He enlisted in the Dutchess County, New York, Militia in 1758 in the French and Indian War at 19 years. His military record says he was born in Boston, but the birth is registered in Yarmouth, Barnstable County, Massachusetts; was 5 feet, eleven inches, ruddy complexion, and a farmer. He was involved in the battles of Louisberg, Fort Niagara, Ticonderoga, Fort Frontenac and Quebec. After the war, he must have gone to the Wyoming Valley in Pennsylvania, because he appears on a list of settlers in "Cushtunk", which is near present day Wilkes Barre. Near him on the list are Isaac and Christopher Tracy, brothers of his future wife. The settlement was abandoned after Indian attacks the next year. Daniel probably followed the Tracy brothers to Preston, Connecticut where he married Mary Polly Tracy around 1765. They had children, probably in Preston. They then moved to Warwick, Orange County, New York, where more children were born and they belonged to the Baptist church.
By 1769, they had returned to the Wyoming Valley, where Daniel appears on a list of early settlers in Kingston, Luzerne County, Pennsylvania. They were accompanied by a large group of families from Connecticut. The Cash family joined the Baptist church at Pittston, Pennsylvania.
Daniel Cash, the son of Samuel Cash and Experiance Baker of Cape Cod, married Mary Polly Tracy, daughter of Isaac Tracy and Mehitable Rude, in 1765 in Delaware County, New York. To this union were born nine children: Zipporah Calista, David Isaac, Mehitabel, Reuben, Nathan, Mary Polly, Phoebe Millicent, Elizabeth and Permilla. All the children, with the exception of the last two who were born after 1778, were survivors, along with their parents who were the family heros, of the Wyoming Massacre of July 3, 1778.
Record of Florence Kellogg, a descendant, states there may have been three other children, of which no record has been found, who possibly died in infancy. She also had his birth year as 1739 and marriage year as 1765.
Both Daniel and Mary Cash died in Minisink, Orange County, New York.
The following is from The Boston and Country Gazette Journal printed Monday, 3 Aug 1778 in Boston, MA:
POUGHKEEPSIE, July 20.
Since our last, many of the distressed Refugees from the Wyoming settlements on the Susquehanna, who escaped the general massacre, of the inhabitants, have passed this way, from whom we have collected the following account, viz.
[Previous to the narrative, it may be necessary to inform some of our readers, that this settlement was made by the people of Connecticut on a grant of lands purchased by the inhabitants of that colony, under the sanction of the government of the Indian proprietors; and that these lands falling within the limits of the Pennsylvania claim, a DISPUTE concerning the right has arisen, between the two governments, and proceeded to frequent acts of hostility. When it was at a height that threatened the disturbance of the other governments, Congress interposed, by whose recommendations and authority, the decision of the dispute was suspended, till that with Great Britain, equally interesting to every American State, was concluded, when there might be more leisure to attend to the other, and consider the justice of each claim.
On this footing the dispute has lain dormant for two or three years; the inhabitants lived happily and the settlements increased, consisting of eight townships, viz. Lackewana, Exeter, Kingston, Wilkesborough, Plymouth, Nanticoke, Huntington, and Salem, each containing five mile square. The six lower townships were pretty full of inhabitants, the two upper ones, had comparatively but few thinly scattered. The lands are exceedingly good, beautifully situated along both sides of the Susquehanna navigable for flat bottomed boats, and produced immense quantities of grain of all sorts, roots, fruits, hemp, flax, &c. and stock of all kinds in abundance. The settlement had lately supplied the Continental army with 3000 bushels of grain, and the ground was loaded with the most promising crops of every kind. The settlement included upwards of a thousand families which had furnished our army with a thousand soldiers, besides the garrisons of four forts, in the township of Lockewany, Exeter, Kingston & Wilkesborough. One of these forts was garrisoned by upwards of 400 soldiers, chiefly of the militia, the principal officers in which were Colonels Dennison and Zebulon Butler.
The Tories and Inhabitants had given some disturbances to these settlement last year, before Gen. Herkemer's battle at Oneida Creek near Fort Stanwix and our skirmishes soon after with parties of the enemy at and near Schohary, when they were dispersed and the Tories concealed themselves among our different settlements; the people here remained undisturbed during the rest of the year.]
About this time the inhabitants having discovered that many of these villainous Tories who had stirred up the Indians, and been with them in fighting against us, were within the settlement, 27 of them were in January last, taken up and secured. Of these 18 were sent to Connecticut, the rest, after being detained some time, and examined, were for want of sufficient evidence set at liberty; they immediately joined the enemy, and became active in raising in the Indians, a spirit of hostility against us. This disposition soon after began to appear in the behaviour of the Tories and Indians, which gave the people apprehensions of danger, and occasioned some preparations for defence.
The people had some frequent intimations that the Indians had some mischievous designs against them but their fears were somewhat abated by the seeming solicitude of the Indians to preserve peace; they sent down at different times several parties with declarations of their peaceable disposition towards us, and to request the like on our part towards them. They were always dismissed with assurances that there was no design to disturb them. But one of those Indians getting drunk, said he and the other messengers, were only sent to amuse the people in the settlement but that the Indians intended as soon as they were in order to attack them. On this the Indian men were confined, and the women sent back with a flag. In March, appearances, became more alarming, and the scattered families settled for 30 miles up the river, were collected and brought into the more populous parts. In April and May, strolling parties of Indians and Tories, about 30 and under in a company, made frequent incursions into the settlements, robbing and plundering the inhabitants of provision, grain and livestock. In June, several persons being at work on a farm, from which the tory inhabitants had gone to the enemy, were attacked, and one man of them was killed; soon after, a woman (wife of one of the 27 tories before mentioned) was killed with her five children, by a party of these Tories and Indians, who plundered the house of everything they could take away and destroyed the rest.
On the 1st instant (July) the whole body of the enemy consisting, it is supposed of near 1600 (about 300 of whom were thought to be Indians, under their own chiefs; the rest Tories, painted like them, except their officers, who were dressed like regulars) the whole under the command of Col. John Butler, (a Connecticut Tory, and cousin to Col. Z. Butler, the second in command in the settlement) came down near the upper fort, but concealed the greatest part of their number; here they had a skirmish with the inhabitants, who took and killed two Indians, and lost ten of their own men, three of whom they afterwards found killed, scalped, and mangled in the most inhuman manner.
