Ghosts of the Queen Mary: Tales from the Most Haunted Ship in the World

[00:00:00] Josh's youngest daughter was about to start high school, so he felt like she was not as baby anymore and before class

[00:00:07] started they wanted one last vacation as a family. His daughter got to choose a location, it was their tradition.

[00:00:16] The kids took turn picking a dream destination before summer was gone. She was a little weird so he wasn't shocked when she told them where she wanted to go.

[00:00:23] The Queen Mary

[00:00:26] Having lived in Long Beach as whole life, he had always heard stories about the ship, but he had never been.

[00:00:32] The family arrived at 5 o'clock, they booked a short tour and then dinner in one of the restaurants inside of the ship.

[00:00:38] Josh felt uneasy and nauseous the whole time and so did his wife and son, especially near the old pool.

[00:00:45] He was glad when the tour was over, maybe food would help him feel better.

[00:00:49] The walk ended at the lobby area of the ship and his daughter wanted to go look at the boiler room before going to the restaurant.

[00:00:56] He told her that that was fine, but they couldn't figure out how to get there.

[00:01:01] So the all-took turns snatching the small map from each other's hands and staring at it. This was getting them nowhere.

[00:01:07] He saw three men in old military uniforms until this family to stop arguing.

[00:01:12] Those guys probably worked there and they would know where to go.

[00:01:16] So he walked over to them and then the men pointed him in the right direction.

[00:01:20] Josh ran over back to the family so they could start walking, but in this rush he realized that he hadn't even thanked the men.

[00:01:27] So he turned around to yell, thank you.

[00:01:31] But no one was there.

[00:01:33] He should have at least seen them walk away.

[00:01:38] In this episode I'm revisiting one of our earliest stories.

[00:01:41] It went about a haunted ship.

[00:01:44] The Queen Mary.

[00:01:48] My name is Edwin.

[00:01:50] And here is a horror story.

[00:01:59] The Royal Mail Ship Queen Mary now sits docked at the Long Beach Harbor.

[00:02:04] It has been there since 1967, but it has a long history.

[00:02:09] Construction for the ship began in 1930 at a ship yard in Clyde, Scotland.

[00:02:14] The goal was to make it bigger, faster and more powerful than the famous Titanic.

[00:02:19] But it took some time to finish it.

[00:02:21] The Great Depression put a long pause on the construction of the Queen Mary.

[00:02:25] And finally, on May 27th, 1936, the 1000 foot ship set sail on her first voyage.

[00:02:33] It was a five day trip from Southampton, New England to New York City.

[00:02:37] A trip it would make hundreds of times over the years.

[00:02:41] The ship became known for its comfort and fancy amenities.

[00:02:44] It had two swimming pools, a gym, a library, a cocktail bar, two ball rooms and even a hospital.

[00:02:52] At the time she was one of the fastest ships in the area.

[00:02:56] The Queen Mary was an instant hit with celebrities, politicians and those who could afford it.

[00:03:02] But then, World War II broke out.

[00:03:06] The Queen Mary was in the middle of a voyage on her way back to New York with at least 2,000 people on board.

[00:03:12] The ship docked in New York City and then stopped all commercial cruises.

[00:03:17] It became a troop ship.

[00:03:19] To the transport more than 15,000 soldiers at a time.

[00:03:23] It even set a record for carrying the most passengers in 1943, a total of 16,683 people.

[00:03:32] The ship was so fast that it usually didn't even need an escort, another ship to guard it.

[00:03:37] It was able to speed away from the attempted U-boat attacks.

[00:03:42] It offered one million rakesacks in the highest military honor to any U-boat that could sink the Queen Mary.

[00:03:49] But none were able to.

[00:03:51] It was nicknamed The Great Ghost because of its reputation.

[00:03:57] But it wasn't all good.

[00:03:59] On October 2, 1942, the Queen Mary found herself off the coast of Ireland.

[00:04:04] It was transporting troops when word of a submarine attack came through.

[00:04:10] The Queen Mary began to sail in a zigzag pattern to protect herself, but it went wrong.

[00:04:15] The giant ship headed straight toward the HMS Kubrakoa, a much smaller light cruiser that was escorting her to port.

