Cornplanter - War Chief

War Chief

Cornplanter first became known as war chief of the Seneca when they allied with the French against the English during the French and Indian War (part of the Seven Years War between the European nations). He was present at Braddock's defeat.

During the American Revolution, both Cornplanter and his uncle, Chief Guyasutha, wanted the Iroquois to remain neutral. He believed the Iroquois should stay out of the white man's war. "War is war," he told other Iroquois. "Death is death. A fight is a hard business." Both the British and the American Patriots had urged the Iroquois nations to stay neutral.

But, both sides tried to recruit the Iroquois as allies. The British offered large amounts of goods. The Iroquois League met together at Oswego in July 1777, to vote on their decision. Although Guysutha and Cornplanter voted for neutrality, when the majority of chiefs voted to side with the British, they both honored the majority decision. Because of the status of the Seneca as War Chiefs among the Iroquois, most of the Iroquois Confederacy followed suit. The Iroquois named Sayenqueraghta and Cornplanter as war chiefs of the Iroquois. Four of the Iroquois nations were allies of the British: the Mohawk, Seneca, Onondaga and Cayuga.

Cornplanter joined forces with the Loyalist Lt. Colonel John Butler and his rangers at the 1778 Battle of Wyoming Valley in present-day Pennsylvania. They killed many settlers and destroyed their properties, in what became known in United States history as the Wyoming Valley Massacre.

Fighting on the frontier was fierce. Patriot forces under Colonel Thomas Hartley burned Tioga. In reprisal, Cornplanter and Joseph Brant participated in the 1778 Loyalist-Iroquois attacks led by Captain Walter Butler and Butler's Rangers in Cherry Valley, New York, later known by the Americans as the Cherry Valley Massacre. During this campaign, Cornplanter's men happened to capture his father Johannes Abeel after burning his house. Cornplanter, who had once gone as a young man to see Abeel, recognized him and offered apology. He invited Abeel to return with the Seneca or to go back to his white family. When his father chose the latter, Cornplanter had Seneca warriors accompany him in safety.

After the victories of the Loyalist and Iroquois forces, commander-in-chief General George Washington commissioned Major General John Sullivan to invade Six Nation territory throughout New York and destroy Iroquois villages. At the Battle of Newtown, Iroquois and British troops were decisively defeated. But Sullivan and his army of 5,000 men caused greater damage in their scorched earth campaign. They methodically destroyed Iroquois villages, farms, stored crops and animals between May and September 1779 throughout the Iroquois homeland (upstate and western New York). Cornplanter, along with Brant, Old Smoke, and Lt. Colonel John Butler, fought a desperate delaying action in order to allow the escape of many refugees, both Native and non-Native, who went to Canada. Surviving Iroquois suffered terribly during the following months in what they called “the winter of the deep snow.” Many froze or starved to death. Cornplanter and Seneca warriors continued to fight with the British against the Patriots, hoping to expel the colonists from their territory.