December 15, 2025 • 27 mins
For four years, an unseen entity tormented the Bell family of Tennessee — pulling hair, slapping faces, filling the house with phantom voices — until Christmas 1820, when it finally got what it wanted: John Bell dead and his daughter's life in ruins. #12NightmaresOfXmas
Episode 3 of 12 in the “Twelve Nightmares of Christmas” series!
IN THIS EPISODE: “Merry Christmas From The Bell Witch”, “The Murder of Thelma Todd”
SOURCES AND ESSENTIAL WEB LINKS…
All stories in this episode are from the book, “The Spirits of Christmas: The Dark Side of the Holidays” by Sylvia Shults: https://amzn.to/3uT2vMA
Weird Darkness theme by Alibi Music Library. Background music provided by Alibi Music Library, EpidemicSound and/or StoryBlocks with paid license. Music from Shadows Symphony (https://tinyurl.com/yyrv987t), Midnight Syndicate (http://amzn.to/2BYCoXZ) Kevin MacLeod (https://tinyurl.com/y2v7fgbu), Tony Longworth (https://tinyurl.com/y2nhnbt7), and Nicolas Gasparini (https://tinyurl.com/lnqpfs8) is used with permission of the artists.
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(Over time links seen above may become invalid, disappear, or have different content. I always make sure to give authors credit for the material I use whenever possible. If I somehow overlooked doing so for a story, or if a credit is incorrect, please let me know and I will rectify it in these show notes immediately. Some links included above may benefit me financially through qualifying purchases.)
= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
"I have come into the world as a light, so that no one who believes in me should stay in darkness." — John 12:46
= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
WeirdDarkness® is a registered trademark. Copyright ©2024, Weird Darkness.
https://weirddarkness.com/BellWitchChristmas
#WeirdDarkness #BellWitch #TennesseeGhostStory #TrueScaryStories #AmericanHaunting #Poltergeist #ChristmasHorror #ParanormalActivity #FamousHaunting #HauntedHistory
Episode 3 of 12 in the “Twelve Nightmares of Christmas” series!
IN THIS EPISODE: “Merry Christmas From The Bell Witch”, “The Murder of Thelma Todd”
SOURCES AND ESSENTIAL WEB LINKS…
All stories in this episode are from the book, “The Spirits of Christmas: The Dark Side of the Holidays” by Sylvia Shults: https://amzn.to/3uT2vMA
Weird Darkness theme by Alibi Music Library. Background music provided by Alibi Music Library, EpidemicSound and/or StoryBlocks with paid license. Music from Shadows Symphony (https://tinyurl.com/yyrv987t), Midnight Syndicate (http://amzn.to/2BYCoXZ) Kevin MacLeod (https://tinyurl.com/y2v7fgbu), Tony Longworth (https://tinyurl.com/y2nhnbt7), and Nicolas Gasparini (https://tinyurl.com/lnqpfs8) is used with permission of the artists.
= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
(Over time links seen above may become invalid, disappear, or have different content. I always make sure to give authors credit for the material I use whenever possible. If I somehow overlooked doing so for a story, or if a credit is incorrect, please let me know and I will rectify it in these show notes immediately. Some links included above may benefit me financially through qualifying purchases.)
= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
"I have come into the world as a light, so that no one who believes in me should stay in darkness." — John 12:46
= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
WeirdDarkness® is a registered trademark. Copyright ©2024, Weird Darkness.
https://weirddarkness.com/BellWitchChristmas
#WeirdDarkness #BellWitch #TennesseeGhostStory #TrueScaryStories #AmericanHaunting #Poltergeist #ChristmasHorror #ParanormalActivity #FamousHaunting #HauntedHistory
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
Welcome Weirdos. I'm Darren Marler and this is Weird Darkness.
Here you'll find stories of the paranormal, supernatural, mysterious, macabre,
unsolved and unexplained. If you are new here, be sure
to subscribe to the podcast on Apple or Android so
you don't miss future episodes. This is a special twelve
(00:24):
Nightmares of Christmas episode. Each day from December thirteenth through
December twenty fourth, I'm posting a new episode of Weird
Darkness featuring material from the new book The Spirits of Christmas,
The Dark Side of the Holidays by Sylvia Schultz. Be
sure to come back every day between December thirteenth and
December twenty fourth for more holiday horrors. Now, bult your doors,
(00:50):
lock your windows, turn off your lights, put another log
onto the fire, and pour yourself an agnob and come
with me into the Weird Darkness. It's been two hundred
(01:11):
years since the Bell Family of Tennessee was tormented by
a mysterious entity known only as the Bell Witch, but
the events that unfolded between the years of eighteen seventeen
and eighteen twenty one have remained evergreen in American ghost lore,
and they are some of the most amazing tales in
(01:32):
Tennessee history. John Bell, a prosperous cotton farmer, was born
in North Carolina in seventeen fifty. He, his wife Lucy,
and their nine children moved to Robertson County, Tennessee in
eighteen oh four. Bell purchased many acres of land along
the Red River and set about improving it even more.
(01:55):
He cleared fields, planted orchards, and built a home for
his large family. He even built a one room schoolhouse
where his children and his neighbor's children could get an education.
