Pastor Johann Gottfried Schupart (1677-1729) was one of the leading German Lutherans of his day, becoming Professor of Theology and eventually Rector at Giesing University.  However, the part of his career that has earned him a place in this blog deals with his lengthy battles with a supernatural force that he naturally described as “the devil,” but what we today would call an unusually violent and persistent poltergeist.

As we are now dealing with the subject of the fallen angels, and at the same time enquiring, "An Diabolus possit gere in corpus?"—I will tell what has happened to me—and I call the thrice-blessed Creator to witness that it is true—and I am prepared, upon demand, to substantiate it, not only with my own oath, but with the evidence of more than a hundred witnesses. I know well, it is true, that many old wives’ fables are mingled among the relations of ghostly happenings; but I earnestly assert, that in all my days I have never been superstitious, and have thought lightly of such things; but, though I kept no journal of the matter, I will relate what I remember. For six years I fought with the devil, and was never sure for one quarter of an hour that he would not wring my neck.

The beginning was so :—

I was lying asleep in bed in my cabinet, and my wife, who had a fever, was in the opposite bed, when, about one or two in the morning, some one or something came to the door, and gave it a blow hard enough to drive it into pieces. I sprang out of bed; but, though I had not been sound asleep, but only dozing, and though my wife was also much startled, I supposed that we had both dreamt it, and lay down again. And yet I had, none the less, my own thoughts about the matter, for a brother of mine, who was ill at the time, afterwards died. But I said to myself, “It’s only a dream!” and settled down again in bed. Then the door was struck again, just as hard as before, and I saw clearly that it was no dream; but I put it out of my mind.

Next evening, when the maid put the light on the table, the spirit struck it so that it fell a good distance off upon the floor, but continued standing and kept alight, which caused me much thought. And from that time forward these things went on. Stones, weighing six, eight, nine, ten pounds, were thrown at my head, as violently as if shot from a bow; they whistled through the air, and struck out the whole window—glass, lead and all. I was not touched by them, but I had to get new windows put in nearly every day. Often I did not take off my clothes for four weeks at a stretch. I was struck in the face, stuck with pins, bitten, so that men saw the marks of both rows of teeth; the two great teeth were there, and were as pointed and sharp as pins. After I had been at confession, I had always the greatest annoyances, and had, generally, after returning home, to pick up all my books, that had been thrown from the shelf and mixed up together. When I wanted to sleep, I had to lay one cheek on the pillow, and cover the other side with another pillow, to protect me from slaps in the face; even then I was pinched and even struck.

At last I used to set my back to the wall at night and read, and thus I read through Syen's Histoire de l’Eglise, four thick quartos. Once the house was set on fire, in seeming, as it were, and then I begged the Prince for a guard, urging that not only I, but other poor loyal subjects were endangered; and I said I wished to pick out honest and pious men, according to my own judgment; and this was granted me. And these guards saw how It beat me, and they got some boxes on the ear themselves, though they hit about them in the room with their swords.

In the presence of twelve persons, It struck my wife so hard on the cheeks that the sound was heard five rooms away. In another house, to which she had retired, I having gone out, she received, in the presence of three persons, more than fifty slaps on the face, till she said, "I might as well bear the blows in my own house as in another’s." But although the strokes resounded so terribly, they did not hurt as much as one would have supposed from the sound of them.

As things were so bad, I procured leave to include myself in the public prayers in the Church, and begged my hearers not to be scandalized, or to adopt sinful opinions, even if God should allow Satan to kill me, and I should be found lying dead in this place or in that. When I had evening prayers according to custom—for my congregation attended diligently—and the whole room was full of people who saw and heard all, I was, during the prayers, pricked, bitten, struck and pinched, till my wife and I had to cover our legs with the clothes of those sitting by us. Cords were thrown around my neck and my wife’s, so that, had we not been quick in pulling them off, we should have unquestionably been strangled. Of all my books, the Talmud had the most to suffer. The book of Church regulations was torn, also the prayer-books and hymn-books. It tore Hedinpro’s Testament and threw it at my feet. It tore the Gospel of St. John, and quod maxime notandum , when I was expounding the Epistle to the Romans in the course of my exordia, and had come to viii. 17 and 18.  It tore the leaf on which the text was—the leaf began with those verses—out of the book, so that, when I came into the pulpit, I had not got the text; but the leaf, torn into little pieces, was strewn on the bed of my wife, then lying sick at home.  Nothing was done to the Bible, save that the Fourth Chapter of the Prophet Isaiah was once splashed with ink.

Once when I was lying in bed, the carving-fork was flung at me, but only the handle struck me; the knife came immediately after the fork, but did me no damage. Another time this great knife was thrown at me again; I heard it come whistling like an arrow, and started; it hurt me, but did no material harm. Once I was sitting in my room in my shirt, and a very sharp little knife was hurled at my side; my wife heard it whiz by, and cried, “You’re surely hurt?” I looked, and there stuck the knife, but no harm had been done. And just as I was saying to my wife, that I clearly saw in this the Divine protection, a stone of a pound’s weight flew past my head, and smashed the window.

When I got into bed, I often lay down on pins, so that they bent, but they did not injure me. My pupils lodging in my house frequently found dirt and stones in their bags. The chairs were thrown about the room. I could see nothing, but one might mark something corporeal was at work, for once when I was going to church, my wig could not be found, and I could not have preached if, after sending to different persons, a certain Cammer-Rath had not lent me his. Now when I came into the pulpit with somebody else’s wig on, everybody at once supposed that some new misfortune had happened, and so, just after sermon, I was summoned to the Count, to dine with him. So I wanted to put on my new coat, but one of the sleeves was gone; I sent for my old one, but that too had only one sleeve. Meanwhile there was an uproar in the house, made by the cats and dogs, and the turtle doves that I kept in the sitting-room; it was as if they were all mad.

On the Monday, I said to my wife that I must have a coat in any case, and wanted to take the sleeve from the old coat and have it put into the new one; but when I took the coat, the sleeve was gone too, and there was I with two coats, which had only one sleeve between them. So I sent to the shop, for stuff to have a new suit made. Meanwhile, my wife went to the store-room, to see whether she had any cloth for lining left, and knelt down before a drawer. Then there fell something on her head, as heavily as if it had been a hundredweight, so that she began to cry out in a lamentable way; I rushed in, and there was my wife on her knees, with my stolen wig on her head. At this I fell into a state of excitement, and conjured the spirit, in a solemn manner, to bring me back the things it had taken—for all the hymn books were gone too. Just then I was called away to exhort a criminal, and told my wife that she should not stay in the house all alone, for the evil spirit would have to bring back the things, and it would not be well to let him do any more mischief. I had not been gone long—my wife was in the garden—when a terrible din began in my sitting-room, all the cats and dogs, the doves too, crying aloud, and tearing about. My wife rushed in, and saw a black bird, like a daw, fluttering about among our animals; she took heart, and resolved to kill it, but, as all the knives had had to be locked up, she had nothing to do it with; but she seized the spit, and thrust at the black bird. In that moment he vanished, my wife could not see whither; but blood lay in the spot where he had been, as I myself saw when I came home. The whole affair came into the courts, and my things were replaced, except the glasses, etc., that had been broken.

Once when I was summoned to court, I wanted first to eat a little sausage and salad. I ate only a small portion, and my wife took some also. In all my life I have never been so sick as this salad made me. My wife was also ill. The cat died, and the dog suffered after eating of it. Whether the devil had put in poison, and wanted to make away with me, I cannot now say, for some negligence or other circumstance may have been the cause; at any rate, this is what happened to me. 

Whenever I had a sword, I was safe from front attacks, for then It only threw things from behind me; but if I laid the sword aside, I received blows again.  When I was asleep, I was safe so long as two of the watchers held their swords over my face, but if they took them away, or ceased to brandish them, my torment began again. I used the Magic Balsam from the Prince’s Apothecary in Stuttgart, but it did no good.

Once when my wife's cheeks were all swollen, a surgeon sent me a book against magic. In this book I found a recipe, and had it made up at the apothecary’s. It was a fumigating powder. I laid it on the coals, and held my wife’s head over it by force, for she said she could not endure the pain the smoke caused her. I fetched a vessel, and drew from her mouth first a long black horsehair, and then much thread and other stuff, the full of half the vessel; the pains were then somewhat better, but as my wife still felt something, I held her head over the smoke again, and drew out such another horsehair; there was nothing more.

