Walnut Cemetery: A Ghost, A Crossroads, and A Poetic Tragedy

I was chatting with someone a while ago, and they asked if I had ever visited Walnut Cemetery in Haverhill, Massachusetts. I was born and raised in Haverhill, but had surprisingly never been to this particular cemetery. After they told me it was haunted, I decided it was finally time to pay a visit. It's an interesting place, and I have lots of thoughts. 

Walnut Cemetery is located in one of the more rural areas of Haverhill. I couldn't find what year the cemetery was started, but it's quite old, with a few gravestones dating back to the 1700s. It's still active today, with newer burials and monuments being added. The newer section is well-maintained, but the older section is a little rough looking. It looks, in fact, like a haunted cemetery. There are a lot of tall weeds. Tree branches have fallen on the graves. Some of the oldest monuments are covered in lichen. We went in the winter, so it may just have been between scheduled maintenance. The older section of the cemetery is also on a rocky hill, so perhaps it is harder to cut the grass there. But whatever the reason, the old part of Walnut Cemetery looks a little spooky. I can understand why someone might think it's haunted. 

The cemetery is said to be haunted by a ghost known as the Woman in White, who roams through it at night. You don't even need to go inside the cemetery to see her - the Woman in White has also been seen by motorists just driving by. Some people say she's terrifying, but others say she is simply eerie and mysterious. As with so many things, I think your mindset might influence what you see. If you go expecting something scary, that's what you'll probably encounter. 

When we visited, I noticed that Walnut Cemetery is located within a triangular crossroads. There's a lot of interesting folklore associated with crossroads, so perhaps it's not surprising there are legends associated with this particular cemetery. The ancient Greeks and Romans believed that crossroads were sacred to Hecate, the goddess of witches, and to Hermes, the divine messenger who guided the dead to the underworld. In England, Scotland and Ireland, people who died by suicide were buried at crossroads, often with stake in their heart. Something similar happened more locally in 1680 in Hampton, New Hampshire, when the citizens of that town buried accused witch Eunice Cole at a crossroads with a stake in her heart. For good measure, they placed a horseshoe on her chest to keep her in her unhallowed grave. And in the American south, legends say that if you want to sell your soul to the Devil, you can find him at a crossroads at midnight. 

Speaking of triangular shapes, paranormal investigator Fiona Broome thinks Walnut Cemetery could be linked to a ley line triangle connecting several weird, legendary places in New England. Ley lines are straight lines that connect important locations on a map, and some people believe these lines conduct mystical energy across the landscape. I can't say if that's true or not, but it's another interesting idea to consider when thinking about Walnut Cemetery. Ghosts plus a  crossroads plus ley lines must all add up to something, right? Well, it may not, but it's still fun to think about. 

Broome and several other ghost hunters investigated Walnut Cemetery back in 2009. They perceived several spirits, including a woman in black, an undefined male spirit, and possibly the restless spirit of a small child. They did not encounter the Woman in White, however. 

Who exactly is the Woman in White? Some people think she is the ghost of Lydia Ayer, the most famous person buried in the cemetery. Ayer was immortalized by the Haverhill poet John Greenleaf Whittier in his 1868 poem "In School-days." In this autobiographical poem, Whittier recalls an incident from his childhood, when he lost a spelling bee to a girl in his class. The girl was Lydia Ayer. Rather than revel in her victory, Ayer instead felt sorry for Whittier.

'I'm sorry that I spelt the word: 


I hate to go above you, 


Because,’ - the brown eyes lower fell, - 


'Because, you see, I love you! ' 



Still memory to a gray-haired man 


That sweet child-face is showing. 


Dear girl! the grasses on her grave 


Have forty years been growing!

He lives to learn, in life's hard school,

How few who pass above him

Lament their triumph and his loss,

Like her, - because they love him.

It's a melancholy poem, and justifiably so, because Ayer died in 1827 when she was just fourteen years old. It's clear that her death made a big impact on Whittier. The poem itself also made a big impact. "In School-days" was one of Whittier's most popular poems, and is often still taught to students today. 

Death is the great equalizer, but Lydia Ayer is the star attraction for living visitors to Walnut Cemetery. A wooden sign points towards her grave, which is marked with a large, handsome memorial that was put up in 1937 by a local civic organization. But is her spirit the Woman in White? 

I'm not sure. Ayer died when she was just a young teenager, and the Woman in White is usually described as a woman, not a young girl. Maybe people only see that the ghost is female, and can't really discern her age, and think she is a full-grown woman. Or maybe Ayer's ghost actually looks older than fourteen. After all, she's over two-hundred years old. Or maybe it's not her ghost at all. And of course, this could all just be a legend. There may not be a ghost at all. 

