Spooks and ghosts and weeping ladies...oh my! Pt 3

Okay, I just wandered in here, please don't do anything scary til I get myself oriented! LOL!

Actually, I love this thread idea and I will be back to read but right now I was looking for a place to put this funny about trick-or-treat codes:

http://www.cockeyed.com/archive/candy_code/candy_code.html

and didn't want to start a new thread as the DAY is almost upon us.

^_^
Kyla

Kyla, those are awesome! LOL We're not going anywhere. You come back soon and share.

BTW...I Google Earthed Weed, CA, as I was not aware there WAS such a place. ☺

Yeah, nor was I, but there is.

glad you enjoyed the codes. I'll be back.

ROFL, my son will enjoy those codes, since he lives in Sacramento...a little too old for trick-or-treating anymore, but he'll get a kick out of it.

So I need to finish this story because it’s Halloween!

The way the house was set up is across the front (if you’re standing in front of the house) my bedroom was on the far right the living room in the middle and the formal dining room next and the bonus room on the far left. The kitchen was behind the dining room, den behind the living room and then there were 2 bedrooms in the corner. There was a guest bath and linen closet between my bedroom and bedroom #2.

My street had school traffic during the day, but very slow at night. I had vertical blinds on the picture windows across the front of the house.

I started noticing a light that would flicker off at the living room window at night. I never really paid much attention thinking it was a headlight from a car down the street. Then I noticed the light would stay a little longer before it would flicker out. This went on for maybe 2 months.

I’m the type of person that doesn’t need “noise” around. I can be alone and quiet and not have a problem with it.

One day I decided to stain the sink cabinet in the guest bathroom. I had already pulled wallpaper and painted, you know, making the house mine. So I’m in the bathroom sanding the pepto-pink paint off the cabinet to reveal this beautiful oak cabinet beneath. Sanding sanding sanding and I stop to rest for a few minutes.

I heard a man’s voice in the living room.

I froze. I’m thinking OMG – I need to get out of the house because someone got in. I walked quietly down the hall and peeked around the corner – nothing…

I walked through the house and the doors were all locked, the windows all closed and Baxter is under the bed in the guest bedroom bristling. I looked everywhere. Nothing.

Soooo, I go back to work in the bathroom – sand some more – and rested – and heard the man’s voice again. I ran to the living room brandishing my electric sander and…Nothing. Just icy cold air. I could never make out what he was saying, but a murmur.

So it’s all coming clear to me…ok I have a ghost. I called the previous owners (we became friends) and asked them if they knew of anyone dying in the house. They said “No, we built the house in 1961”. Okaaaay…

So this goes on for a while. I’d hear him once in a while, as far as I knew he never left the living room. And Baxter wouldn’t go in it.

Not done, be back! LOL!

Edited for typos

This message was edited Oct 31, 2008 2:30 PM

Wow, Sharon. It's more unsettling when you're alone. But with your cat knowing something is up, too?

Our cats suddenly stop and look into a corner. I always look to see what they're looking at but I never see anything. Most times it's toward the ceiling. Isis did that last night while she was on my lap. Looked up into the corner behind me. I didn't look but watched her eyes. They followed something for a minute then she looked away and didn't follow it anymore.

I mentioned quite a while back that I had been seeing a white cat out of the corner of my eye in our front room. It's come back. I've seen it twice now, one week ago today and 3 days ago. Just a flash and it's gone. Darrell thinks I'm nutty. LOL I don't care...I saw what I saw. ☺

One morning about 4am I was thirsty (too much partying I was in my late 30’s) so I got up grudgingly and headed to the kitchen (remember where the kitchen is?). I get to the spot that led from the guest bedrooms to the living room and …

OMG I flipped out

Remember the light that I would see flicker? It was the reflection from the tv (like in poltergeist) being turned off. Yeah, the tv had all that snow going and turned off by itself. I heard the click. The air had to have been at 20* in the living room.

I’m getting the chills talking about this because I never told anyone.

So I decided to have a chat with my roomie. I went in the living room (during the day) and told him that I didn’t mind him being there, just please stay in the living room and pleaaaaaase stop scaring Baxter.