This being Tennessee in the early nineteenth century, John Bell's
cotton plantation was worked by slaves, but Bell and his
family were very devout, and Bell himself seemed to let
(02:19):
his religious beliefs dictate his treatment of his slaves. He
doesn't seem to have been a particularly harsh master. John
Bell knelt to lead his family in prayers three times
a day, and he opened his house as a gathering
place for prayer meetings, Bible studies led by Lucy Bell,
and other worship services. John Bell was socially and politically
(02:42):
active as well. He dressed the part of a wealthy
influential businessman and landowner. When he went to town on business,
he made an imposing figure in his tailored coat with
silver buttons and his fashionable beaver hat. Bell made many
speeches in support of political candidates whose values aligned with his,
(03:03):
and he was known for personal integrity and wasn't afraid
to speak up for his beliefs. John Bell was an
upstanding citizen, a devout Christian, the benevolent head of a
large family, a careful steward of his land and property,
and a prosperous businessman. That's what made the events to
come even more startling. One day in eighteen seventeen, Bell
(03:29):
was inspecting a cornfield when he saw a bizarre looking
animal crouched in the middle of a row of corn.
The creature had the body of a dog, but the
head of a rabbit. Startled and horrified by the anomaly,
Bell shot at it several times. He didn't hit it,
but the strange animal vanished. After this encounter, odd things
(03:53):
started to happen in the Bell home. At first, the
activity was very subtle. Family members would hear tapping on
the windows at night, or rats gnawing on the bedposts,
or a sound like an animal scratching at the doors.
Nothing could ever be found to account for the noises.
Then the noises got violent. The bell children would be
(04:16):
woken from sleep by the sound of vicious dogfights in
their rooms. Other times they would hear the clank of
heavy chains being dragged across the floor, or the racket
of furniture being thrown around the room. The weird noises
continued for a year, then suddenly things got much worse.
(04:37):
The poltergeist activity escalated from noise to physical attacks on
the family. The entity started with pulling bedcloths off of
sleeping children. An overnight guest was woken by the covers
sliding off of him. With a shout, he grabbed the covers,
which were bunched up to look like a human form.
(04:57):
He felt something solid under his hands and yelled in triumph,
I have the ghost. The fire in the hearth was
still burning, and the man jumped out of bed, still
holding the bunched sheets in his fisted hands. He intended
to throw the ghosts, sheets and all into the fire
and get rid of the tormenting entity forever, But before
(05:18):
he got to the fireplace, the room suddenly filled with
an overpowering stench. The smell was bad enough, but the
man started to wretch instinctively. He dropped the wadded sheets
and ran out of the room for some fresh air.
When he could breathe without heaving, he came back into
the room. The nauseating stink was gone, but so was
(05:41):
the ghost. Another time, John Bell's son, Richard, was rudely
jerked from a sound sleep by something pulling his hair
hard it felt like the top of his scalp was
tearing right off. He screamed in agony, and John and
Lucy came running into the bedroom. Then fully ear splitting
(06:01):
shriek came from another bedroom. Betsy, Richard's sister, was being
attacked in the exact same way. To add to the
physical attacks, the entity had upped its repertoire of sounds.
Replacing the animal scratchings and gnawings were a variety of
noises that sounded almost human, lip smacking, throat gulping, and
(06:23):
an exquisitely horrifying choking gurgle that sounded like someone being
slowly strangled. A family friend, James Johnson, wanted very much
to help the Bells with their troubles. He started talking
to the ghost trying to get it to answer questions
to explain its presence in the Bell home. At first,
(06:44):
the only response he got was a faint whistling noise.
Over the next few days, the air became filled with
a feeble whispering that grew in volume until unmistakably there
was a voice. By now, it was clear that Betsy
Bell was increasingly the focus of the entity's attention. The
(07:06):
haunting was a great source of stress for her, even
more so because at one point visitors to the home
all but accused her of faking the voices using ventriloquism.
John and Lucy called in a doctor to debunk this.
The phantom voice spoke, and the doctor laid his hand
on Betsy's throat. He swore he felt no vibrations from
(07:28):
her vocal cords. This convinced him that Betsy was completely
innocent of trickery or games. The Bell family and James
Johnson peppered the ghost with questions, but the entity refused
to give a straight answer. One day, it claimed to
be a Native American whose bones had been disturbed. Another day,
(07:49):
it said, I am a spirit who was once very happy,
but have been disturbed, and now am unhappy. That did
nothing to narrow things down. The most specific answer the
entity gave about its identity was that it was Kate Batt,
a local woman accused of being a witch. But it
wasn't Kate's ghost. Kate Batt was very much alive at
(08:13):
the time, although she'd been driven out of the area
by an angry mob some time before. The voice became
many voices, sometimes stumbling over each other in their clamor
to be heard. The voices called themselves the Family of
Kate Bat, which the Bell family assumed meant that the
(08:33):
witch had summoned a host of spirits in a dark ritual.
With the arrival of multiple voices came multiple personalities. Although
the family still referred to the entity as the Witch.
Not all of these personalities were malevolent. The witch had
its favorites. On one occasion, the entity saved the life
(08:54):
of one of the Bell children. One of the boys
was crawling through a cave near the house. He was
navigating a narrow passage when he got stuck in some
quicksand the cave suddenly glowed with an unearthly light, and
a disembodied voice shouted, I'll get you out. Something grabbed
the boy's legs. He said later it just felt like
(09:16):
strong hands and pulled him to safety. It was Lucy Bell,
John's wife, who was the witch's particular favorite. The ghost
sat in on the Bible study groups that Lucy led
in the Bell home. When the group decided to take
a break, fruit would materialize out of thin air, falling
into the lapse of the stunned guests. Another time, Lucy
(09:40):
was very ill and lay sick in bed. The witch cooed, loose, poor, loose,
how do you feel now? Then, in a show of
solicitous affection, it gently showered Lucy's lap with hazel nuts.