Women in white are a classic form that ghosts appear in, and stories about them can be found all over the world. In a sense, a Woman in White transcends the story of an individual and partakes in a greater, archetypal identity. In his book Daimonic Reality (2003), Patrick Harpur says the following about "white ladies":

"A ghost? Possibly. But it is a distinguishing characteristic of white lady apparitions they are not individually identifiable. They have deeper resonances than the shade of a historical personage. The time and location are suggestive... an hour and place of transition, of in-between. "

He goes on to say: 

"... white ladies do not speak. But their silence is eloquent. Their appearance itself is the message: enigmatic, often sinister, pointing towards the unknown."

 

Jack-O-Lanterns: Demons, Gemstones, and New England Origins

The jack-o-lantern is a ubiquitous symbol of Halloween. All across America, people carve faces into pumpkins, placing them on doorsteps and windowsills as part of the holiday celebrations. Despite New England's modern connection with Halloween because of Salem's annual October festivities, Halloween really only became popular in New England in the latter half of the 19th century as more Irish and Scottish immigrants arrived here. The English Puritans and their descendants did not celebrate before then. 

Still, despite this, the jack-o-lantern has deep roots in New England. It seems likely that people were carving jack-o-lanterns well before Halloween was even celebrated here, and that pumpkin carving became associated with the holiday only later. Read on if you dare...

Nathaniel Hawthorne: Giant Gems and Enchanted Scarecrows

Massachusetts author Nathaniel Hawthorne was apparently the first person to ever use the term "jack-o-lantern" in print. His 1835 story "The Great Carbuncle" is about a group of adventurers searching for a giant, glowing gemstone in the White Mountains. One of the adventurers tells his companions he will hide the gem inside his tattered cloak if he finds it.

‘Well said, Master Poet!’ cried he of the spectacles. ‘Hide it under thy cloak, sayest thou? Why, it will gleam through the holes, and make thee look like a jack-o’-lantern!’

It's not entirely clear what Hawthorne means by jack-o-lantern here. It sounds like it could be our familiar carved pumpkin lit by a candle, but the term jack-o-lantern also was used to mean ignis fatus, the glowing swamp gas phenomena also called willow-the-wisp. Either usage makes sense in the story. Halloween is not mentioned at all in "The Great Carbuncle," which was published before the holiday was celebrated in New England.

Nathaniel Hawthorne

However, a carved pumpkin does appear in Hawthorne's 1851 story "Feathertop," when a New England witch named Mother Rigby uses one as a head for her scarecrow:

Thus we have made out the skeleton and entire corporosity of the scarecrow, with the exception of its head; and this was admirably supplied by a somewhat withered and shrivelled pumpkin, in which Mother Rigby cut two holes for the eyes and a slit for the mouth, leaving a bluish-colored knob in the middle to pass for a nose. It was really quite a respectable face.

Mother Rigby is so pleased with her handiwork that she brings the scarecrow to life, and since this is a Hawthorne story the scarecrow learns a lot about human morality. Hawthorne does not use the term jack-o-lantern in the story, though, and Halloween is not mentioned. 

John Greenleaf Whittier: Boyhood Memories?

The Massachusetts poet John Greenleaf Whittier mentions a carved pumpkin in his poem, "The Pumpkin," which was first published in 1846 (according to Cindy Ott's 2012 book The Pumpkin: The Curious History of An American Icon).

Oh, fruit loved of boyhood! the old days recalling, 

When wood-grapes were purpling and brown nuts were falling! 

When wild, ugly faces we carved in its skin, 

Glaring out through the dark with a candle within! 

Whittier was born in 1807. If he really carved faces into pumpkins when he was a boy, it would have been very early in the 19th century, long before Halloween was celebrated in New England. Whittier only refers to Thanksgiving in "The Pumpkin," but not Halloween, and he doesn't call the carved pumpkin a jack-o-lantern.

John Greenleaf Whittier

It's a little confusing, isn't it? The earliest instance historian Cindy Ott found where "jack-o-lantern" refers to a carved pumpkin comes from 1846. It appeared in a South Carolina publication called Tales for Youth, but again with no apparent connection to Halloween. It sounds as though people were carving pumpkins and using the term jack-o-lantern well before Halloween was celebrated, even if not always together.

