In May of 1780, British living in Canada heard that American authorities were organizing all Loyalists into a ranger corps and any refusing to join where imprisoned in irons. Sir John Johnson, whose late father, Sir William Johnson, had been Superintendent of Indian Affairs, settling his family in the Mohawk Valley decades earlier, decided to go to their rescue. The first houses were not burned as Johnson tried to keep their presence a secret but soon homes of the patriots were set on fire and inhabitants were killed.