When Lucy pointed out that the nuts were still in
their shells and she had no way of cracking them,
(10:01):
the entity shelled the nuts for her, But other members
of the family were victimized by the witch. It seemed
to focus much of its malevolence on Betsy Bell. It
would pull her hair or slap her face. The attacks
would come without warning, and Betsy soon became a shivering,
nervous wreck. Sixteen year old Betsy was engaged to be married,
(10:25):
and the witch would have none of it. When Betsy's fiancee,
Joshua Gardener came to court her, the entity would fill
the air with crude talk about the couple, embarrassing poor
Betsy to tears. Sometimes, the entity took a gentler tactic.
When Betsy lay in bed at night, she would often
hear the phantom voice pleading, please, Betsy Bell, don't have
(10:48):
Joshua Gardener. Eventually, Betsy just gave up and broke off
the engagement. The Witch saved its most savage ire for
John Bell. Early in the Haunting, John had been plagued
with a weird stiffness in his mouth. He said it
felt like someone had jammed a stick in his mouth
(11:09):
and was turning its sideways, forcing his jaws apart. Whatever
was going on in John's mouth caused his tongue to swell.
He couldn't speak or eat for days at a time.
His face would spasm and twitch embarrassingly. Lack of proper
nutrition and the sheer strangeness of his suffering took its toll,
(11:32):
and John began to fade. By December eighteen twenty, he
was seriously ill. He was in bed for a week,
suffering almost continual torment from the Witch. After several days,
John seemed to rally a bit, and he felt well
enough to go outside for a walk in his garden
(11:52):
with his son, Richard, but the pair didn't get far.
Moments after they stepped outside the house, John's head rocked
back with the force of a blow to his face. Stunned,
he sat down on a log to catch his breath.
His face started convulsing, as if someone was squishing his
face and pinching his cheeks without mercy. Then, to add
(12:15):
insult to injury, John's shoes flew off. Richard scrambled to
grab them and knelt at his father's feet to slip
them back on, But every time Richard put the shoes
back on, they would yank themselves off and go flying again.
The ghost cackled with delighted malice. The old man sat
(12:35):
in his garden with tears of frustration rolling down his face,
crying like a kid being tormented by a school yard bully.
On the morning of December twentieth, John Bell fell into
a coma. Thinking to rouse his father, John Junior, went
to the cabinet to fetch the medicine the family doctor
had prescribed. It was gone. In its place in the
(12:59):
cupboard shelf was a strange flask about one third full
of a dark, evil looking syrup. In a panic, John
Junior sent a servant to fetch the doctor. The voice
of the witch rose in a cackle, filling the room
with the sound of its triumph. I put it there and.
Speaker 2 (13:19):
Gave old Jack a big dose of it last night
while he was fast asleep. I guess that fixed him,
the witch bragged. The doctor arrived and inspected the suspicious
looking liquid. He decided to test it on the family cat.
The cat licked a little bit off of a spoon,
then it leaped into the air, whirled around three times,
(13:41):
and dropped to the floor stone dead. Instead of handing
the mysterious flask over to the sheriff, as he should
have done, the doctor poured the rest of the flask's
dark contents on to the fire, where it could do
no more harm. By doing so, though, he destroyed any
evidence that could have helped identify Bell's murderer. Had Bell
(14:04):
been poisoned by someone very much of this world, but
the harm was already done. The next morning, John Bell
succumbed to the mysterious poison and slipped in to death.
The witch didn't even let the family hold John's funeral.
Speaker 1 (14:20):
In peace. It interrupted the service with shrieks of glee
and a crude drinking song. Christmas in the Bell House
was a somber affair that year, but the Witch was ecstatic.
On Christmas Day, the family was rudely awakened by the
raucous voice of the Witch, shouting carols at high volume
(14:42):
and cackling maniacally. The family hadn't planned any celebration, but
they did decide to have a low key exchange of presents.
When they came downstairs, though they found shredded wrapping paper
all over the room, the presents were destroyed. Betsy Bell
lived in two or eighties to the end of her life.
(15:04):
She swore that the most horrendous episode of her life
was the haunting, and that she would always remember eighteen
twenty as the year Satan stole my father and Christmas
and Jesus wept with us. I've known and respected your
(15:36):
husband for many years, and what's good enough for him
is good enough for me. Raucho Marx from the movie
Monkey Business. Hollywood bright lights, movie stars, fame so close
you can taste it. The glamour of the movie business
has lured many eager souls to California. Some hopefuls become stars,
(15:57):
some stars become legend and some stars burned brightly and
then explode, victims of their own incandescence. Thelma Todd was
born July twenty ninth, nineteen o six, in Lawrence, Massachusetts.
She was a bright little girl, a good student who
had dreams of becoming a school teacher. After graduating high
(16:20):
school in nineteen twenty three, she enrolled at the Lowell
Normal School to work towards a teaching degree. But life
and Thelma's mother had other plans. Seeing Thelma's fresh blonde beauty,
Missus Todd encouraged her daughter to start entering beauty contests.
Thelma did well in local pageants and even won Miss
(16:41):
Massachusetts in nineteen twenty five. The prestigious win sent her
on too the Miss America pageant. She didn't win, but
there were talent scouts in the audience who were looking
for fresh, new faces for the young film industry. Thelma
was invited to seek her fortune in Hollywood, which was
just what Missus Todd had wanted all along. Delma proved
(17:06):
to be a natural on the screen. The nineteen twenties
were a heady time for the film industry. Hollywood was
making a transition from silent movies to talkies. Some actors
and actresses just couldn't make the leap, mostly because their
voices didn't match their appearance. Thelma started her career in
(17:26):
silent movies and played numerous supporting roles that showcased her
beauty but gave her little chance to act. That changed
with the coming of sound to movies. Thelma blossomed in
the talkies. Delma's voice, a bright, clear soprano with just
a trace of a Northeastern lilt, matched her image beautifully.