A Demon and A Pumpkin in Rhode Island

Enough with the history, let's turn to the spooky stories. Many years ago, during the Revolutionary War, two young women named Hannah Maxson and Comfort Cottrell were staying at the Westerly, Rhode Island home of one Esquire Clark. One day while the Esquire was away on business, and his wife was sick in bed, the two young ladies decided to practice a little love magic. 

They took a ball of yarn, and tossed it repeatedly down a well and then pulled it back up. As they did, they chanted some psalms backwards. The goal of this magic spell? To find the men they would marry. 

As the sun set, Hannah and Comfort saw a tall figure walking up the road towards the house. They ran eagerly towards it, but their excitement turned to terror as they saw the figure had an enormous, misshapen head with two glowing, fiery eyes. This was no dream lover, but a demonic monster. 

Hannah and Comfort ran into the Clarkes' house and locked the door, but the hideous creature pounded on it insistently. The young women hid behind Mrs. Clarke's bed in fear, listening with the sick woman as the monster tried to break into the house. The supernatural assault only stopped when Esquire Clark returned home. Seeing a demonic creature clawing at his front door, he said some prayers against evil, which sent the monster slinking off into the woods.

This story first appeared in a November 1860 issue of The Narragansett Weekly, and the author, Deacon William Potter, notes that Mrs. Clarke died from all the excitement. Hannah and Comfort vowed never to use magic again. But Deacon Potter includes a strange epilogue. He claims that the demon was really a hoax played by a young many who lived near the Clarkes. He put a carved pumpkin on his head to scare Hannah and Comfort, not anticipating his joke's deadly results. The neighbor only revealed his role in the story seventy years later. 

It's a good spooky, cautionary tale. Young ladies - don't mess around with the occult. Young men - don't play stupid pranks that kill people. But despite the carved pumpkin, the story doesn't reference Halloween. And it's not called a jack-o-lantern.

The Sea Captain and Satan

Captain Snaggs was a wealthy sea captain who lived in Barnstable on Cape Cod. He had earned his riches the old-fashioned way: by selling his soul to the Devil. He had been young and foolhardy when he signed Satan's contract, but as an old man on his deathbed he was filled with regret. He could hear the Devil's hooves coming up the walkway towards his house, and Captain Snaggs didn't want to go to Hell. So he jumped out of bed, climbed out the window, and ran like... well, he ran like hell. 

He ran down the length of Cape Cod to Orleans, where he hid in a hollow tree. But the Devil was hot on his heels, and could smell Captain Snaggs's soul. So Captain Snaggs ran again, this time to Wellfleet, where he hid in a cemetery. 

The Devil was not far behind, so Captain Snaggs grabbed a pumpkin from a nearby pumpkin patch, carved a face in it, and set it up on a tall, white gravestone. Then he lit a candle inside of it and ran towards Truro.

When the Devil arrived in the cemetery he said to the pumpkin, "Your contract is up, Snaggs. I've come to take your soul." When the pumpkin didn't answer, the Devil poked the gravestone with one talon. "Do you hear me Snaggs? Ouch! You're awfully tough for an old man! Where'd you get those muscles?" He grabbed the gravestone and gave it a mighty shake. The pumpkin fell to the ground and shattered. Realizing he had been tricked, the Devil ran towards Truro with a demonic roar. 

Captain Snaggs, meanwhile, had run all the way to Provincetown. He had reached the end of the Cape. There was no place left to go. When the Devil finally caught up with him, sulfurous smoke billowing from his nose and ears, Captain Snaggs stood there in terror.

With a tremor in his voice, he said, "All right, I'm ready. You can take me to Hell now."

The Devil looked puzzled and said, "Take you to Hell? We're in Provincetown, aren't we? We're already there."

As Elizabeth Renard notes in her 1934 book The Narrow Land, there are many variations on this story. The comedic ending always remains the same, but the name of the captain, the Cape Cod towns he visits, and the number of pumpkins involved all vary. You can listen to an excellent audio version of this tale at New England Legends, where the sea captain is named Jedidy Cole. 

Renard also notes that this story is probably of late origin, so perhaps it was first told after Halloween became a popular holiday here. It's hard to say. Have a happy Halloween!

*****

My new book, Witches and Warlocks of Massachusetts, was just released on Kindle recently. So now you can enjoy it either in paperback or on your device of choice. You can buy it wherever books are sold online. 

A Giant Woman and A Man-Faced Dog: Strange Encounters in The 19th Century

Today's post is about strange stories and how they don't always make sense. 

