The Heartbreaking Disappearance of Theodosia Burr Alston
She was the famous daughter of American villain, Aaron Burr, and became one of our country’s oldest and most perplexing unsolved mysteries
From her first breath, Theodosia Bartow Burr was her father, Aaron Burr Jr’s pride and joy. She was born on June 21, 1783, in Albany, New York, and named after her mother, Theodosia Stillwell Bartow Prevost Burr. Aaron Burr not so secretly courted the elder Theodosia, a mother of five, and the wife of British officer Jacques Marcus Prevost. Jacques died in 1781. Aaron married his one true love on July 2, 1782, at her family’s estate in New Jersey, The Hermitage.
The marriage was amicable but short and marred with tragedy. Theodosia, the mother, delivered three stillborn sons and suffered many miscarriages. Mr. and Mrs. Burr had one other daughter, Sarah who was called Sally, who died of an illness in 1788. Regarding the death of their youngest daughter, Mrs. Burr wrote:
“Variegated have been my scenes of anguish, but this exceeds them all…She passed gently from me to the region of bliss…My Sally, she is…