I started thinking of “things” being normal. I had a key holder just inside the dens door. I always entered the house from the back because of the detached garage. My keys would go missing. I’d look and look then one day I got it. I went in the living room and requested him to return my keys. I’d go to my bedroom and about 15 minutes later go back to the den and there they were hanging on the rack. I got kind of used to him taking my keys. I really hope he didn’t take my car for a joyride.

We had a problem when I decided to sell the house. He got mad. I woke up one night feeling like I was being strangled. I started yelling at him to get off me. He left. I didn’t sleep any more that night. That was just about the freakiest thing that happened, besides seeing the snowy tv screen turn itself off.

I sold the house almost immediately. It was weird. I was talking to a friend on my cell phone at the grocery store about selling the house. This guy started following me around the store…which was weird all by itself. Anyway, he finally came up to me and said he had heard me say I was putting the house up for sale and wanted to know if it was in that neighborhood. That he had been looking for a house in the area and couldn’t find one. I gave him my realtor’s name and phone number. The house sold in less than 2 weeks. I never divulged any info about my roomie!

One my last night in the house I told him that I was leaving and I hoped he would find what he needed to move on.

I never looked into what happened in the area. I just assumed that it was probably a similar story like George. Although George never tried to choke me.

Celia - My cats do that too. It always freaks me out especially after living in that house. My grandmother and mother were both sensitive. I am a little, but supress it because truthfully, I don't like it. I don't know how people become confortable living like that. My mother and I had a connection. I would hear her call my name when she truly needed me - and it was always my middle name (what's up with that?), it would sound like she was right behind me. I'd hear her and turn around and say "What"? There would either be no one there or someone would look at me like I was crazy. I'd call Mom and say "You Rang"? We'd laugh.

What I wrote is completely true. I hope it never happens again!

This is Baxter. He went to Rainbow Bridge almost a year ago. I love my "little man".

Oh! He's adorable! A truly pretty-kitty!

I should have posted this one taken last Halloween!

Wow Sharon, That is one heck of a story!! Was scarey just reading it.

Baxter is beautiful!

Celia- I had a cat that I took in about 15 years ago, he had been abandoned. He stayed with me for about a year and the one day Fuzzy didn't come home. :(

He didn't come home for a week. I cried, but hoped someone else thought he didn't have a home and took him in.

I looked out the window about 3 weeks after he disappeared. There he was sitting in the driveway. I was so happy and ran outside ... he was gone. I think he was thanking me for taking care of him during the last year of his life. He looked like Isaboo.

Their spirits linger as well. I believe they can see, hear, feel and sense every thing we can.

Callie and Isaboo lived with me in the house mentioned above. If anyone is a major history buuf and feels the need to reserach the history of the area feel free to d-mail me and I will give the subdivision and maybe the address as long as it isn't intended to cause harm (not that I think anyone here would cause harm to anyone).

Celia - d-mail me please.

This article ran in our local paper on Friday. Thought y'all would enjoy it ^6^

http://www.fbnewsleader.com/articles/2008/11/03/around_town/00atghoststory.txt

Sharon, the link is a "dead" end. It said it was no longer available.

I had to go to the archives to find it. Grrr...

http://www.fbnewsleader.com/articles/2008/10/30/around_town/00atghoststory.txt

Here is the story in case the new link doesn't work

All the makings for a ghost story

Amelia Island, like any place with a deep history and a long memory, has its share of buildings that are reputed to be haunted. St. Peter's Episcopal Church is rumored to have a haunted mirror. Palace Saloon bartender Charlie Beresford, who poured shots from 1906 until 1960, supposedly still stalks through the bar. Legend has it that the Florida House Inn is home to around 30 wayward spirits.

But perhaps the most captivating tale of the supernatural is that of Eppes House.

Eppes House, which has stood at the corner of 10th and Ash streets for nearly 130 years, has all the makings of a crackerjack haunted house. Its story has the perfect ingredients: a beautiful woman, a jealous husband, an innocent man and an unpunished murder. But the story of Eppes House takes an unusual turn: The murder didn't take place in the house, and the victim isn't the one haunting its premises.

