The Minister's Veil: Guilt, Murder and (Maybe) Demons in Old Maine

I appreciate Nathaniel Hawthorne's fiction more and more as I get older. I find the weird mix of the supernatural, the sentimental and the moral very appealing. I recently read his short novel The Blythedale Romance, which is about a 19th century commune, a psychic, and a love triangle, and it was really fantastic. I recommend it if you're into that sort of thing.

Today, however, I want to write about "The Minister's Black Veil,"which was published in 1832 and is one of Hawthorne's better known short stories. Like some of his other work it is based on a kernel of truth, and in addition to Hawthorne's story some interesting legends have grown up around that kernel.

First the fiction. In "The Minister's Black Veil" Hawthorne tells the story of Reverend Hooper, a minister in a small New England town in the 1700s. A quiet but respected member of his community, Reverend Hooper shocks his congregation one Sunday by arriving at the church wearing a black veil over his face. He delivers his sermon without explaining why he's wearing, or even mentioning, the black veil. The congregants are unnerved.

Photo from a 2015 fashion show by Thom Browne

That same day Reverend Hooper, still wearing the veil, presides over a funeral. As he prays over the open coffin a mourner believes she sees the corpse shudder when it sees what is under the veil. Another mourner believes they see the deceased person's spirit walking next to the minister in the funeral procession. That night Reverend Hooper presides over a wedding, his face still covered in black. At the wedding reception he sees himself in a mirror and runs out in terror.

He continues to wear the veil in the following days and his fiancee begs him to take it off. She tells him that people in town think he's trying to hide from his sins:

"What grievous affliction hath befallen you," she earnestly inquired, "that you should thus darken your eyes for ever?" 

"If it be a sign of mourning," replied Mr. Hooper, "I, perhaps, like most other mortals, have sorrows dark enough to be typified by a black veil." 

"But what if the world will not believe that it is the type of an innocent sorrow?" urged Elizabeth. "Beloved and respected as you are, there may be whispers that you hide your face under the consciousness of secret sin. For the sake of your holy office do away this scandal."

The gentle reverend refuses to remove his veil and his fiancee leaves him. He wears the veil for the rest of his life, becoming an object of both fear and reverence in town.

By the aid of his mysterious emblem—for there was no other apparent cause—he became a man of awful power over souls that were in agony for sin. His converts always regarded him with a dread peculiar to themselves, affirming, though but figuratively, that before he brought them to celestial light they had been with him behind the black veil. Its gloom, indeed, enabled him to sympathize with all dark affections. 

Reverend Hooper leaves the veil on even as he lies on his death bed. As he breathes his last breaths he initially agrees to let someone remove the veil, but as they reach for it he pushes them away with the last bit of his strength, telling them to leave it on. When he dies he is buried in the veil.

The grass of many years has sprung up and withered on that grave, the burial-stone is moss-grown, and good Mr. Hooper's face is dust; but awful is still the thought that it mouldered beneath the black veil.

That's Hawthorne's story. It's mysterious and a little creepy. What does that black veil mean? Why won't Reverend Hooper show his face? American high school students have pondered those questions for decades.

Photo from a 2015 fashion show by Thom Browne

That's the fiction, but there is some fact behind it. Hawthorne based his fictional story on the real life of Joseph Moody, which he probably read about in Jonathan Greenleaf's 1821 book Sketches of the Ecclesiastical History of the State of Maine. Moody was born in 1700 in York, Maine and served as a town clerk, register of deeds, and county judge. He became minister of York's second Congregational church in 1732. In 1738 he started to act strangely after his wife died:

Mr. Moody's disorder was of the nervous kind. He supposed that the guilt of some unforgiven sin lay upon him, and that he was not only unworthy the sacred office he held, but unfit for the company of other people. He chose to eat alone, and kept his face always covered with a handkerchief when in company. (Jonathan Greenleaf, Sketches of the Ecclesiastical History of the State of Maine, p. 13)

His congregation waited three years for him to recover but in 1741 they finally hired another minister to take his place. Unlike Hawthorne's Reverend Hooper, Moody eventually did remove the handkerchief but not before earning the nickname "Handkerchief Moody." He died in 1753 and is buried in York. 

