On The Track: A Ghostly Dog in A Haunted Swamp

This week I thought I'd just share a creepy story I recently read.

It comes from William Simmons's book Spirit of the New England Tribes: Indian History and Folklore (1986) which is a collection of Native American folklore from southern New England. This is one of my favorite folklore books, and every time I look through it something new jumps out at me. Divided into topical chapters like "Shamans and Witches" and "Little People," the book shows how local Native folklore has changed and evolved over the centuries.

The following story comes from the chapter titled "Ghosts and the Devil," so you know it will be creepy. It first appeared in 1936 in The Narragansett Dawn, a publication put out by the Narragansett tribe, with the title "On The Tracks." The author was a man named Lone Wolf. 

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The land between Westerly and Bradford, Rhode Island is kind of swampy, and is located in the homeland of the Eastern Niantic tribe. Way back in the 19th century a train track was put down through this swampy area, carrying people from Stonington to Providence. 

One night a Niantic man was making his way home after being out late. It was very dark, so the man decided to walk along the train track rather than risk losing his way in the swamp. He had his trusty dog with him for companionship and protection. The dog was large and covered in white fur. 

No one knows exactly why the man and his dog just didn't hear the train coming, but they didn't. It hit them at full speed and they both died instantly. 

Ever since that night their ghosts have haunted the train tracks in that swamp. The Niantic man's ghost has no head, but his dog's ghost is even more frightening. The animal was cut clean in half when the train struck and its ghost walks in two bloody halves down the track, following its headless master. People avoid going into the swamp at night, and have named it White Dog Swamp. 

*****

That's the story. Short, sweet, and spooky. William Simmons notes that the current Amtrak route still runs through this area so perhaps passengers should keep their eyes peeled for the ghostly white dog and its master. I don't know if the swamp is still called White Dog Swamp.  A search through the US Geographic Survey name locator didn't show anything with that name but perhaps it was not used outside of the Narragansett tribe. 

One last thought. I am not of Native American descent and don't have any ownership of this story. I write mostly about Puritan and Yankee folklore, but I think it's important to post local Native American stories occasionally as a reminder that they were and still are an important part of local folklore and history. 

Bigfoot Found in Maine, Lovecraft Discovered in Beer!

2015 is off to a great start if you like weird New England stuff. I hope it keeps up!

First off, a twelve-year old boy in Turner, Maine claims to have video footage of Bigfoot trekking through the woods. Is it really a giant hairy hominid? Is it a hoax? Is is something else altogether? Watch the video and decide for yourself:




The Bangor Daily News has coverage of the sighting. Bill Brock, a Maine Bigfoot hunter and host of "Monsters Underground" on Destination America, came out to investigate. In addition to the video there were footprints and mysterious howling noises. After looking at the evidence, Brock decided he was unable to conclude anything either way. I admire someone who is comfortable with ambiguity!

Here's a longer video where Brock and a friend evaluate the evidence they have:




Interestingly, Turner was home to another possible monster earlier in the 1990s and 2000s, when a mysterious canine creature roamed through the woods. It emitted high-pitched screams, had eyes that glowed in the dark, and was blamed for the death of a Doberman. A weird-looking dead dog-like animal was found in 2008 - was it the Turner monster?

Moving from creepy things found in the woods to creepy things found in can, Rhode Island's Narragansett Beer company is releasing an H.P. Lovecraft honey ale to the world on January 19.

Lovecraft, a Rhode Island native, was one of the seminal American horror writers and incorporated lots of local New England lore into his stories. But why a honey ale? Narragansett was inspired by a fictional elixir, known as space mead, that appears in some stories inspired by Lovecraft's own work. The space mead allows people to travel between the stars. The honey ale won't allow you to do that, but maybe it will make you feel as if you can. The company also promises another Lovecraft beer in spring, which will be inspired by his story "The Shadow Over Innsmouth." I eagerly await tasting a beer based on a tale about evil fish-people!

Tuggie Bannock: African Magic in Rhode Island

Most of the witchcraft and magic I write about was practiced by people descended from English settlers. After the Indians were decimated by war and disease, the English became the dominant cultural force for many years in this region - hence the name New England.

