The Tryon County militia sent to relieve Fort Stanwix was repulsed at Oriskany, but General Phillip Schuyler was determined to send a second relief column. When none of Schuyler’s subordinates volunteered to lead the expedition, Major General Benedict Arnold agreed to do so.

While the Mohawk and Seneca Indians and British Loyalists were ambushing General Nicholas Herkimer and his Tryon County militiamen at The Battle of Oriskany on August 6, 1777, Lieutenant Colonel Marinus Willett and 250 Continentals were destroying the unprotected British camp outside Fort Stanwix. Once alerted to Willett’s presence, Native American and British forces abandoned the fight to protect their belongings. Willet’s men retreated into Fort Stanwix, but they had saved Herkimer’s militiamen from certain annihilation. In an indication of the ferocity of the battle, 385 of the 700 Tryon County militiamen, or an astonishing 55 percent, had been killed, an unparalleled percentage for an American force during the Revolutionary War.

On August 6, 1777, General Nicholas Herkimer and 700 Tryon County militiamen planned a surprise attack against a British force led by Lieutenant Colonel Barry St. Leger that was besieging Fort Stanwix. Unfortunately, an informer tipped off St. Leger and he directed Joseph Brant, leader of the Mohawks surrounding Fort Stanwix, to set up an ambush in a ravine near the Native American village of Oriska.