October 8, 2025 • 22 mins
Night settles on the porch, the river hums in the distance, and we follow that sound to a Vicksburg mansion that refuses to grow quiet. McRaven House isn’t just “the most haunted home in Mississippi”—it’s a three-part time machine where an outlaw’s bedroom, a grieving mother’s lullaby, and a war-torn hospital all occupy the same breath. We walk the Great River Road, trace the Natchez Trace, and pull at the threads linking moving water, old brick, and stories that won’t lie flat.
We start with Andrew Glass’s two-room hideout, its buttermilk-blue walls and pulled-up ladder designed to stop ambush—until a razor did the job from inside. The story shifts to Sheriff Stephen Howard and Mary Elizabeth, who add grace and light before childbirth steals her future, leaving a soft song many still hear at night. Then the circle widens: the Devil Reverend John Murrell rides the Trace, sermons as disguise, theft as vocation, a conspiracy that boils over in Vicksburg. Names and dates stay anchored even as the uncanny slips through: lynchings, exile, and a city bracing for more violence than law can hold.
McRaven’s architecture becomes evidence. Empire style bridges pioneer bone to Greek Revival polish under John H. Bob, who opens his home as a Civil War field hospital and pays with his life during Reconstruction—dragged to Stout’s Bayou after a garden confrontation, shot in the back and face. The balcony keeps his presence, cigar smoke and orders no one else hears. Union officers take over, and Captain McPherson’s absence ends with a flooded apparition describing a murder and the Mississippi swallowing the proof. Decades later, the Murray sisters choose isolation over modernization, burning furniture for heat as vines erase the house from view. Restoration brings fresh bruises and broken bones, as if the walls have opinions about change.
What remains is a layered account of Southern folklore and American history sharing a single address: haunted Mississippi, Vicksburg siege, Natchez Trace outlaws, Reconstruction violence, and a river that remembers everything. If you love ghost stories anchored by documented lives and places—where the timeline aligns and the impossible refuses to leave—press play, then tell a friend. Subscribe, rate, and share your take: skeptic, believer, or somewhere in between?
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Carole Townsend (00:07):
It seems that every state in the South has its
own stories of haunted places,its own secret corners that hold
loss, that hold sadness orviolence, grief or execution.
This is a region rich incharacter and folklore.
There's no shortage of placesthat embrace the dead, and
(00:30):
places that allow the dead toreach out to us for reasons that
only they understand.
Mississippi is one of thosestates with its rivers
crisscrossing the land, themighty Mississippi being the
grandfather of them all.
As we've learned in earlierepisodes, water, particularly
(00:52):
moving water and limestone, areconducive to strange phenomenon
and odd occurrences.
Imagine then what the GrandMississippi has witnessed in
patient silence over thecenturies.
Is there anything better than areally good story?
(01:13):
I mean a story told by a friendamong friends.
An engaging tale, told in theright place, at the right time,
captures us.
It captures our imagination.
It takes us away from the hereand now and carries us to the
world of what if.
I think a really good storytaps into our childhood, that
(01:38):
magical time when anything waspossible, if we could just close
our eyes and imagine it.
As adults, we don't hide underthe covers anymore, as we listen
to the whispered tales of braveknights or beautiful princesses
or scary monsters.
We don't walk through thewoods, talking as we go, telling
(02:01):
tales of forest creatures thatlive among the trees and the
animals.
We do, however, still spin ourtails, and a comfortable front
porch is often where we do that.
We sit in swings or rockingchairs or rickety woven lawn
chairs, and we still gather withfriends.
(02:21):
At the end of the day, when thesoft light of dusk opens its
arms to embrace nightfall, we'retaken back to a time when the
story is real.
It's possible.
So join me tonight here on myfront porch, won't you?
As we step into another talethat's rooted in both truth and
(02:44):
in myth.
And as night swallows the softdusk, I'll turn on the light.
You're gonna want that.
The following podcast containsmaterial that may be disturbing.
Listener discretion is advised.
