by Mark Nesbitt
A young man was sitting in the bar waiting for his mother to pick him up. He saw a man approach the door, as if about to enter, then abruptly disappear. He mentioned this to one of the waitresses on duty that night, and for a while she dismissed it as a combination of a real customer who had changed his mind about entering and the over-active imagination of a youngster. That was until later that same night.
She was in the kitchen and happened to look out the open sliding doors. There, standing at the end of the bar, was a very large, tall, hulking figure. Thinking she needed to go out and explain that the bar was closed, she took her eyes off him for a fraction of a second, immediately went through the door and found that he had vanished. He could not have crossed the floor to the door in the short amount of time it took her to walk through the door into the bar. The man, his identity, and even his very existence, remain unknown and unexplained.
When cleaning the rooms, the manager has heard the gentle sound of a lady’s demure cough.
And finally, a man in Room 2 looked across the hall one night into Room 1. Standing in the room he observed what he described as a petite blond woman. He thought she was a guest. He said hello, but she ignored him and walked toward the bed in Room 1 moving so as to be out of his line of sight. Not wanting to intrude upon another guest who obviously wanted privacy, he did not pursue the matter. He mentioned it to the management the next morning and was utterly surprised to hear that no one had been checked into that room. Believing that he may have gotten a rare glimpse into the other world, he remained awake and curious all the next night—much to the dismay of his poor wife—hoping to see the lovely blond woman again. It seems that as fickle as people can be in this life, they can apparently be just as fickle in the next. He never saw her again.
In each of the guest rooms in the Herr Tavern is a diary for the patrons to record their comments and experiences. The entries rave about the friendly employees and management, the peaceful surroundings and accommodations and the wonderful food at the tavern. Words expressing heartfelt pain at the realization of the horror of boys doing battle and dying right outside their windows are also read in the diaries. As well as the glowing comments and serious thoughts are some unusual comments relating some of the guests’ unexplainable experiences. The written comments and statements during breakfast have forced the employees to name the ghosts “Fred” and “Susan” after the Herrs. Some of the guest’s comments follow.
1/2/93: …the TV was suddenly turned off and not by either one of us. …So the hospitality at the Herr’s Tavern extends beyond the explicable….
11/14/93: …(We heard the ghost)….
4/24/94: As for Fred, I think he was restless our first night here but last night he must have been elsewhere.
7/17/94: Dear Fred—You can “rest easy” knowing that your tavern is in good hands. …Sorry you missed my [birthday] party, Fred. Or was that you tugging at my pillow last night?
7/20/94: We were told about “Fred” the ghost and I didn’t think he visited us until I found my shoes laced together this morning!
8/12/94: We had a late night visit from Fred. He shook my hand (waking me up) to welcome our family to his home….
8/25-8/94: P.S. Bye Fred…Hope to see or hear you more next time.
11/27/94: …Fred turned up in our room last night. He turned the heater on for us about 2 a.m. Thanks, Fred. We were getting cold.
12/9-10/94: Fred…rattled the fan at night & caused the phone to blink with a message when there was none.
12/29-30/94: By the way, I think Fred did introduce himself last night…thank Fred for watching over us last night.
1/1/95: (Who does the door check at 3 a.m.?)
1/29/95: The fireplace turned off around 3 a.m. Was that Fred?
2/5/95: A few strange things happened, the phone rang at 11:20, answered and no one was there, then it rang again at 3:20 a.m., none of us would get up to answer. The door at the barn opened several times, no one there, and our bedroom door kept opening….
6/12/95: Fred did come & screwed up the phones.
7/30/95: No creaking floors or knocks on the door, however, I swear I heard a lady singing light opera at 12:30 p.m. …I turned on the television on the music channel and it all disappeared.
8/14/95: Fred’s only appearance was via the telephone. We came in and the message light was on. When I picked up the phone I was connected to a Friendship Inn. The phone lights seem to respond to conversation….
Is the spirit the employees intuitively refer to as “Fred” really the former Civil War-era owner of the tavern watching over the place and sending messages to his modern guests? With all the people—weary, thirsty travelers and caring owners, soldiers and officers, wounded and dying, and families—who have passed through the doors and stayed within the brick walls of the old tavern since 1815, it would be difficult to tell.
