I relied on the work of Dr. Terry Jones, professor emeritus of history at the University of Louisiana in Monroe, for this article, letting him do the heavy lifting of research. Read his summation of the legend and the alleged sightings, of the “Wild Girl” of Catahoula Parish, Louisiana here before progressing.
Now, then. Let’s talk about that “Wild Woman”. The only description given of the Woman wearing clothes of any sort is that given by merchant J. H. Hardtner and his daughter on the road between the communities of Pineville and Fishville. They described the woman as being “dressed in a faded home-spun dress”. We might conclude this was an entirely different being they spotted had the woman not fled from them “at a speed such as, all say, they never saw (a) human being run.” All other reports describe the Wild Girl as naked. Was she just the abandoned Gypsy child with the club foot mentioned in the article? A feral child? If so, why did some witnesses describe her as being “covered with hair varying in length in different parts of her” and as “one of the most ferocious-looking beings that the human eye was ever cast upon”? Were they seeing a real “wild girl,” i.e. a feral, but human, child, or an adolescent female Sasquatch? Unfortunately the whole affair was covered so scantily, and what with the penchant for newspapermen back in those days to make stuff up, we’ll never know for sure.