(17:49):
She had enough of a New England accent to sound
aristocratic without coming off as snobby. Acting roles poured in
for Thelma. In a Chicago Tribune article written in nineteen
ninety one, she was described as a cross between Goldie
Hawn and Farah Fawcett, only more popular. She played all
(18:10):
kinds of roles, including parts in dramas and gothic horror films,
but it was as a comedic actress that Thelma really shown.
She made one hundred and fifteen pictures between nineteen twenty
six and nineteen thirty five. Producer Hal Roach paired her
with Laurel and Hardy and lent her to other studios
(18:30):
where she made films with Buster Keaton and the Marx Brothers,
including Horse Feathers and Monkey Business. Stan Laurel was a
particular friend of Thelma's, and he often requested that she'd
be cast as the leading lady in his films. Thelma
picked up a couple of nick names in the business.
She was known as Hot Toddy or the ice cream Blonde.
(18:53):
But Thelma's life wasn't all ice cream and belly laughs.
She married Pat DeCicco in nineteen thirty two and divorced
him in nineteen thirty four. Even before that, in nineteen
thirty one, she had started an affair with director Roland West.
Soon she and West were living together, sharing a house
with West's ex wife. The phrase it's complicated is particularly
(19:18):
apt here, and that wasn't the worst of it. When
Thelma started working with Hal Roach, the producer made her
sign a contract that included something he laughingly called the
potato clause, but it was no laughing matter. The potato
clause said that if Thelma gained over five pounds, she'd
(19:38):
be fired. This had the potential to seriously damage Thelma's
career sucked into the lavish Hollywood lifestyle. Thelma went to
a lot of parties and did a lot of drinking,
filling up on empty calories. Her mother, worried that Thelma
would jeopardize her meal ticket, helpfully introduced her daughter to
(19:58):
diet pills. With her movie earnings, Delma bought a restaurant
in the Los Angeles neighborhood of Pacific Palisades. Tourists as
well as Hollywood royalty, flocked to the popular restaurant called
Delma Todd's Sidewalk Cafe. The second floor of the building
was a nightclub called Joyous and the third floor. The
(20:20):
third floor was an issue. The riches of Los Angeles
had attracted the attention of the mafia. The mobster Lucky
Luciano had dreams of setting up an empire of prostitution, gambling,
and dixtortion in La He introduced himself to Thelma and
started to make himself indispensable to the young actress. He
(20:43):
got her hooked on potent amphetamines that kept the weight
off better than her prescription diet pills. Thelma was intrigued
by the air of rakish danger. Lucky Luciano represented mobsters
were rich with their own brand of glamour. But even
though she herself was a movie star, there was still
a part of Thelma that tried to keep her new
(21:04):
England school teacher innocence. Thelma Todd's Sidewalk Cafe and Joya's
were intensely important to the young star. The restaurant and
club were the first things Thelma owned that were really
truly hers, and they were wildly successful. Visiting Thelma Todd's
Sidewalk Cafe in the thirties was like dining at Spago's today.
(21:28):
It was a place to see and be seen. Thelma
was protective of her investments, so when Lucky Luciano approached
Thelma with a proposition. He wanted to rent the third
floor of her building above Joya's and turn it into
a gambling parlor, Thelma was appalled. She didn't care that
Luciano was one of the biggest names in gangland history.
(21:50):
She channeled the gutsy, wise cracking heroines she played on
the silver screen, and she told Lucky Luciano to go
get stuffed. Another man with a compelling interest in Thelma
Todd's Sidewalk Cafe was Thelma's boyfriend, Roland West. West wanted
Thelma at the restaurant, drawing customers in with her star power,
(22:11):
more than she wanted to be there. West called Thelma
his money magnet with rough affection. He told her, you're
my money maker. If you're not there, I'm not making money.
On the night of December fourteenth, Thelma went to a
gala Hollywood party thrown by her friends Stanley Lupino and
his daughter, actress Ida Lupino. Unfortunately, one of the other
(22:35):
guests at the party was Pat DeCicco, Thelma's ex husband.
When he heard Thelma was going to be there, he
apparently requested to be seated next to her at dinner.
This obviously was not someone Thelma wanted to party with.
Thelma threw back a few drinks, and she and Desicco
argued Thelma was also in the doghouse with her boyfriend
(22:58):
Roland West. The owner, Sid Grohman called West as the
evening wound down, saying that Thelma was headed home and
was a bit under the influence. Groman tactfully suggested that
perhaps West might want to pour Thelma into bed when
she got home, but Thelma never made it home. Sometime
(23:18):
in the wee hours of Monday morning, December sixteenth, nineteen
thirty five, Thelma Todd died in the garage of West's house.
She was found by her maid, May Whitehead, slumped in
the front seat of her Lincoln. The official cause of
Thelma's death was carbon monoxide poisoning, resulting from sitting in
(23:39):
an enclosed garage with the car's engine running, but this
doesn't explain the injuries Thelma suffered immediately before her death,
a split lip, a broken nose, several broken ribs and bruises.
Besides that, she'd been hit in the mouth hard enough
to dislodge one of her dental fillings. She'd made an enemy.
(24:02):
But who was at Roland West who had locked her
out of their apartment that chilly December night. Was it
Pat de Cicco, who had ties with the mob? Could
it have been Lucky Luciano. According to one story, when
Luciano brought up the idea of putting in a gambling
parlor on the third floor of Thelma's building over dinner
(24:23):
one night, Thelma snarled at him over my dead body.
