This caption is taken from the Book of Sketches, the work of an American writer born in 1783, Washington Irving. The plot takes place in New England and tells the story of Professor Ichabod Crane, coming to settle in Greensburgh, New York State (Westchester County). During his wanderings, Ichabod comes face to face with a Dullahan, also called in Gaelic, Gan Geann in other words a... "headless".

It was in this case, still according to the myth, a Hessian mercenary in the service of the English monarchy against the American revolutionaries, who was beheaded by a cannonball.