Once I was sitting and writing, when It took a bottle of brandy, and smashed it over me and my paper, so that I was quite "anointed” with the liquor. All this time I stayed in my house, and would not go for all the devil could do, though the authorities offered me another lodging. One day wanted to smoke, but my pipe and tobacco were gone. I managed to find them; the pipe had been filled. I was going to smoke, but noticing that the pipe was heavy, I cleaned it out, and found it full of dirt, with a little tobacco on the top. Curiously enough, It harmed no one in my house but my wife and myself, except a man who said, as he was keeping watch, and an uproar was going on upstairs, "If this wasn't a clergyman’s house, I should swear," and then, as in the heat of the moment he emitted a curse, a key hit him on the nose with a distinct sound.

Only once was I hurt by a knife, in the lower part of my leg; and I had an old sword lying in a press; this It took and threw at my wife, slightly injuring her foot; when she took the blade and wanted to shut it up again, It tore it out of her hand, and threw it maxima cum vehementia into the press, so that it stuck there. Then I took it into my hand, Saying, “Herr Teufel, if you have power, take it out of my hand," but nothing happened, so I shut the sword up again. It often took my jug of wine away, and brought it back; I drank it and suffered no harm. The rest I cannot now remember. But some time I will put it all down, and have a discussion upon it. I would not have missed the experience for three thousand reichsthaler, for it taught me the power of prayer; but I would not go through it again for that sum, either. You must not think that this went on continually for six years, for it would have been impossible to bear it; but from time to time it ceased, for eight days to a fortnight, now and then for four weeks, and once for a quarter of a year; after that it would be more violent. After my wife had hurt the bird with the spit, we had peace for a long time.

This is all. I call God the Almighty and Omniscient to witness that these things occurred as stated. How or in what manner it was done I do not know. In all my days I saw nothing, but heard and felt enough; and so I leave the matter to every man’s mature consideration.

Everard Feilding

The following tale comes to us courtesy of barrister/psychic researcher (not a combo one sees every day) Everard Feilding, in the form of two letters he sent his friend Hereward Carrington, who published them in the 1951 book “Haunted People.”  It is a rather delightful poltergeist account, complete with a supernatural snipe hunt!

Transylvania,

Jan. 26, 1914

Dear Carrington,

Your letter has just reached me in the middle of the most extraordinary adventure I have ever had. Last year, Crookes received a fantastic letter from a Hungarian lawyer, telling him of certain amazing things that had been happening to him and begging to be investigated. I was then ill and couldn’t come, but this time, finding myself within measureable reach, from Warsaw, I decided to come.

It felt like Dracula—a journey to a mysterious land, to stay in a country village with an unknown person round whom things equal to Home’s phenomena (if 1/10 of what he said was true) were happening. I didn’t know whether he was a lunatic or a liar, but I came.  And my journey has been repaid. I leave tomorrow, after about ten days in this country, with the mediums, ie., the lawyer and his wife, to hunt for buried treasure in Brittany! I shall spend a few days with Schrenck-Notzing, and also with la Tomezyk, with him, in Munich, and shall then take my mediums on, through Brittany, to London.

My lawyer has a Jinn. No less. A friendly, sportive hobgoblin, late a Roumanian, and now the most desirable imp that anyone could wish for. For most of the facts I have to depend on the lawyer, an excitable, very middleclass person, formerly much addicted to wine, gambling and women, good-hearted, hospitable, a spendthrift, hopelessly unbusiness-like, and absolutely staggered by the goings-on of his imp.

This creature first started operations at a time when, for lack of pence, the lawyer wanted to commit suicide. He suddenly found money in his pocket which he knew wasn’t there before. He thought he must have stolen it in a fit of aberration. Then money began to drop on to the table, and he thought he was mad. Then stones fell beside him as he walked out, and then gradually all sorts of things were chucked into his room at all hours of the day and night. Bromide tablets fell on his bed when he couldn’t sleep; bottles of Schnapps in his carriage of a cold night; cigarettes out of the air when he had run out of them, and cigars bearing the Emperor’s monogram!

As things materially eased then, the character of the phenomena changed, and now the things are mostly ancient and useless tagrags and bobtails, ranging from bottle-tops to an elderly pump, about 50 lbs. in weight and 4 feet long, slabs of marble, 5-foot poles, pieces of wood, heavy iron screws, pincers, knives, wire lampshades, toy animals--all hurtle into the room at unexpected moments…And they do: I have seen lots of them.  Two minutes after I first entered his room, a 5-foot pole fell at the other end of it--he and I being alone in it, and he at the opposite end (a room 30 ft. long.)  On another occasion, I being the first to enter the room, a 4 ft. pole jumped out at me from a corner which I was facing at a distance of 3 feet--the lawyer at the time just entering the door.  A glass fell very softly at my feet, the lawyer not being in the room at all, and the nearest person being not within 12 feet of me.  Cigarettes fall out of the air.  Objects which are put under the table change places, or disappear altogether within, once, one minute of having been put there, notwithstanding that we (he and his wife and I) are all sitting sideways with our feet well outside the legs of the table.  A rusty table-knife falls in the middle of the room while we are all sitting writing at the table.  The same 5 ft. pole before mentioned falls very gently at a distance of 6 ft. from the lawyer, sitting with me at the table.  If he had thrown it (as I tested) it would have made a devil of a noise.  Rappings all about the wall and quick rappings on the table, perhaps not evidential, but probably true, are heard.  And so on.  I am therefore tempted to believe the bigger things he tells me of, i.e., the pump which I have seen, and the marble slabs, which I have not.  The dinner table jumps up constantly at meals, again not strictly evidential, but I think true, as it could only be done by his wife, a frail little woman, with her feet under the chair, and I’m sure she doesn’t do it.

The Jinn communicates by Ouija, an alphabet on a card and a bottle-top into which he and his wife each put a finger, with enormous rapidity.  In addition to this is a romantic story, by writing, of a former incarnation, when he was a German Baron called Schindtreffer, who lived in Mindelheim, Bavaria--a place he says he never heard of--in 1700.  And further, of 9 cases of money and jewels and papers, said to have been sent with his son to Brittany in 1713, and buried in a particular place to avoid an attack by robbers.  A map is given of the exact whereabouts, with details of rivers and small villages, and the present aspect of the country.  An ordinance map having been sent for, these villages and rivers are found to exist.  And now nothing will satisfy him but to start forth and hunt, and another lawyer is putting up the journey money, partly because he is smitten with the romance of the thing, and partly to share in the possible treasure.  And I am to go too, to translate, as they can’t speak a word of French.  All kinds of family details are given of the Schindtreffer affair, including an “apport” of a photograph of a picture, said to be in the Munich gallery, of his then-wife, and brought by her!  This we shall investigate first.  We’ll see!

As ever,

E.F.

N.B. I don’t believe the Brittany story, but I do believe in the Jinn.

A short time later, Carrington received a follow-up report:

Just returned from Transylvania.  The lawyer and his wife, and I hope the Jinn too, are coming to stay with me here for a few days.  If he produces a pump in my dining room I shall be pleased.

My Transylvanians have gone, and I am left hopelessly puzzled by the whole business.  There were a considerable number of phenomena here, though nothing at all like they were in Hungary.  Nearly all could (though in some cases with great difficulty) be attributed to the wife.  They nearly all came at unexpected moments, and it was thus impossible to control them.  There was also fraud, e.g., when a snipe, which was found on the dinner-lamp (on indications of the spook at the end of dinner) was traced as having been bought by the wife in a neighboring shop.  At the same time, the circumstances of this “apport” are otherwise so curious--the lamp having previously been examined by the servant before dinner, and the snipe being so very obvious once it was seen--that it is almost unthinkable that it should have escaped observation.

If one accepts the possibility of a poltergeist, it is possible to suppose that part of the phenomenon, namely the purchase of the snipe, was carried through normally by the medium, and the remainder, namely the apport, by the spook.  She said she did not remember anything about the purchase, but in hypnosis I recovered the memory.  She said she was sitting in the park, and that her sister came to her and insisted upon her going with her, and bought the snipe, and then took it away after returning with her to the park.  Her husband, who was present, appeared amazed at this, and said he had no knowledge of any sister, and certainly none in London.  She then said that the sister was sitting in a chair in the room, and got up and went towards her, and then appeared to pursue a phantom round the room, upsetting everything as she went, ending up at the window, apparently very much frightened, and saying that her sister was outside, laughing at her.  Questioned after awakening, she said that she had an elder sister with whom she had not been on good terms, and who had died some ten years ago.  In hypnosis I also recovered the memory in similar conditions of another attempt to purchase something which she knew normally I had been unable to trace.

