HGB Ep. 657 - Haunted County Durham

This Month in History - Emily Warren Roebling's Birth

In the month of September, on the 23rd, in 1843, Emily Warren Roebling was born in Cold Spring, New York. She grew up in a large, supportive family where her parents valued higher education for both their sons and daughters. Emily was encouraged to push against 19th century norms by obtaining a higher education studying science, mathematics and literature. She would grow up to play an indispensable role in the creation of one of America's greatest architectural marvels, the Brooklyn Bridge. In 1872, her husband Washington Roebling, became bedridden with decompression sickness. Washington was the chief engineer of the Brooklyn Bridge project and Emily stepped forward as his vital link to the construction site. She did not merely carry messages; she mastered complex higher mathematics, material science, stress analysis, and cable construction to effectively communicate with contractors, engineers, and day laborers. For more than a decade, Emily managed the project's daily operations, inspected materials, dealt with competing politicians, and defended her husband's position as chief engineer. Her profound dedication and engineering competence were so widely recognized that she was given the honor of being the first person to cross the completed bridge on horseback in 1883, carrying a rooster as a symbol of victory.

Haunted County Durham (Derr um)

County Durham has a deep mining and farming heritage and is located in the northeast part of England near Scotland. This is the only English county prefixed with the word "County." The history spans so many eras that are reflected in the architecture, from Roman conquest to the Anglo-Saxons to the powerful medieval palatinate ruled by Prince Bishops. And all along the way, spiritual residue was left behind. Join us for the history and hauntings of County Durham. 

Durham is a town of quaint cobbled streets lined with boutiques and restaurants. Towering above it are two of its most distinct buildings, Durham Castle and Durham Cathdedral. Both have stood for nearly 1,000 years. Winding through Durham is the River Wear (we're), which hugs the city on three sides. The Roman Empire occupied County Durham starting in 71 AD. After that, the Romans built strategic military roads and Fort Vinovium, known now as Binchester and Fort Longovicium, now known as Lanchester. These supported the infrastructure and garrisons of Hadrian’s Wall, which was built starting in 122 AD under Emperor Hadrian. The Romans withdrew in the 5th century and County Durham became part of the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Bernicia, which lasted for four centuries, eventually becoming the Kingdom of Northumbria. It was during this time that Christianity arrived, as did St. Cuthbert. He became one of England's most venerated saints. When the Vikings invaded Northumbria, Lindisfarne monks fled with the body of St. Cuthbert in 995 AD, and settled at a high peninsula called Dun Holm after a vision. This would be the beginning of Durham. And while we love stories of supernatural visions, historians poo poo this fanciful story by pointing out that the area was readily defensible and the Earl of Northumbria granted them the land. The Normans conquered in the 11th century and William the Conqueror built Durham Castle in 1072 AD to secure the northern border against Scottish invasions. After the Normans left, the county was governed by the Bishops of Durham as a county palantine (pal uh tine). Palantinates emerged in England after the Norman conquest and this arrangement gave Bishops or Earls the power that the King had, but just in one small area. County Durham was unique in that the power of this arrangement endured until 1654 when Durham got parliamentary representation. The county took part in northern uprisings against the English Reformation. The region transformed through coal mining, shipbuilding, and the opening of the pioneering Stockton and Darlington Railway in 1825. Today, it's a great spot for tourism.

Durham Castle

Durham Castle sits atop a hill overlooking the medieval city of Durham. The River Wear (Wee-ar) circles around the castle. Construction of the castle began in 1072 and there are differing accounts on whether parts of it were originally made from wood or stone. 

As was the case with many castles built at this time, wood was an easily sourced material and many parts of a castle were built from it and then later replaced with the more durable stone. William the Conqueror ordered the building of the castle. He was William I, the first Norman king of England, and he had descended from Viking raiders and been the Duke of Normandy. He was the victor at the Battle of Hastings. This battle began the Norman conquest of England. The castle was built six years after that conquest was complete. William the Conquerer ushered in the medieval era and introduced modern building techniques for castles. A main characteristic of Norman castles was the use of a motte, which was a large man-made mound of dirt and stones, and a bailey, which were inner and outer fenced in areas. Many times, the outer bailey was at the bottom of the mound. The day to day activities took place in the bailey, while the castle keep was built atop the motte. William the Conquerer died in 1087 in an unusual way. He was sitting atop his horse watching a Norman village burn when his horse was suddenly startled and reared up. The horn of the saddle struck William in the abdomen with much force. It was hard enough to cause internal injuries and William bled to death  internally. It took several days for him to succumb to the injury. The coffin that was built for him was too small and he was stuffed inside. Legend says that his putrifying body split open. Many centuries later, in 1562, grave robbers stole what was buried in the coffin, leaving only a thigh bone.

Supervision of the construction of the castle was under the Earl of Northumberland (nawrthuhmberland), Watheof. His supervision ended in 1076 when he rebelled against William and was executed. Walcher (waw lchur), the Bishop of Durham, took over control of the castle  and was given the title of Prince-Bishop of Durham. This title remained until the 19th century. It was the only title of its sort and made Durham unique in England. 

Walcher was in charge when many of the buildings of the castle were constructed. The castle today has a gatehouse, two chapels, a Great Hall, kitchen, a courtyard, the Black Staircase and another large building known as the Northern Range with several rooms that was built in the 12th century by Bishop Le Puiset (Pwee zeh). He more than likely built it as two large halls that were later subdivided. One of the chapels and the bell-tower were built by Bishop Tunstall in the 16th century. The Tunstall Chapel is gorgeous with stain glassed windows and carved wood. Durham Castle was crucial to protecting the border with Scotland and quelling English rebellions. The Historia Regum states that the castle was needed "to keep the bishop and his household safe from the attacks of assailants." The Palace Green that runs between the cathedral and the castle was once the old marketplace and originally had several wooden houses built there. Bishop Flambard had the houses taken down during his time to prevent fires. In 1837, the castle was donated to the University of Durham. It was named University College and the castle was restored by architect Anthony Salvin who followed the plans of the original keep. The restoration was completed in 1840 and now provides accomodations for students. More than just students reside here though. It would seem they are joined by the Grey Lady. She is reputed to be the spirit of Isabella Van Mildert. She was the wife of one of the bishops who served during the 17th century. The story goes that she was coming down the Black Staircase when she suddenly fell and broke her neck. Witnesses, many of whom are college students, claim to see a ghostly woman that appears to be grey, floating down the staircase.

There also is reputed to be a ghost from more modern times. Frederick Copeman was one of the university's first students and he had big dreams and expectations. Unfortunately, he did not do well on his final exams. He flunked them all. He was devastated. He climbed to the top most part and threw himself off. He is now seen around the castle grounds and paces the upper rooms. The Grammar School that sits along the Palace Green is reportedly haunted by a young pupil that was killed when one of the school masters threw him from a balcony. 

Durham Cathedral

Durham Cathedral is directly opposite from Durham Castle. The Durham Cathedral started off as The White Church, which was a wooden structure built to house the relics of St. Cuthbert. Upon entering the Cathedral, there is a grotesque knocker that provides comfort and protection against evil to those who touch it. 

The Galilee Chapel is at the Western end of the Cathedral and was built in 1170 and looks different from the rest of the cathedral. This started as a Lady Chapel dedicated to the Virgin Mary. This has pointed arches and slender columns. This was renovated in the 15th century with a new roof and windows. St. Bede (Bead) has this as his final resting place as he was moved here in 1370. He was a Benedictine monk and scholar. The Nave is the main room of the cathedral and has these giant stone pillars measuring over 22 feet high, supporting the nave’s vaulted stone ceiling. The famous Rose Window is here. All the stained-glass windows had to be replaced after Cromwell ordered them smashed during the 17th century civil war. The Quire is where daily worship takes place. It is just behind the crossing of the Nave. In 1640, the Cathedral suffered significant damage when Scottish soldiers burnt much of the wood. Bishop John Cosin commissioned George Clement in 1665 to create new quire stalls that are gorgeous. They feature Gothic canopies with slender supporting columns adorned with elegant scrollwork. Behind this is the organ with red and gold coloring, built by Father Henry Willis and a staggering 5,746 pipes. The South side of the choir has the tomb of Prince Bishop Thomas Hatfield with the Bishop's throne above that. The Gilbert Scott Screen looks out of place since it clashes with the Romanesque design, but the construction from marble and alabaster is gorgeous. The building originally started to house and honor St. Cuthbert and he remains here in The Shrine of St. Cuthbert, buried beneath a stone slab. He wasn't always at peace here. 

In late 1539, King Henry VIII's commissioners were ordered to dismantle the shrine and they stripped it of the gold, silver, and jewels. But when they discovered Cuthbert's body in its priestly garments not rotted, they reinterred him. The Chapel of the Nine Altars was built between 1242 and 1280 and actually has three altars in it today. There is a wooden Pieta on display.

Lewis du Beaumont was a poorly viewed 'Prince Bishop' of Durham and was appointed because of his relation to the queen. He died in 1333. Some of the vergers in the Cathedral called him the Evil Bishop because he was so "rubbish" (illiterate, lazy, spent all of the cathedral's money.) Yet he was buried in a prime space in front of the high altar steps. His grave is marked by a large blue marble slab. Such was the disrespect for him, that they chipped away at the decoration of his tomb over time and now his tomb is hidden by a large wooden board and a large rug. 

An interesting piece of legend about the Durham Cathedral is that a secret passage runs from the Cathedral to Finchale Abbey and that the journey through that passage is a dangerous one. In fact, it is apparently so terrifying that no person is able to make the trek and live to tell about it. 

Durham Castle and Cathedral were awarded the status of World Heritage Site in 1986. And then there is the Sanctuary Knocker, which is a famous bronze knocker on the north door with a grotesque face that was designed to ward off evil spirits from the holy grounds. If criminals touched it, it allowed them 37 days of protection in medieval times. Spirits here include the Jumping Man with local folklore claiming that this was a man who jumped from the top of the cathedral and survived, but then he fell and died on a second attempt when his target was accidentally moved. His confused figure can sometimes be seen repeating the fatal leap in ghostly form. Another legend connected to the cathedral, and specifically to St. Cuthbert, is this story about a mist that showed up during World War II in May 1942. German bombers had targeted Durham. Witnesses claimed a miraculous, localized fog created by St. Cuthbert, rose from the river and completely hid the building, saving it from destruction.

Dun Cow Pub

The Dun Cow is a historic pub located at 37 Old Elvet and is said to be the oldest surviving pub in the town. The building dates back to the late 1500s. A story is told that when those Lindisfarne monks were searching for a resting place for the body of St Cuthbert, they came across a milkmaid looking for her lost cow. She directed them to Dun Holm or Durham and so the pub is named after the story, Dun Cow. 

This pub is said to be haunted by the notorious 17th century serial killer Mary Ann Cotton who killed 11 of her 13 children and three of her four husbands. Mary Ann grew up in Durham and became a nurse and a dressmaker. She married for the first time in 1852 and had eight or nine children with him. Everybody in the family, but one daughter, died from gastric fever, believed to be arsenic poisoning. She married one of her patients and he ended up dead. Mary Ann was collecting insurance money all along the way. She killed her mother and then the daughter who had survived. She found work for a widower named James Robinson and soon his children were succumbing to gastric fever. The two married and had two children and one of those children died. Robinson threw her out. Mary Ann married another widower and well, yeah, he died too. And two more children. This woman was poisoning everybody with arsenic. She was hanged for her crimes. The executioner went to the Dun Cow Pub afterward for a pint and apparently, Mary Ann Cotton followed him there. She also apparently haunts her former home in another town too. She's probably mad at the executioner cause he bumbled her hanging with the trap door not high enough to break her neck. He had to push down on her and it took 3 minutes for her to die. 