People report seeing a lot of weird things, but most of them can be placed into certain categories. Did you see a large hairy humanoid in the woods? We'll categorize that as Bigfoot. Did you see a glowing light in the sky? We'll call that one a UFO. You saw a semi-transparent person in an old house? That was a ghost.

You get the picture. As humans we like our world to be neat and orderly, and that includes even the weird things that are in it. Putting things in categories helps us make sense of the world. If something can be named it becomes less threatening. But not everything can be easily categorized or named. People sometimes report things that are unique, unusual and don't have an easy explanation. And they've done so for hundreds of years. 

I was recently reading John Greenleaf Whittier's 1847 book The Supernaturalism of New England. Whittier was a popular 19th century poet who was born in my hometown of Haverhill, Massachusetts, and he had an abiding interest in New England folklore. Some of his most popular poems were based on old legends, but The Supernaturalism of New England is not a book of poetry. It's a collection of legends and what we modern folks would call "paranormal encounters."

Some of these stories are easily categorized: witchcraft tales, accounts of premonitory dreams, haunted houses. But some are much stranger and harder to categorize, including the following story which was told to Whittier by a neighbor who was walking near Haverhill's Kenoza Lake when she witnessed something otherworldly.

It was a warm summer evening, just at sunset. She was startled by the appearance of a horse and cart the kind used a century ago in New England... The driver sat sternly erect, with a fierce countenance; grasping the reins tightly, and looking neither to the right nor the left. Behind the cart, and apparently lashed to it, was a woman of gigantic size, her countenance convulsed with a blended expression of rage and agony, writhing and struggling... Her head, neck, feet and arms were naked; wild locks of grey hair streamed back from temples corrugated and darkened. The horrible cavalcade swept by across the street, and disappeared at the margin of the pond. (Whittier, The Supernaturalism of New England, edited and with an Introduction by Edward Wagenknecht, 1969, p.75)

Whittier notes that "I have heard many similar stories, but the foregoing may serve as a sample of all." Sadly, he doesn't tell any of the similar stories so it's hard to understand what is going on here. Although the cart is old-fashioned I don't think this is just a ghost story. Perhaps the woman is being taken to Hell by the Devil, which was a common theme in New England legends? But if that's the case, why is she gigantic and so enraged? And why is she being dragged into Kenoza Lake? It's a really puzzling story.

Image from Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978)

Whittier also includes this next story, which was told to him by a friend who was "a man of strong nerves, sound judgment in ordinary matters, and not particularly superstitious." Still, this unsuperstitious man also encountered something creepy in Haverhill:

... He was standing one moonlight evening, in a meditative mood, on the bridge which crosses Little River near its junction with the Merrimack. Suddenly he became sensible of a strange feeling, as if something terrible was near at hand; a vague terror crept over him. "I knew," said he, in relating the story, "that something bad and frightful was behind me - I felt it. And when I did look round, there on the bridge, within a few paces of me, a huge black dog was sitting, with the face of a man - a human face, if ever I saw one, turned full up to the moonlight. It remained just long enough to give me a clear view of it, and then vanished; and ever since, when I think of Satan, I call to mind the Dogman on the bridge. (Whittier, Supernaturalism, p. 53)

Aaah! That's an unnerving little story. It sounds more like the description of a nightmare than something encountered in waking life. Was this dog-creature the Devil, a vision, or something else? Whittier doesn't really say but he does include it with others about the Devil. Does the Devil normally appear as a human-faced dog? And if it was the Devil why didn't he say or do anything? Again, it's another puzzling story.  

Image from Cryptomundo

Interestingly, there are Japanese folktales about human-faced dogs called jinmenken. These creatures are said to be omens of ill-fortune but not particularly evil. When spoken to they usually say "Leave me alone." The dogman that Whittier describes sounds a little more sinister than that. 

I don't have any big conclusions to draw about these two stories. As I said earlier, sometimes people encounter weird things that don't fit into any clear categories. Giant women being dragged into lakes. Dogs with human faces. People saw weird things in the 19th century and people still see weird things today. And sometimes those things don't make sense. I guess it's just part of being human.

Aunt Mose, the Rocks Village Witch

Aunt Mose was reputed to be a witch and the people of Rocks Village (a rural part of Haverhill, Massachusetts) blamed their misfortunes on her. If the butter didn't churn properly they blamed Aunt Mose. If the lamps flickered and went out at a party they blamed her too. One of her neighbors, Captain Peaslee, covered his house and barn with horse shoes to deflect her evil magic. 

