Born in 1754, Mary Ludwig Hays McCauley was the daughter of a New Jersey dairy farmer. Apparently dairy farming wasn’t for her, because young Mary became a domestic servant at the age of thirteen and married the same year. Her husband, William Hays, caught Revolutionary fever and later enlisted as a gunner in the Pennsylvania Artillery. During the Philadelphia Campaign (1777-1778), Mary soon joined her husband as a camp follower and both wintered with George Washington at Valley Forge.
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