All this looks very much like double personality action, and therefore in the realm of subconscious and not conscious fraud, in a trance condition.  She does, as a matter-of-fact, fall very readily into trances, e.g., when I play the piano she falls spontaneously into a trance and dances, but her husband says that this is the first time he has any knowledge of a trance occurring outside the house.

As a result of five weeks’ intimate seeing of the people, I am more inclined to believe in their honesty than otherwise, but in view of the fraud it is impossible at present to put forward such a theory, excepting to anyone already familiar with these curious hypnoid conditions--and who has not seen, as I have, a certain number of phenomena under really good control.

The best controlled phenomena here were a rapid drumming on the table during dinner, exactly as though one were drumming with one’s fingers, although the hands were visible and the feet controlled--not concurrently, but immediately after--and seemed far away from any contact.  Besides, the noise was one which could not be made with the feet as far as I am aware.

I went with them last week to Brittany.  The man said he could not resume his ordinary work without having visited the place.  Excepting the names of small places, nothing was found correct, and he returned to Hungary much disappointed.  He appeared frightfully concerned about his wife’s “unconscious” fraud, and seemed terrified lest in this presumably trance condition she should do dishonest actions.  He begged me again to visit him in Hungary, and to carry-on the control in a still more rigorous manner, if the phenomena continue, and to bring someone with me to help.  I do wish you were here…

Unfortunately, the outbreak of WWI prevented any further investigation of the “Jinn,” which apparently ceased its operations after the lawyer and his wife returned to Transylvania.  Unsurprisingly, but disappointingly,  the Schindtreffer “buried treasure” was never located.

The following are the most relevant extracts from a pamphlet published by the Reverend Alexander Telfair in 1695:  "A true relation of an apparition expressions and actings of a spirit which infected the house of Andrew Mackie in Ring-Croft of Stocking, in the paroch of Kerrick, in the stewartry of Kirkcudbright, in Scotland."  It is a fascinating account of what we today would call one particularly destructive poltergeist.

Telfair prefaced his narrative by expressing his reluctance to appear "in print, to the view of the world."  However, his modesty was overcome by "the conviction and confutation of that prevailing spirit of atheism and infidelity in our time, denying, both in opinion and practice, the existence of spirits, and consequently a heaven and a hell; and imputing the voices, apparitions, and actings of good or evil spirits, to the melancholic disturbance or distemper of the brains and fancies of those who pretend to hear, see, or feel them."

In other words, Rev. Telfair was anticipating our modern world's insistence that alleged paranormal activities are "all in your head," and blowing a big raspberry.

After providing a long list of local worthies who were ready and eager to attest to the truth of his story, Telfair begins:

Whereas many are desirous to know the truth of the matter as to the evil spirit and its actings, that troubleth the family of Andrew Mackie in Ringcroft of Stocking, and are liable to be misinformed, as  I do find by the reports that come to my own ears of that matter, Therefore that satisfaction may be given, and such mistakes may be cured or prevented: I, the minister of the said Parish (who was present several times, and was witness to many of its actings, and have heard an account of the whole of its methods and actings from the persons present, towards whom, and before whom it did act) have given the ensuing, and short account of the whole matter, which l can attest to be the very truth as to that affair.

In the month of February, 1695, the said Andrew Mackie had some young beasts, which in the night-time were still loosed, and their bindings broken; he taking it to be the unruliness of the beasts, did make stronger and stronger bindings of withes and other things; but still all were broken. At last he suspected it to be some other thing, whereupon he removed them out of that place; and the first night thereafter, one of them was bound with a hair-tedder to the back of the house, so strait that the feet of the beast only touched the ground, but could not move no way else, yet it sustained no hurt. Another night, when the family were all sleeping, there was the full of an back-creel of peats set together in midst of the house-floor, and fire put in them; the smoke wakened the family, otherwise the house had been burnt; yet nothing all the while was either seen or heard. 

Upon the 7th of March there were stones thrown in the house, in all the places of it, but it could not be discovered from whence they came, what, or who threw them: after this manner it continued till the Sabbath, now and then throwing, both in the night and the day, but was busiest throwing in the night time.

Upon the Sabbath, being the 11th of March, the crook and potclips [implements for cooking pots]were taken away, and were a wanting four days, and were found at last on a loft where they had been sought several times before. This is attested by Charles Macklelane of Colline, and John Cairns in Hardhills. It was observed that the Stones which hit any person, had not half their natural weight, and the throwing was more frequent on the Sabbath, than at other times: and especially in time of prayer, above all other times, it was busiest, then throwing most at the person praying. The said Andrew Mackie told the matter to me upon Sabbath after sermon; upon the Tuesday thereafter I went to the house, did stay a considerable time with them, and prayed twice, and there was no trouble: then I came out with a resolution to leave the house, and as I was standing speaking to some men at the barn-end, I saw two little stones drop down on the croft at a little distance from me; and immediately some came crying out of the house, that it was become as ill as ever within, whereupon I went into the house again, and as I was at prayer, it threw several stones at me, but they did no hurt, being very small: and after there was no more trouble till the 18th day of March, and then it began as before, and threw more frequently greater stones, whose strokes were surer where they hit: and thus it continued to the 21st.

Then I went to the home and stayed a great part of the night, but was greatly troubled; stones, and several other things were thrown at me.  I was struck several times on the sides and shoulders, very sharply, with a great staff, so that those who were present heard the noise of the strokes: that night it threw off the bedside, and rapped upon the chests and boards as one calling for access.  This is attested by Charles Macklelane of Colline, William Mackminn, and John Tait in Torr.  That night, as I was once at prayer, leaning on a bed-side, I felt something pressing up my arm, and casting my eyes thither, perceived a little white hand and arm from the elbow down, but presently it vanished: it is to be observed, that notwithstanding all that was felt and heard, from the first to the last of this matter, there was never any thing seen, except that hand I saw, and a friend of the said Andrew Mackie's said he saw as it were a young man, redfaced, with yellow hair, looking in at the window; and other two or three persons, with the said Andrew his children, saw, at several times, as it were a young boy, about the age of 14 years, with gray cloths, and a bonnet on his head, but presently disappeared; as also what the three children saw sitting by the fireside. 

April. 3. It whistled several times, and cried wisht, wisht, this is attested by Andrew Tait. Upon the 4th of April, Charles Macklelane of Colline land-lord, with the said Andrew Mackie, went to a certain number of ministers met at Buttle, and gave them an account of the matter; whereupon these ministers made public prayers for the family, and two of their number, viz. Mr Andrew Howart, minister of Kells, and Mr John Murdo, minister of Corsmichael, came to the house and spent that night in fasting and praying : but it was very cruel against them, especially by throwing great stones, some of them about half an stone weight. It wounded Mr Andrew Ewart twice in the head, to the effusion of his blood, it pulled off his wig in time of prayer, and when he was holding out his napkin betwixt his hands, it cast a stone in the napkin, and therewith threw it from him: It gave Mr John Murdo several sore strokes; yet the wounds and bruises received did soon cure. 

There were none in the house that night escaped from some of its fury and cruelty: That night it threw a fiery peat among the people; but did no hurt, it only disturbed them in time of prayer: and also in the dawning, as they rose from prayer, the stones poured down on all who were in the house to their hurt: this is attested by Mr Andrew Mewart, Mr John Murdo, Charles Macklelane, and John Tait. 

Upon the 5th of April: It set some thatch straw in fire which was in the barnyard:  At night the house being very throng with neighbours, the stones were still thrown down among them : as the said Andrew Mackie his wife went to bring in some peats for the fire, when she came to the door she found a broad stone to shake under her foot, which she never knew to be loose before: she resolved with her self to see what was beneath it in the morning thereafter. Upon the 6th of April, when the house was quiet, she went to the stone, and there found seven small bones, with blood, and some flesh, all closed in a piece of old suddled [soiled] paper; the blood was fresh and bright, the sight whereof troubled her, and being afraid, laid all down again; and ran to Colline his house, being an quarter of a mile distant: but in that time it was worse than ever it was before; by throwing stones and fire balls, in and about the house, but the fire as it lighted did evanish: in that time it threw an hot stone into the bed betwixt the children, which burnt through the bed cloaths.

Upon the 9th of April, the bones were sent to the ministers, who were all occasionally met at Kirkcudbright, they appointed five of their number, viz. Mr John Murdo, Mr James Monteith, Mr John Mackmillan, Mr Samuel Spalding, and Mr William Falconer, with me, to go to the House, and spend so much time in fasting and praying as we were able.