(03:06):
The Mississippi River runs twothousand three hundred and forty
one miles to the Gulf, startingin Minnesota and flowing south
through Wisconsin, Iowa,Illinois, Missouri, Kentucky,
Tennessee, Arkansas,Mississippi, and finally
(03:26):
Louisiana.
It flows through ten states,nearly cutting this country in
half.
But remember, those ten statesthe Mississippi River slices
through have only been statesfor about 250 years.
It's hard for us to imaginesometimes that there were people
(03:48):
and a land that existed longbefore some English colonists
left their homeland, traveledacross the Atlantic, and imposed
their will on both the peopleand the land, eventually
creating the United States ofAmerica.
Geologists opined that theriver began flowing about
(04:09):
seventy million years ago, whena large mountain chain opened up
and allowed water to flowsouth.
Old Man River, indeed.
Imagine what he's seen.
Mississippi is known as one ofthe most haunted states in the
(04:34):
nation.
From shuttered plantation homesto long silent battlefields,
paranormal experts tell us thatthe rich earth itself holds
troubled spirits and theirsecrets.
Tonight, let's take a look at aplace in the Magnolia state
that is home to some of thesespirits.
We'll travel the Great RiverRoad, a road that runs alongside
(04:58):
the Mississippi to see whatsecrets the water flows past.
The McRaven Mansion, oftencalled the most haunted house in
Mississippi, is a Vicksburgmansion built in 1797 by a man
named Andrew Glass.
In fact, Vicksburg wasn't evencalled Vicksburg at the time.
(05:22):
It was called Fort Nogales, andit was a Spanish colonial fort.
Nogales, by the way, meanswalnuts, and Vicksburg was also
known as Walnut Hills beforefinally being named for
Methodist minister Newitt Vic.
The McRaven House, laterupgraded to the McGraven Mansion
(05:44):
because of its sprawl, became atime capsule of sorts, because
it was built in three stages.
Two spinster sisters who livedto very old ages in the house
never updated it with modernconveniences, so it remained a
true snapshot of the threearchitectural periods during
(06:04):
which it was built.
Vicksburg is a bustlingMississippi town that was
founded in 1811, strategicallylocated on a high bluff
overlooking the mightyMississippi River.
It became an important tradingport because it was so close to
the river and because theNatchez Trace was not far away.
(06:26):
Natchez Trace is an importanttrading route that links
Natchez, Mississippi toNashville, Tennessee.
We took a closer look at thetrace in a previous episode
titled King's Tavern.
This 440-mile path was litteredwith dangerous bandits and
thieves, and one traveled it atgreat peril.
(06:48):
Andrew Glass was one of thesethieves.
Tales have it that Glass builtMcRaven as a hideout from the
law.
Glass was a feared highwaymanfrom the Morel gang, and his
reputation grew as tales of hislegendary robberies spread
across the region.
He was also a flagrantwomanizer.
(07:10):
At the time it was built,McRaven was just a two-room
hideout with a kitchen on thebottom floor and a sleeping area
above.
The walls were painted withbuttermilk and blueberry paint,
and that paint is still on thewalls in those two rooms.
Glass built the house the wayhe did because he didn't want to
(07:32):
get ambushed.
The only way to get up to thesleeping area was by a ladder
that he would pull up with himevery night before bed.
But even that clever designdidn't protect him.
As it turns out, Glasssafeguarded himself from the
outside intruders, but not froma jealous wife.
Mary Glass slit her husband'sthroat with a razor blade while
(07:57):
he lay sleeping one night, deaddrunk.
It seems that monogamy was notAndrew Glass's strong suit.
Experts today tell us that thatroom in particular is one in
which women do not feel safe.
Books fly off shelves, shuttersbang open and shut, and the
(08:19):
room temperature dropsdrastically when a woman enters.
Women report that their hair ispulled or that they're pinched
and shoved while in the bedroom.
When Andrew Glass was murdered,the McRaven house was sold to
Sheriff Stephen Howard.
Howard and his young wife MaryElizabeth added more rooms, a
(08:42):
staircase, and a beautiful patioto the house.
Mary Elizabeth was pregnant,and the young couple looked to
the future with joy andexcitement.
McRaven was to be home to ahappy family.