If the story is to be believed, Luciano melodramatically replied
that can be arranged. Whether Thelma's death was accident, suicide,
or murder. It shocked the acting world. The sassy, beloved comedian,
(24:43):
not yet thirty years old, was gone. On the morning
Thelma's body was found, the day's mail delivery brought her
Christmas card to stand in Ruth Laurel's home. The trunk
of Thelma's car was full of Christmas presents for her
friends and family. On December twenty third, nineteen thirty five,
Delma Todd was laid to rest at Forest Lawn Cemetery.
(25:08):
Crowds gathered to pay their respects to the actress, who
lay in a casket covered with mounds of yellow roses.
Delma was gone, but her spirit still wanders the hills
of Hollywood. Her ghost has been seen near the restaurant
that bore her name. Even in death, she is still glamorous,
(25:29):
still dressed in the evening gown, mink coat, and jewels
she wore to her last party. Sometimes she appears on
the staircase of the building where she and Roland West
lived and in the garage where she was found dead.
Witnesses of her in a car running and have smelt
the sharp tang of gasoline. The garage hasn't been used
(25:51):
to store cars in decades. If you enjoyed this episode,
consider sharing it with others and help build the Weird
(26:13):
Darkness community by converting your friends and family into weirdos
as well. This special episode is part of my twelve
Nightmares of Christmas series, the collaboration with paranormal blogger and
author Sylvia Schultz. The stories I used in this episode
are from her book The Spirits of Christmas, The Dark
Side of the Holidays, and you can find a link
(26:35):
to the book in the show notes. Also in the
show notes you can find a link to Sylvia schultz blog.
Do you have a dark Tale to tell? Share your
story at Weird Darkness dot com and I might use
it in a future episode. Music in this episode is
provided by Midnight Syndicate. Find a link to purchase and
(26:55):
download this dark, creepy Christmas music in the show notes.
I'm your creator and host, Darren Marler. Merry Christmas and
thanks for joining me in the Weird Darkness.
Welcome Weirdos. I'm Darren Marler and this is Weird Darkness.
Here you'll find stories of the paranormal, supernatural, mysterious, macabre,
unsolved and unexplained. If you are new here, be sure
to subscribe to the podcast on Apple or Android so
you don't miss future episodes. This is a special twelve
(00:24):
Nightmares of Christmas episode. Each day from December thirteenth through
December twenty fourth, I'm posting a new episode of Weird
Darkness featuring material from the new book The Spirits of Christmas,
The Dark Side of the Holidays by Sylvia Schultz. Be
sure to come back every day between December thirteenth and
December twenty fourth for more holiday horrors. Now, bult your doors,
(00:50):
lock your windows, turn off your lights, put another log
onto the fire, and pour yourself an agnob and come
with me into the Weird Darkness. It's been two hundred
(01:11):
years since the Bell Family of Tennessee was tormented by
a mysterious entity known only as the Bell Witch, but
the events that unfolded between the years of eighteen seventeen
and eighteen twenty one have remained evergreen in American ghost lore,
and they are some of the most amazing tales in
(01:32):
Tennessee history. John Bell, a prosperous cotton farmer, was born
in North Carolina in seventeen fifty. He, his wife Lucy,
and their nine children moved to Robertson County, Tennessee in
eighteen oh four. Bell purchased many acres of land along
the Red River and set about improving it even more.
(01:55):
He cleared fields, planted orchards, and built a home for
his large family. He even built a one room schoolhouse
where his children and his neighbor's children could get an education.
This being Tennessee in the early nineteenth century, John Bell's
cotton plantation was worked by slaves, but Bell and his
family were very devout, and Bell himself seemed to let
(02:19):
his religious beliefs dictate his treatment of his slaves. He
doesn't seem to have been a particularly harsh master. John
Bell knelt to lead his family in prayers three times
a day, and he opened his house as a gathering
place for prayer meetings, Bible studies led by Lucy Bell,
and other worship services. John Bell was socially and politically
(02:42):
active as well. He dressed the part of a wealthy
influential businessman and landowner. When he went to town on business,
he made an imposing figure in his tailored coat with
silver buttons and his fashionable beaver hat. Bell made many
speeches in support of political candidates whose values aligned with his,
(03:03):
and he was known for personal integrity and wasn't afraid
to speak up for his beliefs. John Bell was an
upstanding citizen, a devout Christian, the benevolent head of a
large family, a careful steward of his land and property,
and a prosperous businessman. That's what made the events to
come even more startling. One day in eighteen seventeen, Bell
(03:29):
was inspecting a cornfield when he saw a bizarre looking
animal crouched in the middle of a row of corn.
The creature had the body of a dog, but the
head of a rabbit. Startled and horrified by the anomaly,
Bell shot at it several times. He didn't hit it,
but the strange animal vanished. After this encounter, odd things
(03:53):
started to happen in the Bell home. At first, the
activity was very subtle. Family members would hear tapping on
the windows at night, or rats gnawing on the bedposts,
or a sound like an animal scratching at the doors.
Nothing could ever be found to account for the noises.
Then the noises got violent. The bell children would be
(04:16):
woken from sleep by the sound of vicious dogfights in
their rooms. Other times they would hear the clank of
heavy chains being dragged across the floor, or the racket
of furniture being thrown around the room. The weird noises
continued for a year, then suddenly things got much worse.
(04:37):
The poltergeist activity escalated from noise to physical attacks on
the family. The entity started with pulling bedcloths off of
sleeping children. An overnight guest was woken by the covers
sliding off of him. With a shout, he grabbed the covers,
which were bunched up to look like a human form.
