Born about 1752 in Bedminster (now Lamington), New Jersey, Jane McCrea went to live with a brother╒s family in Northumberland, New York, in 1769. A tall, attractive woman with very long blonde hair, she was courted by one David Jones, whom she had known in New Jersey. In 1776 Jones was one of several Tories from the area to join the British army. In the summer of 1777 the approach of a large British force under General John Burgoyne down Lake Champlain and the Hudson River valley and the consequent abandonment of Fort Ticonderoga and then Fort Edward by American defenders caused a panic among the remaining settlers, who quickly began to evacuate southward. Jane McCrea declined to leave, however, for she had received a letter from David Jones, by then a lieutenant with Burgoyne, saying that he hoped soon to see her at Fort Edward. In later legend it was said they were to be married at that time.
On the morning of July 27, 1777, Jane McCrea visited a friend, Sarah McNeil, who was preparing to leave Fort Edward for safety. About noon the two women were captured by some Native American scouts whom Burgoyne had employed as an advance force. McNeil was delivered safely to British hands, but Jane McCrea was later discovered dead, several bullet wounds in her body, and scalped. Her captors claimed she had been killed by a stray bullet from an American detachment, but it was generally accepted that one of the scouts had killed her, perhaps in a quarrel over whose captive she was. The murder and scalping sent a shock of horror through the colonies; it was even felt in England, where in the House of Commons Edmund Burke denounced the use of Indian allies. In America the deed galvanized patriotic sentiment, swung waverers against the British, and encouraged a tide of enlistments that helped end Burgoyne╒s invasion three months later. The tale of Jane McCrea became a favorite and was much romanticized in popular versions. Among the authors who used it were Philip Freneau, Joel Barlow, and Delia S. Bacon.