Upon the 10th of April we went to the house, and no sooner did I begin to open my mouth, but it threw stones at me, and all within the house, but still worst at him who was at duty: it came often with such force upon the house that it made all the house to shake, it brake an hole through the timber and thatch of the house, and poured in great stones: it gripped, and handled the legs of some as with a man’s hand; it hoisted up the feet of others while standing on the ground, thus it did to William Lennox of Mill-house, myself, and others; in this manner it continued till ten o clock at night, but after that there was no more trouble. 

The 16th it continued whistling, groaning, whisling [whispering], and throwing stones in time of prayer; it cryed Bo, Bo, and Kick, Cuck, and shook men back and forward, and hoisted them up as if it would lift them off their knees. This is attested by Andrew Tait.

The 20th it continued throwing stones, whisling, and whisting with all its former words: when it hit any person, and said, Take you that till you get more, that person was sure immediately of another; but when it said, Take you that, the person got no more for a while. This is attested by John Tait.

The 21st, 22nd, 23rd, it continued casting stones, beating with staves and throwing peat-mud in the faces of all in the house, especially in time of prayer, with all its former tricks. The 24th being a day of humiliation appointed to be kept in the parish for that cause; all that day, from morning to night, it continued in a most fearful manner without intermission, throwing stones with such cruelty and force, all in the house feared lest they should be killed.

The 26th, it threw stones in the evening, and knocked on a chest several times as one to have access; and began to speak, and call those who were sitting in the house witches, and rakes, and said it would take them to hell.

Upon the 27th it set the house seven times in fire. The 28th, being the Sabbath, from sun rising to sun setting, it still set the house in fire; as it was quenched in one part, instantly it was fired in another: and in the evening, when it could not get its designs fulfilled in burning the house, it pulled down the end of the house, all the stone work thereof, so that they could not abide in it any longer, but went and kindled their fire in the stable.

Upon Tuesday's night, being the 3rd of April, Charles Macklelane of Colline, with several neighbours, were in the barn; as he was at prayer he observed a black thing in the corner of the barn, and it did increase, as if it would fill the whole house; he could not discern it to have any form, but as if it had been a black cloud, it was affrighting to them all; and then it threw bear chaff and other mud upon their faces, and after did grip several who were in the house by the middle of the body, by the arms and other parts of their bodies, so strait, that some said, for five days thereafter they thought they felt these grips: after an hour or two of the night was thus past there was no more trouble. This is attested by Charles Macklelane, Thomas Mackminn, Andrew Paline, John Cairns and John Tait. 

Upon Wednesday's night, being the 1st of May, it fired a little sheephouse; the sheep were got out safe, but the sheep house was wholly burnt. Since there hath not been any trouble about the house by night or by day. Now all things aforesaid being of undoubted verity, therefore I conclude with that of the Apostle, 1 Pet. v. 8, 9, "Be sober, be vigilant, because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about seeking whom he may devour: Whom resist, steadfast in the faith.”

Telfair could offer only one possible explanation for why the Mackie household was so bedeviled:

"Whereas one Macknaught, who sometimes before possessed that house, did not thrive in his own person or goods. It seems he had sent his son to a witch-wife, who lived then at the Routing-bridge, in the parish of Iron-gray, to enquire what might be the cause of the decay of his person and goods. The youth, meeting with some foreign soldiers, went abroad to Flanders, and did not return with an answer. Some years after, there was one John Redick in this parish, who, having had occasion to go abroad, met with the said young Macknaught in Flanders, and they knowing other, Macknaught enquired after his father and other friends; and finding the said John Redick was to go home, desired him to go to his father, or who ever dwelt in the Ring-croft, and desire them to raise the door-threshold, and search till they found a tooth, and burn it, for none who dwelt in that house would thrive till that was done. The said John Redick coming home, and finding the old man Macknaught dead, and his wife out of that place, did never mention the matter, nor further mind it, till this trouble was in Andrew Mackie's family, then he spoke of it, and told the matter to myself. Betwixt Macknaught's death, and Andrew Mackie's possession of this house, there was one Thomas Telfair, who possessed it some years; what way he heard the report of what the witch-wife had said to Macknaught's son, I cannot tell; but he searched the door-threshold, and found something like a tooth; did compare it with the tooth of man, horse, nolt [cattle], and sheep, (as he said to me), but could not say which it did resemble, only it did resemble a tooth. He did cast it in the fire, where it burnt like a candle, or so much tallow; yet he never knew any trouble about that house by night or by day, before or after, during his possession."

Via Newspapers.com

Unfortunately, the following is all I could find about what was potentially an intriguing poltergeist case, but I thought it was still worth sharing.  The “New York Daily News,” April 21, 1962:

St. Brieuc, France, April 20-Police and church officials today were investigating reports of a "ghost" in two Brittany villages who is said to have "attacked" people's clothing. 

A man at Landebia recently found himself practically undressed in the market place after seams in his clothing had given away, the reports said. 

Large acid-like burns were said to have appeared on the clothes of a family in Henabbihen--while they were wearing them. The "ghost" slit all the bed-sheets of another family.

Henry John “Johnny” Brophy was, to all outward appearances, a perfectly ordinary little boy.  Although described as “slightly crippled” (as a toddler, he had been run over by a carriage) he managed to lead a normal life.  His mother was still alive, and living in Madison, Wisconsin, but since the age of two Henry lived with his grandparents, Mr. and Mrs. Kaut Lund, in nearby Mt. Horeb.  (It seems to be unrecorded why he wasn’t living with his mother, who had remarried after Henry’s father died.)  Until he was eleven years old, Henry gave no indication that he was about to get a brief nationwide fame as the “Child of Mystery.”

Young Henry’s descent into The Weird began on March 9, 1909.  As the boy was entering a side door of his home, he was hit in the back with a snowball.  The impact was so fierce, he was knocked to the ground.  Once he picked himself up, he looked outside for his attacker.  He saw nobody.

The next day, another large snowball hit him.  His grandparents joined him in the hunt for this phantom practical joker, but again, no one was in the vicinity.  The three of them shrugged--hey, life does funny things sometimes--and dismissed the mystery from their minds.

On March 11, as the trio sat down for dinner, things suddenly happened which were impossible to ignore.  Various objects--cups, bars of soap, spools of thread--began being hurled throughout the room by invisible hands, quite thoroughly terrifying the family, and, I presume, really ruining their meal.

The following day, Henry’s mother was in town in order to attend a funeral.  That evening, as they were all in the sitting room, the spectral Hurler of Inanimate Objects made another appearance.  Various household items suddenly flew through the air, and the furniture began moving itself around.  The sight was so shocking that Henry’s grandfather feared he would have a heart attack.  The family, not knowing what else to do, called in their minister, the Reverend Mostrom.  Mostrom soon arrived at the home, accompanied by a family friend, Sam Thompson.  The two men were greeted by a Bible, which threw itself off a table and landed at the Reverend’s feet.

When Mostrom, in an effort to calm the group, began playing a hymn on the organ, their invisible guest seemed to take offense.  A carving knife flew past him, embedding itself in the floor in front of Thompson.  This was soon followed by a hatpin.

"San Francisco Examiner," August 22, 1909, via Newspapers.com

The clergyman’s visit just seemed to accelerate the eerie assaults.  Lamps would suddenly and mysteriously shatter.  The hinges of doors would unaccountably lose their screws, causing them to fall to the floor.  Out of nowhere, the family would be pelted with coal.  It was noted that these frightening occurrences only happened when Henry was in the house, leaving many to conclude that he was somehow responsible.  However, others asked, how could an eleven-year-old of only average intelligence somehow fool all the adults around him?  

Some speculated that the household objects were moving because the house had both electricity and phone service.  Perhaps this was causing items to become literally electrified?  The Lunds were skeptical about this theory, choosing instead to believe that Henry had somehow been secretly hypnotized, and his trance state was somehow causing the uproar.  

In an effort to settle the question of whether Henry was--consciously or not--responsible for what was happening, he was sent to visit his uncle Andrew in Springfield.  The minute Henry walked through his uncle’s front door, a pail of water began spinning, dashing its contents on the floor.  A mirror crashed to the ground, shattering into fragments.

That question was being clearly answered.

Poor Henry was rapidly becoming unpopular among the other children, as it was impossible to play with him without things going right off the rails.  When he and another boy tried a game of marbles, the marbles not only kept disappearing, the ones that remained insisted on moving themselves.  The terrified boys both fled.  When Henry tried racing the other children, invisible hands pelted him with rocks and dirt clods.  Storekeepers refused to allow him into their shops, because whenever Henry came in, jars would fall off the shelves and break.  Even the family cat refused to go near him.