(04:57):
He felt something solid under his hands and yelled in triumph,
I have the ghost. The fire in the hearth was
still burning, and the man jumped out of bed, still
holding the bunched sheets in his fisted hands. He intended
to throw the ghosts, sheets and all into the fire
and get rid of the tormenting entity forever, But before
(05:18):
he got to the fireplace, the room suddenly filled with
an overpowering stench. The smell was bad enough, but the
man started to wretch instinctively. He dropped the wadded sheets
and ran out of the room for some fresh air.
When he could breathe without heaving, he came back into
the room. The nauseating stink was gone, but so was
(05:41):
the ghost. Another time, John Bell's son, Richard, was rudely
jerked from a sound sleep by something pulling his hair
hard it felt like the top of his scalp was
tearing right off. He screamed in agony, and John and
Lucy came running into the bedroom. Then fully ear splitting
(06:01):
shriek came from another bedroom. Betsy, Richard's sister, was being
attacked in the exact same way. To add to the
physical attacks, the entity had upped its repertoire of sounds.
Replacing the animal scratchings and gnawings were a variety of
noises that sounded almost human, lip smacking, throat gulping, and
(06:23):
an exquisitely horrifying choking gurgle that sounded like someone being
slowly strangled. A family friend, James Johnson, wanted very much
to help the Bells with their troubles. He started talking
to the ghost trying to get it to answer questions
to explain its presence in the Bell home. At first,
(06:44):
the only response he got was a faint whistling noise.
Over the next few days, the air became filled with
a feeble whispering that grew in volume until unmistakably there
was a voice. By now, it was clear that Betsy
Bell was increasingly the focus of the entity's attention. The
(07:06):
haunting was a great source of stress for her, even
more so because at one point visitors to the home
all but accused her of faking the voices using ventriloquism.
John and Lucy called in a doctor to debunk this.
The phantom voice spoke, and the doctor laid his hand
on Betsy's throat. He swore he felt no vibrations from
(07:28):
her vocal cords. This convinced him that Betsy was completely
innocent of trickery or games. The Bell family and James
Johnson peppered the ghost with questions, but the entity refused
to give a straight answer. One day, it claimed to
be a Native American whose bones had been disturbed. Another day,
(07:49):
it said, I am a spirit who was once very happy,
but have been disturbed, and now am unhappy. That did
nothing to narrow things down. The most specific answer the
entity gave about its identity was that it was Kate Batt,
a local woman accused of being a witch. But it
wasn't Kate's ghost. Kate Batt was very much alive at
(08:13):
the time, although she'd been driven out of the area
by an angry mob some time before. The voice became
many voices, sometimes stumbling over each other in their clamor
to be heard. The voices called themselves the Family of
Kate Bat, which the Bell family assumed meant that the
(08:33):
witch had summoned a host of spirits in a dark ritual.
With the arrival of multiple voices came multiple personalities. Although
the family still referred to the entity as the Witch.
Not all of these personalities were malevolent. The witch had
its favorites. On one occasion, the entity saved the life
(08:54):
of one of the Bell children. One of the boys
was crawling through a cave near the house. He was
navigating a narrow passage when he got stuck in some
quicksand the cave suddenly glowed with an unearthly light, and
a disembodied voice shouted, I'll get you out. Something grabbed
the boy's legs. He said later it just felt like
(09:16):
strong hands and pulled him to safety. It was Lucy Bell,
John's wife, who was the witch's particular favorite. The ghost
sat in on the Bible study groups that Lucy led
in the Bell home. When the group decided to take
a break, fruit would materialize out of thin air, falling
into the lapse of the stunned guests. Another time, Lucy
(09:40):
was very ill and lay sick in bed. The witch cooed, loose, poor, loose,
how do you feel now? Then, in a show of
solicitous affection, it gently showered Lucy's lap with hazel nuts.
When Lucy pointed out that the nuts were still in
their shells and she had no way of cracking them,
(10:01):
the entity shelled the nuts for her, But other members
of the family were victimized by the witch. It seemed
to focus much of its malevolence on Betsy Bell. It
would pull her hair or slap her face. The attacks
would come without warning, and Betsy soon became a shivering,
nervous wreck. Sixteen year old Betsy was engaged to be married,
(10:25):
and the witch would have none of it. When Betsy's fiancee,
Joshua Gardener came to court her, the entity would fill
the air with crude talk about the couple, embarrassing poor
Betsy to tears. Sometimes, the entity took a gentler tactic.
When Betsy lay in bed at night, she would often
hear the phantom voice pleading, please, Betsy Bell, don't have
(10:48):
Joshua Gardener. Eventually, Betsy just gave up and broke off
the engagement. The Witch saved its most savage ire for
John Bell. Early in the Haunting, John had been plagued
with a weird stiffness in his mouth. He said it
felt like someone had jammed a stick in his mouth
(11:09):
and was turning its sideways, forcing his jaws apart. Whatever
was going on in John's mouth caused his tongue to swell.
He couldn't speak or eat for days at a time.
His face would spasm and twitch embarrassingly. Lack of proper
nutrition and the sheer strangeness of his suffering took its toll,
(11:32):
and John began to fade. By December eighteen twenty, he
was seriously ill. He was in bed for a week,
suffering almost continual torment from the Witch. After several days,
John seemed to rally a bit, and he felt well
enough to go outside for a walk in his garden
(11:52):
with his son, Richard, but the pair didn't get far.
Moments after they stepped outside the house, John's head rocked
back with the force of a blow to his face. Stunned,
he sat down on a log to catch his breath.
His face started convulsing, as if someone was squishing his
face and pinching his cheeks without mercy. Then, to add
(12:15):
insult to injury, John's shoes flew off. Richard scrambled to
grab them and knelt at his father's feet to slip
them back on, But every time Richard put the shoes
back on, they would yank themselves off and go flying again.
