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HAUNTED LAND'S END ROAD: CHAPEL OF EASE, GHOST LIGHT, FORT FREMONT

3/4/2017

 
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Back in the summer of 2016 a couple of us at The Carolinian's Archives decided to take a three night vacation in South Carolina, lounging on one of our favorite beaches -  Hunting Island State Park. It's located off a larger isle called St. Helena's that contains one reportedly eerie road you'll soon be reading about and looking at. And that's the 64 sq. mile isle's haunted Land's End Road, with its Chapel of Ease, Fort Fremont, and ghost light.
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Also, as a boy in the early 70s I remember one could spend almost an entire day walking or fishing on the ocean side of the State park's beach without seeing another soul.. For an example, a seared-in-the-memory-event was one afternoon walking out on a fifty or sixty foot narrow sand spit at low tide. After catching a sand shark, this lad become so engrossed that time slowly slipped by, until, on turning to walk back, the tide had risen enough to cover all but several feet of the spit! It was hairy wading back to shore, let me tell you, with the briny water at first being above knee level.

​Now, to set the tone for the haunted road, lets quickly look at a few interesting factoids about St. Helena's Isle: the place was officially first explored by the Spanish in the early 15th century. As time went on from there it passed back and forth between the Spaniards, French, and eventually Britain. African-Americans have had a long presence in the area, with the ethnic Gullah group being notable. Here's the wiki link for a condensed and interesting history read of the area, including the old towns of Beaufort and Port Royal:
​ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint_Helena_Island_%28South_Carolina%29

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This article wouldn't have been written had it not been for the three friends shown here. Highway 21 is the main road going across St. Helena's Isle. It leads to Hunting Island State Park and then across a bridge to the gated Fripp island. We made reservations at a Quality Inn, which is the last motel on Hwy. 21 before one comes to the aforementioned places. 

​It was late in the season so there weren't a lot of other travelers, which meant we were pretty much alone in a room at the back of the building. This situation was ideal for meeting and making friends with the three employees. Besides great service, they kept an eye out for our room(which was nice as the motel's keys were lost or stolen the first day we were there). But the best thing of all was getting to know and talk to them. Initially all we'd planed on doing was going to the beach and exploring historic Beaufort a bit. But come the morning of day two, something cool and totally unexpected was relayed to me by two of our new pals.

​As we were chatting about the area they told me there was a ghost road almost directly across from the motel. Yes! Although not intending to go paranormal hunting on this trip, this was a temptation not to be missed. The road was maybe 8 or 9 miles long and was called Land's End. The haunted spots our new friends mentioned were the Chapel of Ease and a ghostly light that was around a curve somewhere past the chapel. According to the fellow on the left, the light would come up on people as it got bigger and bigger. So, no beach sand for us that afternoon, but a ride down what turned out to be a most intriguing and exceedingly old road.

​Note: the digital camera that took these pics had not been updated, they were taken in 2016

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Unless otherwise indicated all photos by The Carolinian's Archives
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Since I sometimes write stories on The Carolinian's Archives from a first person perspective, we'll let the State marker handle the basic history about this place. A more detailed history concerning the chapel can be found on numerous pages via the net. There are ghost tales too, like hymn singing and whispers that emanate from inside the chapel, and a lady in white seen cradling a baby as she strolls about the tombstones. 

This was the first ghost spot told to me and it came up on the left of the road fairly quick. Walking around it wasn't particularly anything other than just interesting and mundane. Maybe the darkness of night would have changed these descriptions? There is a strange smoke or misty looking image captured at night near the small vault on another person's article about this historic site.

​The really interesting thing to us, was indeed, that vault. It did give off a rather weird vibe, an uncomfortable feeling in other words. Especially when I thrust forward my upper body inside it to take a few pics. More on the creepy goings-on reported over time in relation to it after some gallery photos.
During the Civil War Union soldiers apparently damaged the door to the vault, so later on it was bricked-up. The workers did such a good job sealing it as to make themselves proud. Come the next morning however, the men found that some of the bricks had been removed and stacked up neatly against one side of the structure. To say the brickmasons were befuddled, is putting it lightly. No doubt, something supernatural seemed to be afoot to at least some of them.
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It really is rather eerie looking inside this structure. Can you imagine someone spending the night in it!
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Picture http://www.sciway.net/hist/lands-end-light-st-helena-island.html
THE LAND'S END LIGHT
​The employees told us the ghost light was around a bend in the road near an old tree. Driving on down after visiting the church we never really came to a bend with any unusual tree. After returning home and researching it, the reason why became apparent. The tree is nearer the bastion and not on a curve in the road, but its branches do overhang the road.

​The history of St Helena's Island goes way back and this spot is part of its legend and lore. There had been hangings on it in the past: like escaped bondspeople, and some have thought this the answer to what the Land's End light is. Others have speculated it was a Civil War soldier who died on the limb for some reason and his fluidal energy is the source of the ball of light.

​The phenomena seems to start as a small ball of white light that approaches the tree all the while gaining size. Apparently electro-magnetism is involved with it for when it passes an idle auto folks' neck and arm hair stands up on end. In decades past, dozens of cars would sometimes park along the road on Saturday nights to experience this, pardon the pun, literally hair-raising event.   

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Here's something that can make putting out these Mists and Moonlight articles extra interesting. I hadn't noticed the unusual looking two room pics in the last gallery above until now. Let's image  them up and see what we have. There wasn't any smoke, fog or mist about that we noticed when exploring. We were the only folks present for one thing. It was late summer, a bit cool with all the tall trees surrounding the place, and we could feel a sleight ocean breeze coming through them  once in a while up on top. The ocean was maybe 150-to 200 feet away, and the entrance to underneath the structure was facing away from the water.

​Also, the humidity in the rooms and walkway under the gun emplacements felt low. When this military fort was made almost a hundred and twenty years ago it was built very, very solidly. It had to have been to support the four massive swivel artillery guns atop it. The bastion was surely made to last, and it most certainly has.
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Well, maybe, maybe not? At least to me,  the whitish swirls are unexplained. Thinking back, it seems when they were first taken I didn't look at them closely enough and just assumed they were paint on the floors and walls. You just never know what a digital photo might catch, especially in a place like this one is. Thinking about it right now, I sub-consciously hurried through, just long enough to stop and snap the pics at each room. Considering some of the graffiti on the walls, maybe it was just as well there was no lingering about. In other words, just the place for one's neutral energy to quickly turn negative had the strange images and sicko writings been clearly visible in the semi-darkness.

Uwharrie Forest: History, Ghosts, Bigfoot

11/17/2016

 
These playful Chameleons really cover this Uwharrie's field I'am standing in the middle of. There must be nearly a dozen of them within eyesight. What a joy it is to watch them go about their business - changing colors, puffing throats, inqusitively cocking their heads.  ~ from AP's mental notebook circa 1990
PictureMysterious Uwharries

It's quite something to imagine the Uwharrie Mountains with Alp-like peaks, thrusting twenty thousand feet skyward, looming in the middle of present day North Carolina where the prehistoric seacoast used to be.
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That's some imagining when you consider that the mountains today barely surpass eleven hundred feet in height at the most, and are really no more than high hills. The passage of time -- five hundred million years in the Uwharries case -- has reduced one of the world's oldest mountain ranges considerably, to say the least.

Once heavily cleared by farming and logging, the woods and mountains have recovered their forested magnificence beautifully since being purchased by the Federal government in 1931 and National Forest protection enacted by President John F. Kennedy in 1961.
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The Uwharrie (pronounced "You-warr-ee") woodlands seem pretty big when your in the midst of them, but technically they're the smallest National Forest in the state at close to fifty-one thousand acres, or nearly eighty square miles. It seems - especially looking at an old Rally map - that the national forest once encompassed a good many more square miles than it does now. Searching on the net has so far been of no use in determining why this reduction happened.
Whatever the case, the forest covers parts of three counties in south-central North Carolina and is bordered on the west by Morrow Mountain State Park, along with the Yadkin River, which forms man-made Badin Lake. North of the forest is the world's largest natural habitat zoo near the city of Asheboro.
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My first realization of the Uwharries as a unique place for wildlife came about as a young boy living in Charlotte, North Carolina. I remember window-spotting Black Sam one day as he came up the driveway with a cage in the back of his somewhat battered Chevy, or maybe it was a Ford, pick-up truck.
Sam was a tall and beefy, sixty-something African American who served as a groundskeeper for a gentleman with a lodge in the Uwharries and who was pals with my father. Eventually Black Sam became good friends with our family and friends through this connection. Probably, the "Black" part in his name was to distinguish him from a man known as White Sam.

Anyhow, what Sam had in that small cage was a spooked and angry bobcat he'd trapped somewhere on the lodge's acreage. Up close the hissing feline was beautifully marked, but, I knew if a finger was thrust through the heavy cage wire I'd be down to a four-digit hand, pronto.
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His reply to a question about the wildcat's fate was a harsh one for an animal loving little boy to hear. He intended to shoot it, presumably for its fur or for taxidermy purposes, or maybe even a bounty if they were still considered "varmits" back then in the early '70s. In any event, Sam was proud enough of his caged prize to show it off some first.
PictureView from Morrow Mountain
Some History
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The Uwharries and surrounding areas were favorite stomping grounds of the Native Americans for at least ten thousand years, but probably for much longer. Their legacy and artifacts to future generations include, but aren't limited to: arrow and spearheads, pottery fragments, ancient campsites, and fish-traps.
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Right below the Uwharrie National Forest is one of the historic Mississippian culture's East Coast ceremonial centers called Town Creek Indian Mound. The archaeology on the mound began in the 1930s and some amazing artifact and other discoveries have been made there over the years. It's well worth anyone interested and unfamiliar with the place taking a look into it through reads or video, or, best of all, visiting.

In the late 1740s, German and Scot-Irish settlers started coming down the Great Wagon Road from Pennsylvania and other areas looking for new lands to settle and farm. Mostly pioneers from Great Britain - and, other nationalities like some Highland Scots and German/Swiss Palatinate settlers from near the Rhine River, had already colonized parts of the Coastal Plain; but only hunters, trappers and traders seem to have made it much farther west by that point in time.

There were no Native American tribes permanently occupying the Uwharries when the pioneers did arrive, but several smaller tribal areas to the east, and the powerful Catawba Nation to the west, were no doubt using the big river, numerous creeks, and fertile forest for bountiful fishing and hunting purposes.

Raiding warriors from the north often attacked Carolinian Indians without warning: a good example would be those from the feared Seneca tribe from New York State, who may have utilized the Uwharries flora and fauna by branching off the Great Catawba Warpath on occasion.
Their captives were sometimes sold to Caribbean sugar plantations, and other places, like the Northern and Southern U.S., where they made poor bonds people, being far too independent for such wicked treatment. The Seneca's and other tribes even incorporated them into their own peoples to replace slain fighting males and females for offspring to increase tribal numbers.

Perhaps occasional Woodland buffalo, ranging eastward of the mountains appeared, eastern elks were present and, especially, white-tailed deer, abounded in the green forest, despite the long-standing skin trade with Europe. The biggest majority of these hides went to the fur ravenous Old World through the colonial port cities of Norfolk, VA, and Charles Town, SC.
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Although numbers could vary, most years saw thousands of furs shipped across the wide Atlantic. Those taken from the Coastal region began to decline after about 1715 because of wars and disease besetting the tribes, but peltries from westwards largely made up the difference.

The animals most affected by the hunting and trapping practices were the otters, beavers and deers, especially the latter two. Revered as spiritual creatures due respect by many Indian cultures, the European merchants simply could not get enough of these unfortunate mammal's pelts.

The beaver's fur went largely into the making of fashionable hats up until the 1840s, when silk became the preferred material; but the beaver's days in Carolina were long gone by then. They have since been reintroduced in many areas, with varying results as the industrious animals gnaw down trees and sometimes with their dams, back-up important streams and creeks.
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The deer populations suffered more and more as time went on as well, and the larger hoofed-beasts like the eastern elk and woodland bison were scarce, if not extinct, by the start of the American Revolution -- along with their predators the panthers and timber wolves. Being in less competition for survival with the settlers, black bears probably remained extant for the longest time in the Uwharries.
Gold was discovered in the Uwharrie Mountains during the early 19th century, which was preceded by the first American gold rush in 1799 at the Reed Gold Mine, just to the west of the high hills and forest in Cabarrus County. The shaft of one mine is purportedly haunted by the angry ghost of a gold miner killed in an accident there during the 1800s.
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Not surprisingly, there was another boom for the precious metal during the Great Depression years. Folks still enjoy panning for it in the rivers and streams, along with horseback-riding, biking, hiking, and camping. These are just several of the many activities available to visitors in the Morrow Mountain Park  and Uwharries area.
PictureUwharries Mists & Moonlight
BIGFOOT, UFO and GHOST BOOKS
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More and more people are coming to accept the idea that Bigfoot exists in the Pacific Northwest. This vast region still has wilderness areas secluded and forested enough to support a small population for one thing, many reason. But it should be realized, the eastern parts of America still have some wilderness left, too. A good example would be the vast mountainous area of Cohutta, to name just one example. The North Carolina Appalachians seem to have their very own Bigfoot with eyes that resemble the shading of a raccoon. More about these particular ones in a moment.

But, still, when some people hear of them being reported in America's eastern parts, they just shake their heads and say no way. They have a point; but any half-serious research on the Bigfoot phenomenon, concentrating on sightings and encounters east of the Mississippi River, is very intriguing to many people, with many credible reports happening - some even coming from police and forest officials.

Perhaps it pays to think outside the box concerning these east coast hairy bipedal enigmas. The Cherokees and other tribes have legends going way back about Bigfoot-like entities. And many parts of the state, across its 500 mile length -- particularly some coastal areas and Appalachia -- still hold areas no human being has ever stepped foot in, at least not in a very long time. The largest number of reports seem to come from the Great Smoky National Forest and in relation to the still mysterious Brown Mountain phenomena and its adjoining regions of the Pisgah National Forest.
One of the best recent videos from the south-east was taken at night by police in the foothills of Georgia, that show a seriously strange hairy biped crossing a 30 foot road at a speed several miles faster than any Olympian has ever achieved- and not from a downhill start. The seemingly cryptid hominid, whatever its origins, was certainly no man in a monkey suit. This not to say there are not those that attempt to make fake videos for monetary gain. These are generally, but not always, easy to spot, and often make laughing-stocks out of those few who try to do so.
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At any rate, as far as this writer can tell, the Georgia case and more than a few others from the Appalachians remain unexplained. And I have heard about, and read, a recently published co-authored book by a seemingly honest gentleman- and many credible others, living in those mountains, who tell of experiences concerning the matter. The book writer claims to have made "friends" of a sort in over twenty years of gently, and with patience, dealing with these sometimes frightening camouflage masters and often hungry mysterious entities.

​A lot of reports about Bigfoot have been coming out of the Uwharries in recent years. These include very credible sightings and encounters by residents, visitors and others. From what I've researched most of these folks seem reasonable and sincere. Of course, we can't say that for all of them, certainly. A lot of videos have been taken too, some more convincing than others. One was at night in infrared, and if real, seemed to suggest the entity was either extraordinarily good at camouflage or was able to go in and out dimensions. Who knows?
And even if they're not indigenous to middle North Carolina, could something else be going on the general public is just not fully aware of yet? I'll leave the possibilities for how that could happen to any open-minded and pondering reader. There might be unconnected DNA evidence, along with the aforementioned video, photos, and eyewitness reports from the National Forest. Indeed, a lot of people are reporting them in the area nowadays regardless of whether they exist or not.
Picturewiki commons photo of Natl Forest pond
The Uwharries have also had their fair share of mysterious UFO sightings over the years. Sometime back in the early 1990s, I recall a video of one taken as it appeared to be landing in the northern part of the forest. It was shown on a Charlotte T.V. news channel and if memory serves, was diamond-shaped with bright light emanations coming out of its underside. It certainly was interesting enough to be remembered over the many years.
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Additionally, it was around the same time while fishing in a farmer friend's pond near Biscoe, that an Army helicopter came out from behind the thick forest a couple hundred feet away. I waved as it headed southeast towards Fort Bragg. This may be nothing to get excited about in and of itself, but becomes interesting when you consider the forest is a key location for the U.S. Army Special Warfare School's training of Special Forces students according to wiki.

The Uwharries over their two hundred and fifty plus years of settlement have provided us with a rich source of haunts, mysteries, and paranormal lore. Author Fred T. Ware collected the finest and most thorough collection of these stories in his two books, "Ghost Tales of the Uwharries" and " Haunted Uwharries", the former published by John F. Blair and the latter by Down Home Press.
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The fifty-five stories in the two books include many ghostly and high strangeness events, like the one about a violent ghost who's rampages were finally quelled by incantation. There is Old John and his magic ball from the 19th century, who was believed to have been from the mists of ancient Egypt. And then there's the haunting tale of the Irishman Peddler Paul, who beheld the digging of his own grave but was saved by a kindly mountain spirit - or benevelot haint, as the vernacular had it in those days.
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The frights continue with hearse wagon, time-clock, porch room, and even sheep-stealing ghosts. Witch tales abound along with stories of buried treasure, haunted graveyards, and of course, goldmines as mentioned previously; and in conclusion to this article, it's certainly no exaggeration to say, that those Gothic forests and ancient hills are holders of history and the paranormal to a great and varied degree.
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Could this map show the reduction to 80 sq. miles?

BROWN MOUNTAIN LIGHTS UPDATE:  DUAL TIME-LAPSE VIDEO EVIDENCE

9/1/2016

 
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You can't have a light without a dark to stick it in ~ Arlo Guthrie

Here's a little piece of stunning info sent into the Contact Me page this April 1st of 2016 by someone named DEBorah (last name withheld): contact me asap about Brown mountain at doodoo g.mail or 17437922244 or 7409937269 I have pictures to prove a lot. I have images of people missing. it all started at the bridge.

​Apparently what DEBorah was referring to was a bridge pic in the first story written on Mists and Moonlight back in 2013 about my Brown Mountain visit. We'll have to assume that the Ms. thought it was a clever cool April Fool's joke. Fair enough. Or maybe she thinks the Brown Mountains Light phenomena is all hooey nonsense in and of itself. If the latter, then maybe she needs to see the following time-lapse video recently taken by two ASU scientists; perhaps she'll see her missing people in what was captured. And then again, more hopefully, she'll think the matter over some more.

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Close to Brown Mountain on the State service road.
Two scientists from Appalachian State University in Boone, N.C. have taken images thought to be those of the cagy Brown Mountain Lights. Recorded reports of the phenomena go back to 1771 with explorer John De Brahms having pride of place on being the first white man to write about them during his survey of the area. Native American oral legends, of course, go back much further in time. 

​Although the lights have often been seen over time, they've only occasionally been preserved on film or video. However, come the night of July 16, 2016, something remarkable happened. A circular light was captured at the same time by two time-lapse digital video cameras located close by the mysterious mountain.

​Dr. Daniel Caton and his colleague Lee Hawkins of the physics and astronomy department  at ASU were the  operators of the cameras. Dr. Caton has sought to secure evidence of the lights phenomena since engaging in a symposium back in 2011 put on by Burke County tourism director Ed  Phillips. He achieved his objective brilliantly and it is being seen as a major breakthrough. Folks who have experienced the lights are delighted that a team of scientists have gotten proof. We can well understand why they would be. 

​This is great because time-lapse video cameras set up on nearby Jonas Ridge had produced no conclusive imagery for the last 5 years and Dr. Caton was considering packing it all in. But good things come to those who wait and reviewing the footage of late night early morning July 16/17 there it was. Dual detection on both cameras in fact. And to quote the scientist: "We've eliminated all the things that are likely man-made natural sources, so we're left with no real explanation other than it's whatever the lights might actually be." Mr. Ed Phillips agrees: " Does this verify the Brown Mountain Lights? I believe it does. Do we have an explanation? No, we don't."

​Sincere kudos from The Carolinian's Archives go out to Mr. Phillips, Dr. Caton and his team of researchers.

We like to give the inside baseball or any interesting info we come upon to the website's followers and new visitors when we can. With that said here is something I heard recently on a call-in internet show covering a certain mystery topic.

​A father called the show with quite a story, and without going into why, the gentleman came across as the real deal. In other words the host, myself, and certainly many others listening had no doubts about the man's sincerity and reasonable balance. Sometimes you can just tell.

​Earlier in 2016 the caller's son, who is a senior at UNC, was riding back home to Asheville from his girlfriend's place in Charlotte. The father explained that the his son is a straight up, no nonsense young man and would never call his parents late at night unless it was extremely important.

​As the fellow was about an hour away from  home, presumably on I-40, he suddenly saw a strange light right outside his driver's window. Reaching for his cell to maybe capture the light it would seem the son was captured himself, in a sense, that is.

​Everything suddenly went blank and the next awareness the lad had was being on Hwy. 64 between Morganton and Lenoir. Little time had passed and he now had an extra two hours to Asheville. He was more upset about this than the missing time, at least initially. On later checking it turned out his awareness came back to him on Hwy. 64 almost directly across from Brown Mountain, 10 miles or so as the crow flies westwards off Hwy. 181.

​The father had his own thought on what might have occurred, and yes, it wasn't mundane or some kind of blackout. Although my leaning on what happened is a bit different than what the dad suspects, does it really matter when the mysterious Brown Mountain and its enigmatic lights come out to play? And with this particular incident, just maybe, they did.

GHOSTS OF HAUNTED FORT FISHER

7/6/2016

 
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General Whiting to General Lamb ~ "Lamb, my boy, I have come to share your fate. You and your garrison are to be sacrificed."

 It's a perfect setting for ghosts and haunts. The decisive second battle of Fort Fisher came in the first month of the last year of the American Civil War. This battle was unique. Naval bombardments and a successful federal landing on January the 15th, 1865 against this Gibraltar of the South, saw savage fighting on the beach surrounding the place and, in particular, a close-in ferocious six hour struggle inside it.

​ The fort guarded the South's last viable and vital port town of Wilmington. And if one wishes to read the definitive book on the battle, it's called Confederate Goliath by Rod Gragg. Even a condensed read of the Second Battle of Fort Fisher on Wikipedia should give one an idea of why this place appears to be so very haunted. 

Below are two wiki commons photos with the first showing the moment Union marines and infantry broke through the beach obstructions to attack the fort directly, and the second is an 1865 photo taken not long after the desperate battle that shows the inside of the fort and some of its bombproofs and debris.

ORBS AT AN OLD COLONIAL TOWN and CIVIL WAR FORT
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Let's start off this article with a revelation told to me by relative who is a Civil War reenactor. It kind of sets the mood for the coming ghost tales about Fisher. A couple of years ago his regiment was camping out at the history site of colonial Brunswick Town/ Fort Anderson which is on the other side of the Cape Fear River from the peninsula Fort Fisher is on. There are two ways I know of to reach Fisher; one is by going straight down Highway 421 from Wilmington and the other is by taking the ferry that is not too far past Ft. Anderson on Highway 133 and cross over the wide river to the peninsula that way.

​One day as the all the reenactor guys were going about their business, one fellow started taking digitals all around. It wasn't long before he called several of them over to see something unusual about the photos. What was rather remarkable about some of the pics was what appeared to be orbs of different sizes hovering around one of the reenactors - and only that particular individual, at that. Stirred, but let's say, not yet stunned, the photographer asked them all to go back to doing their activities but this time in different places other than where they had just been.

​After maybe a dozen or so more digital photos were taken is where the true amazement began among the entire reenactor regiment. The orbs were still all around the solitary man and no one else, or anything else for that matter. Brunswick Town is very old, started in 1726, and later on was used as one of several forts guarding the upper Cape Fear River approaches to Wilmington during the Civil War. The historic site also has some mighty old burial grounds amongst all the many building and home foundations. One can make what they will of this orb ​incident, but whatever the reason for them to appear around this reenactor and nothing else is intriguing.

​Now, on to our ferry ride over to see Fort Fisher.​
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Ferrying over to the peninsula - this and all following photos by The Carolinian's Archives
It wasn't too long after the end of the war, that visitors to the former Confederate stronghold started to notice unusual, otherworldly goings-on. The first people to experience these things were Rebel veterans. Some arch skeptics might say these men were hallucinating from PTSD or something. I offer an alternative take, however. Maybe these spirit remnants choose to reveal themselves first to the comrades they had fought and suffered beside. These apparitions appeared to still be fighting the desperate battle to the startled veterans. As time passed and went on, one butternut-clad soldier began to stand out. He appeared to be a sentry, staring out to sea, and vanished whenever someone tried to approach him. This stalwart watchman still appears to people.

​In addition to this solitary figure,  there is a frequently seen specter that does interact with people. This ghost is speculated to be none other than Colonel Lamb  himself, a high-ranking rebel officer during the battle. He's also encountered outside the fort's perimeters, walking the beach or trails. He even stands at the door to the museum at times. Can you imagine seeing a sight like that. Why, it'd be the highlight of any visit one might think!

​The commander of the fort in Jan. 1865, General Whiting, was also reported in earlier times. He was first seen at a reunion of veterans too. As the day, and spectral figure, faded from their sight, one old soldier pointed out that that was the exact spot were the General had been mortally wounded. He continued to be sighted by the veterans, and any doubters were in no uncertain terms told that men like themselves did not forget what their commander-in-chief looked like; especially in the heat of a battle that killed thousands of men. What is believed to be General Whiting is still spotted on occasion up to this very day. Perhaps, duty still calls for this warrior.
THE INSPIRING STORY BUT SAD ENDING OF A FORT FISHER HERMIT

​Now here was a haunting of another kind at this national historic landmark. There was a fellow back in the 1950s named Robert Edward Harrell. It seems Old Harrell got tired of his ill-treatment at a retirement center and one day bolted for Fort Fisher. The man became self-sufficient by gardening, beach combing, fishing - those kind of things. Some friendly folks fed him on occasion and he earned a bit of money by sometimes bartering. 

​During Harrell's sixteen or seventeen years living in a bunker constructed at the site in WW2, a lot of folks grew quite fond of the recluse and the newspapers even wrote positive articles on him. Apparently, a film crew even did an extensive documentary with a lengthy interview. Unfortunately, some local bullies and punks would harass the hermit occasionally, but no one thought he would ever be physically hurt by them, or anyone else.

​But come June of 1972, he was found deceased in his bunker home. The circumstances surrounding his death were rather mysterious. First off, the police chief and photographer had to remove some boards at the entrance to the bunker - sort of like finding a murder victim inside a room locked from the inside - but not quite, as the boards supported the opening too. Poor Harrell was found on his back all splayed out with a raincoat bundled around his neck. At any rate, the coroner listed the cause of death as from natural causes. However, about six months later a fruitless autopsy was done after many locals suspected foul play. From not long after his passing and up until today, people still hear a distinctive voice that seems to diminish toward the bunker and then cease.
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Sometimes cannon firing demonstrations are given to tourists from this spot. The booms are thunderous.
THE VISITOR CENTER AND MUSEUM SIGHTS & FRIGHTS

The Visitor's Center has had its share of unusual encounters too. In 2006 a group of tourists were looking at artifacts and reading material. When they reached the glass doors at the rear of the building, they observed a Rebel soldier standing on the other side of one of the doors. They took for granted it was an employee or reenactor and went back to what they were doing for a second. Interested, the folks quickly took another glance at the realistic looking soldier but he had vanished. Believing the man was a person, something was unusual nonetheless, and the group became piqued enough to ask some employees about it. They were told politely but firmly that no workers were dressed like that and there were no reenactors at the site that day.

Yes, the specters seem to have taken notice of the Center. A year or two after the aforementioned incident some thing a bit more eerie happened to the last employee left in the building as he closed up.  As the fellow was checking all the doors, frightening events began to take place: firstly, books and brochures began propelling themselves off the racks, literally landing all over the floor of the lobby. This alone would be enough to scare most of us nearly witless. But what occurred next was even worse. The rather weighty donation box then flew across the floor with  incredible force. The employee skedaddled quickly after that affair with no wish to see anything else happen. Come the next morning, the area of this seemingly paranormal activity was a total mess.  

​These are just a couple of the ghostly experiences people have had in and around the Visitor's Center, and for that matter, other areas as well. Many folks report unusual smells; like putrefying flesh; shouts, yells, and agonized moaning; gunshots and cannons booming, and so far as the cannonading goes, sometimes it seems as if it originates from offshore. Many Civil War battle spots report a lot of this kind of activity, but perhaps none are so varied and up close and personal as those at Fort Fisher. Now, after the 3 photos is our lady ghost.
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Cool model construction from museum
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Painting of Union ships offshore off the fortress
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Variety of artifacts: Cannonballs ( look at the size of the one to the far left!), swords, shell, a ship bell, etc.
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Yes, let' s not forget the lady ghost of Fort Fisher before we end this article. There have been a few reports over the years of a woman specter in 1860s apparel that apparently strides along the beach at the site. Nobody seems to know who she might be but there is the possibility her name is Rose O'Neil Greenhow. Rose was to began the war as a Southern spy in Washington City before being arrested in 1862 by the Pinkerton detective agency. She was then imprisoned for a while with her young daughter until released some time later where she returned to Richmond and its citizens acclaim.

​She then become an effective spokesperson for the South in Great Britain and France. In Sept. of 1864 she sailed for home on a British blockade runner with important papers for the government in Richmond. However, at the
entrance to the Cape Fear the vessel was spotted by a Union warship and the chase was on. The weather was bad and the blockade runner managed to elude its pursuer. The captain then decided to wait until night to try again.

​By darkness the weather had gotten worse and Rose became determined to reach her home soil then and there. She pleaded with the captain to let her be rowed ashore, which was close by. He eventually relented and two volunteers assisted her into the dinghy and headed for the beach. But a huge wave overturned the boat and Rose was drowned, weighted down by a bag of gold she had around her neck, which she intended to donate to the depleted Southern treasury. Rose's body was found washed ashore the next morning. Since that time people have reported seeing a woman in Civil War era dress wandering along the beach at the spot. So, being not too far distant from each other, could Fort Fisher's lady ghost be none other than that of Rose O'Neil Greenhow herself?

Here is a great link for more information on Fort Fisher: http://www.nchistoricsites.org/fisher/fisher.htm

Glamis Castle in Scotland - So Beautiful

3/23/2016

 
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Phyllis has gifted us with an awesome story Mists and Moonlight friends. A few weeks ago I asked her to write a guest piece for the site about something from Europe, since so many readers come from that continent. And she did, specifically, in this case, beautiful Scotland..

​As usual, she did a bang-up job and we can't thank her enough. She threw out a few possibilities for a story to me and I told her to just go where the spirit led her. Glamis Castle is what she felt drawn to; and wow, did her talent and inspiration deliver us a special contribution this Spring month of March!  For Ms Burns FB page click her photo.

PictureCaption: Glamis Castle in Glamis, Angus, Scotland, UK Wikipedia Creative Commons https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glamis_Castle



​Glamis Castle near Glamis, Angus, Scotland in the United Kingdom is a beautiful medieval structure and
reputed to be haunted by several ghosts, maybe even more than anyone realizes.
The castle was the childhood home of Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother, wife of King George VI.
Princess Margaret, Countess of Snowdon, the second daughter of Elizabeth and George was born in Glamis
Castle.

