* * * * * [FN] Public Papers Gov. George Clinton, Vol. IX, pp. 421, 422. During 1780, the old military road was infested with roving bands of Tories and Indians. The last massacre of which history has record occurred in June or July of this year, when a man by the name of Koon, from Kingsbury, and three laborers, on their way to Fort George, were found dead and scalped on the highway near the "Half-Way Brook." [FN] * * * * * [FN] Holden's Queensbury, p. 477. In the fall of 1780, Major Christopher Carleton of the 29th Regiment, with about twelve hundred men, regulars, Tories and Indians, made his historic raid through Kingsbury and Queensbury, capturing Fort Ann on the 10th of October, and Fort George on the following day. At this time, all the buildings and structures in Kingsbury and Queensbury, in the path of the raid, were destroyed by fire by the enemy, causing 1780 to go down in local annals as "the year of the great burning." In order to speedily reach Fort George, Major Carleton led his forces from Kingsbury Street directly across country, through the then existing road [FN] entering the Lake George highway near the "Half-Way Brook" post. Thus intimately connecting this spot once more with the stirring events of that time. * * * * * [FN] See Gov. Tryon's Map Vol., Doc. Hist. N. Y., also Holden's Hist. Queensbury, page 479. Holden's History of Queensbury states that Ichabod Merritt, son-in-law of Abraham Wing, the founder, and father of Joseph, the first white child born in this town, erected the first frame house in Queensbury, on one of the sections of the Town Plot, near the "Half-Way Brook," which was burned at this time. Connected in a way with the history of the "Half-Way Brook," is the battle which took place at Fort Ann July 8, 1777, between the Americans under Colonel Long and the 9th British Regiment of Burgoyne's army. The scene of this affair is located only three-quarters of a mile from the point where the "Half-Way Brook" enters Wood Creek at Fort Ann village, and the semi-successful fight put up by Long's forces, was one of the first serious interferences which Burgoyne received in his plan of campaign. [FN] * * * * * [FN] One of the Trustees of this Association, E. J. West, informs me that in 1858 William Welles erected a marble monument on the south end of Battle Hill to commemorate this battle. This was destroyed by an act of vandalism about 1870. Lately the Fort Ann "Grange" has set on foot a project to erect another monument in place of the former marker. It would seem to be proper and fitting for this Association to encourage and forward this movement in every possible way.