The Onondagas now breathed vengeance, and 300 of their warriors poured down on the valley of the Schoharie, where they plundered and burnt Cobelskill, which had been settled by some twenty families, since its destruction a year or two previous. The Mohawks also burst suddenly on the town of Minisink, and laid waste the settlement, burning, killing, and plundering on every hand. A battle was fought between them and a force sent from Goshen and its vicinity. It lasted from 11 o’clock, A. M. till nightfall. The Americans, though superior in numbers, were defeated, and forced to retreat, owing to a successful ambuscade formed by the Indians, and the failure of ammunition. A vigorous effort was now made by the Americans against the Senecas, the most numerous and ferocious of the Six Nations. General Sullivan, at the head of a large force, penetrated into their country, and destroyed forty towns and villages, some of them having fifty or a hundred houses, and one as many as a hundred and twenty-eight. He also destroyed 160,000 bushels of corn, and many extensive fields and beautiful orchards of fruit, some of them containing 1,500 trees. The lovely valley of the Genesee was thus transformed into a scene of desolation, and the nation was left houseless and destitute to encounter the severe winter of 1780. Previous to his reaching the Seneca country, however, a severe battle took place at Chemung, in which the Indians fought with determined bravery, though they were defeated, and lost many of their warriors. In another engagement at Newtown the whole force of the Senecas and the other Indians, variously computed at from 800 to 1,500, was routed with great slaughter. A tragic scene occurred at this period in the cruel death of Lieutenant Boyd, belonging to General Sullivan’s army, who, with a small party of men, was sent out on a scouting expedition. They were cut off by some Indians, and, being captured, the lieutenant was put to death with tortures too horrible to relate. The destruction of the Seneca towns was not, however, suffered to pass without retaliation. The hostile Indians, aided by the British, in 1780, invaded the villages of the Oneidas, and entirely destroyed their castle, church, and dwellings; the Oneidas were thus driven, in their state of desolation, upon the white settlements for protection and aid. The American government gave them support, fixing them, till the close of the war, at Schenectady and its vicinity. Numerous incursions were made, in the same year, by the Indians, led on by Brant, who burned Canajoharie, and took fifty-two prisoners, besides killing seventeen persons. One hundred and forty houses and barns were burned; twenty-four people killed, and seventy-three made prisoners.