Since the 14th century the castle has been home to the Lyon family who were of Celtic origin per
genealogist Sir Iain Moncreiffe, who stated the family were descendants of a young son of the Clan Lamont.
However, the general opinion that is widely accepted is they are descendants of the de Leon French family.
Since the 15th century, the castle has been the seat of the Earl of Strathmore and Kinghorne.
There is a lot of interesting history there involving Edgar, the son of Malcolm III of Scotland and Donald III of
Scotland, King of Scots in 1093 1094.
​
As a self proclaimed historian I may write about that some day, but
for now let's get to the ghosts who are patiently waiting for their stories to be told to the living.
​Monster of Glamis ~

The "Monster of Glamis" is the most famous ghostly legend of the castle. Apparently, many people claimed
that a hideously deformed child was born in the Bowes Lyon family. Rather than put the child to death, as was suggested, he was kept in a secret room till his death. He was well taken care of for he lived for over 30 years in that room. After his death, the room was bricked up. His restless spirit is still there according to some legends.

According to legend in the local village, the "monster" was Thomas Lyon Bowes, the first child of Thomas LyonBowes, the Lord Glamis and his wife Charlotte Grimstead Lyon Bowes.  The birth of Thomas was recorded as 21 October 1821 and death on the same day.

In a 1967 book titled 'The Queen Mother's Family Story' by James Wentworh Day there is an account of
rumors from the villages that the baby did not die and the midwife had claimed the deformed child was
alive and in good health when she left the birthing room in the castle and returned to the village.
When death of the baby was announced it raised a lot of suspicion. In the latter half of the 18th century the
rumors and suspicions were still widely discussed. In 1912 A. W. Jarvis wrote "An Unsolved Mystery, the
Secret of Glamis Castle", which appeared in The English Illustrated Magazine (published by Macmillan and
Company) wherein he wrote: ""Miss M. Gilchrist, writing in 1885, was not only confident that such a monster
did actually exist, but even described him – half frog, half man!".

In Outis (1908), "Notes, The Glamis Mystery" the earliest surviving written account can be found where it
was claimed, "in the Castle of Glamis is a secret chamber. In this chamber is confined a monster, who is the
rightful heir to the title and property, but who is so unpresentable that it is necessary to keep him out of sight
and out of possession".

When reputed family accounts were published in the 1960s it was found that there was no gravestone for
the child Thomas, which tends to support the original village rumors and suspicions of the late 1800s.
Having no gravestone for an infant was in keeping with customs of the time. So, therefore Thomas
Lyon Bowes never had even a memoriam to honor his name and life, whether he died as an infant or died
when he was in his early 30s in the sealed room.

Where was the body of the baby, or the man, buried? Apparently no one alive knows. Maybe that is why his
restless ghost is often sensed or heard in the castle he
is looking for peace and a final resting place and
recognition. Sad story, indeed.
​
Is there really a secret chamber where Thomas lived for over thirty years? There is an old story that the
servants of the castle wanted to know if there really was a hidden room where the "monster" was kept. They
went to every room in the castle and hung white towels out the windows. Then they went outside to count
the towels. Sure enough, there were several windows in one section that had no towels.
Room of Skulls ~
Hidden somewhere else in Glamis Castle walls is the "room of skulls" where the Ogilvie family were walled
up to die of starvation. They had come there to seek protection from their enemies, but were imprisoned
instead. It is probable that their spirits are there trying to find a way out.

Picture
Glamis Castle in Scotland from Morris's Country Seats (1880). Wikipedia Public Domain https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_LyonBowes_% 28heir_to_Lord_Glamis,_born_1821%29
PictureThe Damned Soul. Drawing by Michelangelo Buonarroti c. 1525 Wikipedia Public Domain https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soul ~ ~

King Malcolm II ~

In 1034 the site was the Royal Hunting Lodge where King Malcolm II died painfully from mortal wounds
received in a battle close by.
​
The Grey Lady and the White Lady ~
Yet another ghostly presence at the Castle is that of "the Grey Lady". Her story is a sad one. She was falsely accused of witchcraft and burned at the stake. Her ghost is frequently seen in or near the family chapel.

The apparition of Lady Glamis, Janet Douglas, is occasionally seen. She is referred to as the "White Lady". She was married to John, sixth Lord Glamis, in the 16th century. The legend is that after John's death she
married Archibald Campbell. Jane continued to live in the castle with her new husband.

King James the fifth had a history of hatred for the Douglas family and highly resented Janet. He had her imprisoned on false charges of witchcraft and that she poisoned her husband John Lyon. For many years Janet wasted away as a prisoner in Edinburgh Castle till the king had her burnt at the stake. Both Janet's husband Archibald and her son Lord Glamis were also imprisoned. Archibald was killed when trying to escape and Lord Glamis remained a prisoner till after the death of King James. In the small family chapel at Glamis Castle there is a seat reserved for Janet only and no one is ever allowed to occupy it.
​
Playing cards with the Devil ~

A guest of old, Earl Beardie, was a gambler with a violent temper. His ghost is often heard in one of the
rooms, playing cards with the Devil.
This came about when the servants refused late one night to play cards with the Earl, for the Sabbath was
just an hour or so away. He became violently angered and threatened to play cards till doomsday or with
the Devil himself if no one else would play and he put out that challenge biggest
mistake of his life, for the
Devil will gladly meet any challenge head on.
Apparently the Devil heard the enticing challenge and took Beardie up on it, taking not only his money, but
his soul as well. Beardie has to repeat that fateful night over and over till doomsday for having the audacity
to challenge the Devil at cards.
After Beardie died the room was sealed up. Beardie's screams and angry cursing can often be heard coming
from his damned soul.

Now, you see, with the stories of Thomas, the Ogilvies and Earl Beardie, that makes three sealed up rooms
in Glamis Castle containing who knows what.

Shakespeare's Macbeth ~
Glamis Castle was used as the setting for William Shakespeare's Macbeth, the perfect place for such
strange happenings.
​
To The Last syllable of recorded time,
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, out brief candle!
Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage.
Picture
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glamis_Castle
Some of the most popular folktales are those to do with hauntings and ghosts and there are no better
hauntings than those found in castles which abound with myths and legends of the land. Because most
castles were built to last practically forever there are centuries of spirits abiding within the thick walls and
grounds of these beautiful and enchanting structures of old.
​
Time has only added to the legends and stories of hauntings in the ancient castles. Whether the stories are
true or based on hysteria is a matter of individual thoughts and experiences. However, castles were not built
just for the peaceful habitation of the lords and their families. Within the walls were often rooms or cells for
imprisonment, torture and even execution which leaves hanging about a lot of unhappy spirits to ramble
and roam the dark corridors and dank dungeons and the most intriguing of all, the "secret rooms".
~ ~ ~ ~
Glamis Castle on 30 May 2009, wiki cc
Caption: Glamis Castle, May 30, 2009
Wikipedia Creative Commons
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glamis_Castle
***

Beast of Bladenboro-Inside Story-Beast Fest

3/3/2016

6 Comments

 
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Bladenboro County is in the southeastern part of North Carolina and is one of the largest counties in the state. This was a vast wilderness region when the first pioneers began arriving in the early 18th century; and unsurprisingly, those English, Welsh, Scots-Irish, and German arrivals were very hardy.

​Their descendants of today still have that quality, and are also generous, fun-loving and not given to stupid foolishness. What follows is the story of a well-known cryptid mystery that occurred in the county during the mid-1950s, with an insider's take on setting some facts straight about the strange phenomena.

PictureGreen Swamp
A Cryptid Enigma
The witness to this story about the Beast of Bladenboro is someone I've know about indirectly for decades and personally for the last couple of years. He was a boy living in Bladenboro, North Carolina, in the years 1953-4, when the beast phenomena first occurred.

His parents were well known and influential folks in the county of Bladen, where the small town of Bladenboro is located. He was in a position to later on glean any inside information the mayor, police chief, and other officials received at the time of the attacks and subsequent mayhem. The friend, for obvious reasons, wishes to remain anonymous and will be referred to as Jay.

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Heavily forested part of the county although much of it now is farming land with some very long straight stretches of road
This article will follow the story as best it can be told, considering as Jay pointed out, the tendency for unusual events to take on a life of their own and snowball. Several fallacies or assumptions will finally be set right for the record; and this much can be stated for a fact at the beginning: the attacks were no hoax. Something quite out of the ordinary most certainly took place in Bladen County back then and apparently continues to off and on, even up until today - and in different counties throughout the state, at that..
To begin with, let's set the record straight on this matter: some arch skeptics have claimed Mayor Fussell of Bladenboro, who owned the town's movie theater, in large part invented the story to capitalize on a British horror flick featuring a monster cat or something similar playing there at the time. The solid fact is, the mayor booked the film after the killings had started.

As a smart picture show exhibitor, it wouldn't have been unusual. The mayor was quoted at the time as saying "A little publicity never hurt a small town" or for that matter the ticket receipts on a horror movie that only started the day the mayor - to diffuse the by then dangerous and out of control situation - proclaimed the crisis over.
​
Before that day arrived, however, it became alarmingly apparent to the mayor and his police chief that they had a far more important situation on their hands than any booked scary B-movie. In fact, publicity was soon to be the very last thing they wanted coming to town - in any, way, shape or form. And that, too, is a fact. Indeed, fear factor may be a better term for it all.
PictureSight of the old movie theater
The Beast of Bladenboro enters the pages of unexplained mysteries and paranormal legends.

Back in the 1950s there were newspaper reporters who came through Bladenboro that were known as stringers. They would travel around their assigned areas on the watch for any interesting or newsworthy stories they could wire in to the main paper in Wilmington, North Carolina.

According to Jay, the erroneous assumption in some circles that have Mayor Fussell calling the papers once the killings started is incorrect. It was one of the roving stringers that heard about an attack on several dogs from a farmer who had reported them as being killed by an animal resembling a cat, but with strange characteristics to its appearance. The dogs "skulls were crushed in and chewed" he told the intrigued reporter.
​
They were also drained of blood in an eerie manner reminiscent of today's Chupacabras; a suspected tooth of which has recently been declared after a year's study at a top laboratory to be from an unknown species, by the way. Other folks were soon reporting mutilations of cows, hogs, and even a goat (not mentioned in the papers) who's head had been flattened-out like a pancake.

The eyewitness accounts of the beast itself, described an animal about four and a half to five feet long, furry, resembling a panther-like beast, but with canine and ursine (bear) type characteristics as well. The tracks found were rather strange and unusual, but generally seemed to resemble something akin to the feline family.

The story really begins to roll on January the 5th, 1954, with Wilmington's Morning Star newspaper reporting, "This nervous town chewed its collective nails today, dreading the pitch of night that might bring a return visit by a mystery killer-beast with vampire lust." Perhaps this is tabloid-like descriptive language for our own day and time, but spot on nonetheless.

As Jay explained it, everyone became jittery and frightened, and in the ensuing panic some folks actually did start to see a monster beast behind every nook and cranny. Events quickly began to snowball. One area resident got very jumpy when he heard some dogs' barking outside one night. The man grabbed his shotgun, ran into the yard, and then blasted away at his child's bicycle, much to his later red-faced embarrassment.

But all the misplaced excitement still didn't change the fact that something really was killing animals and leaving strange tracks at the scenes of slaughter. According to one resident, "Everybody was scared, everybody, near 'bout, that had a gun was carrying it." And to quote Jay, "Things were just getting warmed up for what was soon to come."

So, what we have here is a real "cryptid mystery," described by those that sighted the creature as a weird combo of wolf and cat, a hybrid even, with some eyewitnesses reporting a bear-like gait to its locomotion as well. County residents were in a heightened state of anxiety, that was fast becoming something akin to the panicked jitters. Who can blame them when you think about it. And these were not reactions the residents were prone to.
​
Many adults and all the children were staying indoors at night and officials, besides declaring a curfew, were at a loss as to what to do about the bizarre and unexpected animal killings and attendant frenzy. Little did they know at the moment that help was soon to arrive for the frightening situation in numbers nearly over-whelming for the small town of Bladenboro and its surrounding county.
PictureLooking towards downtown Badenboro
The hunt begins and ends.

Police Chief Flores got up a hunt for the beast but most of the dogs refused to follow the unusual scent. The few that did were later found torn to pieces. Flores then suggested tying up a goat or dog in the forest, presumably as bait, but Mayor Fussell nixed that idea.
​
By this time the story had gone national and pandemonium was soon to descend on the county of Bladen. Hunters and trackers from all over started showing up in droves with all kinds of firepower, tracking gear and hunting dogs; along with much respected sage and savvy trapping advice to go along with it all. At one point a large group of men thoroughly searched a swamp of about 400 acres, but this kind of hunt wasn't much territory to cover in a county of nearly 900 square miles.

The Mayor was getting worried about someone getting badly hurt or even killed; so when a large bobcat was snared and slain- the population of which had a rather rapid and steep decline in the area- it was stretched out and photographed- but did not have its body or skin run up a flagpole as is so often written about as fact. A sign laid next to the carcass read, "THIS IS THE BEAST OF BLADENBORO." The panic and hunting frenzy now began to ease up some.

Jay says it was all over within two weeks or so. The beast was gone, perhaps back into the deepest recesses of the nearby Green swamp in next door Columbus and Brunswick counties,  or even deep into what is now the Bladen Lakes State Forest. The Green and other area swamps were known as mysterious and often deadly abodes. Growing up in the Piedmont region of the Carolinas, I recall hearing stories from the grown-up men about  hunters and other outdoorsmen going into some of those swamps and never being seen or heard from again.

Our insider told me as the years went on and the subject came up, most folk, and especially those in South Carolina, assumed with confidence the beast had been a big panther cat, ranging up from their swamps into Bladen County, as they knew of they're continued existence in those areas back then. If so, it must have been an escapee or released pet (most unlikely) - or if wild, one of the last of its kind as they were surely killed or run out of their range about this time in the Carolina coastal regions, if not long before. Some books and articles report a large striped cat either seen or killed, but Jay didn't mention this as having happened. However, if true, then it could indicate an escaped leopard or tiger. But if so, why were the tracks found so hard to identify?
​
An investigation by the television series Monster Quest pointed to a similar conclusion as it probably being a cougar. Possible, but it's hard to see how even an unusually big panther, or other large cat species, could smash the skulls of domesticated animals and tough tracking dogs like crushed aluminum cans and leave nary a trace of blood. But if not the big cats, then what? And, again, what about the odd tracks? If they were a cougars or another big feline wouldn't they have been positively identified as such by all those tracking experts? Bears were extant in the swamps and forests back then and still are in some coastal areas to this day, but this hardly seems the mystery solver to such an intriguing and unusual cryptid mystery.
​
Starting in 2007, Jay told me that the town of Bladenboro has been hosting a Beast Fest every Oct.31st on the spot where the old movie theater used to be. Fun and games for all, with a beast impersonator, doggy costumes, car shows, musical band performances; plus dancing, food, horse carriage rides, and cook-off competitions, just to name several activities available at the Fest. It has turned into a big event with people coming from far away to enjoy everything available.

The link in the paragraph above is to a 2015 YouTube video and gives a good idea what the Festival is like. The town and county are right off Highway 74 heading into Wilmington and the coast, and with a map or GPS, should be easily found if one wants a short side trip to see the area and/or town or attend the cool October 31st fun-filled event.

​And last but not least, to finish the article my thanks go out again to "Jay" for his time and inside baseball.

6 Comments

Georgia's Mysterious "Carolina Bays"

12/18/2015

 
PictureRandy Godwin
The true mystery of the world is the visible, not the invisible ~ Oscar Wilde

It's a great pleasure to have another guest write by Randy Godwin. Randy has contributed several excellent fiction stories on the history pages in the past, but this is his first non-fiction piece on the website and what an article it is. An award-winning one, in fact, on Georgia's enigmatic "Carolina Bays".

Although officially still a mystery as to how these "bays" came to be, the evidence is more and more tending to show that a comet, or rather, fragments of one, struck the Canadian Cordilleran Ice Sheet around 12,800 years ago, with other pieces striking the Americas elsewhere, in a NW to SE leaning-direction, and even hitting or air-bursting in Europe and the Middle East. This catastrophe caused mass flooding, raging fires, and brought on the Younger Dryas epoch  that saw 35 large American mammal genera disappear. As of 2015, enough new evidence has accumulated to make the comet theory look like the most likely answer as to how  the "bays" came to be. But their origins and what caused them are still being debated and thus still considered unknown and mysterious.
http://hubpages.com/@randygodwin

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Unless otherwise indicated all photos are contributed to the site by Randy Godwin
​The Mystery of the "Carolina Bays"

​The southeastern part of Georgia contains many shallow swamps. At first glance these exotic morasses seem scattered randomly throughout the countryside, but an aerial view of these wetlands gives a different picture. Besides the natural wetlands, including streams, rivers, and natural lakes and ponds, there are obvious lowlands with near perfect circular or oval shapes.

These mysterious “Carolina Bays,” are so called because of the propensity of bay trees to grow in these swampy depressions, and for the great number of them found in North and South Carolina. But what caused these remarkable wetlands to form in such obviously unnatural shapes? These bays range in shape from almost circular in the southern Georgia area, to teardrop shaped at their northernmost point in Delaware. 

Until man first took flight over the area the swamps were considered natural, but a look from above seemed to suggest otherwise. There are several theories about the formation of the Carolina Bays with some being favored over others as we learn more about them. However, the theories are all interesting with different causes for these biologically and historically diverse ecosystems.
Early Hunters and Georgia's Bays

​Long before De Soto’s Spanish exploration of Georgia the Carolina Bays were important to both animals, and much later, human inhabitants. These sources of both food and water helped break the monotony of the vast pine forests which covered much of Georgia. The bays were scattered oases of life with water as the main offering. 

Besides being watering holes, they were also places where fish and waterfowl could be found, where alligators and turtles plied the water, where animals came to drink. This is evidenced by the many stone and flint artifacts found along the perimeter of these ancient hunting grounds.


In some cases, the Georgia Bays were used as traps by these first Native Americans. Lacking any canyons or cliffs to entrap the prey these bays were used as barriers to prevent the game from eluding the hunters.

Large alligators and thick cypress forests hindered easy travel or prevented an escape route for the hapless prey. Projectile points from many different cultures and eras are all represented among the artifacts found around the bays.
​
When this part of the country was first settled the bays became important as rich farmland when drained. Some of the bays were natural ponds which became used as reservoirs used to run mills for grinding corn into grits and cornmeal. Others were used to run sawmills and to furnish fish and game for the increasing population.
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Natural Wetlands or Impact Craters?
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Lake Waccamaw in SE North Carolina. Oval-shaped at almost 9,000 acres Average depth of 7 & half feet. Photo via wikipedia commons
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The bays were home to early settlers as they often contained rich soil for growing crops.
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An old log house on the edge of "No Man's Friend" Bay.
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Old tobacco barn in the bay.
500,000 Clues To The Puzzle Of The Bays

​There are over half a million of these Carolina Bays along the Atlantic Seaboard. Some of these Bays cover huge areas in the state of Georgia. Others are merely small circular depressions in now drained farmland.
Until man achieved flight these bays were thought to be ancient lakes and lime sinks left behind when the Atlantic ocean retreated during the last ice age.But when the full picture of the quantity and orientation of these mysterious sand rimmed depressions emerged, it caused scientists to rethink their theories on the origins of the Carolina bays..
​
There was too much of a pattern for the bays to have formed naturally. Plus, the axis of the bays all pointed in the same direction, merging with another string of bays originating in the Texas area.

When the paths of these bays merge they end up in the Great Lakes area. This may end up being a very important clue to the origin of the mysterious bays. The bays were once thought to be meteor impacts, but they were too shallow and no stony or iron material was found in the craters to indicate this to be the case.

Some scientists believe a comet impacted in the Great Lakes region, perhaps when 2 mile thick glaciers covered the earth.  These researchers suspect the Carolina Bays may be ejecta sprayed by such an impact on the ice field.  How such a scenario may have caused the bays to form is an ongoing discussion among protagonists of this theory.
Ice Age Winds Or Comet Strike?

​The geologists thought them to be simply low areas of water, shaped by the prevailing winds into their round or oval shapes, depending on where they were located along the eastern seaboard . The sandy, slightly elevated, rims of the Carolina Bays seemed to be a bit higher on the end towards that which the prevailing winds would be blowing. 

But this explanation didn’t totally satisfy everyone. The meteor or comet crowd and the geological phenomenon crowd went back and forth for many years with nothing new to settle the matter. But perhaps we will find out soon because new techniques are being used to research these strange swamps.

[They are at that. As this is being written at the end of 2015 the evidence from those new techniques, and, as one example, core samples from that sample-rich island of Greenland, is pointing towards a comet's fragments being the cause of the bays, or as Randy has just so rightly called those in the southern parts of Georgia, "strange swamps". ~ AP] 
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Bays in North Carolina using Lidar techniques. The creator of this image posts about this award winning image in the comments on this page.
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Some believe a comet, or fragments of one, may have formed the Carolina Bays in Georgia.
Core Samples Results

​Because of the propensity of the Carolina Bays being swamp areas for the most part, those which haven’t been drained or altered by other means are excellent candidates for taking core samples.
​

Many Carolina Bays have thick layers of peat beneath the surface. Taking core samples from these intact bays tells quite a bit about the history and ecology of the site. 

The types of plants which grew in the swamp, the climate of the area, and other fascinating information may be discovered with these core samples. 
But the range of dates taken from core samples vary depending on the climate experienced by the particular bay being examined. Using Carbon-14 dating methods the dates vary from 10,000 to 50,000 years old. 

Because the bays may have gone through a dry period during its lifetime, the amount of organic material collected in the Carolina Bays will vary. 
Those having water in them for much of their existence tend to have more organic material on the bottom as is to be expected. But these bays seem to be many thousands of years old at the very least.
Plant and Animal Diversity in the Bays

Because of their unique environment, these bays host a large diversity of plants and animals. Some became large lakes filled with all sorts of fish, waterfowl, and wild creatures.

The famous Venus Flytrap carnivorous plant grows well in the Carolina Bays as well as pitcher plants. Alligators, bobcat, whitetail deer, and even black bears prowl the environs of these swampy mysterious bays.

Many of the Carolina Bays located in southern Georgia are home to migratory birds each winter. Wood stork, Sand hill cranes, Canada geese and other duck species find a perfect sanctuary from the northern winters in the snug isolated bays.


The Carolina Bays are also perfect for the production of the Bald Cypress tree. The wood from this species of tree is rot resistant and will last for many years even if exposed to the elements.

Hunters roam the bays looking for game and sport, and are awestruck by the beauty of the strange and peaceful bays.
​
But hunters are long acquainted with the bays, as evidenced by the tools and projectile points they left behind.
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Carolina Bays are often havens for many types of waterfowl.
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Wild turkeys inhabit many of the bays.
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Often one may observe the unusual in a Carolina Bay such as this piebald deer.
The Georgia Bays and Early Man

Those of us who love collecting Native American projectile points and artifacts have found the Carolina Bays are very productive if they have been drained for farmland. This author is lucky enough to have a small bay on his property which was apparently a very productive kill zone for many thousands of years.

On the perimeter, and inside the former bay itself, I have collected many hundreds of points and tools. Those found in the former water covered area of the bay were apparently animals which managed to escape the hunters.

These points seem to be well preserved as opposed to those found outside of the bay itself. Water was the major draw to these bays as the animals and hunters both required a place to drink.


The age of these projectile points run from a few hundred to over 13,000 years old. The Clovis culture is represented, as well as the Woodland and Archaic cultures. The points are made of flint and chert, materials which aren’t available in the immediate area.
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The large amount of projectile points and chipped flakes found around this bay attest to its being very productive hunting grounds for thousands of years.
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Dalton point 10,000-12,000 BC
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Broken atlatl -spear throwing weight, possibly Clovis culture technology
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Some of the many projectile points found around the bay
The Controversy Continues 
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When the bays were first discovered to be regular in shape with similar orientation to the northwest/southeast, the first thought was of an extraterrestrial event such as an asteroid or meteor strike. Or perhaps a comet, such as struck Siberia near Tunguska at the turn of the century. But why were the impact craters so shallow with no trace of material left from the impacting objects?

Some geologists had their own ideas about the origin of the Carolina Bays. They theorized they were caused by ice age winds and indeed, the sandy raised rim, a feature of all bays, on the southeast end of the depression tends to be slightly higher. The prevailing winds were thought to have blown in this direction which tends to bear out this theory.

Since the 1920’s, these different theories have been thrown around in all directions with no true winner being declared as of yet. But new tests which claim to show nano-diamonds and carbon spherules present in the bays are creating quite a stir in the scientific community. These materials are usually only present in areas of meteorite or comet impaction.

Some have speculated the extinction of the woolly mammoth, along with other mega fauna, might have been caused by such an event. The Younger Dryas period, which coincided with the extinctions could have been caused by a comet or asteroid impact on the North American continent. Clovis man also disappeared at the same time, so the mystery deepens. Are these bays connected to this event? Only time will tell the tale. 

A DEVIL'S TRAMPING GROUND VISIT: PHOTOS and the MYSTERY 

9/30/2015

 
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You mean that's it? Hardly my friend, hardly...or so it seems.

Strange circles and mazes can be fascinating and enigmatic.

It is up to the individual to discover their secrets, if they wish to;

And if the secrets aren't immediately obvious, then the more

they become mysterious and strange, until new ideas come along, that is.


THE DEVIL'S TRAMPING GROUND EXERIENCE, PICTURES AND FOREST MAZE

Note: as mentioned in  two stories recently published, the photographer forgot to reset the camera date after a  battery change. The photos here were actually taken in May of 2015. 


If someone really wants to know about a mysterious place it's often best to go and experience the "real thing" itself, as a certain soft drink says about their product. And that's just what an associate and I did not long ago on an excursion into middle North Carolina for spots to explore for future stories on the website. Our first stop was the previous story on Mists and Moonlight about Boone's Cave Park and the astounding photo an associate took at the famed cottonwood tree. We next visited a majestic 18th century house and then a Civil War battlefield.

Our last stop was at one of the two mysterious sites of the four places we visited that is called The Devil's Tramping Ground. The pioneers who settled Chatham County in the mid-18th century  discovered this strange 40-foot circle that nothing was growing on, or that anything could be grown on. ( Our visit did discover one of toughest flora in the forest, wire grass, was finally starting to pop up in very, very small patches, here and there, inside its circumference.) As time went on, the place took on a religious connotation in the 18th century and became known as the ground the Cloven Hoof king himself walked round and round at night thinking up diabolical works for humankind.

The Native Americans throughout the centuries avoided the spot like a smallpox- infected blanket and even had their own legend of how the dead zone came to be. That story had two tribes battling it out on the spot and so bloody a battle it was that the ground was soaked with enough blood to kill the soil forever. This would seem to suggest that the circle is very old indeed, made far in the past, with it even phasing out of 18th century Indian remembrance into legend and lore. That is if there was anything to remember in the first place, of course.

So much has been written on the mysterious place over the years let's leave off the rest of its history, except to say scientific investigations over the years found an exceptionally high salt content in the circle's soil. The answer? Certainly. But how it got there and formed into a 40 foot diameter circle is perplexing -- no, more like baffling, to say the very least.

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Pull-off to Devil's Tramping Ground- Carolinian's Archives Photo
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First off we came to a crossroads which had a general store that had three old-timers sitting out front on a bench: here were our sources, about 7 miles away from our objective. One man was mum with a rather sly look on his face when asked about the spot, another talkative chap had one of the usual mundane reasons for the circle, and another man had a bit different take on it which was more in line with my thinking. One of the gents also said the Devil's Road was heavily wooded and to be careful once there as you could easily get lost in its maze of trails and forest. He was absolutely right about that as things turned out.

There were are lot of pull-offs down the long single lane highway that almost had us fooled into pulling off here and there, but when the real thing was encountered there was no doubt about it that this was the famed circle. As an added thought, one of the men mentioned that we should have seen it 20 or 30 years ago- presumably meaning it was  more pristine-looking then, than it is now.

​On the short walk to the circle it looked like a dump-off in certain spots for discarded junk; like trashed TV's and cans, etc., etc. Perhaps, at least some of these tossed away items, are folks testing the mysterious locale's power of throwing things back out of the circle at night after having them placed there during the day? In retrospect, though, some strange sites may be better off left as they are, or, rather, were - puzzling and interesting but largely left alone, unless shown some proper respect, that is.

Below are some pictures of the site- which had a set of trails, mazes, really, behind the circle that crisscrossed in so many directions I couldn't keep up with them all. No my friends, I've never seen anything like this puzzle to be frank about it, and this fellow has done quite a bit of woods-walking in his time. Strange and definitely odd are the thoughts for these wood paths that came to me, or so it seemed.

​ For sure, though, one could easily get lost in going down them, and pretty quickly at that. Many had low and overhanging weeds and other year round growing flora type entanglements which suggest no animal or human-being had been down them in a very long time, long enough for these woodland growths to cover over some of the smaller trails. 
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Associate Ms. Gale standing near campfire in circle
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Bigger pathways before nearly uncountable smaller ones begin
Now it's hard to imagine in our 21st century that too many people believe the Devil walks around the circle thinking up wicked stuff for the world. As can be seen from the digitals, the trees aren't really all that tall which seem to suggest that this area was once used for farming by settlers and those later on, maybe even by Amerindians from far in the past, growing their maize and squash. A perfect place to...land something, perhaps?

 A cleared spot for crops by both peoples might make it seem so. Many researchers are now theorizing something landed there in past times that put off radiation that neutralized and basically turned the ground to sodium chloride, unsuitable for life, and is only now finally growing back the toughest growth in the forest once again in diverse and small patches, which as mentioned before is wire grass. I know I keep harping on this, but that circle must have been made a very long time ago, we must assume.

 It's not just the Indians that avoided the spot, but animals, too; and whether a rural legend or real, it's strongly suggested a visitor not knowingly take a souvenir home with them. According to many books and stories passed down, this brings bad luck and eerie events to the person, even to the point of them driving back and replacing said item exactly where it was found: things like pebbles, plants, twigs, and in particular...the very soil itself.

After seeing something on one of the cable TV channels recently, apparently the same thing, with creepy stuff taking place at home, occurs after folks have taken mementos from the famous, maybe, infamous, is the better word for it, Bell Witch cave in Adams Co., Tenn. Some even refuse to go back to the cave themselves to replace any item(s) pocketed like rocks or dirt, but ask the owners of a store on the site or others to please do it for them.
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approaching tramping site
--So, what could make an undispersed, formally perfect, geometrically 40-foot diameter circle, that up until just recently, absolutely nothing would grow on, not to mention items placed inside the circle that would disappear or be discovered tossed out of the enclosure come the morning. Some would say a person over the centuries would nightly watch over the place but this answer is, of course, out of the question and ridiculous.

​ Folks who have attempted to stay over night there often report eerie happenings as well. Like the feeling of being in a different dimension or something strange for a brief period of time, among other unsettling experiences. Overactive imaginations or unlikely untruths to the legendary nightly frights? or is something else the answer to the perplexing, enigmatic anomaly, its rather small main locale, and the surrounding woods?