There has been a lot of speculation about why Joseph Moody wore that handkerchief. What was the unforgiven, secret sin he was concerned with? These leads us to several legends about Moody, the  most popular legend of which is that he killed someone when he was a boy. According to Gail Potter in Mysterious New England (1971), he accidentally shot his best friend on a hunting trip. He lied and told everyone his friend had been killed by Indians, but "for years the face of his dead friend rose accusingly before him." He finally decided to wear the veil as a form of secret penance and only confessed to killing his friend on his deathbed. 

Photo from a 2015 fashion show by Thom Browne

There is some truth to that story but it's not entirely accurate. When he was eight years old Joseph Moody and his friend Ebenezer Preeble were playing with a pistol when it went off and shot Preeble in the head, killing him. This is gruesome but apparently was not a secret that Moody concealed from anyone. It probably wasn't related to the handkerchief on his face, which the Museums of Old York believe he wore because of grief at his wife's death and just overall emotional exhaustion.  

Another legend from Mysterious New England claims that Moody accurately predicted the outcome of the Battle of Louisburg, when the troops from the English colonies fought the French for control of a fortress in Quebec. On June 17, 1745 Moody was preaching in York while the English troops battled the French far to the north. He prayed fervently from the pulpit that God would deliver Louisburg to the English. He abruptly stopped and then loudly thanked God for giving the English success and delivering the fortress to them. His congregation later learned that at that very moment the French had surrendered hundreds of miles away. Somehow Moody knew what had happened. 

I don't know if that story is true but it's also good one. A third legend relates to Moody's diary, which he kept beginning when he was 20 years old. He wrote the diary in Latin and in code. According to Kate Holly-Clark, who has given ghost tours in York, the contents of the diary are deeply disturbing. The diary's contents remained a mystery until the 1970s or 1980s when it was decoded by a retired York man who had been a code-breaker for the military. He was shocked by what he read. The diary contained omens of doom, mysterious portents, and references to demonic beings. He finally stopped working on the diary because he was too disturbed by its contents. 

Again, that story is quite creepy but is it true? You can read excerpts of Moody's diary online now. I didn't see anything about demons, but maybe those pages haven't been made public. Or maybe it's just a legend... 

I'm sure that Joseph Moody didn't think he'd inspire nearly three-hundred years of legends and a classic short story when he donned that handkerchief. 

York Maine's Haunted Gaol and the Ghost of Patience Boston

Last weekend while Tony and I were driving home from Lewiston we stopped in York, Maine. York is a really old town steeped in a lot of history, so naturally there are some strange legends there.

York was founded in 1623 by the explorer Fernando Gorges, was later absorbed into Puritan Massachusetts, and was at one time decimated by Indian raids. And now it's a tourist resort! When I was a kid we went to the beach and the zoo in York, but I don't remember visiting York's Old Gaol. I think would remember if I had been there, because it is pretty spooky.

 

York's Old Gaol was built in 1719 and is the oldest existing prison in America. It's a big red building that looks like it might be a barn, but you won't find any happy cows or cute horses inside. Instead, you'll find five small stone cells, some with walls that are two and half feet thick. The cell windows are covered with iron bars, and to make escape even more difficult the windows were framed with sharpened saw blades. Ouch! Those early colonists were pretty serious about their laws.

The Old Gaol has witnessed 160 years of misery: it held prisoners from 1719 until 1879. Naturally, an old building with such a tragic history has a ghost associated with it. Tour guides sometimes feel strong waves of negative energy, and visitors have reported hearing eerie moans when no one else is around. Some staff are reportedly hesitant to work in the building after dark.

The ghost is thought to be the restless spirit of Patience Boston. When I first started researching this story I thought it would just be a fun legend about a ghost, but Boston's real life was disturbing enough even without adding in the supernatural.

A Native American, Boston was born in 1711 on Monomoy Island off the coast of Cape Cod. When her mother died her father sold her into servitude, but she didn't adapt well to the servant life. Boston drank heavily, let the cows out into the fields to eat the corn, and tried to burn down the house a few times. Clearly she was not a good employee. She also resisted converting to Christianity, which was another strike against her in Puritan New England.

After the terms of her servitude ended she married an African American servant, but their marriage was an unhappy one. Boston continued to drink heavily, fought with her husband, committed adultery and even threatened to kill their unborn baby. She didn't, but ironically, the baby was born deformed and died within two weeks.

 

Boston later gave birth to a second child, which died within two months. Remembering her previous threats, her husband accused her of murdering this baby and had her arrested. Boston was a very heavy drinker, and possibly not in her right mind. At first she denied killing the baby, then she confessed, and then she recanted. Because her story was so inconsistent the judges found her innocent of murder.

