John Deseronto Captain John Deseronto ( alt . Deserontyon , ( Odeserundiye ) UE ( c1740s - 1811 ) was a prominent Mohawk war chief during the American Revolutionary War . He was born in the 1740s , most likely in the Mohawk valley . Educated in a white school , he had become acculturated to white customs . In 1759 , during the French and Indian War , he was at the Battle of Fort Niagara , and the following year he was at the Battle of Quebec . In the summer of 1764 , he accompanied John Bradstreet when he went to Fort Detroit at the end of Pontiac ' s Rebellion . American Revolution . When the American Revolution started Deseronto was a chief of the Mohawks , living at Fort Hunter where he owned a handsome house and of rich flat land . He had a wagon , plough , harrow , and ten beaver traps . During this war he sided with the British and the loyalist Johnson family . He accompanied Guy Johnson when he left for Canada in the summer of 1775 . Deseronto went back to the Mohawk valley the following year and met with Sir John Johnson . In May 1776 , he again met with John Johnson and helped him escape to Montreal . In July 1777 , he was the leader of a party which assessed the defences of Fort Stanwix . On 14 July , they surprised and attacked Ensign John Spoor ' s work detail as it was outside the fort cutting sod . Deseronto passed the information that the fort was strongly garrisoned back to Daniel Claus . Barry St . Leger decided to proceed without adequate artillery regardless . He took part in the siege and the Battle of Oriskany . After St . Leger had retreated , Deseronto stayed behind to enjoy a meal at St . Leger ' s table . A scouting party from the fort found Deseronto in St . Leger ' s tent and shot him with buck and ball in the left arm and breast . Deseronto was seriously wounded and almost lost his arm . He continued to Fort Hunter where he set about preparing the village for a mass departure . On 4 September , he arrived at Burgoyne ' s camp with the Fort Hunter families and several prominent loyalists , totalling about 150 persons . The villagers had abandoned their homes after hearing about the sacking of the Upper Castle . The party had to fight through the 3rd New Hampshire Regiment to reach Burgoyne ' s camp . They killed seven of the Americans and Deseronto was freshly wounded . They settled at La Chine , near Montreal and were supplied by the British in exchange for the war service . In 1779 he led two scouting parties up the Richelieu valley . In 1780 , he took part in Sir John Johnson ' s raid on the Mohawk valley and he was at the Battle of Klock ' s Field . In 1781 he led multiple raids into the Mohawk valley destroying mills and cattle and taking prisoners . In the spring of 1782 , Deseronto and Captain Isaac Hill destroyed the mill at Little Falls on the Mohawk and took some prisoners . After War Years . After the war , he and Joseph Brant met with Frederick Haldimand to discuss the loss of their land in New York . Haldimand promised to resettle the Mohawks near the Bay of Quinte , on the north east shore of Lake Ontario , in present day Ontario , Canada . Brant decided that he preferred to settle on the Grand River . Brant and Johnson ridiculed Deseronto ' s decision to stay at the Bay of Quinte . Haldimand purchased and granted the Mohawks a tract 12 by on the Bay of Quinte . About 200 Mohawks settled with him at what is now called the Tyendinaga Mohawk Territory , Ontario . The Mohawks of the Lower Castle primarily settled at the Bay of Quinte , while those of the Upper Castle settled on the Grand River . Deseronto was personally granted a lump sum payment of about eight hundred pounds for his losses , of land , and an annual pension of forty five pounds . In 1797 , Deseronto and Joseph Brant went to New York where , in exchange for a small sum , they agreed to extinguish Mohawk land claims within New York . He died 7 January 1811 at the Mohawk settlement on the Bay of Quinte in Upper Canada . Legacy . The town of Deseronto , Ontario is named in his honour .