Thursday, July 2. The enemy appeared on the mountains, back of Kingston, where the women and children then fled into the fort. Most of the garrison of Exeter fort were Tories, who treacherously gave it up to the enemy. The same night, after a little resistance, they took Lackewana fort, killed Squire Jenkins and his family, with several others, in a barbarous manner, and made prisoners of most of the women and children, a small number only escaped.
Friday, July 3. This morning Col. Zebulon Butler, leaving a small number to guard the fort, (Wilkesbury) crossed the river with about 400 men, and marched into Kingston fort. The enemy sent in a flag demanding the surrender of the fort in two hours. Col. Butler answered he should not surrender, but was ready to receive them. They sent in a second flag, demanding an immediate surrender, otherwise the fort should be stormed, plundered and burnt, with all its contents, in a few hours – and said that they had with them 300 men. Col. Z. Butler proposed a parley, which being agreed to, a place in Kingston was appointed for the meeting; to which Col. Z. Butler repaired with 400 men, well armed, but finding nobody there, he proceeded to the foot of the mountain, where at a distance he saw a flag, which as he advanced, retired as if afraid, 20 or 30 rods; he following, was led into an ambush, and partly surrounded by the enemy, who suddenly rose and fired upon them. Notwithstanding the great disproportion of 1600 to 400, he and his men bravely stood and return the fire for three quarters of an hour, with such briskness and resolution, that the enemy began to give way and were upon the point of retiring; when one of Col. Z. Butler's men, either through treachery or cowardice, cried out that the Colonel ordered a retreat – This caused a cessation of their fire, threw them into confusion and a total rout ensued. The greatest part fled to the river, which they endeavored to pass to Fort Wilkesbury, the enemy pursued them with the fury of Devils, many were lost or killed in the river, and no more than about 70, some of whom were wounded, escaped to Wilkesbury.
Saturday morning, July 4. The enemy sent 196 scalps into Fort Kingston, which they invested on the land side, and kept up a continual fire upon it.
This evening Col. Z. Butler with his family quitted the fort and went down the river.
Col. Nathan Denison went with a flag to Exeter fort, to know of Col. John Butler what terms he would grant on a surrender; Butler answered, THE HATCHET. Col. Dennison returned to Fort Kingston, which he defended till Sunday morning, when his men being nearly all killed or wounded, he could hold out no longer, and was obliged to surrender at discretion. The enemy took away some of the unhappy prisoners, and shutting up the rest in the houses, set fire to them, and they were all consumed together. These infernals then crossed the river to Fort Wilkesbury, which in a few minutes surrendered in discretion. About 70 of the men, who had listed in the Continental service to defend the frontiers, they inhumanly butchered, with every circumstance of horrid cruelty; and then shutting up the rest, with the women and children in the houses, they set fire to them, and they all perished together in the flames.
After burning all the buildings in the fort they proceeded to the destruction of every building and improvement (except what belonged to some Tories) that came within their reach, on all these flourishing settlements, which they have rendered a scence of desolation and horror almost beyond description, parrallel or credibility; and were not the facts attested by numbers of the unhappy sufferers, from different quarters of the settlement, and unconnected with each other, it would be impossible to believe that human nature could be capable of such prodigious enormity.
When these miscreants had destroyed the other improvements, they proceeded to destroy the crops on the ground, letting in the cattle and horses to the corn, and cutting up as much as they could of what was left; great numbers of the cattle they shot and destroyed; and cutting out the tongues of many others, left them to perish in misery.
The course of these truly diabolical proceedings, was marked by many particular acts of distinguished enormity, among which were the following, viz.
The Captains James Bedlock, Robert Durgee, and Samuel Ranson, being made prisoners by the enemy – they stripped Captain Bedlock, tied him to a tree and stuck him full of sharp splinters of pine knots, then piling a heap of pine knots round him they set all on fire, put Durkee and Ranson into the fire and held them down with pitch forks.
Thomas Terry (whose father was killed by the Indians last war) with his own hands killed his own mother, his father-in-law, his sisters and families.
Partial Terry, the son of a man who bore a very respectable character, had several times sent his father word that he hoped to wash his hands in his heart's blood. Agreeable to such a horrid declaration, the monster, with his own hand, murdered his father, mother, brothers and sisters, stripped off their scalps, and cut off his father's head.
Col. Dennison was seen surrounded by the enemy, and was doubtless murdered. Col. Zebulon Butler is supposed to be the only officer escaped.
"Massacre at Wyoming" by Alonzo Chappell, 1857.
It is said he had several times written to the Congress and Gen. Washington, acquainting them with the danger the settlement were in, and requesting assistance; but that he received no answer, except that HE HAD NO CAUSE TO FEAR, SINCE THE INDIANS WERE ALL FOR PEACE AND QUITE ADVERSE TO WAR. However, he lately received a letter from Capt. Spaulding, acquainting him that neither the Congress nor Gen. Washington had received any of his letters, which had been intercepted by the Pennsylvania Tories, who in all probability acted in concert with these execrable miscreants against Wyoming: It is reported that these wretches, after compleating their horrid business at Wyoming, are going or gone to Cherry Valley, and the parts adjacent.
We hear that a party of infernals of the like kind, have within this week or two, infested the parts about Leghowegh, near Rochester, on the Minisink road to Philadelphia, where a party of them, about 40 in number, have plundered and burnt several houses, abused some people, and carried off 3 men. It is hoped speedy and effectual measures will be taken to punish and extirpate these monsters in human shape, from the face of the earth.
The distresses of the surviving inhabitants of that late flourishing settlement are by their present circumstances, rendered such striking objects of charity, that withholding relief from them by those who are able to afford it, argues a criminal obduracy, which deserves, and may be punished by distresses of a similar kind.