Indeed, records indicate that the house wasn't built until the year after the murder. If a ghost does roam the corridors of Eppes House, it isn't crying for revenge. It may, however, be weeping from guilt.

I wanted to find out, so I got in touch with the house's current owner, Ben Humphreys, and arranged to spend Sunday night there. One catch: Humphreys, a tax specialist, is selling the house and currently lives in Arizona - which meant I'd be spending the night alone. Figuring I ought to know what I was getting into, I decided to use the interim to find out more about Eppes House's tragic first residents.


The murder

It was the afternoon of Feb. 7, 1884, and Thomas Jefferson Eppes had spent his walk toward the Mansion House Hotel working himself into a rage. Now Eppes - railroad official and great-great-grandson of President Thomas Jefferson - could see only one way to soothe his anger.

Eppes' wife, Celeste (some sources call her Kate), had complained to him that the Mansion House's manager, former Union Army officer and married father of five Maj. F.C. Suhrer, had been paying her inappropriate attentions. To Eppes, a gentleman of the old school, there was only one remedy for that: the pistol in his coat pocket.

According to the Feb. 9, 1884, Florida Mirror - a paper which would eventually become the News-Leader - Eppes confronted Suhrer on the porch of the Mansion House about 5:30 p.m. A shot cracked the air and Suhrer fell, a bullet in his chest. According to eyewitness reports of the incident, Suhrer asked Eppes why he'd shot him.

"You insulted my wife one week ago today," Eppes said.



"I may be a dead man, Jeff, but before God I did not," Suhrer insisted.

Suhrer was right on both counts. He was a dead man - he expired eight or 10 hours later - and he had never laid a hand on Celeste Eppes. Celeste had invented the story in an attempt to make her husband jealous. "She was trying to get him to stay home more, because he worked for the railroad and was gone all the time," said Brenda Brubeck, Elderhostel coordinator for the Amelia Island Museum of History. Celeste had just wanted her husband to pay more attention to his marriage. Instead, he went out and gunned down his make-believe rival.

It's the "Jeff" in this story that gets to me; Suhrer's diminutive of Eppes' middle name implies a familiarity between the two. Indeed, Eppes had boarded for years at the Mansion House, moving out only shortly before the murder. Nowadays, when a friend is paying too much attention to your significant other you tell him to lay off - or, if you're old-school, sock him in the face. Back then you shot him.

The haunting of Eppes House

After Eppes' arrest, guilt finally got the better of Celeste. "She was really distraught about (her lie) and she finally fessed up about it, and he got off on 'fits of jealousy,'" Brubaker said.

From there, the record starts to get fuzzy; legend becomes intertwined with fact until the two are hard to distinguish. It is certain that the Eppeses lived in their newly built house for a time after Jeff's acquittal, but according to Brubeck, the island eventually became too hot to hold them. "They were told to leave. They left on the rail, and they wouldn't tell anyone where they were going," she said.

According to legend, Celeste's guilt destroyed her mind - and eventually her life. "A real good friend of hers finally tracked them down, and (Celeste Eppes) had just died in an insane asylum," Brubeck said.

So heavily did Celeste Eppes' guilt weigh upon her, in fact, that it reportedly outlived her physical form. Sightings of her spirit, said to haunt a second-floor bedroom of Eppes House, began shortly after her death. In fact, Celeste's ghost is reputed to have actually spoken to the next resident of the house, telling her it wore the mark of Cain and was therefore cursed.

If Celeste still haunts her old home today, she appears to have toned down the gloom and doom. Recent residents don't report seeing her physical form - or even anything particularly scary.

"Actually, we never saw anything odd, but the day that we left, we both had an odd experience individually," said Marie Corbett, who, with her husband Eric, owned the house immediately before Humphreys. "The day we moved, I was walking through the house and crying, I loved that house so much. I was upstairs, and I was walking through the house and one of the lights went off in one of the rooms. It was the room that was supposedly haunted. Then the light turned itself back on. When my husband was there, the kick-plate on the central vac kept moving over and turning on. Never anything scary, though."



"I know that iPods turn themselves on in the middle of the night in that room, but that's about the limit of the spiritual activity I've seen," Humphreys said.

