In the dead cold of a February night in 1690, French and Indian raiders descend on the English outpost at Schnectady, New York, guarded by no more than two snowmen. (William Cullen Bryant and Sydney Howard Gay. A Popular History of the United States. New York: S. Scribner’s Sons, 1881) William Cullen Bryant and Sydney Howard Gay. A Popular History of the United States. New York: S. Scribner’s Sons, 1881