However, there were also other ethnic groups present from the early years of colonization, among them the Irish (like the witch Goody Glover), and the French (like Philippe d'Anglois, aka Philip English, a merchant accused of sorcery in the Salem trials).

There were also many people of African descent, both slaves and freemen. It's estimated that by 1799 10% of Boston's population was African-American, and nearly 30% of South Kingston, Rhode Island's.

Although in many ways people of African descent assumed the culture of their English neighbors, they did maintain some traditional folkways, including magic. African magic was much more influential in the American south, where it still lives in traditions like hoodoo and rootwork, but there were many noted African American fortune-tellers, wise men and healers in New England. In fact, by the 19th century African-Americans were considered particularly powerful workers of magic and were sought out specifically by their neighbors of European descent.

Tuggie Bannock was one well-known African-American witch who lived in the early 1800s in the Narragansett area of Rhode Island. Like many women accused of being witches, Tuggie was slightly eccentric. She lived alone in the rear ell of an old ruined house, and her dwelling contained no chairs. According to legend she never even sat on a chair even when she visited a neighbor's home, preferring instead to perch on a table or a dresser.

Tuggie was a bondswoman of Rowland Robinson, a large-scale slave owner, and also worked for various neighbor women performing household and agricultural work. She also actively cultivated a reputation as a witch. Alice Morse Earle wrote the following about Tuggie in her 1898 book In Old Narragansett: Romances and Realities,

She conformed her mien and behavior to all that was expected of a witch; and she had been gifted by nature with one feature which, much to her satisfaction, enabled her to exhibit convincing proofs of her pretensions. She had two full rows of double teeth...

The magic Tuggie practiced for her neighbors and herself was strongly influenced by African traditions. For example when she decided one snowy day to put a curse on Sidet Bosum, a tinkerer who accidentally destroyed her teapot, she gathered an assortment of items and boiled them in a pot. Among the ingredients were a piece of the southernwood plant that grew in Bosum's yard, hair from his cow's tail, red flannel, a heart made from bread dough pierced with pins, dirt gathered from a graveyard, and a rabbit's foot.

As William D. Piersen, author of Black Yankees, points out, many of these items are derived from traditional African magic, including graveyard dirt and the rabbit's foot, as is the practice of boiling them. Someone practicing English style magic would have been more likely to create a poppet to curse their neighbor, not boil things in a big pot.

Tuggie's attempt to curse Sidet Bosum didn't work out. Before she started her spell she had turned her petticoats inside out and put a bag of eggshells around her neck to protect herself from evil spirits (another tradition from Africa). However, as she was boiling her spell a large dark object burst through the door of her house, knocking Tuggie face down on the floor and covering her in snow. Tuggie lay there in terror with her eyes shut, convinced that the Devil had come to take her away. She begged him to leave her be, and eventually she heard the creature leave her home. Tuggie took the pot off the stove and went to bed, carrying a Bible and a horseshoe as protection.

Was it really the Devil, or Moonack as Tuggie called it, that had come to take her away? Four local boys had been sledding that day, and later they claimed they had lost control of their sled. It had gone careening down the hill and right through the door of Tuggie's house, knocking her down. The Devil had never visited Tuggie at all.

I'm never a big fan of these Scooby Doo endings, where it turns out the supernatural is all just a big joke, but that's how Alice Morse Earle ends the story. I got the information for this post from Alice Morse Earle's book, and from William D. Piersen's "Black Arts and Black Magic: Yankee Accommodations to African Religion" in Wonders of the Invisible World: 1600 - 1900, which was published by the Dublin Seminar for New England Folklife.

Why Babies Shouldn't See Mirrors and Vampires Have No Reflection

Okay, here are three interesting folk facts about mirrors:

1. Farmers in 19th century Massachusetts believed that a baby shouldn't look into a mirror until it's at least a year old. If it does, "that means death to it." (From Johnson's What They Say in New England.)


2. Everyone knows that vampires don't have reflections.


3. In parts of Europe, it was traditional to cover all the mirrors in the house when someone had died. (From Lecouteux's Witches, Werewolves and Fairies).

