Showing posts with label ghost. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ghost. Show all posts

Tuesday, November 24, 2020

Haunted Arkansas Mountain

Fayetteville Confederate Cemetery
On a gentle. wooded ridge of the Ozarks overlooking the town of Fayetteville,  Arkansas is the Fayetteville Confederate Cemetery, the final resting place for hundreds of men who gave their lives during Civil War battles in the northwest part of the state. Officially listed as East Mountain, the locals call the ridge Ghost Mountain. Not as famous as other battle sites like Gettysburg, Manassas, or Vicksburg, this was nonetheless one of the most violent and desperately contested sites of the war.  

The men's original burial places were where they fell when after the battle, soldiers of the victorious side or civilians from the area hurriedly interred the bodies in shallow, makeshift graves trying to prevent disease and the stench of decay. In 1878, the Southern Memorial Association of Washington County established the cemetery and began the process of exhuming the bodies from the area. The Confederates were buried here and the fallen Union soldiers were interred in the Fayetteville National Cemetery.

There are a number of homes just down the hill from the cemetery and the residents often report seeing unusual lights floating along the ridge. There are also numerous reports by residents and visitors alike of strange anomalies showing up in photographs taken within the cemetery. Even more famous though, is the legend of the Burning Bride of Ghost Hollow.

Directly across the slender dirt road from the Confederate cemetery is a much smaller cemetery, The Walker Cemetery is a family burial plot of land much smaller than its neighbor. Here lies the body of David Walker. In the 1860s, he was an Arkansas state senator, three times a state supreme court justice, one of the founders of the University of Arkansas, and served as a colonel in the Confederate army during the war. He was married to Jane Lewis Washington, a third-cousin of George Washington. Buried here next to him are his parents and a few of his close relatives.  

In 1872, Judge Walker had a large, 2-story brick house built for his daughter and her husband as a wedding present. It still stands just a little ways away from the family cemetery. Soon after the happy couple moved in though, strange things began to happen. Mostly small things, items disappearing then reappearing several days later, unexplained "moaning" noises, doors slamming closed for no reason. Then the couple became aware they could no longer find hired help. When the last housemaid quit,  they inquired to learn why nobody would work for them. They learned the African-American community considered the home haunted because of a horrible accident that happened there years before. 

Shortly after the Civil War ended in 1865, a man and his fiancĂ© moved to Fayetteville from Fort Smith trying to start a new life after his hard service in the Confederate army.  They constructed a small home on the exact same spot of land as the Walker-built house. They were married in the house one cold winter evening and after the guests left, the bride of one hour, still wearing her wedding dress, leaned over the fireplace to stir the fire. A spark popped onto her dress and set it ablaze. Running and screaming hysterically out of the house, she ran down the ridge and, having ran through the grounds which would later become the Walker and Confederate cemeteries, she fell down and died in agony. From that day on, there have been reports of people seeing her apparition running through both cemeteries and hearing her screams as she over and over, relives her tragic wedding night.

Unfortunately, more tragedy plagued Ghost Mountain. In 1932, a family lived in a small log cabin located near the cemeteries. One night, the husband came home very drunk to his wife who was caring for a sick infant. The baby cried incessantly no matter what the mother tried and the husband, incensed that he couldn't sleep because of it, suddenly grabbed the baby, stumbled outside and threw the baby down the water well. The wife went into hysterics, grabbed the well rope and jumped into the well to save the child. The drunken father picked up a nearby ax and chopped the rope, leaving his wife and child in the well to die. It was several days later when his employer came to investigate why he had not been to work. Seeing the dangling, chopped well rope, he looked down and saw in the dim light, the floating bodies. It is assumed the husband fled the area as he has never been found. 

Some say the stories are just myths, there's nothing strange about East Mountain. Others insist the stories are not myths. One thing that is for certain, to this day, the stories remain a source of fear for those living on and around Ghost Mountain.


Friday, September 4, 2020

The Goliad Ghosts

The Presidio in Goliad
After the fall of the Alamo in San Antonio, Texas in 1836, the victorious Mexican forces continued to march east toward the Presidio in Goliad where Colonel James Fannin commanded 400 Texas men. The Texans were ordered to move to Victoria, a more defendable position on the other side of the Guadalupe River. During the move though they ran into the main body of the Mexican troops while crossing an open prairie. 

After fending off four separate attacks on the first day, the Texans spent that night digging trenches. In the morning, however, they found they were now totally surrounded by the enemy. Almost out of ammunition, Fannin asked for a parley to prevent his troops from being massacred. General Urrea, commander of the Mexican forces, promised the Texans would be treated as prisoners of war and given clemency. 

Upon surrender, the Texans were marched back to the Presidio at Goliad and placed under the watchful eyes of Nicolas de la Portilla and his detachment of men while Urrea and his remaining troops continued their march south. However, Santa Anna, the president of Mexico, was determined to fight a war of extermination and ordered Portilla to execute the prisoners. Having conflicting orders from General Urrea and General Santa Anna, Portilla chose to follow Santa Anna's orders.

Inside the walls of the Presidio where the
wounded were killed
On March 27, the prisoners were divided into quarters. While the sick and wounded remained in the chapel, the other three groups were escorted on different roads out of town. The three groups were told they were on missions to gather wood, drive cattle or sail to safety in New Orleans. When they were ordered to halt a half-mile from the fort, however, the Texans realized their fates. The Mexican guards opened fire as some of the men began running for their lives. Those not killed by gunshots were slaughtered with bayonets.

Back at the presidio, the Mexicans stood the wounded against the chapel wall and executed them. The wounded who couldn't stand were shot in their beds. Fannin, who had been shot in the thigh during the original engagement, was the last to be killed. His three dying wishes were to be shot in the chest, given a Christian burial, and have his watch sent to his family. Instead, Portilla shot Fannin in the face, burned his body with the others, and kept the timepiece as a war prize. In all, nearly 350 men were killed at Goliad.

Today, almost 185 years later, the old presidio and its adjacent Chapel of our Lady of Loreto still stand. Given the horrific events that happened within and around the site, is it any wonder the walls sometimes echo with the mournful sounds of spirits returning from that troubled and turbulent time? 

Visitors often report feeling "cold spots" and uneasy feelings as they walk around the grounds where Fannin and his men were executed. In 1992, a man named Jim reported strange goings-on. As a former deputy sheriff and a security guard for a number of years, Jim was not a man easily frightened or prone to make up wild stories. Hired for a few nights to watch over some equipment at the presidio that was to be used for the Cattle Baron's Ball, he expected quiet routine nights. On his first night though, just before midnight, the silence was broken by the "eerie, shrill cries of nearly a dozen terrified infants." He swore the sounds indicated "pain and suffering." Although understandably frightened, he tried to find where the sounds were coming from. After several long minutes, he finally determined they were coming from one of the dozen or so unmarked graves that are located near the Chapel of Our Lady of Loreto.

As he shined his flashlight on the spot, the cries abruptly stopped but were immediately replaced by the singing of a women's choir. It sounded like it was coming from the back wall of the old fort, but the beam of his flashlight revealed nothing there. After two or three minutes, the singing stopped and silence returned for the rest of the night. When Jim reported his experience, he was teased by his co-workers, but he is convinced what he saw and heard was real and besides, he is not the only person to report strange things in and around the presidio.

