Portal:Indian Captivity Stories/ValidatingFleming

[This is undergoing major revisions] Major John and wife Mary Walker are said to have had a James, age 15, who was captured at the same time as Mary. James DOB works out to c1745, some 20 years before his gravestone data says he was born. As an alternative, perhaps Mary lived longer than is commonly stated; in that case we know she must have died by 1787, since we have a marriage record between John Cowan and Agness Martin in 1788. That implies that the very latest DOB for James would have been in 1773, at which time John son of Samuel would have been still a minor---and so could not be Major John. Finally, Mary is supposed to be Major John's cousin. That seems to mean that she was the sister of Ann Walker Cowan, and daughter of John Walker III (c1705-c1776) and Ann Houston. This couple is known to have had a daughter Mary, but that daughter is known to have married Andrew Cowan, and lived until well into the 1800's. (That would also make Mary John's Aunt, but we'll not quibble over the point.) John III and Ann did have two sons, and one of their children might have been Mary "Cousin of Major John". One son Samuel died without heirs in 1777, in the same raid in which Ann Walker Cowan was captured; Mary could not, therefore, be his child. The other son, John Walker IV, did marry, and in fact had a daughter Mary; she was involved in an Indian attack, but was not taken captive, and her subsequent history is well known. While we can't rule out the possibility that she was previously married, it seems unlikely; moreover, had she been captured by Indians it seems likely that her story would have been preserved in her family as well, and so far, there's no indication that such a story exists. Other inconsistencies could be pointed to as well, but the above will suffice for present purposes. There seems to be no plausible way to make these data consistent with JB's story of Mary Walker Cowan. If the story of Ann Walker Cowan is well documented, and consistent with known facts, both about the families involved, and about the historical context in which the events took place, the story of Mary Walker Cowan is undocumented with primary or contemporary sources, known only from stories written down long after the events by people who knew (or imagined) the story only second hand. There's little question that JB erred, and erred badly in his presentation. There's also no question that he firmly believed what he wrote. And that belief makes the story seem credible. And that is the problem with JB---his story is at one and the same time factually incredible, but emotionally very real. Why is that? Why did JB err so badly? The answer lies in understanding what JB based his story upon. JB's story is, in fact, based on actual events. Its just that the events didn't happen to the people he thought they happened to. This is discussed in the following article.