Ghosts

by Hans Holzer

  She greeted her husband with a sigh of relief on his return. When she told him of her ordeal, he was amazingly understanding. Had the ghost been playing that night, Mr. D. would have sat up to listen, but unfortunately, his return abruptly ended the nocturnal concerts.

  Gradually the matter of the ghostly pianist faded into memory, especially as the D.s did a lot of entertaining in the house. Among their guests were Neill O., her husband’s assistant, and his wife. One Sunday morning they descended the stairs to breakfast in a somewhat shaken condition. When questioned by Mrs. D., the couple complained about the inconsiderate “neighbor” who had kept them awake playing the piano at 3 A.M. Their room had been exactly above the salon. Mrs. O. added that she had clearly heard a hunting horn outside the house and that it had awakened her.

  Other overnight guests of the D.’s complained similarly about nocturnal concerts downstairs. What could the hosts do but say they hoped their guests would sleep better the next night?

  Eventually Mrs. D., with the help of Neill O., interrogated the maid about the house in which she had served for so long.

  “What about that portrait of a lady outside?” Mrs. D. wanted to know. Apparently Napoleon had wearied of his mistress after a while and left her to live by herself in the house. During those lonely years as a former Imperial mistress she had little company to comfort her: only a grand piano for her amusement, and soon it became her one and only passion. When Mrs. D. asked the maid about a ghost in the house, the girl blanched. Living on the third floor, Paulette had often heard the ghostly piano concert downstairs but had been too scared to investigate. During the DuPrès residency, Paulette had been alone with the children on one occasion when the nurse had gone to sleep.

  One of the children started to cry and Paulette rushed to the room. She found the little girl standing in her bed wide awake, pointing to a corner of the room and saying, “Look at the pretty lady!” Paulette, however, could not see anyone or anything.

  After the D.s left Paris, the house passed into the hands of Robert Lamoureux, who added the projection room on the grounds but left everything else as it was.

  He, too, gave up the house and eventually moved elsewhere. The house then became part of a real estate parcel acquired by speculators for the purpose of tearing down the old houses and erecting a new apartment house on the spot. In August 1968, I was granted permission by the La Tour Malakoff Society to visit the house, with the tense suggestion that I do so as soon as possible if I wanted to find the house still standing.

  Finally, in 1969, I did so, and fortunately the wreckers had not yet come. The house already showed its state of abandonment. The once carefully kept garden was overgrown with weeds, the windows were dirty and the absence of all furniture gave it an eerie, unreal feeling.

  I walked up and down the staircase, taking pictures and “listening with an inner ear” for whatever vibrations might come my way. I did not hear any music, but then the grand piano was no longer there. An Italian watchman, who had spent hundreds of nights on the property guarding it from intruders, looked at me and wondered what I wanted there. I asked if he had had any unusual experiences in the house. He shook his head and explained he wouldn’t have—he never slept there and wouldn’t dream of doing so. Why not? He just smiled somewhat foolishly and changed the subject.

  When my photographs were developed by the professional service I use, one of them showed a strange light streak I could not account for. It was a picture of the iron staircase in the house. The shapeless light streak appears between the second and first floors. Was it perhaps Napoleon’s lady friend rushing downstairs to welcome her lover?

  One can’t be sure about those things.

  * 86

  Haunted Wolfsegg Fortress, Bavaria

  THE FORTIFIED CASTLE at Wolfsegg, Bavaria, is not State property and can be visited only through the kindness and permission of its owner. It is one of the few privately owned fortresses in the world, I believe, and thereby hangs a tale.

  The late Georg Rauchenberger, by profession a painter and the official guardian of monuments for the province of The Upper Palatinate, which is part of the state of Bavaria, purchased this ancient fortress with his own savings. Since he was the man who passed on monies to be spent by the state for the restoration of ancient monuments in the province, he had of course a particularly touchy situation on his hands, for he could not possibly allow any funds to be diverted to his own castle. Consequently, every penny spent upon the restoration of this medieval fortress came from his own pocket. Over the years he gradually restored this relic of the past into a livable, if primitive, medieval fortress. He put in some of the missing wooden floors, and turned the clock back to the eleventh century in every respect.

  Two persons, so far, can sleep comfortably in the large fortress, but as it is still in the process of being restored, it will be a long time before it can compare with some of the “tourist attractions” under State control. Nevertheless, small groups of interested visitors have been admitted most days of the week for a guided tour through the Hall of Knights and other parts of the fortress. Ordinarily visitors are not told of the hauntings at Wolfsegg, but I am sure that anyone referring to these lines will find at least a friendly reception.

  Because of the nearness of the River Danube, the fortress at Wolfsegg was always of some importance. It rises majestically out of the valley to the equivalent of four or five modern stories. Quite obviously constructed for defense, its thick bulky walls are forbidding, the small windows—high up to discourage aggressors—and the hill upon which the fortress perches making attack very difficult.

  Never conquered, Wolfsegg’s Twelfth Century bulwarks are formidable.

