Background
Nicholas Herkimer was born in 1728 in the German Flats, a settlement of Palatine Germans in northern New York.
Nicholas Herkimer was born in 1728 in the German Flats, a settlement of Palatine Germans in northern New York.
He probably attended the German school near the Herkimer home which, about 1776, was enclosed in Fort Dayton.
Commissioned a lieutenant in the Schenectady militia on January 5, 1758, he commanded the fort when the French and Indians attacked Palatine settlers that year.
In 1760 Herkimer moved to Danube (now Indian Castle), N. Y. , and in 1775 he supported the Colonial cause by representing his district on the Tryon County Committee of Safety.
On September 5, 1776, the New York State Convention commissioned him brigadier general of the Tryon County militia, to direct operations against Sir John Johnson and the Mohawk Indian chieftain Joseph Brant.
In July 1777 he organized eight hundred militiamen at Fort Dayton to march to the relief of Colonel Peter Gansevoort at Fort Stanwix (later called Fort Schuyler), then besieged by Colonel Barry St. Leger.
At Oriskany, New York, 10 miles (16 km) from their destination, Herkimer's militiamen were ambushed by British and Indian forces under Johnson and Brant on Aug. 6, 1777, and engaged in one of the bloodiest battles of the Revolution, the outcome of which weakened the British campaign by diverting St. Leger from his plan to join General John Burgoyne in the Mohawk Valley.
Seriously wounded at the start, Herkimer nevertheless directed his troops until the British withdrew.