Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Nothing hard is ever easy: A bicycle tour attempt.

Will do, thanks.

The Susquehanna Valley really is a sort of choke point for pathways into the old Six Nations Country, even today, leaving Bill's for the next two days my path took me close to the present Rt17/Interstate corridor.



Just west of Corning, Painted Post, named after an original 8ft painted wooden post along the route, painted with symbols and apparently a warning or boundary marker of some kind. Whatever it was it was distinctive enough to name a town after it years after the fact, and even today celebrate it with a statue...



Further west, the Forbidden Path into Iroquioia was literally that; a road that it was literally death for uninvited intruders to tread (prob'ly I coulda picked a better angle for this shot)....



http://www.alleganyhistory.org/plac...rticles/1197-before-there-was-an-andover

The trail stretched from Tioga, Pennsylvania which is east of Elmira, to the west towards Salamanca into Pennsylvania, by route of the Allegheny River. It zigzagged with the lay of the land, along the border between New York and Pennsylvania. On penalty of death, any enemy Indian, or white settler was forbidden the use of this trail by the powerful Iroquois Nation. If caught, they were to be burnt to death. If an Indian accompanied a white settler, then they both were to be burnt.

A simplification of course, but correct in the gist. The Sullivan Expedition would find a number of outsiders living peacefully on Iroquois lands, including a village of Scottish Highlanders. By the Rev. War the Iroquois were a shell of their former selves, having been whittled away by repeated epidemics, but their reputation still precedeed them, and Iroquioia remained remarkably undisturbed by uninvited settlement clear through the Rev. War.

A couple of historical markers along the way: This one possibly true specific to Big Flats, but more'n a few Iroquois were living in log and sawn timber houses by the 1760's, complete with nearby orchards....



...and another a ways down the road. I liked this one because it tells the sort of thing that was likely true most of the time, for both sides. Had to be, for so much technological exchange to quietly occur over the years....



So anyways, 1779, the League has finally broken, the Oneidas siding with the Americans (which would benefit them little after the war), the council fire at Onondaga kicked out, and George Washington ordered an expedition to clear the hostile Iroquois from the colonies' collective back.

More....

The Sullivan Expedition and the Battle of Newtown marked the end of an era, a blow from which the Six Nations would never recover, even though but few were actually killed by Sullivan's men.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Newtown

The real significance for me being that all the Iroquois could muster to meet this threat was around 900 warriors, there simply weren't that many Iroquois still around in 1779, not relative to the enormous territory they claimed. By comparison the 3,000 plus Americans in Sullivan's Army represented just a small fraction of the total manpower of the United States, even that early.

Worse, Joseph Brant, though an eminently capable combat leader, did not hold a traditional position of authority by Iroquois standards, and he was a Mohawk, who were by then quite different from the more numerous and remote Seneca who IIRC were te majority of the assembled force. Add a third commander to the mix (the infamous Butler) and maybe an explanation emerges for the poor tactics on the Indian/Tory side: Possibly among the finest Spec Ops forces of the day deployed in a largely fixed and defensive role.

Divided leadership might also explain why the 1,000 plus man Indian/Tory force didn't follow up by harrying and bloodying the Sullivan Expedition repeatedly along the line of march. Or else who knows? Maybe hindsight is 20/20; most Iroquois cleared out of the way of the crop and town burners and few lives were lost directly. Perhaps the terminal consequences of the Sullivan Expedition were not appreciated by either side at the time. This from a marker close to the battlefield:





Anyways, I didn't feel like taking the time and effort to ride up the mountain to the present Battle of Newtown commemorative site, but I did take this pic up there a few years back.



And from below, along the course of Sullivan's route, the best view I could get of the American perspective of the hillside where the Indians and Tories waited. They were flanked out by forces sent around to the right of this pic.



The Iroquois too would strike back with a vengeance in the following years, but again too little and too late to affect the course of the war.

More....

On through Binghamton, and bicycle activism at work: �May use full lane�. Ya, good luck with that



...gotta love them bike routes, beautiful downtown Binghamton...





...and the little green signs that led me astray...



Free at last, over the mountain to the East Branch....



..to Windsor NY....



The East Branch of the Susquehanna at Windsor, Windsor has gone upscale now and fenced off all public access to the river at this point...

[img]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v148/Sharpshin/Bike/btripbing7_zps277331c0.jpg[/img]

Windsor was the site of Onoquaga, one of them places of a sort interesting to me...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Onaquaga

By the 1760's Onoquaga was already a sort of polyglot town, composed of assorted Iroquois, Tuscaroras and various refugee Algonquian remnants of Eastern Tribes. A minority of White folks were there too; border riffraff, visiting traders, and at least a couple of missionaries (a good many of the inhabitants of all shades were nominally Christian). A major war trail to the Cherokee Country passed that way too. White settlers from further down the Susquehanna would visit Onoquaga to be treated by Iroquois healers, at least part of whose assets consisted of a sophisticated knowledge of botanical pharmacology. Going there to be treated for chronic ailments might have been the modern equivalent of going to Mexico.