  As a matter of fact, Wolfsegg never fell to an enemy, and even the formidable Swedes, who besieged it for a long time during the Thirty Years’ War, had to give up. Built in 1028, Wolfsegg belonged to several noble Bavarian families and was always directly or indirectly involved in the intricate dynastic struggles between the various lines of the Wittelsbachs, who ruled Bavaria until 1918. Many of the masters of Wolfsegg made a living by being “Raubritter”—that is to say, robber barons. All in all, the area had an unsavory reputation even as early as the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. The walls are thick and the living quarters located well above ground.

  The Knights Hall on the third floor is reached by a broad staircase, and one flight down there is also a lookout tower which has been restored as it was in the sixteenth century. In the inner court there is a wooden gallery running along part of the wall (at one time this gallery covered the entire length of the wall). The lower stories have not yet been fully restored or even explored.

  The village is remote and depends largely on tourism.

  Entrance to the fortress Wolfsegg

  One of the two rooms “fixed up” by the owner Georg Rauchenberger

  Georg Rauchenberger himself heard uncanny noises, footsteps, and experienced cold drafts at various times in various parts of the fortress. The late Mrs. Therese Pielmeier, wife of the custodian, actually saw a whitish form in the yard, full of luminescence, and she also heard various unexplained noises. On one occasion, Mr. Rauchenberger saw a young lady coming in with a small group of visitors, and when he turned to speak to her she disappeared.

  In the yard, where the ghost of the Countess was seen

  The Medieval gallery

  Strong walls and small windows characterize the early medieval fortress.

  I held a séance at Wolfsegg with a Viennese lady who served as my medium at the time. Through the trance mediumship of Mrs. Edith Riedl, I was able to trace the terrible story of a triple murder involving a beautiful woman, once the wife of a Wolfsegg baron, who had become the innocent victim of a political plot. The legend of the beautiful ghost at Wolfsegg had, of course, existed prior to our arrival on the scene. Apparently, greedy relatives of a fourteenth-century owner of Wolfsegg had decided to take over the property, then of considerable value, by trapping the youn
g wife of the owner with another man. The husband, told of the rendezvous, arrived in time to see the two lovers together, killed both of them, and was in turn murdered in “just revenge” by his cunning relatives.

  The portrait of the unlucky lady of Wolfsegg hangs in one of the corridors, the work of the father of the current owner, who painted her from impressions received while visiting the castle.

  Although I was able to make contact with the atmosphere surrounding the “white woman” of Wolfsegg, and to shed light upon a hitherto unknown Renaissance tragedy, it is entirely possible that the restless baroness still roams the corridors to find recognition and to prove her innocence to the world.

  One reaches Wolfsegg on secondary roads in about a half hour’s drive from Regensburg, and it is situated near a small and rather primitive village, northwest of the city on the north side of the Danube River. There is only one inn in this village, and staying overnight, as I once did, is not recommended.

  This is a remote and strange area of Germany, despite the comparative nearness of the city of Regensburg. By the way, Regensburg is sometimes also called Ratisbon, and is the center of one of the few remaining strongly Celtic areas in Germany.

  * 87

  A Haunted Former Hospital in Zurich

  THE HOUSE IN QUESTION is now a private residence, owned by Colonel and Mrs. Nager. The Colonel is a professional officer and takes a cautious attitude towards psychic phenomena. Mrs. Catherine Nager is not only a talented medium herself, but also serves as secretary to the Swiss Society for Parapsychology headed by the Zurich psychiatrist Dr. Hans Negele-Osjord.

  Rather aristocratic in design and appearance, the house stands on upper Hoenger Street at a spot where it overlooks much of downtown Zurich. It is a square, heavy-set stone house with three stories, and an attic above the top story. In this attic there is a window that does not want to stay closed—no matter how often one tries to close it. When this happened all the time, the Nagers kept accusing each other of leaving the window open, only to discover that neither of them had done it.

  The house is set back from the road in a heavily protected garden; it is painted a dark gray and there is a wrought-iron lantern over the entrance.

  When I first visited the house in the company of the owner, the attic immediately depressed me. The famous window was open again and I had no difficulty closing it. But it could not have opened by its volition.

  Down one flight there is a small room which for many years has served as a maid’s room. It was here that the most notable phenomena have been observed. A maid named Liesl saw a man wearing a kind of chauffeur’s cap standing between the bed and the wall with a candle in his hand. She panicked and ran from the room screaming in terror. Mrs. Nager checked the room immediately and found it empty. No one could have escaped down the stairs in the brief interval. Another servant girl took Liesl’s place. A year and a half after the initial incident, the new girl saw the same apparition.

  Next to the maid’s room is another room famous for uncanny atmospheric feelings. Guests who have stayed there have frequently complained about a restlessness in the room, and nobody ever slept well.

  On the third floor there is still another maid’s room where a girl named Elsbeth saw the ghostly apparition of a man wearing a peculiar beret. When Mrs. Nager’s son was only eight, he saw a man emerge from between the window curtains of his room. He, too, emphasized the peculiar cap the man wore—something not seen today.

  Other servants have described the ghost as being a man of about thirty-five, wearing the same peculiarly Swiss cap; they have seen him all over the house.

