Famous Ghosts

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FAMOUS GHOSTS

TRUE ENCOUNTERS WITH WORLD BEYOND

HANS HOLZER

By the author of Witches and Hans Holzer’s Travel Guide to Haunted Houses

Contents

Cover Page

Title Page

Introduction

Famous Ghosts

Copyright

HANS HOLZER IS THE AUTHOR of 119 books, including Life Beyond, The Directory of Psychics, America’s Mysterious Places, Windows to the Past, and Witches.

He has written, produced, and hosted a number of television programs, notably Ghost in the House, Beyond the Five Senses, and the NBC series In Search of… He has appeared on numerous national television programs and lectured widely. He has written for national magazines such as Mademoiselle, Penthouse, Longevity, and columns in national weeklies.

Hans Holzer studied at Vienna University, Austria; Columbia University, New York; and holds a Ph.D. from the London College of Applied Science. Professor Holzer taught parapsychology for eight years at the New York Institute of Technology, is a member of the Authors Guild, Writers Guild of America, Dramatists’ Guild, the New York Academy of Science, and the Archaeological Institute of America. He is listed in Who’s Who in America and lives in New York City.

Introduction

As we settle more securely into the new millennium, people’s interests in the cosmic continue to grow. Even ordinary Joes and Janes who normally wouldn’t be caught dead reading an astrology column are suddenly wondering what the second millennium will mean for them and this world of ours.

To begin with, the millennium came and went over a decade ago. Jesus was born not the the year zero but in 7 B.C., on October 9, to be exact, as I proved quite a while ago after fifteen years of archeological research. This business of the millennium was strictly hype, a promotion that was created to make people think something very special would happen in the year 2000. The psychological effects of this millennium, however, are already upon us—casting a shadow in terms of a renewed great interest in things paranormal, for instance.

Several new TV talk shows and documentaries dealing with psychic phenomena and the exploration of the frontiers of human consciousness have sprung up, filling the television screens with tabloid tidbits often lacking in depth and validating research. Fictional forays into worlds beyond are also currently hugely successful both in film and television, and in books and even Websites.

As a purveyor of genuine information regarding psychic phenomena, I welcome this resurgence of curiosity in worlds beyond the physical because contemplating these matters tends to make people think about themselves, their ultimate fate, and the nature of humankind itself.

When it comes to dealing with the hard evidence of life after death, there are three classes of people—and this may remain the case for a long time to come, considering how resistant humans are to embracing radically new or different concepts.

There are those who ridicule the idea of anything beyond the grave. This category includes anybody from hard-line scientists to people who are only comfortable with the familiar, material world and really do not wish to examine any evidence that might change their minds. The will to disbelieve is far stronger than the will to believe—though neither leads to proof and hard evidence.

Then there are those who have already accepted the evidence of a continued existence beyond physical death, including people who have arrived at this conclusion through an examination of hard evidence, either personal in nature or from scientifically valid sources. They are the group I respect the most, because they are not blind believers. They rightfully question the evidence, but they have no problem accepting it when it is valid. Included in this group are the religious-metaphysical folks, although they require no hard proof to validate their convictions, which emanate from a belief system that involves a world beyond this one.

The third group is often thrown offtrack when trying to get at the truth by the folks in the metaphysical camp. This makes it more difficult for them to arrive at a proper conviction regarding the psychic. The thing for this third group is to stick to its principles and not become blind believers.

The vast majority of people belong to the third group. They are aware of the existence of psychical phenomena and the evidence for such phenomena, including case histories and scientific investigations by open-minded individuals. But they may be skeptical. They hesitate to join the second group only because of their own inner resistance to such fundamental changes in their philosophical attitudes toward life and death. For them, therefore, the need to be specific when presenting evidence or case histories, which must be fully verifiable, is paramount, as is an acceptable explanation for their occurrence.

It is hoped that those in the second group will embrace the position of the last group: that there are no boundaries around possibilities, provided that the evidence bears it out.

Prof. Hans Holzer, Ph.D.

Famous Ghosts

HERE WE DEAL WITH the ghosts of famous people, whose names nearly everyone will recognize. This category includes historical celebrities, national figures, heroes, leaders, and also celebrities of Hollywood, the theatre, people who once made headlines, and people who had some measure of fame, which is usually a lot more than the proverbial fifteen minutes that, according to the late Andy Warhol, everyone can find.

There are many houses or places where famous ghosts have appeared that are open to the public. These include national monuments, local museums, historical houses and mansions. But are the famous ghosts still there when you visit? Well, now, that depends: many ghostly experiences are, as I have pointed out, impressions from the past, and you get to sort of relive the events that involved them in the past. It is a little difficult to sort this out, tell which is a bona fide resident ghost still hanging around the old premises and which is a scene from the past. But if you are the one who is doing the exploring, the ghost hunter as it were, it is for you to experience and decide for yourself. Good hunting!

