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Of
Women Wronged: Hillbilly Hauntings
The days grow shorter, the air turns crisp, and something
deep within us all knows that the world is changing. Halloween draws near and
with it a thinning of the Curtain this world from the next, allowing haints –
restless spirits – to slip closer by than they were on brighter days.
No part of the world is without tales of restless spirits;
stories of the sorrow, anger, or injustice endured by the living. In Japan they
tell of the onryō, wrathful spirits devoted to revenge against the living. In
Mexico, they talk of La Llorona, who wander the water’s edge, mourning the loss
of their children. Across Europe they speak of the White Lady, symbols of
betrayal and life cut short. When it comes to tales of lost love and betrayal,
my beloved West Virginia isn’t without a tale or two of its own.
We tell the tales of Zona Heaster Shue, Screaming Jenny,
the Weeping Woman of Sweet Springs, Kate Carpenter, and our own White Lady of
Flat Top Manor. Each a spirit bound by sorrow, betrayal, or unfinished
business. Let’s take a moment and remember each, but take care, it’s said that
people die twice, once when their heart beats its last, and again when someone
speaks their name for the final time.
In Greenbrier County they tell the tale of Zona Heaster
Shue who - in 1897 - was found dead under questionable circumstances. Her
husband, Erasmus, was quick to claim she had died peacefully. Zona’s mother
wasn’t having it. She claimed that Zona's ghost began to visit her in the dead
of night, accusing Erasmus of murdering her by snapping her neck. Confronted
with the charges, a local judge ordered Zona’s body exhumed, and the evidence
of Erasmus’ guilt was revealed. Erasmus was convicted of the crime, but Zona’s
spirit still didn’t rest. She is said to haunt Greenbrier County still, a
chilling reminder that justice isn’t bound by the grave.
In Jefferson County we find a different sort of tale.
There, when wind moans through the trees and the moon lights the ground just
so, it’s said that you can hear the pain filled screams of a woman long dead.
Screaming Jenny, a local woman who died in pain and terror. It was a cold night
in autumn when Jenny, poor and living in an abandoned railroad shack, tried to
warm herself by a fire. Somehow, her clothes were set ablaze and, in her panic,
she ran screaming and blind in search of relief. She ran right onto the
railroad tracks and into the path of an oncoming train. Locals maintain that
now and then the figure of Screaming Jenny - still engulfed in flames – can be
seen running through the night. Her ghostly shrieks a reminder of her final,
desperate moments.
From the tranquil beauty of Monroe County comes a tale of
another ghostly presence born of sorrow and despair. Known as the Weeping Woman
of Sweet Springs, it’s said that she was a bride abandoned at the altar or
perhaps a grieving mother who lost her child. Whatever the case, the young
woman fell beneath the weight of her broken heart, and cast herself into the
spring where she drowned. But she wouldn’t have a place on our list if that was
the end for her. It’s said that she still wanders, a ghostly figure draped in a
flowing white gown, her soft sobbing proof that some heartache is too deep to
fade, even in death.
From Mercer County and the grounds of an old plantation
known as Flat Top Manor comes the tale of the White Lady of Flat Top Manor, a
restless spirit whose tragic story is tangled in the past. Some say she was the
young bride of the manor’s original owner; others maintain that she was a
servant who died at her master’s hand. In either case, it is agreed by those
who believe, that her life was cut short by violence. Witnesses maintain that
the air goes frigid long before her shadowy figure - fleeting and ethereal – is
seen gliding through the manor's hallways or lingering at the edge of the
woods. The truth of it is left to you, but the accounts of witnesses and
investigators alike have gone a long way to make Flat Top Manor's reputation as
one of the most haunted locations in the State.
Silent and still, the Greenbrier River flows through
Summers County like an apparition itself. It’s a peaceful scene as beautiful as
any faery tale picture, but its waters gave birth to a tale of lost love and
lingering sorrow. Kate Carpenter was a young woman deeply in love with the
wrong man. Her family opposed her choice of suitor and refused her their
blessing. Unwilling to either set aside her love or go against her kin, Kate
threw herself into the river and drowned the dark, icy waters. But as is the
case in these tales, neither the depths of the river nor the touch of death
could quiet Kate’s restless spirit. She lingers near the place where she left
this world, a spectral form barely visible on misty mornings walking the
riverbanks. For Kate, death was better than the absence of the man she
loved.
This Halloween, when autumn leaves rustle in a cold wind,
remember the story of these women as you sip your pumpkin-spiced drink. Their
stories are the echoes of unimaginable loss and suffering, and they leave us to
wonder—what would we do if faced with such sorrow? Would we find peace, or
would our spirits, too, be bound to the places where our hearts were broken?
But let’s remember as well that these spirits weren’t content to shuffle off
the mortal coil the first time. Speaking their names again – breathing life
into their memory - might be enough to remind them what binds them to this
world.
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Excerpt
"You all right, Buck?" He set his coffee on the small table there as he took more of my weight than I intended.
"Yeah," I lied. "Bit of a headache." I couldn't look him in the eye. "I need to check on something. Be right in."
"Sure you're gonna be all right?" Dad picked up his coffee as I took my weight again.
“I’ll live.” I nodded and started toward the sitting room. I steeled myself against the pain I knew was coming and pushed my senses into the Curtain once again.
The little room off the chapel was packed with overstuffed couches and an ottoman which could double for a bed. I could see just clearly enough to avoid tripping, but it made finding the cat a challenge. I moved from piece to piece, looking behind and under each. There was no sign of it. It could have left through the chapel but I wasn't ready to accept that it had. It was bothersome enough it was inside the church. I didn't want to consider what it would mean if the thing could move across the consecrated ground of the chapel.
"Lose something?" Bonnie asked from the doorway.
Frustrated and defeated, I gave her a weak smile and let go of my view into the Curtain.
"Hello, Bonnie."
She stepped into the room, her coat and purse left behind somewhere. She wore a pained smile on her lips. "That the best you have for me?"
There were people in this town I didn't care to spare a kind word, Bonnie wasn't one of them. She'd done nothing but love me.
I stopped fighting the smile she had always put on my face and replied, "Well if it isn't Bonnie Blankenship, the prettiest girl at Pineville High. How are things, Ms. Blankenship?"
"Much better,” her smile touched her eyes and she stepped in close.
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