The chapel
Numerous people have reported seeing a strange, 4-foot-tall friar who suddenly appears by the double doors leading into the chapel. His robes are black, tied around his waist with a rope and his face is concealed with a hood. He then walks barefooted to each corner of the church and seems to bless it before walking to the center of the quadrangle and begins to pray in Latin. 

A woman in a white dress has been reported kneeling and crying by the graves of the children. When seen, she then turns and looks directly at the person before gliding over to a wall and vanishing. A beautiful soprano voice is often heard emanating from one particular room, but upon investigation, there is nobody in the small space. Visitors who stay late often come back from the fort and comment to the staff about the historical reenactors even though there are no reenactors on the property that day. 

It seems there are many restless spirits here. Who are the crying babies? Are they the little lost souls of pioneer infants killed by Indians in a raid or was there an epidemic that took their too-short lives. The woman in white - is her own child buried in one of the unmarked graves? Why does the short friar keep returning? Is his soul in turmoil over so many brave men who were brutally executed? Whose souls are eternally singing beautiful hymns in a choir, unable to leave this chapel? Caught in a timeless web, so many lost souls searching, sorrowing, singing, praying, unable to let go of the life they briefly lived in a little town named Goliad.

Saturday, April 25, 2020

Anna and the Sailor

Savannah, Georgia is often called "The Jewel of the South" and its rich history is filled with as much tragedy as glory. Many of its buildings have a reputation for being haunted by specters, some of them are even known by name. Anna Power is one of these poor souls perhaps destined to remain chained to a particular place forever. That place is known as the 17 Hundred 90 Inn.

The inn was originally built in 1790 as a boardinghouse. Savannah was a popular fishing and shipping port with a rowdy reputation. This made it a popular hangout for sailors, pirates, thieves, and lonesome people looking for companionship.  Anna Power was a young woman, just 17 years old, but she was known for enjoying the rough and rowdy life in the saloons by the port. She lived with her very religious parents in a respectable part of town, but  the neighbors began openly discussing Anna's loose ways and questionable morality. Her family felt she was a disgrace and when she turned up pregnant, they kicked her out of the house.

Anna came to the boarding house to live with the hard-drinking sailor she had lain with. The sailor she thought was her true love told her he was not ready to settle down with a wife and a baby. No amount of pleading, begging, or crying changed his mind. He had other plans and they did not include Anna and a baby. He signed on as a crewman on a ship leaving on the evening's high tide, told Anna he would not be coming back and left her there in the little room in the boarding house. Anna watch her lover's ship as it sailed away from the harbor and as it disappeared over the horizon, dark despair enveloped her. She threw herself out of the window and ended her suffering.

However, that wasn't end of Anna Power. Shortly thereafter, the next man who rented the same room told of how he was awakened from a dead sleep in the middle of the night by fingers caressing his face and a hand tugging at his blanket. He lit a lamp beside the bed only to find nobody in bed with him. He looked around the room in confusion and saw a thin streak of mist by the window. Before his astonished eyes, the mist turned into the shape of a young woman who looked at him for a second before jumping out of the window.

 Eerie occurrences have continued in the room since. And not just in that room either. Anna has been seen roaming the halls, often playfully coming up behind guests and giving their hair a little tug and then, with a fading giggle, vanishing as they turn around.  Guests and staff have told of flickering lights and mysterious footsteps. Sadly, an unseen baby crying at the top of the stairs seems to be Anna's unborn child. 

As recently as 2013, a gentleman reported he and his wife got into an argument while staying in "Anna's" room. The argument became so heated the wife banished her husband to sleep on the small couch in the room. Fast asleep, he was awakened by his wife whom evidently wanted to kiss and make up. The next morning, he arose from the couch and thanked her for being so understanding and for the wonderful intimate time she had given him. His wife simply glared at him in angry confusion and asked him what he was talking about. The man swore the encounter wasn't a dream.

Over the years, Anna has proven to have a sense of humor. While guests are away from their rooms, she sometimes locks doors - from the inside. She evidently also likes to steal things. Numerous times guests have come to the front desk to complain of someone stealing their wallets or keys only to be astonished when upon returning to their room, the missing item has reappeared sitting in plain sight on a table top. One thing Anna seems to enjoy stealing the most is underwear, especially women's. Nobody's unmentionables are safe as dozens of guest have told of their missing personal garments. Bewilderingly, most of the purloined panties are later found, often after the guests have abruptly left, in planter boxes around the inn.

There's really no rhyme or reason for Anna's appearances. She simply seems to come and go as she pleases. Most of the fun happens in what is now Room 204, the room where Anna lived and loved. If you happen to be lucky enough to book this room, be sure to watch your undies.


Wednesday, October 30, 2019

Partners Forever

The Texas Panhandle plains somewhere 
close to where this story took place.
I heard a story, a disturbing story, of two men, buffalo hunting partners, who lived in what is now Dickens County, Texas in the mid-1860s. They stumbled across a spring that trickled out cool, clear water in a little grove of hardy mesquite trees in the lonely land a few miles east of the city we know as Lubbock. Other than this little patch of land, the area was an unforgiving, gritty vast nothingness of almost constant wind - the kind of place that by night, becomes a domain where the wolf cries to the moon and restless ghosts stalk the harsh, lonely dark. 

Here, Bill and Ike agreed, was a perfect place where they could find peace and solitude. They built a small, crude cabin, a dugout more than a cabin really, but it was good enough for these hardy men who were used to sleeping in the open with nothing but beans, hardtack and buffalo meat to eat and buffalo robes to keep them warm on a long winter's night. When Bill found a cottonwood sapling growing among the mesquite, he dug it up and planted it a few yards from their cabin. They filed homestead papers and named their land "Cottonwood Ranch."

They dreamed of making their claim a real ranch, raising cattle on a vast horizon-to-horizon spread. Month after month eventually turned into years, but the men who had been partners for so long they often enjoyed long periods of silence since each knew what the other was thinking, continued to dream and work to improve their land for their some-day cattle to get fat on the prairie grass. They saw eye-to-eye on everything, never argued, and knew only their dreams of what was to be.

The years went by and the cottonwood tree had grown much larger. Other ranches had sprung up around them, large ranches with funding from foreign investors. Land that had cost them nothing was now worth money! The closest ranch, the Big Sur, had made it known they wanted to buy Bill and Ike's property as they wanted to expand and needed the water from the dependable little spring. They offered more money than the partners had ever grubbed out despite all their backbreaking work and effort.

One night in the cabin's flickering lamplight, Bill announced he wanted to sell out and go back east or at least to a decent-sized city like Dodge or Kansas City. "What?! Are you crazy?" Ike exploded. "No way are we selling out now!" But Bill just sat on his stool, calmly looking up at the sagging roof. Ike blew out the lamp and rolled up in his bedroll, but sleep wouldn't come and he knew a change had come. Something terrible had happened to their partnership.

In the morning, Ike confronted his partner. They must hold onto the Cottonwood Ranch no matter what. Too much work and effort had gone into it and besides, what could be better than the life they had? "A good place to live with a roof that doesn't leak on us while we sleep, a place with good walls that hold off the cold wind, whiskey, and women. That's what would be better. We must sell," replied Bill. "We don't leave," said Ike. "I intend to," said Bill as he walked away. No more words were spoken. In the silence, both men knew the break was complete.