We are told that of the 1000 men in the Continental army, who went from that settlement, their number is by sickness and the cruel usage of the prisons by the enemy, reduced to 400, who have now to lament the loss of their property, wives, children, and all that was dear to them in life! The helpless fugitives from the place, escaped with little more than their lives, they could bring nothing with them – hardly cloathes to cover them and nothing to eat, many were two or three days without sustenance, and pregnant women were delivered alone in the woods. This it is hoped will be the concluding scene of the tragedy acted by the British tyrant and his murderous, diabolical emissaries, in a part of his late kingdom, which he has justly forfeited, and which now forever departed from him.
By 1769, they had returned to the Wyoming Valley, where Daniel appears on a list of early settlers in Kingston, Luzerne County, Pennsylvania. They were accompanied by a large group of families from Connecticut. The Cash family joined the Baptist church at Pittston, Pennsylvania.
Daniel Cash, the son of Samuel Cash and Experiance Baker of Cape Cod, married Mary Polly Tracy, daughter of Isaac Tracy and Mehitable Rude, in 1765 in Delaware County, New York. To this union were born nine children: Zipporah Calista, David Isaac, Mehitabel, Reuben, Nathan, Mary Polly, Phoebe Millicent, Elizabeth and Permilla. All the children, with the exception of the last two who were born after 1778, were survivors, along with their parents who were the family heros, of the Wyoming Massacre of July 3, 1778.
Record of Florence Kellogg, a descendant, states there may have been three other children, of which no record has been found, who possibly died in infancy. She also had his birth year as 1739 and marriage year as 1765.
Both Daniel and Mary Cash died in Minisink, Orange County, New York.
The following is from The Boston and Country Gazette Journal printed Monday, 3 Aug 1778 in Boston, MA:
POUGHKEEPSIE, July 20.
Since our last, many of the distressed Refugees from the Wyoming settlements on the Susquehanna, who escaped the general massacre, of the inhabitants, have passed this way, from whom we have collected the following account, viz.
[Previous to the narrative, it may be necessary to inform some of our readers, that this settlement was made by the people of Connecticut on a grant of lands purchased by the inhabitants of that colony, under the sanction of the government of the Indian proprietors; and that these lands falling within the limits of the Pennsylvania claim, a DISPUTE concerning the right has arisen, between the two governments, and proceeded to frequent acts of hostility. When it was at a height that threatened the disturbance of the other governments, Congress interposed, by whose recommendations and authority, the decision of the dispute was suspended, till that with Great Britain, equally interesting to every American State, was concluded, when there might be more leisure to attend to the other, and consider the justice of each claim.
On this footing the dispute has lain dormant for two or three years; the inhabitants lived happily and the settlements increased, consisting of eight townships, viz. Lackewana, Exeter, Kingston, Wilkesborough, Plymouth, Nanticoke, Huntington, and Salem, each containing five mile square. The six lower townships were pretty full of inhabitants, the two upper ones, had comparatively but few thinly scattered. The lands are exceedingly good, beautifully situated along both sides of the Susquehanna navigable for flat bottomed boats, and produced immense quantities of grain of all sorts, roots, fruits, hemp, flax, &c. and stock of all kinds in abundance. The settlement had lately supplied the Continental army with 3000 bushels of grain, and the ground was loaded with the most promising crops of every kind. The settlement included upwards of a thousand families which had furnished our army with a thousand soldiers, besides the garrisons of four forts, in the township of Lockewany, Exeter, Kingston & Wilkesborough. One of these forts was garrisoned by upwards of 400 soldiers, chiefly of the militia, the principal officers in which were Colonels Dennison and Zebulon Butler.
The Tories and Inhabitants had given some disturbances to these settlement last year, before Gen. Herkemer's battle at Oneida Creek near Fort Stanwix and our skirmishes soon after with parties of the enemy at and near Schohary, when they were dispersed and the Tories concealed themselves among our different settlements; the people here remained undisturbed during the rest of the year.]
About this time the inhabitants having discovered that many of these villainous Tories who had stirred up the Indians, and been with them in fighting against us, were within the settlement, 27 of them were in January last, taken up and secured. Of these 18 were sent to Connecticut, the rest, after being detained some time, and examined, were for want of sufficient evidence set at liberty; they immediately joined the enemy, and became active in raising in the Indians, a spirit of hostility against us. This disposition soon after began to appear in the behaviour of the Tories and Indians, which gave the people apprehensions of danger, and occasioned some preparations for defence.
The people had some frequent intimations that the Indians had some mischievous designs against them but their fears were somewhat abated by the seeming solicitude of the Indians to preserve peace; they sent down at different times several parties with declarations of their peaceable disposition towards us, and to request the like on our part towards them. They were always dismissed with assurances that there was no design to disturb them. But one of those Indians getting drunk, said he and the other messengers, were only sent to amuse the people in the settlement but that the Indians intended as soon as they were in order to attack them. On this the Indian men were confined, and the women sent back with a flag. In March, appearances, became more alarming, and the scattered families settled for 30 miles up the river, were collected and brought into the more populous parts. In April and May, strolling parties of Indians and Tories, about 30 and under in a company, made frequent incursions into the settlements, robbing and plundering the inhabitants of provision, grain and livestock. In June, several persons being at work on a farm, from which the tory inhabitants had gone to the enemy, were attacked, and one man of them was killed; soon after, a woman (wife of one of the 27 tories before mentioned) was killed with her five children, by a party of these Tories and Indians, who plundered the house of everything they could take away and destroyed the rest.
On the 1st instant (July) the whole body of the enemy consisting, it is supposed of near 1600 (about 300 of whom were thought to be Indians, under their own chiefs; the rest Tories, painted like them, except their officers, who were dressed like regulars) the whole under the command of Col. John Butler, (a Connecticut Tory, and cousin to Col. Z. Butler, the second in command in the settlement) came down near the upper fort, but concealed the greatest part of their number; here they had a skirmish with the inhabitants, who took and killed two Indians, and lost ten of their own men, three of whom they afterwards found killed, scalped, and mangled in the most inhuman manner.
Thursday, July 2. The enemy appeared on the mountains, back of Kingston, where the women and children then fled into the fort. Most of the garrison of Exeter fort were Tories, who treacherously gave it up to the enemy. The same night, after a little resistance, they took Lackewana fort, killed Squire Jenkins and his family, with several others, in a barbarous manner, and made prisoners of most of the women and children, a small number only escaped.