Humphreys' realtor, Rick Househeldt, said he once saw a chair in the haunted room swivel of its own accord. "But that could have been anything," he pointed out.

A night in a haunted mansion

Househeldt met me at Eppes House on Sunday as the sun was going down. "My friends decided the best idea would be to come over here tonight and scare the living daylights out of you," he said, "but I convinced them not to." I offered him a weak thank-you as he led the way up the short brick walk to the porch.

The first thing I noticed about Eppes House was that it doesn't look particularly haunted; it's just a handsome Victorian house on an island full of them. Perhaps it would be more menacing if it were isolated - up on a hill, buried in some deep forest - but it's located in downtown Fernandina Beach's historic district, neighbored by other stately Victorian homes.

The second thing I noticed was that the doors didn't squeak ominously. No disembodied voices warned me to leave, either. Househeldt showed me around briefly, told me to call him if there was trouble and wished me - a trifle ominously, I thought - good luck. Then he left me alone.

Humphreys, along with previous owners, has modernized the place without sacrificing its Victorian charm. The house features a state-of-the-art kitchen and a pool, among other improvements. Instead of sheet-covered divans and cobwebs in the drawing room, I encountered recliners and a flat-screen plasma television, complete with surround sound. The old hardwood floors are original, though, as is the narrow staircase leading up to the haunted room.

The room itself is large and airy, with high ceilings, a bay window and, like most major rooms in the house, a fireplace. The walls are painted a cheery yellow. I sat down in a desk chair - the very one Househeldt said he'd seen move of its own accord - and tried to imagine how a spirit could stay restless in such an inviting place.

My contentment didn't last long. It wasn't fear that interrupted my sunny thoughts, but a sudden realization of the sheer amount of history locked up with me in Eppes House. All old houses have ghosts, you see - perhaps not restless spirits, but there are ghosts of a sort in the weight of accumulated memory. Thomas Jefferson Eppes stalked these halls over a century ago, his unpunished crime staining his soul. And Celeste, too - did she live here in fear of her murderous husband? Did the guilt over her role in that murder, as the legends say, finally drive her mad?

And then there were the smaller questions. Those gouges in the banister rail look as old as the house; how did they get there? Where was the stone for the living room fireplace quarried? You could live here for years, decades, and never run out of little mysteries, miniature history lessons. Even if Celeste's ghost declined to make an appearance, I decided, the night would be well worth my time.

I sat for awhile, waiting for a ghostly woman to come and talk to me, or the lights to cut off, or blood to run down the walls. None of that happened. I did hear a loud clatter somewhere downstairs at one point, but I decided - wisely, I thought - not to go investigate. Probably just the house settling.

Finally, I climbed into a day bed that would not have looked out of place in 1885 and opened a book about the Civil War. I read for awhile, still waiting for Celeste. She never showed, so around 1 a.m. I went to sleep.

And dreamed I heard, from the other end of some far corridor of history, a woman weeping. Softly.

That's a very interesting story. Thanks, Sharon.

My DH went to Graceland. He said it had an eerie feeling and they saw "something" in one of the windows. He had his camera but it was too fast for him.

I am pretty sure I had a visitor during the night earlier this week. It was in my bedroom in the middle of the night. Was in that semi-awake state when you turn over in bed sometimes. I am positive someone was standing next to my bed. Seemed male and not real tall. The thought that popped in my mind was my dad. Next week on the !8th would be the second anniversary of his death.

Didn't scare me, but it did startle me.

That would startle me, too.

I've had a few vivid dreams about my mom lately. I think she's telling me it's okay to have the Holidays w/o her.

I am sure she is letting you know that she is still around with you and no doubts wants you to be alive and enjoy the holidays.

Which is exactly what I'm going to do. I had a dear friend help me through T-Day. Xmas will be easier.

Thanks, Nanny.

Hello,
I'm new here and was wondering if I could ask a few questions and share a few things...in time. One question I'd like to ask is, "has anyone had a prophetic dream?" You know a dream that was kinda "odd"...so different that you knew it was a special dream? and then it came true...

