Shepherdstown: Everyone Sees Ghosts Here

Ghosts seem to roam the streets in Shepherdstown, one of the oldest towns in the state of West Virginia. I don't say that lightly. Experiences from residents and their reputation has gathered in the media all point to it being one of the most haunted towns in the country. Researchers have gone to the town to investigate the reported phenomena in several of the buildings and specific areas in the town, and they have come out with documentation that might prove that we're not alone in this realm. But even more importantly, it shows that the past can haunt us. In this episode will hit some of the eerie ghost stories of Shepherdstown, but we're also going to visit it from a more non traditional way, one that involves a fascinating scientific lens in the work of pioneering parapsychologists. We're going to try to answer this question, when we hear footsteps of the past like they echo in Shepherdstown, are we actually encountering the restless dead? Because when we learn of the tragic and traumatic history of the town, it brings forward another picture. When that tells us that there's something else out there maybe that you may or may not be alone when you take those nightly walks by yourself. My name is Edwin and here's a horror story. If you walk through Shepherdstown today, you'll find yourself in a picturesque, pretty little town that's perched in part on a cliff overlooking the Potomac River in Jefferson County, West Virginia. There you'll bump into old local families, commuters from the Washington area, and retirees that are ready for that quiet life. But there's something else there, something that you can't ignore. History. You see, Shepherdstown was officially established in seventeen sixty two, and you can feel the weight of history during an everyday walk. Like German Street, one of the places where people go to take photos. You'll see federal style brick houses that date back to the late eighteenth century. The place even has nineteenth century street fixtures, old trees, old metal fences, old wooden pumps. Well, you get the point. But imagine that homes on High Street or Princess Street that looks so antiquated that you'll feel like you went back in time for a second. German immigrants use logs and local limestone to build, later moving to bricks that date back to seventeen ninety four. Everything all in one place, this community that now has art studios, restaurants, stuff for college students, all packed into one single area. But like a local historian put it, none of the town is spared of a ghost story. And that's where we begin. There is a beautiful yellow brick building with an iconic clock and a bell tower at the Shepherd University campus, a place known as mcmurrn Hall. The place is beautiful, academic and kind of serious, but within those walls there is much darker history. The construction of that building started right before the Civil War, but for several years, as a conflict was going on, it just sat there, unfinished. And then in September of eighteen sixty two, just across the Potomac River, the Battle of Antietam started, becoming one of the bloodiest battles in United States history. Now, I don't know much about the Civil War personally, just what we learned in high school, but this one really stood out to me. Even back then, the death count was unimaginable. And then it quickly moved to Jefferson County, Shepherd's town couldn't handle the carnage in almost every structure that was available, including this unfinished building I'm talking about. Mcmurrn Hall was ordered to turn into a makeshift hospital for the wounded and the dying. The amount of pain, fear, and agony in one unfinished building is hard for us to visualize, especially considering what it looks like today, but it puts mcmurrn Hall at the center of one of the town's most famous legends. If you're there at night, you might join the list of witnesses that have seen the spirit of a Civil War soldier. He silently looks out from the building's bell tower into the night, nothing to say, apparently, just witnessing the tragedies going on around him. And we hear that account and think, well, that must be a restless soul of a man who died in that makeshift hospital, doomed for eternity. To keep watch forever the traditional ghost story, if you will. But here's another idea that's coming in, and it's called recurrent spontaneous psychokinesis rsp K for short for a psychologist. William g Roll came up with it, and he believed that many of these disturbances are not caused by the dead, but by unconscious psychokinesis of the living, the ability for us to move or create things with our minds. He thought that extreme emotional trauma can leave permanent emotional energy imprints on a physical location. In this case, the intense suffering of those dying soldiers in eighteen sixty two could ascard the physical environment of mcmerrn Hall. But here's where it gets a little deeper. According to William g Roll, these historic memories can stay hidden until they're activated by the psychokinetic waves of one of us, a member of the living, someone who's experiencing their own emotional tension. And it's like this, some mcmurrn Hall is the centerpiece of a bustling university, always surrounded by college students, probably stressed out. I mean, I still have nightmares of college, honestly, but they might also be anxious about the future. All that plus transitioning into adulthood what's a lot. While