GHOSTS IN FICTION

Ghosts, phantoms and spirits have always been a staple for novelists and dramatists. Mysterious and worrisome ghosts are both part of the human experience yet outside the mainstream of that world. Many of the false notions people have about ghosts come from fiction. Only in fictional ghost stories do ghosts threaten or cause harm: in the real afterlife, they are too busy trying to understand their situation to worry about those in the physical world.

From Chaucer’s Canterville ghost with his rattling chain to Shakespeare’s ghost of Hamlet’s father, who restlessly walked the ramparts of his castle because of unresolved matters (such as his murder), in literature, ghosts seem frightening and undesirable. No Caspers there.

The masters of the macabre, from E. T. A. Hoffman to Edgar Allan Poe, have presented their ghosts as sorrowful, unfortunate creatures who are best avoided.

The Flying Dutchman is a man, punished by God for transgressions (though they are never quite explained), who cannot stop being a ghost until true love comes his way. Not likely, among the real kind.

* * *

Edith Wharton’s novels offer us far more realistic ghosts, perhaps because she is nearer to our time and was aware of psychical research in these matters.

There is a pair of ghostly dancing feet in one of Rud-yard Kipling’s Indian tales that used to keep me up nights when I was a boy. Today, they would merely interest me because of my desire to see the rest of the dancer, too.

Arthur Conan Doyle presents us with a colorful but very believable ghost story in The Law of the Ghost. Lastly, the ghosts of Dickens’ A Christmas Carol are not really ghosts but messengers from beyond, symbolic at best.

Please don’t rush to Elsinore Castle in Denmark in search of the unfortunate king who was murdered by his brother because, alas, both the murdered king and his brother Claudius are as much figments of Shakespeare’s imagination as is the melancholy Dane, Hamlet, himself.

Television ghosts tend to be much less frightening, even pleasant. The ghosts in The Ghost and Mrs. Muir, starring Rex Harrison, were sarcastic, almost lovable. The ghostly couple the banker Topper had to contend with was full of mischief, at worst, and helpful, at best.

And they did all sorts of things real ghosts don’t do, but special effects will have their say.

* 1

The Conference House Ghost

ONLY AN HOUR OR SO by ferry boat from bustling Manhattan lies the remote charm of Staten Island, where many old houses and even farms still exist in their original form within the boundaries of New York City.

One of these old houses, and a major sight-seeing attraction, is the so-called Conference House, where the British Commander, Lord Howe, received the American Conference delegation consisting of Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, and Edward Rutledge, on September 11, 1776. The purpose of the meeting was to convince the Americans that a peaceful solution should be found for the difficulties between England and the Colonies. The meeting proved unsuccessful, of course, and the Revolutionary War ensued.

The house itself is a sturdy white two-story building, erected along typical English manor house lines, in 1688, on a site known then as Bentley Manor in what is today Tot-tenville. There are two large rooms on the ground floor, and a staircase leading to an upper story, also divided into two rooms; a basement contains the kitchen and a vaultlike enclosure. The original owner of the house was Captain Billopp of the British Navy, and his descendants lived in the house until the close of the Revolutionary period.

Local legends have had the house haunted for many years. The story was that Billopp, a hard man, jilted his fiancee, and that she died of a broken heart in this very house. For several generations back, reports of noises, murmurs, sighs, moans, and pleas have been received and the old Staten Island Transcript, a local newspaper, has mentioned these strange goings-on over the years. When the house was being rebuilt, after having been taken over as a museum by the city, the workers are said to have heard the strange noises, too.

It was against this background that I decided to investigate the house in the company of Mrs. Meyers, who was to be our sensitive, and two friends, Rose de Simone and Pearl Winder, who were to be the sitters, or assistants to the medium.

After we had reached Staten Island, and were about half an hour’s drive from the house, Mrs. Meyers volunteered her impressions of the house which she was yet to see! She spoke of it as being white, the ground floor divided into two rooms, a brown table and eight chairs in the east room; the room on the west side of the house is the larger one, and lighter colored than the other room, and some silverware was on display in the room to the left.

Upon arriving at the house, I checked these statements; they were correct, except that the number of chairs was now only seven, not eight, and the silver display had been removed from its spot eight years before!

Mrs. Meyers’ very first impression was the name Butler; later I found that the estate next door belonged to the Butler family, unknown, of course, to the medium.