But tragically, Mary Elizabethdied during childbirth, a common
occurrence in those days.
(09:03):
Shortly thereafter, Howard soldthe house, but it seems that
Mary's spirit stayed behind.
From the day of her death untilnow, McRaven Mansion had a pall
of sadness and tragedy aboutit.
And still today, MaryElizabeth's ghost roams the
halls, greeting guests andplaying pranks.
(09:26):
And sometimes at night, guestsand caretakers hear a woman,
softly singing lullabies andsometimes crying just as softly.
Glass's murder might explainsome of the strange activity
inside McRaven, but deathplagued the home without mercy
(09:50):
for years after that.
We'll take a closer look atMcRaven as its construction and
tragedies unfolded.
But first, I'm going to take aminute to tell you about the
gang that Glass was a part of.
If you've never heard of theMorel gang, you're missing out.
John Morel, who was accused ofmore than 400 murders, was also
(10:13):
known as the Devil Reverend.
He'd masquerade as a travelingpreacher, moving up and down the
Natchez Trace, sellingsalvation to the poor lost souls
he'd find along the way.
Despite preaching the gospel toa growing following, Morel
stole horses and slaves, sellingthem to others for his own
(10:35):
gain.
As a teen, he was accused andconvicted of horse thievery.
In addition to spending sixyears in prison, he was flogged
and then branded with theletters HT, horse thief.
When Morel was released fromprison, he set out for Natchez
Trace, bent on picking up rightwhere he left off.
(10:58):
And he did.
One day, while Morel preachedto a newfound congregation,
Andrew Glass and a group ofbandits stole all the horses and
valuables they could find,leaving only the horse Morel
rode in on.
The Devil Reverend vowed toexact revenge from Glass, but
he'd never get it.
(11:18):
Mary beat him to it by cuttingher own husband's throat.
In 1835, Morel tried to incitea slave rebellion in the South.
He intended to gain control ofthe South as the planned chaos
from the rebellion spread.
While his plot ultimatelyfailed, it did lead to talks of
(11:40):
conspiracy in major southerncities.
And on July 6, 1835, inVicksburg, Mississippi, those
talks heated up until theyreached a boil.
An angry mob exiled allgamblers from Vicksburg,
believing them to be part ofMorel's treasonous plot.
Five gamblers were lynched andshot that day, but Morrell
(12:05):
escaped unharmed.
In a deathbed confession, yearslater, Morel admitted to being
guilty of most of the crimescharged against him, except
murder, to which he claimed tobe guiltless.
John Morrell died on November21, 1844, nine months after
(12:29):
leaving prison.
He was reported to havecontracted pulmonary consumption
or tuberculosis, and wasinterred at Smyrna Cemetery in
Pikeville, Tennessee.
In an odd twist, years after hewas buried, parts of him were
dug up and stolen by graverobbers.
(12:49):
Although the corpse had beenhalf eaten by scavenging hogs,
the head was separated from thetorso, pickled, and displayed at
county fairs.
His skull is still missing, butthe Tennessee State Museum
proudly holds one of his thumbsin its inventory.
(13:09):
Sheriff Stephen Howard, aformer owner of McGraven
Mansion, was involved insquashing what became known as
Morrell's Excitement.
Because of the tastes of itsvarious owners, the McGraven
House is a true architecturalgem.
(13:30):
Built in three distinct periodstyles, McRaven's rooms take us
on a time travel journey fromMississippi's pioneer era
through the Empire and Greekrevival architectural styles.
Period antiques give us an evenbetter idea of the rich and
comfortable lifestyle of thehome's troubled inhabitants,
(13:54):
whose spirits have chosen tostay on in the house that saw so
much of their personal misery.
Prominent brick manufacturerand sawmill owner John H.
Bob bought the house fromSheriff Howard, who had added to
the pioneer style home in theempire style of construction.
Bob constructed the home'sGreek revival rooms in 1849,
(14:20):
transforming the house into anelegant show place.
He opened up his house as afield hospital during the Civil
War and weathered the bloodyVicksburg siege at McRaben.