As the days passed, the now uncomfortable silence split the break even wider. They continued to work and do the things that must be done, but Ike and Bill were sullen strangers now. The cabin became claustrophobic and the open range became oppressive.


East of Lubbock - the Cottonwood
Ranch was somewhere near here.
It was a late fall morning when the men were working together to remove the stump of a dead tree they had chopped down to lay aside firewood for the coming winter. Ike was leaning on a large ax, taking a break from chopping up the wood while Bill worked at the stump, digging with a shovel. Without looking up, Bill broke the silence by saying, "I don't intend enduring another winter here. I'm leaving in the morning." Without thinking, crying out in rage, Ike swung the ax. 

Bill's scream was suddenly cut off. Seconds later, Ike was aghast at the scene in front of him. He grabbed the shovel and in a daze, walked to the little grove of mesquite trees and dug a shallow grave. When he was finished, he dragged Bill's body to the hole and laid it in. He went back, retrieved Bill's severed head and threw it in the grave atop the body. With tears in his eyes, he completed the burial of his partner.

In the little cabin that night, Ike sat staring at Bill's empty chair. He was startled to hear someone softly calling his name, but he knew it must be the wind. He had just blown out the lamp for the night when he heard outside the familiar sounds of shuffling footsteps across the hard ground. He ran to open the door, but there was only the dark and the faint shadow of Bill's cottonwood tree swaying in the eternal wind.  


Ike couldn't sleep that night and when the dark began turning to light, he saddled his horse and rode toward the horizon. Passing the grove of trees and Bill's resting place, Ike heard the unmistakable sound of hoofbeats and the creaking of a familiar leather saddle following him. The sound seemed to fill the air as a chill went down his spine, but forcing himself to look back, there was, of course, nothing there.

Over the next days and weeks, it seemed Bill followed Ike wherever he went. It didn't matter which trail he took, the sounds of creaking leather and hoofbeats remained right behind him. At night, Ike began drinking more and more whiskey, trying to quiet the voice in the wind calling his name. And then the whiskey didn't work anymore. One night, when the footsteps and the dark and the voice in the wind became too much, Ike threw open the door and found Bill standing there in the doorway! Screaming, Ike fell back into the cabin as Bill calmly walked in and sat down in his seat. Ike knew he was going crazy, but maybe if he drank even more whiskey, he could pass out. He drank and drank some more, but he didn't pass out and Bill continued to sit in his chair, watching him. As much as a headless fellow can watch anyway.

When the sun came up in the morning, Bill seemed to disappear. Ike couldn't stand it anymore. Filled with fear and remorse, he rode into the little town that had grown up a few miles away. He told the sheriff what he had done, but the sheriff didn't believe him. You see, riders coming into town had for several months been telling of a fellow a few miles away who seemed to be crazy, always looking around and talking to himself. He never seemed to do any work; just kept piling stones up in a spot in a little grove of mesquite trees. The townspeople thought the man must have gone crazy living out there in all that open space with the unstopping wind. His partner must have left, unable to live with such a crazy person. One of these days soon, the sheriff thought, he would ride over there just to take a look around.

Eventually, the lawman did ride over to the poor Cottonwood Ranch. But it was too late. He found the rotting body of Ike hanging from a big cottonwood tree next to an old cabin. The sheriff felt bad. He should have locked up old Ike for his own safety. He cut down the body and buried it right there under the tree.

It was getting on dark when the sheriff finished the burying and headed home. As he rode, he could have sworn he heard a voice calling Ike's name, but he knew it was just the wind. A number of times he thought he heard the hoofbeats of a horse and rider following him. He looked back and thought he saw a shadow, but you know how a dark night can play tricks on your eyes. That's how he explained things to his wife when he arrived home and that's what he told all the riders who came into town later and talked of seeing a man hanging from a cottonwood by a rundown cabin a few miles out of town.



One of the roads I traveled to find the
Cottonwood Ranch
I wanted to see where the story took place so I drove out there. I asked around, but people claimed to never have heard the story or didn't seem to want to talk about it. A couple of old men I came across having coffee in a little cafe told me there was nothing to the story and nothing to see out there. But they also told me they don't know of anyone who goes out that way after dark. I followed the vague directions I got from them, but I never did find a big cottonwood tree with the rotted remains of a cabin next to it. I didn't stay around until it got dark. I wasn't afraid, not at all, but I had a nice, comfortable hotel room waiting for me in Lubbock... and why waste a good night's sleep?

Tuesday, April 2, 2019

Haunted Fort Leaton

Ben Leaton, a former scalp hunter, purchased a shack and a plot of land on the banks of the Rio Grande in 1848 and built a 40-room adobe building surrounded by a thick adobe wall. From this fort, he conducted a trading post business and made a truce with the Apache and Comanche Indians whom he formerly killed and scalped for the bounties paid by the Mexican government. He did this by paying with food, goods, and guns for the cattle brought back to him which had been stolen from Mexicans on the other side of the river. 

Leaton died in 1851, leaving his widow alone in the fort on the rugged, inhospitable land. She soon married a man named Edward Hall. He moved into the fort and took over Ben's business. He wasn't as good at the business as Leaton had been and the couple fell on financial hard times. Edward used the fort and land as collateral to secure a loan from Leaton's former scalp-hunting partner, John Burgess. When Hall defaulted on the loan, Burgess demanded he and his family vacate the fort and hand over everything to him. Hall refused to move. Bad decision as he was found murdered not long after.


The now twice-widowed woman took her son and left. Burgess moved in and for the next 10 years, he scratched out a living raising and selling cattle and running the trading post. Then one day, Burgess himself was found with several fatal bullet holes in him. It was reported that Leaton's now grown son was seen in the area shortly before the body was found, but then nothing more was seen of him. It was rumored he had killed Burgess in retaliation for his step-father's death. There was no proof and, like Hall's murder, the murder of Burgess was never officially solved.

When Fort Leaton was abandoned in the 1920s, a number of homeless families moved into the fort's adobe structure. None stayed very long. A man and his wife who had fallen on hard times temporarily moved into one of the rooms. They soon realized although they were the only people there, they were not alone. When it got dark, the couple would retire for the night as they were so poor they didn't even have candles to light the room. Night after night they were startled awake by the sound of dishes crashing to the floor and breaking. Grabbing a burning stick from the fireplace, they searched the whole place but found no broken dishes and no explanation for the sounds. They soon fled, thinking sleeping outside was preferable to staying inside the fort.


For years, there were rumors that old Ben Leaton had buried gold coins inside the fort.  Treasure hunters searched in vain, digging a huge hole just outside the home's northern wall. When the Texas Parks and Wildlife purchased the property in 1968, they hired a team of workers to remove the trash from the hole and fill it in. The job was barely halfway finished when the whole crew abruptly quit and left, not returning even for their paychecks. They claimed that while they worked, something kept grabbing their legs and trying to pull them down into the bottom of the pit. 

