The Legendary Brown Mountain Lights
CHAPTER 21 Ghost Walking in Latta Plantation, Charlotte
Joshua P. Warren’s Asheville Tourism Center and Free Museum
CHAPTER 22 The Legend of Blowing Rock and the Green Park Inn, Blowing Rock
Mass Murderer Charlie Lawson, Germanton
CHAPTER 23 The Haunting Charm of Charlotte’s Fourth Ward and the Old Settler’s Cemetery, Charlotte
The Sad Preacher in the Chapel of Rest, Lenoir
CHAPTER 24 The Juxtaposition of Asheville, from Healing Resorts and Endless Views to the Mass Murderer of Asheville and the Haunted Gallows Trail, Asheville
The Inmates of the Great Smoky Mountains Railroad Tunnel, Dillsboro
CHAPTER 25 The Vanderbilts Who Never Left the Biltmore Estate, Asheville
The Mountain of Terror Haunts You Back
Haunting Theme Parks of North Carolina
The Mysterious Vortex of Mystery Hill, Blowing Rock
GHOSTHUNTING TRAVEL GUIDE
Visiting the Haunted Sites of North Carolina
Further Reading
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Welcome to America’s Haunted Road Trip
DO YOU BELIEVE IN GHOSTS?
If you are like 52% of Americans (according to a recent Harris Poll), you do believe that ghosts walk among us. Perhaps you have heard your name called in a dark and empty house. It could be that you have awoken to the sound of footsteps outside your bedroom door, only to find no one there. It is possible that you saw your grandmother sitting in her favorite rocking chair, the same grandmother who had passed away several years before. Maybe you took a photo of a crumbling, deserted farmhouse and discovered strange mists and orbs in the photo, anomalies that were not visible to your naked eye.
If you have experienced similar paranormal events, then you know that ghosts exist. Even if you have not yet experienced these things, you are curious about the paranormal world, the spirit realm. If you weren’t, you would not now be reading this preface to the latest book in the America’s Haunted Road Trip series from Clerisy Press.
Over the last several years, I have investigated haunted locations across the country, and with each new site, I found myself becoming more fascinated with ghosts. What are they? How do they manifest themselves? Why are they here? These are just a few of the questions I have been asking. No doubt you have been asking the same questions.
The books in the America’s Haunted Road Trip series can help you find the answers to your questions about ghosts. We’ve gathered some of America’s top ghost writers (pun intended) and researchers and asked them to write about their states’ favorite haunts. Each location they write about is open to the public so that you can visit it for yourself and try out your ghosthunting skills. In addition to telling you about their often hair-raising adventures, the writers have included maps and travel directions so that you can take your own haunted road trip.
People may think that North Carolina is nothing more than beautiful green mountains and miles of sandy beaches, but Kala Ambrose’s Ghosthunting North Carolina proves that the mountains are home to shadowy entities that are seen only for an instant before disappearing among the trees, and spirits that leave no footprints in the sands. The book is a spine-tingling trip through the state’s various regions with stops at inns, plantations, churches, lighthouses, historic sites, and cemeteries, and even a battleship—all of them haunted. Ride shotgun with Kala as she seeks out Civil War–soldier ghosts at Fort Fisher and the spirits of sailors who served aboard the USS North Carolina. Travel with her to Asheville’s Grove Park Inn, where the Pink Lady still roams the halls, or sit for a spell in the gardens of the Biltmore mansion and watch for the ghostly—and incredibly rich—members of the Vanderbilt family to stroll by. And can that swaggering spirit stalking the moonlit beaches near Beaufort really be the ghost of the infamous pirate Blackbeard? Hang on tight; Ghosthunting North Carolina is a scary ride.
But once you’ve finished reading this book, don’t unbuckle your seat belt. There are still 49 states left for your haunted road trip! See you on the road!
John Kachuba
Editor, America’s Haunted Road Trip
Introduction
WELCOME TO Ghosthunting North Carolina!
As your travel guide to the haunted state of North Carolina, it seems appropriate to let you know who is traveling with you on this journey. For as long as I can remember, I’ve seen ghosts. I was also born psychic, as well as an empath. As a child with these abilities, I didn’t quite understand what was happening to me. In large crowds or during the holidays, I would feel the intensity of emotions around me until I would experience severe stomachaches as I absorbed the emotional energy of the people around me.
Later, as I understood what I was experiencing, I learned how not to absorb as much of the energy. I also was able to define the energy that I was feeling, whether it was coming from a person who was upset, or if I was in an area that was holding a significant amount of negative energetic residue. I also learned how to detect if there was a noncorporal entity or spirit around me.
During this time, I also discovered that I had the psychic ability of psychometry, the ability to read the energy imprint that resonates from an object while holding it in your hand or touching it directly. I found that when I put an object in my hand, I could feel its connection to the person who owned it, and sometimes I would see an image of what they had been doing when wearing or using the object.
The first time I became aware of this ability, I was at my grandmother’s house and she had let me play with her jewelry. As I went through the jewelry box, I tried on her bracelets, watches, and rings. As I slipped on one of her watches, I had a vivid image of my grandmother with my grandfather when they were much younger. It was like seeing a film clip of them.
I ran to my grandmother and said, “I know what you used to do with Grandpa,” and described the scene to her. She asked me who had told me this, and I explained that when I put her watch on my wrist, I saw it. That evening, when my grandfather came home from work, I heard my grandmother ask him if he had told me the story that I had related to her.
To be discreet here, it was a rather romantic story and not one that my grandmother would have been open to sharing in polite company. Hearing the conversation in the other room growing more heated and animated between my grandparents, I ran into the room with the watch and climbed into my grandfather’s arms. “Here, Grandpa,” I said, “When I put the watch on my arm, it tells me a story.” I held the watch on my arm again and began to tell him what I could see. He held his arm around me and gave me a hug and said that I should take the watch and go put it back in the jewelry box on my grandmother’s dressing table. I did as I was told, and as I walked back toward the kitchen where my grandparents were still discussing the event, I heard my grandfather say that I was like him and like his mother, my great-grandmother, who was French and read tea leaves for a living. He said to my grandmother, “She has the gift.”
My grandmother never allowed me to play with her jewelry again. Looking back at this now, I have to chuckle. In my innocence at the time, I didn’t fully understand the romantic encounter that I saw back then. Now, in my adulthood, I can sympathize with my grandmother and see why having her privacy invaded with that particular memory would be overwhelming. I can also understand, after feeling the intensity and passion of that event, why its memory was imprinted so strongly on the watch. Thus began my understanding of psychometry and my journey of feeling energy in objects.
My