Mercy Harbison

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Mercy Harbison (birth and death dates unknown) was a young American woman living in the decades immediately following the Revolutionary War, who wrote a harrowing description of her captivity among Native Americans in the year 1792. Her short deposition, Capture and Escape of Mercy Harbison, 1792, is a work in the American literary genre of captivity narratives.

In November 1791, Harbison lived in western Pennsylvania with three small children while her husband accompanied General Arthur St. Clair at the disastrous Battle of the Wabash, otherwise known as St. Clair's Defeat and St. Clair's Shame. After the Indian victory, Indian tribes on the frontier became bolder and increased their attacks on frontier settlements. Harbison's husband survived the battle and returned home in March 1792 but was absent in late May 1792 when the Harbison home was attacked. Mercy and her three children were captured. Her three-year-old child was killed immediately, and her five-year-old was killed shortly after they were taken away. Mercy held on to her infant child for six days until she managed to escape back to a settler stronghold. The deposition of her experiences was given before the magistrates in Pittsburgh.

[edit] Academic references

• Kephart, Horace, ed. The Account of Mary Rowlandson and Other Indian Captivity Narratives. Mineola, NY: Dover Publications, 2005. ISBN 0-486-44520-8