Many Civil War soldiers died inthe McRaven house and were
buried on the property.
Bob did not live out his yearsin the walls of his beloved
(14:44):
home, though.
Rather, he was murdered byUnion Reconstruction troops.
During the Reconstructionperiod following the war, Union
soldiers were not welcome in theSouth.
One day, Bob saw some Unionsoldiers walking through his
gardens, drunk, picking flowersand being careless about where
(15:04):
they stepped.
He shouted at them and orderedthem to leave, but they refused.
From his chair on the porch,Bob reached down and picked up a
brick that had fallen off thehouse during the shelling at
Vicksburg.
He hurled that brick and hit asergeant in the head, knocking
(15:25):
him unconscious.
The soldiers left, vowingrevenge.
The matter was taken up incourt, with nothing truly
resolved.
But when Bob returned to hishome, there he found 25 Union
soldiers waiting for him.
They forcefully arrested andescorted him to Stout's Bayou,
(15:47):
not far from McRaven House.
While there he tried to escape,and the soldiers shot him in
the back.
When they caught up to him andsaw that he wasn't dead, they
shot him in the face.
This was the first recorded actof violence following the Civil
War.
Bob's widow Selena sold thehouse following this horrific
(16:11):
incident, but like MaryElizabeth, John chose to stay
behind at McRaven.
To this day he can be seensmoking a cigar on the balcony
or yelling at unseen Uniontroops out in the gardens.
After John Bob was killed,McRavenhouse was then used as
(16:31):
Union headquarters.
Colonel J.
H.
Wilson stayed at McRaven Houseduring this time.
Wilson was a close friend of aman named Captain James
McPherson, and the two metregularly to enjoy brandy and
cigars on the balcony.
But one night, McPherson didn'tmeet Wilson at their usual
(16:52):
spot.
Following an exhaustive search,there were no answers.
McPherson had simplydisappeared.
Weeks later, Wilson sworeMcPherson appeared to him as a
ghost.
The apparition was wet, theuniform dripping and puddling
(17:16):
water on the floor.
The ghost told Colonel Wilsonthat while he had been attending
a bonfire in town, he had beenkilled by a citizen of Vicksburg
and his body dumped in theMississippi River.
This became the first recordedstory of ghosts being seen in
McRaven House in 1864.
(17:36):
But it would be just one ofmany.
Murray lived there with hiswife Ellen, their four
daughters, and three sons.
William died at the house in1911, and his wife passed away
(17:57):
there in 1921.
Eventually, all but two of thechildren passed away.
Only two daughters remained.
Their names were Annie andElla, and they were unmarried.
Spinsters, they were called,back in the day.
The two lived together in thehouse with no modern
(18:17):
conveniences other than atelephone, their entire lives.
They had no contact with theoutside world other than with
their doctor.
In 1969, Ella died there at theage of 81.
Annie sold the house and movedinto a nursing home.
(18:37):
By this time, the house hadfallen into disrepair and become
covered in thick gnarled vines.
Nearby residents had no idea itstill existed.
It was later discovered thatthe reclusive sisters had even
resorted to chopping upexpensive furniture for
firewood.
McRaven House has been boughtand sold a few times since then,
(19:02):
with each owner doing a bit ofrestoration.
In 1984, McRaven House waspurchased by Leland French.
French continued restoring thebeautiful old home and was the
first owner in many years toactually live inside the house.
While there, though, heexperienced some violent ghostly
(19:23):
encounters both inside andoutside the house.
He was shoved down the stairsand had a dresser drawer slammed
onto his hands, breaking hisfingers.
He had his head shoved into thefloor while cleaning it,
leaving him with a broken nose.
(19:44):
French purchased a home thatwas only a few houses away from
McRaven so that he had a safeplace to stay when he wasn't
working on the house.
However, eventually he movedeverything of his out.
And who could blame him?
The McRaven House still standsa glorious testimony to the
(20:07):
architectural styles of eachperiod of its construction.
But as with many places withwhich violence and grief are
associated, violence and griefremain.
Spirits remain, and talesremain untold, or told with
half-truths.
