The ghosts in Gettysburg taught me that you do not have to have money, or even a body, to be generous. You simply have to be open to acknowledging when someone tries to reach you. It might not be pricey or as elaborate as feeding camels from your Lamborghini, but free can hold far much more worth than things people pay for.
Starting out the day at the childhood home of Jenny Wade, which is now the Museum Haunted Objects, I had some fun experiences there, from feeling cool air in a chest and feeling as if my back was hurting from constant coughing, to setting my hand on a board, feeling my wrist tingle, then my elbow, then shoulder from touching the amputation board, then there was the kidney pain, feeling as if I could put my thumb into a bullet hole in my back, but it was the dolls that got me. The little blonde one’s pupils kept shifting, getting slightly bigger and smaller as I stared at it, while the crackled doll they just got kept demanding my attention, but it was that damned covered one positioned in front of the covered oculus that keeps magnifying it that made me question reality when I saw her eyes glow red for an instant. They had warned me not to look at the cursed doll, had even said that people wind up having traffic issues after looking at the doll, such as expensive tickets and even car accidents, but I looked anyways, because I’m stupid, and of course, I came out to a ticket on my car.
Cassie, the tour hostess, pulled out a spirit box, and there were many chatters, clear answers to questions. When I went to leave, we both clearly heard them say, “thank you for coming,” and as Cassie seemed shocked, claiming they had never said that to anyone before, another voice piped up. This one was smaller, like a feminine child.
“Yeah, thank you.” I told them I would write about them. The book will come out before too long if I keep going…
Though I was scheduled for the midnight tour, I also joined the bus tour members from the family reunion were going on, which loads just across the parking lot from the Jenny Wade house. While waiting for the bus, I wandered away from the group to Cemetery Hill. With the air of dusk settling in, amplifying the scene, I stood over the hill, looked left to the tree line, and could have sworn I saw a soldier peeking out at me wearing like a tan colored outfit, which I knew was not black, navy, but I called it grey, as I knew it was lighter, not dark, more tan.
My phone rang. Bus is loading. Hustle back.
Hot hoof it over to the others. Try to explain to a cousin what happened, but only a few words come out. It takes a minute for words to form, as she stares at me like spit it out, so I point: “that place is fuct.”
Not exactly what I was trying to explain to her, but those are the words that slipped out anyways. She just kind of tilted her head at me like I was crazy, and we got on the bus. We heard all kinds of tales about the servants old time photos and other places around town, before making our way to the covered bridge to watch Tennessee smoke a cigarette.
The same cousin that I was trying to explain the Cemetery Hill to, she picked up the cigarette after Tennessee discarded it, and continued to smoke it. My aunts joined in for a puff, just to hit the ghost cigarette. Not sure if that’s how it’s supposed to go, but that’s how it went.
I would go back to the covered bridge alone, after doing the midnight tour through the Jenny Wade house and the orphanage, just to be able to meditate underneath where the dead soldiers hung, to do my own Spirit Box session, as there were a few people at the other end of the bridge offering up cigarettes for the spirit box. If I thought the voices were clear from The Museum Haunted Objects, this was even clearer still, “I want to talk to you,” followed by, “shhhhh!” Then I heard the spirit box at the other end of the bridge go off, like the spirit was trying to talk to both of us, going back and forth between boxes.
The orphanage was equally interesting, as I positioned myself towards the very end of the dining table, towards the darkest corner of the room. Located by the back door, through the darkness, I was watching the reflection in the mirror, which changed oddly into a small red box that I tried to capture in pictures, though it does not do it justice. Through the darkness, I noted a black shadow that was darker than the rest of the shadows that seem to come from the back door and into a corner, directly behind the tour guide.
As that happened, I heard his voice falter just a little bit, and he recalled the story of this one time, a tour guide had broken down in tears in a corner from a dark spirit that had come in and left out the back door. I could not help but think to myself, “buddy, that spirit is right behind you right now.” I kept quiet though.
