Program

NYS Historic

Subject

Event

Location

1288 County Rd 60, Elmira, NY 14901, USA

Lat/Long

42.02728, -76.662816

Grant Recipient

Public Archaeology Facility (Research Foundation for Binghamton University)

In 1779, Major General John Sullivan was tasked by General George Washington to rendezvous with General James Clinton and unleash a campaign of destruction against Native American tribes of New York State who were allied with the British. During this expedition General Sullivan traversed the wilderness of Pennsylvania and New York following along the Susquehanna River. In his wake the left a path of destruction, decimating each Indian community that he encountered.

On August 13, 1779, the Native American community of Chemung was destroyed by General Sullivan and his forces. Sullivan described the event in a letter, dated August 15, 1779, to the President of Congress:

Finding it impossible, to bring them to an engagement I directed their Town to be burnt, which is consisted of between 30 & 40 Houses some of them large and neatly finish’d; particularly a Chapel and Council House.

The community of the Chemung was far from small and consisted of number of houses, Sullivan continued:

I also caus’d their Field of Corn which were of a considerable extent , and all their Gardens which replete with Herbage to be destroy’d; From the Quantity of Furniture, which lay in confused Heaps in their Houses, I have reason to believe that they carried little away.

After the destruction of their crops, Sullivan and his forces proceeded onward with their expedition.