She has been the subject of more books and articles than perhaps any other woman with ties to Sullivan County, and yet she never amassed a fortune, held political office or traveled to far off lands. She was so well known that The New York Times ran a lengthy article reporting her death, although it ran more than 30 years before she actually died.

She was Lucy Ann Lobdell, also commonly known as “the female hunter of Long Eddy.”

Lucy Ann Lobdell was born near Albany around 1829. Her father brought the family to the upper Delaware a few years later and went to work as a lumberman. At the age of 17, Lucy married a timber raftsman, George Washington Slater, who proved to be an abusive and unfaithful husband. When Slater deserted her just a few weeks after the birth of their child, Lucy, who had already earned a reputation as a marksman and game stalker by the time she had entered her teens, left the baby in her parents’ care and dressed as a man, took to the woods.

“The mountains of Delaware, Sullivan and Ulster Counties in this state, and the Delaware River counties in Pennsylvania, were then filled with game,” The New York Times reported on October 7, 1879, in an article reporting Lucy’s death, erroneously, as it turned out. “For eight years the unfortunate wife and mother roamed the woods of that section, making her home in the wilderness, where she erected rude cabins for her shelter. She never appeared at the settlements, except to procure ammunition and needed supplies, for which she exchanged skins and game. Her wild life was one of thrilling adventure and privation, and it was not until she was broken down by the exposure and hardships of it that she returned to the haunts of civilization.”

In 1855, Lucy published a book entitled “Narrative of Lucy Ann Lobdell, the Female Hunter of Delaware and Sullivan Counties, NY” in which she detailed her escapades in the wilderness. In the book, she claimed to have killed 168 deer, 77 bears, 1 panther and numberless wild-cats and foxes.

Lucy lived home until she recovered her health but found it difficult to adapt to the structured life, and before long donned the clothes of a man again and disappeared.

“She did not return to the woods,” the Times reported, “but assuming the name of Joseph Lobdell, she went about the country making a living as a music teacher.”

Lucy, or Joseph, as she was known, next settled in Bethany, Pennsylvania, where she started a singing school. Here she “won the love of a young lady scholar, a member of one of the leading families of the village,” according to the Times.

“The two were engaged to be married, but the sex of the teacher was discovered and she was forced to fly from the place in the night to escape being tarred and feathered.”

Upon returning to Long Eddy a short time after, Lucy once again reverted to living life as a woman, at least for a time. Her health failing, she applied for residence at the poorhouse in Delhi, and was accepted there. In 1868, she became involved with another resident of the poorhouse, a young lady of 25 years of age named Louise Perry Wilson. The Times went on to report:

“They refused to be separated, and in the Spring of 1869, they left the poorhouse together, and for two years they were not heard from in Delhi. In the summer of the above year, a couple calling themselves the Rev. Joseph Israel Lobdell and wife appeared in the mountain villages of Monroe County, Pa. For two years, they roamed about that section, living in caves and cabins in the woods, subsisting on game, berries, and on the charity of the lumbering foresters scattered about in this region. They generally appeared in the settlements leading a bear which they had tamed. The man delivered meaningless harangues on religious subjects and proclaimed himself a prophet. Finally, they became public nuisances and were arrested as vagrants.”

Authorities didn’t take long to discover that the supposed male reverend was actually a woman, and the pair were eventually returned to the poorhouse in Delhi. By 1876, they were living as man and wife again, this time in Waymart, Pennsylvania. Lucy was arrested again, and after a short stint in jail, released.

“The two went to Damascus Township, and in 1877 purchased a farm, which they occupied and worked together until a few days since, when Lucy Ann Slater, or Joseph Israel Lobdell, as she insisted on being known, died after a brief illness. She was nearly 50 years of age," the Times continued.

But Lucy Ann Lobdell did not die in 1879, nor in 1885 as the Wayne County Herald reported that year. In fact, she was admitted to the Willard Asylum for the Insane in Hancock in 1880 and lived the final 32 years of her life there, the doctors consistently referring to her as insane, uncontrollable, indecent, and immoral. 

“At a time when women did not commonly travel unescorted, carry a rifle, sit down in bars, or have romantic liaisons with other women, Lucy Lobdell boldly set forth to earn men's wages,” Sullivan County resident William Klaber wrote in his 2015 novel, The Rebellion of Miss Lucy Ann Lobdell. “Lucy Lobdell did all of these things in a personal quest to work and be paid, to wear what she wanted, and love whomever she cared to. But to gain those freedoms she had to endure public scorn and wrestle with a sexual identity whose vocabulary had yet to be invented.”

John Conway is the Sullivan County Historian.  Email him at jconway52@hotmail.com.