On the 19th they joined the detachment of General Poor, burning the villages of Chukkanut and Owagea, and three days later arrived at the encampment of the main division at Tioga. On the 23d of August, by the accidental discharge of a musket, Captain Kimball was killed and a Lieutenant wounded.
Leaving a garrison to defend Fort Sullivan, at Tioga, the whole army proceeded, on the 26th, taking the route up the Tioga branch of the Susquehanna. About sixteen miles up this stream was a village called Newtown, which they reached on the 29th. Here the light troops, which were marching ahead, discovered a breastworks, artfully masked by green bushes, extending for about half a mile, in an advantageous place, protected by a high mountain on one side, the river on the other, and a large creek in front, behind which the enemy were entrenched. Here occurred the most important fight of the campaign. The design of the enemy appears to have been primarily, an ambuscade. His force of British regulars, consisting of two battalions of Royal Greens and Tories, was led by Col. John Butler, with Captains Walter Butler and Macdonald as subordinates. The Indian forces were commanded by the great Mohawk chief, Joseph Brant. All the cunning of the Indians, combined with the trained tactics of the British regulars, were here exerted to check the advance of Sullivan's invading army. Had the Americans not discovered the trap in time to avoid it, the story of this campaign would have ended here in a tale of butchery hardly equaled in the annals of war. But three companies of Morgan's riflemen, the pride of Washington, were in advance; veterans of a hundred battles, and in no way inferior to the enemy in Indian craft; and the ingenious device for drawing our forces into an ambush was thwarted. For hours the battle waged fiercely. By skillfully maneuvering his troops Sullivan had nearly succeeded in surrounding the enemy, when, admirably commanded, and wisely discreet, the signal for retreat was sounded just in time to escape. The entire loss to the Americans was three killed and thirty-nine wounded. Twelve Indians were found dead on the field, but the number of their wounded is unknown.
The events of the succeeding days during which the expedition was prosecuting its errand of destruction, were a constant repetition of each other. The army was almost constantly on the move, searching out and destroying such settlements as could be found. The Indians skulked away like a pack of wolves at the approach of the hunter, turning now and then to snap at their pursuers, and then vanishing. Where once had stood their pleasant villages surrounded by fruitful fields, was only left heaps of smouldering ashes and masses of trampled grain and prostrate fruit trees. They needed no spies to keep them informed of the progress of the invaders. A trail of smoke by day and a ruddy glow on the sky at night told it too plainly. The scourge had fallen. Not only were the frontiers cleared but the doom of the Iroquoian Confederacy was sealed, and its dominion over the vast territory which it had so long ruled was destroyed forever. From the mountains of northern Pennsylvania, through the beautiful valley of the Susquehanna and the lake region of central New York to the fruitful valley of the Genesee, no Indian settlement of importance was left. Said Sullivan in his official report: "The number of towns destroyed by this army amounted to 40, beside scattering houses. The quantity of corn destroyed, at a moderate computation, must amount to 160,000 bushels, with a vast quantity of vegetables of every kind. Every creek and river has been traced, and the whole country explored in search of Indian settlements, and I am well persuaded that, except one town situated near the Allegheny, about 50 miles from Genesee, there is not a single town left in the country of the Five Nations.
"It is with pleasure I inform Congress that this army has not suffered the loss of forty men, in action or otherwise, since my taking the command, though perhaps few troops have experienced a more fatiguing campaign. I flatter myself that the orders with which I was entrusted are fully executed, as we have not left a single settlement or field of corn in the country of the Five Nations, nor is there even the appearance of an Indian on this side of Niagara."
CONTINUATION OF NATHANIEL WEBB'S JOURNAL
As Published in the Elmira Republican of Sept. 11th and 12th, 1855.
Note—In the volume containing the "Journals of the Military Expedition of Major General John Sullivan against the Six Nations of Indians in 1779," prepared by Frederick Cook, Secretary of State, and published by the State in 1887, on page 285 et seq, is published part of the Journal of Nathaniel Webb, and a note says that a portion of the Journal cannot be found.
In a scrap-book originally kept by Thos. Maxwell, Esq., which was recently bought in an old book shop in New York, I find the missing Journal, and give herewith the portion supposed to be lost.