Early in April, a party of forty or fifty Indians and Tories, under the command of Captain Brandt, the Mohawk chief, made an incursion against Harpersfield, which they surprised and destroyed. Most of the inhabitants, however, had, owing to their exposed situation, left the place, and nineteen prisoners and a small amount of plunder was all that graced their triumph. On his way from Niagara, Brandt had detached a party of eleven Indians, under a young chief called Cheyendowah, to attack the settlement at Minisink, and bring in some prisoners. This was successfully accomplished, and five of its male inhabitants were led captive into the wilderness, as far as Tioga Point. Here, however, they rose upon their captors while asleep, and in a few moments nine of them lay in the agonies of death, while the other two fled, one being mortally wounded. At the time that Harpersfield was destroyed, a party of fourteen militiamen, under command of Captain Alexander Harper, were in the woods making maple-sugar for the garrison at Old Schoharie. Not dreaming of the proximity of an enemy, they were attacked by the party under Brandt, and two of their number shot down before they could seize their arms; and when they attempted to reach them, they found themselves completely cut off and surrounded. Nothing remained, therefore, but to surrender. The Tories composing a part of Brandt's party, were opposed to taking prisoners, and wished to kill them at once, that they might not be an incumbrance at the attack of the Schoharie Fort, which was one object of the expedition. A frightful massacre would have ensued, without doubt, had not Brandt's forethought prevented it. He had raised his tomahawk to strike Captain Harper, which would have been the signal for the death of the others, when, thinking he might get valuable information from him, he lowered his weapon, and, looking the other sternly in the eye, he asked: "How many regular troops are there in the fort?" Harper saw the object of the chief, and, without any hesitation or prevarication, told him that three hundred Continentals had arrived but a few days before to garrison the forts. This was not true, but the manner in which Harper told it imposed upon the chief, who, by the way, had been a schoolmate of his, and, although the circumstance disconcerted his plans, yet he was induced to believe him. One of Harper's men, fearing that the Indians would put them all to death if they should discover the fraud, informed the chief of the true state of the case; but he, thinking it a ruse to lead him into danger, and thus facilitate the escape of the prisoners, put no faith in his story, but, on the contrary, was the more convinced of Harper's truthfulness. A conference was held between Brandt and his subordinate chiefs in regard to the disposal of the prisoners. The former was in favor of taking them to Niagara, but the latter, disappointed at the failure of the main part