The Battle of Oriskany ( or ) was a major engagement of the Saratoga campaign during the American Revolutionary War. On August 6, 1777, an American column of Tryon County militia and Oneidas marching to relieve the siege of Fort Stanwix was ambushed by a contingent of Britain's Indigenous allies and Loyalists. It was one of the few battles of the war in which most non-Indigenous participants were settlers born in the Thirteen Colonies. The Americans suffered heavy casualties during the battle.
Under the command of Brigadier General Nicholas Herkimer, the American relief column came up the Mohawk Valley and initially consisted of about 800 militiamen and between 60 and 100 Oneida warriors. In response to news of the column's advance, Brigadier General Barry St. Leger dispatched a force of roughly 500 men under the command of Lieutenant Colonel Sir John Johnson to intercept them. Most of Johnson's force were Mohawk, Seneca, Cayuga, Onondaga, and Mississauga warriors led by Sayenqueraghta, Cornplanter, and Joseph Brant (Thayendanegea).
Johnson's men successfully ambushed Herkimer's column in a small valley about 6 miles (10 km) east of Fort Stanwix, near the Oneida village of Oriska. The British victory cost the Americans around 465 dead, wounded, or captured, while Johnson's force suffered only 93 men killed, wounded, or captured. Herkimer was also mortally wounded. The morale of Britain's Indigenous allies was damaged when they discovered that an American sortie from Fort Stanwix had looted their camp during the battle. This was a contributing factor in Leger's decision to abandon the siege two weeks later.
The battle also marked the beginning of a civil war among the Haudenosaunee, as Oneida warriors under Louis Cook and Han Yerry aligned with the Patriot cause, as did the Tuscarora. As the Mohawk, Seneca, Cayuga, and Onondaga were allied to the Loyalist cause, this resulted in incidents of armed conflict between the two factions. The battle's location is known in Haudenosaunee oral histories as "A Place of Great Sadness", and has been designated as a National Historic Landmark along with being marked by a monument at the Oriskany Battlefield State Historic Site.
In June 1777, the British Army launched a two-pronged attack from Quebec under the command of General John Burgoyne, whose objective was to split New England from the other colonies by gaining control of New York's Hudson Valley. The main thrust came south across Lake Champlain under Burgoyne's command; the second thrust was led by St. Leger and was intended to come down the Mohawk Valley and meet Burgoyne's army near Albany.
The American Revolutionary War (1775–1783) grew from colonial resistance to British taxation without parliamentary representation — a dispute that radicalized through the Stamp Act (1765), the Townshend Acts (1767), and the Boston Massacre (1770). Fighting began at Lexington and Concord in April 1775; the Continental Congress declared independence on July 4, 1776. The Continental Army under George Washington faced severe shortages of supplies and troops, enduring the brutal winter at Valley Forge (1777–1778) before French alliance and French financing turned the military balance. Major engagements included Bunker Hill (1775), Trenton (1776), Saratoga (1777) — which secured French intervention — and Yorktown (1781), where British General Cornwallis surrendered to Washington. An estimated 25,000 American soldiers died in service, from combat, disease, and captivity. The Treaty of Paris (1783) recognized American independence and ceded British territory east of the Mississippi, though it left unresolved questions about Indigenous land rights and the status of Loyalists.
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