[00:04:23] Because the Queen Mary was twice the size of its escort, it ripped through the ship.

[00:04:29] The HMS Kubrakoa sank.

[00:04:31] The sounds of the crashing metal in the screens of hundreds of men were heard as a Queen Mary continued.

[00:04:37] It was under direct orders not to stop under any circumstances.

[00:04:43] Any men who survived the crash were swept into the Queen Mary's current as a sail by.

[00:04:48] Captain Gordon, illing's worth, ordered nearby ships to look for survivors.

[00:04:53] But only 99 of a crew of 437 survived.

[00:04:58] There are no recorded deaths on the Queen Mary from this crash, but it is said that the screams and carides of the men who lost their lives on the Kurakoa can still be heard in the Queen Mary's boiler room.

[00:05:10] By the time it retired as a troops ship, the Queen Mary carried over 800,000 soldiers and traveled over 600,000 miles.

[00:05:19] It made one last trip to carry warbrys into Canada and they returned to a passenger cruise ship.

[00:05:25] Until her retirement, the ship carried at least 1,000 passengers every trip, though sometimes it was just a crew.

[00:05:34] Her last voyage happened in 1967.

[00:05:37] The Queen Mary left England on October 31 of that year heading to California.

[00:05:42] Then it took 39 days because the ship was too big to fit through the Panama Canal.

[00:05:46] She arrived at her final resting place in December 1967, which she can still be found today.

[00:05:55] At the end of her 31 years traveling the ocean, the Queen Mary carried more than 2 million passengers.

[00:06:03] The ship has now been docked in the city of Long Beach longer than it had spent traveling to seize.

[00:06:09] Although it was hard for many to believe when a psychic who predicted the Queen Mary would be more popular once it stopped carrying passengers.

[00:06:18] The psychic said this back in the 1930s, and it's one of the most visited places in California today.

[00:06:25] The energy of all these people from past and present would be the reason, the tales of hauntings that have persisted through all these years.

[00:06:35] The unknown number of deaths on board could also have something to do with these stories.

[00:06:41] It sent that at least 49 deaths happened on board the Queen Mary dating back to its first voyage.

[00:06:47] On June 8, 1936, Seaman Arthur John Francis Golding was scrubbing the deck when he somehow fractured his skull and died on the spot.

[00:06:58] And so he was buried at sea.

[00:07:01] In 1949, senior second officer William Eric Stark meant to just have a drink after a long day of work.

[00:07:08] Didn't know that the gin bottle he grabbed contained a deadly chemical.

[00:07:15] Carburentetacroryde.

[00:07:15] Some say he died in his office on board, but others say that he died after the ship landed in England, a hospital.

[00:07:24] In 1966, 20-year-old John Petter was doing his normal checks.

[00:07:29] By all accounts he wasn't the best worker, but he tried.

[00:07:33] He liked to take shortcuts and this might have cost him his life.

[00:07:37] When he didn't turn up the check in with his supervisors, they went to find him.

[00:07:42] It was found between door number 13.

[00:07:46] It had been crushed to death.

[00:07:49] No one saw how it happened, but they think that he tried to jump between the doors before they closed.

[00:07:55] And he was too slow.

[00:07:57] It said that at least two others have been crushed to death by door number 13 as well, although these are not recorded.

[00:08:05] Those are probably the most tragic known and recorded deaths, aside from other natural things like heart attacks.

[00:08:13] There are rumors of a little girl that drowned in one of the two pools though, but there are also no records of it.

[00:08:19] There's another story of two sisters who were murdered in room B-474, and it said little four-year-old Dana, two-year-old Penny, and their mother were all found strangle to death in their bed.

[00:08:32] Their father was found dead in the bathroom from a self-inflicted gunshot.

[00:08:37] The truth is, these murders happened in Virginia, and the grandmother was on board between Mary after it all happened.

[00:08:44] The crew was instructed to not tell her until the ship landed back in England.

[00:08:49] Even then, people claimed to see Dana and Penny, the corridors on B-deck, where room B-474 is located.

[00:08:58] Some have heard them calling out to their mom, even in the green room and the boiler room.