Friday, July 3. This morning Col. Zebulon Butler, leaving a small number to guard the fort, (Wilkesbury) crossed the river with about 400 men, and marched into Kingston fort. The enemy sent in a flag demanding the surrender of the fort in two hours. Col. Butler answered he should not surrender, but was ready to receive them. They sent in a second flag, demanding an immediate surrender, otherwise the fort should be stormed, plundered and burnt, with all its contents, in a few hours – and said that they had with them 300 men. Col. Z. Butler proposed a parley, which being agreed to, a place in Kingston was appointed for the meeting; to which Col. Z. Butler repaired with 400 men, well armed, but finding nobody there, he proceeded to the foot of the mountain, where at a distance he saw a flag, which as he advanced, retired as if afraid, 20 or 30 rods; he following, was led into an ambush, and partly surrounded by the enemy, who suddenly rose and fired upon them. Notwithstanding the great disproportion of 1600 to 400, he and his men bravely stood and return the fire for three quarters of an hour, with such briskness and resolution, that the enemy began to give way and were upon the point of retiring; when one of Col. Z. Butler's men, either through treachery or cowardice, cried out that the Colonel ordered a retreat – This caused a cessation of their fire, threw them into confusion and a total rout ensued. The greatest part fled to the river, which they endeavored to pass to Fort Wilkesbury, the enemy pursued them with the fury of Devils, many were lost or killed in the river, and no more than about 70, some of whom were wounded, escaped to Wilkesbury.
Saturday morning, July 4. The enemy sent 196 scalps into Fort Kingston, which they invested on the land side, and kept up a continual fire upon it.
This evening Col. Z. Butler with his family quitted the fort and went down the river.
Col. Nathan Denison went with a flag to Exeter fort, to know of Col. John Butler what terms he would grant on a surrender; Butler answered, THE HATCHET. Col. Dennison returned to Fort Kingston, which he defended till Sunday morning, when his men being nearly all killed or wounded, he could hold out no longer, and was obliged to surrender at discretion. The enemy took away some of the unhappy prisoners, and shutting up the rest in the houses, set fire to them, and they were all consumed together. These infernals then crossed the river to Fort Wilkesbury, which in a few minutes surrendered in discretion. About 70 of the men, who had listed in the Continental service to defend the frontiers, they inhumanly butchered, with every circumstance of horrid cruelty; and then shutting up the rest, with the women and children in the houses, they set fire to them, and they all perished together in the flames.
After burning all the buildings in the fort they proceeded to the destruction of every building and improvement (except what belonged to some Tories) that came within their reach, on all these flourishing settlements, which they have rendered a scence of desolation and horror almost beyond description, parrallel or credibility; and were not the facts attested by numbers of the unhappy sufferers, from different quarters of the settlement, and unconnected with each other, it would be impossible to believe that human nature could be capable of such prodigious enormity.
When these miscreants had destroyed the other improvements, they proceeded to destroy the crops on the ground, letting in the cattle and horses to the corn, and cutting up as much as they could of what was left; great numbers of the cattle they shot and destroyed; and cutting out the tongues of many others, left them to perish in misery.
The course of these truly diabolical proceedings, was marked by many particular acts of distinguished enormity, among which were the following, viz.
The Captains James Bedlock, Robert Durgee, and Samuel Ranson, being made prisoners by the enemy – they stripped Captain Bedlock, tied him to a tree and stuck him full of sharp splinters of pine knots, then piling a heap of pine knots round him they set all on fire, put Durkee and Ranson into the fire and held them down with pitch forks.
Thomas Terry (whose father was killed by the Indians last war) with his own hands killed his own mother, his father-in-law, his sisters and families.
Partial Terry, the son of a man who bore a very respectable character, had several times sent his father word that he hoped to wash his hands in his heart's blood. Agreeable to such a horrid declaration, the monster, with his own hand, murdered his father, mother, brothers and sisters, stripped off their scalps, and cut off his father's head.
Col. Dennison was seen surrounded by the enemy, and was doubtless murdered. Col. Zebulon Butler is supposed to be the only officer escaped.
"Massacre at Wyoming" by Alonzo Chappell, 1857.
It is said he had several times written to the Congress and Gen. Washington, acquainting them with the danger the settlement were in, and requesting assistance; but that he received no answer, except that HE HAD NO CAUSE TO FEAR, SINCE THE INDIANS WERE ALL FOR PEACE AND QUITE ADVERSE TO WAR. However, he lately received a letter from Capt. Spaulding, acquainting him that neither the Congress nor Gen. Washington had received any of his letters, which had been intercepted by the Pennsylvania Tories, who in all probability acted in concert with these execrable miscreants against Wyoming: It is reported that these wretches, after compleating their horrid business at Wyoming, are going or gone to Cherry Valley, and the parts adjacent.
We hear that a party of infernals of the like kind, have within this week or two, infested the parts about Leghowegh, near Rochester, on the Minisink road to Philadelphia, where a party of them, about 40 in number, have plundered and burnt several houses, abused some people, and carried off 3 men. It is hoped speedy and effectual measures will be taken to punish and extirpate these monsters in human shape, from the face of the earth.
The distresses of the surviving inhabitants of that late flourishing settlement are by their present circumstances, rendered such striking objects of charity, that withholding relief from them by those who are able to afford it, argues a criminal obduracy, which deserves, and may be punished by distresses of a similar kind.
We are told that of the 1000 men in the Continental army, who went from that settlement, their number is by sickness and the cruel usage of the prisons by the enemy, reduced to 400, who have now to lament the loss of their property, wives, children, and all that was dear to them in life! The helpless fugitives from the place, escaped with little more than their lives, they could bring nothing with them – hardly cloathes to cover them and nothing to eat, many were two or three days without sustenance, and pregnant women were delivered alone in the woods. This it is hoped will be the concluding scene of the tragedy acted by the British tyrant and his murderous, diabolical emissaries, in a part of his late kingdom, which he has justly forfeited, and which now forever departed from him.