  The explanation is this: during the seventeenth century the house had been a military hospital. Many wounded soldiers who came there died. The cap worn by the apparition was the soldier’s cap worn in the period. Most likely the man is lost between two states of being and would like to get out—if only someone would show him the way.

  * 88

  The Lady from Long Island

  MAURICE O. IS AN elderly man of Polish extraction, healthy, vigorous, and strong, despite his years. He is firmly rooted in the Roman Catholic faith but is also aware of the psychic world around him. Mr. O. operates a workshop located in a loft occupying the second story of a house on lower Broadway. The section is one of the oldest parts of New York City. This case was brought to my attention by the man’s nephew, a teacher on Long Island who had developed an interest in historical research, especially research pertaining to the American Revolutionary period.

  When I met Mr. O., he was at first very suspicious of me and my psychic friend, Ingrid Beckman. He didn’t understand what parapsychology was or what we were going to do in his place. Patiently, I explained that I wanted Ingrid to get her bearings and to see whether she could pick up something from “the atmosphere.” While Ingrid was puttering around in the rear of the place, I convinced Mr. O. that I had to know what had happened to him, so that I could judge the case fairly. He explained that he had been in the neighborhood for fifty-five years. He remembered that, when he was a small boy, another building had stood on the same spot. “I came here from Poland in 1913, when I was ten years old,” Mr. O. explained in a halting, heavily accented voice. “In this spot there was an old building, a red brick building with few windows. On the corner there was a United cigar store. Down the block was a saloon. They had girls there; customers could come into the saloon, have the girls, and go upstairs with them. In those days it cost them fifty cents or a dollar. There also used to be a barber shop in the building. In 1920 they tore down the old building and built the present factory loft, but they used the same foundations.”

  When Mr. O. moved his business into a building he had known all his life, it was a little like a homecoming for him. He was in the business of servicing high-speed sewing machines, which were sent to him from all over the country. Most of the time he did the work alone; for a while, his brother Frank had assisted him. In those days he never gave psychic phenomena any thought, and the many strange noises he kept hearing in the loft didn’t really bother him. He thought there must be some natural explanation for them, although there were times when he was sure he heard heavy footsteps going up and down the stairs when he was alone in the building. One Saturday afternoon around 4 o’clock, as he was ready to wash up and go home, he walked back into the shop to wipe his hands. All of a sudden he saw a heavy iron saw fly up into the air on its own volition. It fell down to the floor, broken in two. Mr. O. picked up the pieces and said to nobody in particular, “Ghost, come here. I am not afraid of you; I want to talk to you.” However, there was no answer.

  “See that latch on the door,” Maurice O. said to us, and showed us how he locked the place so that nobody could come in. “Many times I’ve seen that latch move up and down, as if someone wanted to get in, and when I went outside there was no one there.”

  Oftentimes he would hear footsteps overhead in the loft above his. When he would go upstairs to check what the noise was all about, he would find the third-floor loft solidly locked up and no one about. Once, when he went to the toilet between 1:30 and 2 P.M., at a time when he knew he was alone in the building, he found himself locked out of his place, yet he knew he had left the door open. Someone, nevertheless, had locked the latch from the inside. Finally, with the help of a friend, he broke the door open and of course found the place empty. The incident shook Mr. O. up considerably, as he couldn’t explain it, no matter how he tried. During this time, too, he kept seeing shadows, roughly in the shape of human beings. They would move up and down in the back of his workshop and were of a grayish color. “It was the shape of a banana,” Mr. O. commented. Curiously, during the first eight years of his occupancy—he had been across the street for forty years before—Mr. O. had had no such problems. It was only in the last two years that he began to notice things out of the ordinary.

  However, Mr. O. had heard rumors of strange goings-on in the building. A previous owner of the loft building had a music store and was in the
habit of spending Saturday nights in his shop with some invited friends, listening to music. One night, so the story goes, around midnight, everything started to pop out of the shelves, merchandise flying through the air, and the entire building began to shake as if there had been an earthquake. While all this was going on, the people in the music store heard a tremendous noise overhead. They became frightened and called the police. Several radio cars responded immediately but could not find out what was wrong. Everything seemed normal upstairs. Shortly after, the owner sold the building and moved to California.

  Mr. O.’s workshop is L-shaped, with a small office immediately behind the heavy steel door that gives access to the corridor, and thence to a steep staircase that leads out into the street. The machine shop itself is to the left and in back of the office. Thus, it is possible to work in the back of the shop and not see anyone coming in through the entrance door. But it is not possible to escape hearing any noises on the floor, since the entire building is not very large.

  The day after Thanksgiving 1971 Maurice was alone in the shop, working quietly on some orders he wanted to get out of the way. Since it was the day after Thanksgiving and just before the weekend, the building was very quiet. There was no one upstairs, and Maurice was sure he was the only one in the building at the time. Suddenly, he saw a lady walk into his office. Since he had not heard the heavy door slam, which it always does when someone walks in, he wondered how she had gotten into the building and into his office. She wore what to Maurice seemed a very old-fashioned, very chic dress, white gloves, and a bonnet, and she smelled of a sweet fragrance that immediately captured him. What was so nice a lady doing in his sewing machine shop?