 Of course, a lot of folks who stay overnight have nothing to report but fun campfire roasts, jokes and high jinks; with the often attending bloated beer bellies, the next day's sore throats from laughing and shouting, and any- thing else in that vein you can think of. Some probably try to spook their companions during the late hours too.

​Folks from both sides, meaning those who think the answer is a mundane one and those who are more meta-physically minded about its cause, come from all walks of life; so maybe this phenomena is a hit and miss affair- if that's what it is to begin with. But the fact remains, so far no one, so far as I know, has come up with anything but theories- and often very believable personal stories, to help explain the mysterious place to any extent.
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Roots outside of circle
 This is a great picture of the circle and some of its surrounding area. Most of the trash had been thrown-out near the road, leaving the circle fairly clean of man-made debris, except for the embers of the campfire and charred logs plus a few beer and soft drink cans here and there including wind-blown debris and things.

 What intrigued me almost as much as the sterile ground itself, as mentioned, was all the paths in the woods - going this way and that - with no particular rhyme or reason to a destination or special spot,  so to speak, that is. Presumably it was just animal and  humans wandering around over time, either more or less recently, that made them, the ones with big widths and the narrower smaller trails.

This should be an unarguable fact, that most, if not all of us would agree on how they came to be; nevertheless, how very odd with, at least it seemed at the time, ubiquitous number of them going here and there in such a way as they do. Yes, certainly, a lot of people have visited the spot over the very many years...but still.

I traversed a couple hundred yards and really got nowhere of what must have been acres upon acres of paths in just that one area. It reminded me of that strange house the widow of the Winchester gun inventor kept building to fool the ghosts of the gun's victims, supposedly seeking harassment, with passageways and stairs that led nowhere, till her inheritance ran-out or she passed and the builders left at once - never to return. Not that the forest paths were ghostly or anything like that (there have been reports of strange-looking figures on the trails though), they just reminded me of that unusual case.

 Nowadays in the 21st century, surely few believe Satan goes round and round at night thinking up evil or bad  actions for humankind, as said before, or were the ceremonies of Native Americans in the past, dancing in loops, that created the Devil's Tramping Ground. But here's what more and more researchers are believing is the possible answer: As the twin  disasters of Fukushima and Chernobyl have recently, as time goes, reminded us, radiation and other unseen physics forces can make an affected area unlivable for life, or dangerously so, and in some cases, for a very long time.

Now here's another idea, albeit out​ there, perhaps. There was a time when I had a hard time believing in the wee folk, nature spirits and such; until I learned that over 50% of Icelanders believed in them. An intriguing reason, or single example, of why, is that once there was a large stone boulder that stood smack dab in the way of a road being built by the government that had to be rerouted around the large rock after the crew had a fit trying to go thorough or move the stone. Enough very strange things happened for this to occur and cause dismay.   And in addition to the Icelanders, there appear to be a lot of believers in countries like Norway, and elsewhere in Scandinavia, as well. In other words, not countries full of foolish, superstitious, dumb ignorant folk.

​And lest any think the local warnings about the boulder being an abode best left alone was a joke or prank of some kind, the unfolding of events would seem to prove the people were truly serious about it. Personally, and beside other incidents like the one just told of , the digital taken at the cottonwood tree in the Boone's Cave story that is here on Mists and Moonlight, has made me reassess my former skepticism about such things, or beings, that are called or known by some as nature entities or whatever else they might be. I keep an open mind now.
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The point in mentioning all this is that it's not so far-fetched to believe that a "saucer-shaped" UFO landed at the Tramping Ground and sterilized the area of contact. Remember, at the beginning of the modern age of Unidentified Flying Objects these "craft" were called Flying Saucers because that was the appearance of many of them by eyewitnesses back in the 1940s. Starting with Kenneth Arnold's report to newspapers that the ones he saw near Mt. Rainier moved like a saucer would if you skipped it across the water.  A great many reports by often very credible people, back then, and even up until today, had and have some with a rounded circumference.
    
Possibly, hundreds of years, perhaps, even thousands of years ago, something landed in the Tramping Ground spot, maybe in trouble, in need of some kind of repair, and  radiation or other dangerous emanations were unintentionally, or even a non-accident, as something unavoidable, leaked out, sterilizing the landing soil area, perhaps even opening up some kind of an on and off again dimensional portal. Certainly, all speculation, though.
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​And whether connected to any of this or not, the maze in the woods was interesting enough to ponder on and really made it seem as if somebody, or something, was searching for something very thoroughly. This is almost assuredly not the reason for them, however, as obviously they were made after the trees had begun to grow again, from what was more than likely cropland at one time or another. But I don't know the maximum growth, or the heights, those trees can reach, so regardless of anything else, it's a question that would be rather interesting to know the answer to.

All the suppositions on what caused the circle, are only theories, so far as I know. A recent publication and excellently researched and readable book by Nick Pope, John Burroughs and Jim Penniston titled Encounter in Rendlesham Forest: The Inside Story of the World's Best-Documented UFO Incident  seems to suggest at the end of it that the craft(s) might have been some kind of time-travelers. However, I won't spoil it for anyone who wants to read the book on why they would have considered this as an answer to what the UFO's origins were.

But ​could this have been the case to this article's big question? Maybe, but then again, probably not. Regardless of how the once completely sterile circle came to be, the site is off the beaten path and an intriguing and fun place to go for so those inclined to investigate on site themselves and are able to visit it. Just remember, please keep it clean, don't get lost wandering the paths in the woods, and beware the legend of pocketing mementos...  especially the earth from inside the circle itself!

A link to directions and more info to conclude this article on a cool place of so much mystery and wonder:     https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Devil%27s_Tramping_Ground
                         
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BOONE'S CAVE STATE PARK: HISTORY - DRYAD? - PARANORMAL ACTIVITY

6/20/2015

 
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When I have fears that I may cease to be ~ John Keats

This is where they walked, swam
Hunted, danced and sang
Take a picture here...]
​This land is the land of ours...~ REM


 Sometimes the beginning of a story is like diving into a pool of water. The delay in jumping in is an anticipation of the cold or cool water , and its brief mini-shock to the body. But once the lunge is made everything is quickly alright and the water fun or exercise can begin and go on. Trying to start this particular story was more like jumping into 20-foot swells in the mid-Atlantic for me. Why? Because I deemed it as one of the most intriguing and important stories I've ever written up to this point. And as far as my articles go, that means for stories of the ghostly-type and similar things. So, with this opener written and out of the way, let us begin the dive.

As one starts reading they may initially think this is basically a history piece of some type. It is not, but I felt it necessary to give a feel to the reader of just that interesting history for this small state park area involved in the adventure you will soon be going on with me. That history will pass soon enough and then we will get into what really matters and what this is really all about, not that simple nature and history don't matter, they surely do. 

At times, when I buy or check a book out of the library, I'll often go to the picture section before even reading the first few pages of a non-fiction book. Maybe you do the same on occasion, it is probably a natural tendency. However, here, on this one, I urge the reader not to do that, but to follow the story and pics from the beginning without looking ahead. In this way you can hopefully take this trip from the start to something fantastic at the end and experience this whole thing  like I have done twice; three times actually, the third time with an associate, who if they hadn't been with me, this article would not even have been written, maybe not, that is.

So let us begin with a little selected  history of Boone's Cave State Park in North Carolina, then go to that first visit of mine around 1990, and then finish up with the most recent return visit of May, 2015, with a startling revelation at the tremendously tall Cottonwood tree at the end. It is the hope of this writer to take you on this journey from beginning to end as if you were there yourself and experienced what was experienced by me and the helpful, photographer/co-owner of the site, Janice Gale. 

Note: This trip and the pictures included in it happened and were taken in May 2015. The batteries died so the camera had defaulted to the original date, as the photographer had forgotten to update the date on the camera. 

A Selected History of the Park
Although I have no written proof from books, diaries, or Amerindian traditions that have been passed down, it is my contention that the Park and possibly even the Forks of The Yadkin, which Boone's Cave is slightly north of, were a sacred place for the Native Americans who came there before the arrival of the pioneers. Perhaps they passed through the area in hunting and raiding parties, perhaps they danced and sang in these areas but with a high reverence while doing so. This would apply to the Cherokee and Catawbas, others, and especially those from far in the past before these peoples were even permanently in the regions they came to occupy..

It must have been magnificent. A wild serpentine river teeming with fish of many species - bass, bream, catfish, and many other kinds. Chestnut trees with diameters up to 15 or even 20 feet, with some having canopy spreads of a 150 feet from one side to the other. Large animals such as woodland buffalo, perhaps, coming down on occasion from the Blue Ridge to forage in drought years. There were eastern elk,  white-tailed deer; and all these hoofed beasts with their predators - like the timber wolves and panthers - roamed the area, and in the case of these wolves and mountain lions, they certainly made dens in the caves of the Yadkin Valley, including those at Boone's Cave and its close environs.

I've even read reports from the early 1700s, before the settlement period, that seem to suggest, for a short time, off the beaten path jaguars may have hunted and roamed far enough north to reach the central Carolinas. There is even a large river in upper South Carolina named way back then in the 18th century the Tyger River. In addition to these large mammals, including massive black bears, the Forks and Yadkin River were no doubt often covered by dense clouds and  uncountable numbers of passenger pigeons and waterfowl. 
 Thus were the forks of the Yadkin River and just above it at the Boone's Cave area in the west-central Piedmont of North Carolina around the year 1750. A hardy Daniel Boone must have found the spot on his first long hunt the year before. Which must have been why an adolescent Daniel led his parents and kinfolk to this region when coming down the Great Wagon Road, after a short residency in Virginia,  seeking a new home in the fresh virgin backcountry of Carolina.

 The Forks and its vast a-joining forest were one of the last places to be settled in the Yadkin Valley because of their rather hilly and rocky soil - not to mention wetlands near the river in certain spots, like one part still is to this day in the park, but that now has a wooden walking trail through it.. Settlement by pioneer families had only started two or three years earlier than the Boone's arrival in the valley, and the rough hewn cabins and small rudimentary farms must have been in most places a great many miles apart. It was in all respects a true and untamed frontier wilderness.
 Life was hard then for what might seem a flora and fauna paradise today. The menfolk built cabins and fences, cleared ground and used mules and oxen to pull-up stumps for crop cultivation, if they had any of these animals; they hunted, trapped and fished, and  more often than not died young from their many labors. The females were toiling just as hard; raising children, tending to household and livestock chores such as slopping for hogs and their preparation for meals, again, if they even had them - and in fact, anything that was needed by them to do or assist in. Tough and nurturing are the words for these frontier womenfolk.
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Some things in human nature never change. The younger women smoothed their hair with bear's grease, pulled their shifts tight to display shapely figures, and often exposed their buxom charms shamelessly - no doubt for ease and to catch the eye of any marriageable man. The men themselves often congregated in clearings for shooting competitions, while sipping what must have been fantastically good "stonewall whiskey" or brandies.
PicturePark's entrance sign
Boone's Cave at 110 acres is the smallest state park in North Carolina but I can tell the reader when walking its trails it seems much larger. Dedicated in 1909, it still retains some of the feel of that frontier forest. It's an isolated park located on the Yadkin River near Lexington in Davidson County, or just north of Salisbury. Boone's parents are buried in the small town of Mocksville in next door Davie County. The park even has a 169 foot tall Cottonwood tree, the tallest in the state, which will become important at the end of this story. There is also Boone's Cave, which is up the hill from the river, and which is equally  important to this story as well.

PictureBoone's Cave side view
 According to stories passed down over the years, the Boone family briefly lived in the cave while they constructed their cabin. A legend has it that Daniel once hid in the cave from a Cherokee raiding party which was attacking cabins and farms on the frontier of North Carolina and other states at the time. In the early 1750s Britain was still at peace with the Cherokees, so it must have happened several years later during the French and Indian War. Whatever the case, at least one brave was so determined to claim his scalp that he tried to wait Boone out. But young Dan'l outfoxed him by escaping through a tiny passage to the other side of the hill. 

Now, on my first visit to the cave I didn't get to go inside which will be made plain why later on in the article. However, on the last trip in May of 2015, I was in it and it was really quite large, perhaps the size of a big bedroom, with a separate tunnel off to the left of the main cave. I've seen it written that the cave goes back some 80 feet. But with this one that certainly didn't appear to be the case, by any means, unless there's another  cave the same size or bigger than I'm not aware of. At one time I thought there was one at the river itself but apparently there isn't. Perhaps, any small hole or tunnel has collapsed or been covered up over time?

 Many fine biographies have been written over the years on Boone but none have been able to state with absolute certainty that the park was the original place the family settled in when they came to North Carolina. The one unarguable fact being a deed taken out in 1753 for 640 acres at the forks of the Yadkin by Daniel's father, Squire. But anyone visiting the site as I did for the first time one day in 1990, should sense, by ambient and intuitive feel, that this was indeed the place. Now to that first visit, on which I didn't tote a camera along with me on the walk; but as things turned out, it wouldn't have mattered anyway - especially at the cave.  

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Stone marker for the Boones- Carolinian's Archives photo
My first visit to this history and nature treasure happened in the spring or early summer of 1990. Having recently moved to a small town nearby, with a weekday off from work, I decided to check the place out after seeing it on a state road map. After pulling into, and riding down to the end this out-of-the-way park, I stopped in the small asphalt parking lot that had a picnic shelter and paths leading off in different directions. It was also apparent with no other cars about, that I was going to have this rather exciting new discovery to myself, at least for a while, that is, and that was definitely okay for exploring around a bit. 
The path to the old reconstructed cabin - built around a pioneer fireplace that may well have been the Boones - was off a ways to the left, down a path through some woods. It was cool, but a bit disappointing with the crushed beer cans here and there and the almost obligatory graffiti scrawled in spots on the walls of the empty dwelling. However, Boone's Cave has since most fortunately been up-graded by the state and/or county and acquired a very fine park ranger with their own residence near the entrance to the site; and a facility with information plus bathrooms, a new cabin, a new canoe and kayak trail, and with a primitive camping site, too.

We shall hear from the park ranger later on in the story in the Richard's Experience section.
Leaving the cabin, I crossed over the parking lot to the other side, which led down quite a few wooden step rails to the cave. On reaching it, I had to stoop at the entrance, as the opening was no more than about three feet high or so. Looking straight ahead, it didn't seem that big but was intriguing to me considering its geology and Daniel Boone history. To the right there appeared an elevated granite slab and I remember thinking how very awesome that the great frontiersman himself may have once sat or slept upon it.

After looking around a bit, I peered to the left, down the detached, maybe 12 or so foot long tunnel. I was stooping in a position where I could see into both parts of the cave from the same spot. The rounded tunnel started off with a rather cone-shaped entrance, maybe four feet tall that tapered into a low granite ceiling near the end of it. In fact, neither the tunnel or the main cave is where an average adult can stand up straight.
PictureCave opening
 Now, this may be a difficult and challenging part of the story for the reader, but I'll do my best to explain it as best I can. Peering to the left, down the tunnel to the left of the main cave, there immediately appeared before my eyes a sight to make a person turn and shake their head, which is exactly what I did. A second glance - and there, still before my eyes, not five or six feet away, staring straight at me, was the perfectly formed apparition- I know not what else to call it - of a Wolf! It was staring at me benignly, with just the hint of a smirk, and with what I can only call a palpable intelligence behind its startling red eyes. Indeed, it had a shimmering kind of electricity about it, although I was really mostly staring at its eyes and head, there was absolutely no doubt of the fact that it was a wolf, or something mimicking one, perfectly.

At the instant of perceiving that what the eyes beheld was real, my entire body exploded in a brain stem adrenal rush, causing a full bore flight or fight response, the likes of which I'd never before, nor have ever since, experienced. Something so unexpected as this can hit you like a lightning bolt, except with the lightning, one usually has a warning of stormy weather coming, while with this, there was no warning at all or anything to put it into an understandable perspective.  That is until one learns to open up and be responsive to things beyond the usual five sense reality - there are some of us who think that that is all there is. At any rate, flight won by a long mile that memorable day my friends, and it was  a heart-pounding, seemingly Olympic winning dash away from the tunnel, back up the stairs and into to the car for a quick getaway. 

About ten years later I made up my mind to make peace with this frightening entity that had the appearance of a wolf. Now it should be stressed to the reader that this was no pure fur, flesh and blood animal- it definitely belonged in the paranormal range of entity encounters. Besides, wolves had been exterminated or run off in the central-west Piedmont of North Carolina about 150 to 200 years ago for those who think it could have been a purely physical creature staring at me with those red eyes and electric-like shimmering head, including, what little I saw of its body.

Anyway, on this second hurried visit I noticed bulldozers were knocking down some trees on the other side of the river and as I went down the steps to the cave I had a deep feeling my friend wouldn't be there that day, and it wasn't. Although I would have liked to have tossed a piece of venison into the tunnel, it was out of deer season so some other piece of meat sufficed. Still, at that time, my inclination was to believe it was the spirit of a mother wolf and the meat-tossing was a kind of peace offering. Maybe it just made feel better about the whole thing. After throwing it in I immediately left the park, not to return again for 15 years and, unintentionally, capture the most amazing thing photographed by an accompanying companion in 25 years of being interested and intrigued by the mysteries of this world.  

PictureAnimal bone display
Richard's Experience and a Comment From the Park Ranger: Five or six years ago when I began writing again after a long layoff from some newspaper and magazine article work, which included interviews and ad selling, one of the initial stories I laid down was a condensed one about that first visit to Boone's Cave Park. It just seemed the right time and was one of the stories I wanted to get off the bat first. In other words, it was important to write it down as one of the beginning 60 articles of mine on a large writing site, in addition to co-authoring a book for charity. 

   That story received many comments, including a kind one by the new park ranger, who stated that although they felt nothing evil in the place, she did sense its long history and ancient spirits in certain spots. Whether she meant that last thought imaginatively or literally, I don't know, but was mighty grateful for her input and feelings on that 110 acres of magnificence that is entrusted for her to watch over. No doubt she, or whoever may be there now, knows it very well.

One of, if not the most, intriguing comments on that first story came from a man named Richard, who had no problem publicly posting his first name on it. The gentleman's sincerity and erudition came across strongly in the comment and I believe what he had to say about his own paranormal experiences near and in the park over his life.

Here is his account.

When a young boy Richard and his older brother would often play in the deep woods about and in the state park. One day the lads, by chance, came on a large grassy circle about twelve feet in diameter. Besides the grassy circle being completely out of place, they also observed what at first appeared, and turned out to be, a small pile of animal bones jumbled up in the center of it.

The brothers were presumably amazed and whispering among each other about this weird anomaly they'd stumbled upon, when suddenly, the woods became deathly quiet, even the usual forest noises seemed to stop, as a  low growling noise began from no particular direction that sent the boys high-tailing it back home as fast as their little legs could carry them. 
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View of south Yadkin from part of Baptism Rock- Carolinian's Archives photo
After many years had passed and Richard had grown-up, the frightening experience with the bones and growling had faded somewhat in memory, and unable to be excised completely from his thoughts or come to peace with, placed where it should be, on the backburner of one's mind concerning unsettling encounters from early youth. Richard had once again started going to the park to walk some and fish. He and his brother, however, were never able to explain what that whole thing was about or meant way back then when they were children in those dark woods.

Now, at this later date, many years in the future, Richard one time found himself fishing from near or at the picture above on the Yadkin River, as it later turns into the Pee and Great Pee Dee Rivers on its long way to the Atlantic Ocean. In the comment, he mentioned that on this particular day, he abruptly eyed what appeared to be a large black dog staring at him from across the water, perhaps a hundred and fifty feet away. There was a glowing, shimmering mist about the animal and he later recalled thinking it was more wolf-like than dog-like.

Within minutes of spotting this creature or...apparition, he heard a hearty laughter coming from behind him, and when he turned to look, there stood a man in colonial or frontier-type dress, maybe ten or so feet behind him, who then slowly vanished before his eyes. Richard wrote that he wasn't so much frightened as just amazed, and of course, just plain-out curious as to what was going on and what it could all be.

Unfortunately, after pondering on this experience in the days to come, the man become wary of visiting the area again and remains so to this day. Who can blame him; but my advice to Richard was to keep in mind, although these entity's or powers seem to choose the times when they reveal themselves, we ultimately have the power of good on our side, which I and other folks who feel the same, believe can protect us if we learn to be open to it. 
The Return Visit to Boone's Cave of May 2015: In May of 2015 I and photographer and co-owner Janice Gale of the Carolinian's Archives, decided to take a two night stay in central North Carolina to visit several historical and mysterious sites for material and pictures for future articles on the website.

 Our first excursion was to Boone's Cave. It was easier to find thanks to GPS than it had been with those two previous visits, despite the map. We first noticed the new ranger's house on the right which was very nice and homey-looking with what appeared to be a log cabin like wood in its construct. We then came to the new faculty with the restrooms, and some kind of D. Boone memorial. A path to the new cabin started from there and we decided to go down the trail and visit it first.
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Approaching picnic shelter and car leaving
At the beginning was a display case of park animal bones shown in the photo that starts off this section of the story. Kind of weird but cool, and yes, it did remind me of Richard and his brother's eerie discovery. On coming into sight of the cabin it was obvious that care had been taken in building it to look realistic. The dwelling did have a freshness to it but wasn't at all disappointing or unappealing, quite the contrary in fact.
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Approaching new cabin- Carolinian's Archives photo
 As can be seen from this gallery of pictures the new cabin was just that - new. Although it lacked the old world feel and fireplace of the original cabin, which I would guess stood at this spot as the stone marker in the ground states so; but that first visit had made seem more about a hundred feet away towards the river in a wooded area.

Regardless, the new place was very nice, clean and contemplative. It even had a garden set between wood railings and what might have been tall crossbeams for hanging wild and domesticated animals to drain. I could be wrong or only partially right about that however. That frontier fireplace was really the only thing missed at the up-dated place. There is every good chance in the world that this was the Boone's warming construction of handmade bricks or something. I wonder what they did with it? Surely it, or its parts, are somewhere & secure.
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After hanging around the cabin and garden for maybe 15 minutes, we decided to go to the place that we, or rather more, me, really wanted to go on this trip. That was the cave, of course. As we proceeded down to the end of the road and walked to the right, we began discussing my startling experience there almost twenty-five years before. Walking the steps down I mumbled once that I really didn't want to go inside it and photographer/co-owner of the website, Ms. Gale, would have to go in and take digitals while I held a flashlight at the two openings.

 On arriving  we stooped down to look inside and Janice said no way did she want to go in either. Something came over me right then that was totally unexpected. Very carefully, I walked in a ways, sat on the granite slab that was inside, took a few photos, and then checked the corners by crawling all around on my hands and knees, and yes, I went down the tunnel. I wanted to be in the exact spot where that wolf entity had appeared.

 Before you know it, a feeling of bravado came over me, too,  and I began demanding in a fairly determined voice, a bit loud one in fact, for the entity to reveal itself. In a stern voice I began saying things like "Show Yourself!", or "I'm not afraid of you anymore. Show yourself and let me get some proof, I'm not scared of you at all anymore." Vocalizations of that sort.

 I then exited and we started taking digitals of the inside with a helping flashlight that didn't help and didn't do too much good. About all we got was darkness, blurry objects and shadows so the pictures aren't included. Nothing really happened except for crawling around, getting knee-skinned and my called-out challenges, and after sitting out front talking a bit we went down to the river.
 Now folks, I always respect nature and park rules and never intentionally disregard signs not to pick flowers and stuff, and down a ways from the main cave was some very old steps and a much smaller cave. We obeyed the sign that said stay off the steps and don't go inside.. Anyway, I was careful not to disturb anything like rocks and such in both spots.
 We got to the river and found ourselves on Baptism Rock. For many generations, who knows how long, this was the place where believers were baptized by being dunked in the water. After looking at the water, I made-up my mind to walk down to the right, on the river bank, to see if I could find that elusive riverside big cave, whether it existed or not, I just wasn't sure. Wasn't long after that fruitless little trek that I suddenly wanted go see the tallest cottonwood tree in the state; maybe the tallest one east of the Mississippi. This tree, by the way, has held the interest of scientists and other people from all over the world for some time, especially the United Kingdom.
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Baptism Rock view at narrow part of the south Yadkin River- Carolinian's Archives photo
  It wasn't long going down the path to the tree that we realized this was going to be a bit longer walk than we had originally thought. The little mosquitoes were out in merciless numbers but we soldiered on, with me at least, determined to see it. As we got closer there appeared some very tall trees that almost had me fooled me into thinking that they were the famed cottonwood.

 On approaching the stupendously tall tree to read a small marker next to it,  photographer Janice snapped the stunning picture you see below. We had no idea what had been captured on digital in that flash of a second. Not till later when Janice was uploading the memory card to the computer. Standing around in another room, I suddenly heard her in a low-pitched voice say "Oh my God, what is that?" I hurried to the screen and in less than two seconds intuitively felt we had caught something remarkable. You can bet we studied that picture very thoroughly and with great  fascination..

 So, for your enjoyment, interest, wonderment or just plain pondering; not to mention any skepticism, at least to the image, that will hopefully be laid to rest in just a bit, here it is. Although Janice was moving when the picture was taken, most interesting is the image appears to not only be standing still but in movement itself.  Just very unusual when it finally dawned on me. It also seems as if it wanted to get into just the right place for the perfect, best, or most optimal picture to be taken of it; perhaps, with even Yours truly in the photo? If this is so, then it succeeded in that endeavor brilliantly.

​ And, as Ms. Brenda Barnes (a photography expert) pointed out so insightfully after examining it, since the photo is digital, it is not any malfunction of the camera nor is it a flash issue since we were in the light of mid-day. A double exposure or anything like that can also be ruled out. With thousands of photos taken over time by or with me in the photo nothing even remotely like this has showed up on them, and with the backstory that you've maybe just read, and the particular setting and so on...well, it just super adds to the likelihood that this is something authentically remarkable in our humble opinion. 
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SO FINALLY, AFTER THE BRIEF HISTORY AND LONG BACKSTORY, HERE IT IS
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JUST A LITTLE SPECULATION: Over the next few minutes I eliminated several things, like it being a bird, a reflection, or some kind of lens glitch. My thoughts then turned to it, maybe,  being a nature or guardian tree spirit. If any tree would have one, this wondrous cottonwood was it. But then Janice suggested that after my declarations in the cave, the entity may have become interested in me and followed us to the tree, where it either did (which I believe to be the case) or did not give us that shot and it was only taken by accident. I first talked to a person who is versed in these matters and they said it appeared benevolent and I feel the same way about it.

Another well-regarded friend said they had seen something similar near a relative's grave and believed it a higher spiritual being attached to the venerable tree. I sure hope so and do not know if it was the wolf entity experienced 25 years earlier or is something else. The inclination, gut feeling if you want to call it that, is that it was not the wolf but a separate intelligence with a rounded appendage - even shapeshifting quality to its appearance; and yes, even a bit like Caspar with the rounded part of it on the tree, but only initially. Who knows what it is? I sure don't. What it is, is what it is, period.

In late June a person I know to be a very busy and popular writer, that has a great deal of knowledge with this kind of thing, was able to remark that they knew what it was. Here is their answer: The entity is called a Dryad, an elemental entity, and is attached to the king-sized tree. "She", the elemental spirit, felt curious about and was comfortable with me, and probably allowed her image to be taken. The person also said the veil between our world and theirs is growing thinner. They are attached to old trees and are now learning to trust humans again.

Although I'll keep an open mind on all this, you won't find me disagreeing at the moment with this wise and
intelligent person's interpretation, either. There are photos of the scene without the watermark if they are ever needed. And without meaning to offend anyone's sensibilities, cottonwoods can be either male or female, and the discerning eye might wonder if this as a male tree, with its height and the protruding knob leaking sap; all the more fitting, in a sense, if this towering wood truly is a nymph's home.
 About eight or nine pics were taken at the tree, one with me back-hugging the cottonwood, and no other photos showed the image. It really was a magnificent tree and was probably spared all these hundreds of years because it was near the river and almost in a wetland. Some other trees were apparently spared, too. The walk back on a new path turned out to be much farther than we expected and we finally came out at the facility. We then walked down to the car and departed. We'd been alone the whole time except for a car that was leaving as we pulled down to the shelter parking lot at the start.

Photos and videos of anomalous objects are not uncommon these days. Some are surely real and many are not. But a lot of them, and what makes this one unique in my opinion, is that most of them, are of things like UFO's, aliens, hominids (bigfoot, etc.), human- appearing ghosts and such. The camera and SD are in a secure place with copies being made and unfortunately, a watermark to prove absolutely and unequivocally that the photo is of Carolinian's Archives ownership.

Classical Greece was the home of Aristotle, Plato, Socrates and so many other people of genius. I haven't seen any Parthenon's being built lately either. The point being, maybe photos and videos would have been taken way back then if they'd had them by these no-nonsense folk that were the first to record and classify, in exquisite, scientific-like detail these entities; they certainly didn't seem like they writing about any fantasies or fables. For the most part, the all-inclusive name they've generally been given nowadays is simply dryads.

​We all, or most of us, I take for granted, would like to see any other purported  photos or videos of these beings to compare this one to them. After a thorough search on the internet, I found but very few and none of them impressed me at all; except for one I feel almost certain is genuine and shows a more female-looking, ethereal image as it appears to glide towards a large tree at night. Its passing by apparently triggered a trail cam.

In conclusion, I hope the reader enjoyed this little adventure through the Boone's Cave area , which at least with the granite cave, maybe the whole park, I believe to be a conduit, or even permanent home, for paranormal forces - some at least, seemingly benevolent- that interact with people occasionally, and, whether the visitor is aware of it or not.. However, this should in no way keep any believer in the mysterious, unknown or paranormal from going there with friends, family, or even alone to this very nice and unique place..

At some point in the early years of settlement, or near it, the cave acquired the name of the Devil's Den. Perhaps, these people, experiencing paranormal activity or entity appearances around the area or in the cave, may have only had a religious perspective to put it all in. But, and in finishing the story, I do hope many of you who haven't been there get to see and explore this wonderful park, and for those who do go there regularly or on occasion,
I'm glad you enjoy the good time you have there in fun, peace, contemplation, history and nature.


For more info here is the Davidson County link:http://www.co.davidson.nc.us/ParksAndRecreation/Boone%60sCaveParkInformation.aspx

Guardian Angel & Little Devil Stories

5/6/2015

 
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Little Devil
In 2010 the tragic and sickening murder of ten-year-old Zahra Baker made international headlines. The poor girl was apparently murdered and dismembered by her stepmother, who admitted guilt in court in 2011. This woman also scattered Zahra's remains in different spots throughout the county they resided in.
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We all know people can do evil things with no help from anybody, or anything's, help. But some crimes are so wicked and horrific it can make one wonder if outside forces can become involved, or even just attracted to murder or crime sites as may have happened in Sahra's case. It can be a challenge to imagine such a thing, but becomes a matter for speculation when several stories are related to a paranormal subject writer like this one from people he knows to be credible.

Ruth is a lady known for over ten years by two owners of this website. She is a brave, caring, intelligent, sober, and  honest person. She also has a strong Christian faith but is thankfully refreshingly open-minded when it comes to the paranormal and unexplained. Indeed, she is quite aware this can be a mysterious world at times and that we don't have all the answers yet.

