Mary draper ingles biography

In the 1750's, southwestern Virginia was still a sparsely settled frontier, but this land drew a young woman who continues to have untold influence - even in the 21st Century.

Born in Philadelphia in 1732 to Irish immigrants, Mary Draper, along with her family, became part of the western migration as settlers moved down The Great Wagon Road into Virginia.

Eventually she married William Ingles and settled in Drapers Meadows in what is present-day Blacksburg.

While many parts of the frontier were in the grips of the French and Indian War, the New River Valley residents didn't have reason to fear the parties of American Native Indians, who passed by periodically from the Ohio Valley on their way to fight the Catawbas farther south.

At least, not until a day in  July 1755 when members of the settlement were killed, and Mary and other family members were captured by the Shawnees and taken hundreds of miles into the frontier wilderness.

However, this remarkable woman