One kinda funny thing I'd like to contribute, if I may...I have a photo of my mom and dad that my mom gave me after my dad died. Every time I hang it up weird things happen around the house. So, usually, I leave it in my closet...don't need anything adding to my natural weirdness:) Well, I finally decided to get over it and put the photo out on the side table in the livingroom. A couple of days went by and one night my husband and I were watching tv and my 6lb chihuahua began to get his fur (what he has anyway) up. He would lunge at the photo and bark like crazy. My husband said, “when did you put that back out”. I told him over a week ago. He said, “we'll put it away again will ya”. I think it really spooked him...heehhehe

This message was edited Dec 18, 2008 8:09 PM

Yes I have...but I would rather not discuss what it was about.

Dogs are very perceptive!

I completely understand...

yes, I love my dogs. I don't know what I would do with out them - they are my ears because I am very hard of hearing. When my husband has to be away at night I rely on them to hear for me.

That is interesting. Scarediecat...I love your name. ☺

Glad you could join us. This has been a fun ride and we welcome all stories.

Thanks...about the name. It only suits me one half of the time...my other self I guess. Most artist have more than one sides don't they? Tell me they do so that I won't feel odd anyway:)

I am going to share a dream thing that occurs often with me. If this isn't the correct forum/thread please let me know and I'll switch over to the correct one.

I have learned over the years that when ever I have dreams about my home that I grew up in (I'm 53 now) I know it has something to do with my family or myself. For example...

When I was about 40 years old I had a dream that I was out on my front porch of the house I grew up in. I hadn't lived in that house for 22 years, hadn't seen it for probably 10 years. Anyway, when I went onto the porch I heard heavenly praise music and began to dance. I saw my family out in the yard dancing to the music. The scene began to change...my family faded out and I saw "foreigners" dancing to a strange "foreign" music. I became very sad. I then began to move down to the right side of my porch. My porch seemed to go on and on and the further I went the darker it got. All of a sudden - at the end of the porch - I came upon a rose bush. It was full of white roses. It took my breath away, the roses were so beautiful in the darkness. I reached out to the roses, knowing that I could take as many as I wanted but I only pulled off 3. Then I hear the voice of God and I fell to my knees with my head to the ground. The voice said, "be holy, pure and righteous". I woke.

About 3 months later my husband came home from work and told me that he felt the call to go into the mission field (a child hood dream of mine) but we were in our 40s and I had long ago let the dream go.

Over the next 7 years we went into the mission field 3 time (3 roses). The love of my heart - the Lord - the white roses that filled me with unspeakable love. It took me 13 years to understand the full meaning of that dream.

I've learned to wait, sometimes a long time for the meaning of my dreams. I don't have them as often either, but that's ok cause usually with dreams comes challenges and I am enjoying my peace ...and comfort for that matter:)

That is one Beautiful Dream Scarediecat!

I believe, You have been given a gift. of Vision.

I am so Happy that yours came true.
Nice to be at Peace.

Thanks Seedtosser1. I believe we all have the gift, it just comes to us in the seasons that we need it...and that season has passed for me...as I said earlier...all is "still" for me now.

One girl on another blog (43 things - it just talks about what you have done in and life and what you want to do in life) said she keeps her dream journal on her blog ...so I decided to do the same - keep everything in one place. So if anyone is interested in reading 7 years worth of dreams you can go to http://scarediecat.blogspot.com

Thanks for listening...one of the greatest (and rarest) gifts of all is the gift of listening.

scarediecat - Beautiful dream! You know, time moves differnet for God. It could have been only one minute for Him to your 13 years :)

uugggg, very true. That's a some what daunting thought. If life seems so very long for some of us mortals...and then you stop and realize that for God it is a blink of the eye...huuuummmm. It makes one put things in a completely different perspective..

thanks for the thought...I needed that:)

There was a poor woman on a talk show recently who was wrongly convicted of murdering her own daughter and spent 13 years in prison before DNA evidence proved it was a man they had previously questioned and let go. She was pregnant with twins when she was locked up. Imagine how long those 13 years seemed to her.

13 years is a long time for anyone.

Sure is...I guess that goes with the saying...walk a mile in "their" shoes!

