Non-Civil War Ghost Story

[JerseyBart]

This is when I started believing in ghosts and probably started peeing the bed too. (don't worry, I stopped the latter days ago...lol) This dream, a pretty quick one, occurred probably when I was 7 or 8 years old. In my dream I was laying in my bed looking out into a dark hallway. Only the hallway spotlight was on. Standing under the spotlight and staring at me were two children, a boy on the left and a girl on the right, wearing colonial time period clothing. Scared to death, I woke up, but those two children were still staring at me. I very quickly pulled the covers over my head and tried to fall back to sleep, even more scared to death in real life than I was in my dream.


Bart

[pendlekin]

Bart... where you living in an older home when you were a kid, like maybe one old enough to be around during colonial times????

[JerseyBart]

Pendle,

Not at all. The house I lived in was built in the 1940s. And there's nothing really historic about the town I live in other than it was a stayover town as vacationers travelled from Eastern Pennsylvania to the Jersey Shore in the early and mid 1900s. Nothing that I know of explains that dream, except for the fact that I've had plenty of strange dreams in my life. I regaled my students with them this year. They probably thought that I was nuts. They aren't half wrong.

Bart

[JerseyBart]

But on second thought, I lived just off of the White Horse Pike and the house across The Pike from my house...probably 75 to 100 yards...has been around since the 1700s. But any ghosts living in that house have probably been haunting its revolving door of inhabitants for being the seediest collection of trash ever to populate a historic house.

Bart

[pendlekin]

Bart...I just Googled White Horse Pike (not that familiar with NJ aside from the whole poofy hair thing<snicker>) It seems to be a rather historic route. Who's to say what used to be there pre-40's (or under there) still gives me the creeps.

[JerseyBart]

Gives you the creeps??? I lived it. lol But that was the only time I ever saw them.


Bart

[Texas2nd]

Hi ya'll,

I'm new to this forum and wanted to check in with fellow "believers". I'm a member of a paranormal group. I'm also a great fan of history and the ACW.

Went out the other day to an old Cemetary where the UDC was having a Spirit Walk, you know - where members dress like thier ancestors and escort folks from grave to grave telling history - it was great!

In our pictures (during the day) we got all kinds of phenomena - some looked like light orbs other looked like see through sunspots. I think the old ghosts came out to see what all the commotion was!

If there is a spirit walk near you go check it out. You will be surprised at what you can take pictures of during the day in the cemetery at these events!

Texas2nd

[debski]

I have had strange things happen similar to your experience. I think it's kind of fun to have things out of the "Normal"happen. Sometimes it has scared me to death. Someday I will post some.

debski

[84th Pa Heise]

I was mt biking up an area called Boone Mt in NW Pa. When I reached the top even though it was a hot day in July I became chilled to the point of goose bumps. Out of the corner of my eye I saw a man dressed in dark clothing with a round hat on. He had a beard and a wore a colored sash. That much I know I saw. When I stopped my bike and looked to my left there was no one there but a dead tree with no bark. The tree was more of a five foot stump than an actual tree. The goose bumps really exploded on me then. I decided to continue my ride and just forget about what I thought I had seen. Later in my ride I decided to return the way I had ridden in. When I rode back to the spot of my sighting I was amazed to find the tree was not standing any longer. I got off of my bike and looked for the tree to be laying on the ground but found nothing. I do know that the area of my ride used to be a village known as the Bish Settlement. I have ridden my bike to the Bish Cemetary and the old foundations of some of the long since lived in houses. Back in the seventy or eighties some so called devil worshipers had performed some kind of ritual at the cemetary and put the old tombstones in the center of the cemetary in an upside down cross. They dug up one of the graves and used the skull in the ceremony. They were caught and had to replace the broken stones and do some work to fix the area up. Probably has nothing to do with what I thought I saw on the hill but who knows.

[Texas2nd]

84th,
Sometimes our passed-on relatives, angels and god are trying to tell us something is wrong and to get out of there. Looks to me like you had a "get outa-here" experience!
Texas2nd

[84th Pa Heise]

About a week or so later I took a friend on the same ride. I didn't tell him to much about my experience except about getting chilled to the bone. Right as we were entering the same area of where I get chilled, he yelled out to me and I went back to find he had goose bumps on his arm. I then told him the rest of my story and he didn't want to continue the ride. I still ride there but I feel compelled to not stop for anything but get through as fast as I can.

[ole]

Spooky, 84th. Strange, but somehow spooky.
Ole

[84th Pa Heise]

Spooky is good, it makes the ride more interesting. I really do appreciate the history of the area and show it nothing but respect, especially the cemetery and the civil war veterans that are buried there. I totally don't understand the things that I have experienced there but I love the ride.

