Little Beard's Town

Little Beard's Town, also known as Chenussio (in Seneca) and "Genesee Castle", was a powerful Seneca town in the Genesee River Valley near modern Leicester in Livingston County, New York, where Cuylerville stands today.

It surrounded the area that is now Rt. 39, between Geneseo and Cuylerville, New York. At the time of its destruction by Sullivan, the town was located on the west side of the Genesee River. Ten years prior, it had been on the east side of the river, as the Seneca villages were generally moved approximately every 10 years.

The town was named after its founder, Little Beard, a prominent Seneca sachem in the late 18th century. It was famous for its beautiful surroundings and the productivity of its vegetable gardens, fruit orchards, and fields of corn. It had about 130 houses-- "finely built log cabins with ample furnishings; some even had glass window panes," as well as a large council building, built around a central square. It was located near three other Seneca towns, all of which were destroyed during the Sullivan Expedition in the American Revolutionary War.

The Seneca and three other Iroquois nations fought on the British side during the American Revolutionary War. Little Beard and his warriors participated in the Cherry Valley massacre and the Boyd and Parker ambush, in which two soldiers were brought to Little Beard's Town and tortured. Subsequently, troops of the Continental Army under Major General John Sullivan attacked Little Beard's Town and other Iroquois settlements in the Genesee and Mohawk valleys, destroying buildings and crops. The residents had to flee.

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