Mary Lindley Murray

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Mary Lindley Murray is known in American Revolution lore as the Quaker woman who held up British General William Howe after the British victory against American forces at Kips Bay. According to legend, Murray treated Howe and his generals to cake and wine and delayed them several hours as the American rebels retreated.

Though legend portrays her as tempting the British with her charms, David McCullough notes in his book 1776 that "she may have been extremely charming, but she was also a woman in her fifties and the mother of twelve children."