[Texas2nd]

In Texas, my ghost hunting group just investigated an old plantation foundation that had been turned into a barn. There were still remnants of beautiful cabinets with glass and shelfs in one room and a brief history of the family was written on one door - it had faded so with time and was hard to read.

This was considered a popular plantation in it's time with soirees and teas going on all the time as he had many daughters. The owner commited suicide in 1860 and left his wife and family to deal with the war. We obtained a copy of his will where he left named slaves to his kids. The will is awesome as it portrays life in the South as it was for the average planter.

We got some great pictures and I have to say this was a spooky investigation. We are still trying to sort through all the evidence.
Texas2nd

[ole]

The will is awesome as it portrays life in the South as it was for the average planter.

Can't let that one slide by Tex2. Sorry. The average planter did not off himself and leave his wife and children to fend for themselves, albeit with specific instructions as to who gets what. The average planter cast his lot and rode it out in his own way. Your subject planter chose not to do that, but to quit the table before the deal. Can't assign blame to that, but can't give him "average" status either.

When you get to it, please share his will as much as you can. That could be very interesting.

Ole

[84th Pa Heise]

Very interesting history. Can't figure people out though. His will would be great to read. Have to agree that he wouldn't be average.

[Texas2nd]

I meant average as in what he owned and considered as everyday course of events.
He wrote the will Dec 4th 1860 and his death was after that in Dec of 1860 - we don't have the date but his will was filed Jan 5th 1861. Family rumor says he did it outside by the well with a pistol after a Party - I would think between Christmas and the new year.

This piece of land comes with 101 pages of legal documents and original grants and started out as Cherokee treaty land, 1828 records reflect this.

It was seized by the Texas Rangers in 1839 and consequently parceled out as a league of land promised to the soldiers of the Texas Army of the Republic - it was granted in 1848. It sits about 5 miles south of the Sabine River in East Texas. It was purchased in Oct 1855 and became a plantation.

In his last will and testament, "being ill in health but sound of mind and memory" the owner willed his personal property and a 307 acre tract of land "with all my stock and plantation tools, including all my household and kitchen furniture."

He owned more land but he parceled that out for debts, which are detailed and then gave servitude of named slaves until death to his wife and children. Upon the death of his wife he asked each of his children to pay one hundred and seventy-five dollars per slave to his estate.

His firstborn son was given everything "over and above all other heirs".

In 1861, the wife filed an Application for order to sell Property and claimed insolvency.
That court granted her 30 acres to be called "homestead" and the rest was sold off to pay debts.

On the first Tuesday of June 1868, this auction was carried out on the land.

Cool, huh?
Texas2nd
Oh yes, the pics from this hunt were outstanding - we definately got something by the well!

[michiganmoon]

I always use to believe that ghosts could exist, since I can't prove that they don't, but ultimately that they don't exist. Well my girlfriend bought the house that she grew up in from her parents and her family insists that it is haunted. They are all good people and are very adament that they have seen ghosts in the house multiple times and even conversations with him the ghost a few times. Now I get the creeps at times when I go over there and am starting to believe in ghosts...as tonight we (and her dog) appeared to hear the kitchen door move while laying on her couch. I am not very fond of her house!

[Capt Coxetter]

84th,
Sometimes our passed-on relatives, angels and god are trying to tell us something is wrong and to get out of there. Looks to me like you had a "get outa-here" experience!
Texas2nd

I once had a get-out-of-there experience.

Years ago, I used to walk to work every morning along the same exact route. One day I clearly heard a voice in my head saying "Walk on the other side!" I obeyed without thinking: just automatically.

As I crossed the street, I heard a horrible cracking sound. I looked across the street to where a huge tree branch, for no apparent reason - there was no wind, nothing that would have seemed to cause it to break - broke free, and landed on the sidewalk: in the exact spot where I would have been, if I hadn't obeyed the voice.

However or whatever spoke to me: I thank you!

Capt. Coxetter

[Chuck58]

I had a strange 'ghost' experience when I was about 6, maybe 7. My father was building our house in a nearby town, so we were staying upstairs in my maternal grandmother's house in Castleton Vermont. It was an old farmhouse. My bedroom was at the top of the stairs. The stairs came up into that room.

One night, something awoke me. No idea what time it was. Anyway, I saw a light colored figure coming up the stairs. It topped the stairs, walked across the room, and sat on the end of the bed, then bent over as if taking off its shoes. At that point, I pulled the covers over my head. When I peeked out again after a long time, it was gone.

I told my mother about it next day. She never replied that I remember. Decades later, she, my sister, my wife and I got on the subjects of ghosts (don't ask me), and I mentioned it again. She said she remembered me telling about it but didn't want to scare me. She said her father, my grandfather had died in the bed in which I was sleeping. It used to be my grandparents bedroom and was their bed. When he died in it, grandma moved to a downstairs room and the upstairs was closed off.

Personally, I think I was dreaming, but that's my possible ghost story.