Other workers repeatedly swore they had seen through a window an old woman sitting in a rocking chair in the room that had been the kitchen. Witnesses have reported seeing a shadowy man who matches the description of Edward Hall standing in the chapel room where he was murdered years ago. 

Staff and visitors alike have reported hearing rattling noises coming from the area of the granary. It sounds just like there is a group of men removing the harnesses from their horses, but when you look, no one is actually there. Or are they?

A less well-known tale is of a poor cowboy who, around the turn of the century, was caught in a sudden thunderstorm. Heading toward Fort Leaton for protection, a lightning bolt spooked his horse. The cowboy was thrown from the saddle, but his foot caught in the stirrup and as the horse madly ran across the rugged land, the doomed man was slammed into a boulder and beheaded. Because it is a tale unknown by most, it's all the more disturbing that numerous people have reported seeing a headless horseman riding a white horse around the compound of the fort.

Fort Leaton is an interesting place to tour in the day, but the gates close at 4:30PM and you might want to think twice about being in the area after dark.


Monday, January 14, 2019

The Haunting of Camp Lulu

Haunted houses and scary movies are great, but they are just acting. They might give you the willies and make your hair stand on end, but deep down, you know you aren’t in any real danger. Being outdoors in a haunted campground with nothing between you and the evil entities that might reside there, however, is a different story. Welcome to Camp Lulu in Brownsville, Texas. Taking a hike to Camp Lulu just might be your last.

Camp Lulu used to be a girls' summer camp. At least it was until a deranged camp counselor murdered all of the campers one fateful night. After being found and arrested, the counselor claimed a voice in his head compelled him to do it. After the horror, the camp was closed forever. The few brave souls who have gone on the property at night have said they could hear young female voices screaming in agony and crying. 

A few years ago, a hiker reported seeing a hidden, decrepit cabin on the grounds. Against his better judgment, he entered the cabin and came face-to-face with hundreds of porcelain dolls. Nobody knows what went on after that, but the hiker's body was found just a few days afterward. Nobody knows who built the cabin or if they still come around to check on it, but one thing’s for sure – something evil happened inside of it. Feel free to check it out yourself - if you dare.


Sunday, April 1, 2018

Demon's Road

There's a remote, lonely dirt road outside of Huntsville, Texas that for years has had the reputation as a place you don't want to be after dark. Even the few people who live on the scattered ranches in the area will tell you they will do without something they need rather than take this road toward town once the sun goes down. The road leads to the old Martha's Chapel Cemetery and is known by everyone as Demon's Road. Even in the bright light of day, there are reasons it has become known by that name. Since there were only horse-drawn wagons traveling on it, there have been tales of disturbing encounters and eerie, hair-on-the-back-of-your-neck-standing-up feelings. 

One of the earliest tales is of the apparition of a young child with glowing eyes riding an early version of a tricycle along the road by the cemetery. He has been encountered numerous times and it is reported as you near him, he simply vanishes into the air. Sometimes though, he will slowly turn his head and his glowing eyes will intensely stare at you as if he is looking into your soul before slowly, almost reluctantly, fading away. 


Demon's Road
In 2001, a man named Bob who lived in Houston heard about Demon's Road and convinced a friend to go with him to see things for themselves. As Bob parked beside the cemetery, he saw that his friend had fallen asleep in the passenger seat. It had been a long drive so not wanting to disturb his sleep and figuring he would join him after he woke up, Bob left to explore the cemetery on his own. As he was walking around reading the epitaphs, he saw something moving on the grave next to where he was standing. As he watched frozen in horror, a hand slowly began coming up through the ground. Within a few seconds, the whole arm was above ground and it began grasping around as if in search of something. The undead hand reached Bob's pant leg and grabbed ahold. Finally able to move, Bob instinctively reached down and grabbed the hand to pull it away from his pants leg, but the hand released its grip on his pants, abruptly latched on to Bob's wrist and began pulling him down! At that time, his friend showed up and began frantically pulling him away. With both of them pulling and jerking backwards, Bob managed to get away from the clutching hand. After running a few yards away to safety, Bob turned to look at his friend only to find he was nowhere to be seen. Confused and mightily frightened, Bob continued to run back to the safety of the car. As he quickly opened the driver's door, he saw his friend slumped over in the passenger seat still asleep. Bob quickly started the car and spun away from the cemetery with dirt flying from his rear tires. As the motor raced and the car swayed from side to side, his friend fell toward him, his eyes open, but unseeing. It was later determined he had died of a heart attack hours earlier, apparently during the drive down Demon's Road toward the cemetery.

Buzzard patiently waiting for a meal of
something dead.
In 2010 a woman reported an encounter her husband and their friends had. While visiting the grave of a long-dead relative, they saw a strange-looking man wandering through the cemetery, but none of them paid much attention to him. Several days later, as the woman stepped into the shower, she turned to close the curtain and much to her surprise, there in the doorway stood the same man they had seen in the cemetery! She screamed and the man abruptly faded away before her eyes.

There have also been numerous claims that a strange, faceless, threatening creature appears out of the woods on either side of the road. The one thing in common with all the reports is that no matter what form the spirits choose to reveal themselves, they have never been reported as anything less than hostile.


Monday, March 12, 2018

A Curious Stain at the Bottom of the Stairs


There is a mansion on Highway 14 about two miles west of Marion, Alabama known as Carlisle Hall. The house is rather unusual; a combination of Romanesque arches with a Japanese temple-type hanging copper roof and a Moorish balcony rail, all combined in a Gothic design.

Edwin Carlisle, a prosperous cotton merchant, had the plans drawn up in 1857 and the mansion was built between 1858 and 1859 on his 440 acre plantation. He and his family moved into the house in 1860. After he died in 1873, the house was sold several times to new owners, all of whom only stayed a short time. In the early 1900’s the last owners simply abandoned it and left the area.

Soon afterward, local residents began talking about a blue lantern light that could be seen through the windows of the bedroom originally occupied by Edwin Carlisle. There were also rumors of ghostly footsteps being heard coming down the stairs and what sounded like the swish of petticoats. People thought it must have been Carlisle’s daughter who, toward the end of the Civil War, had fallen in love with a Yankee colonel, one of the Northern occupation troops stationed in the area after the Confederate troops had been driven out. Any time he came calling, the young Miss Carlisle would rush down the stairs to greet him in the parlor. Evidently, she continued to do so long after the war and the lives of the lovers were over.

In the late 1930’s, the home was purchased by a retired naval officer named A. S. Hill. He began to repair the structure, but he never got to spend even one night there as before the work was completed, America entered World War II and Mr. Hill came out of retirement and went off to fight. Sadly, his ship was sunk by an enemy submarine and he didn’t return.

Mr. W. E. Belcher purchased the home next, but he spent all his time traveling and the house fell further into disrepair. Vandals broke in and stole furniture, paintings, books, and anything else of value. They shattered all 56 windows and several leaded Venetian glass masterpieces above the staircase. They ripped the banister apart and chopped into pieces the 6 marble fireplace mantels. They even dug up trees on the property and uprooted plantings in the formerly beautiful flower beds.