Once a group of neighbors who had gathered together for a corn-husking were troubled by a junebug that kept flying around their heads. The insect was quite persistent and wouldn't leave. Finally someone swatted it to the ground with a stick. The next day Aunt Mose was seen limping around the Village. She said she had fallen down the stairs but no one believed her. Clearly, people whispered, she had assumed the form of a junebug and been injured when it was swatted. Clearly she was a witch.

Like many people accused of witchcraft, Aunt Mose did not have much money. She lived for many years in a small house but was forced to sell it. On the day of the sale she angrily told the family who bought it that they would never be happy there. She was right. The family's spinning wheel stopped working as soon as they moved in and only worked properly when Aunt Mose borrowed it. When she returned it to them it stopped working again. Even worse, the mother of the family sickened and died eighteen months after moving in. At her funeral everyone remembered Aunt Mose's angry words...

Of course, the rumors infuriated Aunt Mose and she always denied she was a witch. In an effort to preserve her reputation she went to the local Justice of the Peace and asked him to draft and notarize a document declaring she was not a witch. The JP didn't have any such document, but he wrote one and signed it just to humor the elderly woman.

A 19th century daguerreotype

A young man once fell in love with Aunt Mose's daughter. His friends warned him that her mother was a witch but he just laughed at them. When he told them he was going to Aunt Mose's house that night to announce his intentions they decided to play a prank. They arranged big old chains above the door of her house that would fall when he opened it and scare him off. But things didn't quite work the way they planned. As the young man approached the house a strange light illuminated the doorway and he saw the chains. The prank didn't go off the way they wanted, but the young man was frightened by the strange light and decided not to court Aunt Mose's daughter. 

When Aunt Mose finally died no one could find her will but it was believed to be held by the local wealthy squire. The squire, however, had plenty of other things on his mind and was in no rush to find the document. 

A few months later the squire was sitting next to his fireplace when he got the strange impression he was not alone. Looking up he saw Aunt Mose sitting next to him. He was frightened since she had seen her put into the ground. They sat there in silence, Aunt Mose puffing ferociously on her pipe, until the squire finally spoke:

"Aunt Mose," he said at length, "for the Lord's sake, get right back to the burying-ground! What on earth are you here for?" 

The apparition took her pipe deliberately from her mouth and informed him that she came to see justice done with her will; and that nobody need think of cheating her, dead or alive." (quoted in William Sloane Kennedy, John G. Whittier, the Poet of Freedom, 1892. Note: Kennedy's text calls her "Aunt Morse.")

Aunt Mose then stepped out in the dark night. The squire made sure the will was executed according to her dying wishes the following day. 

*****

I think most small New England towns had their "witches," usually eccentric elderly women that were convenient scapegoats for life's misfortunes. Most of them have been forgotten now but the legends about Aunt Mose have survived thanks to John Greenleaf Whittier (1807 - 1892), the famous poet who was born in Haverhill, Massachusetts. Aunt Mose lived on Corliss Hill behind Whittier's childhood home and he mentioned her in his poems and other writings. Other local residents added their remembrances to Whittier's, giving us the colorful stories we have today. 

John Greenleaf Whittier

Aunt Mose was a real person but it's not entirely clear who she was. In some stories she is called Aunt Mose and in others she is called Aunt Morse, which makes things complicated. The Rocks Village Historical Society suggests that she was Sarah Flanders Chase, who was born in 1762 and was the wife of Moses Chase. Perhaps she was called Aunt Mose because his name was Moses, or perhaps because she was called Aunt Morse because she was related to the Morse family. The Society also suggests that another woman named Chase may have been involved in the sales of the cursed house, not Aunt Mose, so several legends might be conflated. 

In the 17th century being accused of witchcraft was a serious matter, but by the early 19th century being called the town witch was much less dangerous. It was still inconvenient and unpleasant though. I find the stories about Aunt Mose charming (and maybe a little spooky) but I suspect her life was not an easy one. I like reading these old witch tales but have no desire to live in the past. 

*****

My other main source for this post was Rebecca Ingersoll Davis's Gleanings from Merrimac Valley, Sheaf Number Two, 1886.

New England Pumpkin Lore: Cozy and A Little Creepy

October is definitely pumpkin season. The stores are full of pumpkin-flavored treats, jack-o-lanterns are appearing on my neighbors' porches, and someone recently motored across Boston Harbor in a giant pumpkin. Pumpkins are everywhere this month. There is some interesting New England lore about pumpkins, some of it homey and comforting, some of it kind of spooky. I guess that describes October too.