After the trial she became the servant of a man named Joseph Bailey and went with him to Maine. Now before I get to this story's grisly conclusion let me just say that Patience Boston was obviously a very troubled person. She lived almost three centuries ago so we'll never know exactly why. Psychological flaws? Structural oppression? An abusive childhood? Years of alcoholism? Whatever the cause, she clearly had an obsession with killing children that could only lead to tragedy.

Once Boston was in Maine she continued to drink heavily, and also at one point she told nieghbors that she had given birth and murdered her child. This claim was dismissed as a hoax, since no body could be found and an examination showed that she had not recently given birth to a child.

On July 9, 1734, Boston went out for a walk with her master's grandson. As they strolled by a well she dropped her walking stick down into the water. When the child leaned into the well to help retrieve it she pushed him in. The boy struggled to get out, but Boston pushed him under with a heavy branch until he died. After years of threats and hoaxes she had finally and unequivocally murdered a child.

 

She went to the authorities and confessed, and they imprisoned her in York Gaol for many months.While awaiting trial she finally converted to Christianity.

The court sentenced her to death, but her execution was delayed because she was pregnant for the third time. She gave birth to a healthy baby who was given up to a local family for adoption. Patience Boston was executed on July 24, 1735.

So is there a ghost in York's Old Gaol? I can't say, but an old prison certainly seems like a good place to find a ghost, and Boston's tragic life seems like the kind that would result in a restless and unhappy spirit.

*****

My sources for this week's post were Joseph Citro's Weird New England, Thomas D'Agostino's A Guide to Haunted New England, and this fascinating site about early American crime.

Is There A Ghost In This Photo?

More specifically, is there the ghost of a witch in this photo?

A few months ago I wrote about Mary Nasson of York, Maine. According to legend, Mary was an herbalist accused of witchcraft and her ghost is said to haunt York's Old Burying Ground. The legend about Mary Nasson's ghost has been around since at least the middle of the 19th century.

Recently, a man named Steve (who reads this blog) was visiting York's Wild Kingdom zoo with his family. His daughter posed for a photo in one of those cutouts where you stick your face through a hole. She was alone, but after they took the photo Steve's wife noticed two faces were visible: their daughter's, and the ghostly white face of a woman.

Please note, I have blurred out Steve's daughter's face for privacy reasons. 

Steve told me that when he saw the face he thought of Mary Nasson's ghost. She supposedly haunts York and possibly was an herbalist, so he thought perhaps her ghost would be attracted to flowers and butterflies.

First off, I have to say thank you to Steve for sending me this photo. It is great! I think it's the creepiest (and therefore best) ghost photo I have seen in a long, long time.

And I also have to thank Steve for sending me another photo that put's everything into context:

As you can see, and as Steve mentioned in his email to me, the face is caused by the white tarp behind the photo cutout. This is a really good example of pareidolia.

Pareidolia is the tendency of the human mind to see patterns in inanimate objects. In particular, it is the tendency to see sentient, living beings in inanimate objects. For example, think of New Hampshire's Old Man of the Mountain, where people thought a rock formation looked like a human face, or of people who see the face of Jesus in burnt toast. Those are cases of pareidolia.

Many years ago when I was in grad school I read an entire book about pareidolia and anthropomorphism called Faces In The Clouds. The author, Stewart Elliott Guthrie, claims that people are hardwired to see living creatures in the world around them. This is an evolutionary advantage. Is that a stick in your yard, or a snake? It's better to think it is a snake and be wrong than to instantly assume it is a stick. Is that a bear in the dark woods, or just a boulder? A bear might attack you, so it is safer to think it is a bear. You get the idea. Pareidolia helped our ancestors to survive in a dangerous world.

In this case, the pareidolia leads us to ask "Is that a person in the photo, or just some white tarp?" Our brains are wired to see the white tarp as a person.

The word pareidolia comes from the Greek para (meaning "instead of" or "false") and eidolon (meaning "image"). The word eidolon has some interesting supernatural and religious connotations. It was sometimes used to mean ghost or phantom in ancient Greek, and our English word idol is derived from the word eidolon. Depending on your perspective, an idol is either the image of a god, or the false image of a god. It all depends on what you believe about gods.