And sometimes they are told inutter truth by the very people
(20:32):
who live them.
Mary Elizabeth, who lost herlife giving life to a child.
John Bob, murdered for throwinga brick at a Union soldier.
(20:56):
And Captain McPherson,allegedly murdered, his body fed
to the Mississippi.
The ghosts of soldierswandering through the trees on
the grounds.
Lost souls, who will forevercall McRaven House home.
I'm Carole Townsend, veterannewspaper journalist and
(21:21):
six-time award-winning author.
You can find me on social mediaand check out my website at
Carole Townsend.com.
As always, thanks forlistening, and if you're
enjoying these tales of Southernhistory and lore, I hope you'll
tell your friends.
Subscribe to this podcast onSpotify, Apple Play, iHeart, and
(21:45):
anywhere you listen.
My team and I use the followingresources to bring this tale to
you Hauntedhouses.com, McGravenHouse, Supertalk Mississippi
Media, Mississippi's mosthaunted house, Wikipedia,
(22:06):
McRaven House, WJTV Vicksburg, ALook Inside the McGraven House.
It seems that every state in the South has its
own stories of haunted places,its own secret corners that hold
loss, that hold sadness orviolence, grief or execution.
This is a region rich incharacter and folklore.
There's no shortage of placesthat embrace the dead, and
(00:30):
places that allow the dead toreach out to us for reasons that
only they understand.
Mississippi is one of thosestates with its rivers
crisscrossing the land, themighty Mississippi being the
grandfather of them all.
As we've learned in earlierepisodes, water, particularly
(00:52):
moving water and limestone, areconducive to strange phenomenon
and odd occurrences.
Imagine then what the GrandMississippi has witnessed in
patient silence over thecenturies.
Is there anything better than areally good story?
(01:13):
I mean a story told by a friendamong friends.
An engaging tale, told in theright place, at the right time,
captures us.
It captures our imagination.
It takes us away from the hereand now and carries us to the
world of what if.
I think a really good storytaps into our childhood, that
(01:38):
magical time when anything waspossible, if we could just close
our eyes and imagine it.
As adults, we don't hide underthe covers anymore, as we listen
to the whispered tales of braveknights or beautiful princesses
or scary monsters.
We don't walk through thewoods, talking as we go, telling
(02:01):
tales of forest creatures thatlive among the trees and the
animals.
We do, however, still spin ourtails, and a comfortable front
porch is often where we do that.
We sit in swings or rockingchairs or rickety woven lawn
chairs, and we still gather withfriends.
(02:21):
At the end of the day, when thesoft light of dusk opens its
arms to embrace nightfall, we'retaken back to a time when the
story is real.
It's possible.
So join me tonight here on myfront porch, won't you?
As we step into another talethat's rooted in both truth and
(02:44):
in myth.
And as night swallows the softdusk, I'll turn on the light.
You're gonna want that.
The following podcast containsmaterial that may be disturbing.
Listener discretion is advised.
(03:06):
The Mississippi River runs twothousand three hundred and forty
one miles to the Gulf, startingin Minnesota and flowing south
through Wisconsin, Iowa,Illinois, Missouri, Kentucky,
Tennessee, Arkansas,Mississippi, and finally
(03:26):
Louisiana.
It flows through ten states,nearly cutting this country in
half.
But remember, those ten statesthe Mississippi River slices
through have only been statesfor about 250 years.
It's hard for us to imaginesometimes that there were people
(03:48):
and a land that existed longbefore some English colonists
left their homeland, traveledacross the Atlantic, and imposed
their will on both the peopleand the land, eventually
creating the United States ofAmerica.
Geologists opined that theriver began flowing about
(04:09):
seventy million years ago, whena large mountain chain opened up
and allowed water to flowsouth.
Old Man River, indeed.
Imagine what he's seen.
Mississippi is known as one ofthe most haunted states in the
(04:34):
nation.
From shuttered plantation homesto long silent battlefields,
paranormal experts tell us thatthe rich earth itself holds
troubled spirits and theirsecrets.
Tonight, let's take a look at aplace in the Magnolia state
that is home to some of thesespirits.
