In 1877, decades after Blue Jacket's death, a story was published which claimed that Blue Jacket had actually been a white man named Marmaduke Van Swearingen, who had been captured and adopted by Shawnees in the 1770s, around the time of the American Revolutionary War. This story was popularized in historical novels written by Allan W. Eckert in the late 1960s. An outdoor drama based on the Van Swearingen story, "Blue Jacket, White Shawnee War Chief", was performed in Xenia, Ohio, beginning in 1981. Performances of the play ended in 2007.