Bruce and Debbie's Travels & Adventures: A Geocache at a Grave and a Mysterious Grave and More Caches and Quirks

Friday, July 30, 2021

We started our day finding a geocache in a cemetery not far from our campground.

The intersection where we turn to get to our campground seems to be a rather unusual configuration. We discovered why. It is a grave site for Major John Lee. He was killed on August 12, 1782. He and his entire family with the exception of his son, Robert, were killed in an Indian Massacre near Winfield by an Indian war party.

The family and some neighbors were seated for dinner when between sixty and seventy Indians rushed into the house, tomahawked and scalped Major Lee, an old man named John Walker, and Mrs. Claudius Boatman and her daughter. A young woman named Katy Stoner hurried up the stairs and hid behind a chimney where she remained discovered, and thus survived to relate the details of the story. Mrs. Lee, her small child, and a larger boy named Thomas were led away as captives. Lee's older son, Robert, who was absent when the Indians came, returned just as the Indians were leaving, but was not discovered. He fled to Northumberland and gave the alarm.

Colonel Samuel Hunter and twenty volunteers hastened in pursuit from Fort Augusta, where Sunbury now stands. Arriving at the Lee home, Col. Hunter's men found some of the victims of savage cruelty yet alive and writhing in agony of their wounds. Both Major Lee and Mrs. Boatman's daughter were alive and were carried back to Fort Augusta on litters, where Major Lee died in great agony soon after his arrival, while Ms. Boatman was nursed back to health. Without waiting to bury the dead, Col. Hunter hastened after the Indians as rapidly as possible and came in sight of them above Lycoming Creek. Mrs. Lee was accidentally bitten on the ankle by a rattlesnake while crossing White Deer Mountain, causing her leg to become terribly swollen and to pain her so severely that she traveled with great difficulty. The Indians, realiing they were being pursued, urged her along as rapidly as her strength would permit, but she became weaker and weaker, and when about four miles below where Jersey Shore now stands, her strength entirely failed her, and she seated herself upon the ground near the mouth of Pine Run. By this time, Colonel Hunter's party were close upon the Indians, and in order that the poor women might not be recovered by the whites, a warrior stealthy slipped up behind her, placed the muzzle of his rifle close to her ear and pulled the trigger, blowing off the whole top of her head. Another Indian then snatched up her young child, and holding it aloft by the feet, dashed it against a tree. The whole band then fled with renewed speed, crossing the river at Smith's fording, at Level Corner, and following up through Nippennose Valley. When Col. Hunter's men came upon the spot where Mrs. Lee was murdered, they found her body still warm. Happily, her child was not dangerously injured but was moaning piteously. The pursuit was now pressing with so much vigor that near Antes Gap, the Indians hurriedly separated, further pursuit was not prudent. His men came back and then buried the body of Mr. Lee where she died and returned, bringing back the child. At the Lee home, they halted and buried the dead there. They dug a hole alongside Walker's body and rolled him in. (Information from Find a Grave site noting "Indian Wars of Pennsylvania By C. Hal Sipe pg 674: Outrages in Union County in 1782")