Archives at Cornell

The white woman

Collection — huntington box: 39 - folder 1

Identifier: 9002

Scope and content

Handwritten manuscript dated May, 17 1841, Chapel Hill, signed by Susan W. McFarland. An extract of an account of a mission performed in 1820 among the Seneca and Munsee by the Rev. Timothy Alden, president of Allegheny College, addressed to Rev. Abiel Holmes, describing a visit with Mary Jemison.

Dates

1841 May 17.

Creator

McFarland, Susan W. (Person)
Huntington Free Library (Former owner, Organization)

Biographical / Historical

Mary Jemison was taken captive by a raiding party of Shawnee Indians during the French and Indian War when she was a teenager. She was sold by the raiding party to a group of Seneca Indians who adopted her. She was given a new name, Dehgewanus or Two Falling Voices. She married a Delaware, Sheninjee, and had two sons, one who died at a young age, and one who was named Thomas after her father. They traveled from Ohio to the Genesee Valley of New York. After her husband died she remarried and had six more children, three of whom were murdered.