These are all connected by an old belief that a person's reflection, or even their shadow, is their soul. Given this, here are the reasons for these three:

1. You shouldn't let your baby look into a mirror, because its young soul is more loosely connected to its body than an adult's, and could get stuck in the mirror.


2. Vampires have no reflection because they don't have souls anymore.


3. You should cover the mirrors when someone dies so their soul doesn't get stuck in the mirror, rather than moving on to the next world. (Many modern Jews still cover the mirrors when someone dies, but they have other reasons for the practice.)

According to Roger Williams, the local Narragansett had two words for the soul. One of them was michachunck, which was similar to their word for mirror. Maybe the connection between reflections and souls was found in many different cultures?

37 Indian Deities from Rhode Island - or maybe just 13

An illustration of Roger Williams and his neighbors. I don't think the Narragansett wore shirts with buffalo on them - there weren't any buffalo in Rhode Island!

About ten years ago I realized I knew quite a bit about European mythology and folklore, but not very much about the lore of New England, where I've lived all my life. It seemed like a big gap in my knowledge, so I started reading. And reading. And I'm still reading!

I was particularly curious about the religion of the Algonquians before the Europeans came. Unfortunately, they didn't leave written records, so we have to get our information from the English setters, who weren't sympathetic to native beliefs and sought to stamp them out. This is particularly true in Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Connecticut, which were more heavily colonized by the English than the northern New England states.

One exception was Roger Williams, the founder of Rhode Island, who was both sympathetic and curious about his neighbors, the Narragansett. His 1643 book A Key Into the Language of the Americas recorded not only their vocabulary, but some of their religious beliefs. Granted, Williams was still a devout Christian and seems a little squeamish about the native religion, but he was light years ahead of his peers in terms of being open-minded.

Williams wrote that the Narragansett worshipped 37 gods. Unfortunately, he only provides the names of 12, who are:

Wompanand - the Eastern God
Chekesuwand - the Western God
Wunnanameanit - the Northern God
Wowwand - the Southerne God
Wtuomanit - the House God
Squauanit - the Woman's God
Muckquachuckquand - the Children's God
Keesuckquand - the Sun God
Nanepaushat - the Moon God
Paumpagussit - the Sea
Yotaanit - the Fire God
Kautantowwit - the Southwest God, to whose House all soules goe, and from who came their corne, beanes as they say.

He also mentions Wetucks, "a man that wrought great miracles among them, and walking upon the waters, etc. with some kind of broken resemblance to the sonne of God." Wetucks may have been another name for Maushop, the culture-hero/giant of southern New England who is similar to the northern hero Glooskap. The modern Wampanoag still tell stories about Maushop, and his wife Granny Squant, who is probably Squauanit, the woman's god (or goddess) by another name.

It's great that there are still stories being told about Maushop and Squant, and I'm happy that Roger Williams recorded at least 13 names of the deities. But it would have been better if he had recorded all 37 names. Best of all would be if these gods were still being worshipped here in New England. It makes me realize how much has been lost, probably never to be recovered.

I don't want to end my post on a gloomy note, so I'll say thanks to everyone who has commented in the last few weeks. I really appreciate all the feedback and information!

Crow lore from the Narrangansett

It's a gloomy November day - gray skies, humid, and more leaves are on the ground than the trees now. With so many leaves down, though, it's easier to see birds. There were some big noisy crows flapping around the house earlier today.

According to Roger Williams(the founder of Rhode Island whose corpse was apparently absorbed by an apple tree), the the Narragansett Indians would not kill crows, even though they damaged crops:

"These birds, although they doe the corne also some hurt, yet scarce will one Native amongst an hundred kill them because they have a tradition that the Crow brought them at first an Indian Graine of Corne in one Eare, and an Indian or French Beane in another, from the Great God Kautantouwit's field in the Southwest, from whence they hold came all their Corne and Beanes."(A Key Into the Language of the Americas, 1643).

A messenger from the heavenly realm of the creator god Kautantouwit, the crow (or kaukonttuock in the Narragansett language) was responsible for bringing the two staples of Algonquin agriculture into the human world, and therefore was respected and not harmed. According to William Simmons' book Spirit of the New England Tribes, crows were also one of the familiar spirits that aided Algonquin shamans in their work.

So, let's all be nice to crows!