Barnard Castle

Barnard Castle is a market town named for a ruined medieval castle that it is built around. The castle was built in the 12th century and passed down through the Balliol family until Richard Neville became the owner. King Richard III inherited it and it fell into ruin after his death. 

In the 18th century, the town was a center for hand-loom wool weaving and in the 19th century, the spinning and manufacturing of shoe thread. Visitors and locals report seeing the spectral figure of Lady Ann Day who was a 16th-century noblewoman. Legend says she either plunged to her death while fleeing soldiers or threw herself from the battlements after her lover was beheaded. Her body was swept away by the swift current of the River Tees and never recovered. People see her ghostly figure tumbling from the castle's high tower. Some people hear a heart-rending scream as she falls. Visitors to the medieval Round Tower often report a sudden, heavy feeling of inexplicable dread.

Lumley Castle

Lumley Castle is a 14th-century quadrangular fortress built in 1389 by Sir Ralph Lumley with Norman and Gothic elements. This became a family seat and a defensive stronghold. Sir Ralph plotted against King Henry IV and when he was found out, he was executed. 

The castle became a bishop's residence and then a university hall. In 1976, it opened as a four-star luxury hotel. The interior features rich wood-paneling, ornate tapestries , regal suites and grand fireplaces. The opulent Knights Restaurant serves up elegant dining, while the Library Bar is a cozier restaurant with an a la carte menu. The ghost here is Lily of Lumley. She was the wife of Sir Ralph Lumley who was murdered by two priests after she converted from Catholicism to Protestant. They threw her body down a well to hide it. Her spirit is rumored to float up from the well and wander the corridors, rooms, and grounds of the historic fortress.

Jimmy Allan - The Gypsy Piper

Under Durham Castle is Elvet Bridge, which is said to be haunted by Jimmy Allan, the Gypsy Piper. Jimmy Allan was known by many names; Jimmy, Jemmy, Jamie, James, The Duke’s Piper, the Piper of Northumberland, and The Gypsy Piper. Just as he went by many names, he was also known as a musician and a friend of the aristocracy, a thief, a bigamist, and a deserter. 

Jimmy’s parents were thought of around Northumberland as Gypsies, although they did not self identify with that label. Jimmy’s father Will was a tinkerer and he was also very good at playing the bagpipes. Jimmy’s mother Betty kept the home and looked after their six children. Jimmy was the youngest and he was born around 1734. Jimmy was taught to play the bagpipes by his father and quickly made a name for himself with his prodigious musical abilities. He began to travel Northumberland playing when he was a young man. He first played for the Duchess of Northumberland in 1746 or 1747 (exact date unknown). She was so impressed that she made him her official piper. In fact, the Duchess was so fond of Jimmy’s playing, she procured special pipes for him from Edinburgh that were made of ivory and decorated with silver chains. He played on these pipes at the coronation of King George III. The Chamberlain of Alnwick appointed Jimmy to the prestigious position of the town waits (musician). But he was soon fired from that post and from his job at King George’s castle when he committed theft. Jimmy Allan was married three times during his lifetime and two of those marriages were simultaneously, which made Jimmy a bigamist. Jimmy also enlisted in the army only to subsequently desert several times. In 1803, in Gateshead, he was convicted again of theft for stealing a horse and was sentenced to death. King George stayed his execution and remanded him to live on Botany Bay, which was a penal colony in Australia. But before he could be moved to Australia, he died in the Durham’s House of Corrections beneath the Elvet Bridge on November 13, 1810. His body was buried in St. Nicolas’s churchyard in Durham City. Nine months before he died, there was a petition for his release that was presented to King George. However, the King was too sick to sign it. His son, the Prince Regent, signed the document after the King’s death, but it arrived four days after Jimmy Allan had died. His famous pipes were given to two gentlemen in North Shields. 

That was not the end of Jimmy the Gypsy Piper though. He would continue to play his infamous bagpipes in the afterlife and the living would hear them. Jimmy favors the Elvet Bridge and many times people have reported hearing the haunting sounds of a bagpipe from underneath and around the Elvet Bridge.

Ceddesfeld (Seddes feld) Hall

Sedgefield is a historic market town and civil parish in County Durham. This was a hunting center during the 1800s. The first parsonage in Sedgefield was built in 1791. It was headed by Reverend John Gamage. One of the parsons of Sedgefield died unexpectedly one week before the Parson's tithe was due. This was a tax consisting of one tenth ‘tithe’ of a crop, a herd, or the harvest from a woodland. As time went on, cash payments replaced actual crops. His wife was dismayed because they really needed the money, so she hatched a morbid plan. She made a pickling solution from brine and brandy and she put his body in it to pickle him, thus preserving his body and delaying decomposition. Then she propped him up in the Parsonage window, so that passers-by would still think he was alive and bring their tithe. After she had collected all the tithes on his behalf, she announced that the parson had died. The pickled parson wasn't happy about his wife's deception and strange ghostly things started happening at the rectory. For almost 50 years the parson haunted the place until a major fire destroyed the building. Ceddesfeld Hall now sits on that spot. It was a new rectory for a time and is now a community center. 

The Pickled Parson's phantom is said to still haunt Sedgefield and roams the grounds between Ceddesfeld Hall and St. Edmunds Church.

Crook Hall & Gardens 

Crook Hall is the only open hall in County Durham. The main house is believed to have been built in 1217 and was known as the Manor of Sydgate. It is one of the oldest inhabited houses in the area. The house was granted to Peter del Croke not long after and the current name Crook Hall is in honor of him. John Copeland lived at the Hall from 1340 to 1372. From 1372 to 1657, it was owned by the Billingham family. Thomas Billingham piped water from a spring to the Hall in 1450. In 1615, Cuthbert Billingham cut off that water supply to the area and diverted it to his own mill but he was later forced to restore the pipes to the town. The current building mainly survives from the 14th century and represents three eras: The 14th century, the Jacobean Era and the Georgian Era. The Medieval Hall is the surviving section from the 14th century. The Mikletons built on an extension that is on the other side of the Screens Passage around 1657 during the Jacobean Era. The Hoppers built the main block in 1736 during the Georgian Era. The Manor House was built from sandstone and has a Welsh slate roof. The hall is 14th century sandstone and brick. The buildings on the property include two barns, a coach house, granary and farm house. There is the Main Hall and then the Great Hall that is sparsely furnished with just a table and chairs. Most doors to the hall have been closed in. The fireplace and minstrel's gallery remain. On one end of the table, there is a niche set into the wall. One opening from the Screens Passage leads to a narrow tunnel and the other side leads to a sitting room furnished with artifacts from the history of the Hall. A staircase leads to the minister’s gallery. An ancient set of stairs has been closed in so they appear to go up to the ceiling and stop. To get to the top floors there is a tower staircase. The gardens are constantly noted as being spectacular and contain a Secret Walled Garden, Shakespeare Gardens and maze. and sit across from the River Wear with a view of the Cathedral and encompass four acres. Reverend Hopper Williamson leased the property from 1834 to 1858 and the poet William Wordsworth visited the house often when Williamson lived there. 

The Fowler’s owned the house starting in 1859. They lost the property in the 1920s during the Great Depression. The halls fell into disrepair at this time, but in 1979, the Hawgood family moved to Crook Hall and restored the home and grounds. They lived there until 1995. 

At that time, Keith and Maggie Bell purchased Crook Hall  and they still own the property. They realized that it cost a lot of money to maintain the property and they opened it to the public creating special areas like the Tea Room. Crook Hall has been fully restored. The Hall is open all year from Sunday through Wednesday. They have tours, afternoon teas in the gardens and are available for private events and weddings. They also have special events ranging from theatrics, Halloween festivities and traditional English Christmas. The property plays host to more than just the living. Several spirits are here, the most famous is, of course, the Lady in White. The White Lady at Crook Castle is said to be the niece of the tempestuous Cuthbert Billingham (the same one who cut off the water supply to the town). No one quite knows why she haunts the house but she is said to glide down the stairs and then disappear on St. Thomas Eve, December 20th. Christmas seems to be a favorite time for hauntings. One year, a feast was set out in the hall and there was a loud crash. Everything had been overturned or broken and a glimpse of the White Lady was seen as the guests went to see what had happened.The stairway that rises to the ceiling is a spot where she is seen running up quickly and then disappearing into the ceiling as well. She seems to be a residual haunting because she is silent and never talks to anyone, nor acknowledges anyone.

As mentioned earlier, there is a nook in the corner of the Medieval Hall. This nook is rumored to be haunted. A soldier was murdered here and the means by which he was killed was unusual. He was bricked into this nook. People feel cold spots near here or the rush of a cool breeze that seems to slip past them. The soldier's ghost likes to tap people on the shoulder.

Another bizarre haunting experience is the sound of disembodied footsteps on a stairway and what makes this really creepy is that the stairway no longer exists. The Bells were skeptical when they heard stories about their new home being haunted. They became believers when they heard those very footsteps themselves. Maggie Bell wrote on This is Durham, "Many visitors have also had strange experiences at Crook Hall – including one who saw children playing on the gallery an hour after the last child had left the premises. Another visitor rang from the coach he was traveling home on to report that he had seen an old man in bedclothes asleep in a chair before he left. Other people on his coach had also seen the man."

Is Durham County truly one of the more haunted areas in the UK? These various locations and experiences make that premise seem to be true. Does the Gypsy Piper still play his bagpipes in death? Is Durham Castle haunted? Is the beautiful Crook Hall hosting spirits from the past? That is for you to decide! 

HGB Ep. 656 - Haunted Beaufort County, South Carolina

Moment in Oddity - The Chicken Church of Java (Suggested by: Michael Rogers)

Gereja Ayam (guh RAY juh, I am), also known as the "Chicken Church," is a bizarre, bird-shaped structure nestled in the hills of Magelang (Mah guh long), Central Java, Indonesia. It was built in the 1990s by a Christian man named Daniel Alamsjah (Ah lams YAH), who claimed he received a divine dream instructing him to construct a holy house of prayer in the shape of a dove. Despite his original intentions, the massive concrete building ultimately resembled a giant chicken hen, earning the building its famous local nickname. Alamsjah (Ah lams YAH) designed the sanctuary to be fully inclusive for people of all faiths to pray, and he even operated a rehabilitation center on-site before financial troubles forced him to abandon the project in 2000. Left to decay in the jungle for years, the structure went viral online around 2015 due to its proximity to the famous Borobudur (burr-OH buh DOOR) Temple, which is the world's largest Buddhist temple. Since its inception, the dove inspired house of prayer, 'Chicken Church', has turned into a thriving tourist attraction. The structure is complete with underground prayer rooms, a view-point in the crown, and a cafe in the rear of the **cough** chicken. Churches congregate in all sorts of buildings, but a church that was designed to look like any type of bird, certainly is odd. 