When Mr. Belcher returned from one of his trips overseas and saw the condition of the house, he hired a family to live in it. They were to protect the property and to make repairs as they could while the house was up for sale. Within two weeks though, the caretaker family’s only child, a toddler, was killed when he fell down the stairs splitting his little head open and leaving a bloody stain on the floor where he landed.  After the child was buried, they left after telling a few people about seeing old Mr. Carlisle walking the upstairs hallway at night and seeing his daughter gliding down the same staircase that had killed their beloved son.

After that tragedy, the house was abandoned until the 1950’s when it was rescued by a teacher, Kay Klassen, who bought it just before it was condemned by the authorities and torn down.  She and her parents spent 7 years in restoration and modernization work, including sanding and repairing the wooden floors. During this time, they searched all over the South for period furnishings, mantels, and chandeliers to replace those that had been destroyed. When they were finished, everyone agreed they had managed to bring the old place back to its glory days.

Ms. Klassen said she never saw Mr. Carlisle, his daughter or any unexplained lights. The only thing that couldn’t be explained was a section of the flooring that had a nasty stain. She would wash and sand it until the stain was gone, but within several days, it would return. She finally had to cut the section out and replace the wood. Today, if you look really close, you can see where the replacement is located – at the foot of the stairs right where a dying baby’s cries had been heard years and years ago.

Tuesday, January 2, 2018

Evil Bell Witch

Sarah Bell was only six years old the first time it happened. She was standing behind her mother who was washing dishes in the kitchen sink when she floated up in the air. “Momma. Help me, Momma!” When little Sarah’s mom turned to look, her baby girl was floating two feet into the air, held up by her long, auburn hair. Her face was stretched taught by the pull on her scalp. By all rights, she should have been screaming, but she just kept begging in a plaintive voice, “Momma, please help me!”

Her mother grabbed her by the waist and pulled down. The force holding Sarah in the air was strong, but with a mighty pull, mother and daughter fell to the floor. They were laying there when Mr. Will Bell, husband and father, ran into the room, alarmed by the commotion. “What happened here?” “Something got ahold of Sarah! It was invisible, but it was something evil, Will!” If Mr. Bell had any doubts, they were quickly erased when one side of the heavy dining table lifted a foot into the air before gently settling back down.


The Bell family, Will and Martha with Katie and three other children had come by wagon from Illinois to eastern Tennessee and settled on land he had purchased for farming. It’s unknown whether the Bell witch followed them or if they built their cabin on already haunted ground. Whatever it was, the witch refused to go away and settled on Sarah as its victim. If Sarah had been bad, you could kind of understand it better, but Sarah had always been a good child, rarely crying even as a baby and never giving her parents reason to punish her. It seems the witch’s spiteful hate was unprovoked and unjustified, but witches don’t have to have a reason for their evil doings.

Rather than staying within the family cabin, the Bell witch followed poor Sarah wherever she went. The pigs would shy away from her, horses spooked, dogs growled and cats would raise their spines and hiss at her before running away. The witch sometimes slept with Sarah, poking her and pulling on her hair preventing her from getting any sleep. When she dressed in the mornings, she learned to shake out her dress as she often found scorpions, ants, and even small snakes hidden inside. 


Sarah had always been slender, but soon she was deathly skinny. She never knew when the witch had salted or peppered her food so bad it was not eatable. A slice of meat cut from the same roast or ham the rest of the family ate would often become salt-encrusted as soon as it was placed on Sarah’s plate. Sometimes the first few bites would be fine, but then she would spit out the next bite and run screaming from the table. When other family members would taste her serving, they would find it was like tasting a mouthful of salt or pepper. 

It wasn’t long before Sarah seemed to be near death. Her eyelids drooped and her eyes were vacant and stared out from the blackness of many sleepless nights and unrelieved stress. The Bell witch knew her limits though and would cease her torments long enough for Sarah to come back from the brink of death. Her nights went undisturbed and her food tasted normal. The witch would stay gone for so long that Sarah would regain her health and the family would think the evil had passed. But it hadn’t. It would come back. It would always come back.

You may ask, “So why didn’t they move away?” They tried. Several times they tried. Each time though, the witch followed them. They went to a town miles away and stayed in a hotel trying to decide where to move, but the evil doings continued and seemed to even get worse. They traveled back to Illinois and stayed with friends for a while, but the witch was with them there too. They decided moving was useless and went back to their farm.

The days of misery turned into years and eventually, Sarah grew old enough to marry. A young man she met in church fell in love with her in spite of the witchy troubles and asked her to be his bride. The wedding took place in the little wooden church with surprisingly little trouble from the witch. A hymnal flew through the air and slammed against a wall, several hats were knocked off people’s heads by an invisible hand, and the knife that was used to cut the cake flew through the air to imbed itself in the wall just inches from the groom’s mother, but other than that, the wedding went as planned.

Sarah’s father presented them with a sturdy wagon as a wedding gift, a wagon suited for a long-range journey. The happy couple took the hint and left the next day heading to Texas to homestead land for their own farm. For the first few days, the witch continued to bedevil them. Luggage securely tied down would come loose and fall to the ground. Fresh fruit would rot within a day. The horses pulling wagons of other travelers would spook as they passed by. But then, a curios thing happened. As they crossed the boundary into Texas, the witch seemed to weaken. The couple felt as if a heavy veil of evilness was being lifted.
In those days in unsettled Texas, outlaws roamed the land, Indians were protecting their hunting grounds from the pioneers trying to settle on it by killing and scalping and as the newlyweds drove deeper into Texas, the land itself presented challenges. Poisonous snakes were everywhere, biting bugs were plentiful, plants had sharp spikes and even the grass hid stickers large and sharp enough to puncture through heavy leather boots. Perhaps all the meanness that was in Texas was giving the Bell witch competition. By the time Sarah and her husband reached Huntsville, it seemed the evilness of the witch had been worn out by the evilness of Texas. The travelers had no more problems all the way to a spot along a flowing, gentle river in south-central Texas where they acquired land, built a home and lived a happy, peaceful life together.
Don’t be fooled though. The Bell witch may have grown tired and weaker, but she didn’t leave the piney woods of east Texas. It lingers there today. When horses spook for no apparent reason, when snakes appear in flour bins, when babies scream at night, they say the Bell witch is the cause, still playing pranks and bullying the weak.
So when you see a child like Sarah, a child with fear and hunger in her eyes, give what you can. A smile, a touch, a friendly nod. And say a prayer for those like Sarah, that the witches and the evilness of the world will let them be.

Monday, November 27, 2017

Peace Cemetery - Haunted Grounds

Outside of Joplin, Missouri is where you will find Peace Church Cemetery. One of the oldest graveyards in Jasper County, it dates back to 1855, ten years before the Civil War. There was a church next to the cemetery originally, but Peace Baptist Church burned to the ground long ago and now the dead and buried are all that remain.

For many years after the church burned, the cemetery was abandoned and forgotten. The old gravestones were covered in weeds that reached 6 feet tall. Briars and thick brush made it almost impossible to enter. Locals told of strange sounds and a feint, bobbing light late at night that could be seen through the trees. Along with the weeds and brush, the stories helped ensure everyone stayed away.

Eventually, the building of new homes and stores in the area have led the 2-lane road in front of the cemetery to become very busy. Most of the drivers passed right on by, intent on their daily lives and never knowing the intriguing stories of Peace Cemetery.


