latter were
finally defeated with loss, and made good their retreat into Canada.
Young Scarsborough was then in the nine months' service, and while
the action was going on, himself and one Crosset left the Johnstown
fort, where they were on garrison duty, to join in the fight, less
than two miles distant. Between the Hall and woods they soon found
themselves engaged. Crosset after shooting down one or two, received
a bullet through one hand, but winding a handkerchief around it he
continued the fight under cover of a hemlock stump. He was shot down
and killed there, and his companion surrounded and made prisoner by a
party of Scotch (Highlanders) troops commanded by Captain McDonald.
When Scarsborough was captured, Capt. McDonald was not present, but
the moment he saw him he ordered his men to shoot him down. Several
refused; but three, shall I call them men? obeyed the dastardly
order, and yet he possibly would have survived his wounds, had not
the miscreant in authority cut him down with his own broadsword. The
sword was caught in its first descent, and the valiant captain drew
it out, cutting the hand nearly in two."[131]

This was the same McDonald who, in 1779, figured in the battle of the
Chemung, together with Sir John and Guy Johnson and Walter N. Butler.

Just what part the Mohawk Highlanders, if any, had in the Massacre of
Cherry Valley on October 11, 1778, may not be known. The leaders were
Walter N. Butler, son of Colonel John Butler, who was captain of a
company of Rangers, and the monster Brant.

Owing to the frequent depredations made by the Indians, the Royal
Greens, Butler's Rangers, and the independent company of Alexander
McDonald, upon the frontiers, destroying the innocent and helpless as
well as those who might be found in arms, Congress voted that an
expedition should be sent into the Indian country. Washington detached a
division from the army under General John Sullivan to lay waste that
country. The instructions were obeyed, and Sullivan did not cease until
he found no more to lay waste. The only resistance he met with that was
of any moment was on August 29, 1779, when the enemy hoping to ambuscade
the army of Sullivan, brought on the battle of Chemung, near the present
site of Elmira. There were about three hundred royalists under Colonel
John Butler and Captain Alexander McDonald, assisting Joseph Brant who
commanded the Indians. The defe