He enlisted in the Dutchess County, New York, Militia in 1758 in the French and Indian War at 19 years. His military record says he was born in Boston, but the birth is registered in Yarmouth, Barnstable County, Massachusetts; was 5 feet, eleven inches, ruddy complexion, and a farmer. He was involved in the battles of Louisberg, Fort Niagara, Ticonderoga, Fort Frontenac and Quebec. After the war, he must have gone to the Wyoming Valley in Pennsylvania, because he appears on a list of settlers in "Cushtunk", which is near present day Wilkes Barre. Near him on the list are Isaac and Christopher Tracy, brothers of his future wife. The settlement was abandoned after Indian attacks the next year. Daniel probably followed the Tracy brothers to Preston, Connecticut where he married Mary Polly Tracy around 1765. They had children, probably in Preston. They then moved to Warwick, Orange County, New York, where more children were born and they belonged to the Baptist church.
By 1769, they had returned to the Wyoming Valley, where Daniel appears on a list of early settlers in Kingston, Luzerne County, Pennsylvania. They were accompanied by a large group of families from Connecticut. The Cash family joined the Baptist church at Pittston, Pennsylvania.
Daniel Cash, the son of Samuel Cash and Experiance Baker of Cape Cod, married Mary Polly Tracy, daughter of Isaac Tracy and Mehitable Rude, in 1765 in Delaware County, New York. To this union were born nine children: Zipporah Calista, David Isaac, Mehitabel, Reuben, Nathan, Mary Polly, Phoebe Millicent, Elizabeth and Permilla. All the children, with the exception of the last two who were born after 1778, were survivors, along with their parents who were the family heros, of the Wyoming Massacre of July 3, 1778.
Record of Florence Kellogg, a descendant, states there may have been three other children, of which no record has been found, who possibly died in infancy. She also had his birth year as 1739 and marriage year as 1765.
Both Daniel and Mary Cash died in Minisink, Orange County, New York.
The following is from The Boston and Country Gazette Journal printed Monday, 3 Aug 1778 in Boston, MA:
POUGHKEEPSIE, July 20.
Since our last, many of the distressed Refugees from the Wyoming settlements on the Susquehanna, who escaped the general massacre, of the inhabitants, have passed this way, from whom we have collected the following account, viz.
[Previous to the narrative, it may be necessary to inform some of our readers, that this settlement was made by the people of Connecticut on a grant of lands purchased by the inhabitants of that colony, under the sanction of the government of the Indian proprietors; and that these lands falling within the limits of the Pennsylvania claim, a DISPUTE concerning the right has arisen, between the two governments, and proceeded to frequent acts of hostility. When it was at a height that threatened the disturbance of the other governments, Congress interposed, by whose recommendations and authority, the decision of the dispute was suspended, till that with Great Britain, equally interesting to every American State, was concluded, when there might be more leisure to attend to the other, and consider the justice of each claim.
On this footing the dispute has lain dormant for two or three years; the inhabitants lived happily and the settlements increased, consisting of eight townships, viz. Lackewana, Exeter, Kingston, Wilkesborough, Plymouth, Nanticoke, Huntington, and Salem, each containing five mile square. The six lower townships were pretty full of inhabitants, the two upper ones, had comparatively but few thinly scattered. The lands are exceedingly good, beautifully situated along both sides of the Susquehanna navigable for flat bottomed boats, and produced immense quantities of grain of all sorts, roots, fruits, hemp, flax, &c. and stock of all kinds in abundance. The settlement had lately supplied the Continental army with 3000 bushels of grain, and the ground was loaded with the most promising crops of every kind. The settlement included upwards of a thousand families which had furnished our army with a thousand soldiers, besides the garrisons of four forts, in the township of Lockewany, Exeter, Kingston & Wilkesborough. One of these forts was garrisoned by upwards of 400 soldiers, chiefly of the militia, the principal officers in which were Colonels Dennison and Zebulon Butler.
The Tories and Inhabitants had given some disturbances to these settlement last year, before Gen. Herkemer's battle at Oneida Creek near Fort Stanwix and our skirmishes soon after with parties of the enemy at and near Schohary, when they were dispersed and the Tories concealed themselves among our different settlements; the people here remained undisturbed during the rest of the year.]
About this time the inhabitants having discovered that many of these villainous Tories who had stirred up the Indians, and been with them in fighting against us, were within the settlement, 27 of them were in January last, taken up and secured. Of these 18 were sent to Connecticut, the rest, after being detained some time, and examined, were for want of sufficient evidence set at liberty; they immediately joined the enemy, and became active in raising in the Indians, a spirit of hostility against us. This disposition soon after began to appear in the behaviour of the Tories and Indians, which gave the people apprehensions of danger, and occasioned some preparations for defence.
The people had some frequent intimations that the Indians had some mischievous designs against them but their fears were somewhat abated by the seeming solicitude of the Indians to preserve peace; they sent down at different times several parties with declarations of their peaceable disposition towards us, and to request the like on our part towards them. They were always dismissed with assurances that there was no design to disturb them. But one of those Indians getting drunk, said he and the other messengers, were only sent to amuse the people in the settlement but that the Indians intended as soon as they were in order to attack them. On this the Indian men were confined, and the women sent back with a flag. In March, appearances, became more alarming, and the scattered families settled for 30 miles up the river, were collected and brought into the more populous parts. In April and May, strolling parties of Indians and Tories, about 30 and under in a company, made frequent incursions into the settlements, robbing and plundering the inhabitants of provision, grain and livestock. In June, several persons being at work on a farm, from which the tory inhabitants had gone to the enemy, were attacked, and one man of them was killed; soon after, a woman (wife of one of the 27 tories before mentioned) was killed with her five children, by a party of these Tories and Indians, who plundered the house of everything they could take away and destroyed the rest.
On the 1st instant (July) the whole body of the enemy consisting, it is supposed of near 1600 (about 300 of whom were thought to be Indians, under their own chiefs; the rest Tories, painted like them, except their officers, who were dressed like regulars) the whole under the command of Col. John Butler, (a Connecticut Tory, and cousin to Col. Z. Butler, the second in command in the settlement) came down near the upper fort, but concealed the greatest part of their number; here they had a skirmish with the inhabitants, who took and killed two Indians, and lost ten of their own men, three of whom they afterwards found killed, scalped, and mangled in the most inhuman manner.