On July 5, 1861, the Civil War began in Missouri with the Battle of Carthage in Jasper County just a few miles from Peace Cemetery. Before the war ended, hundreds of men from the area were dead and most of the locals were forced to leave the county. A large number of men killed in area fighting were buried in the graveyard, sometimes multiple bodies were buried together with nothing but a small pile of rocks to mark the location. One of the most gruesome events happened on May 18, 1863, at the farm of a family named Rader, less than 300 yards down a dirt road from Peace Cemetery.


Major Thomas Livingston was commander of a Rebel guerrilla unit of about seventy men that ambushed a Union foraging party that was holding the Rader family at gunpoint and taking all the corn from the Rader Farm to feed soldiers at Fort Blair in Baxter Springs, Kansas. African American soldiers from Fort Blair, commanded by white soldiers of a Union artillery battery, were moving the corn from the barn to wagons when Livingston’s soldiers attacked from the woods as they came up from Peace Church Cemetery. The whole area was a field of bloodshed as Union soldiers scrambled desperately for their weapons, sought cover or tried to escape from the devastating surprise attack. Half of them would be gunned down. The Rebel troops, in desperate need of provisions themselves, stripped the bodies of clothing, shoes, weapons, and canteens. In their anger and battle frenzy, some of the dead bodies were mutilated.

A few Union men escaped and made their way back that night to the Baxter Springs outpost. The next morning, seeking retribution, hundreds of Union soldiers rode through the cemetery to the site of the ambush. Their commander, Colonel James Williams, was enraged to find some of the bodies of his ambushed troops mutilated. Because of the warm weather, the colonel decided it would be best to simply cremate the gory remains. The corpses were placed in a pile inside the Rader house, but before the flames were ignited, one of the Rebels who had apparently participated in the ambush the day before was captured and brought before the colonel. The colonel had him marched into the house, shot and thrown on the pile of mangled soldiers. The whole house was then set ablaze. Unfortunately, the Rebel prisoner had only been wounded and his screams of agony were heard until the roof of the burning house fell down.

Since then, there have been numerous reports in the area of moaning sounds, agonized screams, shadows that seem to move quickly from tree to tree and even ghostly apparitions appearing to be dressed in civil war uniforms. Perhaps the events at the Rader farm were so gruesome that the poor victims have been damned to never have peace, to forever wander the area in eternal suffering.

In late 1928 or early 1929, just outside Joplin near Peace Cemetery, William Cook was born. The last of 8 children born to an alcoholic father and an abused mother, Cook had a deformity in his right eye which caused it to be an odd shape and the lid would never close, even when he blinked or slept. His family and others soon gave him the nickname "Cockeyed," a name he hated but was stuck with throughout his brief, troubled life.

At age 5, Cook's long-suffering mother died and his dad moved all 8 children into a cave. A year later, his father deserted them, leaving the kids to make do as they could. The children were discovered by the authorities and moved into an orphan home. His brothers and sisters were all adopted, but Bill's eye, which caused him to look sinister, and a bad temperament prevented his adoption. Eventually, he went to live with a foster mother, but she only wanted the money the state provided for his care and vacillated between abusing and ignoring him, often neglecting even to provide food for him. Two years in a row, he was given a bicycle for Christmas, which he proudly showed the caseworker who came by to check up on how he was being treated. Both times, the bike would soon be repossessed for lack of payment.

Before his 13th birthday, Bill began running around the streets at night, stealing various items. He was arrested and told the court he wanted to go to reform school rather than back to his foster mom. Six months later on the same day he was released, he robbed a cab driver of $11. He was found and arrested that night and spent the next 5 years back in reform school. He often got into fights with the other kids because they made fun of his droopy eye. He almost beat one kid to death and so was transferred to the Old Missouri State Prison. While there, he got into another fight when an inmate joked about his eye and Bill beat him so bad with a baseball bat the man spent a month in the hospital. 


Released in 1950 at age 22, Bill went back to Joplin and looked up his father. Being rejected by him again, he then traveled cross-country to California. He managed to stay out of trouble for a few months, working as a dishwasher, but it wasn't long before he acquired a .32 caliber handgun and began traveling around the country and into Mexico. His method of travel was to kidnap people and make them drive him from one place to another. For reasons he never really explained, some of the people he would kill, but others he let go without harm. 

In New Mexico, the auto he had stolen from one of his kidnapped victims ran out of gas. A car driven by Carl Mosser with his wife and three children stopped to help the stranded motorist. Bad mistake. Bill pulled his gun and made the family drive him all the way back to his old stomping grounds in Joplin. Along the way, he robbed stores and gas stations and shot anyone who tried to stop him. Once back in Joplin, Bill ordered the family out of the car and shot all five of them, finishing them off, even the children, with a shot to the head. He then threw the bodies down an abandoned mine shaft near the cave where his father had abandoned his children.

Bill took the Mosser's car and headed back toward California. The car broke down and he kidnapped a deputy sheriff who had stopped to help him. He left the unharmed policeman handcuffed in a ditch a few miles later. Changing cars in the next town, he shot and killed the new car's owner. He drove this car to California where he shot and killed several more men, taking their cars. He headed south, robbing along the way, until crossing into Mexico where the police chief in Santa Rosaria recognized him from a wanted poster. Casually walking up beside him, he suddenly pulled Bill's gun from the waist of his pants and arrested him without a fight. Sent back to California where he was tried for his crimes in that state, he was found guilty and executed in San Quentin’s gas chamber on December 12, 1952. 


The area outside the cemetery fence where "Cockeyed" Cook
is supposedly buried in an unmarked grave.
"Cockeyed" Cook's body was sent back to Joplin for burial, but once there, nobody claimed it and no cemetery would allow him to be buried in their consecrated grounds. An agreement was finally made with Peace Cemetery for him to be buried outside the graveyard's fence with no marker to indicate the location. The graveside service and burial was held in secrecy under the cover of darkness with the aid of flashlights and lasted less than 10 minutes. It is said that just as the last shovel of dirt was thrown over his grave, the cry of a small child was heard whereupon the preacher and grave diggers hurriedly left.

Today, through the supreme efforts of a few volunteers, Peace Cemetery is once again accessible. The underbrush has been cleared, the weeds are kept mowed and the old gravestones are visible. Along with the souls of the civil war damned, does  Cook’s lonely, pain-ridden ghost haunt Peace Church Cemetery? Stories of the supernatural still abound in the area. Visitors still report seeing strange lights and hearing disembodied voices at night. Some claim to have seen what looks like a man standing in the woods outside the cemetery fence watching them. Many believe the mysterious man is the ghost of Billy Cook trying to make it into the cemetery and finally find some peace. Who knows for sure? Only the ghosts themselves.



Saturday, June 10, 2017

Haunted Granbury Opera House

The opera house in Granbury, Texas was built in 1886. It was a grand structure that shared space with a saloon. In 1911, along with a number of other establishments, it was forced to close by the Women's Christian Temperance Union which wanted to abolish all drinking of alcohol. It remained closed and unoccupied for the next 63 years. It was about to be demolished when a group of citizens took it upon themselves to began restoration. It was almost too late - the roof had fallen in and the interior had been basically gutted.

