I gaze at the woman now. She stands between the young man and the Colonel, but she still looks at me. The snow is falling and her shawl is frayed. She must be cold. How far has she traveled?
Behind her, in the distance, I see mountains shrouded by the snow. Then in the wind, I hear a trembling voice now sing:Alone, yet not alone am I,
Though in this solitude so drear.
When Quetit had the smallpox, I sang this song for her. And now, the woman with the hair like snow sings this song for me.
My mother’s song.
My throat tightens with wonder. Could this woman be my mother? Tears sting my eyes, but I sing too:I feel my Savior always nigh,
He comes the weary hours to cheer,
And as I sing:I am with Him and He with me,
Even here alone I cannot be.
I feel a mother’s arms enfold me.
“Regina,” she whispers.
“Regina.” I repeat the name and it seems to echo through me. “I ... am ... Regina.”
Quetit’s sweet high voice breaks through the echo of my name. She sings my mother’s song while all around her the snow is falling. I take her hand, drawing her into a warmth that for nine long winters I have only felt in dreams.
I want to grab the wonder of this moment and freeze it like a leaf in ice. My mother holds us now and my heart beats with joy. I give thanks for things that time nor circumstance can ever change—a mother’s love, a song. ...
Afterword
Regina Leininger was reunited with her mother on December 31, 1764. The young man dressed in deerskin was Regina’s brother, John. Regina and Quetit went home with them to live in a snug cabin set in the Tulpehockan area of Pennsylvania. Perhaps Regina’s sister, Barbara, joined them there. Both she and Marie LeRoy escaped from the Indians after three and one-half years of captivity.
In February, Regina and her mother walked seventy miles to visit with Henry Melchior Muhlenberg, a prominent Lutheran minister who lived outside of Philadelphia.
Regina asked him if she could have a copy of the book in which God speaks to man.
The Reverend Muhlenberg gave her a Bible. And he watched in wonder as Regina, who spoke only Indian in everyday matters, read whole passages of the Bible aloud in German.
He recorded the moving story of her captivity in his pastoral reports.
With Bible in hand, Regina returned to the home she loved. There she lived her life encircled by the warmth of family. Regina never married.
Now, more than two centuries later, a tombstone stands in Christ’s Church cemetery near present-day Stouchsburg, Pennsylvania. The inscription on it reads:Regina Leininger
In Legend Regina Hartman
As a small child held Indian captive
1755-1763
Identified by her mother’s singing the hymn:
“Allein, Und Doch Nicht Ganz Allein.”*
*“Alone, Yet Not Alone Am I.”
Author’s note: There was a change in the English calendar during this time which accounts for the discrepancy in years. The date on the tombstone should read “1764.”
Selected Bibliography
Axtell, James. “The White Indians of Colonial America.” William and Mary Quarterly 32 (January 1975): 55-88.
Bouquet’s Expedition Against the Indians in 1764. Ohio Valley Historical Series. Cincinnati: Rober Clarke Co., 1907.
Brinton, Daniel G., and Anthony, Rev. Albert Sequaq-kind, eds. A Lenape—English Dictionary. Philadelphia: Historical Society of Pennsylvania, 1888.
Brown, Honorable Isaac B. Historical Sketches of Carlisle. Harrisburg: William Stanley Ray, State Printer, 1905.
Dahlinger, Charles. “Fort Pitt.” Western Pennsylvania History Magazine 5, no. 1:1-44.
Drake, Samuel. Indian Captivities or Life in the Wigwam. Auburn: Derby & Miller, 1851.
Ewing, William S. “Indian Captives Released by Colonel Bouquet,” Western Pennsylvania History Magazine 39:187-203.
Hazard, Samuel, ed. The Register of Pennsylvania, vol. IV, pp. 390-391. Philadelphia: Wm. F. Geddes, Printer, 1829.
Heckewelder, John. History, Manners, and Customs of the Indian Nations Who Once Inhabited Pennsylvania and the Neighboring States. Reprinted from a copy in the State Historical Society of Wisconsin Library: Arno Press and the New York Times, 1971.
Horowitz, David. The First Frontier: The Indian Wars and America’s Origins: 1606-1776. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1978.
Hunter, William A. Forts on the Pennsylvania Frontier. Harrisburg: Pennsylvania Historic and Museum Commission, 1960.
Jenkins, Howard M. Pennsylvania Colonial and Federal 1608-1903, vol. I. Philadelphia: Pennsylvania Historical Publications Association, 1903.
LeRoy, Marie, and Leininger, Barbara. “Narrative of Marie LeRoy and Barbara Leininger.” In Pennsylvania Archives, series II, vol. 7, pp. 428—438. Harrisburg: Edwin K. Meyers, printer, 1891.
Mittelberger, Gottlieb. Gottlieb Mittelberger’s Journey to Pennsylvania in the Year 1750 and Return to Germany in the Year 1754. Translated by Carl Theodore Eben. Philadelphia: John Jos McVey, 1888.
Muhlenberg, Henry Melchior. The Journals of Henry Melchior Muhlenberg, vol. II. Translated by Theodore G. Tappert and John W. Doberstein. Philadelphia: The Evangelical Lutheran Ministerium of Pennsylvania and Adjacent States and the Muhlenberg Press, 1942-1958.
Parkman, Francis. The Conspiracy of Pontiac and the Indian War After the Conquest of Canada. Boston: Little Brown & Co., 1933.
Post, Christian. “The Journal of Christian Frederick Post.” In Penn Pictures of Early Western Pennsylvania, edited by John Harpster, pp. 68-78. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1938.
Richards, Henry Melchior Muhlenberg. “The Pennsylvania German in the French and Indian War.” In The Pennsylvania German Society Proceedings and Addresses at Germantown, Oct. 25, 1904. Vol. XV. Published by the Society, 1906.
Russel, Francis. The French and Indian Wars. New York: American Heritage Publishing Co., 1962.
Strassburger, Ralph Beaver, L.L.D., and Hinkle, William John, P.h.D., D.D. “Pennsylvania German Pioneers.” In Pennsylvania German Society Proceedings, vol. 42, p. 385. Published by the Society, 1934.
Wallace, Paul A. Indians in Pennsylvania. Harrisburg: Pennsylvania Historic & Museum Commission, 1970.
—. Indian Paths of Pennsylvania. Harrisburg: Pennsylvania Historic & Museum Commission, 1971.
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