But notes found in Dr. Charles Emmons’s files dated 1981 seem to confirm that regardless of the decade or the observers, some things continue to occur:
“In the pool room area: chairs had been knocked down off tables with a clatter. Out of corner of his eye once he thought he saw dark shadow form of a man where old bar area was. Coming down stairs he went thru cold area (and once felt cold alternately on front & back depending on which part of his body was facing a spot). Thought that was a female. …[He] has seen nothing in Tavern but thinks there are one male & one female.”
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Chapter 15: Endnotes
The Premature Burial
1 Mason, W. Roy, “Notes of a Confederate Staff-Officer,” Battles and Leaders, 3:101. Mason was appalled after the Battle of Fredericksburg at the “burial” of some of the Union dead: “But the most sickening sight of all was when they threw the dead, some four or five hundred in number, into Wallace’s empty ice house, where they were found—a hecatomb of skeletons—after the war.”
Tourist Season in the Other World
1 Veil, Charles Henry, Memoirs, Herman J. Viola, ed. (New York: Orion Books, 1993), 29–30.
Actors or Reenactors
1 Johnson, Eric, correspondence and telephone conversations, October-November, 1992.
2 Chamberlain, Joshua Lawrence, The Passing of the Armies: An Account of the Final Campaign of the Army of the Potomac Based Upon Personal Reminiscences of the Fifth Army Corps (New York: G. B. Putnam’s Sons, 1915), 312–13.
3 Stewart, George R. Pickett’s Charge: A Microhistory of the Final Attack at Gettysburg, July 3, 1863, (Cambridge: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1959), 141. See also Tucker, Glenn. High Tide at Gettysburg: The Campaign in Pennsylvania, (New York: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, Inc., 1958), 353.
4 Stewart, 157, 167.
Alone in Hell
1 McLaughlin, Jack, Gettysburg: The Long Encampment, (New York: Appleton- Century, 1963), 188-9.
2 Alexander, John, Ghosts: Washington’s Most Famous Ghost Stories (Washington, D.C.: Washingtonian Books, 1975), 59–65.
Hell is for Children, Too
1 See Mark Nesbitt, Ghosts of Gettysburg (Gettysburg: Second Chance Publications, 2012), 30.
2 The full history of the orphanage can be read in Mary Ruth Collins and Cindy A. Stouffer, One Soldier’s Legacy: The National Homestead at Gettysburg (Gettysburg: Thomas Publications, 1993).
Brotherhood Forever
1 See “Off-off Broadway,” Nesbitt, Ghosts of Gettysburg II (Gettysburg: Second Chance Publications, 2011), 53-4.
2 Christ, Elwood W., unpublished research files of historic houses done for the Gettysburg Historic Building Survey Committee (Gettysburg: Preservation Office, Gettysburg Borough Office Building, no date).
3 See “The Play’s the Thing,” Nesbitt, Ghosts of Gettysburg, 33.
Sleep Eternal?
1 See Nesbitt, Ghosts of Gettysburg, 44-5.
The Woman in White…Revisited
1 See “Black Sunset,” Nesbitt, Ghosts of Gettysburg, 67.
2 To hold initiation ceremonies on the battlefield, organizat
ions need special permission from the National Park Service. Almost all of the roads along the battlelines are closed after 10:00 p.m.
3 The addition of the owl to the story is interesting. It is an element that is not needed to add to or complete the story. Often individuals relating their unexplainable experiences to me will include non-sequiturs, things that have nothing to do with the story, but obviously happened at the time. These oddities, to me, mean that the person is not making up the story. No one who is making up a story would insert something that doesn’t make sense.
A Short Walk to the Other World
1 Murray, Dorothy Speicher, A Library for Adams County (Gettysburg: Friends of the Library, 1988), 7–8.
2 Baker, Beth, “Gettysburg’s Ghosts Rise on Occasion,” The Gettysburg Times.
Stone Shadows
1 See Nesbitt, Ghosts of Gettysburg, 76.
2 Hettler, Kurt W., “Weird Hauntings at Gettysburg College,” an unpublished paper done for Dr. Charles Emmons, submitted January 24, 1980.