Haunted Beaufort (BEW-fert) County, South Carolina

Beaufort County is a typical southern coastal area with old live oaks dripping with Spanish moss and antebellum architecture. The county incorporates 68 islands that include Port Royal Island, Fripp Island, St. Helena Island, Lady's Island, Parris Island and Hilton Head Island. These are part of the Sea Islands that stretch from South Carolina to upper Florida. Beaufort County sits in the heart of the Lowcountry and Gullah Geechee culture and Civil War sites and historic buildings are very much a part of the area and this has led to ghost stories. Join us for the history and hauntings of Beaufort County, South Carolina.  

Our listeners are probably familiar with many of the legends and superstitions of the South and the Gullah Geechee people. The Gullah Geechee are a distinct African American ethnic group living mostly along the coasts of the Carolinas and are descended from people brought over in the slave trade from West and Central Africa. They are best known today as the creators of sweetgrass baskets and they have their own distinct Creole language. Their burial customs have been adopted by others in the South, such as covering mirrors or turning them over when someone dies and at the grave, bottles and dishes are smashed to break the chain of death in the family. To protect themselves from evil spirits, the Gullah put folded newspaper inside their shoes because the spirit must read every word before they can control them. Same idea with a broom by the door. Evil spirits have to count the bristles before they can enter the home. General Southern folklore adheres to painting the underneath of a porch roof with haint blue and they sometimes include painting the trim and shutters the same. The South believes in opening a door after someone dies so that the spirit is set free. And speaking of doors, it is unlucky to open the back door for the first time entering a house because only the front door is protected from evil. 

The county seat of Beaufort County is Beaufort, which is part of the largest municipality in the county, Hilton Head Island. The city actually sits on Port Royal Island and was chartered in 1711, making it the second oldest city in South Carolina, right behind Charleston. 

But long before that, there were several small indigenous tribes in the future Beaufort County, the Coosaw, Yamasee, Orista, Escamaçu, Edisto, Wimbee, and Kussoh. Spanish Captain Pedro de Salazar explored the area between 1514 and 1516, and both the Spanish and French would found settlements, Santa Elena and Port Royal Sound, during the 16th century. But these failed. The British would have better success with the city of Beaufort. They named it for Henry Somerset, 2nd Duke of Beaufort. Ship building would be a main industry with slavery running a close second. Ironically, the Union would occupy Beaufort during the Civil War and it would become a haven for runaway slaves. Beaufort is now a popular tourist spot as it is surrounded by natural beauty. The islands here all have their own legends and ghost stories and we are going to touch on a few of them.  

Hilton Head Island

The island was first sited over 350 years ago by William Hilton. When he landed, he found the Yemassee tribe here, which had migrated from Florida. He also found these mysterious shell rings that no one has ever been able to figure out the significance of. These rings measure up to 240 feet across and as much as 9 feet high. 

John Bayley was granted several of the islands here and they were called Bayley's Barony, with the future Hilton Head being named Trench's Island. Alexander Trench collected the land lease fees and was a property agent for Bayley. John Barnwell was the first settler to come in 1717 and he established a plantation. Another planter named William Elliott arrived in 1790 and he established Sea Island cotton, which produced record crops. Many more settlers would come and they would build the Zion Chapel of Ease and Cemetery. On November 7, 1861, the Island became the scene of the largest amphibious landing by U.S forces until D-Day. The Union landed with more than 12,000 soldiers and they captured both Fort Beauregard on St. Philips Island and Fort Walker on Hilton Head Island. After this, formerly enslaved people were granted land and they built a small self-governing town that attempted to grow the Sea Cotton. Unfortunately, the boll weevil would destroy the crops and Hilton Head was mainly abandoned for a long time. The 1950s would bring tourism and the first resort was built and in 1983, Hilton Head Island was incorporated as a town.  

Zion Chapel of Ease

The chapel that used to be here no longer remains, but its churchyard is still here and features the Baynard Mausoleum. The chapel was built in 1786 and was connected to the Episcopal St. Luke's Parish. It was tough for islanders to get to the church and so these Chapels of Ease were built to give congregants a local place to worship. 

There are four Revolutionary War patriots buried within the cemetery. Charles Davant is one of them and he was killed near the chapel in 1781 by Captain Martinangel’s Royalist militia. Davant had been a planter and he was the only military casualty for Hilton Head Island during the war. After being shot during a patrol, he managed to ride his horse back to his plantation, known as Two Oaks, where he died from his wounds. The Captain would get payback when the Bloody Legion assassinated him near Christmas in 1781 while he lay sick in his bed. The chapel’s first permanent priest was Reverend Philip Mathews who arrived in 1811 and served as the St. Luke’s Parish rector until 1828. Union troops occupied the chapel in 1862 and by 1868, nothing of the Zion Chapel of Ease remained other than its cemetery. The cemetery contains thirty-four markers, including the Baynard Mausoleum, and two cast-iron fences. Many of the markers are marble tympanum headstones with a willow and urn design and some of these gravesites also include a footstone. Five of the gravestones within the cemetery are marked by the carver’s name or initials. Three of these stones were carved by members of the White and Walker families, who were prevalent stone carvers in Charleston from the 1790s to the 1870s.

Baynard Mausoleum

The Baynard Mausoleum was built for the family of William E. Baynard in 1846. This is the oldest remaining structure on Hilton Head Island. Baynard was born on Edisto Island in 1800 and inherited Spanish Wells Plantation from his father and he purchased Muddy Creek from his uncle's estate. He did really well with planting Sea Island Cotton. 

William married Catherine Scott and they had eight children. He died in 1849 at what is today called the Baynard Ruins, but had been the Braddock's Point House. How he came to own this property is a matter of legend. The house had been built by James Stoney in 1793 from tabby and was once a grand antebellum plantation overlooking the Calibogue Sound. Braddock's Point Plantation had been in the Stoney family for four generations. Stoney challenged Baynard to a high stakes poker game and he ended up betting the title to Braddock's Point. He lost the hand to Baynard, who became even wealthier with this new property. Baynard was only 49 when he passed. His funeral was at Zion Chapel of Ease and the funeral procession featured a black-draped wagon-hearse followed by Baynard's formal black carriage and other carriages carrying family and friends. It was the most impressive funeral cortege ever assembled on the island. Catherine followed him five years later, she was only 42. She had actually been five months pregnant when William passed. Neither of the Baynards are still in the mausoleum as vandals broke through the once beautiful marble doors and threw the caskets into the marsh. That procession has fed into ghost stories. Islanders claim to still see a shadowy procession making the same long winding trip to the cemetery on some nights, particularly when stormy and foggy.

The Blue Lady of Hilton Head Island  

The lighthouse on Hilton Head Island isn't a beautiful work of architecture. It is a 95-foot skeletal iron tower. The lighthouse is known as both the Leamington Lighthouse and the Hilton Head Island Rear Range Lighthouse and was completed in 1880. This is one of only a few surviving lighthouses in the state. The site still has the vintage brick oil house and a water cistern. 

Adam Fripp was the lighthouse keeper in 1898 when a devastating hurricane hit the island. On August 31st, this second hurricane of the 1898 season hit the southern end of Hilton Head Island. Port Royal received over 10 inches of rain and Savannah was heavily damaged. Fripp dedicated himself to keeping the light going, but it proved too much for him and he had a heart attack. His daughter Caroline was with him and she managed to get him to the lighthouse keeper's cottage. She then took on the job of keeping the light going, while also running back to the house to check on her father. He didn't make it and Caroline was left heartbroken. Some stories claim she died of exhaustion a few days later. Another story says she fell over the railing of the lighthouse in the storm. Website after website and even the New York Post claim that on rainy, windy nights, Caroline can be seen wandering the grounds of the original lighthouse complex wearing the same blue dress she died in. So she is known as The Blue Lady. The light keeper's quarters were moved to Harbour Town in the 1960's and stories claim the Blue Lady haunts this location too. The only probelm is, we couldn't find a lighthouse keeper named Fripp. And that's a famous name in the islands as there is a Fripp Island. Paul Schwarzer was the lighthouse keeper from 1891 to 1905. So he didn't die during the hurricane - which we made sure actually happened. So who is this Blue Lady? We'll never know.

St. Helena Island

Like Hilton Head, St. Helena Island was claimed by the Spanish, colonized by the French, reclaimed by the Spanish, and then Britain occupied the island until the American Revolution. The Union victory at the Battle of Port Royal enabled freed slaves to take over land abandoned by white landowners. 

In 1862, abolitionists provided donations to set up the first school for blacks in the Southern United States and this became Penn School, which grew into a 50-acre campus with multiple buildings and in the 1960s, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. made several visits to the campus and he composed his “I Have a Dream” speech while staying at one of the cottages onsite. the Penn Center is now part of the Reconstruction Era National Park. A welcome center and museum offers tours and exhibits. At the southern tip of the island is Land's End.

St. Helena Chapel of Ease

These are just ruins today. This was another Chapel of Ease in Beaufort County. It was built from tabby between 1742 and 1747 and served the members of the Parish Church of St. Helena. Most locals referred to the church as the White Church because the oyster shells and lime caused the structure to appear to glow white. 

On November 4th, 1861, Sunday services were interrupted when a messenger brought Captain William Oliver Perry Fripp news of the impending invasion of nearby Beaufort by Union troops. The planters left the area during the Civil War and the church was used by Northerners who came to help the freedmen and by 1868, Methodist freedmen were worshipping there. A forest fire in 1886 damaged most of the structure and it was abandoned. The chapel is said to host disembodied prayers and singing.

Fripp Mausoleum

The Fripp family were early colonists here and they had built and upkept the chapel. Their mausoleum still stands in the cemetery and contained the remains of Edgar Fripp and his wife Eliza. The mausoleum was built by Charleston stone-cutter W.T. White. 

Union soldiers broke open the mausoleum during the Civil War, looking for treasure. That door remained damaged for awhile and it was decided to brick up the entrance. And here we find a legend. Workmen started bricking up that entrance and returned the next day to finish and they found most of the bricks removed from the entrance and stacked up next to the mausoleum. They believed a ghost had down this and they left the job unfinished. The door remains only half-bricked up and the vault is now empty. A ghostly form of a woman wrapped in a white veil has been seen walking through the cemetery. She is sometimes seen carrying a child.

Lands End Light

As one drives out to Land's End, heading towards Fort Fremont, one will pass the hanging tree. Stories claim that runaway slaves were lynched on this tree to serve as a warning for any slaves thinking they might try to escape. 

Some people have claimed to see something strange when they come out to the hanging tree at night. They park, turn off their headlights and then they see a light in the distance that looks like a flashlight beam or a lone headlight. As this light gets closer, it gets larger and larger, but seems to get dimmer. If it speeds by, it leaves the witnesses feeling a burst of static electricity. This phenomenon is said to be reliable and appears almost nightly. No one knows the cause, but there are those that think its an optical illusion caused by cars down the road. A legend does claim a school bus slammed into the hanging tree killing several children, but there is no documentation for that. Others claim the light is caused by the souls of the slaves hanged from the tree. The Land's End Light has been responsible for a couple of deaths in the past when people have tried to chase down the light. 

Fripp Island

In the 17th century, King Charles deeded the island to Captain Johannes Fripp and so the island was named for him. He had defended Beaufort from the Spanish and the French. The Fripp family established Sea Cotton plantations before the Civil War. 