We ascended the stairs; Mrs. Meyers sat down on the floor of the second-story room to the left. She described a woman named Jane, stout, white-haired, wearing a dark green dress and a fringed shawl, then mentioned the name Howe. It must be understood that the connection of Lord Howe with the house was totally unknown to all of us until after checking up on the history of the Conference House, later on.

Next Mrs. Meyers described a man with white hair, or a wig, wearing a dark coat with embroidery at the neck, tan breeches, dark shoes, and possessed of a wide, square face, a thick nose, and looking Dutch. The man died in this room, she added.

She then spoke of the presence of a small boy, about six, dressed in pantaloons and with his hair in bangs. The child born in this room was specially honored later, Mrs. Meyers felt. This might apply to Christopher Billopp, born at the house in 1737, who later became Richmond County representative in the Colonial Assembly. Also, Mrs. Meyers felt the presence of a big man in a fur hat, rather fat, wearing a skin coat and high boots, brass-buckle belt and black trousers; around him she felt boats, nets, sailing boats, and she heard a foreign, broad accent, also saw him in a four-masted ship of the square-rigger type. The initial T was given. Later, I learned that the Billopp family were prominent Tory leaders up to and during the Revolution.

This man, Mrs. Meyers felt, had a loud voice, broad forehead, high cheekbones, was a vigorous man, tall, with shaggy hair, and possibly Dutch. His name was Van B., she thought. She did not know that Billopp (or Van Billopp) was the builder of the house.

I feel as if I’m being dragged somewhere by Indians, Mrs. Meyers suddenly said. There is violence, somebody dies on a pyre of wood, two men, one white, one Indian; and on two sticks nearby are their scalps.

Later, I ascertained that Indian attacks were frequent here during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries and that, in fact, a tunnel once existed as an escape route to the nearby waterfront, in case of hostile Indian sieges. Large numbers of arrowheads have been unearthed around the house.

Down in the cellar, Mrs. Meyers felt sure six people had been buried near the front wall during the Revolutionary War, all British soldiers; she thought eight more were buried elsewhere on the grounds and sensed the basement full of wounded like a hospital. On investigation, I found that some members of Billopp’s family were indeed buried on the grounds near the road; as for the British soldiers, there were frequent skirmishes around the house between Americans infiltrating from the nearby New Jersey shore and the British, who held Staten Island since July 4, 1776. At one time, Captain Billopp, a British subject, was kidnapped by armed bandits in his own house, and taken to New Jersey a prisoner of the Americans!

We returned to the upper part of the house once more. Suddenly, Mrs. Meyers felt impelled to turn her attention to the winding staircase. I followed with mounting excitement.

Descending the stairs, our medium suddenly halted her steps and pointed to a spot near the landing of the second story. Someone was killed here with a crooked knife, a woman! she said. There was horror on her face as if she were reliving the murder. On questioning the custodian, Mrs. Early, I discovered that Captain Billopp, in a rage, had indeed killed a female slave on that very spot!

* 2

The Stranger at the Door

I HAVE FOUND THAT there are ghosts in all sorts of places, in ancient castles, modern apartment houses, farms and ships—but it is somewhat of a jolt to find out you’ve lived in a house for a few years and didn’t even know it was haunted. But that is exactly what happened to me.

For three years I was a resident of a beautiful twenty-nine-story apartment building on Riverside Drive. I lived on the nineteenth floor, and seldom worried about what transpired below me. But I was aware of the existence of a theater and a museum on the ground floor of the building. I was also keenly aware of numerous inspired paintings, some Tibetan, some Occidental, adorning the corridors of this building. The museum is nowadays known as the Riverside Museum, and the paintings were largely the work of the great Rohrach, a painter who sought his inspirations mainly in the mysticism of Tibet, where he spent many years. On his return from the East, his many admirers decided to chip in a few million and build him a monument worthy of his name. Thus, in 1930, was raised the Rohrach building as a center of the then flourishing cult of Eastern mysticism, of which Rohrach was the high priest. After his death, a schism appeared among his followers, and an exodus took place. A new Rohrach Museum was established by Seena Fosdick, and is still in existence a few blocks away from the imposing twenty-nine-story structure originally known by that name. In turn, the building where I lived changed its name to that of the Master Institute, a combination apartment building and school, and, of course, art gallery.

It was in February of 1960 when I met at a tea party—yes, there are such things in this day and age—a young actress and producer, Mrs. Roland, who had an interesting experience at my building some years ago. She was not sure whether it was 1952 or 1953, but she was quite sure that it happened exactly the way she told it to me that winter afternoon in the apartment of famed author Claudia de Lys.