In 2012 a young teenage girl who lived in the mobile home right next to the Zahra Baker trailer, visited Ruth's house with some other young folk. After a while all the children went into the garage area to play, which was adjacent to the kitchen. Ruth was in that kitchen when she suddenly saw a small mist swirling on top of the china cabinet that she'd picked up at an antique store some time before; the mist quickly began to form into what can be only called a demonic-looking creature; with a tail, legs, and even, a face. Ruth, in a loud, commanding voice - before it could fully take shape - demanded the thing depart her house immediately in the name of Jesus Christ! She said it then dropped off the end of the cabinet and whooshed out the door, past the kids playing, with the remaining mist leaving a departing trail as a kind- of- calling-card, - that was to never be used, of course.
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On reflection, Ruth was later to surmise the entity may have followed the child from the murder area, perhaps done with its business there, and was seeking a new home; but if so, it certainly picked the wrong one to try and set-up shop in.

How the stories came about
The rest of Guardian Angel and Little Devil stories come from people this author has known and respected for many years. They are truthful and well-grounded individuals who related their incredible encounters to me personally: in two cases face-to-face, and one by an e-mail correspondence which will be explained more fully later on in the article.

This person will have their first and surnames substituted as there was a request for anonymity in the private communication. Their reason for wishing to remain anon comes from a medical condition they feel might make folks think this is where the incidents originated from; but in my own and others' research and investigations, their condition is indeed conducive to such mystical occurrences actually happening. This person also happens to be a best-selling author by the way.
Bonnie's Astounding Childhood Encounters

"...Who knows, but that the universe is not one vast sea of compassion actually, the veritable holy honey, beneath all this show of personality and cruelty." ~ Jack Kerouac
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Bonnie is a friend I've come to know well going on over four years now. She is intelligent, erudite, and down to earth. Although she graciously agreed to let me tell her amazing childhood tale, she also requested anonymity which will be respected. However, if her true identity were known by many who know her, and if she was gotten to know well by others who don't, they would have no doubts as to her mental stability and honest intentions. Bonnie did not ask that her story be published, but as one of the most intriguing this writer has ever heard, the decision was made to reveal what you are about to read.

When a young girl Bonnie lived with her parents in the base housing of a branch of the military forces located in the Deep South. Their house was near a golf course and in-between the two laid a swampy area. All the local kids were warned not to go near the marsh, as alligators were known to inhabit it. But, being a spirited young lass, and desiring the delicious raspberries about the vines one day, she disobeyed her parents and went there with a pail. While picking away, she suddenly heard a woman's voice say, "What are you doing, Brie Collins?"

Bonnie turned to the woman and she was like no person she'd ever seen. The woman was wearing gypsy-like clothing, mainly of red, with a veil about her head. She was holding roses, too, while beside her was a huge bush full of pink roses. Bonnie hadn't seen the bush on arriving so was staring at it, hard. She also asked why the lady had called her Brie Collins. The woman ignored the question and speaking in a firm but kind voice, told her to return home at once or she would never eat raspberries again. Bonnie, a bit frightened, dropped the pail and hurriedly did just that.

Later that evening, it was found one of the base's teenagers had lost a foot to an alligator in the swamp and was lying in a culvert. The most unusual thing about this encounter was what the woman had said to Bonnie. It was only years later, after being told she was adopted by her mama and shown the original birth certificate - presumably her mother knowing one or both parents -- that she found out her birth name had indeed been, Brie Collins.

While living on the base the TV programs would often be interrupted by what her daddy called snow. As Bonnie was to later realize, the snow images had nothing to do with the programming. The freaky part was that often, when the TV was turned off, images would just linger on the screen and move. Sometimes they would suddenly appear on a screen that had been turned off for some time. Once when alone with her dad listening to records, the turned off set abruptly lit up with images of faces. She asked her daddy who those people were. He made a joke about them before getting up and pulling the plug, but even then the images lingered on for quite a while.

Another time she was in her parents' room when the screen of the little TV there suddenly turned itself on and brightened up. Bonnie saw on the screen what she took for strange-looking men. There was audio, too, like they were talking, but not in English. Her mama came in, snapped off the set, and took her out of the room. Her mother never said a word about the incident but she could tell it upset her mom. The TV gremlins, which is what her father called them, spooked Bonnie, badly.

To this day she cannot sleep with an uncovered television set in the room.

All the kids at the base community knew of them. Little men of two different types; taller silver ones, and large-headed red ones. The children usually referred to them as devils although the red ones were more mischievous than bad. They walked through walls and doors and had a habit of carrying things off; things like car parts,  vacuum cleaners, knives, and toilet dispenser bars etc. The kids saw them do these things and could never understand why their parents were at a loss at what happened to our car? Or who dissembled the lawn mower?

Apparently, only the youngsters could see and interact with these entities.

Sometimes the devils would bring things to the children. A hodge-podge of items, really, like cookies or nuts or slips of paper with weird impressions on them.. Bonnie usually saw two of them; one was nice and would play games with her brother, and another was mean who would pinch and try to get the siblings to do dangerous things. Her brother was enticed to hurl a jack-in-the-box at their mother one time and later on led into the middle of the street. If the nice devil hadn't told one of the neighborhood boys, who ran out and retrieved the lad, no telling what might have happened. Another time the mean devil talked Bonnie into licking the coating off some lawn fertilizer by telling her it tasted like candy. She got pretty sick from doing it.

The silver men didn't show up too often. None of the kids regretted this as they were very strange. When they did come around, it was at night, and the children believed they spied on their dreams. The friendly devil taught Bonnie how to get them out of her own dreams by going to sleep thinking about what she wanted to be when she grew up, or by dwelling on some imaginary life. She was supposed to concentrate hard on these thoughts till she fell asleep. The trick seemed to work. But many of the other kids weren't so lucky, and continued to complain how the silver men gave them headaches by coming into their sleep.

There was one night in particular Bonnie remembers. The friendly devil was sitting between her and her brother's bed, quietly playing with her siblings blocks, building what looked like a very nice castle. Later she was awakened by the sound of high-speed chatter. When she opened her eyes, the little devil was still hard at work and she began drifting back asleep, only to be startled awake by seven woman who had seemingly floated into the room. They were all very pretty just hovering there, speaking among themselves, when one suddenly came very close to her. The entity spoke without moving her mouth and told Bonnie she would be leaving soon and wanted the child to see something.

Several of the women took hold of her, barely touching the girl, really, as they then flew through an open window. Bonnie doesn't recall too much about what happened next, except for one thing, and that was a great body of water. The waters were flooded over everything - land, buildings and cities. And then they took her under the water to an airplane that had just landed and was sinking. It seemed like she was suddenly inside the plane feeling cold and terrified.

Bonnie was then back in her bed without recalling any more about being inside the sinking plane or how she had returned to bed. Later she told the friendly devil what had happened. He said the women were enemies of the silver men because the women's people lived forever and the silver people didn't believe in forever. And he also said the silver ones had a king who did believe in forever but, he told the people he was God in order to control them.

She saw the women one more time before her family moved away. They came, they said, to show her wonderful things in a dream. It was a nice dream Bonnie wrote, in which she saw people she had never met before, but people who were dear to her nonetheless. In the years since, she has met many of the people in the dream, most importantly her beloved husband.

Bonnie shared one more childhood occurrence with me. The base community was having a Thanksgiving dinner at a large church when Bonnie got lost in the crowd going to get some oyster casserole. She found herself inadvertently shuffled by the bigger folk into the basement corridor. She wasn't scared at first, for there were people there, too, laughing and talking. But having lost her sense of direction, she became uneasy before bumping into a man carrying a newspaper. He asked why she was crying and on being told why, turned her around and pointed the way back into the banquet hall.

While thanking the gentleman she noticed how very vivid his clothing was and how his skin seemed extremely bright. He then smiled and walked off with the paper tucked under an arm. Later on in the sanctuary, Bonnie saw a photo on the wall and asked her mother who the man was. She said it was one of the pastors (Reverend Andrews) who had been at the church when she was just a baby. He was with God now, having passed away some years before. The man in the picture was the same person who had just helped Bonnie find her way back.

It is not rare for people to have for what is them a reality-based encounter with seeming angels or demons. And, of course, there is more than one possibility with these entity's origins and purpose. Perhaps, at times, the wicked ones are allowed to happen, to show a soul that although great evil or negativity exist and can manifest, so must a greater love that can do the same.


The Queen

This angel and devil section begins with someone who's been there forever it seems like. Sitting on the same table, in the same corner of the same room, at the Methodist Church where I went to kindergarten as a child. Her face is one that exudes kindness, but her lips never speak, they only smile. Whether this is a  true Guardian Angel experience or something from the very deep subconscious, I don't know, but way down, in the gut, it feels like the former.

No wings unfold from behind her arms, for she only wears a medallion on her bodice and a simple but majestic looking white dress that comes down to her shoes. A small, but beautiful crown sits atop her short blond hair. She's also petite and appears to be middle-aged, but then again, there is a timeliness about her, too. In some ways she seems to embrace the past, present and future all rolled into one.

Whenever I was down, or doubting a nice future, this golden lady vision, thought of as The Queen, would appear in my mind's eye and smile, and then I would know everything was going to be alright, or at least feel that it would be.. There was never any hello, how are you - nothing, no words bespoke her at all. She could impart an energy of love simply by looking up and smiling. Then the scene would fade away until the next visitation. This vision of the lady has never been like the classic muse artistic inspiring- kind, but more like a sparkling life vest gifted in a restless sea one finds themselves in at times.

I won't be self-indulgent with the reader by listing all the many times I've walked away from situations that I certainly shouldn't have, near escapes from a deadly fate you might say. But without fail, deep down inside, there was always a feeling of someone or something's protection. Most of us have probably had these intuitions after such times, close calls - a feeling of being watched over that is.

The one personal event I'll use as an example occurred during the rashness of an unbridled adolescence. To keep the story short, suffice to say, after a sideswipe on a twisty, sandy road, a long, thick metal pole entered the Chevy's left front and punched a hole in below the dash, then tore through the base of the driver's seat and exited out the left rear of the vehicle.  

An inch in any other way but vertically straight down would have meant a horrible death as the place was quite rural, it was late at night, and I was some distance away from any occupied dwelling. I was literally sitting on the metal pole with shredded pants but no physical injuries other than a few scratches.

After the police arrived at the scene - I had to walk nearly five miles in a semi-shocked state to find a house which somewhat amazingly turned out to be a Highway Patrolman's - they said it was a miracle I'd walked out of the car alive and let me leave, uncharged, with my employer,- who told me, "Someone was looking out for you, son." And this from a man not given to saying such things at all.


Johnnie's story
Johnnie was an 85-year-old African American gentleman full of the joy of life and a pleasure to be around. He was also a very talented individual creatively, which comes as no surprise considering Academy-Award winner Denzel Washington was a relative, for one thing. The man had been a firm believer in God and the Christian bible since a small lad and the following are the occurrences, or more descriptive yet, manifestations, that happened to him that set Johnnie on that course of devotion and belief. Hypo-Christian is not a term that applied to this fine man.

As an eight-year-old resting in his bed one Saturday morning, Johnnie and his brother suddenly saw, vividly and clearly, three beautiful angelic appearing entities, that slowly glided from one side of their room to the other, only to disappear through a bedroom wall. Anyone who knew Johnnie well can only assume these spirits or angels have been there with him all his life, in one fashion or another; he truly believed that they had.

Also, it wasn't long after his angelic encounters that Johnnie spotted a little devilish-looking entity staring at him from a tree limb near a pond; his pal saw it as well when Johnnie pointed it out to him. Perhaps there was some kind of spiritual battle going on over him at that time in his young life. If this is true, then which side won is obvious.

In Oct. of 2015 Johnnie passed away after a long and uncomplaining battle with bone cancer. I had no machismo problems bending down and kissing his beloved remains good-bye, being one of two whites at his African American Baptist church service. However, the man had many friends, black and white, but some of the white friends were in a position that precluded them from attending and they regretted not being able to be at his funeral. Where ever this man's spirit is now, I have no doubt it's in a beautiful and healing place. Fare thee well my friend.


Zona Shue Ghost Testimony Accepted In Court: by Guest Writer Phyllis Doyle

1/10/2015

 
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Spector appearances or strange phenomena that have resulted in court trials in modern times are unusual but not as rare as one might assume. Apparently, though, this is the only one that resulted in a conviction. The eerie case of the German female Anneliese Miichel is a good case in point about court trials instigated by the supernatural. Although the prosecution barely secured a guilty verdict on some of those attempting to help the poor girl, they were given what amounted to as a slap on the wrist as  punishment.

Anyone who has seriously researched that case with an open mind and listened to the tapes made during the exorcisms- which are more horrifyingly hair-raising in parts than anything many tens of million dollar spook movies can elicit- will consider outside forces of a very negative or evil  nature may have been at work, even if only externally - attracted to the split personality schizoid girl. 

Guest writer Phyllis Doyle kindly provides us with a ghost case that resulted in a trial well over a hundred years ago in the often very paranormally active state of West Virginia. Thank you, Phyllis, for this short but well-written, well-researched and intriguing piece on the remarkable Zona Shue story of justice seemingly secured from beyond the grave.

PictureZona Shue
One of the strangest ghost stories is one of a Greenbrier ghost by the name of Zona Shue, whose testimony was upheld in court as evidence of her own murder.

Throughout Appalachia country there are ghost stories that go way back in time. The American Revolutionary War, the Civil War, several mining disasters, and prior to all this, the Indian Wars between settlers and Native Americans left behind hundreds of lost souls throughout the land. It is a land haunted by those who never found their way back home. Greenbrier County, West Virginia, USA, is just one of the places that abound with the spirits of those who died tragically.

The story of Zona Heaster Shue, a young bride, married just three months when her body was found at the foot of the stairs in her two-story cabin, on January 23, 1897, is tragic and most unusual. There are differing stories as to where Zona was found.

Some say at the foot of the stairs, another says she was lying on the floor at the foot of her , and yet another says she was found in the dining room, and a trail of blood led from the front porch steps, through the house and to her body that was lying there stiff and cold.

Yet, regardless of which account is true, the fact remains that she was dead.

PictureMary Jane Heaster: Zona's mother

According to Dr. Knapp, Zona had died from heart failure. Zona's body was placed in a simple coffin and taken by wagon to her parents home, several miles away. During the ride to the parents home, the viewing of the body by family and friends and right up until Zona's coffin was sealed shut, Edward never left the head of the casket. Zona was buried in the Soule Chapel Church cemetery.

Zona's mother, Mary Jane Heaster, was devastated with the loss of her daughter and felt that something was dreadfully wrong about the way Zona died. She never liked Edward Shue and felt that there was more to be known about Zona's death.

A few weeks after the funeral, Mary found out what the nagging suspicion in her was. Zona's spirit began appearing to Mary at night, four nights in a row. The first time the spirit appeared, the room was filled with an eerie chill and a bright light came which then began to materialize into the daughter Mary knew. Zona communicated to her mother that Edward had choked her and pushed her down the stairs, killing her. To convince her mother that Edward had broken her neck, the spirit turned her head completely around. Well, Mary was convinced alright and went to visit John Alfred Preston, the local prosecutor, and told him her story. After several hours with Mary, Preston sent out deputies to interview Dr. Knapp and other people who had expressed suspicions about Zona's death. 


PictureHouse where murder took place
Dr. Knapp admitted to Preston that he had not done a thorough examination of Zona because Edward Shue was so possessive of the body and became violently hysterical when the doctor tried to examine the neck area. Preston felt that this was enough reason to justify exhumation and an autopsy.

An inquest jury was selected, the body was examined and an autopsy performed. Edward Shue was subpoenaed to attend the inquest and autopsy. He heatedly objected, but by law, had to be present.

Edward Shue, a handsome and well-built man, moved to Greenbrier County in November of 1896. There he met fifteen year old Zona Heaster and swept her off her feet. They married and moved into their own house in Livesay's Mill. Edward got a job as the local blacksmith. Everything seemed to be fine with the happily married couple till that fateful day Zona was found dead. It seems Edward had sent a young boy, Anderson Jones, to his house to see if Zona needed anything from the store that he could pick up on his way home. The poor boy was certainly not expecting what he found at Zona's home.

Anderson found Zona's body. Badly shaken he ran back and told Edward, who immediately left for home. Anderson ran home to his mother who then fetched Dr. Knapp and told him what happened.

When Dr. Knapp got to the Shue home about an hour later, he saw that Edward had carried Zona to their room and placed her on the bed. He was crying, with his arms wrapped around her, cradling her head.  The doctor noticed that Edward had dressed her in a dress with a high stiff neck and a large veil was wrapped around her neck, tied in a large bow under her chin. As Dr. Knapp examined the body, Edward would not leave and continued to cling to Zona's head.
Examination of the exhumed body showed deep indentations of finger marks around her neck, the windpipe was crushed, ligaments were torn . Shue's behavior at the inquest and the physical evidence of brutality to Zona's body was sufficient to have Shue arrested and charged with murder.

As Shue awaited trial, investigations into his past showed that he was married twice before. His first wife divorced him for physical brutality and his second wife died unexpectedly and mysteriously.

During the trial, which began June 22, 1897, Preston tried to avoid the issue of Zona's ghost when her mother was sworn in as witness. However, the defense lawyer badgered Mrs. Heaster about Zona's ghost, hoping to discredit her. Unfortunately for the defense, Mrs. Heaster was not about to back down. She stood her ground and the jury believed her.

On July 11 the jury deliberated. Edward Shue was found guilty of murder and sentenced to life in prison. When Edward was in jail awaiting transfer to prison, a lynch mob tried to break him out and hang him. The mob was disbanded. Edward Shue was transferred to the West Virginia State Penitentiary in Moundsville, where he died three years later from an epidemic outbreak.

Zona Heaster Shue must have known that justice was carried out, for her spirit never appeared again to her mother. A state historical marker was erected near the Soule Chapel Church cemetery, which reads:


"Interred in nearby cemetery is Zona Heaster Shue. Her death in 1897 was presumed natural until her spirit appeared to her mother to describe how she was killed by her husband Edward. Autopsy on the exhumed body verified the apparition’s account. Edward, found guilty of murder, was sentenced to the state prison. Only known case in which testimony from a ghost helped convict a murderer." ~ ~ ~


The Psychic Medium Daniel Dunglas Home Comes Clean

12/2/2014

 
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Muses can appear in many ways and change lives. ~ anon

According to Oliver Stone's movie, The Doors, Jim Morrison once called his lady love - the super-legend singer's main squeeze red-haired Pamela Courson - his earthly muse.

She may well have been and he certainly wrote some great lyrics and poetry that were about or at least inspired by her.

There is a former truck driver I know who had a most remarkable experience while driving down a Kentucky back road one bright sunny day. He was driving his truck and had just passed a cemetery, -when something in the big left-side door mirror reflected enough to catch the attention of his eagle eyes.

This was a sight to make person stop their vehicle, get out, and investigate further. That is exactly what the gentleman did, and what he beheld standing behind his semi in the middle of the road was to change his life forevermore. It was a beautiful girl, ethereal looking, with white shrouds wrapped about her body.  The specter then gazed into the man's eye's with a power that he felt looked right into his soul. She then drifted away, without touching the ground, back into the cemetery from whence she'd come.

To make a long story short, suffice to say this "Lady in white" became the gentleman's, for lack of a better term,  psychic inspirer. Now, according to some wiki descriptions, the word that may come closest to describing my friend's experience is channeling, or, in other words, communicating mind-to-mind, as Vincent apparently did with this particular magnificent entity. He was to encounter her again on a another trip down that Bluegrass State back road with similar results to the first meeting.

I've never had a creatively-inspiring muse experience, well, one that I could see. Why, there once came an evening with a bottle of the now legal Absinthe to hand ( I practically never imbibe these days, maybe a beer on the 4th, at most)  that failed to produce a Green Fairy muse for me (not that I was really expecting one) as they're purported to have done for all those Belle Epoque writers and artists. No visit, but what did happen later on one day is an inspiration came to mind to write this story in the style in which it is written. And although rather brief, I can only wish another such writing notion passes this way again in the future.

Anyway, hope you enjoy this one my Mists and Moonlight friends, it's on the house.

PictureA cheerful nature
THE  PSYCHIC MEDIUM DANIEL DUNGLAS HOME BEGINS HIS INCREDIBLE STORY

They've called me the greatest psychic medium of all time. Do I deserve this appellation? Perhaps I do, perhaps I don't; that's strictly for the individual to make up their own mind on as far as I'm concerned.

Except for a period of twelve months, when They decided to punish me for reasons I'll speak of later, the powers never failed me for well over twenty-five years.

How to begin. My actual surname I prefer pronounced Hume, not Home. I was born nearby to Edinburgh: the year and month, 1833, March. And yes, I'll now confirm the birth was illegitimate.

My father's title was Lord Home, and my mother was a Highlander with the power of second sight. I came to America with my Aunt Mary at the age of nine to be reunited with my mother and siblings. As far as my father being there with the rest as is speculated, it's not something I'll go into, now or later.

The first sign given that the power was in me occurred at thirteen. I saw my best friend Edwin standing at the foot of the bed. He made three circles in the air with his hand that I intuitively knew told of his death three days previous. And so he had. Many years later the power returned with a vision of my mother. She, too, had crossed over into the spirit realm.

The holy mystery was to rarely let up after this, with bangs, raps, moving objects and much more. It finally reached the point where my Aunt, reluctantly, requested I leave the comfort and safety of her home. Thus, at the early age of seventeen, I found myself thrown alone into the maelstrom of the world.

PictureAmazing the learned
DANIEL  BECOMES THE WORLD'S GREATEST MEDIUM

My charm and cheerful nature now served me well. I made many friends who's kindness was joyfully given and most thankfully received. A Professor Bush at one point even suggested I pursue the pulpit life for the salvation of souls.

As I pondered this proposition over the next few days, my departed mother, through the auspices of the power, strongly advised me that a greater extended mission was ordained for this life.

I then continued my wanderings. Eventually I found myself in the very handsome home of a Mr. Elmers, who had arranged a delegation from Harvard to see the power; included if I remember correctly, was the eminent poet William C. Bryant.

It was very  pleasing to meet these esteemed gentlemen, all of whom seemed eager to see the demonstrations. As They began to rap upon the table, then levitate it, they - the Harvard gentlemen that is - vainly pressed down with all their strength upon the table when it angled up on two legs.

The floor then vibrated to the point of producing thunderous booms, all the while my hands and feet were being alternately held by one of those present. Thus, the force of the preternatural power made itself manifest at this academic gathering of men.

Later, through the years, I astounded many by floating up to the high ceilings of my hosts' homes, tipping tables with candle flames that went on burning at the same angle they were when the wood tops were level, pulling by an unseen force the heaviest pianos across lengthy floors and levitating them up to the tops of rooms.

I was tested dozens of times, in the most stringent manner, by numerous committees of scientists and skeptics, and was never once caught in any fraud, for indeed, there was none. Everything achieved being granted by the grace of the power within.

When the gift was at its strongest, I could float or roll out a tall building's window and come back through another one to the befuddlement of the gentlemen attending. Or while having my feet and body held tightly, elongate the body by near half a foot as measured.

Picture19th century drawing room seance
THE PSYCHIC MEDIUM'S d' ATTAINVILLE'S SEANCE

It was an early evening, 1863 for your notes. I found myself in the stylish home of a Madam Jauvin d' Attainville, along with a princess, an ambassador - many more in a majestic drawing room. Sitting in an armchair, away from the others, I went into the usual light trance so the power could manifest itself through me.

Calling on a spirit guide, Brian, in particular, the raps and thumps began above and below the table, the furniture moved about the room, and the heavy chandeliers started their swaying. At this time the Princess Metternich shrieked as she felt strong, invisible hands grasp her. This also began in a softer fashion amongst the  others. The room of course was brightly lit, nothing was hidden.

Next, the embroidered tablecloth lifted high in the air with Prince Metternich fruitlessly flailing underneath it for anything solid. All the men now ran to and fro, seeking the source of the raps and force beneath the cloth, with all their efforts in vain. I then commanded the vase of flowers on the piano to slide across its polished top and airily float into the Princess's lap.

I then asked for an accordion. The princess was requested to stand in the center of the room with the instrument held above her head. A look of bewilderment came over her lovely face as the accordion played a sweet and melodious tune, that soon had many in the room sobbing; after which all was ended.


PictureThe Brownings
DANIEL DUNGLAS HOME AND THE BROWNINGS

The Poets? They called on me, I did not present myself to them; the same circumstance that had occurred in a previous meeting with the two lovers.

During the seance the usual materializations, rappings, body touches and aerial tunes were brought forth through the power. Mrs. Barrett was ecstatic at the conclusion, but I could feel, or  rather keenly sense, the extreme jealousy emanating from her husband.


He most adamantly refused to accept what had transpired, and after his wife's passing over to the other side wrote that outrageously unfair Mr. Sludge, the Medium to defame me.


I shall now state the main reason for his hatred. At another séance Mr. and Mrs. Browning had attended with me, a spiritual hand placed a garland of flowers on her magnificent brow. And stating only the truth, I let it be known about the town that the man in his vanity had attempted to place his own head, unsuccessfully, in its path so as to be crowned himself. 

PictureThe psychic pondering?
THE REVELATIONS FROM DANIEL HOME CONTINUE

I had always been a favorite with the ladies, from the bourgeoisie to the titled, and this was to later cause me the trappings of scandal and the greatest of troubles.

As to my oft debated sexual yearnings, it would be correct to say that when the rare fancy took, a partner of either gender would suffice. But, in all truth, my desires in this matter were more often directed at the ladies.


As my foolish self-pretensions once got the better of me, the power announced I would be punished and bereft of it for a year's time. I learned my lesson well.


Later on I was declared a sorcerer in Rome. ( They did not help matters any by rapping on the desk of the great city's police head.) I was then permanently banished from the Eternal City, much to my regret.

My wanderings then took me to Paris were I fell in with Napoleon lll and his wife Empress Eugenie. This good fortune aroused the envy and jealousies of many; but since the previous chastisement of the spirits, I had kept my sense of pride on a humble playing field, which helped to foil a plot or two against me.

I latter married a Russian Countess, who gave me a handsome son before she caught and succumbed to the consumption that resided in my body. However, all was not lost as They allowed frequent conversations between us.

I went on to retire in 1872 after many more adventures ,ecstasies, disappointments and demonstrations of the miraculous gift. Fourteen years on I departed this life as the consumption finally ended my days on earth. Left behind was my beautiful second wife, a comfortable haven, and my son Grisha, who had inherited the power from me as I from my Highlander mother.*

*The stories presented here are factual, and the amazing powers of the great psychic medium are believed to be true by many writers, historians and researchers.  This one is a case some of the arch skeptics are pulling their hair out over; but, to be more charitable about it, many of them do know, indeed admit, that this is a true mystery and will not be solved by any smoke and mirror or rigged accordion explanations. In 1868 Mr. Home was even put on trail in England by a materialist-minded judiciary but was thoroughly & completely exonerated. 

Daniel Dunglas Home might very well  have been one of the greatest psychic mediums of all time.

TIMESLIP EXPERIENCES?

11/19/2014

 
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Is there a locked door- represented by the Atalaya Castle door below- between what we see and what enters our reality at times?  Does the door unlock and swing open on occasion? Can it? Perhaps it can...even some 21st century physics scientists believe so, and although from a subjective take, people's stories.

PictureAtalaya Castle Door
Yesteryear and the Paranormal

The incident described in this article is about what might have been a timeslip occurrence that happened to me as a youngster. I make no bones about it, having had several no-doubt-about-its, at least to me, paranormal experiences, that took place in my childhood and thirties...and, in a sense, as recently as May of 2015. That last one can be found on the Boone's Cave story on Mists & Moonlight.

A couple more have taken place that are paranormally experienced possibilities, but were probably not. This story belongs in the latter probability category. Folks who have perused it say it's a nice little read, regardless, so the decision was made to include it on the Carolinian's Archives.

In the early nineteen seventies my family would often visit an aunt and uncle who owned and operated a motel-restaurant several miles south of interstate 85 in Jackson County, Georgia.

About ten years or so ago, as I traveled down the interstate towards Atlanta's airport to pick-up someone coming in from Germany, I decided to make a quick detour and ride by the old motel, which was some miles north of the small, now probably, medium-sized town called Commerce.

It turned into a frustrating side-trip as the motel was gone and the extensive wild wheat fields and copses of trees remembered from childhood were now swallowed up by strip malls and fast food establishments. I finally had to stop and ask someone where the place used to be. 

The first-person paranormal story is not always easy for someone to talk about. I have found this out for myself, and by what I believe to be largely honest correspondences and face-to face conversations with many fine folks who have experienced mysterious events themselves. It always helps one to have corroboration in these matters -- and in two cases I tell of here on Mists and Moonlight, that corroboration came forth with other witnesses, animal reactions and an international airport radar, and, in a few unrelated cases, some digital photos.

For the longest time the only people I discussed any of this with was relations or friends. When things like ghost-hunting, sasquatch, and UFOs became more accepted in the popular culture, though, I sensed the time had come to write some of them down and share with anyone interested. It was a great pleasure to hear the response from others and their experiences with the unusual and mysterious.

POPULAR CULTURE AND INTEREST

As a little boy in the sixties, one of the great TV shows watched from those years was Irwin Allen's The Time Tunnel. The setting of the series -- which ran for one season on the ABC network -- was a top secret project known as Tic-Toc, located in a deep underground base in Arizona.

It mostly concerned two scientist entering a spiraling constructed time tunnel and then going forward or backward in time. The show may have been prescient, and certainly put many a young mind to pondering on the possibilities back then.

If we go back in time a bit ourselves, we can see such literary classics on the subject like A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court by Mark Twain, or A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens, and of course, The Time Machine by HG. Wells.

More recent books and movies in the timeslip-time travel genre include the Star Trek and Back to the Future series of films, and Steven King's The Langoliers. The list of scientists and researchers -- past and present -- is also a very lengthy one that are, or were, interested in the subject.

The point being that despite the phenomenon known as timeslips causing much contention between believers and doubters, the subject has been around and fascinated the public and some of the world's greatest thinkers for a very long time.

I'm far from being any kind of expert in the physics of time travel and slips, but a detailed explanation on how they could happen is readily available on shows like The History Channel and in many popular books as well as numerous reliable sites on the internet. 

One of the most famous and interesting cases of a possible occurrence concerning the subject is the Moberly-Jourdain incident. These two Edwardian academic women claim to have seen Marie Antoinette and others on a 1901 visit to Versailles. Of course, this has caused controversy over time like all other such like experiences do.

In conclusion to all this, however, it should be stated that there is some very good evidence these phenomena particularly occur on certain intersections of an Earth grid, the Bermuda Triangle being one of the better known and more powerful of these vortex spots. The Devil's Sea near Japan, which is directly opposite the Bermuda Triangle on the other side of the world, may be another such area. There are many more across the world.

ALL IN THE FAMILY -  BLACK-HAIRED SPECTOR

Before we start with what most probably was not a timeslip, let's look at one intriguing fact and then a sister's reluctantly told story of her own one time admitted mysterious encounter.