in this RSPK theory, these stressed out students are kind of like batteries. This tension powers of phenomena crossing all time boundaries to activate the residual trauma of that dying soldier and then projecting his image into the bell tower. No, it's a haunting, yeah, but it might be a haunting that the living are actively yet without realizing it, keeping alive. At the intersection of German and Princess Streets, there is a hotel, a stately old place called Etler Hotel. Today it's the home to the historic Shepherdstown Museum, But in the early nineteenth century it was a high end ind that was made to serve the wealthier travelers that went through the area. But as you know, the high society we know of has its own kind of darkness. From historical records, we know that the inn's yard was a known spot for gambling and other gaming. And where we have high stakes gambling, well you get even more unfortunate events. According to local lore, one unlucky businessman lost all his money in a card game at the inn, and, witnessing the total loss right in front of him, was devastated. He went to the back of the hotel and shot himself. Now that act created a violent and emotional imprint on a piece of land, at least according to William g. Rohl. And yet that's not the only dark tragedy that happened at the Antler Hotel in eighteen oh nine. There was a card game between two members of prominent Virginia families, between Peyton Smith and Joseph Holmes. The game escalated into a fight between the two and eventually ended in a duel just across the Potomac River. Just like in the movies, Peyton Smith was wounded in the duel and brought back to Antler. There he was put into Room one and he lay there bleeding to death, crying out in pain for his mother. She tried to get there in time, she was arriving from Winchester, but she got there too late. Her son had already died. And to this day people inside the building talk about hearing the agonizing cries of Peyton Smith calling out for his mother. Now, it's a chilling story, but let's look at it from this recurrent spontaneous psychokinesis right. RSPK William g Rohl would have said that this sudden, extreme emotional distress leaves that emotional energy imprint on the physical environment. Right, of course, vioinally ending your own life or feeling terror and physical agony, that's exactly the kind of intense trauma that would leave a scar on the psychic atmosphere of the Antler Hotel. Never remember or this RSPK thing. It isn't that the dead are crying out because they have to connect with the power source aka one of us that's experiencing our own unconscious, psychological or emotional tension. Do you think that maybe why we're more likely to see a ghost when we are terrified of the environment itself, or how they say if you show fear, it only becomes worse. Are we actually powering it? Because think of the people who visit the historic Shepherdstown Museum today. If a modern visitor or a stressed out tourist arrives, they might be acting as the battery that triggers these events. Maybe they connect with the trauma left behind on Room one. It makes you look at a haunting in a different way, doesn't it. Now we're not wondering if Peyton Smith's soul is trapped in Room one, but instead which one of us is carrying enough frustration or stress to wake up the echoes of these final tragic moments. Now as terrifying as it is, let's go back to the university campus for a moment, there's another place that's worth looking at. Here we go, Will I stop at the antler Weltheimer's House or a play simply known as the Yellow House. It's one of the oldest on campus, built right over the site of an old French and Indian War fort. But it's not the war that we're going to talk about. This actually happened much later in nineteen ten. At the time, the house was the home of a local cobbler named George Yount and his cat Ham and George was said to be very wealthy, so when his body was found not far from the cabin, apparently had been murdered, everyone thought that it was so that they could take his money, although a quick search of the house turned up with nothing pointing to that because his stuff was still there. But ever since he was found, people say that they can hear the distinct tap tap tap of his cobbler tools echoing through the house. There's even a story from a family who moved in not long after his death. Their cat had heard the eerie tapping coming from the attic, and it bolted up the stairs to investigate, and then it suddenly came back down in a flash. Dashing back down and out the door and was never seen again. Now, if this was the only active spot on campus, we might just think it's another local legend. But it's not like this other place. For example, Gardener Hall, where residents deal with the spirit of Patty, a former homecoming queen who died from a fall in the shower in the late nineteen eighties. Students actually hang a portrait of Mabel Gardener, the person that the building's named after, upside down, like the portrait is upside down just to keep Paddy's spirit happy. Or another ponting right over on Kenneman, where students say that they regularly encounter the ghost of a young boy in knickers in a driving cap. They say that he was killed in a fall at a local construction site, and today his spirit is notorious for messing with the student's electronic devices. So why is there so much varied in what appears to be unconnected activity around these dorms and campus