When Andrew brought the boy back to his grandparents, he included a present: a basket of eggs.  When he placed the basket on a table, he was unnerved to see an egg shoot out and shatter on Henry’s face.

The frazzled family decided to seek medical help.  Henry was examined by a number of doctors, who reported that he was physically normal.  These physicians said the boy must, in some unknown fashion, be playing a gigantic prank on everybody.  The Lunds then held a prayer meeting in their home, which just seemed to make matters worse.  One George Kingsley, who was both a doctor and a spiritualist, told the family that Henry was obviously a talented medium.  The strange events they were experiencing were merely due to the boy not having the training to control his psychic powers.  Another spiritualist claimed that Henry was surrounded by three spirits: two women and a man.  The publicity the boy was unwillingly attracting became so intense that the Lunds posted an announcement in the local paper, begging the crowds and reporters to leave them in peace.

Fortunately for the family, Henry’s “wild talents”--whatever may have been their source--soon faded away.  By the time of his marriage in 1917, he had long returned to being a perfectly ordinary mortal who, one hopes, spent the rest of his days in peaceful obscurity.

Graveyard at Mink Creek, "Logan Herald Journal," October 29, 1976, via Newspapers.com

The following ghost story was, unfortunately, never fully investigated, so it is hard to tell how much of it is solid fact, and how much is folklore.  However, it’s an intriguing enough tale that--with the above caveats--I wanted to give it a niche in the hallowed halls of Strange Company HQ.

Some time around 1900, a family named Burrell was living in Mink Creek, a small rural community in Idaho.  Rumors began spreading that there were some sort of weird and ominous happenings going on in the family’s log cabin.  Intrigued by these stories, a group of threshers who were working nearby decided to turn amateur paranormal investigators, and invited themselves over to spend the night at the Burrell place.  The family told them that all would be well as long as a lamp kept burning.  After a couple of hours of boredom, the threshers called for the lamp to be extinguished.  The oldest Burrell daughter protested, “No, it will come!”  However, the threshers got their way.  As reassurance, two men held her arms, while the rest surrounded her bed.

“It” indeed soon came.  From a distance up the canyon, everyone heard “a soft wailing sound like a high wind.”  The sound became closer and louder, until by the time it reached the cabin, it had become a terrifying roar.  The Burrell girl began moaning and trembling.  The horses outside began stamping in agitation.  A loud bang erupted in a corner of the cabin, followed by a swishing sound.  A “something” landed with a crash on the table.  The girl went into hysterics and fainted.

One of the men cursed whatever had invaded the cabin.  He instantly began to spasm, as if he was being shaken.  He began gurgling and begging to be let go.

Very wisely, the lamp was re-lit.  Everyone saw what seemed to be teeth marks on the girl’s arm, and bruising on the man’s throat, as if something had tried to choke him.  The Burrells told the man that this happened every night they failed to keep a light burning.

On another occasion, an unnamed man and his friend, Joe Johnson, expressed skepticism of these lurid ghost tales, so they also spent the night with the Burrells, just to see what might happen.  (What the Burrells thought about providing supernatural entertainment for their neighbors is unrecorded.)  The lights were turned out.  Everyone heard a sinister noise, and saw a shadow on the wall moving through the room.  Johnson grabbed his gun and gave the shadow a dose of buckshot.  Immediately afterwards, Johnson and the Burrell girl began screaming.  When the lamps came back on, finger marks were on both their throats.

The two doubters were, to say the least, convinced.

Eventually, the Burrells moved away from Mink Creek, but it was said the malevolent spirit followed them wherever they went.  Worse still, as each Burrell daughter married, the haunting was “inherited” by the next oldest girl.  Mr. Burrell, we are told, eventually died a “hideous death.”

As for why the family suffered such spiritual persecution, their neighbors talked about an old Danish couple who had lived in Mink Creek some time earlier.  Deciding that America wasn’t to their liking, the pair saved enough money to return to their home country.  Mr. Burrell volunteered to drive them to the train station.  However, their relatives in Denmark reported that the couple had never arrived.  In fact, they were never seen again.  The supposition was that Burrell had stolen their money and murdered them.  The hauntings began very soon after the couple vanished.  Possible evidence for this story emerged some years later, when during the construction of a factory, two skeletons were excavated.

To this day, local residents still speak of the “Mink Creek Ghost,” and believe the land where the Burrell cabin once stood is still haunted.

Via Newspapers.com

This odd little maybe-it-was-a-poltergeist-maybe-it-wasn't story appeared in the "Greenville (South Carolina) News," May 15, 1960:

GAFFNEY (AP) - It's a little spooky when a milk-filled glass suddenly shatters in the hand. 

Or when the best glass ash tray cracks with a loud noise. 

Equally ghostly is the noticeable break in a sea shell that adorns a living room end table. 

A vase and serving tray also are victims of the silent menace that has plagued the fragile contents of the Brian Eppley home in Gaffney for the past several weeks. 

Mr. Eppley, a former Charlotte resident who recently moved to Gaffney, believes these breakages are caused by frequency waves emitting from his television receiver. 

"You can't hear anything," he states, "but I can feel it...like pressure, beyond the area of hearing, from these waves." 

He says he develops a headache while watching TV.

Mrs. Eppley says that objects break only after the set has been on for a long period. "And the breaks occur only while the TV is on," she adds. 

Mr. and Mrs. Eppley were sitting in front of their TV set a few days ago. Suddenly, they heard a loud report. Their ash tray had split in the center. 

Later, other objects fell under the mysterious spell. 

Then the chain of events was climaxed when a glass broke into pieces while Mrs. Eppley held it and watched TV.

I couldn't find any follow-ups to this mystery, although three months after this story was published, South Carolina papers carried a small news item informing us that Brian D. Eppley, a former Charlotte resident who had recently moved to Gaffney, was arrested on charges of armed robbery.  Maybe he needed to pay for a new television.

Via Newspapers.com

This account of a ghost who really resented sharing its apartment with roommates appeared in the “New York Times,” March 25, 1900:

Within a stone's throw of the headquarters of the Square-Back Rangers, in Cherry Street, is a three-room front flat, which has come near enough to being haunted, so that no tenant has remained more than a few hours within its walls for the goodly space of nineteen years. Tenants have presumed to move in only to hustle out, after finding their furniture turned upside down and their handsome framed chromos turned to the wall by occult influences. 

The “bravest guy" on Cherry Hill five years ago ventured to go into the hallway several hours after twilight.  He could see nothing there, but he got a thump in the eye and also managed to get a swollen cheek. He said it was the nastiest scrap he ever ran up against. 

An old French woman nineteen years ago became agonized with grief over the loss of her husband, who had sickened and died in this fat. One night she took a blanket and a stout clothes line, and with their help hanged herself on the bedroom door. She was found dead in the morning and her body was taken down by the neighbors.

Since that tragedy the flat has been uninhabitable. Cherry Hill lights hesitate to say that it is haunted, because they do not believe that the ghost of the unfortunate French woman ever comes back to the scene of death. But, everybody in the old Fourth Ward knows that there is something the matter with that flat. There were the Ryans, who were just as respectable a family as ever lived in the hill, and they had no skeletons in their family closet to excite the sinister ill-will of a ghost. They moved into the flat--husband and wife and three children. About an hour after they had all gone to bed there was one of the greatest rackets that ever took place in a genuinely haunted house.

The family woke up to see their furniture being thrown all over the flat by some invisible agency. The husband was punched in the face and the wife had her left eye blackened and the children came down with the whooping cough. All this happened in about ten minutes time. Six hours had been used to move into the flat, but it took that family just fifty minutes to get out with all their belongings.

Four or five other families tried their luck, but the hoodoo was too alert and strong. Old Mike Finnegan could not stand it when his stove, which had been securely set up in position, dropped over on its side. Every kind of tenant has tried it except the Italians, and front flats on the hill are not accessible to them. Nobody has ever seen anything in that flat which could cause a rumpus. No ghost has ever been detected.

The flat is known on the hill as the “stable alley," and any spirit, investigator who really wants to see the place can find it by asking the first longshoreman he meets on the hill for directions to the house where Jackie Haggerty lost the last shred of his reputation by letting himself get a black eye from the evil influence in the hallway. Jackie used to cut a good deal of ice in the social firmament of Cherry Hill before he queered himself in the haunted flat. 

