dead heiress who inspired sunny came home

'It's a melting pot of a story, and thus totally American.” He 'would have been introduced to local ghost stories and lore at an impressionable age,” Bradley says.“He cleverly weaves together factual locations-the Old Dutch Church and churchyard, ‘Major Andre's Tree,’ some actual family names, including van Tassel and Ichabod Crane-and a little bit of Revolutionary War history with pure imagination and fantasy,' Bradley says. He moved to the area in 1798 to flee a yellow fever outbreak in New York City, according to the New York Historical Society.

Irving may have drawn inspiration for his story while a teenager in the Tarrytown region. After being rebuffed by Katrina at a party at the van Tassel farm where ghost stories are shared, Ichabod is chased by a headless horseman (who may or may not be his rival) who hurls a pumpkin at the man, throwing Ichabod from his horse. In it, lanky newcomer and schoolmaster Ichabod Crane courts Katrina van Tassel, a young heiress who is also being pursued by the Dutchman Brom Bones. Irving’s story takes place in the New York village of Sleepy Hollow, in Westchester County. READ MORE: The Dark Side of the Grimm Fairy TalesĪccording to the New York Historical Society, others believe Irving was inspired by “an actual Hessian soldier who was decapitated by a cannonball during the Battle of White Plains, around Halloween 1776.” “Irving had just met and become friends with Scott in 1817 so it's very likely he was influenced by his new mentor's work,” she says, “The poem is about a wicked hunter who is doomed to be hunted forever by the devil and the ‘dogs of hell’ as punishment for his crimes.” American author Washington Irving (1783-1859).

Dead heiress who inspired sunny came home