[00:09:04] That boiler room and the green room are the source of a lot of hauntings on board.

[00:09:11] Myro worked on the Queen Mary back in the early 2000s, and this is one of the places that scared her the most.

[00:09:20] They have this little room, it's called the green room.

[00:09:23] The psychic used to go there, and what she used to do was really cool. She used to have dinner with the gas, and then you would go around 10 o'clock till midnight to do a ghost tour.

[00:09:33] But she would take you to different places where no one could really go through.

[00:09:37] It's literally this little room in the middle of this big old empty space in the bottom of the ship.

[00:09:43] So we go, she's like, when you go there, you're going to see a man, there's a man there, and I'm like, whatever.

[00:09:51] I will see what we see. We got there, and she's like, all right, guys, everyone turn off your flashlights because there's no lights in there.

[00:09:57] So she's like, everyone turn off your flashlights, so we turn off her flashlights, and kid you not, you just see this shadow of a big bald tall man.

[00:10:09] He was walking, he stood right in front of me, my friend is holding me, I'm holding her, then I tell my friend, I was like, hey stop touching my hair.

[00:10:19] She's like, my, I'm holding you. I was like, no, so then I turned on the light and it's just like, no turn it off, and I'm like, no, I felt someone touched my hair.

[00:10:29] And I guess that's the thing like he likes to like, harass women's hair. He apparently hates guys.

[00:10:35] There is a guy that used to work with her, he did a lot of tours. This guy was a bigger guy like 200, I don't know, just like a big guy.

[00:10:42] And he couldn't go in the green room because when he was in there, they saw him get pushed to the wall and got lifted.

[00:10:53] My recent said that even this guy was there, and she was like, yeah, he has to wait outside because things always happen like that, and the spirit does not like him.

[00:11:03] But there is something about that room. For this episode we also spoke with Stephanie Strange, and if you're into the paranormal, you might already know who she is.

[00:11:11] She's a medium man. She hosted the popular show, something scary for some time. She also talks about all this kind of stuff on her TikTok page.

[00:11:21] I believe it though because I saw something like that near that same area. My friend invited me as her plus one to the 57 ghost theatrical sounds that they have going on, which is amazing by the way.

[00:11:32] Prior to that room, we were waiting by the bar area near the lobby where there's a piano and they say don't touch the piano, but the piano has some type of significance to it.

[00:11:43] The lady by the bar, she's like, oh, are you guys doing the sounds? I'm like, yeah, we're doing this theatrical sounds. And she's like, oh my god, that room is really haunted. I didn't know it then.

[00:11:51] But the sound's room is behind the pool area in terms of the layout of the ship. The sound's room is technically next to the pool areas, what they said.

[00:12:01] Apparently some workers were cleaning that area by the sound's room and someone captured a photo of a little girl in the mirror area.

[00:12:09] And so this isn't even weirder because we did the sayons. And again, it's not the theatrical. It's a magic show. It's not anything spooky though. They do believe the magician does draw in some of the influence of the supernatural in his sayons because of course, you know, you kind of have to go.

[00:12:25] At the very end of the sayons he had these dolls. I don't know if they're like animatronics. I don't know if that's the correct terminology.

[00:12:32] One of them is in a little wooden box and you can see it's face poking out of the wooden box. There's these other two dolls against a wall by the vinyl record player.

[00:12:43] When we were all heading out of the room, there was a particular room. We had an exit the room. We had to like, I guess retrace our steps, which is a very similar to some cultures and how you don't want something following you.

[00:12:53] Well, as we were getting up the doll in the box, you can kind of see its eyes, right? But something like me to poke out even more resourceful face. I thought that was part of his theatrics.

[00:13:06] You know, I'm not thinking anything like, I'm like, okay, whatever it's probably his tricks. Well, the couple and front of us, they were freaked out by that. So we're exiting everyone's scurried out of there. It was myself, my friend, the couple and these two girls that were sisters.

[00:13:21] The couple asks the magician, hey, can you tell us the story of that doll because I think it's haunted, it poked its head out.

[00:13:27] And I'm like, it's a theatrics. Why are they asking about this? But he apparently had a story on it. I zoned out. I didn't even know what he was saying because this is where the weird stuff happens.

