Cherry Valley massacre 1778
Recorded location from Wikidata; battle sites are often approximate.
Key facts
| Date | 11 November 1778 | Wikidata |
|---|---|---|
| Year | 1778 | Wikidata P585 (point in time) |
| Era | Early modern (1500–1799) | derived from year |
| Location | United States | Natural Earth (modern borders) |
| Continent | North America | Natural Earth |
| War / conflict | American Revolutionary War | Wikidata P361 |
| Participants | Continental Army, Iroquois, Kingdom of Great Britain, United States | Wikidata P710 |
| Coordinates | 42.7942, -74.7564 | Wikidata P625 |
About the battle
The Cherry Valley massacre was an attack by British and Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) forces on a fort and the town of Cherry Valley in central New York on November 11, 1778, during the American Revolutionary War. It has been described as one of the most horrific frontier massacres of the war. A mixed force of Loyalists, British soldiers, Senecas, and Mohawks descended on Cherry Valley, whose defenders, despite warnings, were unprepared for the attack. During the raid, the Seneca in particular targeted non-combatants, and reports state that 30 such individuals were killed, in addition to a number of armed defenders.
The raiders were under the overall command of Walter Butler. However, he had only tenuous authority, at best, over the Indian warriors on the expedition. Historian Barbara Graymont describes Butler's command of the expedition as "criminally incompetent". The Seneca were angered by accusations that they had committed atrocities at the Battle of Wyoming, and the colonists' recent destruction of their forward bases of operation at Unadilla, Onaquaga, and Tioga. Butler's authority with the Indigenous People was undermined by his poor treatment of Joseph Brant, the leader of the Mohawks.
Text adapted from the Wikipedia article Cherry Valley massacre (revision 1376834953), licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Changes: excerpted from the article lead section; shortened by selecting paragraphs and trimming at a sentence boundary; formatting and citations removed. No text added.
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All 190 battles of the American Revolutionary War →
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