This book is the true story of Mary Draper Ingles's capture by the Shawnee and her heroic escape and journey home.

A Newbery Honor book inspired by the true story of a girl captured by a Shawnee war party in Colonial America and traded to a Seneca tribe. When twelve-year-old Mary Jemison and her family are captured by Shawnee raiders, she’s sure they’ll all be killed. Instead, Mary is separated from her siblings and traded to two Seneca sisters, who adopt her and make her one of their own. Mary misses her home, but the tribe is kind to her. She learns to plant crops, make clay pots, and sew moccasins, just as the other members do. Slowly, Mary realizes that the Indians are not the monsters she believed them to be. When Mary is given the chance to return to her world, will she want to leave the tribe that has become her family? This Newbery Honor book is based on the true story of Mary Jemison, the pioneer known as the “White Woman of the Genesee.” This ebook features an illustrated biography of Lois Lenski including rare images and never-before-seen documents from the author’s estate.

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • “It takes a rare individual not only to see that history can live, but also to make it live for others. James Thom has that gift.”—The Indianapolis News Mary Ingles was twenty-three, happily married, and pregnant with her third child when Shawnee Indians invaded her peaceful Virginia settlement in 1755 and kidnapped her, leaving behind a bloody massacre. For months they held her captive. But nothing could imprison her spirit. With the rushing Ohio River as her guide, Mary Ingles walked one thousand miles through an untamed wilderness no white woman had ever seen. Her story lives on—extraordinary testimony to the indomitable strength of one pioneer woman who risked her life to return to her own people.

Mary Jemison was one of the most famous white captives who, after being captured by Indians, chose to stay and live among her captors. In the midst of the Seven Years War(1758), at about age fifteen, Jemison was taken from her western Pennsylvania home by a Shawnee and French raiding party. Her family was killed, but Mary was traded to two Seneca sisters who adopted her to replace a slain brother. She lived to survive two Indian husbands, the births of eight children, the American Revolution, the War of 1812, and the canal era in upstate New York. In 1833 she died at about age ninety.

A river town located on the banks of the Ohio, the city of Bellevue is nestled in Northern Kentucky among several small cities, including Newport, Dayton, and Fort Thomas. Bellevue became an independent city when its founders' petition to the Kentucky legislature for a charter was granted on March 15, 1870. At that time, there were only 380 people residing in Bellevue. In the years that followed, major religious and educational institutions were established, including Calgary Methodist Church in 1870, Sacred Heart Church in 1873, and the Bellevue Independent School District in 1871. Business and industry began to flourish in the early 1880s, especially along Fairfield Avenue, where at least 13 businesses had been established by 1882. Along with the growth of businesses and institutions, the Ohio River grew to become a very important part of Bellevue's history. Offering countless opportunities for recreation, the Queen City Beach was considered the most popular freshwater beach in the region.

Mary Draper Ingles was a real, live pioneer heroine who lived through a Shawnee Indian attack, kidnapping, and escape, to walk almost 800 miles back home to her family. This is a true story of courage, love and sense of family.