Joseph Brant hisself met his mixed-blood wife there. When the Oneidas split from the League at the onset of the Revolutionary War the community was divided but with IIRC no actual bloodshed resulting. As a base for Joseph Brant and his Indian and Tory raiders Onoquaga was put to the torch by the American side, and never rebuilt by Indians.

Nothing at all above ground remains of the old townsite today.

[img]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v148/Sharpshin/Bike/btripbing8_zps9b15e39e.jpg[/img]

more...

I may have missed the details for the return trip,

Cycling back home?

Over Tuscarora Mountain to Deposit in the fading light....



..and some interesting geology en-route....



So how exactly does a very expensive boat like this one end up on flimsy props on Old Rt 17, far away from water?



At the top of the long downhill to Deposit....



Already posted where I stopped for the night.

Downtown Deposit early in the morning....



I seen a bunch of church signs on this trip, and took photos of many, but this one stood out



First view of the Delaware River Valley....

[img]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v148/Sharpshin/Bike/btripdep10_zpsa6c92e4b.jpg[/img]

Second view, note the boat w/fly fisherman and oarsman.....

[img]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v148/Sharpshin/Bike/btripdep16_zpsda52caef.jpg[/img]

IIRC this is called a drift boat, commonly used on the Upper Delaware....

[img]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v148/Sharpshin/Bike/btripdep14_zps4ae96e8f.jpg[/img]

more...

OK, been on this all day and I gotta get up and move around while I still can

I'm currently enjoying the heck out of riding around old familiar haunts, another 50 miles back up to my mom's place tomorrow, ship out the bike on Friday.

Prob'ly I'll work on this again on Monday. Hope the pics ain't getting tedious.

One more, the revised victory portrait, from the Hawk's Nest on the Delaware...



Later,

Birdwatcher

Flying, not sure I'd fancy cycling south this time of year, even if I had the time. Even schoolteachers have to go back to work sometime.

Pictures tedious? You ARE tired! Loving every post, Mike!

I hope your visit with family is everything you hoped for. The journey certainly appears to be.

Thank you again for sharing this with us.

Ed

An incredible journey, by an amazing man ! My daughters and I have enjoyed your writings, your photos, and your adventures along the way. We were/are your Canadian Cheer Squad ! Congratulations !

We look forward to your book !

Great stuff, BW.

That is indeed a drift boat. Very common in my AO.

Still cool. Love all the pics, its like being there on the ride, but with a non battered prostate.

...a well worn, but victorious Trooper, and his trusty mount. Eastern Frontier style.

Again, Mike - will you and Mathilde be attending Q?

Funny co-inky-dink. Last week I took some rare documents I inherited to Skinner for an appraisal for their upcoming annual auction. The expert on revolutionary war documents about shat himself when he laid eyes on one of the inspection reports I brought, from 1780. Many of those listed in my document were involved in the Clinton-Sullivan festivities, as well as the successful defense of Ft. Stanwix.

Guy said that if I'd called a week prior, he'd have had my item on Antiques Roadshow in a heartbeat. He'd just arrived back from NM where he did a AR segment. Amazing stuff.

Sorry for the thread drift. Congrats and good on you, Mike.

QUITTER !!


J/K

Damn impressive feat sir.
Pictures and commentaries were excellent.
Thanks for sharing this! Great job!!

Divorce.

Been following but keeping my trap shut. Saturday I had the pleasure of Mike and his 3 nephews dropping in for a short notice visit He asked for some aimimg to get to interesting points North. Aimed them at Ft Edward and the graves of Maj. Duncan Campbell and Jane MacRhea. Damn, his one nephew that I met before got even TALLER(and skinnier). Mike looks good but the callouses on his ass might be showing fo quite some time My wife likes Mike,but allowed that I have some mighty weird friends that would go across the USA on a bicycle

Ever hear of Lyme? And its effects?

Ticks ain't a problem, getting bitten by the wrong one can be a lifetime of issues.

Just gotta be careful to prevent them.

Birdy

Well done my man!!!! I've been away for a hot week at fire school, and had kind of forgotten about all this, IIRC you were home or almost home when I quit reading.

Glad to read that it all finished out just fine!

Congrats!

Jeff

Ever hear of common sense? Reality? Obviously not.

Mike, I have appreciated your travelogues in the past, but this one pretty much topped them all. It's been fun following your journey.Safe travels back to San Antonio, amigo!!