We'll travel the Great RiverRoad, a road that runs alongside
(04:58):
the Mississippi to see whatsecrets the water flows past.
The McRaven Mansion, oftencalled the most haunted house in
Mississippi, is a Vicksburgmansion built in 1797 by a man
named Andrew Glass.
In fact, Vicksburg wasn't evencalled Vicksburg at the time.
(05:22):
It was called Fort Nogales, andit was a Spanish colonial fort.
Nogales, by the way, meanswalnuts, and Vicksburg was also
known as Walnut Hills beforefinally being named for
Methodist minister Newitt Vic.
The McRaven House, laterupgraded to the McGraven Mansion
(05:44):
because of its sprawl, became atime capsule of sorts, because
it was built in three stages.
Two spinster sisters who livedto very old ages in the house
never updated it with modernconveniences, so it remained a
true snapshot of the threearchitectural periods during
(06:04):
which it was built.
Vicksburg is a bustlingMississippi town that was
founded in 1811, strategicallylocated on a high bluff
overlooking the mightyMississippi River.
It became an important tradingport because it was so close to
the river and because theNatchez Trace was not far away.
(06:26):
Natchez Trace is an importanttrading route that links
Natchez, Mississippi toNashville, Tennessee.
We took a closer look at thetrace in a previous episode
titled King's Tavern.
This 440-mile path was litteredwith dangerous bandits and
thieves, and one traveled it atgreat peril.
(06:48):
Andrew Glass was one of thesethieves.
Tales have it that Glass builtMcRaven as a hideout from the
law.
Glass was a feared highwaymanfrom the Morel gang, and his
reputation grew as tales of hislegendary robberies spread
across the region.
He was also a flagrantwomanizer.
(07:10):
At the time it was built,McRaven was just a two-room
hideout with a kitchen on thebottom floor and a sleeping area
above.
The walls were painted withbuttermilk and blueberry paint,
and that paint is still on thewalls in those two rooms.
Glass built the house the wayhe did because he didn't want to
(07:32):
get ambushed.
The only way to get up to thesleeping area was by a ladder
that he would pull up with himevery night before bed.
But even that clever designdidn't protect him.
As it turns out, Glasssafeguarded himself from the
outside intruders, but not froma jealous wife.
Mary Glass slit her husband'sthroat with a razor blade while
(07:57):
he lay sleeping one night, deaddrunk.
It seems that monogamy was notAndrew Glass's strong suit.
Experts today tell us that thatroom in particular is one in
which women do not feel safe.
Books fly off shelves, shuttersbang open and shut, and the
(08:19):
room temperature dropsdrastically when a woman enters.
Women report that their hair ispulled or that they're pinched
and shoved while in the bedroom.
When Andrew Glass was murdered,the McRaven house was sold to
Sheriff Stephen Howard.
Howard and his young wife MaryElizabeth added more rooms, a
(08:42):
staircase, and a beautiful patioto the house.
Mary Elizabeth was pregnant,and the young couple looked to
the future with joy andexcitement.
McRaven was to be home to ahappy family.
But tragically, Mary Elizabethdied during childbirth, a common
occurrence in those days.
(09:03):
Shortly thereafter, Howard soldthe house, but it seems that
Mary's spirit stayed behind.
From the day of her death untilnow, McRaven Mansion had a pall
of sadness and tragedy aboutit.
And still today, MaryElizabeth's ghost roams the
halls, greeting guests andplaying pranks.
(09:26):
And sometimes at night, guestsand caretakers hear a woman,
softly singing lullabies andsometimes crying just as softly.
Glass's murder might explainsome of the strange activity
inside McRaven, but deathplagued the home without mercy
(09:50):
for years after that.
We'll take a closer look atMcRaven as its construction and
tragedies unfolded.
But first, I'm going to take aminute to tell you about the
gang that Glass was a part of.
If you've never heard of theMorel gang, you're missing out.
John Morel, who was accused ofmore than 400 murders, was also
(10:13):
known as the Devil Reverend.
He'd masquerade as a travelingpreacher, moving up and down the
Natchez Trace, sellingsalvation to the poor lost souls
he'd find along the way.
