From White House Ghosts to Reddit's Most Terrifying True Hauntings

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
Thousands of people have testified to experiencing the supernatural at
locations all across the world, and the notion of a
place being haunted is nearly universal in folklore. Many haunted
houses are said to be the real deal, complete with ghosts, spooks,
and weird things going bump in the night. Whether these

(00:23):
haunted homes and locations are real or fake, famous or not,
they are full of mystery. Do you believe a location
can be haunted? You might after listening to tonight's show,
I'm Deren Marler and this is Weird Darkness. Welcome weirdos.

(00:51):
I'm Darren Marler and this is Weird Darkness. Here you'll
find stories of the paranormal, supernatural, legends, lore, crime, conspiracy, mysterious, macabre,
unsolved and unexplained coming up in this episode. For some people,

(01:11):
living in a haunted house is a dream come true.
For others, it's a nightmare. Real haunted house stories are
not as rare as one might think, and they are
often so creepy even skeptics could acknowledge that something strange
is going on. As for anyone who can say they
lived in a haunted house. The idea that ghosts or

(01:34):
poultergeists are real? Is not all that hard to swallow.
Now bolt your doors, lock your windows, turn off your lights,
and come with me into the weird darkness. Haunted house

(02:01):
stories have become a staple of pop culture. You don't
need to look far to see the highway billboards challenging
you to spend a night in a haunted house, or
horror movies about homes built on Indian burial grounds. But
are there haunted houses in real life filled with the
ghosts of former occupants and grisly murder victims. Evidence can

(02:23):
go either way, and we only have the word of
those who tell of their experiences. These haunted locations are
infamous for the paranormal activity that has taken place there.
The White House at sixteen hundred Pennsylvania Avenue has been
the home of every American president and his family since
the John Adams administration in eighteen hundred. Homes in the

(02:48):
US don't get much more historic, and few are reported
to be more crowded with undead souls. According to legend,
the first lady to take residence in the mansion like
it so much that her spirit remains there today. Abigail Adams,
wife of John Adams can reportedly be seen hanging laundry

(03:09):
in the East room from time to time. Adams probably
doesn't get much chance to be lonely, as Dolly Madison,
wife of James Madison, has also been spotted hanging out
in spirit form in the Rose Garden. Madison, who designed
the garden during her husband's administration, allegedly returned to stop
work on the garden's removal years later. That's far from

(03:32):
all of the haunting in this landmark. In the Rose Room,
also known as the Queen's Bedroom, President Andrew Jackson has
been seen and heard laughing and swearing. Finally, many visitors
and residents of sixteen hundred Pennsylvania Avenue claim to have
seen Abraham Lincoln's ghosts walking the grounds. First Ladies Eleanor

(03:53):
Roosevelt and Grace Coolidge told of spotting Lincoln's ghost in
the appropriately titled Lincoln Bedroom as well. Queen Wilhelmina of
the Netherlands claimed that while spending the night at the
White House, she heard Lincoln knocking at her bedroom door.
I'm sure it was perfectly innocent and how real is this?
While most ghost stories seem to indicate that great traumas

(04:16):
or intense emotions are what sparkle haunting. Ghosts don't want
to hang out just anywhere. They occupy those locations where
significant events went down, and it's hard to think of
a more significant place where more dramatic decisions have been
made than at the White House. Still, with so many
people walking through the White House every day, it seems

(04:38):
an odd place for ghosts to be mucking about unseen,
and a lot of the stories about White House hauntings
are patently absurd, such as when Winston Churchill claimed to
have been taking a bath in the White House only
to emerge nude and find himself face to face with
Lincoln's ghost, although I choose to believe that one just

(04:59):
because I'm the story. Rose Hallhouse is one of the
most famous and lavish homes in Jamaica. It was first
constructed in the seventeen seventies in Montego Bay and was
recently furbished in the nineteen sixties. It is a popular
tourist attraction. In eighteen twenty, Haitian born Annie married John
Palmer of Montego Bay. John owned Rose Hall at this point,

(05:23):
and it ran as a plantation utilizing slave labour. John
died soon after returning to Rose Hall with his Haitian bride.
According to local legends, Annie was a psychopath who used
voodoo and violence to dominate the men of the plantation.
She allegedly manipulated the string of new husbands she acquired

(05:44):
over the years, as well as the slaves who worked
on the plantation, tolerating them for a time, only to
murder them when she lost interest. It is said that
Annie was eventually killed by another powerful magician, a slave
whose family member shee had tried to curse. Annie was
buried in a special grave on the property, and her

(06:05):
spirit reportedly remains in Rose Hall to this day. The site,
in addition to being a tourist attraction, has been home
to seances and other attempt to commune with Annie's spirit.
She's come to be known as the White Witch of
Rose Hall. But is it true? Almost certainly not. Aside

(06:26):
from a book apparently inspired by the house from the
nineteen twenties, there is nothing in the historical record to
suggest that Annie Palmer was a voodoo priestess using the
house as a home base for a bloodthirsty rampage. There
was a real John Palmer who had a second marriage
to a woman named Annie, but he died soon after
the wedding and Annie had to leave the mansion. Located

(06:51):
in San Diego, California, The Waley House was built over
the site where James Robinson, nicknamed Yankee Jim, was executed
in eighteen fifty two after a conviction of grand larceny.
A few years after the hanging, Thomas Whaley purchased the
land and constructed the home for his family, hence the

(07:11):
name Whaley House. Yankee Jim was a relatively infamous character
in the area. Eventually, he and two other men were
arrested for stealing a boat, and he was condemned to die.
On the day of the execution, Yankee Jim was said
to have swung like a pendulum, going back and forth
for an hour before he finally died. Thomas Whaley was

(07:32):
there to witness it. After moving into the home built
atop the site of the execution, the Whaleys began hearing
strange noises, including the sounds of boots stomping around the house.
Soon enough, the story spread that the ghost of Yankee
Jim was still wandering the grounds, angry about his death sentence.

(07:52):
Since the Whaleys and their descendants stopped living in the
house in the nineteen fifties, other visitors began to notice
strange things. Some reported seeing not Yankee Jim, but the
ghosts of Thomas Whaley, his wife and children. Even television
personality Regis Philbin has claimed to have seen a spirit
in the home. Should we believe it Beyond first hand accounts,

(08:15):
The most compelling evidence to date of the haunting of
Whaley House includes a series of photos appearing to show
smokelike apparitions, and we all know how weary we should
be of paranormal photography. A brief history lesson. Anne Boleyn
was the second wife of King Henry, the eighth of England.