When it re-opened in 1975, patrons were astounded at the quality of the restoration work. Such attention to detail left them feeling as if they had walked through a time portal back into the nineteenth century. Soon, rumors began circulating that the old building was haunted by perhaps the most notorious American actor of that century.

Employees and patrons often reported they had seen a translucent apparition of a man who was wearing a white shirt, black waistcoat, black pants, and high black boots. Several employees said they had been frightened while closing up at night by the apparition suddenly appearing on stage and reciting lines from some of Shakespeare's plays. Numerous actors, theater workers, and even the managing director have reported hearing unexplained footsteps walking back and forth along the balcony when no one was up there.


The ghost seems to be rather mischievous as he often will flush a urinal at one end of the row in the men's room while it is occupied by only one person who is standing at the other end. Ladies sometimes walk into a cold spot outside the lady's room even when the air conditioning is not on, but evidently, the spirit is a gentleman as nothing strange ever happens inside the room. Often, after the crew has cleaned up and are preparing to lock the doors and leave for the night, the last call light will turn off by itself. Tom, a long-time worker has sworn that one night as he was walking toward the last call light to turn it off, the switch flicked off by itself and he heard a man's voice whisper, "I got it, Tom."

Some say the ghost is the spirit of a man who went by the name of John St. Helen. St. Helen arrived in the nearby town of Glen Rose and landed a job as a school teacher. He also ran an acting school for the children of upper-class families. John fell in love and became engaged to the daughter of a well-known local politician. He wanted them to have a quiet ceremony, but the bride had other ideas and began the planning. Due to her parent's status and money, the wedding was to be a splendid affair with many high-powered politicians and elected officials in attendance. When John was shown the guest list, it included a number of soldiers and the U.S. Marshal for the Eastern District of Texas. St. Helen immediately called off the marriage and left town. 


John St. Helen or John Wilkes Booth?
(Historical photo)
A full year later, St. Helen showed up in Granbury where he got a job as a bartender at the saloon adjoining the theater. He stood out because of a distinctive limp, a southern accent, and his strange habit of reciting lines from Shakespeare while having a conversation. Nobody ever saw him take a drink except on April 15, the anniversary of Lincoln's assassination, when he became roaring drunk and spent the night sleeping it off in a back room of the saloon. He would often attend plays at the opera house, sitting quietly and intensely watching throughout the performance. When the director decided to perform a Shakespearean play, John tried out and won the leading role. Everyone was extremely impressed with his acting ability and he was requested to be in other plays, but he always refused except for Shakespeare plays.

St. Helen had lived quietly in Granbury for several years when he became severely ill. The local doctor examined him and said he would soon die from the disease. The next day, John called for his friend and lawyer Finis L. Bates to come to his deathbed. In a weak, barely audible voice, St. Helen confessed to Finis that he was actually John Wilkes Booth, the assassin of President Abraham Lincoln. He then gave Bates several of his possessions and instructions for his burial. 

A few days later St. Helen and the doctor were surprised when he woke up one morning feeling much better. After several more days, it became evident he would survive his "terminal illness." Summoning his friend Finis again, John told him that the leader of the conspiracy to assassinate Lincoln was Vice-President Andrew Johnson and the identity of the man mortally wounded man in the Garrett tobacco barn was a plantation overseer by the name of Ruddy St. Helen. Booth had asked Ruddy to fetch his papers, which had fallen out of his pocket while crossing the Rappahannock River. Ruddy was able to retrieve Booth's papers, and while still in possession of them, Ruddy was mortally wounded in the Garrett barn, thus leading his captors to believe that he was Booth. The next night, John abruptly left town without telling anyone where he was going. When Finis heard he had left, he opened the small chest that St. Helen had given him and found a Colt single-shot pocket pistol wrapped in the front page of a Washington, D.C. newspaper dated April 16, 1865, the day after Lincoln's assassination.

Nothing more was heard of John St. Helen until 1906 when Finis heard about an alcoholic named David George who had committed suicide in Enid, Oklahoma. A house painter, George had an affinity for quoting Shakespeare. For reasons known only to himself, he purchased strychnine from several druggists and ingested the poison. When neighbors in the rooming house where he was living heard loud moans coming from his room, they broke in to find him writhing in pain on his bed. They summoned a doctor who arrived within 10 minutes. 
As he lay dying, he told the doctor that he didn't want to be buried under a false name. He claimed he was actually John Wilkes Booth and told the doctor numerous very specific details of the night President Lincoln had been killed.

Finis immediately traveled to Enid and was shown the unclaimed body in question. After a careful and thorough examination, Finis concluded that it was indeed the body of his former friend John St. Helen due to matching scars and features. He had the body embalmed and then invited government officials to examine it for authentication that it was indeed the body of the infamous John Wilkes Booth. The government officials declined and repeated the story that Booth had been shot and killed by Boston Corbett, a Union soldier, on April 26, 1865.


Mummified body
of John
Finis kept the mummified body in his garage for a while, but then began touring it in circus sideshows until after World War 1 ended. In 1920, he rented the body to the showman William Evans for $200 per month to be exhibited as a sideshow attraction. Evans still had the body when Finis died in 1923 so he purchased it from the widow Bates for $1,000. The body spent years traveling all around the country with various circuses until the 1950's when a man named R. K. Verbeck purchased "John" from a female landlord in Philadelphia who had held it as collateral from a man who had died owing her rent. By the time Verbeck was able to travel to Philadelphia, the entire neighborhood had been razed and the body had disappeared. "John" turned up for the last time in the mid-1970s once again touring in a small carnival. The carnival went out of business in the late 1970s and the body has never been found.

According to the many reports coming from Granbury, Texas though, the mysterious man's spirit has found its way there and is content to spend eternity in the Granbury Opera House. 


Saturday, May 27, 2017

Buried Alive

A universal fear of all humans, a fear that crosses distance and different languages, is the fear of being buried alive. In the early 1800s, Samuel Jocelyn lived in Wilmington, North Carolina. As the son of a well-respected local lawyer, Sam enjoyed a great amount of respect himself. The young man was best friends with another young man named Alexander Hostler. The two men shared many interests and were always seen together.

During a discussion one day with a group of friends, the idea arose of returning from death and making your presence known. While the rest of the group laughed at the idea, Sam and Alexander both defended it. While discussing the matter later, a deal was struck between the two men that the first one to die would come back and make his presence known to the other. They would not have to wait long.

Sam loved horses and had a stable of fine steeds. He found great pleasure in taking to the wooded trails on one of his fine horses and forget any troubles. One afternoon as Sam was out for a ride, tragedy struck. No one knows what happened, but Sam was found unresponsive in the middle of a trail near his home, his horse a few yards away grazing.

He was taken back home where everything medical science had to offer was tried in an attempt to wake the boy from his coma, but it proved to be no use. Two days later, Sam Jocelyn was declared dead and was buried in St. James Church cemetery. The funeral was a massive event with hundreds of people from the area in attendance.

Alexander was beside himself after his friend's death. Many thought he might die of grief. As Alexander lay in bed two nights after Sam's burial, a ghostly vision suddenly appeared. It was his friend Sam. "How could you let me be buried when I am not yet dead?" the ghost asked Alexander. Horrified both by what he saw and the prospect of burying his dearest friend alive, Alexander stuttered "Not dead?". "No, I was not. Open the coffin and you will see that I am not in the same position you buried me in." And with that, the ghost of Sam Jocelyn faded away.