Psychical students can get more real information in five minutes spent in that flat after dark about the spirit business than they get now in a whole series of Winter lectures at a lyceum on the way brain molecules have of wagging on St. Patrick's eve and other great spirit occasions of the year. 

There is a man on the hill who has never been out of the Fourth Ward.  He was born in the haunted flat before the evil days came upon that habitation, but he has not crossed the threshold of his birthplace for twenty years, and all the profits of the Gambling Commission could not induce him to visit the scenes of his childhood. He says, though, that he does not believe the flat is haunted.

I have to admit, a ghost that can give kids an instant case of whooping cough is a new one for me.

Hafod Uchtryd, circa 1795

As I have mentioned a number of times before, Wales is a wonderful source for ghost tales, folklore, accounts of strange creatures, and basic High Strangeness of all sorts, so it’s no surprise that the land has spawned some first-class poltergeists, as well.  In 1759, lexicographer Lewis Morris wrote a letter to his brother Richard describing the lively spectral doings which were then happening at the estate of Hafod Uchtryd in Ceredigion:

Great numbers of honest people agree, and those of no mean understanding, that an invisible power performed extraordinary feats at Havod in the year 1751, and that the same kind or the like feats are now performed there after an intermission of 8 years.  A sensible man told me he had seen in the kitchen there by daylight the potatoes in a basket made ready to be boiled jump out one after another towards the top of the room, and were no more seen till they soon returned into the basket, as you have seen maggots jump out of cheese in hot weather.  

Several others that were in company at that house in 1751 told me there was about 15 of them one night in the same room, who had met there out of curiosity.  The room was shut close.  The hearth was soon full of stones--some as large as one’s hand, all laid gently down there by an invisible power without hurting anybody.  One of the company took the largest of the stones and put it under his foot that he might keep it secure as he thought, but while they were in full talk about the surprising effects of the spirit, all the stones were instantly removed to the other end of the room, and that on which the man had his foot along with the rest; and at the same time they could hear a tinkling in a brass pan which was in the room, and nobody near it.

At other times this invisible power would lift up a large hall table as much as 4 men could lift and turn it feet uppermost, and knock it against the top of the room, and in an instant put it in its place.

Once the mistress called her maid to bring a certain tub with oatmeal on the table to make the bread, and in an instant this officious fellow heaped up the tub with oatmeal and threw it on the table without spilling a grain, which would have been impossible for any human being to do.

He broke a parson’s head till the blood ran for pretending to control him, and a son of John Rowlands, then tenant, that was in bed with the parson, had a cut on his nose, and he’ll carry the scar to his grave.  You see what it is to keep bad company.

Evan Williams, who you know, saw a piece of window glass fall from the air on a table there, without breaking, which no man could have done, and a piece of painted delft ware come gently on a person’s plate that eat there.

This intruder would take John Rowlands’ great coat and button it about a chair, and place 2 or 3 peats on the top of the chair for a neck and a hat atop of that, which no man could possibly balance to stand there, and when the old man would hit them down with his hand in a passion, and cry what is this foolish fancy, all the buttons of the great coat would open instantly and the coat thrown after him.   This strange gentleman was more free and paid more pranks with the old man than with any of the family.  He would sometimes raise a great coffer with oatmeal, and put it athwart the bed over the old man’s legs.  He would often open the curtains and pull the clothes off his bed; it grew so busy at last till all the servants were tired with his company, and chose to leave him in possession of the house.  How he’ll behave with his friend Brych time will show.

I had forgot to tell you that when the stones as above were removing about the room, a person in thin pumps was heard to walk very gently and slide on the boards above them, while at the same time there was knocking in the brass pan, so it seems there is more than one of them, perhaps he may have his female as well as Brych, if bwganod [ghosts or goblins] do propagate their species.

Now upon all this what can we say?  The evidence of his being there is of the strongest kind, but why should he play those monkey tricks, and why not play more of them as it is in his power to play some of them?  He is no good being, for he might be at home doing something if he was.  Is he a devil, one of the inhabitants of hell?  He is a simple one if he is, otherwise he would have put on the shape of an angel of light, and cunningly have infused pernicious doctrines into the head of Brych, who was so well qualified to receive them.

Other sources say that the “bwganod” liked to laugh and shout and “kiss women in the dark.”  At other times, it would appear as “a beautiful woman wanting to be kissed” and a pig that would rub against the master and mistress of the estate.

The Hafod poltergeist was not only versatile, but unusually persistent.  In 1879, one Charles Wilkins noted that the bwganod had moved its main base of operations to the stables:  “If Mr. Johnes wanted a horse saddled quickly, the moment it was done, everything would be taken off by invisible hands.  Busy stablemen would get lumps of turf thrown at them, and they would be obliged to run away in fear and trembling, and when they returned it was to find everything in disorder--combs and brushes lying about in all sorts of places, harnesses piled in a heap, and, in fact, just such a condition of things as one might expect from the hands of a practical joker.”

Hafod Uchtryd was eventually destroyed by a fire that was widely suspected to have been caused by the resident bwganod.  Whether this was the case or not, the spirit continued to make its usual mischief around the ruins.  The owner, Thomas Johnes, had no desire to rebuild his home around a trouble-making sprite, so he engaged a conjurer to perform an exorcism.  This expert summoned the bwganod and turned it into a fly, which he snapped up in his book of spells.  The spirit was then ordered to “betake himself to Devil’s Bridge, and there with an ounce hammer and a tin tack cut off a fathom of the rock.”

Although this sounds like a spectral success story, Hafod--considered one of Europe’s finest 18th century picturesque landscapes--is still considered to be haunted.  It is a justly popular hiking area, if you don’t mind the possibility that you will be sharing your walk with a vintage hobgoblin.

Via Newspapers.com

It's Mystery Water time!  The "Leicester Mercury," November 11, 1991:

A family today claimed they were being plagued by a ghost that leaves patches of water which then vanish throughout their Leicester home. 

The Boulter family say their four-bedroom council house on the Netherhall estate has been disrupted by the spirit--believed to be that of a former woman resident. 

In the past two weeks they claim the ghoulish goings-on have become so troublesome they have called in county exorcist Canon Ken Quine. 

Blessed palm crucifixes have now been hung in the home, which the family say has been haunted since they moved in two years ago. 

Pensioner Mrs Doris Boulter (70) said: “It hasn’t bothered me up to now, but now things are getting really bad. We find water everywhere--on the beds, chairs, and carpets. A couple of days ago I picked up the remote control to change the TV channel and it was dripping wet. But within minutes it was dry again.” 

She added: “Two men from the council have been out but couldn't find a leak anywhere “The strange thing is the liquid doesn’t seep through and it is silky to the touch." 

Her railway worker son Stephen (36) who lives with Doris, her husband Frank, (68) sister Janet, (30) and his son Luke, aged eight, said the family has become worried by the incidents.  

“I work a constant night shift, and when I come home the house feels colder than it is outside. I get a real shiver down my spine. It affects my mum more than anyone but my little boy is bothered by it too,” he said. 

Canon Quine, vicar of Belgrave, who has been studying psychic phenomena for 25 years, confirmed the bizarre happenings.

He has visited the home twice, and on one occasion saw an apparition of a swarthy woman with dark hair and eyes.

“It is the first time I have come across a spirit using liquid in this way. It seems it wants the family out. The substance is not water and simply disappears in minutes so cannot be analysed.” 

He added: “It is all very disturbing for the family and I will do what I can to help them.” 

Two neighbours have also seen the water appear.

I couldn’t find any follow-ups to the story, so perhaps, as so often happens in poltergeist accounts, the strange phenomena soon ended as abruptly as it began.

"Montana Record-Herald," September 24, 1900, via Newspapers.com

This somewhat unusual story about ghosts with a taste for spectral construction work originally appeared in the “Boston Herald” in 1900, but was reprinted in a number of different newspapers.  The author was F.R. Guernsey, an American living in Mexico who was a regular correspondent for the “Herald.”

For scores of years the old one-story stone house on the Street of the Seven Gentlemen in the city of Querendaro had remained in the possession of the Allendes, till, in the troublous times preceding General Diaz's coming into power, it had passed Into the hands of "Col." Marron, guerrilla leader against the French and imperialists, as he preferred to be known; but regarded by the "Mocho" party in the city as a bloody-handed robber and highwayman. 