In 1854, severe storms and ocean breaches split the original landmass into three separate islands: Fripp, Pritchard’s, and Capers. By the 1820s, the island was primarily used as a private hunting and fishing preserve. In 1960, developer Jack Kilgore discovered the isolated land and planned a private island community and it now is a spot where tourists like to vacation. There are many legends connected to this island as pirates liked the secluded nature of the island and its tidal creeks. 

The Lovers of Fripp Island Beach

This legend is connected to Blackbeard. He had managed to orchestrate a blockade of Charleston for a week in the spring of 1718. Several townspeople were taken hostage, as were people from plundered ships in Charleston Harbor. 

One of these ships was the Crowley and aboard that ship was a beautiful young woman. Blackbeard was captivated by her and he took away with him to Fripp Island. Blackbeard tried to whoo her, but she wasn't interested. She told him that she loved another and was betrothed to this other man. This angered Blackbeard and he sent some of his men to kill the man, with orders to bring back his hand. The hand was presented to the girl and she was so distraught that she threw herself into the sea and drowned. On the nights of full moons, two figures can be seen frolicking on the beach together and people believe that these are the lovers reunited in the afterlife. 

Port Royal Island

The sound was named Port Royal in 1562 by the French Huguenot Jean Ribault (Ree bo). He established Charlesfort just to the south of Port Royal Island and left 30 men there. That didn't last long as the settlers killed their leader and returned to Europe the following year. 

The Spanish occupied and in 1670, the British laid claim to Carolina. They were out with the Revolution and during the Civil War, Port Royal was used as a Union coaling and repair station after the Union won the Battle of Port Royal. The city of Beaufort is on this island. The island is mostly agricultural today. There are plenty of things for tourists though too with restaurants and shopping and iconic movie locations for films like Forrest Gump, G.I. Jane, The Big Chill, The Fugitive, Forces of Nature and The Prince of Tides.

Old Beaufort Arsenal 

The city’s Visitor Center is housed in the old Beaufort Arsenal, built in 1798. The building was designed by Colonel Thomas Tailbird and constructed from tabby-and-brick and painted yellow. Many visitors ask about the re-enactor seen passing through the gate. The staff have to explain that they don't do re-enactments. Apparently there is a leftover soldier from the Civil War who likes to nod to visitors before disappearing. 

Haunted House at 810 Ribaut (Ree bo) Road

This was shared by the Beaufort District Collection from a woman named Cora Newcomb in January of 2007, "One thing you may find interesting about the house [810 Ribaut (Ree bo) Road] – we thought the house was haunted. Not a bad ghost. None of our animals liked to go up the stairs. Our dog would not go up the stairs unless we were at the other end telling him it was okay. Even if they did go up the stairs, they would go around the edge, they would not go not go straight up the stairs. So this made us think there must be ghost in the house because the dog could obviously get up the stairs easily, but he just wouldn’t do it unless we said it was okay. Sometimes right in the middle of the stairs, it would be kind of cold. So we thought it was a ghost. Usually people who have ghosts in their houses say that when they are packing up to move or are doing something that is disruptive to the ghost, that is when they will show themselves. So, we were packing up all our belongings to move and one night I was walking down the hallway on the second story to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night when there appeared to be kind of white, misty shape in the hallway. I really wasn’t paying that much attention to it because I was half asleep, but I noticed it and I walked through it and after I walked through it and was in the bathroom, I was like, 'Did I just see a ghost?' It was definitely something misty and white in that hallway." 

Joseph Johnson House or The Castle

The Castle is one of Beaufort's most celebrated historic homes. The home was built in 1859 by Dr. Joseph F. Johnson and constructed from brick and covered in a faded plaster. There are seventy-nine windows so this home had a lot of light and ventilation. 

The style is Greek Revival and Italian Renaissance with six massive columns along the front veranda. The interior had twenty-three rooms and eight fireplaces. The nickname "The Castle" comes from the fact that the Beaufort River flows alongside the property, creating a moat effect. The Johnson family moved into the house in 1861 when it was still incomplete as the Civil War was under way and decorative features were blocked by the Union. The Union used the house as a headquarters and military hospital with the summer kitchen being utilized as a morgue. There is a really weird legend connected to The Castle about a dwarf named Gauche (gowsh). His spirit is said to wander the property. The backstory is that he arrived with Jean Ribaut (Ree bo) and his Huguenots in 1562. He apparently had been a court jester seeking a new life. His life ended here from either brawling with other colonists or he died of disease. However, the Danner family said that the restless spirit of Gauche (gowsh) himself had told them that he was killed with a pike in a fracas near the Danner’s home, which was The Castle. Lily Danner was the daughter of Dr. Johnson and she had inherited the house. Gardeners claimed to see the spirit and Dr. Johnson himself saw this short statured person walking outside the home. Lily Danner reportedly saw the ghost of Gauche many times when she was a child. She said he would join her at tea parties that she held for her dolls in the basement. The spirit was described as being dresses in colorful jester’s garb. The ghost tapped out coded messages in 16th-Century French and, according Lily " … always swears and uses words the same way. He has no opinion of anyone. He called one of the family members a hellion one night." 

House guests have reported that Gauche (gowsh) is somewhat of a poltergeist, moving furniture and opening and closing doors at night. Mysterious bells are also heard. It is also legend that Gauche leaves his red hand prints on the windows of the home. The Danners had to find someone who could translate Gauche’s archaic French so they could communicate with the ghost.

The Beaufort District Collection shared, "In a June 1940 interview in Harper’s Bazaar magazine, however, a 'Mrs. Danner' (no first name given) attested that Gauche himself was never really visible, but that it was 'only by table tipping that we find him. Whoever taps, it’s always the same person who answers.' The ghost taps out coded messages in 16th-Century French and, according to Mrs. Danner, '...always swears and uses words the same way. He has no opinion of anyone. He called one of the family a hellion one night. She never listened in after that.' Mrs. Danner’s brother called Gauche 'a rough little customer.' The Danners had trouble understanding Gauche at first. Only by writing down the tapping code and finding someone who could translate Gauche’s archaic French could they eventually communicate with the ghost. In Tales of Beaufort, Nell S. Graydon told of how Gauche spoke out (in English) to a Castle house guest one stormy evening. Here is a transcript of that conversation:

GAUCHE: This is Gauche.
GUEST: What are you doing here?
GAUCHE: I live here — in the cellar.
GUEST: Why?
GAUCHE: It reminds me of my English home that I will never enter again.
GUEST: Will you let me see you?
GAUCHE: No, I do not show myself to fools."

The home stayed with the Johnson lineage until 1981. Then I found these stories. In 1969, according to a Beaufort Gazette newspaper article, "At 6:00 p. m., November 8, 1969, Mrs. Howard Danner of East Street opened her oven to remove the roast her maid had placed there that afternoon. The oven was empty, and there was no trace of the roast anywhere in the kitchen! Mrs. Danner had just taken the maid home and had left the house door unlocked for that short time. According to the report of Beaufort city police officer G. D. Smith, 'Either a very hungry person entered the house while Mrs. Danner was gone or it may be surmised that the ‘Ghost of the Danner House’ (that is, Gauche, the Huguenot Ghost) became hungry and absconded with the practically cooked roast, being unable to withstand the temptation and waiting for it to cook.' The roast thief — spectral or human — struck again the following night at the 707 North Street home of Mrs. Isiah Thomas. Mrs. Thomas, unlike Mrs. Danner, had taken the precaution of locking her door leaving her roast unattended. When she returned from a visit with nearby relatives, her supper was missing, too! L. H. Martin, the police officer reporting this incident, wrote, 'when (Mr. and Mrs. Thomas) returned hungry and ready to feast on the roast, the roast was gone.' There had been no evidence of forced entry." 

Wigg-Barnwell House

The house was built for Sarah Reeves Gibbes as a wedding gift in 1816 by her brothers. She married William Wigg Barnwell and thus the name. Philadelphia artisans designed the three-story square house that features a two-story veranda on the front with slender classical columns. 

Sarah was the great-granddaughter of Tuscarora Jack Barnwell who was the leader of the bloody 1711-1712 expedition against the Tuscarora Indians of North Carolina. And yes, that last name means she was a cousin of her husband. During the Civil War, this was a hospital and so people have seen the ghosts of soldiers outside the house and the interior features strange noises. There is also a story that the home was apartments for awhile and a young woman was murdered inside and her ghost still hangs out here. We couldn't find any evidence of a murder. 

John Mark Verdier (vair dyay) House 

The house was built by John Mark Verdier (vair dyay) in the 1804 and is also known as the Lafayette Building. He was a wealthy planter and he enjoyed entertaining the town. The interior of this house had a new style to us. It's called Adam style and was named for Scottish architect brothers Robert and James Adam. 

This is a neoclassical style with a single uniform scheme and simplified the rococo and baroque styles. The Adam style in this house was modified with a center hall and a drawing room on the right and dining room on the left. There were two additional rooms behind this and a divided stairway leads to the second floor that had a large ballroom. That ballroom eventually had the first telephone installed in Beaufort. The mantels were carved with allegorical figures, sheaves of wheat and fruit and flowers. During the Civil War, it was used as a headquarters. Verdier died at the age of 71 in 1857. Heirs of Verdier owned the home until 1940 when it was bought by a committee for the Preservation of the Lafayette Building. That committee founded the Historic Beaufort Foundation in 1967 and they use it as their headquarters. People can tour it as it is also a museum. Staff and visitors report ghostly sounds of ringing phones, cold chills and objects move about on their own. Ghost lore claims that Verdier's son died in a violent duel and that he haunts the house as well. The Beaufort District Collection Connections found a letter from a woman named Claudia Stuart who wrote her brother of this duel that was held near Beauifort at Pigeon Point. She wrote, "A very tragical affair came off there last week. John Verdier the son of old Mr. John Verdier whipped on one of George Cuthbert’s negroes, and sent by him a very impudent message to his master. George went over to Verdiers place and had a fisticuff, in which Verdier was worsted. A few days after he sent to George Cuthbert and dared him to meet him, armed at Pigeon’s Point. G.C.  went there with a double barrel gun and a pair of pistols. J. V. advanced with his pistol aimed at G.C. who told him that if he/Verdier/advanced another step, he would shoot him with his gun. Verdier continued to advance and G.C. shot him in the leg; he fled but immediately aimed at George again who shot him a second time in the body. Verdier is now lying in an almost hopeless state. Upon examining his pistol it was found not even loaded. What could have possessed him, who can tell!"

The Sea Islands are beautiful and full of history. Beaufort County is just a small section of these islands and clearly seems to have some strange things going on there. Are these places in Beaufort County haunted? That is for you to decide! 

HGB Ep. 655 - Haunted Chattanooga

This Month in History - George Frideric Handel's Messiah

In the month of September, on the 14th, in 1741, composer George Frideric Handel completed his masterpiece, Messiah. The process took an astonishing 24-day period of continuous, intense composition. Working in isolation at his London home, Handel became completely consumed by the project. He frequently skipped meals and sleep to set Charles Jennens's biblical libretto (luh breh tow) to music. He worked in rapid, intense bursts of creativity. The speed of his creation was helped due to portions of the piece being adapted from some of his earlier works. The resulting 260-page oratorio, which includes the iconic "Hallelujah" chorus, went on to premiere in Dublin the following April, securing its place as one of the most celebrated and enduring works in Western classical music history.