A lecture-meeting dealing with Eastern philosophy had drawn her to the Rohrach building. Ralph Huston, the eminent philosopher, presided over the affair, and a full turnout it was. As the speaker held the attention of the crowd, Mrs. Roland’s eyes wandered off to the rear of the room. Her interest was invited by a tall stranger standing near the door, listening quietly and with rapt attention. Mrs. Roland didn’t know too many of the active members, and the stranger, whom she had never seen before, fascinated her. His dress, for one thing, was most peculiar. He wore a gray cotton robe with a high-necked collar, the kind one sees in Oriental paintings, and on his head he had a round black cap. He appeared to be a fairly young man, certainly in the prime of life, and his very dark eyes in particular attracted her.

For a moment she turned her attention to the speaker; when she returned to the door, the young man was gone.

Peculiar, she thought; why should he leave in the middle of the lecture? He seemed so interested in it all.

As the devotees of mysticism slowly filed out of the room, the actress sauntered over to Mrs. Fosdick whom she knew to be the boss lady of the group.

Tell me, she inquired, who was that handsome dark-eyed young man at the door?

Mrs. Fosdick was puzzled. She did not recall any such person. The actress then described the stranger in every detail. When she had finished, Mrs. Fosdick seemed a bit pale.

But this was an esoteric forum, so she did not hesitate to tell Mrs. Roland that she had apparently seen an apparition. What was more, the description fitted the great Rohrach—in his earlier years—to a T. Mrs. Roland had never seen Rohrach in the flesh.

At this point, Mrs. Roland confessed that she had psychic abilities, and was often given to hunches. There was much head shaking, followed by some hand shaking, and then the matter was forgotten.

I was of course interested, for what would be nicer than to have a house ghost, so to speak?

The next morning, I contacted Mrs. Fosdick. Unfortunately, this was one of the occasions when truth did not conquer. When I had finished telling her what I wanted her to confirm, she tightened up, especially when she found out I was living at the enemy camp, so to speak. Emphatically, Mrs. Fosdick denied the incident, but admitted knowing Mrs. Roland.

With this, I returned to my informant, who reaffirmed the entire matter. Again I approached Mrs. Fosdick with the courage of an unwelcome suitor advancing on the castle of his beloved, fully aware of the dragons lurking in the moat.

While I explained my scientific reasons for wanting her to remember the incident, she launched into a tirade concerning her withdrawal from the original Rohrach group, which was fascinating, but not to me.

I have no reason to doubt Mrs. Roland’s account, especially as I found her extremely well poised, balanced, and indeed, psychic.

I only wondered if Mr. Rohrach would sometime honor me with a visit, or vice versa, now that we were neighbors?

* 3

A Visit with Alexander Hamilton’s Ghost

THERE STANDS AT Number 27, Jane Street, in New York’s picturesque artists’ quarters, Greenwich Village, a mostly wooden house dating back to pre-Revolutionary days. In this house Alexander Hamilton was treated in his final moments. Actually, he died a few houses away, at 80 Jane Street, but No. 27 was the home of John Francis, his doctor, who attended him after the fatal duel with Aaron Burr.

However, the Hamilton house no longer exists, and the wreckers are now after the one of his doctor, now occupied a writer and artist, Jean Karsavina, who has lived there since 1939.

The facts of Hamilton’s untimely passing are well known; D. S. Alexander (in his Political History of the State of New York) reports that, because of political enmity, Burr seems to have deliberately determined to kill him. A letter written by Hamilton calling Burr despicable and not to be trusted with the reins of government found its way into the press, and Burr demanded an explanation. Hamilton declined, and on June 11, 1804, at Weehawken, New Jersey, Burr took careful aim, and his first shot mortally wounded Hamilton. In the boat back to the city, Hamilton regained consciousness, but knew his end was near. He was taken to Dr. Francis’ house and treated, but died within a few days at his own home, across the street.

Ever since moving into 27 Jane Street, Miss Karsavina has been aware of footsteps, creaking stairs, and the opening and closing of doors; and even the unexplained flushing of a toilet. On one occasion, she found the toilet chain still swinging, when there was no one around! "I suppose a toilet that flushes would be a novelty to someone from the eighteenth century," she is quoted in a brief newspaper account in June of 1957.*

She also has seen a blurred shape, without being able to give details of the apparition; her upstairs tenant, however, reports that one night not so long ago, a man in eighteenth-century clothes, with his hair in a queue walked into her room, looked at her and walked out again.

Miss Karsavina turned out to be a well-read and charming lady who had accepted the possibility of living with a ghost under the same roof. Mrs. Meyers and I went to see her in March 1960. The medium had no idea where we were going.