How the "colonel" had become possessed of the house was something of a mystery. No deed was passed; the old owners, the family of Allende, most respectable people with haciendas and shares in mines. had been extinguished, there remaining, at last, only one old man, as deaf as a wall, to occupy the place. He disappeared one night, and the next day the "colonel" took possession with his "estado mayor” or staff, a desperate crew recruited among the sort of people who hang on the edges of every revolutionary cyclone. And as the "colonel" was a testy person whose hands were stained with powder, and something more doubtful, and as his enemies had a trick of vanishing, nobody in the city dared inquire Into the conditions of his tenure of the Allende property. He was a tall, wiry, sinewy man, with long brownish mustachios, eyes gray and full of fire, a harsh mouth, and an eagle's beak of a nose. Things were unsettled in the state and the "colonel" was much afield, usually in the sierra where, like a hawk, he watched the fertile plain below and swooped down on an unwary enemy. During the war of the Intervention, he commanded as many as 1,410 daredevils, and once had made a dash Into Querendaro, surprising and punishing awfully four thousand French soldiers, some of whom had seen African service, and all tough chaps. That exploit made the name of "Col." Marron famous. For a few days he was master of the city, and good imperialistic citizens were hiding in friendly houses, or getting away in the disguise of cotton-clad peons. A dozen or more were ranged against a wall out by the cemetery and shot for "enemies of the republic." It was said that the "colonel” did some extensive and profitable looting. Anyhow, he seemed, in after years, to have hidden treasure to resort to in case of any financial difficulty.

The Emperor Maximilian went to his doom, and, slowly, peace returned. The iron-handed Juarez ruled in the city of Mexico and finished the anti-clerical programme begun years before by President Comonfort. Friars and nuns were bundled out of the convents and monasteries, great properties, the result of centuries of church rule, were sold to speculative people for whatever they chose to pay, and thus the great leveler, revolution, redistributed accumulated wealth. It seems a natural sort of process; it happened in Henry's time in England; it has occurred In many lands at different epochs. President Juarez gave place to President Lerdo, who was a milder man and had less strenuous work to accomplish, and, finally, there loomed high in the political firmament of Mexico a soldier of genius and the ablest of them all. the great son of destiny, Porflrio Diaz. Lerdo was beaten, and, fleeing, left the country. Thus the dawn of modern Mexico began. A man with vast and Napoleonic plans had begun to build a new national edifice, a statesman who had no fear of American invasion, the friend of Grant and an encourager of railways. 

It was, as has been said, some two years before this restorer of order took Mexico in hand, that "Col." Marron became the de facto owner of the ancient city house of the Allendes. Querendaro was a long way from the federal capital; times were doubtful; he had been a power in his region, and had shown that he could raise troops and command them to good purpose, and so his predatory tastes had to be overlooked by men at the capital. It was no time to bother about a fighting gentleman's peccadilloes.

The occupancy of the old house by the guerrilla chieftain was characterized by prodigal expenditure, much cock fighting on Sunday afternoons, and high gaming. Awful tales were told of people inveigled there, who were tortured into sending letters to their friends in distant places demanding large sums of money for some unmentioned purpose. One party in the city said these were high players who had to send home for money to meet debts of honor, but the few Mochos, or Clerical party men, still alive, whispered that "Col." Marron was no Republican officer, but an out-and-out scoundrel. They only whispered this statement in the privacy of their own houses, and with the doors barred. But Marron carried himself with a high head; he rode abroad with his bodyguard of friends all armed to the teeth, and nobody liked to talk of his doings. He had become possessed of all the bakeries and meat shops of the city, leased them to enterprising north-country Spaniards, or to natives of a business turn of mind, and so had a comfortable monthly income of fully $2,000. Thus, with extra income derived from queer sources, he could live in the style becoming a gentleman and support his henchmen quite like an old-time feudal baron, and just as respectably. In fact, this type of strong, unscrupulous and resolute men paralleled, in the time spoken of, the followers of William the Conqueror: might makes right till lawyers and notaries come along with red sealing wax. much tape, and stiff parchments. You have got to begin somewhere and somehow. Families of the aristocracy begin like the Duke of Argyll’s race, by killing off troublesome property holders and seizing what they have. And, after all, it will be seen on due reflection that Colonel Marron’s manner of accumulating capital was not a whit worse than the exploiting of the general public by the modern kings of finance and the great speculative manipulators of Wall street. They have the men of the long robes to help them steer clear of the awkward points of the criminal code, and take little risk; Marron took big risks, spent his money, and poor people found him likeable. In fact, a numerous party in Querendaro would have mobbed you had you remarked that he was a red-handed villain. They were recipients or his bounty. 

The house was ample, like all old-fashioned Mexican houses, built on broad and generous principles, and suited to the patriarchal life of the people. Fifty guests could easily be accommodated there, and In the palmy days of the Allendes they entertained in baronial style. Marron, their successor, was lavish In his hospitality. Nobody outside of his following lived there: he was a woman hater, and allowed none of the gentler sex on the premises. His cooks were devoted followers. They would not be tempted to poison him.

No one exactly knows what went on in the house and its great gardens and enwalled orchards. There were "high jinks," much feasting, gambling and pistol practice, occasionally strangers, apparently well-to-do, went to the house, and popular rumor ran that they did not always come out again. The Marron tenure lasted from 1874 till 1890. Then the colonel, being old and worn with excitement, and, most of all, with high living, fell ill, and his spirit departed to unknown regions. The Mochos, who were unsympathetic, said he had gone to hell. But as he had merely lived as other able men had done in many periods in the world's history, and gave of his substances to the poor at all times, we may cherish the hope that he fared as well as any feudal baron. 

Don Nicolas Valdemoro, about fifty years old, was the next owner. How he arranged that little matter of the title I don't know. He probably satisfied, for a song, any legal heirs of the Allendes, and Marron's estate had passed into the hands of his only nephew. 

The Licenciado Valdemoro was from Puebla, and as keen as the Poblanos have always been reputed to be. A Philadelphia lawyer would have had to take his dust on the highway of professional competition. And he was hard-headed. He had come to Querendaro in 1888, two years before Marron died. He liked the place, and when the time came, bought it. His family consisted of his wife Elena and three children of between twelve and eighteen, two boys and a girl. He had perhaps ten servants, including the chief gardener, who had peons under him, and they don't count. 

People talked about Marron's uneasy ghost walking about the rooms at night without any regard to locked doors. Servants stayed but a few weeks as a rule, and went away with queer tales to tell. The licenciado grew nervous, and, finally taking a house a few blocks away, began tearing down the Allende-Marron casa. He confided to his friends that he had no fear of anything phantasmal, but his wife not being able to keep servants long, it seemed best to pull down the house and build a new one on its foundations, and then he would have something modern, with the up-to-date conveniences that women like so well. It was a year and a half before the Valdemoros went back to the place, into a house spick and span. brand new and smelling of fresh paint and paper, with a private electric-lighting plant and electric bells all over the house, which was of one story, like the old place. The parish priest blessed the premises and there was a grand fiesta and any amount of champagne. The ghosts were surely banished. They might walk in the orchards, said the licenciado, and much good would it do them.

And the ghosts did remain away until a year ago, when they came back in troops and with any amount of accumulated ingenuity. You would have said that it was “Colonel" Marron and all his desperado gang. The pride of the licenciado’s heart was his collection of oil paintings, many of them selected by him in Europe, and valued at many thousands of dollars. He liked to show them to his guests and expatiate on their merits. 

He had sometimes talked of having a portrait painted of "Colonel" Marron, as a sort of fit historical subject, and, perhaps, if he had carried out his purpose things might have gone better with him. But the Senora De Valdemoro objected, and put her plump Mexican foot on the project.

One morning the licenciado went into the big sala, or parlor, for some purpose and noted with Indignation that several paintings had been pulled from their frames and lay on the floor. He called up all the servants and read the riot act to them. They got down on their knees and assured el senor amo that they could not have been guilty of such vandalism. It was evident that they were sincere, and badly frightened into the bargain. 

A week after, the pictures having been duly restored to their frames, the same thing happened again, only this time several costly paintings had been ripped from the frames and slashed as with knives. Valdemoro was wroth and consulted the chief of police, who sent two trusty and confidential men to stay in the parlor nights. They remained on guard ten days, when one night they saw pictures falling from their frames and heard a smashing of mouldings which terrified them. They bolted into the patio and stayed there, yelling for the licenciado. who arose and went to the sala and saw things for himself. His hair stood up all over his head. He was a badly scared man. He swore rippling, gentle oaths in the Creole manner, too. It was plain that the supernatural visitors were no admirers of the fine arts. So the pictures were taken down, packed, and sent away for storage. The parish priest and his young assistants came and exorcised the demons, and things went well for a few months. Marron had never been addicted to the use of holy water.

