However, the 1720s-30s were a period of Anglo-French détente in Europe with both the duc d'Orleans, the Regent for the boy king Louis XV in France, and Prime Minister Sir Robert Walpole in Britain, being committed to a policy of peace.

[3] Fort Oswego was a remote frontier post located in the wildness, and in the words of the Canadian historian René Chartrand its "Achilles heel" was its supply lines.

The Oneida Carry traversed an unnavigable section between what is now Rome, New York and Wood Creek that was between one and six miles long, depending on seasonal water levels.

[8] The majority of the Shirely's regiment, who arrived in the Oneida Carry on 2 September 1755 were described by the American historian Gilbert Hagerty as "raw" and "untrained".

[11] Since the New England colonies had voted more money and raised more men than did either Pennsylvania and Virginia, Shirley was focused on his plans for a campaign on the Great Lakes rather in the Ohio river valley.

[12] In the fall of 1755, Onondaga Indian travelers passing through Montréal mentioned to the French that the British were building two warehouses at the Oneida Carrying Place.

[14] Ou8atory returned to report that the British had built two supply-houses at the Oneida Carry, where they were stockpiling weapons, ammunition, bateaux, and other supplies for a spring offensive.

[15] In early 1756 French military leaders in Canada decided to send a raiding expedition to attack Oswego's supply line.

[17] Vaudreuil admitted that a winter strike was dangerous, going on to write in a report to Paris "...but the situation became urgent and I could not defer it without running the risk of being forestalled by the enemy at Niagara and at Fort Frontenac".

[21] Chartrand wrote the Canadian-born officers of the Troupes de la Marine had "...devised an unwritten tactical doctrine that combined the best elements of European organization and discipline with the American Indians' extraordinary ability to travel great distances largely undetected and mount very fierce attacks".

[22] In New France, all able-bodied men had to serve in the militia from the ages of 16 to 60 with every parish being organized into a company that practiced war games once every month.

[24] As almost every Canadien man owned a gun, was a good shot having been using flintlocks from childhood onward and as many French-Canadians worked as voyageurs in the fur trade, they knew the frontier very well.

[29] As the French did not know the part of Kanienkeh where the Oneida Carrying Place was located very well, they needed the assistance of the Canadian Iroquois to guide them there.

[33] On 29 February 1756, Léry's force of Troupes de la Marine, French-Canadian militiamen and Canadian Iroquois war bands left Montréal.

[35] On 9 March 1756, Léry learned from an Akwesasne war band that the British had built two forts at the Oneida Carrying Place, information that he chose not to share with the Canadian Iroquois accompanying his expedition.

[36] On March 12, a company of men left Fort de La Présentation and began an overland trek toward the Oneida Carry.

On 13 March 1756, an Oswegatchie traveler told the Canadian Iroquois about the British forts at the Oneida Carrying Place, which caused them to demand a halt.

This perspective was not necessarily shared by soldiers and militiamen for whom personal survival might take precedence over the achievement of abstract imperial goals.

[39] Furthermore, Léry as the product of the authoritarian French state expected his orders to be obeyed unconditionally while the Iroquois war chiefs were merely first among equals, who had to seek a consensus from their warriors before acting.

[47] One consequence of their isolation and physical weakness was no patrolling had been done, and the British had no idea that an expeditionary force had left Montreal at the end of February heading for the Oneida Carry.

[54] The Iroquois regarded the Western style of war as "irrational" and saw no point in making a "suicidal" attack against Fort Bull that was likely to cause heavy losses.

[57] Ultimately, following much negotiation, 30 Iroquois agreed to join the assault on Fort Bull together with 259 French soldiers and French-Canadian militiamen.

[71] After Bull refused several calls to surrender, the gate was smashed down at about noon by using a fallen tree trunk as a battering ram, and the attackers stormed into the fort.

"[76] Nearly all of the small garrison was killed and scalped, according to a report by Sir William Johnson, who inspected the carnage when he eventually arrived at the head of a relief column.

[79] Léry reported that he had destroyed all of the cannonballs, grenades, and shells plus clothing for 600 men, and 1,000 blankets while taking barrels full of biscuits, salt pork, butter, chocolate and alcohol back to New France.

[83] One officer of the troupes de la Marine wrote that he found it "astonishing that the English garrison with all its grenades and all its musket fire killed so few people".

[88] The commander of Fort Williams, Mercer, sent out a patrol of one sergeant and 15 privates plus one American civilian volunteer named Robert Eastburn out to investigate.

[96] Every so often, the Iroquois gave what Eastburn called terrifying "dead shouts" to thank the Master of Life for the scalps and prisoners they had taken, whose sound chilled him to the bone.

[113] The crews of the bateaux refused to cross the Oneida Carry unless the British Army provided them with guard as almost all whites had an obsessive fear of being captured by the Indians, whose practice of taking scalps was the cause of much dread.

To reinforce the threatened frontier, several British Army regiments were rushed up, much to the annoyance of the Palatine settlers who complained to the Oneida Indians that the presence of these troops was likely to bring fresh French attacks and hence fighting that might devastate their settlements.