At first, Mrs. Meyers, still in waking condition, noticed a shadow of a man, old, with a broad face and bulbous nose; a woman with a black shawl whose name she thought was Deborah, and she thought someone had a case; she then described an altar of white lilies, a bridal couple, and a small coffin covered with flowers; then a very old woman in a coffin that was richly adorned, with relatives including a young boy and girl looking into the open coffin. She got the name of Mrs. Patterson, and the girl’s as Miss Lucy. In another impression of the same premises, Mrs. Meyers described "an empty coffin, people weeping, talking, milling around, and the American Flag atop the coffin; in the coffin a man’s hat, shoes with silver buckles, gold epaulettes…." She then got close to the man and thought his lungs were filling with liquid and he died with a pain in his side.

Lapsing into semitrance at this point, Mrs. Meyers described a party of men in a small boat on the water, then a man wearing white pants and a blue coat with blood spilled over the pants. Two boats were involved, and it is dusk, she added.

Switching apparently to another period, Mrs. Meyers felt that something is going on in the cellar, they try to keep attention from what happens downstairs; there is a woman here, being stopped by two men in uniforms with short jackets and round hats with wide brims, and pistols. There is the sound of shrieking, the woman is pushed back violently, men are marching, someone who had been harbored here has to be given up, an old man in a nightshirt and red socks is being dragged out of the house into the snow.

In still another impression, Mrs. Meyers felt herself drawn up toward the rear of the house where someone died in childbirth; in fact, this type of death occurred several times in this house. Police were involved, too, but this event or chain of events is of a later period than the initial impressions, she felt. The name Henry Oliver or Oliver Henry came to her mind.

After her return to full consciousness, Mrs. Meyers remarked that there was a chilly area near the center of the downstairs room. There is; I feel it too. Mrs. Meyers sees the figure of a slender man, well-formed, over average height, in white trousers, black boots, dark blue coat and tails, white lace in front; he is associated with George Washington and Lafayette, and their faces appear to her, too; she feels Washington may have been in this house. The man she sees is a general, she can see his epaulettes. The old woman and the children seen earlier are somehow connected with this, too. He died young, and there was fighting in a boat. Now Mrs. Meyers gets the name W. Lawrence. She has a warm feeling about the owner of the house; he took in numbers of people, like refugees.

A General Mills stored supplies here—shoes, coats, almost like a military post; food is being handed out. The name Bradley is given. Then Mrs. Meyers sees an old man playing a cornet; two men in white trousers seen seated at a long table, bent over papers, with a crystal chandelier above.

After the séance, Miss Karsavina confirmed that the house belonged to Hamilton’s physician, and as late as 1825 was owned by a doctor, who happened to be the doctor for the Metropolitan Opera House. The cornet player might have been one of his patients.

In pre-Revolutionary days, the house may have been used as headquarters of an underground railroad, around 1730, when the police tried to pick up the alleged instigators of the so-called Slave Plot, evidently being sheltered here.

Lawrence may refer to the portrait of Washington by Lawrence which used to hang over the fireplace in the house. On the other hand, I found a T. Lawrence, M. D., at 146 Greenwich Street, in Elliot’s Improved Directory for New York (1812); and a Widow Patterson is listed by Longworth (1803) at 177 William Street; a William Lawrence, druggist, at 80 John Street. According to Charles Burr Todd’s Story of New York, two of Hamilton’s pallbearers were Oliver Wolcott and John L. Lawrence. The other names mentioned could not be found. The description of the man in white trousers is of course the perfect image of Hamilton, and the goings-on at the house with its many coffins, and women dying in childbirth, are indeed understandable for a doctor’s residence.

It does not seem surprising that Alexander Hamilton’s shade should wish to roam about the house of the man who tried, vainly, to save his life.

* 4

The Fifth Avenue Ghost

SOME CASES OF haunted houses require but a single visit to obtain information and evidence, others require two or three. But very few cases in the annals of psychic research can equal or better the record set by the case I shall call The Fifth Avenue Ghost. Seventeen sessions, stretching over a period of five months, were needed to complete this most unusual case. I am presenting it here just as it unfolded for us. I am quoting from our transcripts, our records taken during each and every session; and because so much evidence was obtained in this instance that could only be obtained from the person these events actually happened to, it is to my mind a very strong case for the truth about the nature of hauntings.

* * *

It isn’t very often that one finds a haunted apartment listed in the leading evening paper.

Occasionally, an enterprising real-estate agent will add the epithet looks haunted to a cottage in the country to attract the romanticist from the big city.

