September 15, 2023 – September 17, 2023
The Mary Ingles Trail Associates (MITA) presents the 2023 “Legacy of Mary Ingles” encampment and living history event. This year marks the 268th anniversary of Mary Ingles’ odyssey in 1755 as she was captured by, and escaped from, Shawnee Native Americans. This history and heritage program is September 15 – 17, 2023 at Beech Fork State Park.
The Mary Ingles Trail Associates (MITA) presents a historical encampment based on research of the life of Mary Draper Ingles.
• Friday activities are offered for school groups.
• Saturday and Sunday encampment activities and presentations are open to the public free of charge.
About Mary Draper Ingles
In 1755, during the French and Indian War, Ingles was a 23-year-old frontier wife living with her extended family at Drapers Meadow, near present-day Blacksburg, Virginia, when a Shawnee war party attacked the settlement. The pioneer woman’s mother was among those killed in the raid, while Ingles, her two sons and a sister-in-law were among the settlers captured. Ingles was separated from her boys and taken to a Shawnee settlement near the site of present-day Portsmouth, Ohio, and then on to Big Bone Lick in north-central Kentucky. There, she and a captive from another settlement managed to escape, and follow the Ohio, Kanawha, and New rivers back to Drapers Meadow in a perilous 40-day trek.
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