I've read and seen information that seems to suggest people with Celtic or Native American blood are more likely to pick up on extraordinary phenomenon. Whether this has to do with DNA and/or something else, no one seems to know for sure. However, the ability to experience the metaphysical does appear to be able to be passed down in blood relations. 

I am of English, German, and, particularly, Scot-Irish heritage; the latter of which should include some Celtic stock. A great-grandmother supposedly had a bit of Native American blood in her as well. So, if the Celtic and First Nation blood-lines do indeed have a higher perceptiveness to what is usually unseen, then a combination of the two lineages, in varying degrees, would obviously be the most receptive of all to the paranormal, supernatural, or whatever one wants to call it.

After speculating that some people are born with this "receptiveness ​factor", there is also the possibility that people may gain it through a strong electrical shock. When I was about six or seven years old, one afternoon I was fooling around alone in my father's basement office. At one point, I stuck a finger in a bad wall outlet.

The shock was severe enough to knock me, still hunched over, at least ten feet across the room, to wind-up sitting, stunned, against the opposite wall. Could this serious jolt have caused the "dials" in my energy field to be more receptive? That is a question I've wondered about but have no definitive answer to. At least it was a hard lesson learned about being careful with electrical wall outlets and the potential power of electricity. 

​Ava is a pragmatic and down-to-earth woman, not given to aerie-faerie flights of fancy or telling falsehoods. She was rather hesitant to relate the following story as the subject of one of my extraordinary events came up around a warming fire in her home one winter's day.

It all began when a previous, but at the time current, husband's grandfather passed away.  A day or so before the funeral, Ava casually walked into her den one afternoon only to be met by the stunning sight of a middle-aged looking woman stretched out on her sofa, staring up at her with dark, sunken eyes. 

This wasn't any ordinary lady, but one with stringy, unwashed looking long black hair. Startled, Ava stood there in amazement for some time as the figure slowly vanished right in front of her. This wasn't to be the only appearance of this specter. For the next three or four nights running, the eerie apparition came to Ava's side of the bed, hung on to the bed post, and just stared at her.

She said after a while the apparition would float away towards the bedroom door or wall and pass on through. After the three or four nights the wraith stopped appearing and Ava initially thought it had something to do with her then husband's deceased grandfather, but soon changed her feelings on that. Her spouse, whom she told of the visits at the time, had no clue about the specter's identity, either. He felt the same as Ava now did about why the entity was appearing -- and that was that they really had no idea.

Somewhat amazingly, a Scottish writer and investigator friend of mine made the insightful comment that the woman and family situation have all the earmarks of what is known as an Irish Banshee encounter! But if so, why did she  appear after a death, as they're thought to foretell them? One can only wonder if this was such an entity or something else entirely.
Picture19th century southern cabin reconstruction -- this is basically what that cabin in the Georgia meadow appeared like
TIMESLIP EXPERIENCE?

As mentioned previously in the article, I would often visit the aunt and uncle's place as a young teenager. Other than watching programs like The Flip Wilson Show in the lobby, or swimming in the tiny outdoor pool, there really wasn't much to keep a young boy occupied at the motel.

I'd recently been given a 20 gauge shotgun, which was a common thing for a boy to receive around the age of twelve or thirteen back then. In front of the motel and across the highway were grass and wild wheat fields, interspersed with patches of trees that went back for many miles. I often walked those fields trying to stir up rabbits to hunt or just think on things as young boys are wont to do.

One day, while returning from a fruitless hunt, I suddenly felt all tensed up and a bit light-headed. It was a sunny day and it should be noted that as far as I knew back then there weren't any buildings, roads, or homes anywhere in those expansive Georgia meadows.

Within a few seconds of the tense feeling there suddenly appeared to my right a strange looking abode. There were also several small, nearly naked African American children squealing and chasing each other out in front of the antiquated looking place, an old cabin in appearance, really.

But what caught my eye more than anything else was an attractive young woman sitting on a log who was closest to me as I passed by. I took her as the little ones' mother. She turned and smiled at me very warmly, and what struck me then, and even more so later on, was what she was wearing.

The young woman had on a turban-style head wrap and a distinctly old-timey looking dress that went to her feet and came down to her wrists. And this was summer as that was the time of season we visited. There was nothing "modern" that I could see anywhere and the whole scene and feel was completely out of place with any kind of familiarity. Returning the smile and quickly moving on by, the tenseness and odd feeling soon went away.

At some point, maybe the next day, maybe several days later when I was back in those fields, although not specifically looking for the cabin, it was no where in sight which puzzled me a little. The hunting forays at the motel soon ended after this time, so there was no chance of coming on the place again in the future.  I'll be the first to admit the people and cabin were near certainly from the early '70s, but still, the experience seemed very strange and obviously was never forgotten.

Ghostly Grins at Ft. Pulaski, Chimney Rock, Kindred Spirits, Cades Cove, & the Sheldon Ruins, Bruton Parish, Old St. Paul's, Kadesh Churches       

7/29/2014

 
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BELIEVE IT OR NOT ~ Robert L. Ripley

This Mists and Moonlight article is a bit different than those who have come before it. All the stories contained herein don't necessarily concentrate on ghosts, hauntings, mysterious going-ons and such; but some of them do. The words Mists and Moonlight can mean many other things, too; things like peaceful feelings, busted spirit-hunting excursions, wonderful vistas, and, even kindred souls meeting through letters in a cooling ocean breeze.

In other words a story with a tongue-in-cheek theme about it here and there with a chance for we true believers to laugh at ourselves a bit. As mentioned in another piece on M&M, what good is life without at least a little humor in it sometimes? 

I do hope you enjoy some of these well-known but occasionally off the beaten path discoveries, and for those already familiar with them, an enjoyable look back. This is going to be a fun write and hopefully an even more enjoyable recall for those with memories of their own concerning some of these Carolina and Georgia spooky and not so spooky wonders. And remember, many of these sites and stories do indeed report strange goings-on, including tragedy and plenty of history to ponder and wonder on.

In fact, some of the info included throughout these stories are certainly no joke, as the first one about Fort Pulaski may show. All just done in the spirit of fun is perhaps a good way to sum it up for this one.

FORT PULASKI

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Old soldiers never die; they just fade away~ Douglas Mac Arthur 

 The highly thought of but lowly-ranked U. S. officer  Robert E. Lee, was given a command in 1829 by the U.S. military to continue the construction of Fort Pulaski, which was  on one of the most geologically inhospitable places in the southern United States to try and construct such a place.

 Dutifully, the respected and much admired engineer   
 lieutenant (pre-Mexican-American and Civil War fame),  who graduated second in his class at West Point  with an incredible no demerits, went to the task with gusto; which was t0 be a one of so many hallmark achievements made by this  diligent  and remarkable legendary figure in history. He was to give the project all he possessed, with many personal sacrifices, until called away to other very difficult engineering jobs on the East Coast of America.

At the time of these East Coast fort building projects the American government really only considered the British empire to be a threat. The Revolutionary War and War of 1812 were still close in memory during the 1820s, 30s and 40s. These bastions were never to be used against that potential enemy as things turned out, but against each other in the soon to come War Between the States.

The 1989 Academy-Award winning movie Glory was filmed in the area of Savannah and other places and during a morning headed to the set,  a group of rebel soldier reenactors in period uniforms paid a visit to the nearby fort. While walking about there suddenly appeared a Confederate officer approaching the men who upbraided them for not giving a salute. He then commanded them to fall into a battle-line as a Yankee attack could happen at any moment. Believing this very realistic looking officer was an unknown reenactor to them, they did just that, as much for a demonstration to the other tourists about as for anything else. He then ordered them to about face, which they did; but on turning 'round a second later, the officer had completely vanished, with no place he could have run-to or hidden from sight that quickly -- from anybody!

Although the following  was in the National Enquirer, the paper (with the exception of some of its exaggerated celebrity pieces), is often quite accurate in its articles.  During the making of the film Gettysburg, something purportedly happened that was witnessed by hundreds of people. It seems on one of the days the Confederate reenactors were in-line ready to move across the long field of the Pickett-Pettigrew-Trimble Charge, a tremendous yell and cheer, which seemed like it came from thousands of full-throated voices, occurred behind them in the empty woods, as if urging them on, or even paying homage for what they were about to do. After a thorough inspection no recording devices were ever found -- not even in the trees or any other hard to find  places such sound devices could have been concealed.

Spirits or no spirits, places like Fort Pulaski, the Gettysburg National Military Park, and many other Civil War battle sites are fascinating and introspective historical landmarks to gambol about.  Who knows what you might see or hear or even capture with your cell phone while visiting them.

The National Park Service Site can be found here: http://www.nps.gov/fopu/planyourvisit/directions.htm

SHELDON CHURCH RUINS

Some ruins of ancient times are much more beautiful than the best buildings of the modern eras~ M. M. Ildan

Once while driving home from Beaufort, S.C. ( about 15 miles our so outside of that beautiful town) we stopped and asked a man at a country store if there were any interesting sites about.  With a look of glee he mentioned an old church ruin on the Old Sheldon Church road. The directions he gave were on our route back and we decided to check it out, liking to visit out-of-the-way historic sites.

I do believe the gentlemen mentioned the back road to the church was long, largely wooded, and could be rather unsettling, especially at night. Boy, was he ever right about that as it turned out to be about seven or so miles of nothing much more than woody marsh, with over-hanging moss laden limbs on both sides of the road, that gave off a rather nice but strange vibe. ( Anyways, definitely not a stretch of road to have a flat tire on at at midnight!)


The interest greatly arose as we pulled over to the remains of this very old church building. Thank goodness brick only melts at around 2200 degrees or there would have been nothing to have pulled over and see. But, about the time this photo was made, we discovered savage invaders still lurked about the woods as dozens of bloodsucking mosquitoes descended on our uncovered arms , faces and legs! And with no can of insect spray or cream to repel them with what a bloody slaughter we received at the proboscis of these determined kamikaze-like attackers.  
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Despite the  ferociousness of the mighty Culicida attack, it was ultimately defeated, or, perhaps, endured is the better word for it as the human tendency for knowledge and curiosity is often a mightier force in such situations; and the military training of hand-artillery slaps applied effectively with swabbed disinfectant skin tissues did the job....But just barely. 

The historical plaque above tells it all pretty clearly as to the Sheldon, or Church of Prince William's Parish, unfortunate history concerning warring parties and the destruction they can bring. What has always intrigued me with houses of the holy like this is the fact of both Christian sides inflicting such things on the other. In the Revolutionary War years by the redcoats and 76 years later by the bluecoats (with the war practically over) in this instance. Whether out of spite, or fears of meeting places of sedition, it still seems ironic that opposing sides professing the same savoir and religious books would do it to each others' places of worship..

As for the present generation, may the heavens be thanked for having made brick possible and that refuses to be burned easily, as mentioned previously. And maybe those mosquito armies come from some hotter region of the universe known as mosquito hell. . Now, now, Alastar, you might say, all creatures have their purpose in creation and by golly on reflection I must agree with you...but, only after years of letting the haunting memory chill some.

In conclusion there are of course ghost tales told about this lonely structure and even eerie ones about the creepy back road it's on, too, so, at least in this story's case, Mists and Moonlight experiences can occur to the visitor's perspective, be it ghostly-minded, undecided or skeptical, and day or night at that.

For more info on this Old Sheldon church ruin here is more on wiki; with GPS it should be no trouble to find: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_Sheldon_Church_Ruins



CHIMNEY ROCK LITTLE FOLK?

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Not too long ago I saw an article on Google, that to paraphrase the title, went something like " a wee folk battle seen  at Chimney Rock, N.C." Now, this was a very clever, if misleading piece of title writing, as it made the reader think it was an up-to-date aerial, or rather, fairy-battle, just witnessed in the state park's skies. Of course, the truth was something else entirely.

In all fairness, though, folks can have different interpretations of phenomena of this kind, and it could certainly have been some kind of gnome or fairy dispute up there in the skies, but the Chimney Rock case was certainly not "hot off the press" as the saying used to go..

The Chimney Rock State Park is located about 25 miles SE of the New-Age city of Asheville, N.C.;  yes, Asheville is a progressive city and is starting to be called the Sedona, Ariz. of the East, the Paris of the South. Perhaps one reason is the beautiful mountains surrounding the town are largely made up of granite with lots of embedded piezo- crystals.  The pic to the left is the easier way up to the outcropping as there is a more natural and harder way up, too. The photo to the right is referred to as the Devil's Head and is at Hickory Nut Gorge in the park.

The true story of these strange aerial sightings goes like this, and is much farther back in time than the 21st century; now, perhaps, the author got the gist of the story correct later on in the piece, which had a first page Google ranking, but here is the true tale of the Chimney Rock State Park encounters, or ghostly sightings, way back when almost 210 years ago now.

West-central North Carolina was still somewhat frontier country in that year of 1806: horses or mules carried folks and wagons around, and what passed for doctors and other professionals were few and far between. Many cabins were quite a few miles apart in most sections of the area too..In a sense, Chimney Rock could, and can, be considered the gateway to North  Carolina's Appalachian Mountains.

Today it's a tourist area attraction with the beautiful Lake Lure (home to many NASCAR drivers), the climbing up to the outcropping itself (there's an elevator  for the disabled), a moonshiner's old cave to explore, plus a magnificent gorge and waterfall to see in the area as well; there's also camping, cabin rentals, hiking, bicycle endurance racing, and, of course, souvenir shopping to name just several other activities available at the park.

The ghost story begins in June of 1806 when hundreds (some said thousands) of apparitions were seen by many people floating about the air surrounding the mountain and its chasms. To be frank about it, and without meaning to offend anyone, Chimney Rock looks as if it could be some kind of  giant phallic symbol, protruding as a granite outcropping in honor of,  or even protecting,  some local Cherokee mountain god or something.

The settlers of the early 19th century were down-to-earth folk. Although superstitious in certain ways, they knew their mundane day-to-day world from the highly unusual better than most of us do today.

And what happened in that summer of 1806 was anything but the usual. On that day a girl told her brother she'd seen a small man on the dome which was highly irregular as no one at the time did such a thing as climb the outcropping.

What soon unfolded had  many people of the area experiencing multitudes of human appearing figures clothed in white gamboling about, some even said battling each other, below the clouds. Eventually three of these, apparitions, rose above the other specters and led them all high into the sky, out-of-site of the folks gathered below observing the strange, extraordinary action.

 Now, of course, this is a condensed re-telling of possible and incredible mysterious happenings at Chimney Rock way back when, but hardly seems a recent occurrence, wouldn't you agree folks? 


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HIGHLY UNUSUAL: GHOST PHOTOGRAPHED AT HISTORIC WILLIAMSBURG PLEADING TO BE SET FREE

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Shapeshifting ghost captured in modern clothing apparently hoping to be released by concerned tourists from lord knows how long in leg stocks for some unknown serious colonial indiscretion committed centuries ago!

Bruton Parish Episcopal Church

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This very old Williamsburg Catholic Church goes all the way back to the 17th century. Walking around it, and in it, during day-light hours isn't particularly ghostly-like but nighttime may be a different matter.

Multiple strange-looking pictures and other anomalies have been taken and sighted there over the years by so many folks that who knows for sure what's really going on. And this is just one place of a very many where paranormal reports come in from Historic Williamsburg.

Heaven as most of us imagine it is certainly incomparably beautiful, but this church would be a very nice place to re-visit on occasion from the heavenly realms, especially on a lovely mist-filled and moonlit night, just maybe that is, if such visits are allowed to happen from that hallowed place to beat all hallowed places in the first place, that is.

Historic Williamsburg is a wonderful walk back through this very old Virginia colonial capital - until the somewhat overpriced commercial upper part of the street is reached. Any vacationing spirits would be advised to avoid this part of King William's Street that we currently earthbound folk seem to need for the present time, at least, to make the world go round and round and wonderfully delightful for us.

KINDRED SPIRITS

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Kindred's Cove on Bird Island is truly a beautiful and reflective place...during the sunlight of day or moonlight of night. No ghosts or haunts reported here, sad to say, but that's alright as such a spot is meant for other things. Bird Island is now attached to the resort town of Sunset Beach, N. C. The spot where the Kindred's Island mail box is,  where folks from all over the world can take a rest (a very long walk from Sunset Beach) and leave their thoughts written on paper of all types for others to read and to write their own musings about the beautiful, isolated and enchanting spot.

Mists and moonlight or sunshine and cool ocean breezes, make this a very special spot in the world. On the landward side of the walk, one has sand dunes, birds, sometimes sea turtles laying eggs, and, nothing much
more than some flora in this protected shoreline. For those of an especial freewill, there are, or rather were,
some reported nude tanning parts on Bird Island, too; but please don't tell anyone you read that here. Many sincere thanks to the dedicated grassroots initiators and state of North Carolina for this beautiful shoreline and its wonder stop of Kindred Spirits.

[ In July of 2016 a friend informed me there are those who are trying to build almost two dozen homes [rentals?]
on the wild shoreline marsh behind the dunes. Two lawsuits are attempting to stop this outrage of greed and/or selfishness and most of us surely hope and pray the lawsuits are successful.]


HAUNTED CADES COVE CHURCH GHOST HUNT ... A BUST!
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Another place on the National Register of Historic Places (which this writer uses a lot in his stories) is Cades Cove. This is an isolated valley in the southwestern part of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. An excellent breakdown on almost ever aspect of Cades Cove can be found on other sites so with that in mind we'll just concentrate some on the original indigenous natives, the first white settlers and some of their churches and cabin pictures.

The Treaty of Calhoun ended all Cherokee rights to the Great Smokies in 1819. Before that the Cove apparently had been a rich hunting ground for otter as the natives had a small village called "Otter Place", pronounced "Tsiya'hi" in the Cherokee language. By this time many of the whites and natives had begun to intermingle some although prejudice and occasional dust-ups still existed.

What finally sealed the Cherokees fate in the ancient Appalachians was when a Cherokee lad found a huge nugget of gold in the north Georgia mountains in 1829 that started a gold rush onto Cherokee Nation land. Naturally, the more valuable acreage itself that was desired by the state of Georgia was a bigger factor overall in wanting the tribe gone, so it was the beginning of the end, with Congress passing the long debated Indian Removal Act by one vote not too many years later.

Greed will surely do it every time, and by 1839 the tribe had either been forced to relocate to Oklahoma (Indian Territory as it was called then), lay in death along the Trail of Tears, or, as a many did, held out in the deep mountains until an agreement by the nearest general- in-charge of the relocation promised, and honored,  those remaining in their ancient homeland hiding out that they could stay there in perpetuity.

​But only if a certain Cherokee man, having now escaped twice, gave himself up for execution by a Cherokee firing squad after helping his son's, or relatives, slay two soldiers, who during the final round-up had prodded his wife along a little too hard with their bayonets. There are conflicting stories as to what really happened but this version seems to be the correct one.

So, in summation, this is a tale of a brave Cherokee family man named Tsali, or Charlie, who's ghost is said to still be seen to this day walking the high ridges of his homeland, as if watching over the lovely mountains of his beloved Smokies - and one day  his ghost or spirit story might be written about here on Mists and Moonlight. 
It's not surprising that a place like Cades Cove would be full of tales of the supernatural and ghostly church and graveyard stories. As a matter of fact there are so many it would take quite a while to even list them all on here. Here are some pictures of one of the earliest places of worship and a peek inside. Sorry to report no haunts were encountered ,but plenty of deer and as of fifteen years or so ago, re-introduced elk, and in the elk's case, sights to behold all by themselves no doubt.

Sadly, the attempt at re-introducing wolves was not as successful. But, in the wolves case, mother nature herself seems to have filled the void by hybridizing a highly intelligent and elusive new species in Canada called a coywolf, part coyote, part timber wolf; which is rapidly spreading across eastern North America and sooner or later will probably reach  the Great Smokies.

Below are six pictures of what I believe is the first church built in the Cove and many of its early cabins. To be frank about it, what would be unusual for me were if there weren't any occasional returning  or remaining
 spirits in such a magnificent and beautiful place like Cades Cove.

A Haunting Tale from the Kadesh Methodist Church and Old St. Pauls Lutheran Graveyard Ghost Hunt Ends in Failure

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In the west-central North Carolina counties of Cleveland and Catawba are two old churches called the Kadesh Methodist in the former county and Old St. Paul's Lutheran in the latter. A tale has long been told about a ghostly organist at the Kadish church that apparently began in the early 19th century when a carpenter came back one evening after a hard day's work to retrieve some tools. As he gathered things up, suddenly the sawdust-covered keys of the organ began playing a melodious tune all by itself that sent the man high-tailing it out of the church building with no intentions of ever returning.

These person-less  performances continued to be heard by many folks for years to come and became part of the local legend and lore of the small community of Belwood in Cleveland County. Sometimes parishioners would sprinkle a little something on the keys after locking-up after a Sunday or Wednesday evening service, only to later find fingerprints on the organ's keys the next morning!

Some years ago a friend who grew up in the Belwood area gave a hayride at his farm for eight or nine local kids and several adult couples. After the ride, while sitting around the bonfire roasting marsh mellows and hot dogs, I got to talking to the farm-owning friend. The conversation eventually got around to the farm house which had  been in the family for many generations and, with my interest in haunted houses, asked him if there were spirits or any ghost stories attached to the property and old residence.

The friend didn't have much to say about any ghosts, except for the time he and a few friends played a prank on some of his high school's overbearing school jocks. Seems he and the friends got the footballers to the nearby
Kadesh Church one night on some pretext or another and had rigged the organ to depress a few keys by itself when the bullies entered the place. He and his buds, hiding in the bushes,  got great guffawing double pleasure
watching the boys skedaddle in their battered Ford, or maybe it was Chevy, pick-up trucks.
Since it only seemed right to try and do a little churchyard ghost hunting myself for this article, I found one in Catawba County. St. Paul's Lutheran was formed before 1771 and even has its own haunting ghost tale.

At some point in the early 19th century, an enraged slave-owner shot and killed his bondsman on the church's balcony. Even up till our own time blood is said to appear periodically on the pew in the balcony where the man was killed. Late night organ music is also reported from time to time at Old St. Pauls, just like the one at the old Kadesh Methodist Church.

In addition to the main picture that starts off the stories of these two church's, the above photo at far left shows the Old St. Paul's Church and graveyard's age to good effect.  Some taken at night showed nothing but bad pictures taken by me; however, during the day shoots one really stood out. It had recently rained and as we all know sometimes after rains things can be pushed up from underground, like rocks or artifacts, for instance.

The two pieces, of something, in the far right picture, to be frank about it, reminded me of human bone shards, yellowed with age. Now, I'm no anatomist and am not saying these two objects came from that grave with the freshly sprouted pair of daisy flowers, but that was a very, very old headstone and just to be sure they were reverently placed atop the undecipherable and nearly gone stone marker. Just in case that is.

Thanks to the reader for being a good sport and hopefully sympathetic at my attempts to have some fun and a different look, kind of, at this strange world we live on and the wonders it still possesses for us to more fully discover someday. On second thought and in conclusion, leave us at least a few mysteries to always ponder on  and all should be well at the young girls' slumber or stay-over parties and around the boy scout's campfires.  

Ghosts of Haunted Georgetown, S. C.

6/5/2014

 
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"I would rather have a mind opened by wonder than one closed by belief" ~ G. Spence

The great thing about hunting for haunted houses or other places phantoms might stroll, in Georgetown, as compared to towns like Charleston or Savannah, is its compactness. Except for an island's beach and a lighthouse,  that proved to be the case for this article.

Although the following tales don't contain all the many stories of  ghosts and mysterious happenings in Georgetown and its county, which is also named Georgetown, they are the ones this writer was able to visit and take pictures of on a trip to this historical town. They're also more about the benevolent...or friendlier specters...in this place that's often called the Ghost Capital of the South.

Georgetown is a rather unique spot, sort of in-between the 55-mile long vacation wonderland known as the Grand Strand to its north, and Charleston, S.C. to its south. It is the third oldest town in the state and there are historians who think it was founded as early as 1526 by Spanish colonizers and their African slaves, which is mighty old for a North American settlement if factual.


In any case, a perfect place for things that go bump in the night--or better yet, calls from another realm.

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PictureEntrance to All Saint's Church graveyard
One of the first things I did on settling into the motel room was Wi-Fi the ghosts of Georgetown, specifically looking for any ghost tours. There was one with a man dressed-up as a pirate and a woman in 18th century period dress.

The other had some good reviews but apparently the gentleman tour guide had had a poor night with a couple of reviews complaining he wasn't in period dress and they smelled liquor on his breath. Maybe that's the reason he was no longer in town, having relocated to Florida. Too bad about having an off-day spoil a good thing if true.

So, I decided to just do this spooky exploring trip on my own. That same day, on a trip to the local Walmart, while walking down the parking to the entrance, an attractive older lady was just getting out of an SUV and said something to me. This started a conversation, which included a wonderful chat with her daughter named Rita, who had driven her parents to the store. After mentioning I was interested in the town's ghosts, she kindly told me about the Alice Flagg story and where to find her grave. People can be awesome and she also informed me about an artist who gave permission to include the Gray Man of Pawley's Island at the end of the article.

Now, to Alice's intriguing and rather sad story.

SWEET ALICE FLAGG

The story goes that in the 19th century Alice met and fell in love with a gentleman that her family did not approve of. He was a lumberman and her family thought he was beneath their social status.   Although Alice was deeply in love with him, her family forbade her to see him.  When this love of  her life gave her an engagement ring her family would not let her wear it on her finger. Therefore, Alice decided she would wear it on a ribbon around her neck, underneath her clothes, out-of-sight. 

Her father, Dr. Flagg, decided to send her from her home at the Hermitage to school in Charleston hoping she would forget about the young man.  However, she could not adjust to Charleston and the difference in the bustling environment there and the bucolic Hermitage.  Alice fell ill, her father and brother then went to Charleston to bring her home.  Unfortunately, Alice did not live.  When preparing her for her funeral, her ring was found and thrown away, so she was not buried with the ring her beloved had given her. 

After the burial, and the many intervening years between then and now, it is said that Alice has been seen looking for her ring and can not rest in peace without it.  It has also been said that once a group of young people was visiting her grave when one girl had the terrifying experience of having her ring fly off her finger!

While talking with Rita she told us of an experience she had had herself.  Rita went on one of the ghost hunt tours that take place each year around October.  When the group arrived at the Hermitage, Alice's home place, they all sat on the porch in chairs and on the porch-swing while  the owner told them more stories about Alice and her family. 

​ During one of the stories, a young lady that was on the swing had her ring come off, and, on its own at that! It then fell through the cracks of the porch. The porch was off the ground, as most of the homes were that were built during that period and, it had a space where folks could go underneath.  Everyone in the group went below the porch and helped thoroughly search for her ring, but it was never found. 

The consensus was that Alice had been out and about - and no one was laughing in jest.

As can be seen from Alice's, um, un-resting place here, many to this day still leave tokens of affection on her unique memorial stone. 
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THE STRAND

The Strand is a former movie theater at 710 Front St.  The spot was first used as a cinema in 1914, almost from the start of these kind of entertainment venues.

Nowadays the old Strand is used by the Swamp Fox Players as a community theater for their performances.

With a place like the Strand's kind of history ( this writer knows of no other such ancient picture-show building still being used for anything in the Carolina's, although there certainly may be) it isn't too surprising that icy spots, strange footsteps and phantom murmurings, have been reported there since the movies stopped running on its silver screen over forty years ago.

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NORTH ISLAND LIGHTHOUSE

Ten miles down Georgetown's Sampit River, heading out to the open sea, is the North Island Lighthouse. Eighty-seven feet tall, six feet thick at the base, the old lighthouse's construction began in 1799. The structure was roughed-up good right after the War Between the States by Federal warships using it as a target practice. The present one was re-built, or perhaps the term should be added-to, the original tower in 1876.

The most intriguing ghost story told about this venerable landmark, listed on the National Register of Historic Places, concerns a light housekeeper and his little daughter Annie. He had no wife, so he was the sole caregiver of the lighthouse and his child. It was very hard work because normally the keeper would have had an assistant or a spouse who could aid him.

 His little daughter was by his side all day. His chores would take twice as long because Annie was with him. Every couple of weeks, they would get in the rowboat to go to Georgetown for supplies. They would leave very early in the morning, when the current would help carry the rowboat into the harbor, then return in the evening when the tide washed back out to sea.

Early one morning, they made their trip to town. While shopping the little girl helped check off the supply list, which included buying herself a doll. Around noon a stiff wind caught the keepers attention, so he told Annie to come along ,they must leave at once. The water was still calm when they left, so without waiting for the ebb tide, he began rowing. The wind picked-up and a hard rain began, kicking up the water and rocking the boat.

Annie was wet and cold and afraid. She began to cry as the water filled the rowboat. Soon the keeper realized he would not be able to save the boat and supplies. He then took a rope and tied Annie, who was clutching her doll, to his back. Annie held on tightly to her father's neck as he fell out of the boat and began swimming for their very lives. He didn't know which way to swim as the foaming white seawater and driving rain blinded him. The keeper was determined, though, calling on everything within himself to save his beloved charge.


The man reached the shore, crawling to safety with Annie still tied to his back - and then fell into a deep sleep, not rousing till dawn.. After calling Annie's name several times to wake her, he untied her from his back, and then discovered she had drowned. Afterwards he became despondent - unable to do his duty at the lighthouse. In his grief he would wander into town, searching all about for his precious little girl. According to some fisherman and mariners, Annie, to this day, comes aboard their vessels warning them of hurricanes and nasty weather. Those in-the-know definitely heed this petite specter's benevolent appearances, so it is said. 

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Confederate Memorial Day on Front Street circa 1910
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Front Street and the Sampit River circa 1920
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DUPRE HOUSE

The DuPre House at 921 Prince St. is by far the most fetching place for a haunting this writer saw while riding along the streets behind Front St. There are maybe five or six well-known haunted houses in this small area but this was the only one I was able to get out and walk around a bit because of its large front-yard. Indeed, all but one of the property's were up for sale.

Probably because of the down-turned economy, but, one can't help but wonder if at least some could be up for purchase because of any frightening goings-on. In any case, the ghostly tales told throughout the centuries about all these homes and buildings are legendary.

The haunted happenings at the DuPre House - formally a bed and breakfast- concerns the spirits of a lady and her daughter from the 19th century. The two supposedly died in a fire at the home before the Civil War. Since that time, folks have reported childish giggling from closets and rooms, female-sounding arias wafting about, and mysterious footprints appearing in carpets. These are just several of many paranormal things this earth-bound pair seem to produce at times.

Below are three pictures from the porch and front-yard of the empty of residents and for sale place. It's a charming house, but I can tell the reader this after peeking into two open-blind windows, half-expecting to be confronted by a startling sight, it's the perfect setting for ghostly frights or delights, take your pick.

PicturePawley's Island Shore 2014
THE GRAY MAN OF PAWLEY"S ISLAND

The legend of this benevolent specter is one of the most well-known and written about on the East Coast of America. Books, articles, videos and TV shows have all covered his appearances  over the many years pretty well. So, with that in mind, only a short part or recounting of this most unusual ghost's history will be told here. As a matter of fact, the main reason the story is included on this article, instead of another one, is because of the great painting below, kindly contributed to us by Ms. Cathy Turner. The link to her worthy site is below the painting.