Haunted Chattanooga (Suggested by: Matt Liese - pronounced Lease)

Chattanooga is one of our favorite cities that we have visited. This is a charming city, surrounded by the Appalachian Mountains and bordered by the Tennessee River. Chattanooga's history includes several Civil War battles, the Trail of Tears, the Chattanooga Choo Choo, the Tennessee Whiskey Trail and there are several haunted locations. Join us for the history and hauntings of Chattanooga, Tennessee. 

Chattanooga is the fourth largest city in the state of Tennessee. Native Americans were the first to settle the area and the name Chattanooga is derived from the Muskogean (muh-SKOH-gee-uhn) words for rock and dwelling. The Muskogean tribe were the first in the area followed by the Cherokee. In 1816, John Ross, who was half Scottish and half Cherokee, settled the area and so Chattanooga was originally known as Ross' Landing. Ross would find himself torn between the Cherokee and the American government. A part of the Trail of Tears came through Chattanooga. In May 1838, soldiers under the command of General Winfield Scott began rounding up Cherokee Indians in the Chattanooga area who had refused to move to Indian Territory in the future Oklahoma. About 15,000 Cherokee were placed in stockades in Tennessee and Alabama until their removal. Roughly 3,000 were sent by boat down the Tennessee River and the rest were marched overland in the fall and winter of 1838-39. This forced removal was under harsh conditions and resulted in the deaths of about 4,000 Cherokee. Ross tried his best to alleviate concerns and make the transition better and he came to be known as the Cherokee People's Moses. He would pay a heavy price as his own wife, Quatie Ross, would later die on the Trail of Tears. In 1839, Ross' Landing incorporated and became known as Chattanooga. Shortly after that, Chattanooga became a boom town. There were three battles in the area during the Civil War and after the war, industry took over and Chattanooga flourished once again. A large flood in 1867 overwhelmed the city and a reservoir system was built to prevent future flooding. The 1930s saw Chattanooga take on the nickname "Dynamo of Dixie" and the song "Chattanooga Choo Choo" by Glenn Miller was released in 1941. Being the center of battles during the Civil War seems to have left some residual energy in the area and there are many historic locations with ghost stories. 

Ross' Landing

Ross' Landing bears no resemblance to the place of utter suffering for the Cherokee people that it once was. Today, it is part of Chattanooga's revitalized riverfront area. Tourists find the Tennessee Aquarium here as well as restaurants, shops, and the Riverfront Parkway. 

The experience of the Cherokee has been honored with historical markers and interpretive displays. But nothing can really convey the conditions and suffering. There were an estimated 2,000 to 5,000 Cherokee that spent time here crammed into makeshift camps with inadequate shelter, food, and sanitation. The summer heat was oppressive, disease spread rapidly, water was contaminated and the elderly and infants died. Because of this misery, visitors claim to feel a heavy feeling on the property with profound sadness. Others feel anger and sometimes people report physical symptoms including chest tightness, difficulty breathing, and nausea. Electronics fail in the area. Phantom noises are heard, including Cherokee words, moans, weeping and children calling out. There have been some full-bodied apparitions seen. Groups of figures that are translucent or foggy are seen as is a Cherokee woman wearing a traditional dress. She looks very real until she disappears. A child spirit is seen. This ghost disappears when approached. Walking with dogs is not recommended as many seem to become distressed. 

Underground Chattanooga 

The flooding in the city caused city planners to decide to rebuild with the city higher. It was decided to build up the ground with a bunch of dirt and then they would put the buildings on top of that. So there's a lot of buildings that have basements and then sub-basements because those used to be the first floor. 

And the way they accomplished this was pretty incredible. The dirt was hauled in by horse and cart because they did not have tractors and bulldozers when they did it. The townspeople did this, not only by paying for it, but they did the work. Because of this, there are no official government records, but the city was clearly elevated. The townspeople said, our city is broken and we are going to fix it. That's awesome. This underground area was used as tunnels and hiding places. Ghost City Tours talked to a business owner along Broad Street and he told them, "I watched the ghost walk right through the door." The owner had been in the basement when he felt as though someone were watching him. When he turned around, he saw the spirit who was "wearing old work clothes and looked like he was in pain. Just as soon as he made eye contact with the apparition it turned and walked right through the doorway which leads to underground Chattanooga. Needless to say, the gentleman in question never ran faster in his life as he sprinted up the stairs. He now refuses to work in the basement after dark." 

Visitors and people who work downtown have reported strange, unexplained sounds coming from beneath the sidewalks and they have seen shadowy figures moving through old sealed archways. Sometimes there are sudden drops in temperature when entering these underground areas - like extremely cold that isn't what one would naturally expect. 

Gordon-Lee Mansion

The Gordon-Lee Mansion once housed one of the city's most prominent families and is an antebellum Greek Revival home. The house was built between 1840 and 1847 by James and Sarah Gordon on his 2,500 acre property. The grounds were the location of the Cherokee Courthouse before the Trail of Tears began. The Gordon's daughter Elizabeth and her husband James Lee would own the house after her parents passed. The mansion would be used during the Battle of Chickamauga by both Union and Confederate forces as a headquarters and then as a field hospital. James Lee was a Colonel in the Confederate Army, so he used the house as a headquarters. In 1889, the property hosted the Blue-Gray Barbeque with 14,000 Civil War veterans in attendance. At that event, a decision was made to form the Chickamauga-Chattanooga National Military Park. This would be the first Civil War Battlefield to be set aside for historical preservation in the United States. Elizabeth and her husband James' son Gordon Lee would own the house next. Chattanooga dentist, Dr. Frank Green, bought the mansion in 1974 and he restored it to be historically accurate. He sold the house to the city of Chickamauga in 2007 and now is run as a museum with 18th and 19th century antiques.

There have been several deaths in the house. Colonel Lee died in the house in 1864. No one is sure if it was from an illness or wounds sustained in battle. People have reported seeing the ghost of Colonel Lee in a Confederate officer's uniform standing in the study. He always seems to be surveying papers. He vanishes when approached. Disembodied booted steps are heard in the study as well, usually running from the window to the desk and back again. The Colonel liked a pipe and pipe smoke is also smelled. 

His wife Elizabeth is here in spirit too. The couple lost two of their children to scarlet fever in the 1860s and she spends much her time in the afterlife hanging out in the former nursery on the second floor. She also sits on a ghostly rocking chair. People say she wears a black mourning dress and is seen as a translucent figure that is sometimes cradling an invisible child. The disembodied cries of a woman are heard or sometimes there are lullabies. A family who lived here in the 1970s had a young daughter who saw what she described as a 'sad lady.' This woman would tuck her in at night sometimes and give her a smile through her tears. The Lees had slaves and then servants and some of these people seem to continue on doing their jobs, so they are probably residual. A woman in period servant's clothing is seen in the kitchen looking as though she is cooking and pots and pans would move on their own. The nose pictures of cooking and baking food are smelled. A young servant has been seen carrying linens up the stairs and she fades away at the top. Disembodied footsteps are heard. The Lee's daughter Rebecca liked to play the piano. She died of tuberculosis in her twenties and now her spirit returns to play the piano in the parlor, late at night. Ghost City Tours reported, "One resident in the 1980s recorded the phantom music on a cassette tape. While the quality is poor, a melancholy melody can be heard, along with what sounds like a woman softly humming along with the music."

A young Confederate soldier is seen in the garden near an old magnolia tree that dates back to the Civil War era. The story behind him is that he was shot while delivering a message to Colonel Lee and he died beneath this tree. The sound of a horse galloping up the drive is heard late at night and if the door is opened, the scent of gunpowder is in the air. 

The Read House

Kelly and I have both been inside the The Read House, which is not a house, but rather a hotel. It is the longest continuously operating hotel in the southeast. Before this hotel was built here, there was the Crutchfield House. This was built in 1847 by Thomas Crutchfield, and his plan was to have a place where people could stay that were traveling across the Atlantic and Western railroad lines. And he had a great location for it. This hotel was right across from the new railway terminal. So you couldn't find a better place to put it. And it had a real golden period for about a decade. Crutchfield was born in 1801, and he moved with his family to Chattanooga in the 1830s. And one of the first things that he did here was to survey and clear the streets when they were first laying down the roots of Chattanooga. He and his brother-in-law had a brick kiln that was down near the river, and they helped to contribute to building some of the first brick homes that were in Chattanooga. He became a very successful businessman, which is why he had the money to build the Crutchfield Hotel. As is the case with a lot of big historical hotels and towns, they became the center of the community. Everybody would come here for meetings, political rallies, other civic kind of things. And so the Crutchfield was just like that. They had political rallies and such that happened here.

Things started going downhill for Crutchfield and the Crutchfield Hotel when a certain Jefferson Davis comes to town. He was heading home from the Senate in 1861, and he enters the lobby of the Crutchfield and gathers all these people around them and informs them that he has left the Senate. And not only that, but he is planning to lead the South into seceding from the Union. 

Now, you can imagine an announcement like this in a hotel is not going to go over well for an owner who maybe is not really into that kind of thinking. And Crutchfield was not. He was a loyalist and he was pissed. He jumps up on the counter and he points over to Jefferson Davis and he says, you, sir, are a traitor. Get out of my hotel. Well, things go to fisticuffs and the men start throwing punches at each other, as do many of the other people who are in the lobby. Of course, they are all toting guns at that time. So you've got guns being drawn just as these punches are being thrown as well. Crutchfield's son is in the middle of the melee and he sees what's going down. He grabs his dad and drags him out of the room. And this manages to prevent any bloodshed from happening. With the onslaught of the Civil War, Crutchfield decided that he didn't want to be running the hotel anymore. And so he sells it. And right after he sells it, Union forces come into Chattanooga. They manage to take the city and they take over the Crutchfield Hotel and turn it into a Union Army hospital. As you can imagine, that hotel bore the signs of being a Civil War hospital for a few years after that. A lot of people died here. There was a lot of blood all over the place. As a matter of fact, the floors were stained with blood that they could not get clean. They managed to make it through this period. They opened up as a hotel again after the Civil War stops.

That only lasted for a couple years because the hotel burned to the ground in 1867. For a couple of years, the ground just stayed that way. There was just the ruins of the Crutchfield there for a little bit. And then John T. Read came to town. He was a doctor and he saw this plot and he saw that it was a really good spot to build a hotel and he decided to build a new hotel on top of the Crutchfield ruins. 

This would be The Read House, which opened on New Year's Day in 1872. It was a really fancy looking place. In 1884, Grover Cleveland’s presidential victory was celebrated at Read House and he was the first democrat to be elected in 28 years. In 1904, Coca-Cola was first introduced in Chattanooga at the Read House drug store. In 1904, Read House adopted the European Plan with room rates at $1.00 and up and meals were served a la carte. The unusual Turkish baths were said to be the finest in the South. In 1926, the hotel was torn down and another hotel was constructed based on the design of two architects, Holabird and Roque. And they did it in the Georgian style. It stood 10 stories with 400 rooms and was just gorgeous inside with marble floors, walnut paneling, Waterford crystal chandeliers, carved woodwork and crown molding. In 1942, Sam died at the age of 83 and Albert Couch became the manager. The Read House heirs sold the hotel to Albert Noe and Associates. The hotel was renovated in 2004. For a while, the hotel was associated with Sheridan, but that ended in 2015. And now it is just known as the Read House. Some famous people that have visited the Read House include Gary Cooper, Winston Churchill, Oprah Winfrey and Al Capone. Capone stayed here for a short time during his federal trial in the early 20th century. They actually put custom iron bars on the window for the room that Capone was staying in so that they could keep him under lock and key. When they did that renovation in 2004, they took those custom iron bars off of the window, but they were there until that time.