The ghost cackled with delighted malice. The old man sat
(12:35):
in his garden with tears of frustration rolling down his face,
crying like a kid being tormented by a school yard bully.
On the morning of December twentieth, John Bell fell into
a coma. Thinking to rouse his father, John Junior, went
to the cabinet to fetch the medicine the family doctor
had prescribed. It was gone. In its place in the
(12:59):
cupboard shelf was a strange flask about one third full
of a dark, evil looking syrup. In a panic, John
Junior sent a servant to fetch the doctor. The voice
of the witch rose in a cackle, filling the room
with the sound of its triumph. I put it there and.
Speaker 2 (13:19):
Gave old Jack a big dose of it last night
while he was fast asleep. I guess that fixed him,
the witch bragged. The doctor arrived and inspected the suspicious
looking liquid. He decided to test it on the family cat.
The cat licked a little bit off of a spoon,
then it leaped into the air, whirled around three times,
(13:41):
and dropped to the floor stone dead. Instead of handing
the mysterious flask over to the sheriff, as he should
have done, the doctor poured the rest of the flask's
dark contents on to the fire, where it could do
no more harm. By doing so, though, he destroyed any
evidence that could have helped identify Bell's murderer. Had Bell
(14:04):
been poisoned by someone very much of this world, but
the harm was already done. The next morning, John Bell
succumbed to the mysterious poison and slipped in to death.
The witch didn't even let the family hold John's funeral.
Speaker 1 (14:20):
In peace. It interrupted the service with shrieks of glee
and a crude drinking song. Christmas in the Bell House
was a somber affair that year, but the Witch was ecstatic.
On Christmas Day, the family was rudely awakened by the
raucous voice of the Witch, shouting carols at high volume
(14:42):
and cackling maniacally. The family hadn't planned any celebration, but
they did decide to have a low key exchange of presents.
When they came downstairs, though they found shredded wrapping paper
all over the room, the presents were destroyed. Betsy Bell
lived in two or eighties to the end of her life.
(15:04):
She swore that the most horrendous episode of her life
was the haunting, and that she would always remember eighteen
twenty as the year Satan stole my father and Christmas
and Jesus wept with us. I've known and respected your
(15:36):
husband for many years, and what's good enough for him
is good enough for me. Raucho Marx from the movie
Monkey Business. Hollywood bright lights, movie stars, fame so close
you can taste it. The glamour of the movie business
has lured many eager souls to California. Some hopefuls become stars,
(15:57):
some stars become legend and some stars burned brightly and
then explode, victims of their own incandescence. Thelma Todd was
born July twenty ninth, nineteen o six, in Lawrence, Massachusetts.
She was a bright little girl, a good student who
had dreams of becoming a school teacher. After graduating high
(16:20):
school in nineteen twenty three, she enrolled at the Lowell
Normal School to work towards a teaching degree. But life
and Thelma's mother had other plans. Seeing Thelma's fresh blonde beauty,
Missus Todd encouraged her daughter to start entering beauty contests.
Thelma did well in local pageants and even won Miss
(16:41):
Massachusetts in nineteen twenty five. The prestigious win sent her
on too the Miss America pageant. She didn't win, but
there were talent scouts in the audience who were looking
for fresh, new faces for the young film industry. Thelma
was invited to seek her fortune in Hollywood, which was
just what Missus Todd had wanted all along. Delma proved
(17:06):
to be a natural on the screen. The nineteen twenties
were a heady time for the film industry. Hollywood was
making a transition from silent movies to talkies. Some actors
and actresses just couldn't make the leap, mostly because their
voices didn't match their appearance. Thelma started her career in
(17:26):
silent movies and played numerous supporting roles that showcased her
beauty but gave her little chance to act. That changed
with the coming of sound to movies. Thelma blossomed in
the talkies. Delma's voice, a bright, clear soprano with just
a trace of a Northeastern lilt, matched her image beautifully.
(17:49):
She had enough of a New England accent to sound
aristocratic without coming off as snobby. Acting roles poured in
for Thelma. In a Chicago Tribune article written in nineteen
ninety one, she was described as a cross between Goldie
Hawn and Farah Fawcett, only more popular. She played all
(18:10):
kinds of roles, including parts in dramas and gothic horror films,
but it was as a comedic actress that Thelma really shown.
She made one hundred and fifteen pictures between nineteen twenty
six and nineteen thirty five. Producer Hal Roach paired her
with Laurel and Hardy and lent her to other studios
(18:30):
where she made films with Buster Keaton and the Marx Brothers,
including Horse Feathers and Monkey Business. Stan Laurel was a
particular friend of Thelma's, and he often requested that she'd
be cast as the leading lady in his films. Thelma
picked up a couple of nick names in the business.
She was known as Hot Toddy or the ice cream Blonde.
(18:53):
But Thelma's life wasn't all ice cream and belly laughs.
She married Pat DeCicco in nineteen thirty two and divorced
him in nineteen thirty four. Even before that, in nineteen
thirty one, she had started an affair with director Roland West.
