The history of Col. Bigelow is so interwoven with that of the Revolution, that it is difficult to separate the two. We shall therefore, give in this chapter a short account of the bloody butchery of the inhabitants of that beautiful little colony at Wyoming, and what Col. Bigelow thought of that demoniac cruelty, the bare remembrance of which makes us shudder. Wilkesbarre is the shire town of Luzerne county, Pa. It is situated in the Wyoming valley, one hundred and fourteen miles northeast from Harrisburg, and one hundred and twenty northwest from Philadelphia. This place was settled by emigrants from Connecticut in 1773, under the auspices of one Col. Durkee, who gave it the compound name it bears in honor of two eminent and zealous advocates of the American cause in the British parliament, Wilkes and Barre. Wyoming contained eight townships, each containing a square of five miles, beautifully situated on both sides of the Susquehanna. Wilkesbarre is one of those towns. The inhabitants of this beautiful valley were much engaged in their country's cause, and nearly one thousand of their young men had joined the army, and were absent from home. Most of those remaining at home were tories, although these were not so numerous as the friends of liberty. Yet they formed an alliance with the Indians, and the first of July there appeared before the fort at Wilkesbarre about sixteen hundred armed men, two-thirds of which were tories and one-third Indians. The colony of Wyoming could muster only about five hundred men. In this condition, the tories and Indians fell upon them, and put them nearly all to death; only about sixty escaped. Never was a rout so deplorable; never was a massacre accompanied with so many horrors. The barbarians took the men, women and children promiscuously into houses and barracks, and set fire to them and consumed them all, listening, delighted, to hear the moans and shrieks of the expiring multitude.