Guest authors, Mark and Carol Nesbitt, are the owners of The Ghost of Gettysburg Tours, visit their website to learn more.
Do you love a good scare? Perhaps you simply want to commune with the spirits of the long dead that may still walk among us. Satisfy your ghostly cravings with a trip to Gettysburg, the site of the largest, costliest, and deadliest battle of the Civil War and a well-known hang-out for the ghostly crowd. It is on these hallowed grounds that many of the 7,058 known dead Union and Confederate soldiers and upwards of 11,000 missing are believed to still roam this earth.
How exactly can one tell ghosts are around? Ghost encounters, of course! About 10 percent of Gettysburg ghost encounters have been visual. Another two-thirds have been auditory, with sounds such as footsteps, cannon fire, hordes of men cheering, and intimate whisperings in one’s ear. Others have been tactile — unexplained taps on the shoulder, clothes pulled, or the sensation of being pushed by invisible hands. Still others have been olfactory, describing smells with no obvious source: cigar smoke, lilac or rose water as in old-fashioned perfumes, or the strong and pungent smell of sulfur, a key component of black gunpowder. Bottom line: be on high alert when ghost hunting in spooky Gettysburg!
If your goal is getting the living bejeebers scared out of you, visit some of the most haunted places in Gettysburg on your own where the restless spirits of hundreds of soldiers and some townsfolk are said to still wander. You might hear the sounds of hooves and frightened neighs of horses who fell victim during the battle’s carnage.
1. Spangler's Meadow
At Spangler’s Meadow, just east of Spangler’s Spring, hundreds of Union soldiers from Massachusetts and Indiana lost their lives on the morning of July 3, 1863. Be on the lookout for the legendary “Woman in White” who has been seen countless times since the battle. She appears floating, then bending down, apparently searching for someone. While no one knows her name, some have speculated she is one of the many nuns who came from a nearby convent to tend to the wounded right after the battle.
2. The Angle
The Angle on Culp's Hill is the location of still existing (but empty) burial pits. Listen carefully and you might here the painful and pitiful cries of “Help…Help me…” — or perhaps a ghostly plea from a long-dead soldier still seeking to return home from haunted Gettysburg.
3. Farnsworth House Inn
Farnsworth House Inn is the only Civil War period dining experience in town. Visitors will find period fare served by period-dressed servers in the historic inn, which has more than 100 bullet holes in its exterior south wall from the war. Dining specialties include game pie, peanut soup, spoon bread and pumpkin fritters, steak, and seafood dishes. After dinner, descend the stairs to the cellar where a guide will share the many tales of the spirits that reside within the walls of the historic Farnsworth House — one of the most haunted attractions in Gettysburg.
4. Hospital Woods
Hospital Woods on Country Club Lane served as one of the battle’s primitive temporary field hospitals. In one paranormal investigation of haunted Gettysburg, gifted medium Kayla Miner reported seeing two officers from the 42nd Mississippi, one named “Feeney” and the other “Moseley.” A Colonel William A. Feeney and a Lieutenant Colonel Hillery Moseley indeed served in the 42nd Mississippi and were stationed in Hospital Woods. Both were wounded at Gettysburg.
Other souls are said to frequent Hospital Woods, reportedly kicking doors, turning on lights, activating electronics, moving heavy furniture around, and leaving nail holes in the fine furniture at one completely locked home along the lane. Also frequently seen is the specter of a woman from the neighborhood who committed suicide years ago.
Although many of the trees have since been removed from the Camp Letterman site, ghosts may still haunt the grounds.
Why Gettysburg?
So, why, you may be wondering do spirits appear to be “stuck” in a place like Gettysburg? Undoubtedly, it is due to the extreme expenditure of human emotional energy embedded in the physical surroundings by the Battle of Gettysburg. This legendary Civil War battle took place on July 1-3, 1863, when nearly 165,000 soldiers from the Union and Confederate Armies battled each other. Thousands lost their lives or were grievously injured.
Emotions were running at a fever pitch during the battle. Every soldier knew what was on the line: reunion for the north; independence for the south. Many who died on the battlefield lay where they fell for days, while others were placed in shallow graves subject to the rain and winds. Thousands died far from home.
The Union dead were eventually moved to the new National Cemetery, which was dedicated by President Abraham Lincoln with the graves consecrated on November 19, 1863. The Confederate dead would have to wait in their unconsecrated graves until southern women gathered enough funds to have them brought home in the early 1870s. Some — both north and south — never made it home from the fields and backyards of Gettysburg; the most recent remains were discovered almost 135 years later near the Railroad Cut in 1996. As Shakespeare wrote, “I am afeared there are few die well that die in battle.” Many soldiers gave their lives for the cause they believed in and perhaps that is why they have haunted Gettysburg.
Mark and Carol Nesbitt are the owners of The Ghost of Gettysburg Tours,
visit their website to learn more.
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