Battle of Wyoming - Background

Background

In 1777, the British General John Burgoyne led a campaign to gain control of the Hudson River in the American Revolutionary War. Burgoyne was forced to surrender after the Battles of Saratoga in October. News of his surrender prompted France to enter the war as an American ally. Concerned that the French might attempt to retake parts of New France that had been lost in the French and Indian War (something they did not know the Franco-American Treaty of Alliance specifically forbade), the British adopted a defensive stance in Quebec. They recruited Loyalists and allied Indians to engage in a frontier war along the northern and western borders of the Thirteen Colonies.

Colonel John Butler recruited a regiment of Loyalists for the effort, while Seneca chiefs Sayenqueraghta and Cornplanter recruited primarily Seneca warriors, and Joseph Brant recruited primarily Mohawk men for what essentially became a guerrilla war against frontier settlers. By April 1778 the Seneca were raiding settlements along the Allegheny and Susquehanna Rivers, and by early June these three groups met at the Indian village of Tioga, New York. Butler and the Seneca decided to attack the Wyoming Valley while Brant and the Mohawks (who had already raided Cobleskill in May) went after communities further north.

American military leaders, including Washington and Lafayette, also sought to recruit Iroquois, primarily as a diversion to keep the British in Quebec busy. Their recruitment attempts met with more limited success. The Oneida and Tuscarora were the only two of the Six Nations to become Patriot allies.