[00:13:37] His body is in front of the door. The glass doors to enter the sand.

[00:13:41] But his back is facing it. He's facing us. I'm in his right side facing like his side profile. But that's also where I can see the metal doors on it, the other side of him if that makes sense.

[00:13:52] The couple is directly in front of him facing him but their backs are facing the stairs. The girls, the two sisters are between the couple and myself.

[00:14:02] One of the girls is definitely looking at the metal doors and his side profile like I am. And by the way, these stairs are also,

[00:14:08] we're near the stairs where apparently people have died and fallen off and hurt themselves. They say that there's no recorded death, so I'm a little confused on those details.

[00:14:18] But I know that there's something very predominant with those stairs and having activity and being dangerous.

[00:14:24] He's explaining this story about the dolls. But behind him through the glass, I see this white orb, a physical white apparition. I've never seen anything like it before.

[00:14:36] It walks past him towards the metal doors. I'm like blinking profusely because I'm like, is there an eye booker? Is there a weird glare?

[00:14:47] What's going on with my vision? What's happening? My brain is trying to comprehend what is happening here.

[00:14:54] I would have thought it was an eye booker but then this white apparition is trying to open the metal doors and you can hear the metal clanking. You can hear it.

[00:15:02] And I'm like, okay, no, no, no, no, no, no, he's not touching that. He's not even near the doors. He's closer to our side.

[00:15:09] And then it just dissolves through the doors.

[00:15:13] And I was like, what did I just see? I hear the girl next to me gasped. She's like, and then she turns to her sister and pastor on the shoulder.

[00:15:21] She's freaking out. Like, did you see that? Did you see that?

[00:15:24] So then I grab her and I'm like, no, no, no, no, no, did you see what I just saw? We both saw it.

[00:15:30] And the magician is explaining the history of the dolls and the couple is obviously very intently listening to him.

[00:15:34] So that's how I rationalize how no one else saw it other than me in the girl because we're just like, what the hell just happened.

[00:15:41] And we both heard the metal clanking. We both saw the white or thing dissolved to the doors.

[00:15:47] That was wild. Recently I went back on there to show my friend where the stuff happened another friend.

[00:15:54] It was during the day because the sans is I think our held at night or later in the evening.

[00:15:58] And no, no, no was there. And there's music plane. There's the record plane playing by itself.

[00:16:06] There's no one in the room. It's locked. The lights are dim. There's only lights for the dolls are at and it's just this music plane.

[00:16:14] It's like very like 1950s or like very old time in that respect.

[00:16:19] And of that era.

[00:16:21] There's no one here. Why is a music plane? This is very eerie. So me and my friend Orlando are like, is it playing by itself?

[00:16:29] He saw the light flicker when we went there. I was like, I don't know if this is paranormal. I message the magician.

[00:16:36] And I said, by the way, we stopped by the saons room. You weren't there. It was locked and the music was playing. Was that you?

[00:16:43] And he's like, yeah, I leave the music plane for the ghosts.

[00:16:47] So the magician is aware that there are ghosts in there.

[00:16:51] Little Dana, Penny and John are not the only spirits on board of the Queen Mary. They say that there's at least 150 different spirits in the ship today.

[00:17:00] There are tales of another little girl who was set to up drown in the room. She's known as Jackie.

[00:17:06] And many have seen her or heard her calling for her parents.

[00:17:19] Myra, believe she encountered Jackie.

[00:17:22] I was working at the cafe. I was a hostess. We always had people like tourists come in and some people didn't really speak like our language which is fine.

[00:17:31] And there were European. They came that they were like, oh, can we have a party of four?

[00:17:35] I said of party of four. What do you mean? There's a party of five of you.

[00:17:41] And they're like, no, there's four. And I was like, okay, maybe they don't understand. I was like, oh, give me a minute. So I went to the back and I'm like, hey, can you do a party of five?

[00:17:50] They're like, okay, so they set up the table. What I saw was it was the husband, the wife.

[00:17:57] There are three kids and one of the kids was behind the husband I do believe she was kind of like, you know when you're like scared like your shy.

