warfare, and while he does not seem ever to have been
guilty of wanton cruelty himself, those under him, on
more than one occasion, ruthlessly murdered their foes,
irrespective of age or sex. That he tacitly permitted
his followers to murder and scalp unarmed settlers shows
that he was still much of a savage. As one historian has
written: 'He was not a devil, and not an angel.' It is
true, as we shall see, that on several occasions he
intervened to save Tory friends and acquaintances, but
these are isolated examples, and his raids were accompanied
by all the horrors of Indian warfare. The only excuse
that can be offered for him is that he was no worse than
his age, and that the white loyalist leaders, such as
the Butlers, as well as the colonial commanders of the
revolutionists, were equally callous regarding the
destruction of property and life.

Brant appears to have spent the winter of 1777 and 1778
in Canada, but with the opening of military operations
in the spring he was again at Oquaga and Unadilla. One
of his first exploits of the year 1778 was at Springfield,
a small settlement lying some miles beyond Cherry Valley
at the head of Lake Otsego. When news of Brant's approach
reached this place, a number of the men-folk fled for
their lives. Those who remained were taken prisoners.
The chief gathered the women and children into one house
and set the torch to all the other buildings in the
settlement. Brant's care for the weaker sex and the
children during this expedition shows that he had a
tenderness of heart unusual among the red men of his