Thursday, July 2. The enemy appeared on the mountains, back of Kingston, where the women and children then fled into the fort. Most of the garrison of Exeter fort were Tories, who treacherously gave it up to the enemy. The same night, after a little resistance, they took Lackewana fort, killed Squire Jenkins and his family, with several others, in a barbarous manner, and made prisoners of most of the women and children, a small number only escaped.
Friday, July 3. This morning Col. Zebulon Butler, leaving a small number to guard the fort, (Wilkesbury) crossed the river with about 400 men, and marched into Kingston fort. The enemy sent in a flag demanding the surrender of the fort in two hours. Col. Butler answered he should not surrender, but was ready to receive them. They sent in a second flag, demanding an immediate surrender, otherwise the fort should be stormed, plundered and burnt, with all its contents, in a few hours – and said that they had with them 300 men. Col. Z. Butler proposed a parley, which being agreed to, a place in Kingston was appointed for the meeting; to which Col. Z. Butler repaired with 400 men, well armed, but finding nobody there, he proceeded to the foot of the mountain, where at a distance he saw a flag, which as he advanced, retired as if afraid, 20 or 30 rods; he following, was led into an ambush, and partly surrounded by the enemy, who suddenly rose and fired upon them. Notwithstanding the great disproportion of 1600 to 400, he and his men bravely stood and return the fire for three quarters of an hour, with such briskness and resolution, that the enemy began to give way and were upon the point of retiring; when one of Col. Z. Butler's men, either through treachery or cowardice, cried out that the Colonel ordered a retreat – This caused a cessation of their fire, threw them into confusion and a total rout ensued. The greatest part fled to the river, which they endeavored to pass to Fort Wilkesbury, the enemy pursued them with the fury of Devils, many were lost or killed in the river, and no more than about 70, some of whom were wounded, escaped to Wilkesbury.
Saturday morning, July 4. The enemy sent 196 scalps into Fort Kingston, which they invested on the land side, and kept up a continual fire upon it.
This evening Col. Z. Butler with his family quitted the fort and went down the river.
Col. Nathan Denison went with a flag to Exeter fort, to know of Col. John Butler what terms he would grant on a surrender; Butler answered, THE HATCHET. Col. Dennison returned to Fort Kingston, which he defended till Sunday morning, when his men being nearly all killed or wounded, he could hold out no longer, and was obliged to surrender at discretion. The enemy took away some of the unhappy prisoners, and shutting up the rest in the houses, set fire to them, and they were all consumed together. These infernals then crossed the river to Fort Wilkesbury, which in a few minutes surrendered in discretion. About 70 of the men, who had listed in the Continental service to defend the frontiers, they inhumanly butchered, with every circumstance of horrid cruelty; and then shutting up the rest, with the women and children in the houses, they set fire to them, and they all perished together in the flames.
After burning all the buildings in the fort they proceeded to the destruction of every building and improvement (except what belonged to some Tories) that came within their reach, on all these flourishing settlements, which they have rendered a scence of desolation and horror almost beyond description, parrallel or credibility; and were not the facts attested by numbers of the unhappy sufferers, from different quarters of the settlement, and unconnected with each other, it would be impossible to believe that human nature could be capable of such prodigious enormity.
When these miscreants had destroyed the other improvements, they proceeded to destroy the crops on the ground, letting in the cattle and horses to the corn, and cutting up as much as they could of what was left; great numbers of the cattle they shot and destroyed; and cutting out the tongues of many others, left them to perish in misery.
The course of these truly diabolical proceedings, was marked by many particular acts of distinguished enormity, among which were the following, viz.
The Captains James Bedlock, Robert Durgee, and Samuel Ranson, being made prisoners by the enemy – they stripped Captain Bedlock, tied him to a tree and stuck him full of sharp splinters of pine knots, then piling a heap of pine knots round him they set all on fire, put Durkee and Ranson into the fire and held them down with pitch forks.
Thomas Terry (whose father was killed by the Indians last war) with his own hands killed his own mother, his father-in-law, his sisters and families.
Partial Terry, the son of a man who bore a very respectable character, had several times sent his father word that he hoped to wash his hands in his heart's blood. Agreeable to such a horrid declaration, the monster, with his own hand, murdered his father, mother, brothers and sisters, stripped off their scalps, and cut off his father's head.
Col. Dennison was seen surrounded by the enemy, and was doubtless murdered. Col. Zebulon Butler is supposed to be the only officer escaped.
"Massacre at Wyoming" by Alonzo Chappell, 1857.
It is said he had several times written to the Congress and Gen. Washington, acquainting them with the danger the settlement were in, and requesting assistance; but that he received no answer, except that HE HAD NO CAUSE TO FEAR, SINCE THE INDIANS WERE ALL FOR PEACE AND QUITE ADVERSE TO WAR. However, he lately received a letter from Capt. Spaulding, acquainting him that neither the Congress nor Gen. Washington had received any of his letters, which had been intercepted by the Pennsylvania Tories, who in all probability acted in concert with these execrable miscreants against Wyoming: It is reported that these wretches, after compleating their horrid business at Wyoming, are going or gone to Cherry Valley, and the parts adjacent.
We hear that a party of infernals of the like kind, have within this week or two, infested the parts about Leghowegh, near Rochester, on the Minisink road to Philadelphia, where a party of them, about 40 in number, have plundered and burnt several houses, abused some people, and carried off 3 men. It is hoped speedy and effectual measures will be taken to punish and extirpate these monsters in human shape, from the face of the earth.
The distresses of the surviving inhabitants of that late flourishing settlement are by their present circumstances, rendered such striking objects of charity, that withholding relief from them by those who are able to afford it, argues a criminal obduracy, which deserves, and may be punished by distresses of a similar kind.
