Of course every lady wants to know how the girls looked. Unfortunately, there is no picture of either of them prior to middle life. Mrs. Dunavan lent to me a very rare daguerreotype picture of her mother, Mrs. Munson, taken at the age of about forty-two years, and a photograph of her aunt, Mrs. Sylvia Hall Horn, taken when she was over sixty years of age. Also, I borrowed from Mrs. Dunavan a tintype picture of herself when she was sixteen, which is said to be a very good likeness of her aunt Sylvia at the time that she was taken captive. These pictures are reproduced herein. The tradition of the neighborhood is that the girls were unusually handsome in both figure and face and of captivating kind dispositions. They were born in Kentucky and carried with them to Illinois the southern culture which has won for the ladies of the South considerable fame in story and song. “She was bred in old Kentucky, Where the meadow grass grows blue, There’s the sunshine of the country, In her face and manner too.”--Braisted. Milwaukee, Wis. July 15, 1915. CHARLES M. SCANLAN. CONTENTS PAGE Preface, 3 I. Description of the Country, 9 II. Indian Davis Troubles, 13 III. The Davis Settlement, 23 IV. The Massacre, 31 V. The Captivity, 38 VI. To the Rescue, 48 VII. Military Movements, 51 VIII. Reward Offered, 54 IX. The Captive Girls, 59 X. Ransomed, 66 XI. Royally Welcomed, 81 XII. Homeward Bound, 90 XIII. Romance and History, 95 XIV. Shabona, 106 XV. Comee and Toquamee, 111 CHAPTER I. DESCRIPTION OF THE COUNTRY. In its natural condition, perhaps no more attractive country ever laid before the eyes of man than that in which occurred the incidents of the following narrative. On the south it is bordered by the Illinois river, with its historical events beginning with the old Kaskaskia Mission established by Father Marquette in 1673 amidst the most beautiful scenery in the whole state of Illinois, which is now included in Starved Rock State Park. What memories cluster around old Kaskaskia! As the first capital of Illinois, it was visited by Gen. La Fayette and Presidents Jackson, Lincoln, Taylor and Harrison; by Jefferson Davis, Gen. Albert Sidney Johnson, and by nearly every other man who was prominent in United States history prior to 1837, when Springfield became the state capital.