Vice President Aaron Burr’s daughter was named Theodosia.
Alexander Hamilton, who was bitchy sort of person, spread rumors that she had
an incestuous relationship with her father (part of the reason for the infamous
duel).
Anyway, in 1813, following the death of her son, she boarded a
boat at the port of Georgetown, then in Maryland today a part of Washington DC,
and was never seen again. Several months after the War of 1812 broke out,
Alston's husband was sworn in as governor of South Carolina on December 10. As
head of the state militia, he could not accompany her on the trip north. Burr
sent Timothy Green, an old friend, to accompany her instead. Green possessed
some medical knowledge. On December 31, 1812, Alston sailed aboard the schooner
Patriot from Georgetown, South Carolina. The Patriot was a famously fast ship.
After she left port, the Patriot was never heard from again.
Rumors about what happened to the ship were far and wide. Some said the Patriot
had been captured by pirates. Another said that the Patriot had fallen prey to
the wreckers known as the Carolina "bankers," who operated near Nags
Head, North Carolina and were known for pirating wrecks and murdering both
passengers and crews.
Pirates may have gotten her, but that’s very doubtful. One wild
story has it that she was in love with a Native American and left colonial society
with him. Possible, but, again, very doubtful.( she was married to a fellow
named Joseph Alston who was the governor of South Carolina. In all probability,
her boat capsized on the rough seas and she drowned. She was only 29 years old.
A man named J.A. Elliott of Norfolk, Virginia, made a statement
in 1910 that in the early part of 1813, the dead body of a young woman
"with every indication of refinement" had been washed ashore at Cape
Charles, and had been buried on her finder's farm.
A popular but improbable local story in Alexandria, Virginia,
suggests that Alston may have been the Mysterious Female Stranger who died at
Gadsby's Tavern on October 14, 1816. The stranger was buried in St. Paul's
Cemetery with a gravestone inscription that begins: "To the memory of a /
FEMALE STRANGER / whose mortal sufferings terminated / on the 14th day of
October 1816 / Aged 23 years and 8 months."