[00:18:07] She was like behind him. I still remember how she looked. She had blonde hair being slight the old things.

[00:18:14] She was just really cute. She had a lacy dress with a little ribbon.

[00:18:18] I was like, I don't understand. And then when I went to go see them, I was like, hey, where's your little girl?

[00:18:23] And they're like, what little girl? Like, this is these are my kids and I was like, no, I saw a little girl.

[00:18:29] And I was so freaked out. So scary. I couldn't stay in the front anymore because I closed and I had to go to the back.

[00:18:38] And I was in the middle of the restaurant every time I would see someone I would go up there, but I was so scared.

[00:18:43] Because I swear I physically saw her. Now when I do medium-ship kids differ and I don't see.

[00:18:50] And this one it was just like a complete like apparition. And she looked human like she was a human.

[00:18:58] Me and my niece who I want to say she was six. She wandered off into the bankwood hall area.

[00:19:05] They also do like dining and stuff out there because it's the early 2000s.

[00:19:10] I don't know if you remember this or anyone will remember this, but it was like those very like clunky brick digital cameras when digital cameras were becoming a thing like

[00:19:19] There was a limited amount of photos that you could take to because SD cards had very low gigs back then.

[00:19:25] And she still couldn't take that many photos, at least for me I couldn't.

[00:19:28] It was like okay, I'm going to be very mindful with the photos that I take on this trip.

[00:19:31] I don't want to run them out of memory. My niece was running around in the bankwood hall area was very echoey, but they had like this like grandfather clock thing.

[00:19:38] It was really eerie. I took a picture for dancing.

[00:19:42] And as she's trolling around, I took like maybe two photos because I'll turn me very conservative with the photos.

[00:19:48] I didn't think anything of it. We then walked out of there because a maintenance person or a janitor had walked in there and we did not want to get in trouble.

[00:19:56] So we ran out of there. We went with my sister, we walked around and we went elsewhere.

[00:20:01] Fast forward, I get home from this trip. I had photos from the funeral. I had photos from the Queen Mary and all the things that we did.

[00:20:08] I was showing my friends because I'm like, oh my god, I got a digital camera. Do you want to see the photos before I uploaded on my space?

[00:20:15] So we're looking through the photos. One of my best friends, she's like, hold up. What's that? And what's what?

[00:20:22] And it's in that room, the banquet hall room looks like there's this white apparition of a man.

[00:20:27] An older man just standing next to the grandfather clock looking at us.

[00:20:31] It's a white apparition. It doesn't look like UNI. It looks like this white apparition just sitting there staring at us.

[00:20:38] It seriously looked like a tall man with a very stern face. He was wearing a flannel shirt with it's a very like 1950s worker attire.

[00:20:50] When my friend saw it and I'm like, that does look like a man. We ran inside the house and it was my friend Sierra, my friend Joey and myself.

[00:20:57] We all saw it. We uploaded it on the computer. My Windows 98 Windows 95.

[00:21:03] And we uploaded this photo and when we would upload it, it would disappear.

[00:21:09] But it was show up on the digital camera but not on the computer.

[00:21:13] We all saw it. We were all thrown off by this like what the heck.

[00:21:17] But of course we chalked it up as like maybe like a glitch with these cameras because it's those early models.

[00:21:24] We were trying to find some logic with it. Of course I don't have the image.

[00:21:29] I'd have to like maybe dig through my space if it's still even up there to see if I can find these images.

[00:21:35] I know for a fact that all three of us saw it and we're all freaked out by that.

[00:21:40] That was one of Stephanie's first experiences aboard the Queen Mary.

[00:21:45] But it wouldn't be the last. She actually went back not too long ago and found herself in the same area.

[00:21:51] When we were walking around, we visited, I told my friend what happened with activity.

[00:21:55] I brought this thing that's called the pull-through script.

[00:21:58] The way that I describe it and simplify terms is receiving a tax from a spirit.

[00:22:03] Some people may know this device as an obvious if you do paranormal investigations or you're familiar with it.

[00:22:09] The idea is that it draws in the electric magnetic fields and converts them into words and just generates the words based on that.