Pumpkins are of course native to the Americas. Historians say they were first cultivated in Central America and eventually adopted by the various American Indian groups that lived in New England. Samuel de Champlain, an early visitor to New England's shores, saw Algonquin Indians growing beans, maize and pumpkins along the banks of Maine's Saco River in the early 17th century. Pumpkin and squash were often included in dishes like succotash and were also dried for eating over the cold winter months.

When the Puritans colonized New England they adopted many local crops into their diet, including pumpkins. And because many of their English crops didn't grown well here, the early Puritans apparently ate a lot of pumpkin. A lot. It was seen as less desirable than traditional English foods, but Edward Johnson (1598 - 1672), the founder of Woburn, Massachusetts, wrote the following:

.. let no man make a jest at Pumpkins, for with this fruit the Lord was pleased to feed his people to their good content, till Corne and Cattel were increased.

Take that, pumpkin haters!

The colonists atet pumpkin in variety of ways. Boiled and mashed pumpkin was a popular dish. Mashed pumpkin was also added to breads, while dried pumpkin was used to sweeten alcoholic drinks. In addition to mashing, another popular preparation was to hollow out a pumpkin and fill it with cream. The pumpkin would then be baked until the flesh became soft and the center custardy. It sounds delicious, and I did once try to make something like this. It didn't work too well, but I think I was using the wrong type of pumpkin.

Modern New Englanders are more familiar with pumpkin custard as the filling in pumpkin pie, not actually baked in a pumpkin. Surprisingly, the earliest pumpkin pie recipe from New England (written down in the 1760s by a wealthy Boston Tory family) calls for slices of fried pumpkin layered with apples and dried fruit in a pastry shell. It sounds good, but that's not what we would call pumpkin pie today. After the  Revolution the pumpkin custard pie that Americans still know and love become dominant.

So, there's the homey, cozy lore about pumpkins. They're also obviously associated with Halloween, which here in America is part harvest festival and part celebration of death and the macabre. Corn stalks, hay bales, apple cider, and cute little pumpkins are all part of the holiday's harvest aspect. Ghosts, witches, horror movies and scary carved pumpkins are part of Halloween's macabre side. Pumpkins can be cute or scary depending on how they are used.

Halloween was not really celebrated in New England until the late 1800s. It was one of those holidays, like Christmas, that the Puritans and their Yankee descendants avoided. But even though there was no Halloween, New Englanders still carved pumpkins in the fall months and lit them with candles. For example, local poet John Greenleaf Whittier (1807 - 1892) includes the following line in his 1850 poem "The Pumpkin":

Oh, fruit loved of boyhood! the old days recalling,
When wood-grapes were purpling and brown nuts were falling!
When wild, ugly faces we carved in its skin,
Glaring out through the dark with a candle within!

Halloween wouldn't have been celebrated when Whittier was a boy, and in fact that poem celebrates Thanksgiving.

Nathaniel Hawthorne seems to be the first writer to use the term "jack-o-lantern" to describe a carved candle-lit pumpkin. He used it in his 1835 story "The Great Carbuncle." A carbuncle is a type of gemstone, and the titular one shines with a blinding light.

Hide it under thy cloak, say'st thou? Why, it will gleam through the holes, and make thee look like a jack-o'lantern!

Again, that was written well before Halloween would have been celebrated in New England. Hawthorne seemed to like jack-o-lanterns. In his 1852 story "Feathertop," a witch brings to life a scarecrow with a carved pumpkin for its head, but again there is no reference to Halloween in the story, which takes place in May.

I'm not quite sure how the jack-o-lantern became exclusively associated with Halloween, but somehow, as immigration changed New England and holidays like Halloween and Christmas became accepted, it took it's place as the reigning symbol of Halloween.

Before it was used to describe carved a pumpkin, the term jack-o-lantern denoted either a lantern-carrying nightwatchman or a will-o-the-wisp, one of those wandering orbs of light, perhaps of supernatural origin, that appear in forests and swamps to lead travelers astray. Will-o-the-wisps were often thought to be lights carried by malevolent fairies seeking to trick unwary humans. One of the rare pieces of English fairy lore from early New England mentions jack-o-lanterns in this sense of the word:

... Marblehead (Massachusetts) was a sort of compendium of all varieties of legend. For instance, the belief in the Pixies of Devonshire, the Bogles of Scotland, the Northern Jack o' Lantern was prevalent there; _ and my father has told me that he was often cautioned by the fishermen, just at twilight, to run home or the Bogles would be sure to seize him (William Wetmore Story, The Life and Letters of Joseph Story, 1851)

When you're out and about this Halloween, be careful as you walk towards that glowing pumpkin. Maybe it's been carved by friendly neighbors, but maybe it's a trick to lead you into the dark October night.

