All accounts agree that Miss M'Crea was staying at the house of a Mrs. M'Neil, near the fort, at the time of the tragedy. A granddaughter of Mrs. M'Neil (Mrs.F—n) is now living at Fort 1848. Edward, and from her I received a minute account of the whole transaction, as she had heard it a "thousand times" from her grandmother. She is a woman of remarkable intelligence, about sixty years old. When I was at Fort Edward she was on a visit with her sister at Glenn's Falls. It had been my intention to go direct to Whitehall, on Lake Champlain, by way of Fort Ann, but the traditionary accounts in the neighborhood of the event in question were so contradictory of the books, and I received such assurances that perfect reliance might be placed upon the statements of Mrs. F-n, that, anxious to ascertain the truth of the matter, if possible, we went to Lake Champlain by way of Glenn's Falls and Lake George. After considerable search at the falls, I found Mrs. F-n, and the following is her relation of the tragedy at Fort Edward.
Jane M'Crea was the daughter of a Scotch Presbyterian clergyman of Jersey City, opposite New York; and while Mrs. M'Neil (then the wife of a former husband named Campbell) was a resident of New York City, an acquaintance and intimacy had grown up between Jenny and her daughter. After the death of Campbell (which occurred at sea) Mrs. Campbell married M'Neil. He, too, was lost at sea, and she removed with her family to an estate
Residence of Jane M'Crea at Fort Edward.—Her Betrothal.—Abduction of Mrs. M'Neil and Jane.
owned by him at Fort Edward. Mr. M'Crea, who was a widower, died, and Jane went to live with her brother near Fort Edward, where the intimacy of former years with Mrs. M'Neil and her daughter was renewed, and Jane spent much of her time at Mrs. M'Neil's house. Near her brother's lived a family named Jones, consisting of a widow and six sons, and between Jenny and David Jones, a gay young man, a feeling of friendship budded and ripened into reciprocal love. When the war broke out the Joneses took the royal side of the question, and David and his brother Jonathan went to Canada in the autumn of 1776. They raised a company of about sixty men, under pretext of re-enforcing the American garrison at Ticonderoga, but they went further down the lake and joined the British garrison at June l, 1777 Crown Point. When Burgoyne collected his forces at St. John's, at the foot of Lake Champlain, David and Jonathan Jones were among them. Jonathan was made captain and David a lieutenant in the division under General Fraser, and at the time in question they were with the British army near Sandy Hill. Thus far all accounts nearly agree.
The brother of Jenny was a Whig, and prepared to move to Albany; but Mrs. M'Neil, who was a cousin of General Fraser (killed at Stillwater), was a stanch loyalist, and intended to remain at Fort Edward. When the British were near, Jenny was at Mrs. M'Neil's, and lingered there even after repeated solicitations from her brother to return to his house, five miles further down the river, to be ready to flee when necessity should compel. A faint hope that she might meet her lover doubtless was the secret of her tarrying. At last her brother sent a peremptory order for her to join him, and she promised to go down in a large bateau * which was expected to leave with several families on the following day.