One afternoon in summer a servant was sent from the family sitting room to the dining room for a glass of water; she came back and reported that midway in the big dining room somebody had built a wall and that she could not pass beyond It. Her face had grown singularly white and her knees shook. The senora went to the dining room and she, too, ran up against the invisible wall. Then she properly and decorously (as is customary under such circumstances) fainted dead away. When the licenciado, who was away from home, returned, he found his wife in a high fever and delirious. The servants told him what had happened, and he was naturally incredulous. He went to the dining room, but found no wall. Then he cursed them for a pack of imbeciles. But he was uneasy in his mind for all that. 

The next day he remained in the house, his wife still ill. Once he arose and went to his library to fetch a book, and just inside the library door he found a wall, solid, on which you could rap with your knuckles and hurt them. He had a queer feeling about the stomach and in the throat, and went back to his bedroom to reflect and collect his senses. Then he returned to the library and found the wall once more. It was a rough wall, he could tell by the touch, but he could not see it. He retired discomfited.

Next morning, he having said nothing about the matter, he went once again to the library and found no wall. He accused himself of being a victim of an hallucination. But his brain was dizzy and his nerves unstrung. 

The invisible builders were active for weeks; there were times when the dining room was obstructed, and always in the middle, across which a good stiff wall had been erected. Only no one could see it. Neighbors intimate with the Valdemoro family were called in, and they felt the wall and were wonderstruck. In an hour the wall had vanished, and for months the family could move about freely, but a few weeks ago, the house became again the scene of building operations. Valdemoro called in an architect, who made measurements, and finally submitted a plan; it was, in outline, a very good sketch of the old Allende-Marron house; the old walls were rising just as they had before. Jokers said that the dead-and-gone Allendes were recovering their property, of which they had been dispossessed. The Valdemoros moved out during such hours as the invisible builders made their walls passable. The house stands unoccupied; Valdemoro is puzzling over a nice legal question, namely, the right of ghostly owners to erect a house within your own. The descendants of the old Mocho families of the city are wagging their heads and saying, "I told you so." On some days, you can wander all over Licenciado Valdemoro's new house; on other days you run up against unseeable walls. 

The fame of the house is spreading beyond Querendaro. Some people say it is the work of the Allendes; most people fancy it is a trick of "Col." Marron and his henchmen. I don't pretend to know; I only put down the story as told by travelers from Querendaro. It is a psychical "nut" of the most unbreakable sort.

The archives of the Humble Oil & Refining Company are about the last place where you’d expect to run across a first-rate poltergeist account, but it just goes to show that we live in a funny old world.  In 1948, a folklorist and historian was browsing through the company’s papers when he came across a letter that had absolutely nothing to do with oil.  It read:

Jan [illegible] '26

Mineral Wells

Manager Humble Oil Co. Cisco

Dear Sir

I know you will think I am batty but I hope I am not. I understand from Mr. R T. Woodson who is figuring with you to lease the old B Y. Woodson farm 6 miles south of Cisco. B Y Woodson was my wifes Grandfather.... Now this is a Spooky Story but Its a fact In the Early day in the Setling up of that Teritory B Y Woodson bought that place from yet an earlier Setler with the one Room log-house which Still remaines in part & after living there some years thare got to be some Strange things going on thare would be Knocking on the wall outside & finally whatever it was would get up Stairs while the family was all in the Room & throw Rocks Eggs Butcher Knives & all Kinds of things from up Stairs & they would rush up Stairs & make a Search & not a thing to be found & hundreds of People went thare & witnessed that performance & the mistery was never Solved & Every one believed that there was Some Kind of Treasure under the house & all at once all of that monkeying quit. If you will go & have a look around just whare the house stands you will find a Tea Pot dome with lots of black Oil & gas rocks on it & thare may be oil there. I forgot to say that the first Strange thing that happened thare was late one night my wifes father & another man was in the Room Setting by the fire & all of a Suddent a small cole black little Negro Boy Stood before them & Said nor done nothing for a flew minutes & then Vanished. Say I'll be(t) an oil well you wont go down there & spend a night in that house all alone. Now if you Will put down a well at the South West Corner of the log Shack you are bound to get a big oil well as thats whare the Spook always started to perform. I go down thare every Fall to gather Pecans... Let me hear how you like this Spook Story.... yours Truly

A C. Traweek

714 E. Hubbard St.

The historian was naturally intrigued, and wondered if there was any way of gathering more details about this bit of The Weird.  After asking around, he was directed to a Cisco oil man, O.G. Lawson.  Lawson was delighted to do a little sleuthing.  In April 1949, his efforts were rewarded when he found an elderly man named Lafayette Walters, who had known the Woodsons well.  Walters introduced him to R.T. Woodson, the last surviving member of the family, who had been a boy of twelve at the time of the “spook story.”  This enabled Lawson to piece together a fairly complete account of those strange days, which he eventually published in the “Journal of American Folklore,” for October-December 1951, under the self-explanatory title, “Texas Poltergeist, 1881.”

B.G. Woodson, along with his wife and six children, settled just outside of Cisco in 1877.  The Woodsons were a hard-working lot, and their farm proved to be a fertile one, so the family soon became one of the most prosperous households in the neighborhood.  They were well respected for their industry, their piety, and their honesty.

In March of 1881, the family’s busy, but pleasant, existence suddenly took a bizarre turn.  One evening, the Woodsons were sitting around the fire when they heard knocks on one of the boards covering a crack in their house.  The father went to the door, but saw no one there.  When the knocks continued, Mr. Woodson decided they must have been caused by a harness hanging on the front porch being knocked around by the wind.  However, taking the harness down failed to stop the noise.

After that, the family heard the knocks nearly every night, usually preceded by the sound of a cat mewing.  The sounds generally ended at midnight, with the closing flourish being a noise resembling a large bird, such as a turkey, flying straight up in the air.  

Other disquieting things began happening.  R.T. Woodson, who shared a bedroom with his brothers Bose and John, recalled that at night, the boys would hear a small animal running up the stairway and into their room, where it hid behind a large trunk near their bed, growling and “popping his teeth.”

After several weeks, the pragmatic Woodsons were able to shrug off the strange phenomena.  Their neighbors, however, took a deeper interest.  Rumors spread that the weird noises were a sign that buried treasure lay somewhere on the Woodson land.

After a while, the Woodsons became relaxed enough to “prank” what they assumed was the family ghost.  They would ask the entity to “make a noise like a broom” or “go like a drunk man,” and the spirit would immediately oblige.  The spirit would answer simple questions, giving one knock for “yes,” and two for “no.”  On one occasion, during a visit from a neighbor named Ira Townsend, someone mischievously asked the ghost, “Did Ira Townsend ever steal a sheep?”  When one particularly loud knock rang out, Townsend indignantly retorted, “That’s a lie!  I never stole a sheep in my life!”  However, after a moment he remembered that, yes, when he was in the Confederate army, he was once desperate enough for food to grab someone’s sheep.

The ghost’s repertoire expanded.  During the day, rocks would periodically be thrown into the living room from upstairs.  The stones were usually decorated with a letter of the alphabet, but efforts to use them to form a coherent message were unsuccessful.  At night, the spirit would hurl around knives, forks, salt cellars, and bottles.  When anyone would be in the barn, they’d be greeted by a rock shower.  However, despite the size of these bombardments, no one was ever hit by them.  Sometimes, when a hen was sitting on eggs in a corner of the living room, the eggs would disappear from under her only to be thrown into the room from upstairs.  Oddly, the hen never seemed disturbed by this.

On at least one occasion, the ghost could be charitable.  Mrs. Woodson occasionally suffered from indigestion, which she would ease by chewing a little tobacco.  One day, she was feeling unwell, but had no tobacco.  As she was sitting by the fire, lamenting her loss, something fell into her lap.  It was a hunk of tobacco.

The Woodson front door was held shut by a wooden pin inserted in a hole in the door jamb.  One evening, in front of the entire family, the pin was thrown to the floor.  That happened repeatedly that night, but never when anyone was looking at the pin.

The strangest event of all took place when the oldest Woodson boy, Columbus, and a friend named Charlie Rucks sat up in the living room all night, in the hope of finally solving the mystery of these manifestations.  As they were sitting by the fire, a black child aged about three years old suddenly stood before them.  After a few minutes of staring silently at them, the child vanished as quickly as he had appeared.

Four weeks and one day after the first spectral knocks were heard, the family breakfast was interrupted by a rock thrown down the stairway.  That proved to be the “spook’s” farewell message.  After that, all the supernatural manifestations ended, for good.