We are told that of the 1000 men in the Continental army, who went from that settlement, their number is by sickness and the cruel usage of the prisons by the enemy, reduced to 400, who have now to lament the loss of their property, wives, children, and all that was dear to them in life! The helpless fugitives from the place, escaped with little more than their lives, they could bring nothing with them – hardly cloathes to cover them and nothing to eat, many were two or three days without sustenance, and pregnant women were delivered alone in the woods. This it is hoped will be the concluding scene of the tragedy acted by the British tyrant and his murderous, diabolical emissaries, in a part of his late kingdom, which he has justly forfeited, and which now forever departed from him.
By 1769, they had returned to the Wyoming Valley, where Daniel appears on a list of early settlers in Kingston, Luzerne County, Pennsylvania. They were accompanied by a large group of families from Connecticut. The Cash family joined the Baptist church at Pittston, Pennsylvania.
Daniel Cash, the son of Samuel Cash and Experiance Baker of Cape Cod, married Mary Polly Tracy, daughter of Isaac Tracy and Mehitable Rude, in 1765 in Delaware County, New York. To this union were born nine children: Zipporah Calista, David Isaac, Mehitabel, Reuben, Nathan, Mary Polly, Phoebe Millicent, Elizabeth and Permilla. All the children, with the exception of the last two who were born after 1778, were survivors, along with their parents who were the family heros, of the Wyoming Massacre of July 3, 1778.
Record of Florence Kellogg, a descendant, states there may have been three other children, of which no record has been found, who possibly died in infancy. She also had his birth year as 1739 and marriage year as 1765.
Both Daniel and Mary Cash died in Minisink, Orange County, New York.
The following is from The Boston and Country Gazette Journal printed Monday, 3 Aug 1778 in Boston, MA:
POUGHKEEPSIE, July 20.
Since our last, many of the distressed Refugees from the Wyoming settlements on the Susquehanna, who escaped the general massacre, of the inhabitants, have passed this way, from whom we have collected the following account, viz.
[Previous to the narrative, it may be necessary to inform some of our readers, that this settlement was made by the people of Connecticut on a grant of lands purchased by the inhabitants of that colony, under the sanction of the government of the Indian proprietors; and that these lands falling within the limits of the Pennsylvania claim, a DISPUTE concerning the right has arisen, between the two governments, and proceeded to frequent acts of hostility. When it was at a height that threatened the disturbance of the other governments, Congress interposed, by whose recommendations and authority, the decision of the dispute was suspended, till that with Great Britain, equally interesting to every American State, was concluded, when there might be more leisure to attend to the other, and consider the justice of each claim.
On this footing the dispute has lain dormant for two or three years; the inhabitants lived happily and the settlements increased, consisting of eight townships, viz. Lackewana, Exeter, Kingston, Wilkesborough, Plymouth, Nanticoke, Huntington, and Salem, each containing five mile square. The six lower townships were pretty full of inhabitants, the two upper ones, had comparatively but few thinly scattered. The lands are exceedingly good, beautifully situated along both sides of the Susquehanna navigable for flat bottomed boats, and produced immense quantities of grain of all sorts, roots, fruits, hemp, flax, &c. and stock of all kinds in abundance. The settlement had lately supplied the Continental army with 3000 bushels of grain, and the ground was loaded with the most promising crops of every kind. The settlement included upwards of a thousand families which had furnished our army with a thousand soldiers, besides the garrisons of four forts, in the township of Lockewany, Exeter, Kingston & Wilkesborough. One of these forts was garrisoned by upwards of 400 soldiers, chiefly of the militia, the principal officers in which were Colonels Dennison and Zebulon Butler.
The Tories and Inhabitants had given some disturbances to these settlement last year, before Gen. Herkemer's battle at Oneida Creek near Fort Stanwix and our skirmishes soon after with parties of the enemy at and near Schohary, when they were dispersed and the Tories concealed themselves among our different settlements; the people here remained undisturbed during the rest of the year.]
About this time the inhabitants having discovered that many of these villainous Tories who had stirred up the Indians, and been with them in fighting against us, were within the settlement, 27 of them were in January last, taken up and secured. Of these 18 were sent to Connecticut, the rest, after being detained some time, and examined, were for want of sufficient evidence set at liberty; they immediately joined the enemy, and became active in raising in the Indians, a spirit of hostility against us. This disposition soon after began to appear in the behaviour of the Tories and Indians, which gave the people apprehensions of danger, and occasioned some preparations for defence.
The people had some frequent intimations that the Indians had some mischievous designs against them but their fears were somewhat abated by the seeming solicitude of the Indians to preserve peace; they sent down at different times several parties with declarations of their peaceable disposition towards us, and to request the like on our part towards them. They were always dismissed with assurances that there was no design to disturb them. But one of those Indians getting drunk, said he and the other messengers, were only sent to amuse the people in the settlement but that the Indians intended as soon as they were in order to attack them. On this the Indian men were confined, and the women sent back with a flag. In March, appearances, became more alarming, and the scattered families settled for 30 miles up the river, were collected and brought into the more populous parts. In April and May, strolling parties of Indians and Tories, about 30 and under in a company, made frequent incursions into the settlements, robbing and plundering the inhabitants of provision, grain and livestock. In June, several persons being at work on a farm, from which the tory inhabitants had gone to the enemy, were attacked, and one man of them was killed; soon after, a woman (wife of one of the 27 tories before mentioned) was killed with her five children, by a party of these Tories and Indians, who plundered the house of everything they could take away and destroyed the rest.
On the 1st instant (July) the whole body of the enemy consisting, it is supposed of near 1600 (about 300 of whom were thought to be Indians, under their own chiefs; the rest Tories, painted like them, except their officers, who were dressed like regulars) the whole under the command of Col. John Butler, (a Connecticut Tory, and cousin to Col. Z. Butler, the second in command in the settlement) came down near the upper fort, but concealed the greatest part of their number; here they had a skirmish with the inhabitants, who took and killed two Indians, and lost ten of their own men, three of whom they afterwards found killed, scalped, and mangled in the most inhuman manner.
Thursday, July 2. The enemy appeared on the mountains, back of Kingston, where the women and children then fled into the fort. Most of the garrison of Exeter fort were Tories, who treacherously gave it up to the enemy. The same night, after a little resistance, they took Lackewana fort, killed Squire Jenkins and his family, with several others, in a barbarous manner, and made prisoners of most of the women and children, a small number only escaped.