*****

Source for the jump rope rhyme: B.A. Botkin's Treasury of New England Folklore. The information about early pumpkin recipes and preparation comes from Keith Stavely and Kathleen Fitzgerald's America's Founding Food. 

Telling the Bees: An Old Funerary Ritual

I always associate this time of years with bees. Maybe it's because they appear in such large numbers at this time of year, or maybe it's because honey tastes like liquid sunshine. When I was a child I was afraid of being stung, but now that I'm older I'm happy to see the bees going about their work.

The other day I was standing near some window boxes that had lots of lavender growing in them. Swarms of bees were flying around and crawling through the lavender. The ground was covered in pollen they had knocked down. The bees were as busy as bees!

The Native Americans did not keep bees, but the English settlers brought honeybees with them when they came to New England. They were an important part of farm life and in some ways were treated almost as partners in the agricultural endeavor. Unlike other farm animals, the bees worked independently and asked for almost nothing in return.

I think that it's because of this that people in New England used to practice an interesting ritual called "telling the bees." When someone on a farm died, their surviving relatives would be sure to inform the bees that this person had passed away. Otherwise, it was thought that the bees would stop working or possibly even abandon their hive.

Image from Fast Company magazine.

The poet John Greenleaf Whittier wrote about this practice in his 1858 poem "Telling the Bees." After a month away, a man comes to visit the farm where his beloved Mary lives. As he approaches he notices the following:

Just the same as a month before, 
The house and the trees,

The barn's brown gable, the vine by the door,
  
Nothing changed but the hives of bees.

Before them, under the garden wall,
  
Forward and back,

Went drearily singing the chore-girl small,
  
Draping each hive with a shred of black.

Trembling, I listened: the summer sun
  
Had the chill of snow;

For I knew she was telling the bees of one

Gone on the journey we all must go!

The narrator at first thinks that Mary's elderly grandfather has died, but...

But her dog whined low; on the doorway sill
With his cane to his chin,

The old man sat; and the chore-girl still
  
Sung to the bees stealing out and in.

And the song she was singing ever since
  
In my ear sounds on:

"Stay at home, pretty bees, fly not hence!
  
Mistress Mary is dead and gone!"

(I'm going to pause a moment because I have something in my eye. I shouldn't write about sad topics when I'm tired!)

The tradition of telling the bees came to New England from old England, where it was a common practice. I don't think anyone still does it now, but the ritual was remembered here until the early 20th century. For example, some of the people interviewed for Eva Speare's New Hampshire Folk Tales (1932) claimed their grandparents would tell the bees about deaths in the family.

It was generally believed that if a member of the family died where bees were kept that some other member of the family must go out to the hives and explain the matter to the bees or they were likely to leave the hives and not return. Something black must also be hung upon the hives...

A man who owned several swarms of bees died; the bees ceased working. One of the family went out and told them their master was dead, and read a chapter of the Bible.

The bees went to work.

If at all seems rather gloomy, you'll be happy to know there was a parallel but less common practice of telling the bees when someone got married. In the 1893 April/June issue of The Journal of American Folklore, Pamela MacArthur Cole of East Bridgewater, Massachusetts notes the following:

The little workers were to be informed of the event, and receive a bit of wedding-cake. As members of the family they were entitled to such attentions, and were supposed to resent the neglect of them. 

I started writing about funerals and ended writing about weddings. It sounds like a good way to start the week!

Fairies at a New Hampshire Inn

Lots of witches and ghosts lurk in New England folklore, but not many fairies. Why is that?

The poet John Greenleaf Whittier wrote, "Fairy faith is, we may safely say, now dead everywhere ... It never had much hold upon the Yankee mind, our superstitions being mostly of a sterner and less poetical kind." He also claims that any fairy beliefs found in New England were brought here in the 1700s by Irish Presbyterians.

That quote is from Prose Works of John Greenleaf Whittier, which was published around 1866. He then goes on to provide a story to prove the Irish brought the fairies with them.

Poet John Greenleaf Whittier, 1807 - 1892.

In the early 1800s, a surly, unhappy man decided to open an inn in New Hampshire. Business suffered because of his dour personality and "poverty came upon the house and its tenants like an armed man." The man's wife, who was of Irish descent, remained hopeful despite the dire financial situation. A better day would come, she told her husband and daughters.