(08:36):
Henry grew displeased with Anne after she failed to produce
a male heir, though she did give birth to a daughter,
the future Queen Elizabeth, and two stillborn babies. Henry decided
to be with his new mistress, also named Anne Anne Seymour,
so he had Anne Boleyn arrested and locked up in
the Tower of London. It was there she was executed

(08:57):
for several falsified charges on May nineteenth, fifteen thirty six.
Blickling estate in Norfolk was where Anne was born, though
the Bolin family home no longer stands on the grounds.
The circumstances surrounding Bolin's death have made her a key
figure of fascination in British history. Almost immediately after her execution,

(09:19):
stories of her practicing witchcraft and even laughing in the
face of death started to spread. Even the Governor of
the Tower of London, present at her execution reportedly said
this lady had much joy and pleasure in death. Each
year on May nineteenth, it is said that a headless
Anne Bolen visits Blickling Hall. Apparently she's a nostalgic ghost.

(09:44):
According to local legend, Anne arrives each year in a
carriage led by a headless horseman, though it's not exactly
known where the head of the horseman lies. Anne carries
her detached skull along with her for the ride. Anne's father,
Sir Thomas Bolin, is also thought to haunt the grounds.
There are so many stories about Anne Boleyn's ghost appearing

(10:05):
in various spots all over England, it's a bit difficult
to take any of them too seriously. For example, on Christmas,
Anne appears in Kent at Heber Castle, as well as
in Essex at Rochefort Hall, where her family also spent time.
Either Anne is seriously committed to being a ghost or

(10:25):
people are just fascinated by her and thus see her
in many places. In Northern Ireland. Overlooking the sea is
the picturesque bally Galley Castle. The castle was built in
sixteen twenty five by James Shaw of Scotland and his wife.
The home remained in the Shaw family until the early

(10:45):
nineteenth century, when it was sold by James Shaw's descendant, Williamshaw.
Today it is operated as a hotel by Hastings Hotel Group.
It holds the distinction of being the only occupied residence
from the seventeenth century in Northern Ireland. Perhaps the most
notable ghostly resident of the castle is Lady Isabella Shaw,

(11:07):
the wife of James Shaw. According to one's story, after
Lady Shaw gave birth to a boy, the prized male
heir for Lord Shaw, her husband locked her away in
the castle's tower, separating mother from child. While attempting to
escape and steal back her baby, Ladyshaw allegedly fell to
her death from the tower. Today, she's believed to wander

(11:30):
the hallways and the tower room, occasionally knocking on the
doors to random rooms looking for her child. Madam Nixon,
another former resident, also appears from time to time in
the castle, wandering around in a silk dress. There is
a room in the castle located within the turret that
is locally known as the Ghost Room, which I have

(11:52):
linked to a photo of in the show notes, and
the room is not rented out to guests. Numerous other
ghost stories have circularly relating to the castle. One former
manager of the hotel claims to have once set up
an elaborate dinner party in an area known as the
Dungeon Room, only to return and find the table in
complete disarray. Others have said that due to all the

(12:15):
battles that have taken place on or near the grounds,
that the ghosts of dead soldiers still appear to visitors
on the property. A variety of psychic mediums claims to
have detected restless spirits in various points in the castle
as well, with one notably claiming that the hotel had
more ghosts occupying its rooms than guests. The place certainly

(12:39):
seems creepy. Furthermore, former manager Olga Henry, herself a skeptic
when it comes to hauntings, has some pretty creepy anecdotes
about guests who received considerable scares. One in particular concerns
a guest staying alone who felt the presence and even
heard the noises of children in his room. But alas

(13:00):
it seems that the ghost room may in fact just
be a gimmick, certain bloggers have stayed in the room
and not actually observed anything supernatural. One noted that the
ghost room is surprisingly modern and not even locked away
from the rest of the hotel, which seems like a
precaution that you would take if there were actually ghosts around.

(13:27):
When we're darkness returns, I'll tell you about a few
more famous or in this case infamous, real question mark
haunted houses. It'll be up to you to decide whether
to believe they are real or not.

Speaker 2 (13:41):
Up next.

Speaker 1 (14:01):
Raenham Hall was built in Norfolk, England, in sixteen twenty
at the behest of Sir Roger Townsend. The home was
built in a popular Italian style that would become the
rage in England many years later, making Raynham Hall notably
ahead of its time and known as one of the
finest stately country homes in the area. The home is

(14:23):
also notable for the extensive work done on the house
by famous English designer William Kent. Many of Kent's finest pieces,
along with a variety of other artwork he hand picked
for Raynham, can still be found in the home to
this day. One of Sir Roger's descendants, Charles Townsend, married
a woman named Dorothy Walpole in seventeen twelve. It's rumored

(14:46):
that Lord Townshend found out his wife was having an
affair and locked her up in the home in seventeen
twenty five, where she died a year later from illness.
The first sighting of her ghost, which came to be
known as the Brown lan because of her brown dress,
took place at Christmas in eighteen thirty five, where a
guest of the house saw her in the halls. He

(15:08):
said that she was wearing a brown satin dress and
seemed to glow from behind her empty eye sockets. His
account led to many of the house servants leaving the
house immediately refusing to return. Numerous notable figures claimed to
have seen the Brown Lady while staying in Raynham Hall.
In fact, one of the first and most infamous encounters

(15:29):
happened to King George the Fourth when he stayed in
one of the homes staterooms. He claims to have woken
up to find the deathly pale lady hovering near his bed.
The Brown Lady is the subject of arguably the most
famous ghost photograph of all time, which I'll link to
in the show notes for you. However, the Brown Lady
story does feel a bit like the product of the

(15:51):
Victorian fascination with both the occult and sexual moralizing, rather
than an accurate account of the townshend marriage. It's hard
to argue with the seriousness and integrity of some of
these witnesses. In the early eighteen hundreds, farmer John Bell
and his family moved from North Carolina to Red River,

(16:13):
Tennessee today called Adams, Tennessee. He eventually came to own
over three hundred acres of property in the area and
became a respected local leader and elder of the town church.
By most accounts, strange things started happening on the Bell
family farm around eighteen seventeen, which have been blamed on
an entity known as the Bell Witch, the subject I

(16:37):
covered recently in the podcast. I'll link to it in
the show notes for you. There are several popular stories
about the Bell Witch. Here are a few of the
more intriguing variations. John Bell found a strange animal on
the property that looked like a half dog, half rabbit.
The Bell children started hearing strange sounds, which at times

(16:58):
resembled vermin invading their rooms and gnawing at their beds.
Faint whispering heard around the house that resembled an old
woman softly singing hymns. The Bells found a vial of
unknown liquid sitting around the house. They tested it out
by giving some to the cat, which soon died. Bell

(17:19):
grew ill in eighteen twenty by some accounts, owing to
the stress and terror of believing a witch was haunting him.
In other accounts, John became sick because the Bell Witch
had given him some of the strange liquid that killed
the cat. It was said that after John's funeral, the
Bell Witch could be heard laughing and singing in the graveyard.