One of the main ghost stories told about the Reed House centers on a woman named Anna. This is a legend, so of course, there are lots of different stories that are told about her. There are some people who believe that she was here with another man and that her jealous husband came and killed her. There's another story that claims she killed herself.

But the main story that's told about Anna is that she was named Anna Lisa Netherly and she was a lady of the evening. There was a Union soldier who decided that he would like her company for the evening and he went all out. He got himself a room at the Crutchfield Hotel and he took her there. They spent a few hours having a good time with each other and then towards the end of that evening, something happened. They had some kind of a disagreement. Maybe he wasn't going to pay up and they got into a fight. At the end of the fight, poor Anna ended up with her throat slit and she was on the floor, dying. This assault took place in Room 311. This took place in the Crutchfield Hotel, not in the Read Hotel, so one wouldn't think that Room 311 would be haunted in the current hotel. But guests claim to have experienced haunting activity in that room. While on a ghost tour, we were taken in the hotel and our tour guide Jessica said, "Do the people who work here know that it's haunted? What do you think? Yes, sir. Some of them know it's haunted. Some of them do not believe the place is haunted, don't believe in things like that. And others, non-believers, have had experiences that they cannot deny. Pictures that the manager of the steakhouse showed where employees have seen things like glowing hands on their shoulders while Snapchatting with their boyfriend, while completely alone in a locked office. And Mr. Read, the original owner of the hotel, showing up when an employee who didn't believe in ghosts snapped a few photos getting on the elevator after she had gone to the third floor to see the renovations. It had taken some time to renovate the third floor. They kept having trouble keeping employees working on the third floor. They would not show up for work. In some total, like 60 people in all wouldn't come back to work on the third floor of the hotel for whatever reason. They didn't explain. Yes, the third floor has definitely been creepy. The new owner has placed photographs to give hints to the guests that the place is haunted. You might have picked up on what's down there. The reason it's that particular photo is because the ghost that haunts room 311 was murdered in the bathtub. By her jealous boyfriend. Back in the 1920s, Anna Lisa Netherly was nearly beheaded by her boyfriend. He used a steak knife and made a bloody mess of the whole thing. Didn't quite get her head off but definitely ended her life. Ever since then, she has been targeting certain men who stay in the room. Making sure that they have a miserable stay. Keeping them awake and disturbed. Her personal items often ending up in the middle of the floor. Drawers pulled out and stacked on top of each other. The bathroom faucet is being turned on in the middle of the night. No one is in the bathroom. People have also seen a figure peering out of the bathroom in the middle of the night. Standing at the foot of the bed with her arms crossed. Kind of just staring at people. And also sitting on the bed next to women. Leaving a definite impression of her behind. Once she disappears. So that you know she is actually there." 

Tivoli Theater

The Tivoli Theater is known as the "Jewel of the South." The building was designed in the Beaux-Arts style by architects Rapp and Rapp and Reuben H. Hunt and built from iron, glass and steel by the John Parks Company. The interior featured crystal chandeliers, forest-green marble, music-motif medallions and red velvet covered chairs. 

The name was from Tivoli, Italy. This began as a moving-picture palace that was one of the first air-conditioned public buildings in the US. It opened in March of 1921 and closed in 1961. The theater reopened as a new Cultural Center. The city of Chattanooga bought the Tivoli in 1976 and Chattanooga's Department of Education, Arts, and Culture owns and operates the Tivoli. Today it features live music and shows. There is a ghost here that performers are told to acknowledge by calling out "hi," especially towards the balcony. This is a patron who used to come and watch everything and apparently if he is not acknowledged, the show or production will have some problems with the lighting or the sound system. A tour guide from another tour we took named Kevin said they had a problem with the sound system during one of their productions where it shut down for about 20 minutes and it was all because they didn't acknowledge the ghost. 

Hunter Museum of American Art

One of the cool things that we found out about Chattanooga was connected to Coca-Cola and that was that the first time Coca-Cola was bottled, you know taken from the fountain into bottles, was in Chattanooga. Since Coca-Cola thought that it was going to be a complete failure to put their product into bottles, they gave them the rights to bottle it for absolutely free. We're talking about this because Coke has a connection to the Hunter Museum. 

The museum sits above the Tennessee River on land that used to be home for the Cherokee. The mansion was built in 1904 by insurance broker Ross Faxon. Benjamin Thomas bought it in 1920, and he was a part of the founding of the Coca-Cola bottling company. He and his wife moved in there. They didn't have any children to pass the house onto, so they gave it to their nephew, George Thomas Hunter. And he's the one that's really known for living in this home. He was a lover of art. He filled it with all kinds of works of art. And that's why it's a museum. It basically showcases his art collection that he had. And also, of course, they have other artwork that they put in there. Apparently, there are five different ghosts that haunt this location. George Hunter is one of them. When I was standing outside of this museum, there was one window that kept drawing my attention, and I just kept looking at it. And I don't know why at first it was drawing my attention, but I just kept looking at it, and it seemed like it had a little bit more of a misty, foggy look to the front of it, and kind of like when a window is covered over with humidity or something. And so I just kept looking at it, and the tour guide ended up telling us that that is the window that George likes to sometimes look out of. The interesting thing is they've walled up all the windows up there because they don't want the artwork to get damaged by the sun, so there's no way that anybody could actually look out of any of those windows. Another haunt is actually from next door. (pg. 63)

Battle of Chickamauga 

Chickamauga Battlefield sits just south of Chattanooga, across the Georgia state line. The name Chickamauga is believed to derive from a Cherokee word meaning "river of death." Just like the Gettysburg Battlefield, this battlefield is dotted with over 1,400 monuments marking significant events and units. 

Abraham Lincoln believed that taking Chattanooga was as important as taking Richmond. If they could capture this city with four railroads converging within it, they could stop the Confederate supply lines. In the summer of 1863, Confederate General Braxton Bragg controlled Chatta­nooga. Union General William Rosecrans was sitting across the Tennessee River and threatening the rear of the Confederates. Bragg had been outmaneuvered by September and so the Confederate Army had no choice but to abandon the city and its remaining residents. Rosecrans pursued, but found that Bragg had gotten reinforced. The Battle of Chickamauga was fought on September 19–20, 1863, and it proved to be catastrophic for both sides. The landscape was hard as there were dense woods that made it hard for soldiers to differentiate who was who. Much of the fighting was confused and units would stumble into each other with point-blank combat. There was literal fog of war from all the smoking muskets and artillery. General Rosecrans moved his troops in such a way that he left a gap in the center of his line, which the Confederates swarmed through. General George Thomas had troops that made a heroic stand on a spot called Horseshoe Ridge. The fighting was intense and the only thing that saved the Union was darkness. General Rosecrans backed his army into Chat­tanooga and the Confederates occupied Lookout Mountain and Missionary Ridge. This surrounded Chattanooga and a siege began that lasted for a month until General Ulysses S. Grant and reinforcements arrived to help open a supply line into the city. We;ll talk about this more in a minute.

The Union suffered approximately 16,000 casualties and the Confederates suffered over 18,000. Several days passed before burial parties arrived and they dug shallow graves, which were uncovered by rain and animals. Chickamauga and Chattanooga National Military Park was established in 1890 as one of the first national military parks in the United States.

The National Cemetery at Chattanooga was founded and reburials were done, but not all the bones were moved. These soldiers wouldn't have proper rest and that has led to hauntings. Visitors have seen full-bodied apparitions in the tree line and in the open fields. People hear the sound of gunfire in the morning and also drums beating a cadence. Disembodied voices are heard. And then there are the Green Eyes of Chickamauga. This is a legend about a pair of glowing green eyes that appear in the woods of the battlefield at night. The eyes don't blink and are located where they would be for human height. A story is told that these are the eyes of a Confederate soldier who was decapitated during the battle. Why the eyes glow green, nobody knows. Another version of the story claims that these are the eyes of a soldier who was blinded. Science claims that people are just seeing a type of bioluminescent fungi or animal eye shine. Along with the eyes, people see unexplained lights in the woods that are not like flashlights. There were two people who claimed to wreck their car in the because of Old Green Eyes.

Lookout Mountain

Six miles southwest of downtown Chattanooga is Lookout Mountain. Diane camped here in 2015. The Confederate Army had a tactical victory at Chickamauga and that had been the most significant Union defeat in the Western Theater of the Civil War. 

The Confederates controlled Chattanooga and Confederate General Braxton Bragg had his army on the high ground surrounding the city at Missionary Ridge to the east and Lookout Mountain to the southwest with plans to starve the Union forces. On the morning of November 24, 1863, Major General Joseph Hooker took his force of 10,000 men to Lookout Mountain and they climbed up it on the west and south. The fight would be called the Battle Above the Clouds as a fog moved in making visibility tough. Units couldn't see signals and they couldn't see the ground around them, so they stumbled blindly in both sight and what they were supposed to do. Muzzle flashes became the only way to see where the enemy might be. The battle was a bunch of independent skirmishes as everyone fought blind. The Union persisted and broke through the Confederates and gained the summit of Lookout Mountain. The siege was broken. A total lunar eclipse witnessed the retreat of the Confederates that evening. Almost immediately, Lookout Mountain became a tourist destination. Lookout Mountain is part of the Chickamauga and Chattanooga National Military Park. Point Park was established as a ten acre memorial park that overlooks the Lookout Mountain Battlefield and the city of Chattanooga. There are several monuments, with the New York Peace Memorial being the most prominent, and walking trails and a home that had been on the mountain during the battle, The Cravens House. Most of the fighting took place near the house and it was badly damaged. Robert Cravens returned with his family and they rebuilt the home. The underground caverns at Ruby Falls served as a field hospital. 

Unexplained activity has been reported, of course, and seems to increase during foggy conditions. Visitors can become as disoriented as the soldiers were. Could this be why people think they see and hear things? There are the muffled sounds of battle heard and figures are seen and many people feel like they are being watched. 

Newell Sanitarium

This was a private hospital and sanitarium founded in 1908 in downtown Chattanooga by cousins Dr. Edward T. Newell and Dr. Cecil Newell. They built a new building in 1911. The hospital resembled a colonial plantation home with massive columns and white porch railings and it was built from red bricks. The place was later named Newell Clinic Hospital. The first X-ray equipment in Chattanooga was here and one of the doctors trained in Boston and returned in 1938 with a hip pinning technique to fix fractured hips. In 1969, the hospital was purchased by a Nashville-based healthcare corporation and a new hospital building was built. The original colonial-style building was demolished and a modern medical wing replaced it. This is now called Kindred Hospital. The ghost tour we took told us that the typical controversial psychiatric treatments of the 1940s and 50s were employed here, including lobotomies, but there is no record of any of this. It's just a legend. 