But the haunted apartment I found listed in the New York Daily News one day in July 1953 was the real McCoy. Danton Walker, the late Broadway columnist, had this item—

One for the books: an explorer, advertising his Fifth Avenue Studio for sublet, includes among the attractions ‘attic dark room with ghost.’…

The enterprising gentleman thus advertising his apartment for rent turned out to be Captain Davis, a celebrated explorer and author of many books, including, here and there, some ghost lore. Captain Davis was no skeptic. To the contrary, I found him sincere and well aware of the existence of psychical research. Within hours, I had discussed the case with the study group which met weekly at the headquarters of the Association for Research and Enlightenment, the Edgar Cayce Foundation. A team was organized, consisting of Bernard Axelrod, Nelson Welsh, Stanley Goldberg, and myself, and, of course, Mrs. Meyers as the medium. Bernard Axelrod and I knew that there was some kind of ghost at the Fifth Avenue address, but little more. The medium knew nothing whatever. Two days after the initial session, a somewhat fictional piece appeared in the New York Times (July 13, 1953) by the late Meyer Berger, who had evidently interviewed the host, but not the ghost. Mr. Berger quoted Captain Davis as saying there was a green ghost who had hanged himself from the studio gallery, and allegedly sticks an equally green hand out of the attic window now and then.

Captain Davis had no idea who the ghost was. This piece, it must be re-emphasized, appeared two days after the initial sitting at the Fifth Avenue house, and its contents were of course unknown to all concerned at the time.

* * *

In order to shake hands with the good Captain, we had to climb six flights of stairs to the very top of 226 Fifth Avenue. The building itself is one of those big old town houses popular in the mid-Victorian age, somber, sturdy, and well up to keeping its dark secrets behind its thickset stone walls. Captain Davis volunteered the information that previous tenants had included Richard Harding Davis, actor Richard Mansfield, and a lady magazine editor. Only the lady was still around and, when interviewed, was found to be totally ignorant of the entire ghost tradition, nor had she ever been disturbed. Captain Davis also told of guests in the house having seen the ghost at various times, though he himself had not. His home is one of the those fantastic and colorful apartments only an explorer or collector would own—a mixture of comfortable studio and museum, full of excitement and personality, and offering more than a touch of the Unseen. Two wild jungle cats completed the atmospheric picture, somewhat anticlimaxed by the host’s tape recorder set up on the floor. The apartment is a kind of duplex, with a gallery or balcony jutting out into the main room. In the middle of this balcony was the window referred to in the Times interview. Present were the host, Captain Davis, Mr. and Mrs. Bertram Long, the Countess de Sales, all friends of the host’s, and the group of researchers previously mentioned—a total of eight people, and, if you wish, two cats. As with most sittings, tape recordings were made of the proceedings from beginning to end, in addition to which written notes were taken.

MEETING A GHOST

Like a well-rehearsed television thriller, the big clock in the tower across the square struck nine, and the lights were doused, except for one medium-bright electric lamp. This was sufficient light, however, to distinguish the outlines of most of the sitters, and particularly the center of the room around the medium.

A comfortable chair was placed under the gallery, in which the medium took her place; around her, forming a circle, sat the others, with the host operating the recorder and facing the medium. It was very still, and the atmosphere seemed tense. The medium had hardly touched the chair when she grabbed her own neck in the unmistakable manner of someone being choked to death, and nervously told of being hung by the neck until dead. She then sat in the chair and Bernard Axelrod, an experienced hypnotist, conditioned her into her usual trance condition, which came within a few minutes.

With bated breath, we awaited the arrival of whatever personality might be the ghost referred to. We expected some violence and, as will be seen shortly, we got it. This is quite normal with such cases, especially at the first contact. It appears that a disturbed personality continuously relives his or her passing condition, or cause of death, and it is this last agony that so frequently makes ghostly visitations matters of horror. If emotional anxiety is the cause of death, or was present at death, then the disturbed personality, or entity, will keep reliving that final agony, much like a phonograph needle stuck in the last groove of a record. But here is what happened on that first occasion.

Sitting of July 11th, 1953, at 226 Fifth Avenue

The medium, now possessed by unknown entity, has difficulty in speaking. Entity breaks into mad laughter full of hatred.

Entity:…curry the horse…they’re coming…curry the horse! Where is Mignon? WHERE IS SHE?

Question: We wish to help you. Who is Mignon?

Entity: She should be here…where is she…you’ve got her! Where is she? Where is the baby?

Question: What baby?

Entity: What did they do with her?

Question: We’re your friends.

Entity: (in tears) Oh, an enemy…an enemy.…

Question: What is your name?

Entity: Guychone…Guychone.…(expresses pain at the neck; hands feeling around are apparently puzzled by finding a woman’s body)

Question: You are using someone else’s body. (Entity clutches throat.) Does it hurt you there?

Entity: Not any more…it’s whole again…I can’t see.…All is so different, all is very strange…nothing is the same.

I asked how he died. This excited him immediately.

