Marinus Willett, ca 1791, by Ralph Earl, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons
Colonel Marinus Willett sloshed through the icy marsh with growing concern. It had been two hours since midnight. They should have seen the fort by now.
Even as the Treaty of Paris was being crafted to end the Revolutionary War, the frigid night of February 9, 1783, gave way to the frozen morning of February 10. On New York’s western frontier, Willett found himself leading one final secret mission for George Washington.
Willett pushed his way to the head of the column. “Where’s the guide?” he asked. The lead soldier shrugged. They had not seen the guide in quite some time and were doing their best to follow his tracks. The soldier pointed forward as the last light of the setting moon shone upon the footprints in the silvery, shadowed snow ahead of them.
With urgent impatience, Willett hurriedly followed the freshly made steps. It took him thirty minutes to catch up to the Oneida scout. The Indian stood like a statue, frozen as the snow around him. He was scared. Worse than that, he was lost.
Washington’s words reverberated in Willett’s head. “You can always waste time, but never recover it… in such an enterprise as yours, want of time will be a certain defeat.”1 The misdirection delayed them. They were late. The element of surprise was gone.
Willett was forced to abort and return to Fort Rensselaer.
* * * * *
George Washington wanted one last victory before the war officially ended. With the defeat of Cornwallis at Yorktown in October 1781, the British lost any taste for further fighting. In March 1782, Parliament effectively abandoned further offensive operations in America. With the exception of their Indian allies, the year remained relatively quiet.
Yet, there was no formal peace treaty.
Was the war really over?
In Philadelphia, many assumed the clash with King George was coming to an end. Along New York’s murky western frontier, however, such certainty remained elusive.
British regulars may have been quiet in 1782, but that didn’t mean the soldiers weren’t at work. They busied themselves rebuilding Fort Ontario. Abandoned in 1778, early in the Revolutionary War, it was located on the east bank of the mouth of the Oswego River, high above Lake Ontario. Clearly, the British weren’t taking chances. Whatever diplomats might eventually agree upon, military planners on the frontier still prepared for war. At a minimum, they intended to protect their lucrative fur trade.
The possibility of renewed conflict remained. Washington also wished to take no chances. With his army camped in New Windsor, New York, the Continental’s Commander-in-Chief decided upon one final military gamble. His target: Fort Ontario.
The prominent fortress represented Britain’s closest and most formidable stronghold on the frontier. Unlike Fort Niagara, which guarded the Confederacy’s western gateway, Fort Ontario lay deep within the former territory of the Six Nations, just beyond New York’s western-most settlements.
In January 1783, Washington developed a plan to surprise the British and take Fort Ontario. He selected Colonel Marinus Willett to lead the operation. Willett was in command when his troops pursued and killed “the notorious Captain Walter Butler” on October 20, 1781, just ten days after the surrender of Cornwallis.2 So vilified was Butler that it’s been said news of his death brought more cheers in the Mohawk Valley than Washington’s victory at Yorktown.3
Despite the apparent finality of Cornwallis’ defeat, Washington wasn’t going to be lulled into a false sense of security. He presented the Colonel with strict instructions to operate under sealed orders. The fewer who knew the purpose of the mission, the better they could conceal it from the enemy.
Alas, an errant Oneida scout lost his way guiding Willett’s troops to the fort. Forced to forsake the mission, Washington’s hand-picked man returned to Fort Rensselaer and soon learned that American leaders had received Lafayette’s letter reporting a treaty had been agreed to.
Was Lafayette negotiating on America’s behalf? The short answer is “No.” That responsibility fell to Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, John Jay, and Henry Laurens. The longer answer is a bit more complicated. If you thought the competing European claims and the Royal mess surrounding Western New York were complex, ending the Revolutionary War required just as many moving parts.
For peace to become reality, not only did Great Britain and the United States have to agree, but so did France (hence, Lafayette) and Spain.
(Did you notice who was missing from the negotiating table?)
It was the preliminary multinational agreement reached in January 1783 that Lafayette reported to American leaders. The formal Treaty of Paris would be finalized later that year and officially ratified in 1784.
