David Lewis was born in Carlisle, Cumberland County, Pennsylvania in March of 1790. By the age of twenty the bright, handsome young man had developed a career of robbery and counterfeiting. He worked his trade in the central counties of PA near the Susquehanna and Juniata rivers and in the Allegheny mountains from Lock Haven to Bedford. From 1816 to 1820 he was a highwayman, robbing people at gunpoint and living as a mountaineer in various cabins and caves throughout the state. He was known to use a cave at Doubling Gap, where he knew the owner of a cabin near the sulphur springs. When the coast was clear the friend hung a flag from his window and Lewis could venture from the cave to the cabin. He was apparently well known and liked by the locals and there were stories of men and women visiting the cabin for parties and impromptu dances with Lewis and his fellow outlaws and friends.
There were many stories of the exploits of Lewis. He was well known for his brazen daylight robberies, but was even better known for targeting wealthy people and then giving the money to poor farmers and laborers that were facing hard times or foreclosure. He called himself an 'equalizer", but became known as the Robin Hood of Pennsylvania.
He was successful at his trade, despite being arrested and jailed between 4 and 8 times. This bad luck was offset by his ability to escape before standing trial. In his most famous escape he seduced the jailers daughter and then eloped with her. She became the mother of his first child.
In 1820 a Centre County posse caught Lewis and his men after they robbed a wagon train that was on its way to Bellefonte on the Seven Mountains Road. Lewis was wounded in the gun battle and developed gangrene while being held at the Bellefonte jail. He wrote his memoir on his deathbed and claimed to have hidden caches of money, gold and plunder in caves throughout the Allegheny Mountains.
David "Robber" Lewis died at the age of thirty in the Bellefonte jail and was buried in Milesburg, Pennsylvania.
