Female Stranger

Female Stranger

Interment Location Visited  
Alexandria, VA January 31, 2025  

Photographed January 31, 2025.

The inscription on the gravestone reads as follows:

To the memory of a FEMALE STRANGER

whose mortal sufferings terminated

on the 14th day of October 1816

Aged 23 years and 8 months.

 

This stone is placed here by her disconsolate

Husband in whose arms she sighed out her

latest breath and who under God

did his utmost even to soothe the cold

dead ear of death. 

 

How loved, how valued once, avails thee not

To whom related or by whom begot

A heap of dust alone remains of thee

Tis all thou art and all the proud shall be. 

 

To him gave all the Prophets witness that

through his name whosever believeth in

him shall receive remission of his sins

Acts 10th Chap 43rd verse

Per a document published by the Gadsby Tavern Museum, “The third section in the epitaph is a quote from an Alexander Pope poem, Elegy to the Memory of an Unfortunate Lady, lines 71-74.”

Photographed January 31, 2025.
Photographed January 31, 2025.

Fast Facts

Born: Circa February 1793

Died: October 14, 1816 in Alexandria, Virginia

Age: Allegedly 23

Interment: St. Paul’s Cemetery, Alexandria, Virginia

"Even without documentation as to her identity, she remains an important piece of Alexandria's folklore."
- Gadsby's Tavern Museum
2018
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