Entity: (hysterical) I didn’t do it…I tell you I didn’t do it, no…Mignon, Mignon…where is she? They took the baby…she put me away…they took her…. (Why did she put you away?) So no one could find me (Where?) I stay there (meaning upstairs) all the time.

The Fifth Avenue ghost house—New York

At this point, tapes were changed. Entity, asked where he came from, says Charleston, and that he lived in a white house.

Question: Do you find it difficult to use this body?

Entity: WHAT?? WHAT?? I’m HERE…I’m here…. This is my house…what are YOU doing here?

Question: Tell me about the little room upstairs.

Entity: (crying) Can I go…away…from the room?

At this point, the entity left, and the medium’s control, Albert, took over her body.

Albert: There is a very strong force here, and it has been a little difficult. This individual here suffered violence at the hands of several people. He was a Confederate and he was given up, hidden here, while they made their escape.

Question: What rank did he hold?

Albert: I believe that he had some rank. It is a little dubious as to what he was.

Question: What was his name?

Albert: It is not as he says. That is an assumed name, that he likes to take. He is not as yet willing to give full particulars. He is a violent soul underneath when he has opportunity to come, but he hasn’t done damage to anyone, and we are going to work with him, if possible, from this side.

Question: What about Mignon and the baby?

Albert: Well, they of course are a long time on this side, but he never knew that, what became of them. They were separated cruelly. She did not do anything to him.

Question: How did he leave this world?

Albert: By violence. (Was he hanged?) Yes. (In the little room?) Yes. (Was it suicide or murder?) He says it was murder.

* * *

The control then suggests to end the trance, and try for results in open sitting. We slowly awaken the medium.

While the medium is resting, sitter Stanley Goldberg remarks that he has the impression that Guychone’s father came from Scotland.

Captain Davis observes that at the exact moment of frequency change in the medium, that is, when Guychone left and Albert took over, the control light of the recording apparatus suddenly blazed up of its own accord, and had to be turned down by him.

A standing circle was then formed by all present, holding hands, and taking the center of the room. Soon the medium started swinging forward and back like a suspended body. She remarked feeling very stiff from hanging and surprised to find that I’m whole, having been cut open in the middle.

Both Axelrod and I observed a luminescent white and greenish glow covering the medium, creating the impression of an older man without hair, with high cheekbones and thin arms. This was during the period when Guychone was speaking through the medium.

The séance ended at 12:30. The medium reported feeling exhausted, with continued discomfort in the throat and stomach.

THE INVESTIGATION CONTINUES

Captain Davis, unfortunately, left on a worldwide trip the same week, and the new tenant was uncooperative. I felt we should continue the investigation. Once you pry a ghost loose from his place of unhappy memories, he can sometimes be contacted elsewhere.

Thus, a second sitting took place at the headquarters of the study group, on West 16th Street. This was a small, normally-furnished room free of any particular atmosphere, and throughout this and all following sittings, subdued light was used, bright enough to see all facial expressions quite clearly. There was smoking and occasional talking in low voices, none of which ever disturbed the work. Before the second sitting, Mrs. Meyers remarked that Guychone had followed her home from the Fifth Avenue place, and twice appeared to her at night in a kind of whitish halo, with an expression of frantic appeal in his eyes. Upon her admonition to be patient until the sitting, the apparition had vanished.

Sitting of July 14th, 1953, at 125 West 16th Street

Question: Do you know what year this is?

Guychone: 1873.

Question: No, it is 1953. Eighty years have gone by. You are no longer alive. Do you understand?

Guychone: Eighty years? EIGHTY YEARS? I’m not a hundred-ten years?

Question: No, you’re not. You’re forever young. Mignon is on your side, too. We have come to help you understand yourself. What happened in 1873?

Guychone: Nobody’s goddamn business…mine…mine!

Question: All right, keep your secret then, but don’t you want to see Mignon? Don’t you want justice done? (mad, bitter laughter) Don’t you believe in God? (more laughter) The fact you are here and are able to speak, doesn’t that prove that there is hope for you? What happened in 1873? Remember the house on Fifth Avenue, the room upstairs, the horse to be curried?

Guychone: Riding, riding…find her…they took her away.

Question: Who took her away?

Guychone: YOU! (threatens to strike interrogator)

Question: No, we’re your friends. Where can we find a record of your Army service? Is it true you were on a dangerous mission?

Guychone: Yes.

Question: In what capacity?

Guychone: That is my affair! I do not divulge my secrets. I am a gentleman, and my secrets die with me.

Question: Give us your rank.

Guychone: I was a Colonel.

Question: In what regiment?

Guychone: Two hundred and sixth.

Question: Were you infantry or cavalry?

Guychone: Cavalry.

Question: In the War Between the States?

Guychone: Yes.