Another dream - a quick one...
In my dream my husband and I were walking down the sidewalk holding hands and enjoying the day. We were happy and content. As we were walking I looked up at the sky and remarked how beautiful it was. Then we began to notice small black dots. We watched them in wonder. As we watched the small black dots got closer to us and started getting a little larger. We watched, still baffled as to what they were. Soon the black dots got close enough for us to realize that they were falling from the sky, coming straight at us. Just when we realized that we were in danger we realized that the black objects were ...tires!!! Tires - falling from heaven!! My husband and I released hands and jumped off the sidewalk - dodging the tires. I woke.

In that season of my life I was attending a bible college (along with my husband). I told the dream to one of my mentors - a woman whose ministry was exclusively prayer. She simply asked me “who in your family works with tires”. Her question was sooo simple that I was taken back for a moment and then realized that my oldest son (a mechanic in the Army) worked with tires!! A few months later my husband and I graduated from the bible college and headed into another mission field - this time we went to work with Mercy Ships in Australia. We loved it there. We had found a little apartment close to the ocean where we could walk to work everyday. I was a graphic artist and my husband was an administrative assistant for the hospital ships. We were content and full of awe for the daily adventures we experienced. Six months went by in a flash - then my oldest son called us and told us that his wife of 8 years had left him and their 2 children to move in with another man. We were devastated for our grandchildren and our son. Our son is career Army - he needed family back up for the children so we immediately made plans to head home and take over the household for our son and grandchildren.

That was about 10 years ago. It was the beginning of a rough period but now...10 years later all has worked itself out and peace rules again:)

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you all.

May the Spirit(s) be with you all.

Judy
I am gone for 2 weeks, will enjoy your stories when I get back!

Scardiecat, bless you for all the wonderful work you've done on your missions away, and at home! And may you all have sweet holiday blessings.

Scardiecat, bless you for all the wonderful work you've done on your missions away, and at home!
May everyone here have sweet holiday blessings.





Edit: I just noticed that the day after Christmas is DG founder Dave's birthday, so don't forget to wish him a Happy Birthday, everybody!

This message was edited Dec 26, 2008 1:05 AM

Thanks, KyWoods!!!

I watched ashow last night called My Ghost Story. Has any of you seen this? It was quite interresting. They have video/photos of ghosts...or at least, that's what they say they are. Some are very believable. Not at all like Ghost Hunters.

Oh, how I wish I could get cable tv, sattelite, etc. so I could see shows like that. Or was it on regular tv?

i've had many of those types of dreams... here is one of them. I believe I also posted it on the other thread.

When I was little, from 1970 to the Spring of 1977, I would keep dreaming of a house. I had never been in it before. I see the street, the outside of the house, the staircase to the second floor, a room with two single beds and a closet beside the bed on the right. I remember dreaming of being in that bed and looking out the door into a hallway. To the right was a watercloset and another bedroom to the left of it and to the left of the bedroom , the stairs down to the livingroom. To the right of 'my' bedroom was a washroom.

I would also dream about rolling fields and a high stone wall, that seemed to go on forever. I also dreamed of castles and rooms of glass cases full of old things. Of a high hill, with a circular road winding three times around. It had a big edifice atop it and a fence about that.

In the Summer of 1977 my father, who was from England, decided to take us to England to meet his family. Everywhere we went was the same as my dreams. The house turned out to be my Uncle's and the room my sister and I shared was the room from my dreams. We went sightseeing with my uncles and we would average visiting 5-6 castles a day, plus many museums, churches, priories, abbeys and cathedrals. One such museum was The Bowes Museum. The wall turned out to be Hadrian's Wall, that spans the border between England and Scotland. The hill was Penshaw Hill, from the legend of The Lambton Worm. One of the castles turned out to be Bramburgh Castle on the Holy Island, Westminster Cathedral, Tynemouth Priory and St. Margaret's Church. We visited over 50 ancient sites in 14 days.


Aquene(Peace),
Moe/WautuckquesSochepo(SnowRabbit)
(__/)
(='.'=)
(")_(")

Muskouantamook Christwekonantamunat (Merry Christmas) kah(and) Wunnegen Wuske Kodtumoo(Happy New Year)!



This message was edited Dec 26, 2008 3:12 PM

What network was that show on?? Scifi?