buildings. Is it rsp que you know, academic pressure, relationship drama, all that stuff college students go through. They're just piling up into this big generator of emotional stress. Or are we dealing with an actual entity or entities roaming around, perhaps a combination of the two. I wanted to add another short snippet here of a story that I found while I was researching the topic. Just outside of the main town area, there's a historic property known as the Wild Goose Farm. At the center of the estate, there is this beautiful mansion that was built around eighteen ten by the Stipp family. It was later owned by resident Shepherd, giving the home this distinct southern plantation feel, and like much of Shepherd's town, the property is also packed with heavy history, rumored to have been used as a makeshift hospital during the Civil War and maybe even as a stop on the underground railroad. But the phenomenon reported there is bizarre. It's interactive, and it goes a step further than the cries or footsteps that we explored in this episode so far. A former resident, Michelle Schultz, said that she was witnessed to a whole group of ghosts while living there with her husband and sons. She said that there was a spirit of a slave named Joseph, who her husband actually saw walking through the yard with two children. The apparition even turned around and waved at him before he disappeared. And then there's Mary, a little girl who haunts the third floor and apparently hates new visitors. When strangers would spend the night, Mary will let them know by causing this thick, honeylike goo that was kind of yellowish to come out directly from a light fixture. Repairman can never find a logical source for the slime stuff also seems to move around in the property. They have all seen the doors of this old hutch swing open as antique hats flew out of the room. A friend of their son spent the night in the Red Room, a highly active spot known for creating orbs that could be caught on camera, and when he stayed there, he mysteriously woke up in a locked closet with no idea how he got there. Even the alarm clocks would go off in the middle of the night while completely unplugged. It's worth noting, though, that not all the activity is bad. Like one spirit called the Mi Maco. It's known to help out as a type of alarm clock, waking the homeowner up at exactly three fourteen am with the rich and comforting smell of freshly brewed coffee. So what we are left with is to answer these questions as we walk along the bricklined historic streets of Shepherdstown. What is happening and are we creating these ghosts? The dark past of the area is intense. Now think about it being the oldest chartered town in West Virginia, the carnage of the wounded during the Battle of Antietam. Maybe these ghost sightings are more complex and just spirits wandering at night. Maybe these theories by parapsychologists William G. Rohll or one of the many others that can help us understand ghost phenomena. There have been paranormal investigators, some from shows you may have heard of, have been there. There's even a series called Ghosts of Shepherdstown which haven't watched, but you know, it kept popping off during the searches. During my research about this episode, it makes me wonder if all this attention it gets might also have to do with the ghosts that are set to roam in the town. Now, if I had to add my own theory to this, it would be about how we can manifest stories and legends, turning them real with our minds once we start opening up to the supernatural. But hey, I don't plan on doing any academic research there at Shepherd's Town, so we're gonna leave that up to the pros for now. We hear of these imprints, those dark and tragic stories that stay in Shepherd'stown, like the dying cries at the Antler Hotel or the ghostly tapping of a cobbler's hammer. You might hear it in wonder who's making that noise, But the chilling truth might be that the true mystery of Shepherd's Town it's not that the dead are refusing to leave or to calm down, but maybe it's us, the living, the ones that are refusing to let them rest. So after looking into Shepherd's Town, I kept thinking of the pattern behind them, like how the stories were tied into these intense moments of pain fear loss in places where people still go through every single day. Now it's hard to ignore even if you don't believe in ghosts, right, and the theory of RSPK tries to explain it in a way that feels almost grounded, like it gives it that logical angle that we need to process what happens. But I don't know. Something just doesn't feel right about it. To me like not complete and it happened with the story of the Olds. I don't know that that Wild Goose Farm showed that these things interacted like literally a ghost waved before disappearing, where it acts up when a stranger is around. I mean, if true, of course, but how do they respond or move things? If they're just memories playing over and over, why do they seem to notice us? Do you believe in ghosts? Do you even feel like we should have to justify or prove that belief? Now let me know in the comments or through email links to everything, or in the description of this episode. We did get a couple comments. In the previous story The Truth about Shadow People, we have a thumbs up from Sino morph Merritt. Michael r says, I've seen a shadow while being wide awake and with witnesses. It was seven feet tall and swooped through the living room of a college