There are some who believe the founder of Pawley's Island, just north of Georgetown, is the Gray Man. However, the far more likely apparition is of a young man thrown from his horse and drowned in quicksand during the year 1800. The unfortunate fella was soon to be married which made the accident all the more tragic and sad.

Since then, an entity has appeared to warn folks of approaching danger, specifically hurricanes. Many, many  people over the centuries who have sighted him on the island prior to this terrible force of nature, later found out that their homes, property, and other things remained untouched, while all else around their possessions were badly damaged or devastated.

In the year 1954, one of the most horrific hurricanes to ever hit eastern North America, did just that. At the time my father and several fishing buddies were fast asleep in a rented bungalow at either south Myrtle Beach or Pawley's Isle, when my dad heard a loud knock on the door. He arose and answered, only to find no one there. He then turned on the radio and heard the frightening news that Hazel was bearing down fast. He and the fishing buds skedaddled quickly and later learned the building they'd just left in a flash was flattened within 30 minutes of their departing it.

This story is not told to suggest it was the Gray Man who did the knocking, but shows the suddenness and awful power Hurricane Hazel wrought in those pre-Doppler radar days. It is intriguing, though, to recount that at least one person who had seen the Gray Man on the beach a day or two before, found that his family's beach home was completely undamaged -- including clothes still hanging on a wash line -- while all the other homes next door and roundabout were obliterated. This is not an isolated case throughout time by any means, either.

Whatever, or whomever, this entity is, it's a very caring and concerned one and that's a very good thing.

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Gray man image in foreground - compliments of: Cathy Turner http://www.turnerwildlifeart.com/
Cathy Turner
Ghosts of Haunted Georgetown was by no means meant as an all-inclusive look at all of Georgetown and Georgetown County's mysterious spirits and haunts, but was specifically done in a Mists and Moonlight style. For those interested in further stories and directions these can easily be found on other Web sites, books, mag articles, YouTube, etc. There are plenty, indeed, more than plenty on the subject about the town's ghosts.

UFO Sightings & Angel Aliens Encounter

5/15/2014

 
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The two following stories are first person experiences with UFO sightings and in one case interactions with entities. Wherever these phenomena originate, be it extraterrestrial, terrestrial, time travelers from our future, inter-dimensional, more advanced spiritual realms ,  different time-space continuum's, or even some form of living creatures; and all or part of these or something else entirely different, this writer doesn't know.  In my case the only way I know how to relate it to the reader is straight-up.  Little speculation, mainly the facts as experienced.

In the second story, perhaps, seen from a different perspective than my own, is a lady writer friend I've known for a long time and highly respect and admire.  It was only recently that I learned what you will read here regarding her own sighting and encounter.  Whether one is undecided, a knowledgeable believer, skeptic or debunker, what is an unarguable reality, is that untold millions of people, from all walks of life, have claimed to have experienced similar things to these stories and in many cases on a more profound level. At least with the first recounting that is. And now, with all that said, let's begin.

 "They have ways of picking up the thought currents that emanate from our minds. They can focus upon a group of individuals to learn their innermost secrets." ~ Desmond Leslie 1953

"There are no coincidences." ~ Carl Jung

1989 was a pivotal year in human history on this planet, particularly so in Eastern Europe. It was also one for this writer, in a sense. Although I had never been much interested in the subject of UFOs and Aliens, except for a brief period in 1977 after the release of Steven Spielberg's Close Encounters of the Third Kind, events were to occur that year that changed my perceptions concerning the matter. Perhaps those perceptions had been there in some misty form all along, only waiting for the appropriate time to enter the light of day. Maybe, maybe not, is the best way to sum it up.

When the news broke worldwide about the UFO landing with entities briefly outside the craft in a park where mostly children were playing in Voronezh, Russia, and the mainstream news reporting on the crop formations in Britain, it really was like a shift in conscious awareness happened to me. Suddenly, I was enthralled by the subjects. Magazines, books, TV shows, radio shows,  anything with info and speculation covering the topic of UFOs became of great interest here.

This went on for a couple of years before the enthusiasm faded somewhat around 1991 or early 1992. Before that time, though, it had gotten to the point of me walking out into the fields at night, lying down with my face to the starry sky and will, or rather ask, a UFO to come down and show itself.  On many of these outdoor quests  a faithful Siamese cat would follow me into the meadows and keep company, and in all kinds of weather at that.

And then one evening, after I'd moved to a new town, and had my mind and interest on the subjects much lessened by other things, it happened. As the old saying goes, things can occur to you when least or not expected.

One late afternoon, after arriving home from work, I was compelled to do something that wasn't a habit by any means. For whatever reason, I stayed in my truck in the open-air garage listening to the radio. This went on for about three hours, until what was later learned - thanks to a former state MUFON director acquaintance-  to have been approximately nine o'clock p.m. on September the 29th, 1992. 

At that time, I abruptly found myself standing in the front yard with no recollection how I'd gotten there from the truck . The very next thing was hearing the cows in a nearby pasture going wild with lowing. A strange cat was also at my feet, running back and forth as if on a yardstick, looking quite scared and confused. Next, and this, after much reflection on the experience, was a summation, that what happened right after hearing the cows and seeing the cat, might not have been of free will or happenstance, as my head just angled to the right and up for no particular reason, and just in time to see one of the two most amazing things I've ever seen.

Not two hundred and fifty feet away - probably closer, at near tree-top height - a craft, for I know not what else to call it,  passed silently before me at perhaps 25 or 30 mph. It was around one hundred feet long, and thirty to forty feet in width through the middle. Ovoid-shaped, overall, with smaller ovals within the main outline. It also had a slight undulation along these edges, and an incandescent appearing light about it the likes of which it is hard to compare with anything or even describe properly. In addition, a back draft, like little sparkles, followed its progress for some thirty feet - and was detached from the end of the craft by maybe 10 feet. And, as a last detail about it, there was a grayish mist covering parts of the visible side it presented to view.

The sighting was quick, perhaps six or seven seconds, but thorough, as it then passed over some woods and out of view. I almost hopped in the truck to try and follow it but realized there were no roads to do so in that area.
 
This Close Encounter of the Second Kind was unique in that it turned out to have strong corroboration. That night, after the experience, I told a lady partner and an unrelated neighbor. They were both a bit incredulous, as I was myself, even considering the possibility of an hallucination, although in fact, the sighting was more numinous than anything hallucinatory and deep down I knew it..But I had to consider everything before totally accepting the fact that I had seen a UFO of unearthly appearance.  But, as stated before, I know not its origins positively .
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The next morning, the nearby big city news reported on it, and the craft was briefly picked up on radar at the international airport. There was also a church group, perhaps four or five miles away, who may have been the first to have seen it as they were leaving a Wednesday service. It was also learned by me later on, that the church group saw it at a farther distance from me and from a different angle. Its trajectory through the evening skies of that county and a small part of an a-joining one was rather brief and possibly on a set course.

And that my friends is the end of the story, related to you as straight-up as I know how.

In conclusion, it's a bit of a mystery to me that on coming inside the house, I immediately made a drawing of it with bubble captions describing different aspects of its appearance. On finishing the drawing, it was put in a kitchen drawer but, was nowhere to be found the next day or at anytime thereafter. Maybe, with the startling event mainly in mind it was placed somewhere else and inadvertently mixed up with junk mail that got thrown away at some point.

This video of a UFO that was taken in Brazil in 1991, is not exactly, but is close, in certain light configurations and shape, to what was seen. I only saw this after the story here was written. In fact, I saw it on a Netflix documentary soon after finishing the piece and then went on to the internet for the video. You might imagine the surprise here with the timing after so many years of looking at pics and videos for a match or something close to it. But, those things can happen,  hence no speculation or added take will be forthcoming from me on this coincidence.



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Brenda Barnes is a close friend of this writer and I'm most pleased to present her first guest write here on Mists and Moonlight. Brenda also took, and kindly contributed, the great photos of the 'Hunger Games Village' in a previous story.

What can be said about Brenda as a person to the reader is this: she's a beautiful human inside and out, loyal, fiercely intelligent, a great writer, truthful, and a dedicated advocate for children. The list could go on.

As to her guest story,  you'll be learning about it not long after myself. Her website search is below and is outstanding and well worth a look-see. Thank you, Brenda, for the courage and forthrightness to tell us of your remarkable sighting and amazing encounter as you experienced them, and, from your spritual perspective, too.

Brenda's articles can be accessed on the net under Hyphenbird @ HubPages. She also has several unique and colorful children's books that can be found on Amazon, our Book Shoppe on the site, and elsewhere.


    Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting:                                                         

  The soul that rises with us, our life's star,
          Hath elsewhere had its setting,

                  And cometh from afar:
           Not in entire forgetfulness,

           And not in utter nakedness,
   But trailing clouds of glory do we come

           From God, who is our home. ~ William Wordsworth


UFO-the very phrase causes spines to tingle and heads to bob. Some people instantly agree there are alien spaceships that visit our planet on a regular basis while others refuse to discuss the possibility that other life forms even exist. Debates about what UFO’s are have dragged on for years, resulting in anger, resentments, mistrust, family splits, and even murder.

We all have seen the six o’clock news stories where some wild-eyed, unkempt person babbles on about seeing a UFO. These unidentified flying objects are thought to be the brainchild of drugged out minds or inventions of poor deluded souls who have nothing better to focus attention on. However, UFO’s sightings happen to seemingly normal folk also. Now, I hesitate to call myself normal but I am indeed a law-abiding citizen who lives in a regular little town. I am a grandmother, a writer and am committed to Christ and the Christian principles of life. I was driving a Chevy van when my experience with a UFO occurred. You don’t get much more “normal” than that. Nevertheless, how does one explain such uncommon and remarkable things in perspective with a Christian way of life? It certainly is a conundrum I never thought to find myself considering.

On the day this happened to me, I had decided to drive into town and get some errands over with. I always went in using the back streets and then ventured onto one of the main boulevards which leads directly into our sweet little city. As I sat at the intersection waiting for a green light, a shadow caused my van do become quite dark. I thought a surprise thundercloud had moved in.

Now one’s first instinctive move is to peer out the windshield glass or side windows but surprisingly, I tilted my head back and looked up. I should have seen only the headliner above me, but instead could see the sky above and the vessel that hovered there. It was surreal and magnificent, a deep grey color and about the size of a school gymnasium. The skin of the craft did not reflect light but absorbed it as a sponge soaks up water. I instinctively knew and still believe this is how it is powered.

I intentionally choose not to dwell too deeply on the physical appearance of the Unidentified Flying Object. When we go on vacation, the type of automobile used to get us to our destination is not important. It is simply a tool that we use to fulfill a need. This UFO I saw was used in the same manner. So many people waste time on trying to figure out the size, shape and totally lose focus of what matters most-who these visitors are and why they appear to certain individuals. I intend, and hope to accomplish, to do that in this writing.

Few are aware that interest in UFO visits go millennia back, referring to unusual vessels that showed up and were recorded in the Holy Bible. The prophet Elijah was very close to God and they talked together daily. God wanted to spend all of His time with Elijah so He sent a chariot of fire and two horses of fire and Elijah was swept up in them and never seen again here on earth. Can you imagine the talk that commenced once word got around that the prophets apprentice saw a vessel fly through the sky, snatch up the venerable old man, and then disappear in a flaming cloud.

Well, my experience was not that exciting but it has stayed with me for years. I still firmly believe it happened. I do not know who or what I saw. Perhaps it was an angelic visitation. I certainly believe in angels, as do most people. I am a student of the Bible and read it daily, taking time to scrutinize passages.

Nowhere does the Bible state that we, here on earth, are the only forms of valuable life but clearly makes it known there are unseen beings that live in another dimension, or dimensions. We are not alone. We must begin to believe that things and experiences happen that we cannot understand or receive a satisfactory explanation for in the physical. For example, there are radio, television and internet signals all around us. We do not see or feel them but accept that they exist. Other life forms are the same way. We just need to apply the same principles to spiritual things.

Genesis 2:1 says, "Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them." Host" means a lot, many, a multitude, a numerous array. It refers to here with the earth and the heavens, meaning all that these places contain. We know there are millions of planets and galaxies. Could a living being from another planet or dimension really visit us here on this “third rock from the sun?” Why not?

If some UFO sightings are angelic visitations, why are they using a “spaceship” when they can just manifest to the human eye? Perhaps they ARE that vessel, that UFO, that “spaceship”. They certainly are alien to us and are supremely intelligent. They were present with God in the beginning of mankind’s history, when He created this material universe we live in. Therefore they have the most superior comprehension of physics and technology.

Faced with such powerful beings, a vulnerable human like myself might indeed fall into a stupor of fear yet I was not the least bit afraid. I remember everything about my experience yet very little. I still remember the emotions and the feeling of extreme relaxation I felt afterward. I do NOT remember every detail or even returning home. Hours had passed and evening was upon us when I came to myself. I know I spent a great deal of time with these beings. Perhaps I even was transported to heaven itself. I honestly don’t know what to make of my special day.

I do know that we must be very cautious when investigating these occurrences. Not all angels are good, contrary to the popular thought that everyone who dies turns into a harp carrying, white robed cherub who floats around shooting love darts at unsuspecting humans. We are also told in the Bible that there are evil angels (demons) whose desire is to harm us, to totally destroy mankind.

The supernatural/paranormal realm is a dangerous place. Most of us do not have a clue how to protect oneself from the influence of beings who dwell there. They have no emotions like we do, no compassion or forgiveness. Since they do not have fleshly bodies, they do not feel pain, weariness or even love. They operate on a scale we humans cannot begin to comprehend. While my own UFO experience was from a safe place, not all are and one must investigate carefully and tread lightly. Alien-like creatures have been described over and over by so many people that a pattern can be placed on them to know whereof they originate. Reptilian (serpent-like) aliens have been recorded as appearing to people who have suffered near death or back from death experiences. They live in Hell and are servants of the great evil one himself, Satan.

Greys are reported to perform medical experiments with human and alien tissue. I believe these are some of the lecherous demon angels mentioned in Genesis 6, “…the sons of God saw that the daughters of men were beautiful; and they took wives for themselves, whomever they chose.” These creatures do not have physical bodies but wish to have carnal relations so they attempt to create “hybrids” in hopes of achieving their awful goal.

The beings I was with looked nothing like those described above. They were huge and powerful and majestic, muscular and capable of fighting an army off single handed so to speak. Some had a myriad of glittering eyes that were colors unknown on earth while others shone with gold and  a pearlescent glow. I was not only unharmed but filled with peace and joy. That is why I know they were good and of God. 

There are other forms of aliens. I truly do not believe any are from outer space. No half way smart space traveler would come all this way and “hide out” just to spy on the earthlings. Really, it just is not a feasible or intelligent concept. Most people deny the existence of supernatural beings so they are more apt to believe in creatures from another planet or galaxy. This puts them at risk of demonic activity. Humans are fascinated by demons but hardly know anything about them. Take care that your own UFO experience does not land you in danger of falling prey to such creatures.

Remember that UFO means unidentified flying object. It could come from anywhere, not just outer space. I hope these reflections of my own personal encounter have given new insights and ways to think about this subject. My UFO encounter was a positive one and I have since researched and studied until I feel confident my findings are confirmed, but then, I suppose everyone else feels the same way. What is your take on the subject, dear reader? Please leave comments and/or questions in the comment section below. We want to know your opinion on this fascinating matter.


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Angel cloud photo taken by Brenda right after the encounter
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Update: Dec. 2016 - objects seen by a neighbor friend of Brenda - just north of I-40 corridor about 50 miles east of Asheville

Beyond Nightmares-The Horror of Sleep Paralysis: by Phyllis Doyle

3/27/2014

 
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This writer can certainly relate to the guest article here by Ms. Doyle readers of  Mists and Moonlight. At some point in my teenage years, for a short period of time, I was bothered during sleep by a cacophony of metallic-like sounds that would build up to a climax that had me feeling like my head would explode. Fortunately, I always awoke at that point.

Later on, in my twenties, that dreaded condition known as sleep paralysis paid me a visit every now and then for a couple of years. Any of you who have experienced this knows how unsettling these attacks can be in that vulnerable state we are in between consciousness and sleep. 

The sleep paralysis had finally stopped for maybe seven or eight years, when one afternoon, as I lay down to rest, something happened within half a minute of closing my eyes- not even drifting yet, actually, that was not only totally different from the aforementioned two incidents, but started me on a search for answers. Maybe one day I'll write about that horrid experience - where pure evil was seen...and felt, like nothing else, not even close.

Phyllis Doyle Burns is one of the best story writers I know on the internet today.  She writes on a wide variety of subjects, including, but not limited to, history ( recently she's been writing a lot on the Revolutionary War in the North), mythology, folklore, and perhaps especially, spirituality.  You see my friends, Phyllis is also a Spiritual coach and Advisor.  Phyllis is a talented poet as well. I encourage all readers to check Phyllis's site below, you should be delighted with what you find.

Phyllis has a meaty site for reading here:
http://creativeexiles.com/author/phyllis/​

Summary: She saw it in her mind. It had entered quickly, with a burst from the hallway and flung the door open. Then it stood there for a few seconds, an evil grin, crooked ugly shaped lips grinning, showing sharp teeth, its eyes glowing in anticipation of attacking. Almost gleeful it looked at the thought of devouring her.

Nightmare ~

SCREAM !!! Her mind shouted, but her voice would not obey. Move! Just MOVE !!! And her body would not respond. She was beyond nightmares and in the horror of sleep paralysis.

She was trapped and under the power of the horrid looking creature that had come into her room. She saw it in her mind. It had entered quickly, with a burst from the hallway and flung the door open. Then it stood there for a few seconds, an evil grin, crooked ugly shaped lips grinning, showing sharp teeth, its eyes glowing in anticipation of attacking. Almost gleeful it looked at the thought of devouring her.

Chills covered her whole body, yet she was perspiring so heavy her nightgown and the sheets were damp and sticky. Her mind was alert, active, telling her what to do, yet she was paralysed, held down by a heavy weight on her body, preventing her from moving. Ever so slowly the creature approached the foot of her bed with the horrible grin and crept up slowly towards her face, glaring at her. When it reached out a claw-like hand and touched her shoulder, something snapped within her and she exploded with action, threw out her arm with all the strength she had and flung the creature off her bed. She sat up and screamed at it, "GET OUT OF HERE. GET OUT !!!!"

It was gone. She turned on the lamp by her bed and sat there, huddled against the wall, holding her pillows tightly to her chest, breathing hard. It seemed like hours she sat like that, her eyes wide open, staring, not knowing if it had been a nightmare or if some demon had come into her room. In the morning she awoke, slumped over onto the bed, exhausted and aching all over.

It returns ~

For several nights she slept fitfully, afraid to turn out the light and relax. She was terrified of the dark, afraid she would be attacked again in her sleep. Then it happened again and that time it was worse. She could not stay in her room and turned on every light in the apartment. She sat in her recliner, bundled up, hugging her pillows, trying to focus on the late night news or anything to keep her mind off the demon.

The next day she called her doctor. Told him she was not sleeping well and what had happened. He told her to come in and she made an appointment. By the time she saw the doctor she felt a little embarrassed, like a child who is simply afraid of the dark, afraid to be alone. When she expressed this to the doctor he explained it was normal for her to feel like that, then he asked her to tell him when the nightmares started and asked so many questions. Had she been reading any horror stories or watching horror movies? Had she changed her eating habits? Did she have a bad experience or argument with anyone? No, no, no -- nothing different, nothing new in her life, just feeling down, lonely, nervous since the nightmares. "Before the nightmares," he asked, "what happened before the nightmares started?" Nothing that she could think of except constant financial worries and the possiblity of losing her home.

He told her some medication may calm her down enough so she could relax and sleep well. But, it might make it worse, he said, preventing her from waking up to abolish the nightmares and did not want to prescribe any medication at that time. He set up an appointment for her with a psychologist, saying he thought she might be experiencing sleep paralysis. With the psychologist, doctor and patient working together, over a short period of time, the diagnosis was deep anxiety over some life changes and an unknown future of her ability to provide food and shelter for herself. In her case it was a temporary disorder that never reoccurred after consultations and medication for clinical depression and anxiety.

Sleep disorders expressed in poetry and literature ~

Edgar Allen Poe seemed to focus a lot on the state of being "in between" -- in between awake and asleep, between a dream and reality, between life and death, between sane and insane, wondering where the dreamer was, going deeper and deeper into wild thoughts and the meanings of a dream, illusions, hallucinations. Did Poe himself experience sleep paralysis, or was he somehow aware of this state of being? When we read poetry it is the symmetry, the rhyme, the flow of words coming together in a way that creates a balance and harmony which makes the poem pleasing or even very emotional. Often, we do not really look deeper into the thoughts behind the words. One has to look into the mind and soul of the poet. Few poets can convey the thoughts of their mind and soul as well as Edgar Allen Poe did. Often a writer will draw from life, or from the subconscious, emotions or thoughts that go into a story. In The Pit and the Pendulum, Poe wrote:

"Yet in a second afterward, (so frail may that web have been) we remember not that we have dreamed. In the return to life from the swoon there are two stages; first, that of the sense of mental or spiritual; secondly, that of the sense of physical, existence."

Towards the time when the character was becoming more alert, Poe wrote, "Then a rushing revival of soul and a successful effort to move."


This is so indicative of pulling out of that paralysis and coming back to the senses, the physical ability to finally move and banish the nightmare. Was Poe aware of the horror of immobility during sleep paralysis, the helplessness to not save himself from attack of a demon or spirit? During his life, the medical term and condition was referred to as nightmares. Yet, it seems Poe had more than likely suffered through this condition, not really knowing what it was and relating to the feelings, the fears, reliving it through his characters.

"The Premature Burial" written by Poe and made into a movie starring Ray Milland in 1962, was about a man who suffered greatly from the fear of death and an obsession of being buried alive. The narator of the story, Guy Carell, had been obsessed with the study of several real cases of people who had been buried alive yet to all outward appearances were deemed dead. He then explains that he had been having attacks of what his physicians termed catalepsy -- thus, his deep fear of being buried alive. In his madness and swirling thoughts he said in his ramblings:

"We know that there are diseases in which occur total cessations of all the apparent functions of vitality, and yet in which these cessations are merely suspensions, properly so called... But where, meantime, was the soul?"

In Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol, poor old Scrooge blamed his nightmare on "an undigested bit of beef" or other possible foods he had eaten.

Witch trials ~

The Salem Witch Trials are notorious for cases of panic and hysteria. So many people either died in prison of were executed simply because someone accused them of being a witch. Before being sentenced, these accused persons were subjected to humiliating tests and examinations, some done right in the court room with the public observing.

Other than a personal jealousy or hateful spite, many of the accusations came from a person suffering horrible nightmares and paralysis. Medical theories of today suggest that the sufferers could have experienced anxiety due to the fear of Indian attacks, eating rye bread that contained Claiceps purpurea (a fungus  which is a source of LSD), a sleeping sickness transmitted by the tsetse fly which can cause neurogenic motor immobility), or sleep paralysis.


Understanding Sleep Paralysis ~

Sleep paralysis is an almost unbelievable phenomenon which can be caused by several things. It is important to understand what sleep paralysis is and what the symptons and causes are. One of the possible causes for sleep paralysis is narcolepsy, which is also a phenomenon. Studies as recently as 2014 still provide no conclusive causes of narcolepsy. There are, however, many theories.

Samuel Johnson (1709 - 1784), an English writer and lexicographer, in his A Dictionary of the English Language gave the term 'nightmare' to the as yet unexplained condition of what we now know as sleep paralysis.

In 1881, the Household Cyclopedia provided advice on some causes of nightmares, including:

"Great attention is to be paid to regularity and choice of diet. Intemperance of every kind is hurtful, but nothing is more productive of this disease than drinking bad wine."

Other causes may be the disorder of catalepsy, or even a bad case of anxiety. This article will not go further into the medical terms and causes. If you or anyone you know has experienced sleep paralysis, a link that may help you know what to discuss with your doctor can be found by reading the Narcolepsy - Symptom Recognition Guide.

http://www.narcolepsylink.com/patients/home.html?utm_source=bing&utm_medium=cpc&utm_term=what%20is%20sleep%20paralysis&utm_campaign=Bing_NL_Top_Performers
~ ~ ~ ~

Note from author ~

Disclaimer:  The information provided in this article is not a substitute for professional medical advice. Please consult your physician or healthcare provider before making any decisions on what you may be experiencing.

I am far too familiar with the case of the woman I wrote about in the beginning of this article, for it is myself who suffered sleep paralysis. I am very fortunate to have overcome it with the help of my doctor, a psychologist, and medication. The experience happened many years ago and I have had no further problems with it. Please do not use my experience as a self diagnosis, for we are each different and have different lifestyles and issues. Please consult with your medical doctor if you have any concerns.

In Germany they were known as mara, mahr, mare.

German Folklorist Franz Felix Adalbert Kuhn records a Westphalian charm or prayer used to ward off mares, from Wilhelmsburg near Paderborn:

    Hier leg' ich mich schlafen,
    Keine Nachtmahr soll mich plagen,
    Bis sie schwemmen alle Wasser,
    Die auf Erden fließen,
    Und tellet alle Sterne,
    Die am Firmament erscheinen!  
    Dazu helfe mir Gott Vater, Sohn und heiliger          Geist. Amen!
    

    Here I am lying down to sleep;
    No night-mare shall plague me
    until they have swum through all the waters
    that flow upon the earth,
    and counted all stars
    that appear in the skies.
    Thus help me God Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Amen!

Historic Henry River Mill Village - Hunger Games Movie Filming Location

2/19/2014

 
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"THE HUNGER GAMES" VILLAGE IN NORTH CAROLINA

In writing on history and the paranormal things have a way of coming together unexpectedly. Such is what happened with this story.

Part of where the movie The Hunger Games was made, was filmed not far from me at the Henry River Mill Village in Burke, Co., North Carolina. Wiki says it's an important remnant of the change over in America from an agrarian society to an industrial one. 

And it should be remembered that the South was last section of the settled part of the Country to do this. As an added thought and fact, one just doesn't see a company town preserved like this one is very often anymore, especially without our present day wonders, like fast food chains and discount outlets, hanging on the fringes, waiting to soak-up what they can from us in a monetary sense.

 These old and deserted homes indeed have a strange but comfy charm all their own.


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Picture courtesy of Heather Anglin.
SOME HISTORY

Much of eastern Burke County is in the foothills of western North Carolina and was once a king of textile manufacturing. Indeed, much of the State was as well. With the dispersion of these mills to places like Latin America and above all China, entire mill communities simply melted away. We are fortunate that one like the Henry River cotton mill, which dates from the very early 20th century, was kept fairly intact by the private owner(s) who wound up with what was left of the propertys when the mill shut down in the late 1960s.

The Village was originally planned as a self-contained community, with its own worker homes, company store, water/fire systems, the cotton mill and a dam on the Henry River. The place is still in private hands, but the vast number of people and tourists stopping by since the release of the first movie, is to put it bluntly, driving the present owner to the point of wanting to sell  the whole kit-and-cabodle 72 acre village. Who can blame him!

The village was partly used as a filming location in the 2012 movie The Hunger Games, the exteriors of which were filmed in the village and Burke Co. mountains of the Old North State, or rather North Carolina. As of this writing the second installment of the movie has already been released. What a franchise author Suzanne Collins created in her trilogy of novels, which supposes a part three and four of the Hunger Games one would imagine.
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SHERIFFS​
Let's make no bones about it. Prohibition was an unmitigated disaster in America. Perhaps the sentiments were in the right place, but the results brought broken homes, more unemployment, blindness, horrible health problems, and the firm entrenchment of organized crime to parts of the country.

When people want something bad enough they'll always be suppliers, legal or not. What comes to mind when we think of a sheriff? Idyllic ones like sage Sheriff Taylor in the Andy Griffith Show (on a par in classic sit comedy popularity with the I Love Lucy show, at least in America, perhaps).

Or maybe county corruption crime busters like Tennessee Sheriff Buford Pusser in the true to life movie series Walking Tall. The first couple of movies starred Joe Don Baker and a hunky fellow named Bo Svenson, who if I remember correctly, were both very good at swinging a baseball bat as their chosen weapon of justice. The real Pusser was one tough hombre.

Then of course we have the Sheriff of Nottingham County chasing Robin Hood and his merry men throughout Sherwood Forest in 1200's medieval England; and even the comic sheriff Buford T. Justice played by "The Great One," Jackie Gleason, in the Smokey and the Bandit films.

Like Sheriff Buford Pusser's tale, though, the following story is the real deal, on a night of  swirling mists cut by the sound of  shouts and gunfire, but very little, if any, moonlight.

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General Store
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 DEATH OF A COLORFUL SHERIFF                                           

It was very dark in the Henry River Mill community way back then on that Sunday night of August the 21st, 1966. A fitting kind of darkness for what was soon to transpire as things turned out.

One of the largest manhunt's in the history of Burke County( which the River Hill community was a part of) was fixing to commence as Deputy Sheriff Joe Burns attempted to serve a peace warrant on a 62 year old moonshiner ( illegal whiskey distiller) named Boyce C. Liverett, who worked at the Henry River Cotton Mill as a machine fixer.

As Deputy Sheriff Burns attempted to serve two warrants on Liverett around ten o'clock that evening, he was slightly wounded in the arm by the wanted man firing his .22 rifle from inside the house. Burns remained on the scene until other officers arrived with an extra warrant for assault with a deadly weapon and teargas canisters.

Among the reinforcements was Burke County's vibrant, entertaining and full of life head sheriff, David W. Oaks. Sheriff Oaks was well known as a stalwart moonshine still-buster who had heard of the stand-off from his home on Jonas Ridge. He quickly joined the others converging on the place.

Moonshiners had had a long history of ornery and independent-acting behavior in Appalachia and its foothills, and this was proved in spades as the tear gas was applied and Liveritt was spotted on the floor, under the gas, as his front door was kicked in by a deputy named Gassman of all things.

Nowadays, I don't know anyone who begrudges a mountaineer from making small amounts of "shine" for home/medicinal use, or even a little barter, but apparently it was a different story back in the day. As of 2009, it's even legal now in places like Tennessee to do so.

Back to the story: Liveritt quickly began shouting "I give up!" "I give up!" Chief Sheriff Oaks then hollered back at the man "Come on out with your hands up and nobody will hurt you!" So ill-fated, for whatever reason, Mr Liveritt decided in a tragic moment of time not to submit peacefully.

Deputies reported Oaks as holding his service revolver in his right hand while beaming a flashlight with his left were he expected the wanted man to be. The sheriff told Gassman to back up his car to where he was. Gassman later said he was standing right in front of Oaks when Liverett started walking towards the door with his arms held high, but, he then lowered them and began a spray of .22 bullets from his rifle which were aimed directly at the light source.

The head sheriff was instantly hit by several of these  small-caliber but high velocity missiles and badly wounded.  As Oaks was being placed in the car he told his men he was in deep trouble from the shooting. He was then rushed to the county hospital, but most unfortunately, this colorful and popular peace officer ( law enforcement officer now, of course) died on the way there.

