Yo k S H s o , V , U Y H MPHRE S, COLONEL DAVID

Life of Israel Putnam .

O . LANDON , JUDS N S

Historic Towns of the Middle States .

LOSSING, BENSON J.

ae . . Cyclop dia of U S . History The Empire State ! A Compendious H1story of the Common

wealth of New Y ork .

The Hudson from the Wilderness to the Sea .

i . Life of Gen . Ph lip Schuyler LOUNSBURY

Life of James Fenimore Cooper . [ 126 ] THE SUMMER PARADISE IN HISTORY

PALMER, PETER S .

History of Lake Champlain .

PARK MAN, FRANCIS

Pioneers of France in the New World . A m mi The Jesuits in North ca . The Old Regime in Canada under Louis XIV e 1 Count Frontenac and New Franc under Lou s XIV .

A Half Century of Confli ct .

Montcalm and Wolfe . A condensa Historic Handbook of the Northern Tour . ti on of t al r m the a bov volum s r much of the m a eri f o e e , eferring to the m l n al e struggles i n the Cha p ai V l y.

PELL, HOWLAND In E i ht t nnual The Germain Redoubt at Ticonderoga . g een h A Report of the A m eri can Sceni c and Histori c Preservati on oci et 1 S y, 19 3 .

Y C Y RE NOLDS, U LER ni Albany Chro cles . R ROOSEVELT, THEODO E 1 Naval War of 18 2 .

SILLIMAN, PROF . B .

Tour Between Hartford and Quebec . E SIMMS, J PTHA R .

History of Schoharie County .

Border Wars .

SPARKS, JARED ’ rks s Librar o A m eri can Bi ra In S a o h . Life of Ethan Allen . p y f g p y

STARK, CALEB ffi Memoir and O cial Correspondence of Gen . John Stark .

L STONE , WILLIAM . R Border Wars of the American evolution . if L e of Joseph Brant . - Life of Red Jacket .

. m Poetry and History of Wyo ing . M i n n m Uncas and a to o ah. L STONE , WILLIAM . , JR . li Life and Times of Sir Wil am Johnson .

Letters and Journals of Mrs . General Riedesel . - Life and Military Journals of Major General Riedesel .

Reminiscences of Saratoga and Ballston .

Ballads of the Burgoyne Campaign . [ 127 ] THE SUMMER PARAD ISE IN HISTORY

Y T S LVESTER, NATHANIEL BARTLET Historical Sketches of Northern New York and the Adirondack

Wilderness .

AR . T BOX, INCREASE N f Li e of Israel Putnam .

THOMPSON, DANIEL PIERCE n The Green Mountai Boys . ’ The Rangers ; or the Tory s Daughter .

E R WALWORTH, LLEN HA DIN

Historic Towns .

WATSON, WINSLOW C .

Pioneer History of the Champlain Valley . W R EISE, A THUR JAMES

History of the City of Albany .

[ 128 ]