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Betty Zane

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Excerpt about Betty Zane, from West Virginia: A Film History (1:13)

Narrator: After five years of warfare, 200 Indians and British soldiers surrounded Fort Henry on Wheeling Creek in September 1782. Leading the attack was Joseph Brant, an educated Mohawk chief who was also an officer in the British army.

When ammunition in the fort ran low, 16-year-old Betty Zane volunteered to get gunpowder stored in a nearby house.

Allan Eckert: "She said, 'Your lives are more important than mine and maybe they won't shoot because I'm a woman.' So she gathered up her skirts and took a running start and hit the ground going as fast as she could, and the Indians yelled out, 'A squaw, a squaw' and didn't shoot. They poured a keg of gunpowder into her apron, and then she ran back. By this time, the Indians were waiting, and they started firing at her, and spurts of ground flew up all around her as she ran, but she managed to get back with the gunpowder and save the day."

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  • Company: West Virginia Humanities Council
  • Filmmaker: Mark Samels
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