Herkimer's disaster produced no disheartening effects upon the garrison. They repulsed every attack, and refused to listen to any mention of a surrender, although they no longer had any hope of being relieved.
As it was of the utmost importance to reduce this place, in order to leave no military post in the hands of the Americans which might threaten the right flank of Burgoyne's army in its approach, St. Leger tried the arts of intimidation. On August 8 he sent a flag to the fort with a summons to surrender, in which he exaggerated his own strength, and represented that Burgoyne had entered Albany in triumph, after laying waste the whole country in his victorious march. He further stated that Brant and his Indians were determined, if they met with further resistance, to massacre every soul on the Mohawk river; and, in case they were obliged to wait any longer for the surrender of Fort Schuyler, every man in the garrison would be tomahawked.
Gansevoort, maintaining his inflexible resolution, was not moved in the slightest degree by these threats, but determined to make one more attempt to obtain relief. Two of his officers volunteered their services, and with much difficulty and many adventures, made their way through the cordon of the enemy to German Flats, from which place a message was sent to General Schuyler, at Stillwater. Measures were instantly taken to relieve the fort. General Arnold offered to conduct the expedition, and a brigade was detached for this purpose.
But an opportunity presented itself for directing a stratagem against the enemy. Among the Tory spies recently captured was a half-witted fellow named Hon-Yost Schuyler; he was tried by court-martial and condemned to death. His mother and brother interceded with Arnold on his behalf; the general at first was inexorable, but at last proposed terms on which he would grant Hon-Yost's pardon. He must hurry to Fort Schuyler and alarm St. Leger's army, so that he would raise the siege. The foolish fellow immediately accepted these conditions, and his brother became a hostage in his stead. Hon-Yost now made arrangements with a friendly Oneida Indian to aid him, and, after firing several shots through his clothes, the two men started by different routes to St. Leger's army.
Brant's Indian warriors had been morose and dissatisfied since the battle of Oriskany; they had been promised an easy success and much plunder, and they had found neither the one nor the other. They were now holding a great pow-wow to consult the spirits about the success of the present siege. In the midst of the ranting and drumming, and dancing, and other mysterious jugglery, Hon-Yost arrived in camp. Hon-Yost was well known to be on their side, and they crowded around him to hear the news. With the trickery of a half-witted man he did not deliver his message in plain words. He knew the effect of mystery with an Indian. He shook his head ominously, and pointed to his riddled clothes to denote his narrow escape from the coming foe.
"How many men—how many men are there?" asked the eager Indians.
Hon-Yost looked up and pointed to the leaves of the trees over his head. The report ran like wild-fire through the camp; it quickly reached the ear of the commander. St. Leger sent for Hon-Yost. The wily fellow adopted a different policy in talking to the English commander. He told a straight and pitiful story; how he had been captured, tried and condemned; how, on the way to his execution, finding himself carelessly guarded, he had fled, thinking he would die any way, and he would as soon be shot as hung. His escape had been narrow, as the colonel might see by looking at his clothes. And the Americans were coming in great force to raise the siege. While Hon-Yost was being interviewed at headquarters, the Oneida messenger arrived with wampum to say that the Americans were indeed coming in great force. Of course, after all this, the spirits consulted in the pow-wow gave ominous warnings. St. Leger saw that the Indians were about to decamp; he tried to reassure them; he called a council, but neither the influence of Thay-en-da-ne-gea nor that of Johnson was of any avail.
"The pow-wow says we must go—the pow-wow says we must go," persisted the Indians. And the besieging army went—as fast as they could, strewing their baggage along the route.
The simpleton, whose well-told lie was responsible for this sudden departure, went with them a few miles, and then contrived to slip away. He reported to General Arnold, who promptly released his brother, and gave him a full pardon.
Brant was again at Oquaga in 1778, the terror of the border. Women turned pale and children trembled at his very name. In the bitter animosity of the day no story of cruelty was too black to be laid upon Brant, the great chief of these savage warriors. Brant felt keenly the hatred with which he was regarded in afterlife among frontiersmen. The proud chief wished to be regarded as a gentleman in every respect. "He always denied," as Edward Eggleston says, "that he had ever committed any act of cruelty during this cruel war, and none has been proved against him, while many stories of his mercy are well authenticated. He led, indeed, a savage force, and fought in the savage way, as the English officials who managed the Indian alliance desired. When Indians were accused of cruelty Brant would return the charge upon the whites, who sometimes, in fact, excelled the savages in their revengeful barbarity. To Brant the civilized custom of imprisoning men was the worst of cruelty; a man's liberty, he held, was worth more than his life. Of the Indian custom of torture he did not approve, but when a man must die for a crime, he thought it better to give him some chance to make atonement in a courageous and warrior-like death than to execute him after the manner of the whites by the humiliating gallows. Brant used in after-life to defend the Indian mode of warfare. He said the Indians had neither the artillery, the numbers, the forts, nor the prisons of the white men. In place of artillery they must use stratagem; as their forces were small, they must use every means to kill as many of the enemy with as small a loss to themselves as possible; and, as they had no prisons, their captives must, in some cases, be killed. He held it more merciful to kill a suffering person, and thus put an end to his misery."