The inn's business did improve, but for an odd reason: a troupe of fairies took up residence in the building. Although they were invisible to mortal eyes, their quiet, squeaky voices could be heard by everyone who visited the tavern. It was noted by several visitors that they spoke in a distinct Yankee/Irish dialect.

Word spread throughout the area about the fairies, and curious crowds gathered to hear them speak - and to spend money on food and drink. Life was good for the innkeeper, his wife, and three daughters.

Gradually, though, people began to question the reality of the fairies. Why had they taken up residence in New Hampshire? How come no one could see them? Whittier claims these doubts arose because fairies just weren't part of New England culture:

Had the place been traversed by a ghost of disturbed by a witch they could have acquiesced in it very quietly; but this outlandish belief in fairies was altogether an overtask for Yankee credulity. As might have been expected, the little strangers, unable to breath in an atmosphere of doubt and suspicion, soon took their leave, shaking off the dust of their elfin feet as a testimony against an unbelieving generation.

Some skeptics said the fairies weren't even real. The skeptics claimed some men from Massachusetts had come to hear the fairies and pried away a board in the ceiling - to reveal the innkeeper's three daughters upstairs speaking like the fairies. The skeptics also claimed that once the hoax was revealed the fairy visitation stopped. The innkeeper's wife dismissed this rumor, claiming instead that the fairies had simply gone back to Ireland.

I have a few rambling thoughts on this story. It does seem Whittier was correct that New Englanders were happy to believe in supernatural beings, but only if they were scary and malevolent. The witchlore and ghost stories from this area are full of gruesome creatures and grim situations. You don't encounter too many playful magical creatures in the folklore of this area, but there are a few exceptions.

Whittier doesn't name the town where the inn stood, but only gives the first letter of its name: S. There aren't many New Hampshire town names beginning with S, and since Whittier lived most of his life in the Merrimack Valley of Massachusetts I suspect the inn was in southern New Hampshire. Maybe it was in Salem, or possibly Sandown?

Southern New Hampshire does seem to have a stronger fairy tradition than other parts of New England. You can see my post about Tisenetto, the Derry fairy, here. Some people also claim this little green man seen in the 1950s was another version of the Derry fairy. You can find some more speculation on the topic of fairies in New Hampshire here.

The Black Fox

I've had a gross stomach bug the last few days, so I haven't updated this as much as I should. Luckily, I had this post pre-written from a while ago. The weather is still wintry outside, so this little piece of New England Gothic works well today.

Pre-stomach flu post:

Foxes, sly and crafty, are notoriously difficult to catch. The Narragansett Indians, however, knew about mysterious black foxes that were impossible to catch or kill.

In 1643 Roger Williams, the founder of Rhode Island, wrote:

"The Indians say they have black foxes, which they have often seene, but never could take any of them. They say they are Manittooes, that is Gods, Spirits, or Divine powers, as they say of everything which they cannot comprehend."

As the years passed, the black fox took on more sinister connotations among the British settlers, and a particularly nasty black fox was said to haunt the Salmon River in Connecticut. Poet John Brainard made this legend into a verse that was well-known in its day. Later, John Greenleaf Whitter, a poet from from Haverhill, Massachusetts, expanded the legend in his own poem in 1831, incorporating elements of the Wild Hunt myth and Algonquin shamanism.

According to Whittier,

"They said it was a Fox accurst
By Hobomocko's* will
That it was once a mighty chief
Whom battle might not kill
But who, for some unspoken crime
Was doomed to wander still."

*Hobomocko is one name for the Algonquin god associated with death, night, water and shamanism.

One winter, the black fox appears near a New England town, and two cocky young Yankee hunters chase after it with rifles, vowing that they will kill it. The local Indians disagree.

"They told us that our hunters
Would never more return
That they would hunt for evermore
Through tangled swamp and fern
And that their last and dismal fate
No mortal ear might learn."

Hmmm. Obviously, these hunters had never seen a horor movie or read a horror story. When the old guy at the gas station tells you to avoid Camp Crystal Lake, avoid it! When the local Indians tell you something's cursed, it really is!

In the spring, the hunters' corpses are discovered deep in the forest. Nothing ever grows on that spot again, and animals and birds avoid it.

"For people say that every year
When winter snows are spread
All over the face of the frozen earth
And the forest leaves are shed
The Spectre-Fox comes forth and howls
Above the hunters' bed."

It's a nice little story, and it's interesting to see how over two hundred years the black fox changed from something spiritual to something spooky.