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Han Yerry was born about 1724 to a Mohawk mother and a German father (he was also known by Han Yerry Doxtader, referring to his part-German ancestry), though he considered himself an Oneida and became chief warrior of the nation’s Wolf Clan. He was “ordinary sized” and “quite a gentleman in his demeanor.” At the outbreak of the war, he mustered Oneida warriors to support the Revolutionary cause. After Oriskany, Han Yerry was part of the Oneida party that travelled to Valley Forge, where he had a personal dinner with George Washington. In 1779, he was one of a number of Oneida and Tuscarora warriors who received officers’ commissions from Congress (he was made a captain). He remained a leader after the war and died around 1794. 

In August 1782, Pierre Charles L’Enfant painted West Point, the administrative and strategic center of the Continental Army. Since the spring of 1778, West Point had become the army’s largest post. During that summer, New England troops dug entrenchments on the surrounding hills and built fortifications on Constitution Island, across the river. These buildings and fortifications are visible in L’Enfant’s scene. 

Image courtesy of Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, Washington, D.C. 

George Washington called the Hudson River the “Key of America.” With the Mohawk River to the West and Lake George and Lake Champlain to the North, the Hudson was part of a system of waterways that reached from the Great Lakes, to Canada, and down to New York City. During the Revolutionary War, Americans clustered their Hudson River fortifications around three narrows– West Point in the North, the Popolopen Creek in the middle, and King’s Ferry to the South. These posts were between 45 and 60 miles from New York City. In 1781, French troops and a portion of the Continental Army crossed the Hudson River at King’s Ferry on their way to Yorktown, Virginia, a crossing that is now recognized as part of the Washington-Rochambeau Revolutionary Route National Historic Trail. By the summer of 1782, the American Army had secured its control of this region. Along the 15-mile stretch of the Hudson River, Washington maintained a force of over 11,000 soldiers. At the same time, 13,000 British troops occupied New York City. West Point was the Continental Army’s strongest fortification. Verplanck’s Point and Stony Point, on either side of King’s Ferry, were the front line against the British to the south.

Click on the numbers here to learn more about the components of the tent and to see images of the original objects and paintings that helped us build this replica.

Skenandoah was born in 1706 as a Conestoga but became Oneida soon after through a “requickening” (absorption and reidentification) ritual. After an embarrassing episode in Albany in 1755, he abstained from alcohol for the rest of his life. According to one observer, he “possessed a vigorous mind, and was alike sagacious, active and persevering.” In 1775, he accompanied a Presbyterian missionary friend to the new army camp outside Boston, where they met Washington and the Massachusetts Provincial Congress. Because of his allegiance to the Revolution, he was imprisoned by the British at Niagara in 1779-1780 and under a sort of house arrest until 1784. His engagement in the treaty negotiations with the British in this period was something for which some Oneida people never forgave him. He died in 1816, aged about 110.