Friday, July 3. This morning Col. Zebulon Butler, leaving a small number to guard the fort, (Wilkesbury) crossed the river with about 400 men, and marched into Kingston fort. The enemy sent in a flag demanding the surrender of the fort in two hours. Col. Butler answered he should not surrender, but was ready to receive them. They sent in a second flag, demanding an immediate surrender, otherwise the fort should be stormed, plundered and burnt, with all its contents, in a few hours – and said that they had with them 300 men. Col. Z. Butler proposed a parley, which being agreed to, a place in Kingston was appointed for the meeting; to which Col. Z. Butler repaired with 400 men, well armed, but finding nobody there, he proceeded to the foot of the mountain, where at a distance he saw a flag, which as he advanced, retired as if afraid, 20 or 30 rods; he following, was led into an ambush, and partly surrounded by the enemy, who suddenly rose and fired upon them. Notwithstanding the great disproportion of 1600 to 400, he and his men bravely stood and return the fire for three quarters of an hour, with such briskness and resolution, that the enemy began to give way and were upon the point of retiring; when one of Col. Z. Butler's men, either through treachery or cowardice, cried out that the Colonel ordered a retreat – This caused a cessation of their fire, threw them into confusion and a total rout ensued. The greatest part fled to the river, which they endeavored to pass to Fort Wilkesbury, the enemy pursued them with the fury of Devils, many were lost or killed in the river, and no more than about 70, some of whom were wounded, escaped to Wilkesbury.
Saturday morning, July 4. The enemy sent 196 scalps into Fort Kingston, which they invested on the land side, and kept up a continual fire upon it.
This evening Col. Z. Butler with his family quitted the fort and went down the river.
Col. Nathan Denison went with a flag to Exeter fort, to know of Col. John Butler what terms he would grant on a surrender; Butler answered, THE HATCHET. Col. Dennison returned to Fort Kingston, which he defended till Sunday morning, when his men being nearly all killed or wounded, he could hold out no longer, and was obliged to surrender at discretion. The enemy took away some of the unhappy prisoners, and shutting up the rest in the houses, set fire to them, and they were all consumed together. These infernals then crossed the river to Fort Wilkesbury, which in a few minutes surrendered in discretion. About 70 of the men, who had listed in the Continental service to defend the frontiers, they inhumanly butchered, with every circumstance of horrid cruelty; and then shutting up the rest, with the women and children in the houses, they set fire to them, and they all perished together in the flames.
After burning all the buildings in the fort they proceeded to the destruction of every building and improvement (except what belonged to some Tories) that came within their reach, on all these flourishing settlements, which they have rendered a scence of desolation and horror almost beyond description, parrallel or credibility; and were not the facts attested by numbers of the unhappy sufferers, from different quarters of the settlement, and unconnected with each other, it would be impossible to believe that human nature could be capable of such prodigious enormity.
When these miscreants had destroyed the other improvements, they proceeded to destroy the crops on the ground, letting in the cattle and horses to the corn, and cutting up as much as they could of what was left; great numbers of the cattle they shot and destroyed; and cutting out the tongues of many others, left them to perish in misery.
The course of these truly diabolical proceedings, was marked by many particular acts of distinguished enormity, among which were the following, viz.
The Captains James Bedlock, Robert Durgee, and Samuel Ranson, being made prisoners by the enemy – they stripped Captain Bedlock, tied him to a tree and stuck him full of sharp splinters of pine knots, then piling a heap of pine knots round him they set all on fire, put Durkee and Ranson into the fire and held them down with pitch forks.
Thomas Terry (whose father was killed by the Indians last war) with his own hands killed his own mother, his father-in-law, his sisters and families.
Partial Terry, the son of a man who bore a very respectable character, had several times sent his father word that he hoped to wash his hands in his heart's blood. Agreeable to such a horrid declaration, the monster, with his own hand, murdered his father, mother, brothers and sisters, stripped off their scalps, and cut off his father's head.
Col. Dennison was seen surrounded by the enemy, and was doubtless murdered. Col. Zebulon Butler is supposed to be the only officer escaped.
"Massacre at Wyoming" by Alonzo Chappell, 1857.
It is said he had several times written to the Congress and Gen. Washington, acquainting them with the danger the settlement were in, and requesting assistance; but that he received no answer, except that HE HAD NO CAUSE TO FEAR, SINCE THE INDIANS WERE ALL FOR PEACE AND QUITE ADVERSE TO WAR. However, he lately received a letter from Capt. Spaulding, acquainting him that neither the Congress nor Gen. Washington had received any of his letters, which had been intercepted by the Pennsylvania Tories, who in all probability acted in concert with these execrable miscreants against Wyoming: It is reported that these wretches, after compleating their horrid business at Wyoming, are going or gone to Cherry Valley, and the parts adjacent.
We hear that a party of infernals of the like kind, have within this week or two, infested the parts about Leghowegh, near Rochester, on the Minisink road to Philadelphia, where a party of them, about 40 in number, have plundered and burnt several houses, abused some people, and carried off 3 men. It is hoped speedy and effectual measures will be taken to punish and extirpate these monsters in human shape, from the face of the earth.
The distresses of the surviving inhabitants of that late flourishing settlement are by their present circumstances, rendered such striking objects of charity, that withholding relief from them by those who are able to afford it, argues a criminal obduracy, which deserves, and may be punished by distresses of a similar kind.
We are told that of the 1000 men in the Continental army, who went from that settlement, their number is by sickness and the cruel usage of the prisons by the enemy, reduced to 400, who have now to lament the loss of their property, wives, children, and all that was dear to them in life! The helpless fugitives from the place, escaped with little more than their lives, they could bring nothing with them – hardly cloathes to cover them and nothing to eat, many were two or three days without sustenance, and pregnant women were delivered alone in the woods. This it is hoped will be the concluding scene of the tragedy acted by the British tyrant and his murderous, diabolical emissaries, in a part of his late kingdom, which he has justly forfeited, and which now forever departed from him.
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