The Fort Smith National Cemetery in Sebastian County,
Arkansas played an important role in the western expansion of the United
States. By the early 1800s, white settlers were moving into the land acquired
in the Louisiana Purchase of 1805. As the settlers moved onto land inhabited by
the Indians, tensions naturally began to rise. The U.S. Army began building
military posts to protect the settlers. Fort Smith was the first and most
western of these forts. As a wild and lawless town grew around the fort, it
became the last “civilized” place for outlaws, bandits, and renegades to
acquire supplies before entering Indian Territory.
In 1823, out of the 200 troops stationed there, 51 died and
the first official cemetery was created and dedicated on the site just outside
the stockade where there had already been 3 burials. In 1824, Fort Gibson was
constructed and Fort Smith was closed. Between 1824 and 1838, when the army
returned to re-open Fort Smith, a number of men, most of whom died due to the
lawlessness of the town, were haphazardly buried there. The army rehabilitated
the cemetery and began overseeing internments.
When the Civil War began, Confederate forces took over the
fort. When the Union forces recaptured it in late 1863, over 475 Rebel
soldiers, most of them men who had fallen in battle, had been buried in the
expanded cemetery.
The war ended in 1865 and by 1867, the bodies of so many fallen Confederate soldiers had been removed from hasty graves dug on battlefields
and reburied in the Fort Smith cemetery that it was increased in size to over
5 acres. It was officially made a National Cemetery in late 1867 and was placed
on the National Register of Historic Places in 1999.
Over the years, the cemetery has been expanded to cover over
33 acres and include almost 14,000 burials. Probably the most famous person
buried here is Isaac Parker, the “Hanging Judge.” During his 21 years in Fort
Smith, he sentenced 160 men and women to die with a noose around their necks.
79 of those 160 actually met their fate on the gallows.
During the 1860s, as the bodies of more and more soldiers
who had suffered horrible deaths during battles were being dug up from their
resting places and reburied in the cemetery, stories began circulating of
strange sounds emanating from the graveyard at night; cries of anguish,
sometimes a painful scream, and a persistent rumor of hearing what sounded like
a young man crying out for his momma. Sometimes strange, bobbing lights would
appear, float around the headstones and then vanish. Soldiers who were assigned
night duty of standing guard at the cemetery’s gate refused to do it alone and
would not enter the grounds.
By the early 1900s, it seems things in the cemetery began
to settle down. Although still spooky after dark, stories of the unexplained
sounds and lights virtually ceased. In the late 1990s however, for some
unknown reason, it seems the forever occupants of the Fort Smith cemetery
became uneasy. Once again, strange lights began to be seen floating around in
the dark. Cemetery caretakers began reporting tools left amongst the graves
overnight would be moved when they reported back to work the next morning.
Sometimes the tools would simply be moved from one side of a grave marker to
the other side of the same marker and other times a rake or shovel would be
moved several graves away from where it had been left.
In 1998, on a cold December night, one of the groundskeepers
had been performing maintenance work around Isaac Parker’s grave. He had left a
spade and clippers next to the grave when he had been called away to help on
another task. It was dark when he returned alone to retrieve his tools and put
them away in a shed. After gathering up the tools, he turned away heading
toward the shed when he heard something behind him. Thinking it was just a leaf
being blown along the grass, he didn’t think anything of it. A few steps later
though, he realized the noise had not gone away; in fact, it seemed now like it
was the footsteps of someone following him. He pulled a flashlight from his
tool belt and turned it on as he quickly turned around. Illuminated by the
flashlight stood an old man with white hair and a white beard, wearing an
old-fashioned black suit. The man was just standing there looking at him. The
groundskeeper asked him what he wanted and the man began moving his lips as if
he was talking, but there was no sound. It was then the groundskeeper realized that in the beam of his flashlight, he
could see right through the man to the headstones directly behind him! Dropping
the flashlight and the tools he had retrieved, the groundskeeper ran directly
to his car without looking back and sped home.
Having worked and been in the Fort Smith Museum and having
seen the pictures of Isaac Parker numerous times, the groundskeeper had no
doubt the eerie apparition had been the Hanging Judge himself. The story goes
that when the groundskeeper came in the next day, his salt-and-pepper-colored
hair had turned completely white. He told his supervisor of his encounter and
then, with trembling hands, gave him his letter of resignation and walked out.
