This campaign provided for the advance of Burgoyne to Albany, where he was to meet a large force sent up the Hudson from New York. This is not the place to describe the failure of the important movement, ending in the capture of Burgoyne and his whole army. A part of this great scheme was that Colonel Barry St. Leger was to go up the St. Lawrence to Lake Ontario, and thence to Albany by the Mohawk River. His command was composed mostly of Tories and Indians, and Brandt and the Butlers were with him. Early in June, Brandt gathered his Mohawks together and made ready to strike a blow for the English. General Nicholas Herkimer in command of the Tryon County militia, was ordered to check Brandt. He set out to relieve Fort Stanwix (also called Fort Schuyler), which was besieged by a large number of British, Canadians, Tories and Indians. Most of these marched to meet Herkimer, of whose approach they had learned. While marching in loose order through the woods at Oriskany, near Utica, Herkimer's militia were ambushed by the Tories and Indians. They were thrown into a panic and a large number shot down. A bullet killed Herkimer's horse and mortally wounded him. He propped himself on the ground with his back against a tree, lit his pipe and continued to give orders. The reports of the guns of a body of troops that had hurried out of the fort to the relief of the militia, alarmed the Indians who fled, the Tories quickly following them. General Herkimer was carried to his home, where he soon died from the effects of the wound. [Illustration: COLONEL JOSEPH BRANDT] The relief of Fort Stanwix was brought about by a curious piece of strategy. Schuyler, in command at the time of the campaign against Burgoyne, could hardly spare a man, and yet, unless relief was sent, the fort must fall. His officers opposed, for the reason named, and the angry Schuyler asked for some leader to volunteer. Benedict Arnold promptly offered, and at the head of eight hundred men, hastened toward the endangered post. Brave as was Arnold, he could not shut his eyes to the fact that his force could not compare in number with the Tories and Indians, and was more likely to fail than to succeed. Reaching German Flats he found that one of the prisoners held by the Americans was a half-witted Tory, who had been condemned to death for some fault. He was hardly responsible for his acts, but was scared almost to death, and his mother was in an agony of distress over his fate. She sank on her knees before Arnold and prayed him to save her son. The officer consented on the single condition that the youth should do a certain thing for him. The joyous mother and boy declared that he had only to tell them what it was and it should be done. "It is simple," explained Arnold, "you and a friendly Oneida Indian are to go to the camp of St. Leger and make him believe my force is twice as great as his, and that if he waits where he is, I shall kill them all."