Arabesques Upon Water
1 Coco, Gregory A., A Vast Sea of Misery: A History and Guide to the Union and Confederate Field Hospitals at Gettysburg, July 1–November 20, 1863 (Thomas Publications, 1988). Coco writes that no documented evidence exists to prove the tavern and barn were field hospitals, but included the fact that bloodstains could be seen on the upstairs floor as late as 1986. He also pointed out that several surrounding sites were “possible” hospital locations.
2 Coco, 134–5.
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Chapter 16: Acknowledgments
Once again, I am forced, as all writers are sooner or later, to admit that I have had a great deal of help creating this work. Many individuals are involved in the research, writing, and publication of a book, and without the assistance of the following people, this one could never have been written.
I must acknowledge fellow historian and author Gregory Coco for his dedicated research on the Campaign and Battle of Gettysburg. No matter what book I’ve been working on, he seems to come up with a pertinent historical fact from his files, which adds to the story.
Dr. Walter Powell, author and preservation officer of the Borough of Gettysburg, and Elwood “Woody” Christ have also been there when I needed access to their research at the borough building.
Steve Wolf, Denise Clark, and Deb Hagen at the Herr Tavern and Publick House were always helpful no matter how busy their schedules.
I owe a thank-you to Lynn Goddard for missing her in my last book. My long-time friend Goretti Schrade and Rebecca Krishan added a story to this collection, as did Mary Sutphen of the American Print Gallery in Gettysburg and Susan Sutphen of Gettysburg One-Hour Photo.
Joe and Colette Hood graciously opened their home to me, as did Mark and Diana Snell. Pam Saylor, a gifted psychic, in a speech and in subsequent discussions, gave me additional insight into the paranormal world. Dane Wagle and Mr. and Mrs. F. William Wagle shared with me one of the unexplainable events that happened to them.
This wouldn’t be one of my ghost books without the help of my friends Karyol Kirkpatrick and Dr. Charles Emmons who both generously shared their vast knowledge and experiences in the field of parapsychology.
Erica and Tom Crist, Jennifer Musumeci, Eric Persson, and Steve Hammond all contributed their strange experiences in Gettysburg. Eric Johnson contacted me from California to relate the incredible number of mysterious happenings during the filming of the movie “Gettysburg.”
Bob and Georgia Servant and Kevin Servant of Servant’s Old Tyme Photos in Gettysburg allowed me access to research one of the stories. Diane Brennan at the Wills House shared her experiences as well.
Darla Peightal and Jennifer Suroviec were kind enough—and courageous enough—to share a story that allowed a legend to become a documentable fact. Glenn Sitterly shared his knowledge, and Priscilla R. Baker, fellow author, helped with one of the stories.
To those I have spoken with and who have encouraged me in this work, yet haven’t been mentioned in these acknowledgments, I apologize and say a heart-felt thanks.
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We died, those bitter winters, believing in a spring.
When all the buds would blossom,
and all the bells should ring,
Not for our own doomed selves,
but for all tribes of sons unborn—
For us to plough the heavy fields, for them to reap the corn
We died, unhalting, killed and died,
that wars at last should cease,
And man, to fuller stature grow, honor us dead with Peace.
—Howard I. Chidley
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Chapter 17: About The Author
Mark Nesbitt was a National Park Service Ranger/Historian for five years at Gettysburg before starting his own research and writing company. Since then he has published over fifteen books, including Blood & Ghosts, Civil War Ghost Trails, The Ghost Hunters Field Guide: Gettysburg & Beyond, and the national award-winning Ghosts of Gettysburg series. His stories have been seen on The History Channel, A&E, The Discovery Channel, The Travel Channel, Unsolved Mysteries, and numerous regional television shows and heard on Coast to Coast AM, and regional radio. In 1994, he created the commercially successful Ghosts of Gettysburg Candlelight Walking Tours®, and in 2006, the Ghosts of Fredericksburg Tours.
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