Old Jail
Lancaster, Lancaster County, Pennsylvania
Marker Inscription
The Lancaster jail was located a half block to the north from 1753 to 1851. The last remaining Conestoga Indians were held here in protective custody in 1763. They were killed by a vigilante group, the Paxton Boys. No arrests were made.
Erected by Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission
The Story
Lancaster's colonial jail once stood just north of this spot, serving the county from 1753 to 1851. In December 1763, the last surviving members of the Conestoga—a small community descended from the once-powerful Susquehannock—were sheltered here for their own safety. A frontier mob known as the Paxton Boys broke in and murdered them, and no one was ever charged for the killings.
Why it matters
The Conestoga massacre stands as one of colonial America's starkest examples of vigilante violence against Native people, a killing that shocked even Benjamin Franklin and exposed the failure of law to protect the vulnerable on the frontier.
The story behind this marker
AI contextThe era
In the middle of the eighteenth century, Lancaster was one of the largest inland towns in colonial America, a bustling center in a Pennsylvania colony founded on ideals of tolerance and peaceful dealing. Its county jail, which stood just north of this spot from 1753 to 1851, was part of the ordinary machinery of colonial law and order.
But the 1760s on the Pennsylvania frontier were anything but peaceful. The long, brutal fighting of the French and Indian War, and the conflict that followed it on the frontier, had left many colonists — especially those in exposed backcountry settlements — fearful and enraged. That fear too often hardened into indiscriminate hatred toward all Native people, regardless of whether they had any part in the violence.
Into this charged atmosphere came the events of December 1763, when the machinery of the law and the fury of the frontier collided in this very town — with the jail meant to protect the vulnerable becoming the place where they died.
People & events
The Conestoga were the last remnant of a Native community with deep roots in the region, living peacefully near Lancaster. In December 1763, amid the frontier's climate of suspicion and violence, a vigilante group known as the Paxton Boys attacked and killed several of them.
The survivors were brought into Lancaster and held in the county jail — placed there in protective custody, sheltered by the authorities specifically for their own safety. It should have been the end of the danger. Instead, the Paxton Boys returned, broke into the jail, and killed the people inside. The last of the Conestoga died there.
The most chilling detail the marker records is also the simplest: no arrests were made. A group of men murdered people held in official custody, in a county seat, and the law that had promised to protect the victims failed utterly to answer for their deaths. No one was ever held to account.
Its place in the American story
The Conestoga massacre stands as one of colonial America's starkest examples of vigilante violence against Native people, and its horror was recognized even at the time. It laid bare a failure at the heart of frontier society: that the law could promise protection to the vulnerable and then prove powerless — or unwilling — to deliver it.
The killings provoked debate and condemnation in the colonies, forcing colonial leaders to confront the reality that mob fury could override justice and that racial hatred could turn deadly against people who had done no harm. That the perpetrators went entirely unpunished only deepened the disgrace, raising questions about lawlessness and accountability that echo far beyond one town.
As a site of memory, this marker refuses to let a difficult chapter be forgotten. It insists that the American story includes not only triumphs but also grievous wrongs, and that honoring the truth means naming what happened to the Conestoga, and acknowledging that no one answered for it.
If you visit
This is a place for quiet reflection rather than spectacle. The old jail is long gone, so what you are visiting is a site of memory — a spot where you are asked to stand where terrible events unfolded and to hold them honestly in mind.
As you read the marker, let the plainness of its final line land: people were killed in protective custody, and no arrests were made. It is worth pausing on how close together the jail and the surrounding town were, and on the fact that this happened not on some remote frontier but in the heart of a thriving colonial community.
Lancaster has a deep and layered history, and this marker sits within a walkable historic core well worth exploring. Give the Conestoga their due here first: a moment of stillness for a community that was destroyed, and for a wrong that was never made right, is the truest way to honor this place.
Written by AI to add context, grounded in the marker’s inscription and the historical record. The inscription above is the original, unaltered text.
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Related people
- · Paxton Boys
Related events
- · Conestoga Massacre of 1763
Themes & tags
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