Harper's Encyclopedia of United States History
Benson Lossing, Ed.

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Butler, John, 1776-1794

Tory leader; born in Connecticut; was in official communication with the Johnsons in the Mohawk Valley before the Revolutionary War, and was colonel of a militia regiment in Tryon county, N. Y. In 1776 he organized a band of motley marauders — white men and Indians, the former painted and behaving like savages. He was in command of them in the battle of Oriskany (q. v.), and of 1.100 men who desolated the Wyoming Valley in July, 1778. He fought Sullivan in the Indian country in central New York, in 1779, and accompanied Sir John Johnson in his raid on the Schoharie and Mohawk settlements in 1780. After the war, Butler went to Canada, and was rewarded by the British government with places of emolument and a pension. He died in Niagara in 1794. His son, Walter, was a ferocious Tory. and was killed during the war.