Family of Richard Bard Captured by Indians
April 13, 1758
During the French and Indian War of 1755–58, the barrier of the South Mountain shielded the settlers of York County, from the savage incursions that desolated the Cumberland Valley and other parts of the frontier of Pennsylvania. Yet occasionally a party more daring than the rest would push across the mountain and murder or carry defenseless families into captivity.
An affecting instance of this kind was the captivity of Richard Bard, which is narrated in detail by his son, the late Archibald Bard, of Franklin County.
Richard Bard owned and resided near a mill, which was later known as Marshall’s Mill, on the Carroll tract, in now Adams County.
On the morning of April 13, 1758, his house was invested by a party of nineteen Delaware Indians, who were discovered by a little girl named Hannah McBride. She was at the door and when they approached she screamed and ran into the house, where were Richard Bard and his wife, a child six months old, a bound boy, and a relative of the Bards, Lieutenant Thomas Potter, a brother of General James Potter.
The Indians rushed into the house, and one of them, with a large cutlass in his grasp, made a blow at Potter, who wrested it from the savage. Mr. Bard laid hold of a pistol that hung on the wall and snapped it at the breast of one of the Indians, but there being tow in the pan it did not fire, but the Indians ran out of the house.
The savages were numerous and there was no ammunition in the Bard home, and fearing a slaughter or being burned alive, those inside surrendered, as the Indians promised no harm would befall them. The Indians went to a field and made prisoners of Samuel Hunter, Daniel McManimy, and a lad named William White, who was coming to the mill.
Having secured the prisoners the Indians plundered the house and set fire to the mill. About seventy rods from the house, contrary to their promises, they put to death Thomas Potter; and having proceeded on the mountain three or four miles, one of the Indians sunk the spear of his tomahawk into the breast of the small child, and after repeated blows scalped it.
The prisoners were taken over the mountain past McCord’s fort, into the Path Valley, where they encamped for the night. The second day the Indians discovered a party of white men in pursuit, on which they hastened the pace of their prisoners, under threat of being tomahawked.