What then ensued was one of the biggest manhunts Burke County had ever seen, with officers called in from as far away as the city of Asheville and neighboring counties. A telephone call  from a village widow finally pinpointed the moonshiner and now murderer, laying on a friend and his wife's sofa in the village. The couple were apparently unaware, at least at first, of what had transpired that night. 

Liverett was arrested after a scuffle and taken to the hospital, having taken a wound to his right side during the previous attempted take-down. He was then jailed and later convicted of the charges against him. Leveritt made parole shortly before passing away in 1999. Sheriff Oaks left behind a wife, three daughters, and a son who followed in his father's footsteps by becoming a Burke Co. deputy.

One final note should be told in this tragic story, for all concerned, and that is in a year and a half period of time,  Oaks reportedly busted-up some 65  illegal whiskey stills. A man beloved by many and obviously totally effective at his elected position and appointed duty.*

*A direct descendent of Boyce C. Leveritt has responded to this story in the comments section. This writer would like to thank her very much for her kindness and post.


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 ORBS AT THE HENRY RIVER MILL VILLAGE

One of the first things that comes to my mind when the controversial subject of orbs is brought up, is the Kevin Spacy  movie called K-Pax. Here we are reminded by the "blue bird of happiness" alien, played by Spacy, that the most efficient form for energy to take is a bubble, or rather, ball. Hence the planet, moon, and stars which are obvious examples of this physics fact.

Orbs are controversial as mentioned previously and this writer makes no claims as to their true origins. But one listens and learns in life and there can be no doubt that some of them can act very strange at times. Some might even say with some kind of meaning or even intelligence. After all, everyone of us lives on a revolving sphere with a  mostly beautiful sheen surrounding it, and many believe some of these phenomenon are the spirits, in a sense, of departed folk or even angels.

I've so far left off writing about the two pictures above, hoping the reader would take a close look at them and see if they saw anything relating to the subject. The one to the left was taken by a lady named Brenda Barnes, whom you'll meet shortly. Looking at the front porch closest to the viewer, a large circular light should be seen. A camera or light anomaly probably, something else, maybe?

The pic to the right of Yours truly was taken by professional photographer Alicia Jaye Phillips at the Hunger Games village. Of all the many photos I've had taken in my life, this is the only one where orb activity has shown up. It should be seen about midway down the left arm on the black coat. Interesting, perhaps, that the pose
 had a hand of mine on the town's old water pump. Did this action spark the interest of the orb? - if that's what it is to begin with, of course.

Again, it's probably not, but I'll give Mrs. Philips the benefit of the doubt; and I did have another investigative professional take a look at it. They were somewhat adamant it didn't at first glance appear to be a fake of any kind and certainly fit the know genuine orb appearance. Who knows for sure? I'd be amiss, however, not to point out to the reader that I also appear to have horns and there's a green cross on the roof of the house.

About a month ago, previous to this writing, a niece had her baby shower, with the menfolk from both families gently banished during the female festivities to one of the local restaurant-bars in town. I didn't know the dad's side at all except for the soon-to-be father, but was delighted to have the pleasure of sitting next to and meeting a most interesting older gentleman.

 This fellow was not only a decorated combat leader in Vietnam, but a helicopter and large plane pilot as well. He had even been a paratrooper in the 101st(Screaming Eagle) Airborne Division at the Battle of Little Rock, Arkansas, in 1957. Many Arkansans violently fought to prevent desegregation of their main high school in Little Rock and according to a google search and what the gentleman told me, it was bayonet time for the out-numbered 1,000 men present of the 101st, as they formed at the entrance to the school in a semi-ring to face off  against massed assaults, curses, bricks, and even rifles. Sources also mention the 10,000 Arkansas National Guardsmen taken from the governor - who was going to use them to keep 9 black students out of the school - and federalized by Eisenhower, thus preventing a catastrophe from happening.

My point is, here is a man to be respected and seriously listened to.  He told a most intriguing story of being a boy on his parents' farm in western New York State. Up a ways from where he took care of the animals and other chores, was a large stand of trees. Apparently, for many generations, the area had what we now call orb activity. Being a youngster, the boy was obviously curious. He wanted to walk the long way over the fields and investigate. But his father told him to leave those things be and never approach them.

Superstition? or had something happened with previous generations to cause the father to feel this way?

Yes, we can go on wiki or other searches including all the many videos for the science and phenomenon of orbs, ball lightning and St. Elmo's Fire, but to tell you the truth about it,  I think I will listen to dear ol' dad when it comes to such matters as eerie orb activity.

While researching this section of the story the writer looked at a good many videos of supposed orbs. Many of them looked like they could be coming from flashlights or some other light source in the background, behind the cameras. However, I did find a 3 minute video that caught my attention because of its relatively short running time, small cave location, slow motion parts and freeze and one orbs particular reaction on getting close to the arm of one of the videographers present.

Unfortunately, the video is no longer available which is a shame as it's one of the best and most convincing, or rather was one of the best and most convincing, on YouTube. The small cave location really caught my attention because of an incident that happened after staring into one here in North Carolina almost twenty-five years ago. They can truly be mysterious places. Even frightening places to the surprised and unwary at times.
The writer would like to thank the esteemable friend Brenda Barnes/Hyphenbird for the wonderful photos of the Henry River Mill houses. Brenda is a marvelous person with many interests like photography and writing. Many, including myself, would also refer to her as a humanist and philanthropist as well. She is certainly a widely read writer with most interesting stories and children's books.  Brenda writes on a variety of topics,  in addition to the books. Her site can be found @ Hyphenbird on HubPages.
Alicia Jaye Phillips is a professional photographer from Indiana. The two photos of this author included in the story are gifts from Alicia. She has published a book of her picturesque photography in the book  Scribble Shots and is currently working on her second book for West Bow Press.

Tennessee Legends: by guest author Beth Perry

10/20/2013

 
The Carolinian's Archives Mists & Moonlight page is most fortunate  to have another one of Author Beth Perry's Tennessee collections of haunting, superstitions and legends, etc. 

Beth is an outstanding author, screenplay writer and will begin working on a new novel shortly. I consider this contribution on Tennessee Legends a special treat.

To read more of Beth's fascinating writings search for bethperry @ HubPages or click the other mature-themed site below.
http://anyahoward.weebly.com/
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TENNESSEE LEGENDS THOUGHTS BY BETH
A commonly shared belief among open-minded skeptics is that 
legends originate in some grain of truth.  Tennessee is rich in legends, some of them amusing, and other tragic or frightening.   The following legends are compiled from East Tennessee.  I do not vouch for how much truth lies behind any of them, but like all good legends, I believe that beneath the entertainment factor, some bit or more of truth dwells.  And since Halloween/Samhain is not far away, I thought these might make for some timely reading.

The Singing Trees of Ripshin Mountain

According to old-timers of the area, the trees of  Ripshin Mountain have been known to sing.  This alleged singing occurs usually right before a local child is born or at the hour of death of someone living here.  Although called  "singing ", those who have heard the sound describe it more of a dulcet murmur that strums the leaves and boughs, and yet one  distinctive (and unworldly) enough to make the listener's hair stand up.

Haytop Henry

The nickname Haytop Henry was bestowed on him in tribute to the way he had been found: asleep in the hay loft at the Lacey farm near what is known today as the Indian Springs community. The year was 1880, and no one in the area remembered ever having laid eyes on this child before that morning.  But those that were graced to meet him would never forget him.

The farmer and his wife encouraged the boy to tell them where he came from, but an answer would have to wait as his capacity for speech was entirely undeveloped.  All they could tell was  he appeared to be around eight years old, with shining gold curls and deep blue eyes.  He was also clean and very well dressed.  There was a knapsack found in the hay he had slept on, in which had been placed a meal of pork shank, biscuits, and a piece of red velvet cake.  Overall the boy appeared to be the picture of health,  except for his left temple, which was noticeably elevated and covered over by scar tissue.  Those who saw him surmised someone had burned the child at a tender age.  Oddly, he did not seem afraid of the elderly farmer, his wife or any of their farm hands.

Mr. and Mrs. Lacey took the boy into their home.  After several weeks  waiting for the boy's family to come claim him, it was decided he had been abandoned.  The old couple had already raised several of their own children, but they had come to love this stray child, so adopted him and gave him the name Henry.  With their patient help, Henry learned to speak coherently.  He also learned to read and write, and took especial delight in drawing pictures.

Although Henry was said to be quiet around most everyone except his parents, in his early adolescence he began to exhibit a  gift for prediction.  He knew when the foals and calves were about to drop, and accurately predicted their gender and markings.  He was able to tell his mother when she needed to set out extra plates for unexpected dinner guests.  He reliably warned his father of hail before it arrived.  He knew where to locate lost piglets and escaped cattle.  He knew the day the first snow of winter would  fall and what subject the minister would preach about come Sunday morning.  One day, during perfectly mild weather, he urgently told one of the hired hands to move away from the tree the man had taken shade under.  The hired hand complied none too soon,  for moments later lightning struck the tree and cleaved it in half.

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His mother once asked Henry if he could "see" everything that lay ahead.  Henry's answer was straightforward but cryptic, "All I am supposed to see, Mother, and many things I don't want to see.  But about the nature of my own death, the eyes are thankfully blind."

In his young adulthood  Henry's reputation as a natural born soothsayer drew its share of undesired attention. Some folks would chase him down just to ask for petty, gossipy information. The small-minded among the church congregation believed Henry was evil and they broke away from the church when the minister defended him. More often than not, however, people respected Henry's abilities and in fact, considered him a local godsend.

One day young Marilee Phelps and a friend were planning a picnic lunch in a meadow.  They had told no one but their parents about it.  As Marilee was baking a pie to take,  a frantic knock was heard at the front door.  Mrs. Phelps hardly got a word in as she opened the door to Henry Lacey.  Although he had never been in their home before, he made his way to the kitchen where Marilee was.  Here, he told Marilee to stay away from the meadow because something "wrong" would happen.  Luckily for Marilee, she took his advice, as did her girl friend.  In the morning the owner of the meadow told the Phelps family he had shot a mad boar the previous evening.  The boar had been found roaming the very spot that his daughter and Marilee had chosen for their picnic.

Henry and Marilee became close after this, and planned to marry the next summer.  But one afternoon of the coming spring Henry's father and one of the hired hands found Henry prostrate by the side of the road.  Henry's face was ashen and he had lost the ability to speak or walk.  He was immediately brought home.  Marilee was summoned, but Henry took his last breath before she could get there.

If Henry ever told his adopted family about his birth family or divulged who had brought him to their farm, the Laceys kept the information to themselves.  They buried Henry in their family cemetery, along with the second face and eyeballs the inquisitive undertaker had discovered beneath the scar on the young man's temple.

Big Dane

The rivers of Tennessee are famous for having some of the biggest catfish in the world.  Divers and fishermen alike have reported seeing ones large enough to swallow a full-grown man whole.

According to local legend, Big Dane of Holston River was the biggest of them all.  Not only was he known for his size, but his un-fish-like and charitable nature.  Old-timers used to say Big Dane once saved a drowning old man by buoying  him up from below and pushing him back to shallow water.  The great fish was said to have similarly saved a newly wed couple, who had rented an aged fishing boat  without first inspecting it for rot.

Why he was called Big Dane is a mystery; some believed he was first reeled in by the Danish-born father of a small boy, a child that took pity on the fish because it had a "blind eye", and who told his father the fish deserved to be released for putting up a worthy fight.  Others have said Big Dane got his name for being even larger than Great Danes.  However he got his name, sightings of Big Dane have dwindled over time.  Perhaps he simply died at a ripe old age?  Whatever may have happened to  Big Dane, the rare contemporary report of human encounters with the leviathan still makes for a good whopper "fish tale". 

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The Sinkhole Folk

Tennessee land is pocked by a great many sinkholes.  Some of these have become natural (and popular)  swimming pools over time, and others, upon opening, have given entrance to large, meandering underground cave systems.

In Sullivan County, some residents have reported seeing people going down into these sinkholes.  These odd folk are reported to look human, but to have bluish or green-tinted skin.  The first time I ever heard of the Sinkhole Folk was from a  middle-school teacher of mine (we'll call her Mrs. K.).  Mrs. K. taught English class and at the time we were studying Beowulf.  She mentioned one day, quite casually, that she never knew what to make of the story of Grendel and his mother, but that she didn't doubt there were strange things in this world even the most educated of men could not explain.  One of my fellow students asked her why she believed this and she told the class this little story:

As a  young woman she and her husband had been out walking near their property when they came across a young boy standing near an old fallen log.  He looked sad and lost.  Mrs. K  and her husband approached to offer him help, when they saw the boy had bluish skin, and his eyes were almost white.  On seeing them, the boy began to cry and back away. The next moment a naked woman, with the same blue skin and white eyes,came running out of some brush.  She took the boy's hand and ran off.  The K.'s followed, and saw the woman and the boy got down  and crawled into the sinkhole.  When the K.'s searched the sinkhole  they didn't think any human being could possibly have got past the muck and debris of rock there.  Mrs. K. and her husband  spent the rest of the day searching for them, but the two were gone and they never saw them again.

Some years later I heard similar tales about the  Sinkhole Folk.  Although these tales came from different places around the Tri-Cities, all of then involved blue or green skinned people that allegedly come and go through sinkholes.


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The Lost Child of Old Butler

When the TVA decided to build the Watauga Dam and create Watauga Lake, there was one major obstacle in the plan, and that was the communities and farms already established in the Roan Creek and valley regions.  So it was decided to uproot these communities and their residents and move them elsewhere.  Among the uprooted was the old and lively town of  Butler (known today as Old Butler), which was originally established in 1778.  It was a major effort, but at last the town and its residences were all resettled to higher ground.  Soon the whole valley area was flooded.  Today Old Butler, like the countless farms and other old locations, sleeps beneath the artificial lake.

Not so easily rested is the tale of the Lost Child.  It is one shared by tourists and locals alike, and one very similar in each case: a plaintive voice heard in the wee hours of the night calling out "Mama!" or "Mama, where are you?"  Some who have heard this voice say they indeed found the calling one - a little child wearing denim overalls and holding a kitten, and typically  standing near the lake edge.  He (or she?)  might acknowledge their presence and questions with a look, but more often than not, the child simply walks away and vanishes into the mist.  Still others say that they have witnessed the child wade straight into the water.  These witnesses typically also report seeing the spectacular sight of Old Butler glowing like polished silver at the bottom of the lake.
                                       

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The Wildwood Flower (Maid)



There is debate as to whether the story of the Wildwood  Flower is based on a real life event in the Tennessee hills , or if  it is legend inspired by archaic ballads and poems.  Wherever the legends may lie, this tale-turned-legend made an indelible impression on composers and writers alike.  Poet Maud Irving is credited for writing the original lyrics for, I'll Twine Mid the Ringlets, the 19th century ballad that recounts the Maid's story.  These lyrics were later used in the song, Wildwood Flower, made popular by the Carter family.  And a few years ago, I wrote the short story , Wildwood Maid, inspired by the lonely Maid who seeks love from legend beyond the mortal plane.

If the Wildwood Flower did indeed exist, her name has been lost to the ages.  No one is even sure exactly where the events of the story conspired.  They could have taken place in the lush mountains that seperate Tennessee from North Carolina, or possibly even the fertile valley hills of Cades Cove.  Whenever the story took place, it is at once  a tragic story of love and betrayal.


As they tell it in Appalachia:

The Maid was a young Irishwoman of fourteen or fifteen when severe hardship came upon her family.  The family had been reduced to poverty and her brothers languished in prison for angering the English.  The final straw for the family came with the death of the paternal head of the family.  The Maid's mother, wanting to save her daughter from what seemed a curse on the family, sought a way to get the girl to America.  This would not be easy and it took some time to find the contacts necessary to accomplish this. 

At length the mother arranged for the daughter to take work as an indentured servant in newly penetrated territories in Tennessee.  She sold all her worldly goods and bought the girl passage on a ship bound to America.  The Maid did not want to leave her mother, but seeing how anxious her mother was about her future, agreed to go.  After the lengthy journey across the sea and  an adventurous carriage trek through the wilderness, the Maid arrived at her employers' home in the Eastern mountain ranges of Tennessee.

The Maid's employers were charitable, decent folk that treated the Maid well.  Her dark eyes and beauty , however, did not go unnoticed by the oldest son.  It was not long before the son declared his love for the Maid.  The Maid sucumed to his seductions and declared affection.  In fact, so devoted to her love act, that he informed his family that her intended to  marry his Irish "flower".   The family was happy in his choice, for they knew the Maid to be a caring and hard-working young woman; one they believed had finally tamed the son 's roguish ways.

But shortly after announcing their engagement,  the son met a woman in his social circle that would change his life forever.  The daughter of a merchant from Boston, this woman was not only beautiful, but sophisticated and fashionably exciting. Forgetting the betrothal to the Maid, the son and the object of his new infatuation sought out a minister and were wed.  

His parents were hardly approving of this marriage.  And when it was discovered that the Maid carried his child, they released her from her legal bonds and gave her the portion of property that would have gone to the son.  They even built a cabin in the woods there for her to dwell in and raise the child.  Embarrassed by losing his inheritance , the son left with his bride to distant Boston. The Maid gave birth to a son and named him after the paternal grandfather that had shown her kindness.  Unfortunately, as comely as the child was, he only lived for a few days.  

The Maid was a landowner in her own right now and cherished by the family of the man that had betrayed her.  Many men ventured to be court the Maid and take her to wife, even his younger brother and old friends.  The Maid would have none of them, however, and it was suspected that she waited for her lover to see his wife as the noxious vine that she was and he returned to the arms of the flower that still loved him.

But the Maid's grief was not over.  When her lover did return, it was in a pinewood box.  Once returned to her norhtern homeland, his bride had taken up with another behind his back, and this other man had challenged him to a dual.  The challenged had won, and the widow, not  wanting any more to do with her husband, had sent his body back to the Smokey Mountains for burial.

 No one had seen the Maid for several days following the funeral.  Her lover's family paid a call to her cabin, only to find her missing.  They did find her valuables and clothing, all unmolested, as well as a small portrait of their son hanging on the wall of the Maid's bedroom.  A thorough search of the area was carried out.  But the Maid's body was not found and friends and neighbors were ever to lay eyes on her again. 

Years passed and the Maid's deserted home turned to disrepair.  But even as time and nature reclaimed what she had left behind, local rumors began to spread.  Married men would tell companions, of  how while out hunting or fishing, they had encountered a pretty dark eyed young woman in the wood.  She would guied them inside a cozy inviting cabin, and here offered them drink, food and her charming company.  Most of them took her up on the offer, and content they would be until they made the mistake of admitting to the girl that their troth was already given to another.  And then, as the story goes, the woodland nymph with the dark eyes would suddenly vanish and the cabin would turn into the decayed ruin of it's true state.  But more disturbing than these tales were the vanishings of perfectly fit young bachelors known to had ventured onto the old property.   What fate these men met, could only be speculated on.  But the legend of the Wildwood Flower would survive long after they, their kin and friends were dust in the ground. 

Superstitions of East Tennessee: by guest author Beth Perry

10/10/2013

 
Treasured readers of The Carolinian's Archives, it is my distinct pleasure to present guest author Beth Perry's second  offering on Mists and  Moonlight. My hope is you'll find this read as entertaining and informative as I did. 

Beth is  becoming as fine a writer of mysteries and superstitions of Tennessee and surrounding states as she is a writer in her other areas of expertise.

You can also find many of Beth's other stories on the hubpages link below. Notice: The anyahoward site has some mature themes.

So, without further ado, I present to you Beth's latest and most welcome contribution.

bethperry @ HubPages

anyahoward.weebly.com
PictureBeth Perry - bethperry.hubpages.com
 Superstitions of East Tennessee


Practically every region of the world has its native superstitions (or auguries as they’re otherwise called). East Tennessee is no exception; in fact, thanks to the heavy influence of wedded Celtic/Gaelic/Native American cultures, the region is perhaps a little more rich in auguries than most parts of the United States And while some may dismiss all superstitions as silly, if we look with an open mind, we realize there is often a grain or more of common sense behind them.

The following superstitions are collected from this region; some old, others a little more modern. They are divided into Area Specific and Generally Shared, although I am sure the beliefs cross borders and localities. You will also find a short inclusion of old sayings, which not necessarily based on superstitions, give an interesting glimpse into the wit and wisdom of the area. I do not ask anyone to accept anything here at face value, but do hope you will enjoy them at least for the historical and cultural interest. 

Generally shared superstitions 

Eat only chestnuts from the side of the tree the squirrels dine from. 

To upturn a nine of Clubs while plowing brings nine years of prosperity.

It is bad luck to wake a sleeping cat or baby.

A pregnant woman should never walk over a grave that is older than she is.

It is considered bad luck to purposely kill a black snake living in your barn. However, to accidentally drive over a black snake on the road presages a long life ahead.

When visiting for social occasions, one should never leave by the same door they entered the residence.

A first-born son named after his father will strive to be like his father. A second-born son named after the father will strive to make his mother proud.

When building a home, teeth of a mule buried under the foundation will insure a strong structure.

Sweet Williams grown near the front door of a home brings the guardianship of angels.

Those who cultivate non-native fruit will quarrel often with neighbors.

A baby’s first blanket should have a piece of hog leather sewn in it to insure the child will not be too thin.

A man should not hunt and fish on the same day, or impotent he shall become.

If you have ants in your house, sprinkle some sugar outside to draw them out.

Eating the string of the first bean you pick brings an enjoyable summer.

If an apple falls from a limb onto the head of an unmarried person, it means love is on the way to them. If a married person is similarly stuck by an apple it means an old friend is thinking of them.

Whispering the name of a dead friend or relative into the entrance of a cave will take your prayers for/to them to the spirit world.

Carry a small piece of coal in your right pocket or shoe to fight a curse. When the coal has turned to crumbs the curse has been canceled.

Drinking green punch at your high school prom will make you a parent within the year.


PictureGrandpa Jones
 Area specific superstitions


Blountville
It is said  if you utter a lie while walking the streets of Blountville you will soon lose a dollar bill.

Stepping on a toad brings seven days of good luck.  Stepping on an frog brings seven weeks of woe.To insure your plane will arrive safely to its destination, one should never board a plane aat the Tri-Cities Airport without either first spitting on the ground or moving their fingertips through the grass.

Bluff City
If  you pass by a black goat in Bluff City, you will soon hear news of an impending birth.
Likewise, to pass by an injured bird without offering aid is said to bring bad luck.

Bristol
It is said that by naming your first-born child after a NASCAR driver, the number of grandchildren you will have will be the same as the number on the driver's car.

Bristol Caverns
Those who stumble while inside the Bristol caverns will soon stumble upon love.

Bristol  Foothills
Carry sour milk cornbread in your pocket for protection against being robbed at night.

Offering tobacco to passing fiddlers and flute players will help your crops grow.

Butler
To prevent impotence it is recommended that on the first day of spring a man should give a potato or ear of corn to the first fruitful mother they meet.

Cades Cove
A widower that speaks ill of his dead wife on her birthday or their anniversary will marry a woman with murder on her mind.

Singing "The Battle Hymn of the Republic" will anger the spirits of the dead,  sicken horses and deer and make cows' milk curdle in the teat.

Carter County
To intentionally kill honeybees-wild or domesticated - is said to be a bad omen.

Avoid anyone that has been struck by lightning while riding a horse.
Car salesmen that wear plaid should not be trusted around your money, your daughter or your wife.

Carter, Johnson,Sullivan and Unicoi Counties
To wade barefoot in the waters of the Doe River in Elizabethton augurs that no matter how far you travel in life, you will   return to Elizabethton at least once more before you die.

It is said that to utter the name, "Bonnie Kate"  will protect women from men with violence on their mind.  (Catherine "Bonnie Kate" Sherril was the wife of Carter County's famous forefather John Sevier.  Catherine 
barely escaped death in 1776 when a band of Cherokee warirors attached For Caswell.)

It is said lawyers seeking to practice in Elizabethton must first make a pact with the devil.  Likewise, the infernal lord is said to slake his thirst in the baptismal fonts of bickering churches.

Mugwort should be praised for appearing in one's garden or lawn, for it denotes a happy household.  Also, expectant fathers should carry this herb in their pocket or wallet to insure an easy delivery for the mother.


Erwin

Prosperity is said to come to those that keep a spinning wheel on their front porch or lawn.  Likewise, wealth shadowed by tragedy is said to come to those that mock  the Irish or refuse lodgings to passing gypsies.

Fort Patrick Henry Dam
It is said whenever  a visiting the dam one should throw a coin into the waters in memory of dead native peoples, or your own ancestors will haunt your home.


Gatlinburg
It is said whenever a visitor helps out an unfortunate family in Gatlinburg prosperity will greet them on their return home.

Greeneville
To feed a stray dog will bring prosperity, unless you are only doing it for the gain.

To feed a stray cat, for whatever reason,  will boost your vitality.

If you come across a silver coin, put it in your left pocket for good luck.  Putting it into your right pocket is said to open your home to chaos.


Hampton
To steal tobacco in Hampton brings thieves to your own home.

Newlyweds that spend their honeymoon in a barn will inherit a large,  fine home.



Hawkins County
To steal a neighbor's moonshine or report his still to authorities will bring a plague of  vermin to your residence. 


Johnson City Mall
It is said if you extend an act of charity while at the JC  Mall it will come back to you 10-fold.


Johnson City (general)
To come across a dead man lying across a train track will extend your natural life by seven years.

If you take a toy away from a quiet and inoffensive child you will be visited by two loud, unruly ones.


Johnson County
Old timers say that anyone seeing a black dog resting on a loved one's grave will soon join them in paradise.

The head of a household  should eat buckwheat pancakes on New Year's Day morning to insure the good health of his family during the coming year.


Jonesborough
To say anything disparaging about artists, writers or musicians while walking through downtown Jonesborough is said to draw vandals to your property.

The last slice of pumpkin pie should be reserved for the youngest member of a family, or else the mother of the family tempts having another baby in her old age (asa a winter season's child).


Kingsport
To avoid catching the flu or pneumonia one should always carry a penny in their  left pocket while walking by a train track in Kingsport.

To keep your home peaceful during the coning year, it is advised to pin a corsage of violets to your lapel or bodice before attending Easter church service.


Knoxville
A truck driver that gives a ride to a prostitute without harming her will never run out of gasoline.
Hotel/motel/inn patrons that make their beds before checking out will soon receive a generous gift.

Bathing in a hot tub with your clothes on will bring on illness.

Making disparaging remarks about Tennessee will make you garden vegetables wither on the vine.

A physician that mocks their patient will soon be mocked by friends. 

To drink coffee without offering some to your guests will make the milk in your refrigerator spoil.

Lynn Garden
To argue with neighbors on a Sunday in Lynn Garden is said to bring a year of troubles from friends.


Milligan area (Carter County)
It is said the gods of old dwell in the trees here, and that they grant fortuhe upon those that share tobacco or drink with strangers.

Milligan College
To disparage the ghosts on this campus is said to make new shoes age and fall apart.

Morristown
To make a rude gesture toward an old soldier will bring you a reversal of fortune.


Mountain City
 Montain City inhabitants that marry for wealth and not love   are doomed to be the victim of their own greed.


To eat the first snow of winter in Mountain City is reputed to bring a good batch of moonshine come spring.


Pigeon Forge

To utter the words, "mountain dew" or  "Grandpa Jones" while making love on the bare ground in Pigeon Forge is said to produce musically-girted children.  ( Grandpa Jones was a real-life banjo player named Louis Marshall Jones.  Jones was also a song writer and an inductee of the Country Music Hall of Fame.  He is probably
best remembered as a regular cast member of the TV show, "Hee-Haw" and for his popular recording of the old-time  favorite, "Mountain Dew".

Roan Mountain
When fishing,  one is advised to thank the fish or their cupboard will go bare within the year.

Ruining a Rhododendron blossom in anger will be punished by a headache.  On the other hand, visitors to Roan Mountain should take a stalk of a Rhododendron plant and cultivate it next to their home.  This is said to spread the tranquility of the mountains to whatever part of the world they live.

Sevierville
Landlords that cause hardship for their tenants ' children will one day see their own kin working for those children.


Sullivan County
Mail carriers that steal mail will be cursed with children that steal from them.

One should always name their well or the water will dry up when the need is greatest.

It is believed that any argument that goes on while one is snapping or canning beans will be taken up again once the beans are served.

Unicol County
A bachelor that fails to tip his hat to a woman riding a horse will get a shrew for a wife.

Passing by the injured on a road without help will bring similar injuries to your loved ones.

Louisiana practitioners of left-handed magic are said to have no power over good (aka white) witches of Unicoi Co.

Watauga
It is said that couples that marry in May in Watauga will be blessed by brave sons and loyal daughters.

Your first catch of the year (fish) should be given to a widow for the overall community good. 



PictureBristol Caverns
A  few quaint regional sayings:


Snow out of season, tears without reason.

The most beautiful flower grows on the tardiest vine.

Red at night, shepherd's delight.  Red in the morning, shepherd's warning.

Water does flow under where the fairy ring grow.

Yankees that pray with you, friends just fine.  Yankees that preach to you, filthier than swine.

You can build a home over an outhouse, but you'll still have the stink.

God invented moonshine and moderation , man invented teetotalers.

Gossip among two friends leaves both friendless.

Small-minded people hide behind mean-spirited dogs.

Granny  has forgotten more about life than you'll ever learn  from a book.

He who boasts no vice talks over Christ's advice.

Dirty dishes and warm laughter make a better home than spotless dishes and a cold bed.

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Roan Mountain

Haunted Graceland and a Ghostly Encounter in Memphis

9/23/2013

 
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All the way to Memphis ...
In the early 1990s a partner and I were invited to spend some time visiting an octogenarian friend in Memphis, Tennessee.  This fine  gentleman was often addressed as Mr. B, as he was usually called that by everyone who got to know him well. A name of affection as well as respect. The following story about visiting him was the first of two trips made there to his home back in those years.

Mr. B had been a good pal and business associate of a man I once worked for known as Pop T, affectionately named so by many of the employees who worked for him at the movie theater he owned, and some other multi-state single screen cinemas and drive-in venues he had a percentage of ownership in as well. 
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In many ways, these old-timers were like a mentors to me, particularly during my tenure at Pop T's home-based cinema, where I was co-manager for a number of years.  For a long time I sometimes drove the two gentlemen around to the many indoor and drive-in movies they had partnered-up in among themselves and a few others.

Later on, after Pop T had passed on and I'd left the theater, Mr. B and I even became real estate partners for a while.  It was during that time the first invite came to visit Mr. B. in his stately home and see some of the sights Memphis, Tennessee had to offer. I'd never been there before so it was an exciting thing to look forward to.

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Memphis's Pyramid
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Elvis's Pink Cadillac
Jen and I hit the road early from North Carolina, and despite only a couple of short stops, it still took us eleven long hours to reach Memphis.  We swapped off driving duties every now and then, as starting from the middle of North Carolina, Tennessee can seem a long ways to travel across from end to end.  On arriving we were greeted by Mr. B and given a tour of his home.  When we reached the back bedroom, he asked us if it would be alright for our lodgings.  It was the only other room besides Mr. B's that had a bathroom.  