However, we had something interesting occur. We had been told about the lobotomies and then we were told that a little girl ghost likes to hang out on the stairs there and had even been captured on camera holding a doll. We were using the Ghost Radar App outside the building. We first got doll and then we got brain. Coincidence? 

Chattanooga Choo Choo 

The Chattanooga Choo Choo is said to be one of the most haunted places in Chattanooga and we made the effort to check it out. Obviously, the railroad is significant in Chattanooga's history. The name Chattanooga Choo Choo is a nickname for the Cincinnati Southern Railways passenger train that went from Chattanooga to Cincinnati. It launched in March of 1880. 

The Southern Railway decided to build a grand Terminal Station in 1909, and this was done in the Beaux-Arts style. The station was open until 1970 and today it is a hotel complex that features restored train cars. People also say it hosts the spirits of railroad workers and passengers. Ghost City Tours had stopped by the hotel when planning out their tours and they took some photographs. They share on their website, "After photographing the inside of the building, I went out back to where the trains are. I was the only one out there, pretty perfect. So, I went about my business, setting up the tripod and taking photographs of anything that looked interesting. As I was photographing the main train body, I had my eyes trained to the camera. Through the glass, I watched a white figure come out from between two of the train cars. I immediately lifted my head to see it, but it was gone...I had just seen a ghost moving through the trains at the Chattanooga Choo Choo." The black porter ghost (pg. 68)

Cherry Street Tavern

The building that houses the popular restaurant and bar Cherry Street Tavern started as a boarding house in the 1870s. As was the case with historic buildings in bustling downtown areas, this one went on to be used for a variety of uses. There was a dry goods store and a tailor shop and during Prohibition, rumors claim it was a speakeasy. The Cherry Street Tavern opened in the 1970s and it features live entertainment.  

Staff and patrons all report experiences and it seems as though there are several ghosts here. Objects like pool balls and bar stools move on their own, lights flicker and there are unexplained cold spots. Wait staff claim to find their tips arranged with coins stacked upright and their name tags disappear and reappear later in weird places. One of the spirits is a woman in a period dress that likes to appear in a mirror at the end of the wall and she stares down at patrons as they eat at the booths. She's been nicknamed The Lady. Some people claim to have seen her sitting by herself at a corner table and she is often described as looking sad. Could she have run the boarding house? There is also the Phantom Bartender who shows up near closing time. Staff have seen him behind the bar wearing clothes of another time period and he seems to be working, cleaning up the bar back. When staff tries to go up to him, he vanishes. Bottles get rearranged overnight. There are ghosts in the basement as well and this seems to be the most active area. There are disembodied voices down there and one worker reported hearing a child's voice say his name when he went down to get more beer. He could actually see his breath when he heard his name and this freaked him out so bad, he left the beer and won't go into the basement unless someone goes with him. Disembodied footsteps are heard on the stairs. It is thought that the secret speakeasy was in the basement.

Chattanooga is a great city to visit, especially if you are into history and ghosts and the natural surroundings are just breathtaking. Dolly Parton taught us all that Tennessee is a great place and Chattanooga proves that to be true. Are these locations in Chattanooga haunted? That is for your to decide!

Source: Haunted Chattanooga by Jessica Penot and Amy Petulla, 2011 

HGB Ep. 654 - Thurber House

Moment in Oddity - Standard Wing Nightjar

Most of our listeners know that Diane and I are animal nuts, and birding is one of our favorite things to do when we are camping. The Standard Winged Nightjar is a nocturnal bird that transforms into something otherworldly during the breeding season. Found in the savannas of Africa, the male of this species sprouts two absurdly elongated feathers from the middle of its wings. These feathers grow up to twice the bird's actual body length, ending in large fantastical, flat flags that trail behind it like flying kites. During courtship displays, the male flits through the sky at dusk, making these detached-looking paddles flutter above him to mesmerize nearby female Nightjars. When it lands, the bizarre appendages fold back awkwardly, blending in with its perfectly camouflaged, bark-like plumage. There are many bizarre courtship rituals in the avian world. But a bird that flies with its own trailing banners to find a mate like a cessna pulling an advertisement banner looking for love, certainly is odd. 

Thurber House

The Thurber House in Columbus, Ohio is a charming home that is now a museum and meeting place for those with literary interests. There is a tragic and haunted history to the abode. The house sits on the outer border of the former Central Ohio Lunatic Asylum, which burned down in 1868, killing seven women in the fire. Jeweler Thomas Tracy Tress accidentally shot and killed himself in the house when he lived here. Writer, humorist and cartoonist James Thurber lived in the house for a time and he had a ghostly experience that he wrote about. Spirits do seem to knock about the place. Join us for the history and hauntings of the Thurber House. 

Columbus is the capitol of Ohio.  The city is nearly smack dab in the center of the state and so it made sense to make this the center of the state government. It was planned in 1812 and named for Christopher Columbus and quickly absorbed the nearby settlement of Franklinton that had been founded in 1797. When a branch of the Ohio and Erie Canal opened in 1831, the city grew and this growth skyrocketed with the arrival of the railroad in 1850. Columbus would become one of the country's major manufacturers of horse-drawn vehicles and the story of Columbus would continue to be one of transportation and industrial growth. The town took on the difficult task of caring for the mentally ill by building the Central Ohio Lunatic Asylum. The original hospital building was completed in 1838. In 1868, a fire burned the asylum to the ground. Seven patients were killed and over 300 patients had to be moved elsewhere. A new building was built in the Kirkbride style and opened in 1877. It was the largest building in the US until the Pentagon was built in 1943. The hospital would remain open for over a hundred years, closing in the late 1980s. It was eventually demolished. The Thurber House was built on the outer edge of the hospital's property in 1873.

So clearly, the land beneath the Thurber House already had its memories long before the first brick of the house was set. There were the asylum patients who had died. But more tragedy would be added to that after the house was constructed.

Thomas Tracy Tress was born in 1865 and he worked hard in jewelry, becoming the owner of Tress Diamonds. He opened a jewelry shop in downtown Columbus. He and his wife were prominent members of the community. Tress was a member of the Mt. Vernon Commandery, the Columbus Club, the Board of Trade and the Aladdin Temple. He was also the President of a dancing club. We don't know when he and his wife moved into the house at 77 Jefferson Avenue, but they were living there on April 27, 1904.It was a few minutes before 8pm when he had returned home and was in an upstairs room having a conversation with his wife and a woman named Tine Ackerman. Dinner had just been announced and Tress told his wife that he wanted to change his collar and then he would be down for dinner. Before the women left the room, Tress walked over to the dresser and picked up an .38 caliber Iver Johnson revolver that was sitting on it. He whipped around with thew gun in his hand and scared his wife. He laughed and said that the gun wasn't loaded, but she insisted that he put the gun down. He said, "Why, it's not dangerous. Look at me." He put the gun muzzle to his left chest and pulled the trigger. The gun, unfortunately, was loaded. Tress managed to walk himself across the room to a couch and he laid down. He said that he had been foolish and then passed out. Medical help was called, but it wouldn't help. Tress died at the age of 39.

The house was named for its most famous resident. James Thurber was one of the foremost American humorists of the 20th century. He was born in Columbus, Ohio on December 8, 1894 to Mary Agnes "Mame" Fisher and Charles Leander Thurber. 

Thurber's father was a civil clerk and he used to change jobs a lot. Every time he would change a job, he would change the home they lived in. So they moved from house to house to house through most of his childhood. Much of Thurber's humorous writing was inspired by his mother because she was considered a brilliant humorist. Her jokes and theatrics were immortalized by Thurber in a lot of his own writing. Thurber had two brothers, an older one named William and a younger one named Robert. And it would be William who would shoot James' eye out. Apparently the guys were playing a childhood game of William Tell and as part of the game seven-year-old James turned around and waited for his brother William to shoot at him with what was apparently a blunt arrow. His brother was taking a long time so Thurber turned back around just as his brother let the arrow go and he was accidentally shot in his left eye which irreversibly blinded him and he had to have a prosthetic put in that eye. Later on in life Thurber would lose the vision that he had in his remaining eye due to a medical condition but he always continued to write and draw.

From 1913 to 1918, Thurber attended Ohio State University and he wrote for the college paper, The Lantern. He also became editor in chief of the Sun Dial which was a humor and literary magazine. It was during this time when he was going to OSU that the Thurbers rented the house at 77 Jefferson Avenue. 

We'll come back to this time at the house as it entails the most famous ghost story about the house. Throughout the years Thurber worked for the federal government first in Washington D.C. then at the American Embassy in Paris. He eventually came back to Columbus in 1920 and worked for the Columbia Dispatch as a reporter. James got married and move to New York and in 1926 he began his career as a freelance writer. There he became friends with E.B. White who was the author of Stuart Little and Charlotte's Web and it would be E.B. White who would introduce him to the editor of the New Yorker, Harold Ross, and Ross hired Thurber. E.B. White and Thurber shared an office at the New Yorker and Thurber had been working on some drawings, which he ended up throwing into a trash can. White looked at them and thought they were pretty good, so he submitted them to the New Yorker for publication and they did publish them and this began Thurber's decades-long career of contributing drawings and writings to the New Yorker. The two men also worked on their first book together which was called "Is Sex Necessary" and it featured a number of Thurber's cartoons. Thurber collaborated in 1940 on a comedy play that  was called The Male Animal. This made its way to Broadway, became a hit, and then was turned into a 1942 movie starring Henry Fonda and Olivia de Havilland. In 1947, Thurber probably published one his most popular works, The Secret Life of Walter Mitty, and this was adapted into a feature film that starred Danny Kaye and Boris Karloff. 

Thurber was prolific and he wrote other plays and dozens of books. In his later years, he struggled with a thyroid condition and then he was stricken with a blood clot in his brain in October of 1961. While a surgery to deal with the clot was successful, James ended up dying on November 2nd of that year due to complications from pneumonia. He was 66 years old at the time. 

Now looking back at the Thurber House, when the Thurbers moved out of 77 Jefferson Avenue, the home changed hands many times. It became a music school, a beauty shop, and a boarding house. Eventually, it fell into disrepair and it was set to be demolished in the 1970s. But before the house could be torn down, attorney Arthur Worreys purchased all of the properties on the Jefferson Avenue ellipse and his intention was to restore all those homes and turn the block into a community of non-profit organizations. There were several historic Victorian homes. 77 Jefferson was going to take a lot of work because it had extensive deterioration. The woodwork had been painted over, the floorboards were rotted out and the fireplaces had been covered up. They have managed to restore it and Robert Thurber, who was the younger brother of James, helped with some of the restoration and actually donated some items from the family. So some of the items that are in the house today, did belong to them. It now looks the way it did when the Thurber family lived here from 1913 to 1917, with the same kind of wallpaper, antique furnishings, and the woodwork has been preserved. Today, the Thurber house is a non-profit literary arts center that offers creative programming for adults and children and has the James Thurber Museum that's available for public tours. Rooms on view include the former parlor, the living room and its alcove, the dining room, five bedrooms, and the bathroom that Thurber hid in to avoid the ghost running up the back stairs. Wait, did we just say "to avoid a ghost?"