(17:40):
President Andrew Jackson certainly believed this was all true. He
became intrigued by stories of the haunting, and in eighteen
nineteen took a trip there to investigate. Further peculiar things
started happening almost immediately upon his arrival at the farm,
such as the wagon he was bringing suddenly became immobile,
with horses refusing to budge. However, it's hard to tell

(18:04):
how much of this report is folklore versus actual history.
Most accounts at the Bell Witch come from an eighteen
ninety four book by journalist Martin van Buren Ingram called
An Authenticated History of the Belle Witch of Tennessee, which
was written decades after the events took place. The story
has inspired a number of notable pop culture haunted houses

(18:25):
and ghost stories. The horror film An American Haunting is
a largely fictionalized retelling of the bell Witch story, though
in this version John Bell is raping his daughter and
the bell Witch is actually a manifestation of her anger
and grief. Borley is a small town in Essex, England,
near the border with Suffolk on the eastern coast of

(18:48):
the country. In eighteen sixty three, the location became home
to a church also called Borley, which had a large
rectory on the grounds, built by its first recorder, Reverend
Henry Dawson. According to later paranormal investigations, there was ghostly
activity on the property, some which was connected to tragedies

(19:09):
that happened centuries earlier. The origin of the ghostly nun
story dates back to the site's original purpose as a monastery,
a claim that has not been proven by historical records. Supposedly,
a monk from the monastery carried on an affair with
a nun from a nearby convent. When the couple were
found out, the monk was beheaded and the nun walled

(19:31):
up inside the cellar, where she died. Reverend Bull's own
family reported seeing a sorrowful ghost nun haunting the grounds
in nineteen hundred, and the nun appeared to servants, villagers,
and others who visited Borley Rectory after Reverend Bull died.
His own ghost was reportedly cited. In the late nineteen twenties.
Reverend guy Eric Smith and his family lived at the

(19:54):
Borley Rectory for a year and experienced a great deal
of paranormal phenomena. Why did the then noted paranormal investigator
Harry Price to inspect the rectory. Price claimed to discover violent,
chaotic poltergeist activity. Reverend Smith and his wife moved out.
The next reverend to move in was Lionel Foyster, who

(20:16):
arrived at the rectory with his beautiful wife, mary Anne.
The spirit of the rectory appears to have taken a
liking for mary Anne, singling her out for attention, and
allegedly even writing messages on the walls for her, one example,
writing mary Anne, please help get Foyster arranged then to
have the home exercised of evil spirits, which is said

(20:38):
to have worked for a time, but soon enough the
vengeful spirits returned, attacking Foyster's child, turning wine to ink,
and other horrors. The Foyster family moved out of the
rectory shortly after. Harry Price, still intrigued by the strange
phenomena happening at the rectory, rented it himself in nineteen

(20:59):
thirty seve and began a series of tests and experiments
meant to determine exactly what was happening at Borley Rectory.
A year after Price stayed there, the rectory burned down.
Price returned to inspect the grounds in nineteen forty three
and claims to have found a jawbone that could have
belonged to a nun. Harry Price's team logged a large

(21:22):
amount of research and observations relating to their time spent
at Borley Rectory, and a number of photographs of spirits
came out of the period as well. A number of
the original individuals involved in the Borly legends spoke publicly
about their experiences, including Mary Anne, who suspected that some
of the actions credited to the Bory ghost were probably

(21:43):
hoaxes or fakes, but still maintained the house was likely haunted.
It's also extremely unlikely that the story about the ghost
none is accurate, and by the nineteen thirties this version
of events had already been widely discredited. It's believed to
have come from a popular novel at the time by
Rider Haggard. This obviously hurts the believability of all the

(22:06):
later stories, as the undead nun trapped forever in the
rectory walls seems to have been the original source for
all the other legends. Finally, though a series of exorcisms
were undertaken, and Price even found the jawbone amidst the
rubble and gave it a proper Christian burial. Sightings of
ghosts around where the rectory stood continue to this day.

(22:29):
What more could this ghost possibly want? After centuries of
wandering around aimlessly. The Edinburgh Castle in Scotland that sits
atop the famous volcanic castle Rock was constructed by King
David First in the twelfth century, and it remained the
seat of the Scottish king until the English overtook it

(22:49):
in sixteen fifty. After that it endured many sieges and
was used as a prison in the eighteenth and early
nineteenth centuries battles. Today the site is one of Scotland's
most popular tourist attractions and one of the most iconic
images of the country, or should I say the legends.

(23:10):
Because of the location's key significance in Scottish history, there
are too many ghost stories circulating about the place to
even compress into anything less than an essay, So in brief,
the ghostly drummer and piper can be heard through the
castle whenever it's about to be attacked. Obviously, this hasn't
happened in a while. Prior to sixteen fifty siege of
the castle by Cromwell's forces, the drummer was spotted and

(23:33):
identified as the ghost of a headless boy. The dungeons,
where numerous prisoners were held and tortured, are thought to
be populated by some of the restless spirits and visitors
can now tour the Dungeons to find out for themselves.
While many believe it not to be true, there is
in fact more evidence pointing toward Edinburgh Castle being haunted

(23:53):
than almost any other place on earth. In two thousand
and one, a study was conducted on the castle, testing
the reaction of people who had never before heard the
legends of its haunting to exploring the castle. Fifty one
percent of the subjects reported experiencing something supernatural in areas
that were previously identified as haunted. In other areas, only

(24:15):
thirty five percent of subjects reported supernatural goings on. Among
the reports were strange shadows and the sensation of something
tugging at your clothes. The Gothic style Crescent Hotel of
Eureka Springs, Arkansas, is sometimes called the Grand Old Lady
of the Ozarks, and it's often listed as the most

(24:39):
haunted place in all the Ozark Mountains, a location known
for its colorful folklore. The hotel and spa was designed
by famed Missouri architect Isaac Taylor and built in eighteen
eighty six. Eureka Springs had recently become infamous as the
hum of healing spring waters, which were believed to have

(24:59):
cure properties for all variety of ailments. Tourism to the
area also got a boost when a stop on the
newly built Friscool Railroad was built close by. Interest in
the resort waned by the turn of the century after
it became clear that the springs, though delightful for holiday goers,
didn't actually help cure anything. It has been run in

(25:21):
the intervening years alternatively as a hotel and health clinic,
and is currently open as a spa and resort. Rumors
and stories about hauntings at the Crescent started as soon
as construction began. It said that one of the workers
in most accounts, a Stonemason named Michael, plunged from the
roof to his death, landing in the spot currently occupied

(25:44):
by Room two eighteen. Naturally strange noises have been reported
in this room over the years by guests. Most of
the horror stories surrounding the Crescent concerned the years it
was operated by a Charlatan named Norman Baker. Baker, who
not a licensed physician, intended to use the Crescent as
a clinic for people with cancer. Local legends sprung up

(26:08):
around the clinic, however, about Baker's cruel and gruesome treatments.
Baker was arrested in connection with the scheme in nineteen
forty and did four years in prison, abandoning the hospital thereafter,
but it's said that the ghosts of his tormented patients
still linger here, most famously a nurse named Theodora. There's