Despite preaching the gospel toa growing following, Morel
stole horses and slaves, sellingthem to others for his own
(10:35):
gain.
As a teen, he was accused andconvicted of horse thievery.
In addition to spending sixyears in prison, he was flogged
and then branded with theletters HT, horse thief.
When Morel was released fromprison, he set out for Natchez
Trace, bent on picking up rightwhere he left off.
(10:58):
And he did.
One day, while Morel preachedto a newfound congregation,
Andrew Glass and a group ofbandits stole all the horses and
valuables they could find,leaving only the horse Morel
rode in on.
The Devil Reverend vowed toexact revenge from Glass, but
he'd never get it.
(11:18):
Mary beat him to it by cuttingher own husband's throat.
In 1835, Morel tried to incitea slave rebellion in the South.
He intended to gain control ofthe South as the planned chaos
from the rebellion spread.
While his plot ultimatelyfailed, it did lead to talks of
(11:40):
conspiracy in major southerncities.
And on July 6, 1835, inVicksburg, Mississippi, those
talks heated up until theyreached a boil.
An angry mob exiled allgamblers from Vicksburg,
believing them to be part ofMorel's treasonous plot.
Five gamblers were lynched andshot that day, but Morrell
(12:05):
escaped unharmed.
In a deathbed confession, yearslater, Morel admitted to being
guilty of most of the crimescharged against him, except
murder, to which he claimed tobe guiltless.
John Morrell died on November21, 1844, nine months after
(12:29):
leaving prison.
He was reported to havecontracted pulmonary consumption
or tuberculosis, and wasinterred at Smyrna Cemetery in
Pikeville, Tennessee.
In an odd twist, years after hewas buried, parts of him were
dug up and stolen by graverobbers.
(12:49):
Although the corpse had beenhalf eaten by scavenging hogs,
the head was separated from thetorso, pickled, and displayed at
county fairs.
His skull is still missing, butthe Tennessee State Museum
proudly holds one of his thumbsin its inventory.
(13:09):
Sheriff Stephen Howard, aformer owner of McGraven
Mansion, was involved insquashing what became known as
Morrell's Excitement.
Because of the tastes of itsvarious owners, the McGraven
House is a true architecturalgem.
(13:30):
Built in three distinct periodstyles, McRaven's rooms take us
on a time travel journey fromMississippi's pioneer era
through the Empire and Greekrevival architectural styles.
Period antiques give us an evenbetter idea of the rich and
comfortable lifestyle of thehome's troubled inhabitants,
(13:54):
whose spirits have chosen tostay on in the house that saw so
much of their personal misery.
Prominent brick manufacturerand sawmill owner John H.
Bob bought the house fromSheriff Howard, who had added to
the pioneer style home in theempire style of construction.
Bob constructed the home'sGreek revival rooms in 1849,
(14:20):
transforming the house into anelegant show place.
He opened up his house as afield hospital during the Civil
War and weathered the bloodyVicksburg siege at McRaben.
Many Civil War soldiers died inthe McRaven house and were
buried on the property.
Bob did not live out his yearsin the walls of his beloved
(14:44):
home, though.
Rather, he was murdered byUnion Reconstruction troops.
During the Reconstructionperiod following the war, Union
soldiers were not welcome in theSouth.
One day, Bob saw some Unionsoldiers walking through his
gardens, drunk, picking flowersand being careless about where
(15:04):
they stepped.
He shouted at them and orderedthem to leave, but they refused.
From his chair on the porch,Bob reached down and picked up a
brick that had fallen off thehouse during the shelling at
Vicksburg.
He hurled that brick and hit asergeant in the head, knocking
(15:25):
him unconscious.
The soldiers left, vowingrevenge.
The matter was taken up incourt, with nothing truly
resolved.
But when Bob returned to hishome, there he found 25 Union
soldiers waiting for him.
They forcefully arrested andescorted him to Stout's Bayou,
(15:47):
not far from McRaven House.
While there he tried to escape,and the soldiers shot him in
the back.
