Schenectady massacre

The Schenectady Massacre was an attack against the village of Schenectady in the colony of New York on 1690-02-08. It was carried out by a party of over 200 French and Sault and Algonquin Indian raiders that set out from Montreal to attack English outposts to the south, and was intended as retaliation for a series of devastating Iroquois raids for which the English had provided weapons and ammunition. Isolated northern and western settlements were the targets.

Late on February 8, when a scouting party reported that no one was guarding the stockade at Schenectady, a decision was made to attack at once, despite the bitter cold. The original target was Fort Orange (present day Albany), but when Schenectady was discovered to be defenseless the raiding party decided to attack here instead.

In the bloody midnight massacre which followed, houses and barns were torched and men, women and children were slaughtered. Many were in night clothing and had no time to arm themselves. By the morning of February 9, the thriving community lay in ruins more than 60 buildings were burned and residents were dead, taken prisoner, or fled as refugees to the safety of the fort at Albany.

The 60 dead included 38 men, 10 women and 12 children. The raiders departed with 27 prisoners and 50 horses. [http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~vanepsgenealogy/schmass.html] It was a brutal attack on a defenseless settlement, and the community took many years to recover. John A. Glen, son of the founder of Scotia across the river from Schenectady, had shown previous kindness to the French. The Schenectady prisoners were taken to him, where he was told he could pick out his relatives as a gratitude. Glen took as many survivors as he could without raising suspicions, and the rest were taken prisoner to Canada.

One of those killed was Reynier Schaets, along with a son. Reynier Schaets was a son of of Gideon Schaets, dominie of the Dutch Reformed Church at Albany. Reynier was a surgeon, who had been appointed Justice at Schenectady by Governor Leisler on December 28, 1689. His wife,Catharina Bensing, and three other children: Gideon, Bartholomew and Agnietje survived.

ee also

* List of massacres
* Indian massacres

External links

* [http://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/documents/documents_p2.cfm?doc=238 Journal of Robert Livingston, a settler]
* [http://www.schenectadyny.org/Massacre/toc.htm Detailed story, an online book]
* [http://www.geocities.com/vanpatten.geo/sdystkd.html Detailed story, Van Patten website]
* [http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~vanepsgenealogy/schmass.html List of settlers killed and captured, Van Epps website]