one of the best partisans of the French in the war of 1756.
Burgoyne trusted to his newly-arrived Indians to give a check to the
operations of Schuyler, knowing the terror they inspired throughout
the country. He was naturally a humane man, and disliked Indian
allies, but these had hitherto served in company with civilized
troops, and he trusted to the influence possessed over them by St. Luc
and Langlade to keep them within the usages of war. A circumstance
occurred, however, which showed how little the "wild honor" of these
warriors of the tomahawk is to be depended upon.

In General Fraser's division was a young officer, Lieutenant David
Jones, an American loyalist. His family had their home in the vicinity
of Fort Edward before the Revolution. A mutual attachment had taken
place between the youth and a beautiful girl named Jane McCrea, who
resided with her brother on the banks of the Hudson, a few miles below
Fort Edward. The lovers were engaged to be married, when the breaking
out of the war severed families and disturbed all the relations of
life. The Joneses were royalists; the brother of Miss McCrea was a
stanch whig. The former removed to Canada, where he joined the royal
standard, and received a lieutenant's commission. The attachment
between the lovers continued, and it is probable that a correspondence
was kept up between them. Lieutenant Jones was now in Fraser's camp;
in his old neighborhood. Miss McCrea was on a visit to a widow lady,
Mrs. O'Niel, residing at Fort Edward. The approach of Burgoyne's army
had spread an alarm through the country; the inhabitants were flying
from their homes. The brother of Miss McCrea determined to remove to
Albany, and sent for his sister to return home and make ready to
accompany him. She prepared, reluctantly, to obey, and was to embark
in a large bateaux which was to convey several families down the
river. The very morning when the embarkation was to take place the
neighborhood was a scene of terror. A marauding party of Indians, sent
out by Burgoyne to annoy General Schuyler, were harassing the country.
Several of them burst into the house of Mrs. O'Niel, sacked and
plundered it, and carried off her and Miss McCrea prisoners. In her
fright the latter promised the savages a large reward if they would
spare her life and take her in safety to the British camp. It was a
fatal promise. Halting at a spring, a quarrel arose among the savages,
inflamed most probably with drink