No one could find where they slept, unless it was
those who never came back again.
The Iroquois raged, and so did the Butlers and the Johnsons and
Braxton Wyatt. This was a flaw in their triumph, and the British
and Tories saw, also, that it was beginning to affect the
superstitions of their red allies. Braxton Wyatt made a shrewd
guess as to the identity of the raiders, but he kept quiet. It
is likely, also, that Timmendiquas knew, but be, too, said
nothing. So the influence of the raiders grew. While their acts
were great, superstition exaggerated them and their powers
manifold. And it is true that their deeds were extraordinary.
They were heard of on the Susquehanna, then on the Delaware and
its branches, on the Chemung and the Chenango, as far south as
Lackawaxen Creek, and as far north as Oneida Lake. It is likely
that nobody ever accomplished more for a defense than did those
five in the waning months of the summer. Late in September the
most significant of all these events occurred. A party of eight
Tories, who had borne a terrible part in the Wyoming affair, was
attacked on the shores of Otsego Lake with such deadly fierceness
that only two escaped alive to the camp of Sir John Johnson.
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