(26:29):
also a ghostly cat named Morris. The Crescent is a
popular location for TV shows and documentaries about ghost hunters,
and has appeared on sci fi channels, ghost Hunters, NBC's
Today Show, A and e's Haunted Road Trips, and elsewhere.
It's important to bear in mind, though, that much of
the Crescent's business depends on the fascination with its haunting,

(26:51):
so it's in everybody's financial best interests to make sure
that there are an appropriate number of sightings well. Baker
was never charged with torturing or brutalizing patients, merely with
defrauding them. The Biltmore Estate in Asheville, North Carolina, is
the largest private residence in the United States. The Gothic

(27:15):
style mansion house covers four acres within its walls, with
one hundred and seventy five thousand square feet and two
hundred and fifty rooms under one roof and sits on
a plot of over eight thousand acres of land. Reportedly,
over one million people visit the attraction annually. The home
was built by George Washington Vanderbilt between eighteen eighty nine

(27:37):
and eighteen ninety five and remains tied to descendants of
the Vanderbilt family. The home was built in a chateau
style inspired by French Renaissance architecture. Following George Vanderbilt's death
in nineteen fourteen, his wife Edith claimed to still see
him and speak with him around the house. Servants attested

(27:58):
to seeing Edith having full conss with their late husband,
though none of them apparently saw the ghost. Others have
claimed to see George's ghosts relaxing in his favorite sitting
room on the second floor, or hearing the ghosts of
George and Edith conversing late at night in the halls.
Other guests have reported seeing an orange cat, sometimes appearing headless,

(28:20):
or hearing strange things, and feel terror near the indoor
swimming pool. Due to the popularity of the Biltmore among tourists,
there are dozens of eye witness accounts and anecdotes about
strange goings on at the estate. It seems, if nothing else,
that there must genuinely be some way to explain the
bevy of strange sounds people are hearing, particularly by the

(28:43):
Pool area. Sites like Yahoo Answers even have numerous people
testifying to experiences with ghosts at the Biltmore. Plus. Unlike
most haunted locations that now serve as tourist destinations, the
Biltmore downplays the spirit world connection on their website and
in promotional materials. Counterintuitively, this lends an air of credence

(29:06):
to the rumors. William Wirt Winchester, heir to the Winchester
Rifle fortune, was happily married to wife Sarah, and in
eighteen sixty six they had a daughter, who lived for
less than a year because of ill health. William's death
followed in eighteen eighty one, plunging Sarah Winchester into a

(29:26):
deep depression and also leaving her with an estimated twenty
million dollar inheritance. In eighteen eighty six, Sarah Winchester used
some of the money to move from her home in
New Haven, Connecticut, to San Jose, California, and begin construction
on a lavish mansion. The house was constantly under construction

(29:47):
twenty four hours a day, seven days a week, for
the next twenty years until the nineteen oh six San
Francisco earthquake. Sarah died in nineteen twenty two. She paid
workers to make all soort some improvements in the home
at all hours, day and night, often demolishing one improvement
to add another. One particularly befuddling addition was a staircase

(30:10):
to nowhere, having been built on the upper floor of
the home and ending at the ceiling. It estimated Winchester,
over the course of her life, spent approximately five million
dollars on the home, or seventy one million dollars in
today's money. The spooky story of Winchester House begins before
the property was even built. It said that Sarah had

(30:32):
met with a psychic medium in Boston who told her
she was being haunted by the spirits of all those
people killed with her late husband's rifles, and she must
move west and build a mansion to house all of
these undead souls. Apparently, Sarah believed that should she ever
stop working on the home, the spirits would overtake and

(30:52):
kill her. Other variations of the story say that Sarah
believed her husband and daughter had already been killed by
these spirits, and building the mysterious home was hopefully a
way to make the ghosts confused and keep them from
finding and killing her as well. This would explain some
of the peculiarities of the home's design and its maze

(31:14):
like layout. The presence of only two mirrors may also
play into Sarah's alleged paranoia, as she believed spirits were
afraid of their own reflections. Sarah was also fixated on
the number thirteen, so much of the house's design revolves
around that figure, including the ringing of a large bell
thirteen times every Friday the thirteenth. In subsequent years, Sarah

(31:39):
herself has become part of the ghostly mythology of the house,
with later visitors claiming they have seen her spirit lingering
around the property. It seems definitely true that Sarah Winchester
was an odd lady who had some kind of fixation
with the occult and the supernatural, as very little in
the way of rational explanations for the mystery House, particularly

(32:02):
the stairways leading to nowhere and the obsessive number thirteen details.
It also is certain that the house holds a certain
fascination for visitors and is definitely creepy, But was Sarah
Winchester really being haunted? Tourists have reported many of the
now recognizable calling cards of the haunted house, strange footsteps

(32:24):
and creaking floorboards, odd reflections in the home's many mirrors,
faint whispers heard around corners or behind closed doors, and
the usual gathering of psychics and paranormal investigators have toured
the home, many of them convinced that there is some
kind of spirit energy in the place, but nothing concrete

(32:45):
indicating a ghostly presence has ever been identified in the house,
and its ongoing popularity as a tourist destination is probably
enough reason for the rumor mill to continue even in
the absence of evidence. Adding more mystery to the all
at a Mysterious House, it was reported in October twenty
sixteen that a one hundred sixty first room had been

(33:06):
discovered and opened to the public in attic space, containing
a pomp organ couch, sewing machine, paintings, and other items.
The room was apparently boarded up by Sarah Winchester after
the nineteen oh six earthquake. She'd become trapped in the
room and believed evil spirits had caused the widespread destruction.

(33:28):
Once said to have been visited by blonde bombshell Marilyn
Monroe and playwright Arthur Miller, the Chandler Estate is secluded
deep in the spooky woods of Mount Sinai, New York.
Originally built as a resort, it was later turned into
an apartment complex. The building mysteriously burned to the ground.

