Sullivan's men outflank a hidden breastwork as Butler and Brant's line breaks at Newtown

By late August 1779, Major General John Sullivan's 3,200-man army was pushing north through the Chemung Valley to break Haudenosaunee power on the frontier. On August 29, near a Delaware village called Newtown, his riflemen found a camouflaged log breastwork hidden on a hillside, manned by Major John Butler's Rangers and 350 Haudenosaunee and Lenape warriors. Sayenqueraghta and Cornplanter had chosen the defensive stand over the objections of Butler and Joseph Brant. A marsh slowed the flanking brigades, but American artillery opened early and drove the defenders from their position before they could be surrounded. Brant's counterattack on the retreating line was thrown back. It was the only major battle of the Sullivan Expedition…