rental house and I was living in with my cousins. I never had Siley paralysis in my life. I started having it after seeing this thing. Had no idea what was going on. This experience brought me closer to Jesus. One night, this shadow being tried to hold me down and I was trying to fight back. There was an explosion of white light and I was on my knees. Bes Man, that is an intense story. And yeah, I have heard that some experiences do bring people closer to Jesus, you know, like to their God, like to believing in something finally when they were completely lost and what to believe experiencing something like that. From what I found, also some of the other experiences about shadow people terrifying. Campy's porn Shack says love love love this episode. Could some shadow people be time travelers or astral projections of someone sleeping on the other side of the world? Now I want an episode deep diving into folkalo or Japanese Filipino anti shadow people. That is a very interesting theory right there. Could somebody sleep like could you know how half of the world is at night? Right because it's in the dark at all given points, like as in at all times? Could we somehow be when they say we have out of body experiences, are we the ones that are turning to shadow people and going across the world and will be showing up and scaring the heck out of someone else? Interesting theory. I don't know if that's what you meant, but I found it like that and it's very very interesting. But also time travelers like you know when they have time slips. Man, we have to do an episode about this. Really cool. Thank you so much for this CAMPI let me see, Lou says, Can I get the link to the pdf book? Yes? Actually me, I'm going to add these to the descriptions, so any links that are missing, check them out in the description of that particular episode, so you can get a link to my sources and those PDFs if they get taken down, because I guess we're not supposed to share stuff like that, I'll link to where I found it so you can just I don't know if you have to download it or somehow get a hold of it, you can do that. That question came in from Lou. Thanks a lot. I'm sure other people are also going to find that useful. Kay says had goosebumps throughout the episode. OMG, makes me think of the new experiences I had during my UNI days living in a shared room with this building that was set to be built on hunt Land and remembering a cat pulling me out a sleep paralysis attacks every time. Interesting stuff here, definitely interesting. Thanks for sharing that, Kay, Like you know, I have had people send in their stories for a podcast, true scary story when they were in university, like back in the day when they were young and everything and the buildings being built on haunted land or the buildings already being haunted for something else. Man, I can't believe they put us through that. For me, college specifically was just haunting as it was like a very traumatizing experience in terms of like all the stress I was involved in it. But uh man, thanks a lot for sharing that. Appreciated the game. Sarah Finn scream says this was such a great episode. Gave me the creeps, but also loved the research and history lore that went along with the story. As someone who's always had trouble sleeping. The hat man is my worst year. Keep up the great work, Edwin. Corpus Christie represents a huge shout out to Corpus Christi and another huge shout out to what we call I don't know if it's Oregon or Oregon. I've heard another pronunciation recently, but we do have a group of listeners there that keep responding to to our episode. Then sending me comments and stuff, so super cool. But of course Corpus Christy Texas of course is here. If you're from Texas, please let me know, because I feel like Texas is everywhere and in our shows, like it's unbelievable, like there's this huge red spot of people that keep like showing up from there. Like we see this little map that says where our listeners come from, and Texas has a huge US spot there, like like a hot zone. So it's really interesting. Lord Smooth says, what a great ending to the episode, shivers Loo. Yes, Actually I work hard on those things on especially on the conclusion, to to try to really bring in the story for you and so that you can remember it a little bit easier. Some some outtros are a little better than others, But I do what I can, so I appreciate that. Thanks a lot for noticing it. Anyway. This episode was research and produced by me Edwin Kovar Rubias. It was backed up by the Great Idea sent in by you and are Scary plus members who support the storytelling and research that goes around here, which is a lot. Every once in a while we bumit to books that we have to pay for Paywalt content, old archives and stuff. It gets intense, but it's possible because of Scary plus members the ads that get to play. Even though sometimes they're a little annoying, it really does help. Anyway. If you have a comment and idea, something that you want to share, something you want me to look into, reach out to me. You can email me Edwin at horror story dot com. I have a bunch of emails too within the podcasts that I do, but you can find me there. You can also reach out to me through the contact form or find me on social media edwind Cove That's E. D w I n c o V on Facebook, Instagram and TikTok. Anyway, thank you very much for listening to this episode. I really hope you enjoyed it. Keep it scary everyone, see us soon.