Question: Where did you make your home before you came to New York?

Guychone: Charleston…Elm Street.

Question: What is your family name, Colonel?

Guychone: (crying) As a gentleman, I am yet not ready to give you that information…it’s no use, I won’t name it.

Question: You make it hard for us, but we will abide by your wishes.

Guychone: (relieved) I am very much obliged to you…for giving me the information that it is EIGHTY YEARS. Eighty years!

I explain about the house on Fifth Avenue, and that Guychone’s presence had been felt from time to time. Again, I ask for his name.

(Apparently fumbling for paper, he is given paper and fountain pen; the latter seems to puzzle him at first, but he then writes in the artistic, stylized manner of the mid-Victorian age—Edouard Guychone.)

Question: Is your family of French extraction?

Guychone: Yes.

Question: Are you yourself French or were you born in this country?

Guychone: In this country…Charleston.

Question: Do you speak French?

Guychone: No.

Question: Is there anything you want us to do for you? Any unfinished business?

Guychone: Eighty years makes a difference…I am a broken man…God bless you…Mignon…it is so dark, so dark….

I explain the reason for his finding himself temporarily in a woman’s body, and how his hatred had brought him back to the house on Fifth Avenue, instead of passing over to the other side.

Guychone: (calmer) There IS a God?

I ask when was he born.

Guychone: (unsure) 1840…42 years old….

This was the most dramatic of the sittings. The transcript cannot fully convey the tense situation existing between a violent, hate-inspired and God-denying personality fresh from the abyss of perennial darkness, and an interrogator trying calmly to bring light into a disturbed mind. Toward the end of the session, Guychone understood about God, and began to realize that much time had passed since his personal tragedy had befallen him. Actually, the method of liberating a ghost is no different from that used by a psychiatrist to free a flesh-and-blood person from obsessions or other personality disturbances. Both deal with the mind.

It became clear to me that many more sessions would be needed to clear up the case, since the entity was reluctant to tell all. This is not the case with most ghosts, who generally welcome a chance to spill emotions pent up for long years of personal hell. Here, however, the return of reason also brought back the critical faculty of reasoning, and evaluating information. We had begun to liberate Guychone’s soul, but we had not yet penetrated to his conscience. Much hatred, fear, and pride remained, and had to be removed, before the true personality could emerge.

Sitting of July 21st, 1953

Albert, the medium’s control, spoke first.

Question: Have you found any information about his wife and child?

Albert: You understand that this is our moral code, that that which comes from the individual within voluntarily is his sacred development. That which he wishes to divulge makes his soul what it should eventually be.

I asked that he describe Guychone’s appearance to us.

Albert: At the moment he is little developed from the moment of passing. He is still like his latter moments in life. But his figure was of slight build, tall…five feet nine or ten…his face is round, narrow at the chin, high at the cheekbones, the nose is rather prominent, the mouth rather wide…the forehead high, at the moment of death and for many years previous very little hair. The eyes set close to the nose.

Question: Have you learned his real name?

Albert: It is not his wish as yet. He will tell you, he will develop his soul through his confession. Here he is!

Guychone: (at first grimacing in pain) It is nice to come, but it is hell…I have seen the light. It was so dark.

Question: Your name, sir?

Guychone: I was a gentleman…my name was defiled. I cannot see it, I cannot hear it, let me take it, when it is going to be right. I have had to pay for it; she has paid her price. I have been so happy. I have moved about. I have learned to right wrongs. I have seen the light.

Question: I am going to open your eyes now. Look at the calendar before you, and tell me what is the date on it? (placing calendar)

Guychone: 1953…. (pointing at the tape recorder in motion) Wagon wheels!

Question: Give us the name of one of your fellow officers in the war. Write it down.

Guychone: I am a poor soul…. (writes: Mignon my wife…Guychone) Oh, my feet, oh my feet…they hurt me so now…they bleed…I have to always go backwards, backwards. What shall I do with my feet? They had no shoes…we walked over burning weed…they burned the weed…(Who?) The Damyankees…I wake up, I see the burning weed…. (Where? When?) I have to reach out, I have so much to reach for, have patience with me, I can only reach so far—I’ll forget. I will tell you everything…. (Where?) Georgia! Georgia! (Did you fight under General Lee?) I fell under him. (Did you die under him?) No, no.

Question: Who was with you in the regiment?

Guychone: Johnny Greenly…it is like another world…Jerome Harvey. (Who was the surgeon?) I did not see him. Horse doctors. (Who was your orderly?) Walter…my boy…I can’t tell the truth, and I try so hard…. I will come with the truth when it comes, you see the burning weeds came to me…I will think of happier things to tell…I’d like to tell you about the house in Charleston, on Elm Street. I