(33:48):
For many years, the Chandler Estate became synonymous locally with
the practice of Satan worship. Stories circulated about the tourists
being lured into the area to then either witness Satanic
cultrige jewels or be directly threatened by Satanists. One story
tells of a resident who returned home to find a
bunch of creepy, devil obsessed children in his apartment. One spot,

(34:12):
near where the fire escape was once located, seems to
be a particular conduit for other worldly visitors. People who
have stood in the spot report experiencing dizziness, blurred vision,
and difficulty breathing. But the most famous spirit said to
occupy the estate is Mary, a mental patient who had

(34:33):
once been a resident to the boarding house there until
her mysterious disappearance. Missus Chandler, who was then running the
boarding house, claimed that even after the disappearance, she would
sometimes see the lights go on and off in Mary's room,
and people thought they saw her wandering the property almost
assuredly not though. The legend of Mary may go back

(34:55):
to the name Mary that was genuinely written on one
of the doors in the old estate, but it's unclear
if this ever linked up to a real person named
Mary who lived in the apartment, or if she was
indeed a mental patient who vanished under mysterious circumstances. Blurry,
indistinct photos are the only real evidence of supernatural happenings

(35:17):
at the Chandler. In eighteen thirty two, the wealthy and
glamorous Creole socialite Marie Delphine Laurie built an opulent mansion
in the French quarters of New Orleans, where she lived
with her third husband, doctor Lewis LaLaurie. Even by the
abhorrent standards of the time, Madame Mlaurie was considered to

(35:38):
be exceptionally cruel to her slaves, so much so that
nine of her slaves were confiscated by law enforcement. Though
l Laurie set up her relatives to secretly buy them
back and return them to her. Rumors continued to swirl
about Lluri until the kitchen fire in eighteen thirty four
revealed the terrible truth. Firefighters found the Glory's seventy one

(36:01):
year old cook chained to the stove. The cook confessed
she had set the fire on purpose in desperation to
avoid being sent to the attic, where she knew terrible
tortures took place. When firefighters burst into the attic, they
witnessed unimaginable atrocities. Slaves have been chained and subjected to terrible,

(36:22):
disgusting tortures and mutilations. Madame Mlori escaped punishment and fled
the house, never to be seen again. Following the Civil War,
the now abandoned Llori House was used for several purposes,
including a school, a furniture store, and apartments, but none
lasted very long. The mansion was eventually converted into an

(36:43):
apartment building, where occupants reported a large amount of supernatural activity,
such as the ghosts of former slaves. None of the
supernatural stories surrounding the apparently cursed mansion have been conclusively proven,
of course, but it is a popular spot for New
Orleans gould ghoshunters, and it's featured in horror films and television.

(37:05):
The Large Myrtle's Plantation Hub began in seventeen ninety six
in Louisiana by General David Bradford, who had a land grant,
but owners in the early to mid nineteenth century remodeled
and built up the mansion. The large plantation house boasts
twenty two rooms and a veranda that ran the entire
length of the facade. There are rumoured to be at

(37:28):
least a dozen ghosts haunting the property, the most famous
of which is that of Chloe, a slave who was
sleeping with the plantation owner. Chloe began to fear he
was growing tired of her and would soon send her
to much more difficult work in the fields, so she
intentionally maked a poisoned cake for his young daughters. Her

(37:48):
plan was to make them only a little ill and
then miraculously cure them and nurse them back to health,
earning herself a permanent place within the house staff. Tragically,
she miscut calculated the dose and accidentally killed the daughters,
as well as the owner's wife. In punishment, Chloe was hanged.

(38:08):
In addition, the home was thought to have been built
on an Indian burial ground. These ghosts have supposedly showed
up in at least two different photographs. A ghostly girl
appeared in a photograph taken in nineteen ninety two by
a National Geographic explorer. Later, a teacher and her students
posed for a photo while on a field trip to
the Myrtle's plantation, and the little girl's ghosts appears to

(38:30):
be visible in the window behind them. Much of the
history surrounding the house has been found to be little
more than tall tales, though it's claimed at least ten
people have been murdered in the house, though in reality
there's only one documented case. In January eighteen seventy one,
an attorney named William Winter was shot in front of

(38:51):
the house by a stranger without explanation and without warning,
and died. In addition, a number of people, including children,
died in the home of Yellow Fever, as was tragically
common at the time. While filming an episode the TV
show Unsolved Mysteries there in two thousand and two, the
crew reported unexplained technical difficulties with their equipment and the

(39:15):
present day Joshua Ward House in Salem, Massachusetts is an austere,
three story brick house built in seventeen eighty four. However,
the house was built on the site of the former
home of Sheriff George Corwin, who signed the warrants for
arrests and executions during the Salem witch trials. Apparently, as

(39:36):
he died, the accused witch, Giles Cory, cursed Corwin and
every sheriff who would come after him in Essex County.
Corwin died at the young age of thirty, and his
wife had him buried in the basement of his own
home so as to prevent anyone from disinturing him or
desegrating his grave. In nineteen eighty one, Richard Carlson bought

(39:57):
the building to use for his real estate office. To
one paranormal blogger, the burglar alarm would constantly go off
at night, getting Richard or another employee out of bed
to attend to it. Doors would shut on their own,
and lights would go on and off, activated by unseen hands.
It one particularly interesting incident, an employee had two candlesticks

(40:18):
on the fireplace mantle in her office. As she unlocked
her office one morning, she noticed that the candlesticks were
turned upside down on the mantle, and the candles themselves
were actually on the floor, one bent in an S
shape and the other into a boomerang shape, as if
they had been melted and manipulated. Most frightening, an employee

(40:40):
was taking photos of everyone who worked in the office
to use as holiday decorations, but when he took a
photo of one young woman, the terrifying image of a
witch turned up instead. There are other explanations offered for
the so called witch photo, but the connection of the
house with the Salem witch trials is a fact, and

(41:00):
no doubt leads to the homes spooky vibe. Up Next,
we move from the more well known haunts to the
completely unknown ones, stories from ordinary people like you and

(41:22):
me who've had their own personal experiences with a ghost
or poltergeist or something possibly even more sinister. These stories,
when weird darkness returns. Not all haunted locations are as

(41:56):
famous as those we've already covered. In fact, you've likely
never heard of a majority of haunted spots personal homes
of no one in particular, aside from the fact that
something creepy or terrifying has happened to them there, and
people on Reddit are always anxious to share their frights
with the world. From redditor lt obvious. I was a

(42:19):
teenager at the time, and I was instant messaging my
girlfriend with my webcam turned on. I had the viewer
up so that I could see myself in the webcam.
Behind me, there was a stairs leading up left of
camera view and the entrance to the living room right
of cameraview. My younger sister would typically fall asleep every
night on the couch in front of the TV and

(42:40):
make her way up to bed in the middle of
the night. At one point in my webcam view, I
saw my sister leave the living room and go up
the stairs. The thing that struck me as odd was
that I didn't hear anything. He was an older Victorian house,
so the wooden floor and stairs were loud. Without saying
any thing to my girlfriend, I got up and looked

(43:02):
into the living room and there was my sister passed
out on the couch. I sat back down and asked
my girlfriend if she had seen anything in my camera.
She said, yeah, I just saw your sister go upstairs.
From reditor Lunches and bentos. One Saturday morning, my husband
was on his computer in another room. I'm in the

(43:24):
apartment playing with a tamagotchi app on my iPad when
I hear the stereo sitting in front of me click
on and a girl's voice started talking from it. I
thought he controlled the stereo from his computer, so I
ignored it because he often puts on music to work
out before class. He teaches the morning class. I do
remember thinking what kind of weird indie music is he