The next morning Alexander doubted that what he saw was real. Through the day as he thought about it, he decided it was nothing more than grief that had caused him to imagine the ghost. That night saw the ghost of Sam Jocelyn come back though and once again ask of his friend "How could you let me be buried when I am not yet dead?" This time the spirit's tone was more urgent, begging even.

Alexander then realized that what he saw was real, but afraid of people thinking him insane, he decided to say nothing. Not until the third night anyway when the ghost of Sam appeared again. This time the ghost pleaded with the living Alexander "How could you let me be buried when I am not yet dead?" Alexander decided right then to investigate the claims of the spirit as the ghost slowly vanished into nothingness.

The next morning, Alexander found his other friend, Louis Toomer, and told him everything. Toomer agreed to help Alexander only because he thought it might save what was left of Alexander's sanity. They went to Sam's family and sought permission to dig up his casket. Seeing how upset Alexander was, they agreed, but with the stipulation it be done in private. 

Late that night, Toomer and Alexander snuck into the St. James cemetery with shovels and began to remove the still fresh earth from the grave. Before long, their shovels met with the coffin. They opened the lid and lowered a lantern. There in the coffin was Sam, but as the ghost had said, he was not in the position they had placed him in. He was face down. Deep scratches were on the inside of the casket and the struggling, no doubt terrified young man had managed to loosen one side of the lid. Death had not come from the accident on the road, but suffocation from being buried alive.

Until the day he died just a year later, Alexander Hostler would sit in front of the grave of his friend all night muttering over and over "I'm sorry, I didn't know. I'm sorry, I didn't know".


Sunday, June 19, 2016

The Indian Sentinel

As the sun was setting one fine autumn day, a young boy was watching a motionless figure standing on top of the hill at the edge of Tehuacana, Texas. For over a half-hour the boy had been watching that figure staring westward, never moving, still as a statue.

The young boy was John Boyd, son of the founder of the village. The figure he was watching was obviously an Indian as John could see the feathered headdress on his head, but this was 1858 and the Indians had been driven from the area some years ago. He finally decided to climb the small hill to get closer. What danger was one lone Indian when it appeared he didn't have a horse and there were settlers with guns nearby should John call out to them?

Making his voice friendly, young John called out to him, but the Indian didn't move. It was as if he didn't hear him so John walked closer. He was close enough now to see the fine buckskins he wore, the craftsmanship of the stitches and the colorful beads which adorned the shirt. He had fine, long black hair which was braided and a beautiful leather belt with strips of rawhide that moved with the wind. John looked carefully, but he could see no weapon.  "Are you hungry? We can spare some food."

Ever so slowly, the Indian's head turned, as though it took an intense labor of will. The eyes, as dark as a black pit fixed on the boy. No expression crossed the face, only the awareness of another's presence. Jon felt paralyzed, totally incapable of running away from those eyes staring unblinking at him. It was then he noticed a strange glow about the figure, as though the fading sunlight radiated not around him, but through him! Suddenly, John felt very cold and an inner voice said to run, run very fast!

Before he could move though, the Indian was gone. John carefully looked, but there was nothing around him. The figure had vanished into the air.

John Boyd would not be the last to see the hilltop Indian sentinel, the last chief of the Tawakoni tribe, a man who had died in a massacre thirty years earlier. For years afterward, at daybreak and sunset, the chief would appear and stand motionless atop the little hill overlooking the land that had once been home. Whether he was awaiting the return of his people, his son at their head, or he was standing guard in penance has never been determined.

The Tawakoni were allies of the Tejas who lived to the east. They were an industrious and friendly people who protected their lands, and thus the land of the Tejas, from the war-like and more savage plains warriors who roamed the west. The Cherokee were being driven from their own lands by the white man by the 1820's and they needed the game and watering holes of the Tawakoni. The Cherokee came in force, but the Tawakoni fought them to a standstill in a battle where Waco now stands. The enemy invaders retreated and left them in peace...for a while. Thinking they had driven them away, the Tawakoni relaxed and braves posted as guards were not as vigilant. The Cherokee snuck back and in a devastating attack, virtually annihilated all of them. They burned to the ground the bee-hive-shaped dwellings and erased any signs the Tawakoni ever lived there. Only a handful escaped, mostly women and small children, as Tawakoni braves and their chief sacrificed their lives giving the survivors time to grab the chief's son and flee into the brush.

The last stand of the Tawakoni was not recorded in white man's books and may have gone completely unknown except for an Indian scout who worked for General Earl Van Dorn, a grand-nephew of Andrew Jackson. Known only as Tawakoni Jim, he told the troopers his childhood memory of his father's death on that flaming hilltop. As soldiers were transferred to other units, the story was passed around the evening fires from one army camp to another. As stories do, this one made it back to the Tehuacana settlers who were finally sure of what they saw - a father waiting for his son's return.

In the late 1900's, archaeologist found proof of the story. Near Barry Springs on Tehuacana's eastern side, they located the old village. They traced the sunken floors and the central fire basins. They found the lodgepole marks for oval dwellings. They gathered artifacts clearly identified as Tawakoni. Most telling, they found proof of a village which had been razed by fire. Tawakoni Jim's story was true.

Shortly before Jim passed away at the age of 90 in the early 1900's, his minister was able to trace his lineage and authenticate that he was indeed the chieftain-to-be, escaped from his dying village. The return of Jim's people was a lost dream.

When I heard this story, of course I had to drive there and check it out for myself. There's not much to the community of Tehuacana now, a lot of abandoned buildings and broken dreams. When asked, most of the older people I found to talk to just smiled and said they had never heard of the story. One old gentleman dressed in a farmer's dirty overalls and beat-up straw hat looked at me sideways for several seconds, spit some chewing tobacco juice on the ground and said he didn't have time for such nonsense as he turned and walked away.

I found another old man with a deeply-lined, weather-beaten face and snow-white hair sitting on a bench in front of a small store. I sat for a little while, drinking a coke I bought inside. When I asked him if he knew of the story, he admitted he did. He said he was born and raised around Tehuacana and had heard the story from his grandfather. He told me the old Indian still makes an appearance every now and then, always at sunrise or dusk. He claimed to have seen him himself. He said he thinks he is standing guard, doing penance for allowing his people to become lax, to be caught unprepared to defend themselves. But then again, he thinks it's just as likely he's still waiting for his son to return, a father's vigil. "That's just my figuring though cause nobody knows for sure," he said. "You can't read the mind of a ghost." And then he gave me directions to the hill.

It was getting dark as I followed the old man's directions. It's a pleasant place with a few hackberry tree's around a little park at the top, cleared of vegetation, overlooking a vast open countryside. I waited there, alone, hoping to see an old Indian chief appear out of thin air. It didn't happen. Perhaps all these years later he has given up returning. There's no one left to listen to his warning of what happens to a people when they let down their guard. I drove away wondering about things that can't be explained.

At the bottom of the hill, I looked in my rearview mirror. I'm sure what I saw at the very top of the hill was just a tree. Strange, I hadn't noticed it while I was there.