[00:22:17] It doesn't hear you. It's not responding to you. It's just generating words.

[00:22:21] And so that may not be as impressive but was impressive is that it's very on point sometimes in the general area that we're in.

[00:22:30] It doesn't have a camera. It does have a mic on. It's literally a word generator.

[00:22:34] We were upstairs again by the banquet hall area. If you head towards the bar, so not the cafe, not the banquet hall, not the gift shop.

[00:22:41] If you go head towards the bar, there's this room. It's closed off through a glass but you can see the room.

[00:22:49] It's a children's play area. There's dolls in the corner. There's books. There's toys and I think it's antiques from that era or maybe stuff from a ship.

[00:22:57] I have no idea but it definitely can tell that there is stuff that is very much not from this time.

[00:23:04] We have this poultry script because I feel like it's the less distracting device to have on while you're walking around and it's not distracting people. It's not loud.

[00:23:14] My friend Orlando and I were just like having it on and it said, rabbit.

[00:23:21] And first of all, that's really weird but this will be important later because I didn't realize this but my friend Orlando's Instagram handle is Mr. Jack Wabbitt.

[00:23:30] I don't know if it was trying to get his attention, so then we go to the other side of the room and we're looking at the dolls at this point.

[00:23:38] And then the word generates hat, corner hat, sat.

[00:23:44] And in my Instagram video you can see that there's this doll on a little rocking chair with a hat near the corner.

[00:23:50] And so I'm like, are we talking to you? And then the thing generates me as in like, yes, that's me.

[00:23:58] And so I'm like, oh no, this is the most on point. This device has been throughout the ship because we had walked around by the pool area, the sails area even outside on the deck.

[00:24:09] And then it says, 11 years old.

[00:24:12] I have it all on video, you can see it and I'm like, what is happening?

[00:24:19] So we're like, was it the doll? Was it the spirit of the little girl that's in on the ship allegedly that followed us up there? I've no idea.

[00:24:33] And it was at that same banquet hall where Mira felt the most on ease.

[00:24:41] The feeling there, if felt like, if you're in Jello, like, I don't know how to explain it but it just had this weird vibe and you feel like everyone staring at you.

[00:24:50] It was just really creepy. Like you could feel just eyes on you right away within a week. I would hear my name get called sometimes I would feel like because you're walking in like the deck the ship is long, right?

[00:25:03] So you're walking to clock out and I would always feel like someone was running to get me, you know when you feel like someone running behind you and then they'll just stop right when they were like right behind me.

[00:25:15] So I was like, who is that an alternate? And then there's no one, like I still get chills. There's like no one there.

[00:25:22] People have seen a little girl singing children songs playing hide and seek and then she disappears before their eyes always near one of the two pools.

[00:25:32] And neither pool has water yet people have reported hearing sounds of splashing.

[00:25:37] Some have heard wet footprints walking behind them only to turn around and see no one there.

[00:25:43] In the old salon some have seen a beautiful young woman in a white dress dancing by herself and then she disappears into the dark shadows of the room.

[00:25:53] Some have seen a tall dark herred man in an old suit who disappears into the first class rooms.

[00:26:00] There's also reports of a baby's cry in the old children's playroom and countless door slams, temperature changes and disembodied knocks and screens.

[00:26:11] Despite all the unsettling experiences reported by so many people just like Maira and Stephanie, thousands of people still visit the Queen Mary every year.

[00:26:22] If you're a fan of horror and a haunted places it looks like you have some ghosts waiting for you to visit.

[00:26:36] This episode of Horror Story was researched by Test Retmin written by Christina Lumagi and narrated by me Edwin Coarrius.

[00:26:44] This special thank you to Maira and Stephanie for their accounts at the Queen Mary.

[00:26:49] Also thank you very much for your ideas for the stories that we share here, and if you have more reach out to us over at horrorstory.com

[00:26:56] And check out our other shows by scary FM.

[00:26:59] By listening to our episodes, add free you will also be supporting the production.

[00:27:03] You'll find out more over at scaryplus.com.

[00:27:06] Thank you very much for listening.

[00:27:09] Keep it scary everyone.

[00:27:11] See you soon.