(43:46):
listening to? Anyway, because the voice just said, Hi, my
name is I thought I heard Katie, but I'm not
one hundred percent sure because I wasn't paying attention. I
am blank years old, I'm from blank Et, cetera. I
didn't catch the specifics because I wasn't really listening. But
that went on for about two or three minutes until

(44:07):
it suddenly went Something's hurting me. And when I caught that,
I looked up and squinted at the stereo. Something's killing me.
Something's killing me. At this point, the hair is standing
on the back of my neck and I'm getting up
from the couch to take a closer look. Please someone
tell my parents, Tell the teachers, tell the corrections officer

(44:28):
at the word corrections officer. I just bolt into the
other room and start yelling at my husband and cursing
him out because I was certain he was playing a
trick on me. Told we don't e FN play jokes
about dead people, and he's of course looking at me
like what uh. And when he finally calms me down
long enough to get what I heard out of me
and what I was accusing him of, he told me

(44:50):
it was impossible. It led me to the stereo. It's
not plugged in. I thought maybe the stereo picked up
the signals from an ebook or something from Redditor. Nine
seventy five, I moved from the US to the UK
and our parents bought an old, beat up house. It

(45:10):
still had lead pipes for the water. Anyway, work proceeded
on the house whilst we lived there. We started seeing
bright lights in the corners of rooms at night, footsteps
on floorboards. The house had carpet. I was about six
at the time and started getting woken up in the
night by a little girl who would dance on my
chest of drawers for me. I was terrified. My mom

(45:33):
just fobbed it off as me dreaming. Workmen complained of
strange things happening like tools being moved, and odd feelings
like being watched. After about a year or this, my
eldest sister's friend stayed overnight. She woke the whole house
up screaming, saying a little girl had been in her room.
She had apparently been pulled from her bed. The friend

(45:55):
left the house and refused to ever come back. Mom
decided she might need to do something about it and
got some advice. He suggested my mom and the whole
family should treat the presence as part of the family.
So when we got home, we'd shout, Hi, we're home.
Did you have a good day. Over time, the house
settled down and we didn't get any more troubles. We

(46:16):
also found out that a little girl did die in
the House of Asthma. My parents still live there and
it is a beautiful, homely place now. From reditor the
Toenaio Collector. I lived in a haunted house when I
was a teen along with my parents. One day, I
was underneath my truck, which was supported by only a

(46:39):
jack Stupid, I know, I was in the middle of
working on it with no good reason to get out
at that moment. Suddenly I had the overwhelming urge to
get out from underneath. No sooner than I got out,
the truck fell to the ground. The jack had slipped.
Freaked Dad out. He thought I was under it. When
Mom got home, we mentioned it and she started crying,

(47:01):
sobbing pretty hard. Turns out the previous owner died in
the driveway under a vehicle. In that spot, I would
often see moving shadows and strangely hear music from the
upstairs area. The windows of the old house were cocked shut,
and blackbirds would often get caught between the panes. We

(47:21):
ended up replacing all the windows, but we had to
break three inside panes to get them out. One of
the more disturbing things happened when my mother was cooking breakfast.
She turned away to get something out of the cabinet,
and when she turned back around, all the forks set
out were bent straight up from redditor twig snapper. My

(47:44):
uncle's house out on a very eastern part of New
York was said to be haunted. The old stableman and
the maid were said to have haunted the place. We
always used to joke that you'd hear people or things
moving at night, but since the house is so old,
we just laughed it off. My uncle's friend had her
and a sister stay over at the house one night,
and the friend noticed a maid bringing towels down the stairs.

(48:07):
When she woke, she saw the maid again bringing what
looked like a percolator down the stairs. She was so
impressed by my uncle hiring staff. He's a neurologist in
New York City, so he had a habit of spending
a little bit extra. She went back to bed and
woke up later downstairs to see my uncle and his
friend just chatting. She asked where the maid went, and

(48:28):
she thought that the maid was cooking breakfast. My uncle
had no idea what she was talking about and asked
what the maid looked like. The sister explained, and he laughed.
Walked her to the living room and pointed to an
old picture. She said that was the woman. My uncle replied, yeah,
she's been dead for about one hundred years. From Redditor Rayali.

(48:55):
I grew up with the cat Boots, who was just
a year my junior. Boots was motivated only by food
and spent his later years sleeping on my parents' bed
until someone came home. Then he'd jump off the bed
with a funk thunk, of his front and back paws
hitting the ground, and then run to his food bowl
to beg He had to be put down. When I
was eighteen, my parents moved out of my childhood home.

(49:19):
During my first year of college. I went back a
few times before it sold. Every time I was certain
I felt the cat's presence, like i'd hesitate my step
because I was sure a cat just walked under my
legs kind of thing. Also, upon walking in, I'd always
hear a funk thunk, like boots jumping down to beg
for food. My mom and I went back for the

(49:41):
last day my family would ever be in that home,
and I told her on the way what I'd experienced.
To my surprise, she had the exact same feeling when
we walked into the house funk thunk. We exchanged shocked
glances and confirmed we both heard it. I went and
sat in my empty while my mom got the final
things together, and while my eyes were closed, I had

(50:04):
to force myself to not pet a cat that I
felt walk up to me because I knew logically he
wasn't there. Before leaving, we stood in the hallway outside
my parents' bedroom. I said, I thought boots were still
around and suggested we take his spirit to the new house.
She agreed, so she called out Bootsy from my parents' room. Thunk, thunk.

(50:26):
We both heard it. I don't think he came with us.
He never liked car rides, but I hope the owners
since us have enjoyed their ghost Kittie. He was a
good boy from Redditor, most likely need help. One man
ended himself in the garage, and the other fell ill
and perished in his bed. In the basement of my house,

(50:49):
I lived in the basement room and often just felt
like I was being watched all the time. The bedroom
in the basement has a secret storage room behind a
bookshelf with a locking latch. I'd always wake up to
find the door wide open. It happened so often that
I'd wake up cold and routinely go shut and lock
the latch of the door in the middle of the night.