Much to America’s delight, George III agreed to cede all British territory south of the Great Lakes, including lands extending to the Mississippi River. Naturally, this would include Western New York.
On paper.
It’s one thing to draw a map showing boundaries. It’s quite another thing to turn that map into reality. And for the Greater Western New York region, that reality remained as murky as the night of February 9th was to Colonel Willett.
For one thing, the British still occupied their chain of forts within what was now nominally the United States of America. These included both Fort Ontario and Fort Niagara.
This wasn’t an oversight. Article 7 of the Treaty of Paris specifically said “his Britannic Majesty shall with all convenient speed…withdraw… from every Post, Place and Harbour…”4 The wording in the Treaty was clear. Despite this, when asked to comply, General Sir Frederick Haldimand, Governor of the Province of Quebec and Commander-in-Chief of British forces in North America, stated that he was aware of the Treaty but had not yet received orders to evacuate the forts.5
Whether he admitted it or not, Haldimand had several reasons for this delaying tactic. Occupying the forts provided the British with leverage over the Americans.6 It protected British trade interests.7 It helped ameliorate the restless Iroquois who felt betrayed when the British ceded lands they felt were theirs.8 Finally, the British understood the United States was too weak to enforce the Treaty9, so there was little downside in breaching it.
The Treaty changed the maps, but it didn’t change the reality on the ground. The British still held the forts. Their former allies, particularly the Seneca, remained a powerful presence on the frontier. There also remained the question of the precise boundary along the Niagara River.
This reality posed a challenge to the new nation of America. A new nation bound by the fragile Articles of Confederation. The Articles offered little money and little authority. In short, they provided the United States with no practical ability to enforce its frontier claims.
Not that New York State was in any better position. In fact, it was worse.
By the end of the Revolutionary War, most of the other competing colonial claims for this territory had been resolved. Massachusetts, however, continued to rely on the wording of its provincial charter. The Bay State insisted those provisions still conveyed rights in the Greater Western New York region.
The Treaty of Paris may have settled the war between Britain and the United States, but it left too many matters unresolved. For the coastal cities, independence had been indisputably achieved. For the frontier of Western New York, it only created more questions.
And a vast void of authority.
Into that void rushed old claims, forgotten charters, and competing visions of who possessed the right to the frontier. One dispute in particular would shape the future of Western New York forever.
1 Willett, William M., “Washington Letter to Willett, February 2d, 1783,” A Narrative of the Military Actions of Colonel Marinus Willett, G.&C.&H. Carvill, New York, 1831, p.147.
2 Halsey, Francis Whiting, The Old New York Frontier, Charles Scribner’s Sons, New York, 1902, p. 306.
3 David A. Charters, “BUTLER, WALTER,” in Dictionary of Canadian Biography, vol. 4, University of Toronto/Université Laval, 2003–, https://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/butler_walter_4E.html, retrieved June 8, 2026.
4 Article 7, Treaty of Paris (1783), National Archives, https://www.archives.gov/milestone-documents/treaty-of-paris, retrieved June 3, 2026.
5 Collections of the New York Historical Society for the year 1878, Publication Fund Series Vol XI, New York, 1879, p. 193.
6 Broadhead, John Romeyn, Documents Relative to the Colonial History of the State of New York V10, E.B. O’Callaghan, ed, Weed, Parsons & Co., 1858, p. 1004.
7 Sessional Papers Volume 5, Second Session of the Parliament of the Dominion of Canada, A. Senecal, Ottawa, 1888, p. xx.
8 Stone, William L., Life of Joseph Brant – Thayendenegea Including the Border Wars of the American Rev, H.&E. Phinney, Cooperstown, 1838, p. 271.
9 Ibid., p. 263.
A European Tug Of War
Why, then, would the powers of the day go through all the trouble of pretense?
Well, first, it was all pretend. Europeans did come to this New World. Some explored. Some conquered. Many settled. Still, their activities covered only a small fraction of their claims.
But it was the claim itself that rendered prestige. It was a symbol of potency, a symbol of Continue Reading “A European Tug Of War”