Gardner-Sharp had a long history of illness after the event, likely due to post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD.

[4] Very soon after returning home, at the age of 14, Gardner-Sharp married 18 year-old Casville Sharp, with whom she had three children, the youngest a daughter who died in childhood.

In 1891 using proceeds from her book sales, as a quietly divorced mother of two sons, she purchased the property and cabin where as a 14-year old she had seen eight of her family members shot and then beaten to death with firewood, and where across the road her parents and siblings were buried.

As the location of the last Indian massacre in Iowa, known nationwide through Gardner-Sharp’s memoir, the site became a popular tourist attraction.

Gardner-Sharp died on January 17, 1921, and was buried with her birth family near the Abbie Gardner Sharp cabin, which still stands near Arnold's Park in Spirit Lake, Iowa.