[FN] Marshall's Life of Washington.
The Dutch and German population of the valley, however, were chiefly Whigs; as also, by this time, were a decided majority of the entire white population, not only of the Mohawk Valley, but of Schoharie, Cherry Valley, and the other settlements in the southern part of that widely-extended county. The general Committee executed their functions with equal diligence and vigour. The inhabitants were enrolled and organized into militia; the Committee deposed the sheriff, Alexander White,[FN-1] and caused Colonel John Frey to be appointed in his place; and, in one word, they took upon themselves both the civil and military jurisdiction of the large section of country, over which they had provisionally assumed the government. White had rendered himself particularly odious to the Whigs from the first. Under some trifling pretext, he had arrested a Whig by the name of John Fonda, and committed him to prison. His friends, to the number of fifty men, under the conduct of Sampson Sammons, went to the jail at night and released him by force. From the prison they proceeded to the lodgings of the sheriff, and demanded his surrender. White looked out from the second story window, and probably recognizing the leader of the crowd, inquired—"Is that you, Sammons?" "Yes," was the prompt reply; upon which White discharged a pistol at the sturdy Whig, but happily without injury. The ball whizzed past his head, and struck in the sill of the door. This was the first shot fired in the war of the Revolution west of the Hudson. It was immediately returned by the discharge of some forty or fifty muskets at the sheriff, but the only effect was a slight wound in the breast—just sufficient to draw blood. The doors of the house were broken, and White would have been taken, but at that moment a gun was fired at the hall by Sir John. This was known to be a signal for his retainers and Scotch partisans to rally in arms; and as they would muster a force of five hundred men in a very short time, the Whigs thought it most prudent to disperse. They collected again at Caughnawaga, however, and sent a deputation to Sir John, demanding that White should be given up to them.[FN-2] This demand, of course, was not complied with.
[FN-1] The first liberty pole erected in the Mohawk Valley was at the German Flats, and White, with a band of loyalists, had cut down the emblem of rebellion.
[FN-2] MS. narrative of Jacob Sammons.
After his dismissal, as already mentioned, by an act of the people "in their sovereign capacity," White was re-commissioned by Governor Tryon; but the County Committee would not suffer him to re-enter upon the duties of the office. On the contrary, so high was the popular indignation against him, that he was obliged to fly—setting his face toward Canada, accompanied by a white man named Peter Bone, and two or three Indians. He was pursued to Jessup's landing on the Hudson River, where the house in which he lodged was surrounded, and the fugitive sheriff taken prisoner. From thence he was taken to Albany and imprisoned. [FN] Shortly afterward he was released on his parole, and left the country.
[FN] Narrative of Jacob Sammons.
The exigencies of the times required prompt and vigorous action; and the Committee seems to have been composed of exactly the right description of men. They arrested suspicious persons, tried them, fined some, imprisoned more, and executed others. Their duties also involved the preservation of the peace in a critical period, among a mixed population of border-men, ever more or less disposed to impatience under legal restraint, and of course requiring the controlling power of a strong arm. And yet these high duties were generally discharged with great satisfaction to the public—the loyalists excepted, of course—and their resolutions and decrees were submitted to by their constituents with alacrity. Their influence was likewise successfully exerted in winning friends to the popular cause, by deciding the wavering and confirming the irresolute. [FN]