(51:11):
For the longest time, I thought it was my dad
or stepbrothers messing with me, but it wasn't. My stepbrother
now occupies that room, and he says it still happens
to him, and that he's even seen it open on
its own. There are no air vents or anything, so
I've ruled out wind. Also in the garage, I always
see light coming from under the door through the crack,

(51:33):
only to open the door to pitch black. I've heard
sounds coming from the garage, only to find saw blades
clanging together and slightly rotating in their place on the
whole storage wall. I didn't think anything of it at first,
but when you find stuff moving on more than one occasion,
it makes you look over your shoulder. From redditor fit

(51:56):
nurse six. Two weeks before we moved, my dad and
I toward our house and I noticed this guy was
painting the water heater, which I thought was weird, but
I was ten, so whatever. Anyway, we moved in on
a Wednesday, and my parents let me stay home from
school until the following Monday and preoccupied me with coloring
books in a new dollhouse. In my brand new crayons pack,

(52:18):
there literally wasn't a blue crayon like it was a
sixty four pack, but there were only sixty three crayons
in it. One day, I went downstairs into the basement
and my blue crayon was next to the hot water
heater and scribbled on there and said Hi, my name
signed Kevin. I was so confused. I started school and
my new classmates were like, OMG, do you live in

(52:41):
Kevin's house? Your house is going to be haunted. Turned out,
Kevin was a little eight year old boy that lived
in our house prior to us, and he got hit
by a car in the front yard. He'd write notes
if you left out a pen and paper, open and
closed doors, adjust the thermostat the kind where you had
to turn a knob, and always turn on Christmas music
when it was that time of the year. Went a

(53:03):
swing set in the backyard, and even on the hottest,
calmest days of summer, only the left swing would be
moving back and forth. We had this cat that I
would lock in my bedroom at night, and every morning
my parents would open the door and let him mount
and then close it back. One night, I woke up
and the cat was meowing at the door, and it
woke me up. But the door opened and the cat

(53:26):
hissed and ran out really fast. I asked my mom
the next morning why they didn't close my door, and
they said they didn't open it. The last story is
when I was very upset and nearly ready to take
my life one year during Christmas break, the police just
randomly showed up at my house. The policeman said he
was patrolling our neighborhood and felt like something was wrong

(53:49):
in our house. I'm absolutely certain Kevin had something to
do with it. From redditor Mt. Swagger, I watched one
of our cats being pulled backwards about five feet by
her tail. She was walking through the dining area and
suddenly was sliding backwards as if someone was pulling her

(54:10):
by her tail, only there was no one there. She
freaked out and tried to run, but couldn't. I tend
to think that was the handiwork of a four or
five year old girl ghost who hangs out and she
just wanted to play with the kitty. From reditor Economy Cactus.
When I was younger, I used to take naps upstairs,

(54:33):
but by the time I was eight years old, I
absolutely refused to go upstairs. The upstairs had two large closets.
They ran from one side of the upstairs all the
way to the other side. On both sides, it was
essentially a crawl space that was maybe thirty feet long.
It started one day when a friend and I went
crawling from one side to the other with flashlights like

(54:55):
kids normally do. And then I saw a girl sitting
there in the corner, acting like she wanted to play
with us. I know a lot of people say when
they see a ghost, they're not scared, just interested. Nope,
I was beyond terrifying. This girl looked normal, had blonde
hair and nice dress, seemed friendly. I stayed silent, kept

(55:17):
crawling behind my friend and got out of the closet
told him what I saw in there. He said he
didn't see it, but felt like he didn't want to
go back in. Then, my parents would occasionally send me
upstairs to get something, and when i'd get up there,
I would see the doors swing open, as if they
were trying to get me to come inside. I'd lose

(55:37):
toys and wouldn't be able to find them anywhere. Suddenly
my parents would be fishing Christmas presents out of the
attic and they'd find some of my toys in there.
I remember being eight years old, my parents are asleep
still in the morning, and I leashed up my dog
to go take on the monster in the attic. A
dog usually up for anything, refused to go off the

(56:00):
top step into the attic. My parents never believed me.
With all the weird things that happened in that house,
I'd get blamed for things that happened all over the house,
leaving lights on toys all over things I knew I
didn't do well. Anyway, we move out of there when
I was ten. Not a week passes before the new
owners call us up and ask if the house is haunted.

(56:23):
Their daughter sleeps upstairs. She says that she's been playing
with a blondhaired girl at night. My parents laughed at
out crazy these new homeowners must be. To make an
already long story short, the girl started appearing in other
parts of the house for them. They kept in contact
with us. They'd look over while watching TV and see
the girls sitting on their daughter's lap, et cetera. They

(56:44):
looked up on the computer. The past owners of the
house filed an old dressmaker that lived there, and yep,
the picture of the little girl wearing one of the
ladies dresses. More true stories from redditors of personally experiencing
hauntings and unexplainable creepiness are still to come when Weird

(57:08):
Darkness returns. From redditor rag x Doll, my father in

(57:34):
law passed before my son was born, so he never
met him. When we moved into our new home, my
son would often be laughing in the middle of the
night by himself. No biggie kids will play with anything.
One day, we were finally putting pictures up in the house,
and once I put up the picture of my father
in law, he said, oh, mommy, why do you have
a picture of that man that comes and plays with

(57:54):
me at night? He'd never ever seen a picture of
my father in law before. From Redditor Munchies. I lived
in an old, haunted house in college. Things got so
weird that everyone moved out except for me and one roommate.
Here's a few I woke up at three am because

(58:15):
my roommate's door kept opening and slamming shut from bed.
I yelled for him to stop, only to realize I
was the only one home that weekend. As soon as
I yelled, the slamming stopped, but the hippie beads I
had hanging outside my closet door began to sway perfectly
yet violently against the doorframe. For half an hour. While

(58:37):
I debated if I should pop out my air conditioner
unit and jump out the window, I laid in the
fetal position in bed until it stopped. Then I woke
up at three am alone, again, hearing the Nintendo in
the back porch playing loudly. I figured a drunk kid
came in and started playing. I grabbed a bat and
walked toward the back of the house as the music
got louder and louder. As soon as I opened the door,

(58:59):
it was was completely quiet. Mind you, it was loud
enough to wake me up. Another time, I had friends
over and told them the house was haunted. No one
believed me, so I asked the ghost to do anything
to prove it was there. As soon as I asked,
all the lights in the house began flickering for about
a minute straight. This was the middle of the day.

(59:21):
Everyone witnessed it. Almost everybody who stayed at my house
had sleep paralysis at least once while there, and every
time something spooky happened, the house would smell like old
lady flowery strong perfume from redditor imported thighs. I used

(59:42):
to sleep on the second floor and my sister slept
in the attic. She used to have sleep paralysis often.
Then she moved out and now I have her old room.
She no longer has sleep paralysis, but I do. From
Redditor weekly Pie had come home to the windows on
the second floor being open when it was raining, to

(01:00:04):
food containers being open in the fridge that I hadn't
touched yet. The worst was that the ghost hated clocks.
She hated them. I had antique cougoo clocks that had
worked for fifty years that would just stop, brand new
wall clocks that ate through batteries like it was candy.
My watch ended up on the floor one morning the

(01:00:26):
crystal shattered, even though I knew I slept with it on.
The one that frustrated me the most was that I
got a brand new kit cat clock for Christmas and
the ghost threw it off the wall. I was cooking
and out of the corner of my eye I saw
the cat freaking fly turned around and it was across
the kitchen broken. It was brand new from Redator count Fish.