Mr. B. had a large, four-bedroom house in an older neighborhood that had perhaps seen better days.  The home sat on an acre and a half of property inside the Memphis city limits.  As Jen and I looked the bedroom over, it suddenly occurred to me that this was Mr. B's deceased wife's room.  It was also apparent that the bedroom still held her furnishings and nick-knacks as though she was still alive, especially in the bathroom, as we soon found out. While surveying the room, my eyes were drawn to the carpet, near the foot of the bed, for some reason.  

It then dawned on me that this was where a tragedy had befallen Mr. B's wife.  I asked if that was the spot where she had died, at the foot of the bed.  In an understanding way, he said yes, it was, and offered us another room to stay in if we felt uncomfortable.  Glancing at each other, we both quickly told our host it would be alright -- the room would be just fine.  He then left to get ready for dinner and  we unpacked our luggage and toiletries.  At the table he suggested we visit Graceland the next day.  That idea of his was accepted without a second thought!
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Graceland Mansion

Graceland visit and the ghost of Elvis Presley ...

Hitler and Eva surviving the bunker against their will, possibly?. But an an aged  Elvis seen pumping gas in the Heartland?  Not  an impossibility, but a most unlikely scenario and for good reasons; however,  the King's ghost or spirit energy, haunting his Graceland home, might be a different story.  In any case, we'll take a look in a moment at some of peoples' ghostly experiences from the mansion and estate grounds.

The first thing that struck me on entering the home was how intimate it  all seemed.  We were expecting a Dallas TV show- type opulence, when what we got was definitely, decidedly different.  If homey isn't exactly the right word for it, something similar most certainly is -- like cozy? Yes, that's what it felt like.  Comfy as a fine fitting pair of blue suede shoes to be exact. 

As a matter of fact, the first surprise on viewing the place was its relatively small size in comparison to what was expected. Just the type of residence a spirit might have a particular affinity for and, after all, the upstairs are off limits to the tourist crowds, and Elvis could enjoy downstairs,  playing piano, or just lounge around in the Jungle Room late at night if he got tired of seeing curious fans during the takin' care of business hours.

One of the buildings on the property contains Elvis's jumpsuits, and that's where a lady devotee claims she saw the King.  In wonderment, gazing at the sparkling jewels on one outfit, she suddenly saw something, or more precisely, someone, move in her peripheral vision.  Thinking no more about it, she turned back to the glass case, only to be confronted by the face of Elvis himself!  After calming down some, she checked around for any source the astounding sight could have been reflecting from, but there was nothing.

Later on, after seeing one of the estate's black horses head into the barn as if being called by someone, she asked a guide if any of Elvis's horses could still be around.  She was told, no, and the horses were elsewhere being groomed and couldn't possibly be near the barn.  Pale and trembling, she moved on to the Meditation Garden, where the graves are.  Now, as if what had already happened wasn't enough, there in the glass case, holding the eternal flame,  was the idol's reflection again! A double whammy of the King that quickly is enough to make any Elvis Presley fan's day; cool, calm and collected...or not.

Other haunting encounters with the great entertainer, range from folks giving a uniformed Elvis a lift up to Graceland's gates, sometimes accompanied by a song or two from the great singer en route. Visitors also occasionally report hearing strains of Elvis' singing wafting down from the second floor.  Speaking of the upstairs, many people report feeling strange, eerie sensations when standing in the foyer of the great master's mansion, which just so happens to be directly under the bathroom where Elvis expired.

These are just some of the many unusual sightings and experiences folks have had over the years since his passing on.  Supposedly a gentleman even caught the King's face on video in the meditation garden one time.  The maids have reported strange goings-on in the house as well.  Why,  it's even rumored a rather reluctant-to-talk-about-it  Lisa Marie knows a thing or two about all this.


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(Top)State historical marker in front of Graceland
(Bottom) Elvis' swimming pool.
While this section on Elvis's ghost or spirit energy at Graceland may be written in a kind of tongue-in-cheek way, who's to say for sure the black velvet megastar isn't a stay-at-home in the afterlife?  He certainly loved the house and estate grounds very dearly while alive and kicking, and maybe, just maybe, he still does.
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Graceland Stables
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Graceland Meditation Gardens

Memphis Site-Seein'

Although we didn't have enough time to explore world famous Beale Street, with its myriad of haunted places, we did walk through the Peabody hotel on Union Street.  The hotel lobby has been called the gateway to the Mississippi Delta.

It really was a shame missing historic Beale Street, with its blues and jazz joints, not to mention ghostly spots like the Orpheum Theater and Hunt-Phelan Home. The ever popular Ernestine and Hazel's dive bar, with it's jukebox and historic haunted upstairs-brothel, is another place we didn't get to experience.

The historic Peabody is also well known for the resident ducks who gambol about the fountain and lobby to the amusement of guests.  If  there aren't any ghostly residents in the Peabody hotel, there certainly ought to be with its long and varied past. 

I remember exactly where I was when the news broke of  Martin Luther King's murder in April of 1968: sitting on the couch as a little boy watching The Wild, Wild, West  TV show with my parents.  The Lorraine Motel, where the assassination happened, is a haunting of another kind -- one of memory, that is.
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(Top) Fountain in the Peabody-Memphis
(Bottom) The Lorraine Motel
The Lorraine Motel was located just a street or two over from Mr. B's office where he oversaw all his business's and investments.   Mr. B took us by there later on in the visit.  He asked us to pull over so he could donate money for the site's non-profit organization.  Apparently, it was always the same dedicated young African American girl sitting at the outdoor table taking donations and Mr. B made it a point to stop and contribute most every time he went by the tragically historic place.

A chilling night sweat ... 

On the second night of our stay, Jen and I went to bed around eleven o'clock.  I distinctly recall  Mr. B. asking us what temperature we'd like the thermostat set on before turning in.

One of us replied anything in the low seventies would be fine, as it was late autumn and the days had been mild. After saying good night, being a bit exhausted from all the recent activities, we quickly fell into a comfy slumber. 

Later, we abruptly awoke at the same time.  It took us only seconds to realize we were soaked in sweat: the pillows, the sheets, our very night clothes, were all were nearly wet enough to have come straight out of  a washer. The room was still a comfortable degree of temperature as it had been when we retired for the night.  We talked in hushed tones for a few moments,  before I went off to the bathroom for some towels.  Thinking  thoughts neither of us wanted to express to the other right then, we soon fell back to sleep.

An hour passed, or maybe two, when we were startled awake again by a room nearly cold enough to see one's breath in. That did it for me and I roused up to check the windows  and vents for any drafts.  Nothing was amiss. Checking those in the bathroom I was hit with a very uncomfortable feeling.  The deceased lady's things were really laid about in profusion here, like she'd never left.  Next I went down to the end of the hallway to have a look-see at the thermostat. I don't remember the exact degree but it was in the low 70s.  On the way back I noticed Mr. B's door was shut and stifled a desire to knock.

Come the morning, we discussed telling our host about the eerie experience, but decided to just ask if he had adjusted the thermostat during the night.  He replied no, he hadn't, and asked in return if everything was alright. Jen told him everything was fine, but of course it wasn't, not really.  We never did say anything to him about that night as things turned out.

A few years previous to our stay, the missus had opened the front door to someone she knew (there had been more than a few maids and Man Fridays over the decades) while waiting on Mr. B to return home from his downtown office.  She'd even prepared a cocktail for him and placed it on a table in the foyer, as she always did, when she expected him to be coming back home from work.

Whoever she opened the door to knew where the lady kept her pin money -- two-thousand dollars hidden in her feminine hygiene bag as it turned out.  Before they plundered the cash, they had taken Mrs. B to her bedroom, forced the lady onto the floor at the foot of the bed, and then cruelly shot her in the back of the head.

As to the disturbing temperature fluctuation and heavy sweat Jen and I experienced, it can only be said there was never any reason we could come up with for them to occur. No spicy dinners, medications or alcohol-laden nightcaps in other words. There was nothing at all we could figure that caused all these things to happen.
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So, could all the unusual events have been perpetrated by the ghost of the murdered Mrs. B, displeased or not, by the two strangers in her bed? Or, perhaps, some kind of negative residual energy or memory imprint on time itself? Whatever the case my be, it certainly was an unsettling night in the old Bluff City, and that's for sure.

Tennessee's Haint Happenings by Guest Author, Beth Perry

7/26/2013

 
Author, Beth Perry, comes from a State that has a rich lore in mysteries and the paranormal. That state is Tennessee. One of America's best and creepiest cases comes from there - the one that Beth mentions in the beginning - which is the Bell Witch.

That case is certainly an infamous set of occurrences from the early 19th century. As Beth also mentions, President Jackson had encounters with the entity before he became president, and the Bell Witch even stopped the curious  Jackson's carriage from moving  towards the afflicted house despite the most strenuous efforts of his team to get the carriage and horses going forward after fixing a strangely broken axle , and this was some miles from the house at that! Whatever the entity was it definitely didn't want that visit to check out the eerie goings-on.
Dear readers of the Carolinian's Archives, it is my pleasure to introduce you to author, Beth Perry, with her debut on Mists and Moonlight.

I've known Beth as a friend and fellow writer for over two years now and continue to be amazed at her skills and talent in this area. This lady is genuinely a fantastic writer as you will soon see.

Past what she's sharing here,  you can read  more of her work via various articles on the sites below. The anyahoward one is mature-themed fiction.

bethperry @ HubPages
anyahoward.weebly.com
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Author, Beth Perry
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The Bell Witch 

When it comes to the supernatural, Tennessee has its fair share of hauntings and focal points of paranormal activity. Some of our renowned haints include: Elvis’s ghost in and around Memphis, several taverns and inns that boast the returning spirits of Daniel Boone and Davy Crockett.  There is the city of Erwin, where they hung an elephant (Mary) in 1916, and which is said to have been cursed for the unjust treatment given to the maltreated animal. But without doubt our most famous paranormal entity is the Bell Witch of Adams, TN. This poltergeist tormented the family of John Bell in the 1800’s, and its aggressive nature was said to haunt the area for some years. Andrew Jackson  is credited to have encountered the Bell Witch during his years before becoming president. Numerous books about the known real-life events, and films adapted from the legend, have made the Bell Witch world famous.

Our state boasts many lesser-renowned, but just as interesting, paranormal focal points. Several are found right here in upper east Tennessee, home of our beautiful Smoky Mountains. As urban-legendish as the tales surrounding them may sound today, these paranormal personalities and places have contributed to the region’s rich heritage. And I thought I'd share a few of these here today.
“Granny” February’s grave.
Location: Arney Hill Cemetery, Elizabethton, TN


I didn’t know about Granny February until I married and moved to Carter County, and my husband and his friends and neighbors told me the story about her. Today, her story is today more widely known, as she has been mentioned in paranormal sites across the internet. The typical online anecdote relates the popular belief that if you leave food at Granny February’s mausoleum she is likely to converse with you, and if the offering is particularly yummy she will grant you a wish.  

The history: Granny February’s real name was Nannie Crow Brister, and she was a homemaker with a great fondness for music. According to old-timers, Nannie was also reputed to be a white witch, with a particular penchant for healing children. Mrs. Brister’s elevation into local legend, however, had to wait until her golden years.

When Mrs. Brister (Granny) was an elderly woman she suffered a seizure-type episode. This episode left her in a state which doctors at the time believed was death. Granny February was given a funeral, and buried beside her husband’s remains in a mausoleum at Arney Hill cemetery. A few days later the caretaker was horrified to hear Granny call for help from inside the mausoleum. Discovering that Granny was very much alive, the caretaker unchained the mausoleum doors and contacted her family. Granny returned to her home and she was said to be, by all who knew her, unaffected by the non-death.

In time Granny fell lifeless –or seemingly lifeless- again. She was declared dead and buried for a second time in the family mausoleum. But this time a table was put near her coffin inside the mausoleum, and food and drink were left out. This was a wise decision, for indeed Granny February returned from “the dead” a second time. 

She lived a few more years before once more falling dead. She was returned to the coffin inside the mausoleum, and once again the table was set out with food and drink. 

But Granny February did not rise from her coffin again. Her remains stayed among the dead, the mausoleum stood silent, the food on the table grew moldy, the drink eventually evaporated from the goblet. 

Legend: After Granny February’s final entombment people replaced the old food and drink with fresh offerings for many years. Some of these individuals have claimed that when they put the offerings down they could hear Granny February say “Thank you.” as clearly as the sun rises in the east. Some have said they even enjoyed lengthy conversations with Granny February. Others went on to say they've encountered another spirit inside the mausoleum, one that claimed to be an even more ancient spirit than Granny February. And yet others maintain that on visiting the mausoleum, they have had their destiny revealed by one or more of these spirits. 

Personal anecdote: In time there were so many incidents of people breaking into the Brister mausoleum that Granny February’s table was finally removed and the door chained shut.

I saw Granny February’s mausoleum for the first time in 1994, when my husband took me to the cemetery. At that time the table was standing just inside the mausoleum doors and there was a wooden bowl sitting on top of it. Today the chain remains across the door, but it has obviously one or more persons have tried to free them. When standing right in front of these doors, you can see offerings of flowers lying just inside.

Of related interest: in Elizabethton, it is common practice on Halloween night to attempt to conjure up the spirit of Granny February. This is done by standing in front of a mirror, with only a burning candle for light, and speaking the name Granny February five times in succession. It is reported that she is more willing to appear if you also put out a donation of food during this little rite.
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Granny February's mausoleum.
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Memorial plate at the mausoleum entrance.
PictureWatauga Bridge, Carter County, Tennessee
The Watauga Bridge Monk
Location: Carter County, Tennessee


Legend: for many years people have reported a hooded figure lurking under the Watauga Bridge. Those who have encountered this apparition say its head is only a flaming skull. Others say that in laying eyes on the skull face, they have been besieged by bad luck.

History: Some locals of native heritage say the hooded figure is the spirit of a fanatical monk, who in bygone days took pleasure in physically hurting Native Americans.

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PictureIvy Hall Nursing Home, Elizabethton, Tennessee
Ivy Hall Nursing Home
Location: Elizabethton, TN


The history: this nursing home was originally St. Elizabeth’s hospital. Sometime after my husband’s birth there in 1956 it was bought by his grandmother, Phoebe Crosswhite Perry, who transformed it into Ivy Hall Nursing Home.

Legend: According to eye-witnesses accounts, children have been heard running and playing across the floors of Ivy Hall during the wee hours of morning. Others have claimed to have run into my husband’s grandmother in the wing she resided in before her death.

I have never witnessed any of these things at Ivy Hall, but for anyone who might be nervous about running into Mama Phoebe there, have no fear. In life, she was known for her generosity and for making folks feel at home.


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Shadowtown Road, Blountville, Tennessee
Shadowtown Road
Location: Blountville, TN


Blountville is a small town found near the south fork of the Holston River. My Nanny (grandmother) and my grandfather lived just outside of Blountville proper, as well as most of their extended family. Like most of their kin and neighbors they were farming folk. The community was a tight-knit one and enjoyed the peacefulness of country living. And in this otherwise bucolic area is a place that speaks of the seriousness the community took their commitment to neighborly decency.

Before commercial industry came to the area Shadowtown Road was just a small and remote cut of rural road. Hardly more than a carriage wheel-pressed path, there was nothing distinctive about it for a long time. This was, the story goes, until the crimes of outsiders got this little-known path named.

The Legend: Several decades ago KKK members from another county decided it was high-time to set things “right” in the community of Blountville. They arrived with their hate and with it, violence. These men began by making a nuisance of themselves with hateful speech, and when they saw their blowhard doctrines were falling on deaf ears, decided to stir up trouble. To do this they targeted one of the few black families in the area. In the middle of the night they visited the family home and set it on fire. If this wasn’t bad enough, the family infant was burned to death. The Klanners may have been quite proud of their accomplishment, but what they failed to realize is that the people of the area weren't white racists; they were Scot-Irish and German immigrants who had come in search of a place to escape the brutal conditions of the industrialized North. These people wanted no part of slavery. They had no use for racial division. They honored the Confederate flag because, in their eyes, it stood for liberation from amoral industrialists. And they welcomed everyone who came with decency and respect for others. Klanners, especially murderous Klanners, were anything but decent and respectful.

The arsonist/killers were soon arrested, in no small thanks to the fact they were boasting about the crime to anyone who would listen. It wasn’t the first time the peace-loving locals had had to deal with suspected crimes from the Klan. But the residents decided it would be the last time.

In the court room the Klanners admitted their guilt and showed no remorse for their crime. As it was, there was no case for the jury; all they had to do was decide the men’s fate. Two of them were sentenced to hard labor. The third, the one who had discovered the family’s residence and had drenched the foundation of their home with lantern fuel and brought the matches, was sentenced to death. This man was unfazed; he ordered his attorney to contest it the verdict, and further declared to the judge he had friends in the state capitol that would see he received a pardon.

On the night following the verdict a group of local men arrived at the jail house. The condemned boaster was handed over to them. He was taken to a narrow, thicket-flanked and carriage-trodden road just outside of Blountville proper. Here, a hanging rope was thrown over the limb of a tall oak. The killer was seated on the back of a horse; the noose was thrown over his neck. Moments later someone slapped the horse’s rear and the beast shot forward. The man’s neck snapped in that instant and those who had sentenced him watched as his twitching body swung in the moonlight. They did not celebrate, for they remembered the heinous crime that had led to the execution. But they did leave the killer’s body to hang as warning to others with hate and intolerance in their hearts.

In time his body was removed and his family retrieved it. Shadowtown Road was never again to be used as a place of execution. But over the years the bodies of three other men turned up in the ditch on Shadowtown Road. The causes of their individual deaths were never determined, though in truth no one showed much grief over their demise anyway. One of these men was out on bail at the time his body was recovered, as he had been charged with the rape of a Cherokee woman. The other two were similarly awaiting trial, having been accused of vandalizing and setting fire to the Mason’s Lodge.

Travelers to Shadowtown Road have reported that on moonlit nights the shadow of a hangman’s noose can be seen lying across the old rural road. And some who have walked the road by night have claimed to have not only seen this shadow, but also heard the ominous sound of a creaking rope.

I've never walked down Shadowtown Road at night, and can't attest to whether the shadow is real or not. But there an old sing-songy chant about the place that survived even to the days I was in grade school:  The devil sells you vengeance, the devil trades you gold. And the devil comes to collect on Shadowtown Road.

Brown Mountain Lights Visit With Unusual Photo Taken 

5/7/2013

 
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NOTE: the new time-lapse video from July 2016 is in an updated story at the top of the blog pages now.

​1920-[1923]: North Carolina. Reports of brilliant spheres or disks
appearing from time to time [during the three years], moving in leisurely formation, or singly, in the neighborhood of the Brown Mountains. Much talk. Official investigation draws blank. ~ Desmond Leslie 1953 

How does one start off the story of the mysterious Brown Mountain Lights that has been around for hundreds of years with a quote like that, and, with tons of ink and gigabyte memory devoted to it? 

How about a comparison? 

Several years ago I was invited to spend a week with a friend who lives on the Maine-Canadian border. We had lots of fun visiting sites like the resort town of Bar Harbor , Maine, and Campobello Island, Canada, that has one of the magnificent Franklin D. Roosevelt homes on it.

But, for the comparison, a local state park we went to is what reminds me of Brown Mountain in a way. You see dear reader, this Maine wonderland had a hiking trail that followed a misty, beautiful, boulder-strewn ocean shoreline with high rocks. You could even peer down into these big crevasses at times and see the ocean water swirling magnificently through them. It also had an ancient bog that rivaled one I had seen in Scandinavia once, albeit, on a smaller scale. There was much unique fauna in the moisture-soiled park as well. 

The link to Brown Mountain, here in North Carolina, came about when my host told me that the Pine Tree State folk only occasionally took advantage of this majestic park, and as for locals, well, they almost never came to this cool place in their midst. The majority of my life I've probably resided within 100 or so miles of Brown Mountain. But until just recently, I'd never taken a trip or stopped to look at the phenomenon-laden mountain 
ridge, one of the most famously unexplained places in the States, if not the world, despite driving down the closest road to it ( Hwy. 181), many times over the years.

I certainly can't claim ignorance of the place as I'd known of it since a young lad reading a 1960's book titled Ghosts of the Old North State, by the late Nancy Roberts, who specialized in the Carolinas' paranormal with her wonderful writing style. Her remarkable stories (including one on Brown Mountain itself)  are still in print today, available in many libraries and on-line book sites.

This, plus numerous other reads and TV shows,  including an X-Files episode with an Alien slant to it - that I didn't watch, but heard about, have during the years certainly made me very aware of the enigmatic mountain. But, as I said earlier about never visiting it,  that finally changed come the year 2013 with a new but rather different kind of mystery photo taken that is shown near the end of the article.

PictureAll photos by Alastar Packer
For those readers unfamiliar  with the Brown Mountain Lights phenomenon,  what they are, the history and legends, plus the scientific undertakings to explain them, I'm compelled to give a bit of an account. 

The mystery is an uncanny, even weird,  display of multicolored orbs of light, often reminiscent of  Roman candles firing off in different ways or directions.  Sometimes they will rise higher and higher from the ridge, darting here and there. Then at other times, singularly, or in groups, they will  shoot straight up the slopes, only to maneuver sideways or simply disappear.

A remarkable aspect of these lights is the fact that they often  display themselves as if guided by some kind of intelligence. Stops, hard angle turns, hovering, and their just plain moving about in general, can give one this distinct impression.  The lights' sizes  are varied, sometimes as big as several stars  in appearance,  with a deep-red or sapphire blue color to them.  At other times they are so numerous, and moving so fast, it is hard to keep track of them all.  At times, only one, or a few, or none at all appear during  a night's darkness.  Early autumn is considered the most active season for this so-far unexplained phenomenon, but they can and do appear throughout the year.

Picture
Brown Mountain is the mile-and-a-half long ridge to the right of the V-dip in the background of the picture here. It seems a lot closer in person than it does in this photograph taken on the Hwy. 181, Brown Mountain overlook pull-off. Also, since the digital age has become commonplace with the public, the lights seem to be diminishing.

These pictures were taken in April of 2013 , I just forgot to reset the date after changing the  batteries. I'll have to find out how to keep them off any further photos on this older digital...or better yet get a new camera, along with an assistant photographer along to use it from different perspectives, or to be blunt, a keener eye for the art.

According to Native American legends, the Cherokee and Catawba nations waged a particularly bloody conflict on the mountain over 800 years ago. The mystery lights in the Cherokee version, at least, have their sad maidens forever searching with torches for lost lovers who fell in the battle. A reader in the comments section has an even more amazing Cherokee legend concerning the mountain with an intriguing, mysterious explanation..

A gentleman named Douglas has commented that the Cherokees have legends of the mountain as a portal that contains a kind of door that leads to another dimension, or, as Douglas puts it, world. Whole villages sometimes relocated through this portal. A fifty year old book by a researcher and author named Alexander Key wrote about one of these "doors" in particular according to his post.

​So, could the big battle with the searching maidens have been a tale to appease the white men and throw him off from searching the inside of Brown Mountain too thoroughly for this Shangri-La? With this enigmatic, long-lasting phenomena, can we really rule out anything concerning it? Seems a very interesting and fantastic story, absolutely, regardless if there is anything to it or not.

The first white  man to report on the lights occurred in 1771, when a German engineer named de Brahm noted them in his exploration of the area. His take was naturally of a scientific bent.  He wasn't the last to go that route over the years, all proven wrong in their theories as things turned out, of course. The lights continued to be seen throughout the nineteenth century, with active expeditions and studies starting in the early twentieth century.

This writer won't run through all the scientific and mundane explanations that came from all this.  Suffice it to say all were found to be in error as time went on, and better technology methods of detection had their chance at breaking the mysterious code of the Brown Mountain Lights.

 To date, these modern methods have come up almost as empty-handed as any used before them.

 The lights' origins are simply baffling to this day.

Picture
What you have here my friends is a digital picture someone was nice enough to take of me staring off at the mountain in the far distance.
​
Remember, it's the ridge to the right of the V-dip. 

Also notice the rock to the left of me that has some kind of occult symbol on it. A triangle with some kind of eye- shaped drawing in the center of it, in fact. It would be most interesting to know the strange symbol's exact meaning.

Although it's not too apparent in the photos, the first thing that struck me as different from any of the other large number of mountain ridges in the southern Appalachians, was the numerous granite outcroppings on it. This may become important when I state my own humble thoughts on what might be causing the strange lights at the end of this story.

By the way, there is also a large triangle with an eye-in-center of it on one of the big rock outcroppings on the mountain, too. Now, to the new mystery photo that is part of this article's title.

Here is something intriguing, a strange digital that the person taking it would have had to have been standing in just the right spot and angle for it to line up exactly like it did. Notice how the pair of rocks just to the right of me form-up to look like those enigmatic heads on Easter Island. Seen from right to left, the two have the green scrub for hair or a top hat, then a forehead, eye and nose; and then the second, closer to the camera rock, forms a cheekbone, mouth and chin, to complete the profile.

​Pareidolia, only? Possibly. However, several people I showed it to, with no lead or prior reading of the article by them, saw it too, with two seeing the resemblance to a Maori head and one remarking that it reminded them of an Amerindian profile. But was it all just an unusual chance shot? Maybe so...but then again?

Considering the high strangeness of the area, I'll keep an open mind for now on just what's going on with them lining up in the photo to appear in the way that they do. We would, of course, want to know how long they've been there. Those two stones certainly aren't new placements in the dirt, and seem to be firmly embedded in the ground, so it would seem they've been there for ages, or at the very least until Hwy. 181 was built.
​
As to any connection between the mountain phenomena and the Maori, the only one I can think of is they're both mysterious. The Island figures may be much older than what is generally thought. Even Professor Robert Schoch, famous for his back-dating the Great Sphinx through its weathering, but who generally sticks with mainstream archaeology chronology, believes them to be of a more extreme antiquity than the present age given. Could this one even have some kind of connection to the ones on Easter Isle? Ah! there I go speculating again!

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Can you believe while formulating this trip I actually considered climbing up the mountain for, well, whatever might happen.  So I brought along a canteen, some semi-decent hiking shoes, and a gummy granola bar. 

However, on stopping at the overview I was quickly disabused of that notion.  As you can see from the pictures, there's a good bit of wilderness and quite a ways to go if one were to attempt any walking  between the two spots.

Not long after hanging around, I saw what looked like a dirt road a-ways down to the right.  So, the hiking hope kind of reignited, briefly.  On returning to the car (it was very windy, as you might imagine) and driving back down the highway, about a hundred feet or so, there appeared the entrance to the dirt road, sealed off with a metal pole  of course!

Well, that seemed the end of the expedition but then suddenly, not another hundred or so feet down the main  highway, there appeared another side road that looked to take a sharp dip. Bypassing it a ways on down the road and then turning around across from the big campground park on Hwy. 181, I drove on back and turned into it.

You know you're onto something a bit different when road exploring when one of the first things you see is a state road sign that basically says - be careful and drive at your own risk.

 Oh boy.

But, being the adventurous type, and hoping to get as close to Brown Mountain as possible, I continued on the unpaved  mountain road.  It wasn't long till I came to this bridge here, and that was when the fun really began.


Picture
After crossing the bridge, with its rather pretty mountain creek underneath, the service road split, right and left. Figuring it probably circled whatever mountain I was on now, the right way was chosen.

The thinking was that this must take one up close to the holy grail of mysterious lights. It was a twisty, steep, often narrow road, and it wasn't long before an unusual feeling started coming over me. It was right before the blooms of Spring, and to be frank about it, the slopes and gullies gave off a rather uncomfortable vibe, not a place one would want to be caught alone at midnight.

As a matter of fact, later on, a friend who had been up this way told me they had gotten the same, if not eerie, then very strange feeling too. Perhaps a lot of psychological things go into that but I've driven many a back-road in the mountains and nothing could quite compare to this odd sensation of uneasiness. The sight of it here is actually one of the better  looking stretches. Most of it was rough gravel, and quite snaky. You wouldn't want to run into another vehicle coming the other way, especially at night, and that's for sure.

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A bit steep here...and frankly, steeper & a bit eerie as well, especially the farther down the gravel road one goes.
This was about as far as I got in the Saturn. You know how those twisty back mountain roads can seem like a dog's year.  In other words, one mile feels like seven.  It was maybe two-and-a-half to three miles to reach this point where what I believe is Brown Mountain or a rise very near it could be seen.

The car's fan kept whirring for some time after stopping. This gives you an idea of how hard a ride it was to get maybe halfway around this ever escalating relatively steep elevation. 

Maybe it's alright to come this way with a group of people in a four-wheel drive, to have a front row seat to a
mystery light(s) show at night, but I turned around at this point.  It was more because of not knowing how much farther this service road went around the mountain than for any other reason, despite the lonely and uneasy feeling.  By the way, there wasn't another soul in sight the whole time except for some good ol' boys near the entrance, hanging around a tributary of the stream that went under the bridge..
Picture
A couple of days before the trip I watched a YouTube clip of a Nat. Geo. team who recently tried to figure out the mystery behind the enigmatic Brown Mountain Lights. They had several specialists, including a geologist with his input, plus the very latest in high tech equipment: things like infra-red film and lasers etc.

Three teams set up in three different vantage points and waited for the fall of night to begin. Sure enough, they eventually caught a very strange light, near the base of the mountain next to the V-dip, I believe.

The next morning reviewing the tape, they were startled to discover the infra-red film of the light, or object, was a totally different color than what it should have been. The mystery still remains.  Also very interesting, and something I didn't know about until watching the piece, the geologist pointed out that Brown Mountain is basically made of granite rock with a lot of quartz in its make-up, which if not mistaken, should be full of piezo-crystals. On learning this my proverbial light-bulb went off on what, or at least partially what, could be going on.

​Those lights can be elusive, in fact, had seemed to be tapering off significantly, but scientists from Appalachian State University have gotten evidence that seem to show them. Come the night of July 16, 2016, a circular glowing light was captured by two time-lapse digital video cameras close-by the mountain. Dr. Daniel Caton and his colleague Lee Hopkins of the physics and astronomy dept. at ASU attempted to gain evidence about the phenomena. They were successful. One video is in an updated article at or near the top of the blog pages. 
​

Although some may consider this hackneyed or unscientific, I now believe the mountain is an inter-dimensional portal or conduit of some kind, and has been for God knows how long. On second thought, 21st century physics is seeming to discover this idea may not be so hackneyed after all. What energies or intelligence(s) are coming through, and why, I won't hazard to guess, but will leave it for any open-minded reader to ponder on or just consider the possibilities at their pleasure. However, the fact should be noted that the Pisgah National Forest
​can be a hot spot for paranormal and high strangeness activity, particularly in close proximity to the mountain. 

And in conclusion to the story, let's have a bit of fun with what the picture above is. It is a fair-sized granite boulder on the side of the service road I saw on the trip, with a perfectly-bored hole through it. My guess is it was drilled for dynamite or some other explosive when building the road. But if so why was the rock intact? What's your guess dear reader? Perhaps this is one we can both solve for sure.

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