Soon she and West were living together, sharing a house
with West's ex wife. The phrase it's complicated is particularly
(19:18):
apt here, and that wasn't the worst of it. When
Thelma started working with Hal Roach, the producer made her
sign a contract that included something he laughingly called the
potato clause, but it was no laughing matter. The potato
clause said that if Thelma gained over five pounds, she'd
(19:38):
be fired. This had the potential to seriously damage Thelma's
career sucked into the lavish Hollywood lifestyle. Thelma went to
a lot of parties and did a lot of drinking,
filling up on empty calories. Her mother, worried that Thelma
would jeopardize her meal ticket, helpfully introduced her daughter to
(19:58):
diet pills. With her movie earnings, Delma bought a restaurant
in the Los Angeles neighborhood of Pacific Palisades. Tourists as
well as Hollywood royalty, flocked to the popular restaurant called
Delma Todd's Sidewalk Cafe. The second floor of the building
was a nightclub called Joyous and the third floor. The
(20:20):
third floor was an issue. The riches of Los Angeles
had attracted the attention of the mafia. The mobster Lucky
Luciano had dreams of setting up an empire of prostitution, gambling,
and dixtortion in La He introduced himself to Thelma and
started to make himself indispensable to the young actress. He
(20:43):
got her hooked on potent amphetamines that kept the weight
off better than her prescription diet pills. Thelma was intrigued
by the air of rakish danger. Lucky Luciano represented mobsters
were rich with their own brand of glamour. But even
though she herself was a movie star, there was still
a part of Thelma that tried to keep her new
(21:04):
England school teacher innocence. Thelma Todd's Sidewalk Cafe and Joya's
were intensely important to the young star. The restaurant and
club were the first things Thelma owned that were really
truly hers, and they were wildly successful. Visiting Thelma Todd's
Sidewalk Cafe in the thirties was like dining at Spago's today.
(21:28):
It was a place to see and be seen. Thelma
was protective of her investments, so when Lucky Luciano approached
Thelma with a proposition. He wanted to rent the third
floor of her building above Joya's and turn it into
a gambling parlor, Thelma was appalled. She didn't care that
Luciano was one of the biggest names in gangland history.
(21:50):
She channeled the gutsy, wise cracking heroines she played on
the silver screen, and she told Lucky Luciano to go
get stuffed. Another man with a compelling interest in Thelma
Todd's Sidewalk Cafe was Thelma's boyfriend, Roland West. West wanted
Thelma at the restaurant, drawing customers in with her star power,
(22:11):
more than she wanted to be there. West called Thelma
his money magnet with rough affection. He told her, you're
my money maker. If you're not there, I'm not making money.
On the night of December fourteenth, Thelma went to a
gala Hollywood party thrown by her friends Stanley Lupino and
his daughter, actress Ida Lupino. Unfortunately, one of the other
(22:35):
guests at the party was Pat DeCicco, Thelma's ex husband.
When he heard Thelma was going to be there, he
apparently requested to be seated next to her at dinner.
This obviously was not someone Thelma wanted to party with.
Thelma threw back a few drinks, and she and Desicco
argued Thelma was also in the doghouse with her boyfriend
(22:58):
Roland West. The owner, Sid Grohman called West as the
evening wound down, saying that Thelma was headed home and
was a bit under the influence. Groman tactfully suggested that
perhaps West might want to pour Thelma into bed when
she got home, but Thelma never made it home. Sometime
(23:18):
in the wee hours of Monday morning, December sixteenth, nineteen
thirty five, Thelma Todd died in the garage of West's house.
She was found by her maid, May Whitehead, slumped in
the front seat of her Lincoln. The official cause of
Thelma's death was carbon monoxide poisoning, resulting from sitting in
(23:39):
an enclosed garage with the car's engine running, but this
doesn't explain the injuries Thelma suffered immediately before her death,
a split lip, a broken nose, several broken ribs and bruises.
Besides that, she'd been hit in the mouth hard enough
to dislodge one of her dental fillings. She'd made an enemy.
(24:02):
But who was at Roland West who had locked her
out of their apartment that chilly December night. Was it
Pat de Cicco, who had ties with the mob? Could
it have been Lucky Luciano. According to one story, when
Luciano brought up the idea of putting in a gambling
parlor on the third floor of Thelma's building over dinner
(24:23):
one night, Thelma snarled at him over my dead body.
If the story is to be believed, Luciano melodramatically replied
that can be arranged. Whether Thelma's death was accident, suicide,
or murder. It shocked the acting world. The sassy, beloved comedian,
(24:43):
not yet thirty years old, was gone. On the morning
Thelma's body was found, the day's mail delivery brought her
Christmas card to stand in Ruth Laurel's home. The trunk
of Thelma's car was full of Christmas presents for her
friends and family. On December twenty third, nineteen thirty five,
Delma Todd was laid to rest at Forest Lawn Cemetery.
(25:08):
Crowds gathered to pay their respects to the actress, who
lay in a casket covered with mounds of yellow roses.
Delma was gone, but her spirit still wanders the hills
of Hollywood. Her ghost has been seen near the restaurant
that bore her name. Even in death, she is still glamorous,
(25:29):
still dressed in the evening gown, mink coat, and jewels
she wore to her last party. Sometimes she appears on
the staircase of the building where she and Roland West
lived and in the garage where she was found dead.
Witnesses of her in a car running and have smelt
the sharp tang of gasoline. The garage hasn't been used
(25:51):
to store cars in decades. If you enjoyed this episode,
consider sharing it with others and help build the Weird
(26:13):
Darkness community by converting your friends and family into weirdos
as well. This special episode is part of my twelve
Nightmares of Christmas series, the collaboration with paranormal blogger and
author Sylvia Schultz. The stories I used in this episode
are from her book The Spirits of Christmas, The Dark
Side of the Holidays, and you can find a link
(26:35):
to the book in the show notes. Also in the
show notes you can find a link to Sylvia schultz blog.
Do you have a dark Tale to tell? Share your
story at Weird Darkness dot com and I might use
it in a future episode. Music in this episode is
provided by Midnight Syndicate. Find a link to purchase and
(26:55):
download this dark, creepy Christmas music in the show notes.
I'm your creator and host, Darren Marler. Merry Christmas and
thanks for joining me in the Weird Darkness.
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