Biography
Demasduit was captured by European settlers in 1819 and was renamed Mary March. A minister selected the name in respect to the Blessed Virgin Mary and in memory of the month in which Demasduit was kidnapped in a settler’s raid on a Beothuk camp. Demasduit’s husband was killed trying to prevent her capture, and her infant son died a few days after she was taken.Demasduit was captured by European settlers in 1819 and was renamed Mary March. A minister selected the name in respect to the Blessed Virgin Mary and in memory of the month in which Demasduit was kidnapped in a settler’s raid on a Beothuk camp. Demasduit’s husband was killed trying to prevent her capture, and her infant son died a few days after she was taken.
Mummification
During the summer of 1819, a number of attempts were made to return her to her people, without success. Captain David Buchan was to go overland to Red Indian Lake with Demasduit in November, the people of St. John's and Notre Dame Bay having raised the money to return the Beothuk to her home. She died of tuberculosis at Ship Cove (now Botwood) aboard Buchan's vessel Grasshopper, on 8 January 1820. Her body was left in a coffin on the lakeshore, where it was found by members of her tribe and returned to her village in February. She was placed in a burial hut beside her husband and child. There were only thirty-one of the Beothuk remaining at that time.