(01:00:53):
I used to live in a big house by myself.
I was there as a hiring perk and to look
after the place for my boss, who lived out of
state but owned the home. One of those win win situations.
The first couple of months were fine, but when winter
came I started hearing things coming from the second floor.
I lived pretty much exclusively on the first floor. It

(01:01:13):
started with little bumps and bangs coming from above where
I had my computer set up, and progressed to distinct
footsteps coming and going across the second floor. I've been
up to the second floor to check up on it
from time to time, and I knew that they were
unfinished areas up there. The one place always stuck out,
an unfinished room that was a sort of walking in

(01:01:35):
closet for one of the upstairs bedrooms. It was attached
to the garage attic, completely unlt it was open. When
I went up to investigate the noises. I shut the
door and locked it. Two nights later, more noises, footsteps
leading from the unfinished room to the bathroom, and then nothing.
The worst part, the door that led to the unfinished

(01:01:57):
room would not stay closed or locked. I tried everything.
Eventually I pushed the bed up against the door to
keep it from opening. That seemed to work. A few
months went by without the door coming open, but I
would find it unlocked all the time. As time passed,
I'd hear noises all over the house, mostly footsteps, but

(01:02:18):
the occasional thump with no explanation. I cannot explain how
horrifying it is to hear little taps up and down
the hall from the other side of the bathroom door
during your morning shower. I eventually moved out, but another
employee moved in to take my place. His stay there
only lasted about a month. The story he told me

(01:02:40):
is that he was shaving one morning before work and
he heard a slam like someone dropped a heavy stack
of books right outside his bedroom door, then heavy footsteps
like someone running down the hall. He won't stay there anymore,
and no one in the company will live in the
house from redditor suspicious palm tree. I live in a

(01:03:01):
house built in the eighteen hundreds. It survived the two
World Wars, and it's seen some stuff. I imagine. One
of the previous owners had two sons who both ended
their own lives. A lot of strange stuff happens. The animals,
dog and parrots will wake up from their naps and
follow something with their heads, just as they would follow

(01:03:21):
me if I walked around. Also, before I switched rooms
in a house, my brother had a room and he
refused to sleep there as he would hear voices he
slept with my parents he was a child until the
day he got my old room, and since then has
slept in that room without problems. There's also a whole
floor we don't use, and I sleep in the attic.

(01:03:42):
I passed through that floor to get to my attic.
Weird explanation, but it's a weird house. And I have
a motion activated light there that goes on as I'm
walking the stairs to that unused floor. It also switches
on in the middle of the night while nobody is
walking under the motion detector. Also, there's cold spots from

(01:04:04):
Redditor Kulicidel. I'd fallen asleep at night with my fan
running and woke up freezing. I turned it off. Not
long after, I woke up hot and turned it back on.
This happened several times. The last time I woke up
hot once again, and the moment I opened my eyes,
I heard the pull of my fan and looked up

(01:04:25):
to see it slowly start speeding up. I said, thank you,
fell back asleep and from Redditor doctor Philly. I grew
up in a huge seventeenth century house. During my nine
years living there, I found out it was once a brothel.
It once was a plague hospital. It once was a

(01:04:47):
normal hospital, It once was a morgue. During World War II,
it was a German SS post. Napoleon slept there a
couple of days, which is pretty cool. And there were
three families where multiple occurred inside the house. As a kid,
I saw a lot of shadows, heard a lot of
weird noises the usual. My sister, who lived on the

(01:05:10):
third floor, came down to my room a lot at
night to stare at me sleepwalking, and sometimes slept in
my room and forgot about it the next night. The
doors creaked and opened and closed on themselves, a lot
which could happen in an old house due to draft.
Now this is all stuff that any kid can imagine.
Due to the suggestive state an old house can give

(01:05:31):
a person nothing really scary. Also, the alarm went off
a lot during the night. One time my parents were
in China for business, Me and my brother and sisters
slept at other places because my parents were away for
quite some time. I had to go to hockey practice,
but I forgot some gear, so me and my friend
went to get it. The house was engulfed in darkness

(01:05:53):
and very silent. As we walked out of my room,
we hear footsteps in the attic. Two of my SAIDs
had their bedrooms there, so I thought one of them
was at home. I shouted at them, which made the
footsteps stop. After five seconds or so, we heard the
footsteps coming closer to the stairs and actually setting foot
on the very old, wooden, creaky steps, one step at

(01:06:15):
a time. I actually felt a weight setting foot in
front of me. Very strange, but I saw nothing. Nevertheless,
we were twelve, so we noped out of there. Outside.
My friend had a total nervous breakdown because he saw
some scary face or form that looked like an alien
to him. He never set foot in my house again.

(01:06:38):
I credit all of it to the creepiness of the house,
but that one night with my friend still gives me chills.
Thanks for listening. If you like the show, please cheer

(01:06:58):
it with someone you know who love the paranormal or
strange stories, true crime, monsters, or unsolved mysteries like you do.
All stories in Weird Darkness are purported to be true
unless stated otherwise, and you can find source links or
links to the authors in the show notes. And now
that we're coming out of the dark, I'll leave you
with a little light Ephesians one, verse seven. In him

(01:07:21):
we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins
in accordance with the riches of God's grace. And a
final thought, you can't control how some people will treat
you or what they will say about you, but you
can control how you react to it. I'm Daryn Marler.
Thanks for joining me in the weird darkness. Welcome to Marshport, Maine,

(01:07:57):
a quaint little coastal town preparing for their annual Winter
Wonderland Festival. But beneath the lights and holiday cheer, something
evil is stirring and it's not a mouse. When a
mysterious package arrives on the doorstep of veteran police officer
Matthew Kleine and his family's home, it seems at first

(01:08:17):
like a harmless holiday gift. However, there's no tag and
no sender. Inside lies an antique wooden advent calendar with
strange engravings and twenty four doors that each shelter something
dark and unspeakable. The line between reality and nightmare quickly
becomes blurred as Matthew races to figure out the calendar's

(01:08:41):
origin and who scent it. But as each door is
opened and Marshport is thrust into a sinister nightmare. Matthew
realizes the terrifying truth and is forced to relive the
horrors from his past that refuse to stay buried. The
countdown has begun. Once that first door is opened, there

(01:09:02):
is no turning back. Weird Darkness presents Advent of Evil,
a twenty four episode audio saga beginning December first. Listen
each day for a new chapter through Christmas Eve, and
if you'd like to follow the story in print. The
full novel is now available in paperback and hardcover editions,
as well as on kindle. Grab the novel now for

(01:09:25):
yourself or for someone else and be ready to follow along.
December first, and for a limited time only, you can
also grab an Advent of Evil gift back, including a
signed copy of the novel by the author, Scott Donnelly,
wrapped up with an Advent of Evil bookmark, pen, highlighter,
hot chocolate, Chai tea chocolates, a candy cane, and some

(01:09:46):
horror stickers. The gift pack is in limited supply, so
act fast if you want to take advantage of it.
You can find links to purchase the book or the
gift back at Weirddarkness dot com, slash Advent of Evil.
That's Weird Darkness dot com, Calm slash Advent of Evil,
and then be ready as the first episode comes your

(01:10:06):
way December first,

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