Down in the basement is the not so fun place. That creepy corridor is nothing compared to the hole. Compelled to simply walk inside of it, I could feel my hands raw, as if I had been clawing, trying to get the mortar out from in between the rocks of the wall.
The dread heaviness in my chest let me know that if someone had not died, people had experience near death experiences there, and I could picture a child curled up in the corner closest to the opening, though I got the impression the child had died in that spot. It’s that feeling in the chest, as if exhausted from crying and coughing.
The creepy toys in the back had lingered there too long. They had an energy of their own. It’s the time loop.
At the house where Jenny Wade was killed making bread for soldiers, the cabinet door had opened up after an emf reader spiked. The body laid out in the basement of the house was an interesting addition. I did have to put my ring finger through the bullet hole of the door, the bullet that killed Jenny, just to see if the rumors come true.
The next day, we visited the Dobbin house, and got to learn about the underground railroad action that happen there, seeing the slave hideout. The upstairs had a dizziness factor, which could be the uneven floors, but it could just be a weird thing with where the beds were. My aunt smelled tobacco smoke in there and pipe smoke at the covered bridge.
Convinced that I was going to leave the Dobbin house and go to the national cemetery, I wound up taking a wrong turn into a different cemetery next-door. Somehow, that wrong turn led me straight to Jenny Wade‘s grave. When I noticed that people had left pennies for her, I did not have a penny, so I left her a dime.
I did wind up finding my way to the national cemetery, but of course, I had to find my way back to Cemetery Hill. As if pull to the location where I had last scene that goes to the image pop out from behind the tree at me, I walk down to the tree line, to where I saw him. Something told me to look down at the rock lined wall.
Not sure what I was expecting to find, may be a stray bullet lodged in a rock, or some kind of weird memorabilia from the war, I was pleasantly surprised to find a nut that was cut perfectly in half. Laying in a position where I would see it, the inside of the nut was the perfect shape of a heart. I knew this was what he wanted me to find, but I questioned why.
Why was this better than a stray bullet? Why was this better than some shrapnel? Why was this better than some bloody object from the war?
He seemed to laugh at me. Didn’t I understand that this was the fruit born from the blood of dead soldiers? This was the only life that they could give from the fruit of their loins, as they had been unable to produce as many heirs as they would have hoped, dying so young and early.
The trees were left to produce their babies. These are the nuts dead soldiers can give. This is their living legacy.
Perspective. Sometimes, you have to be open to a new perspective. That’s when the soldier explained a person does not have to be rich to be generous and give what they can, pointing out the budding flowers of the trumpet vine, proof that life continues after death.
Upon booking one final ghost tour at night, I learned about the butter nut. When the tour guys showed up were in the exact color that I had seen from the tree line, I questioned what troop he was representing. Thinking that there was only gray and navy, I felt a little stupid to realize that there was butternut and many troops that simply wore whatever clothes they could find.
Questioning him, asking what states were likely to have worn this butternut color, especially around the Cemetery Hill area, he explained that it was probably some of the poor southern states, places such as Georgia or Louisiana. Both states I have ties to, so that’s kind of interesting. When I told him what had happened, he said it was very likely that I could have reminded them of a former loved one.
He took us back to the Dobbin House, explained a lot more of the history there, and pointed out the shadow that looks like Abraham Lincoln. Having a spring inside the house is one way to have kept groceries cold back in the day. Also, a great way to actually have running water.
Overall, I would say that the ghosts are very much still active in the area. To put it in perspective, they say that whenever people build, they often turn up remains, including the high school, where they exposed a mass grave of like 200. When you think of these poor guys that got these amputations, because that was a procedure for handling a bullet wound back in the day, here they are lying in the ground, starving, dying of thirst, trying to convince people to shoot them because they have no limbs to shoot themselves, and then comes the Fourth of July flood that just drowns them like a mercy killing.
There’s tales of couples falling side-by-side in battle. There’s accounts of “male” soldiers giving birth. The women paid prices just as high as the men.
Go visit Gettysburg. Go see Jenny. Leave her a Penny.
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