Not only did James Thurber claim to have heard a ghost in the house on November 17, 1915 and believed to his dying day that the home was haunted, but other people who have visited and worked in the house have had experiences themselves. People believe there are several spirits, including the asylum patients, the jeweler Tress and some believe that Thurber returned to this home, perhaps because of his ghostly experience or because it is a museum dedicated to him and his writing. 

The museum embraces the fact that they have a haunted history here and talk about it on their website. People have experienced unusual phenomenon over the years which included a clock chiming despite not being operational, the glass in a picture frame inexplicably shattered all over the floor, there's been sightings of glowing orbs, a full-bodied apparition of a man in a collared shirt has been seen, disembodied footsteps have been heard, people have had the sensation of being touched or poked, and witnesses have report books flying from their shelves and disembodied footsteps on the back staircase, which is also where James Thurber had heard some ghostly footsteps as well. James Thurber wrote a short story about his experience and it was entitled, "The Night the Ghost Got In." Here's how the story went: 

"The ghost that got into our house on the night of November 17, 1915 raised such a hullabaloo of misunderstandings that I'm sorry I didn't just let it keep on walking and go to bed. Its advent caused my mother to throw a window of the house next door and ended up with my grandfather shooting a patrolman. I'm sorry therefore, as I've said, that I ever paid any attention to the footsteps. They began about a quarter past one o'clock in the morning, a rhythmic quick cadence walking around the dining room table. My mother was asleep in one room upstairs, my brother Herman in another. Grandfather was in the attic in an old walnut bed which, as you will remember, once fell on my father. I had just stepped out of the bathtub and was busily rubbing myself with a towel when I heard the steps. They were the steps of a man walking rapidly around the dining room table downstairs. The light from the bathroom shone down the back steps, which dropped directly into the dining room. I could see the faint shine of plates on the plate rail. I couldn't see the table. The steps kept going round and round the table. At regular intervals, a board creaked when it was trod upon. I supposed at first that it was my father or my brother Roy, who had gone to Indianapolis, but were expected home at any time. I suspected next that it was a burglar. It did not enter my mind until later that it was a ghost. After the walking had gone on for perhaps three minutes, I tiptoed to Herman's room. Psst! I hissed in the dark, shaking him. Ah, he said in the low, hopeless tone of a despondent beagle. He always half suspected that something would get him in the night. I told him who I was. There's something downstairs, I said. He got up and followed me to the head of the back staircase. We listened together. There was no sound. The steps had ceased. Herman looked at me in some alarm. I had only the bath towel around my waist. He wanted to go back to bed, but I gripped his arm. There's something down there, I said. Instantly the steps began again, circled the dining room table like a man running, and started up the stairs towards us, heavily, two at a time. The light still shone palely down the stairs. We saw nothing coming. We only heard the steps. Herman rushed to his room and slammed the door. I slammed shut the door at the stairs' top and held my knee against it. After a long minute I slowly opened it again. There was nothing there. There was no sound. None of us ever heard the ghost again. The slamming of the doors had roused Mother. She peered out of her room. What on earth are you boys doing, she demanded. Herman ventured out of his room. Nothing, he said gruffly, but he was, in color, a light green. What was all that running around downstairs, said Mother. So she had heard the steps, too. We just looked at her. Burglars, she shouted intuitively. I tried to quiet her by starting lightly downstairs. Come on, Herman, I said. I'll stay with Mother, he said. She's all excited. I stepped back onto the landing. Don't either of you go a step, said Mother. We'll call the police. Since the phone was downstairs, I didn't see how we were going to call the police, nor did I want the police, but Mother made one of her quick, incomparable decisions. She flung up a window of her bedroom, which faced the bedroom windows of the house of a neighbor, picked up a shoe, and whammed it through a pane of glass across the narrow space that separated the two houses. Glass tinkled into the bedroom occupied by a retired engraver named Bodwell and his wife. Bodwell had been for some years in rather a bad way and was subject to mild attacks. Most everybody we knew or lived near had some kind of attacks. It was now about two o'clock of a moonless night. Clouds hung black and low. Bodwell was at the window in a minute, shouting, frothing a little, shaking his fist. We'll sell the house and go back to Peoria, we could hear Mrs. Bodwell saying. It was some time before Mother got through to Bodwell. Burglars, she shouted, burglars in the house. Herman and I hadn't dared to tell her that it was not burglars but ghosts, but she was even more afraid of ghosts than of burglars. Bodwell at first thought that she meant there were burglars in his house, but finally he quieted down and called the police for us over an extension phone by his bed. After he'd disappeared from the window, Mother suddenly made as if to throw another shoe, not because there was further need of it but, as she later explained, because the thrill of heaving a shoe through a window glass had enormously taken her fancy. I prevented her. I think I love his mother. The police were on hand in commendably short time, a Ford sedan full of them, two on motorcycles, and a patrol wagon with about eight in it, and a few reporters. They sent out the cavalry, it sounds like. They began banging on our front door. Flashlights shot streaks of gleam up and down the walls, across the yard, down the walk between our house and Bodwell's. Open up, cried a hoarse voice. We're men from headquarters. I wanted to go down and let them in since there they were, but Mother wouldn't hear of it. You haven't a stitch on, she pointed out. You'd catch your death. I wound the towel around me again. Finally the cops put their shoulders to our big heavy front door with its thick beveled glass and broke it in. I could hear a rending of wood and a splash of glass on the floor of the hall. Their lights played all over the living room and crisscrossed nervously in the dining room, stabbed into hallways, shot up the front stairs, and finally up the back. They caught me standing in my towel at the top. A heavy policeman bounded up the steps. Who are you, he demanded. I live here, I said. Well, what's the matter, you hot, he asked. It was, as a matter of fact, cold. I went to my room and pulled on some trousers. On my way out, a cop stuck a gun into my ribs. What you doing here, he demanded. I live here, I said. The officer in charge reported to Mother, no sign of nobody, lady, he said. Must have got away. What'd he look like? There were two or three of them, Mother said, whooping and carrying on and slamming doors. Funny, said the cop. All your windows and doors was locked on the inside tight as a tick. Downstairs we could hear the tromping of the other police. Police were all over the place. Doors were yanked open, drawers were yanked open, windows were shot up and pulled down. Furniture fell with dull thumps. A half dozen policemen emerged out of the darkness of the front hallway upstairs. They began to ransack the floor, pulled beds away from walls, tore clothes off hooks in the closets, pulled suitcases and boxes off shelves. One of them found an old zither that Roy had won in a pool tournament. Looky here, Joe, he said, strumming it with a big paw. The cop named Joe took it and turned it over. What is it, he asked me. It's an old zither our guinea pig used to sleep on, I said. It was true that a pet guinea pig we once had would never sleep anywhere except on the zither, but I should never have said so. Joe and the other cop looked at me a long time. They put the zither back on a shelf. No sign of nothing, said the cop who had first spoken to mother. This guy, he explained to the others, jerking a thumb at me, was naked. The lady seems historical. They all nodded but said nothing, just looked at me. In the small silence we all heard a creaking in the attic. Grandfather was turning over in bed. What's that, snapped Joe. Five or six cops sprang for the attic door before I could intervene or explain. I realized that it would be bad if they burst in on Grandfather unannounced or even announced. He was going through a phase in which he believed that General Meade's men, under steady hammering by Stonewall Jackson, were beginning to retreat and even desert. When I got to the attic, things were pretty confused. Grandfather had evidently jumped to the conclusion that the police were deserters from Meade's army trying to hide away in his attic. He bounded out of bed wearing a long flannel nightgown over long woolen underwear, a nightcap, and a leather jacket around his chest. The cops must have realized at once that the indignant white-haired old man belonged in the house, but they had no chance to say so. Back, you cowardly dogs, roared Grandfather. Back to the lines, you goddamn lily-livered cattle. With that, he fetched the officer who found the zither, a flat-handed smack alongside his head that sent him sprawling. The others beat a retreat, but not fast enough. Grandfather grabbed Zither's gun from its holster and let fly. The report seemed to crack the rafter, smoke filled the attic. A cop cursed and shot his hand to his shoulder. Somehow, we all finally got downstairs again and locked the door against the old gentleman. He fired once or twice more in the darkness and then went back to bed. That was Grandfather, I explained to Joe out of breath. He thinks you're deserters. I'll say he does, said Joe. The cops were reluctant to leave without getting their hands on somebody besides Grandfather. The night had been distinctly a defeat for them. Furthermore, they obviously didn't like the layout. Something looked, and I can see their viewpoint, phony. They began to poke into things again. A reporter, a thin-faced wispy man, came up to me. I'd put on one of Mother's blouses, not being able to find anything else. The reporter looked at me with mingled suspicion and interest. Just what the hell is the real low down here, bud, he asked. I decided to be frank with him. We had ghosts, I said. He gazed at me a long time as if I were a slot machine into which he had, without results, dropped a nickel. Then he walked away. The cops followed him. The one Grandfather shot, holding his now-bandaged arm, cursing and blaspheming. I'm gonna get my gun back from that old bird, said the zither cop. Yeah, said Joe. You and who else? I told them I would bring it to the station house the next day. What was the matter with that one policeman, Mother asked after they had gone? Grandfather shot him, I said. What for, she demanded. I told her he was a deserter. Of all things, said Mother. He was such a nice-looking young man. Grandfather was fresh as a daisy and full of jokes at breakfast next morning. We thought at first he'd forgotten all about what had happened, but he hadn't. Over his third cup of coffee, he glared at Herman and me. What was the idea of all them cops, tarry-hooting around the house last night, he demanded. He had us there." 

Thurber always maintained this happened and he changed the address of the house so that it wouldn't bring too much attention to the original house. We have to wonder what was all that running around the table about? And boy, what a commotion it started there. We find it interesting that it never seems to have happened again while they were there.

Anne Touvell, who was the Thurber House Deputy Director, told the Columbus Monthly in 2015, "... a ghost group came in here once, and the electronic voice phenomenon they recorded was clear as day. They asked the air, 'Did you accidentally shoot yourself in this house?' And, I swear, the voice came back on the recorder saying, 'Ask her.' A volunteer named Jan Williams stated in the same article, "Our cleaning people, who also clean the other buildings on the block, they say they've had stuff happen. They won't clean at night anymore. One of our writers had a dog, and it kept barking and barking at the corner in the front room; it wouldn't let her near that corner." Amy Drake shared in a Medium article about a short film that she shot in the Thurber House called Showdown in Amherst. She wrote, "I silently asked for Mr. Tress’s blessing for our filming. As it turns out he had quite a sense of humor. We used authentic late 19th century clothes from my personal collection as costumes for the film. The man’s coat, worn by actor Douglas Fries, had secure buttons when it left my house. During the shoot, one of the buttons fell off. The back of the button was engraved with the name Tress(e), as, I discovered, were all the buttons. After the shoot, I was notified via email that a bookseller had a silk advertising ribbon from Tress Diamonds for sale on Ebay. I purchased and framed the ribbon. In the film credits, I thanked Mr. Tress for his cooperation. I believe he just wanted to be remembered and involved." 

Tom Moore wrote in a News and Sentinel article about visiting the museum and the docent "began telling us a few things that have happened there including the clock that opened on its own, along with people claiming to have seen a gentleman standing behind them with a white collar when they look in the mirror above the fireplace in the parlor."

Did James Thurber really have this ghostly experience? Have other people experienced unexplained stuff here? Is the Thurber House haunted? That is for you to decide.