When they caught up to him andsaw that he wasn't dead, they
shot him in the face.
This was the first recorded actof violence following the Civil
War.
Bob's widow Selena sold thehouse following this horrific
(16:11):
incident, but like MaryElizabeth, John chose to stay
behind at McRaven.
To this day he can be seensmoking a cigar on the balcony
or yelling at unseen Uniontroops out in the gardens.
After John Bob was killed,McRavenhouse was then used as
(16:31):
Union headquarters.
Colonel J.
H.
Wilson stayed at McRaven Houseduring this time.
Wilson was a close friend of aman named Captain James
McPherson, and the two metregularly to enjoy brandy and
cigars on the balcony.
But one night, McPherson didn'tmeet Wilson at their usual
(16:52):
spot.
Following an exhaustive search,there were no answers.
McPherson had simplydisappeared.
Weeks later, Wilson sworeMcPherson appeared to him as a
ghost.
The apparition was wet, theuniform dripping and puddling
(17:16):
water on the floor.
The ghost told Colonel Wilsonthat while he had been attending
a bonfire in town, he had beenkilled by a citizen of Vicksburg
and his body dumped in theMississippi River.
This became the first recordedstory of ghosts being seen in
McRaven House in 1864.
(17:36):
But it would be just one ofmany.
Murray lived there with hiswife Ellen, their four
daughters, and three sons.
William died at the house in1911, and his wife passed away
(17:57):
there in 1921.
Eventually, all but two of thechildren passed away.
Only two daughters remained.
Their names were Annie andElla, and they were unmarried.
Spinsters, they were called,back in the day.
The two lived together in thehouse with no modern
(18:17):
conveniences other than atelephone, their entire lives.
They had no contact with theoutside world other than with
their doctor.
In 1969, Ella died there at theage of 81.
Annie sold the house and movedinto a nursing home.
(18:37):
By this time, the house hadfallen into disrepair and become
covered in thick gnarled vines.
Nearby residents had no idea itstill existed.
It was later discovered thatthe reclusive sisters had even
resorted to chopping upexpensive furniture for
firewood.
McRaven House has been boughtand sold a few times since then,
(19:02):
with each owner doing a bit ofrestoration.
In 1984, McRaven House waspurchased by Leland French.
French continued restoring thebeautiful old home and was the
first owner in many years toactually live inside the house.
While there, though, heexperienced some violent ghostly
(19:23):
encounters both inside andoutside the house.
He was shoved down the stairsand had a dresser drawer slammed
onto his hands, breaking hisfingers.
He had his head shoved into thefloor while cleaning it,
leaving him with a broken nose.
(19:44):
French purchased a home thatwas only a few houses away from
McRaven so that he had a safeplace to stay when he wasn't
working on the house.
However, eventually he movedeverything of his out.
And who could blame him?
The McRaven House still standsa glorious testimony to the
(20:07):
architectural styles of eachperiod of its construction.
But as with many places withwhich violence and grief are
associated, violence and griefremain.
Spirits remain, and talesremain untold, or told with
half-truths.
And sometimes they are told inutter truth by the very people
(20:32):
who live them.
Mary Elizabeth, who lost herlife giving life to a child.
John Bob, murdered for throwinga brick at a Union soldier.
(20:56):
And Captain McPherson,allegedly murdered, his body fed
to the Mississippi.
The ghosts of soldierswandering through the trees on
the grounds.
Lost souls, who will forevercall McRaven House home.
I'm Carole Townsend, veterannewspaper journalist and
(21:21):
six-time award-winning author.
You can find me on social mediaand check out my website at
Carole Townsend.com.
As always, thanks forlistening, and if you're
enjoying these tales of Southernhistory and lore, I hope you'll
tell your friends.
Subscribe to this podcast onSpotify, Apple Play, iHeart, and
(21:45):
anywhere you listen.
My team and I use the followingresources to bring this tale to
you Hauntedhouses.com, McGravenHouse, Supertalk Mississippi
Media, Mississippi's mosthaunted house, Wikipedia,
(22:06):
McRaven House, WJTV Vicksburg, ALook Inside the McGraven House.
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