We all interpret the world around us. Our minds need to filter out most of the sensory stimulus around us or we would be unable to function. So I think when you encounter a case of pareidolia it is useful to ask "Why am I experiencing this here and now?"

If you are a hardcore scientific rationalist, a la Mr. Spock from Star Trek, you might answer, "Oh, that ancient part of my brain I inherited from my hominid ancestors is acting up again. Silly me, there's no face in that tarp."

I am not a hardcore rationalist all the time, and I don't think anyone really is. There are times where I am all about the science, and there are times where I am completely irrational. If I had been reading about Mary Nasson, the ghost witch of York, Maine, and then took a photo in York and saw what appears to be a ghostly face, I might answer, "Hey, maybe that is the ghost I've heard about!"

Of course, it is clearly the tarp. But couldn't a ghost or other spiritual entity manipulate a tarp to show their face? It is the same principal behind the Virgin Mary manifesting in a grilled cheese sandwich, or the monkey god Hanuman manifesting in the bole of a tree in Singapore. We live in a material world, and spiritual entities manipulate matter to send messages to perceptive people. 

Well, at least that's the theory. If you don't believe in gods or ghosts it's all just caused by faulty perception. This is not a debate that I can resolve in a single blog post or probably ever...

If you go to York's Wild Kingdom looking for the ghost you might be disappointed. Steve sent one final picture and the face is not visible. Had it only been the wind or the angle of the camera that caused the face to appear? Or maybe Mary Nasson had accomplished her ghostly chore and gone on her way.

The Witch's Grave of York Maine: Is The Story True?

A while ago someone who reads this blog asked me to post about an alleged witch's grave in York, Maine. What a great idea! I love old graveyards, and I love New England witches. So here's a post that brings those two great tastes together like a Reese's peanut butter cup of the uncanny.

When I was a kid my family went to York, Maine a few times for vacations. I remember going to the beach, and visiting the zoo there. When I was a kid I think it was called York Wild Animal Farm, but these days it's York's Wild Kingdom.

As far as I know, we did not visit the Old Burying Ground, which is located in charming and historic York Village. It's too bad, because as with most charming cemeteries around here it has a weird legend is attached to it. I probably would have enjoyed hearing it.

The legend is about the grave of Mary Nasson, who who passed away in 1774. Her gravestone is a little different than the others. It has a portrait of Mary on it, and is covered with a big stone slab.

Photo from The Journal Inquirer.

A plaque on the cemetery wall indicates that the stone slab was put there by her family to prevent animals from digging around in Mary's grave. Local folklore gives another explanation: it was put there to keep Mary, who was a witch, from rising from the dead.

I think the stone succeeded in keeping the animals away, but it hasn't kept Mary's ghost from coming up to the surface. According to Joseph Citro's Weird New England, her ghost has reportedly been seen pushing local children on swings and giving them wildflowers. Hmmm. For a witch's ghost she doesn't seem particularly menacing. Online I've found quite a few sites claiming that Mary Nasson only acquired her witchy reputation because she was an effective herbalist. Her neighbors didn't understand how her cures worked and therefore thought they were magic. Oh, and maybe she could perform exorcisms...

Image from Atlas Obscura

Those stories indicate that Mary was basically a good person, and if she was a witch she only practiced white magic. Other, creepier stories say Mary was executed for witchcraft and that her gravestone emanates a strange heat. The crows that flock around the cemetery are said to be her familiars. Spooky!

So, was Mary Nasson a good witch, or a bad witch, or just someone who has an unusual gravestone? Are any of these legends true?

I don't know if they are true, but they definitely are old. I thought they might just be recent urban folklore but found they date back to at least the 19th century. I found this passage in ‪1894's Ancient City of Gorgeana and Modern Town of York (Maine) from Its Earliest Settlement‬: ‪Also Its Beaches and Summer Resorts‬ by George Alexander Emery:

Near the southwest corner of the old burying-ground is a grave, with head and foot stones, between which and lying on the grave is a large flat rock, as large as the grave itself. The inscription reads thus: - "Mary Nasson, wife of Samuel Nasson, died August 28, 1774, aged 29 years." No one, at least in this town, seems to know anything about her origin, death or even of the singular looking grave. No other occupant of a grave bearing this cognomen can be found in this cemetery, and the name is unknown in the town. A great many surmises and conjectures have been advanced in regard to this matter, in order to arrive at the facts, if there be any, and to clear up the dark affair, but nothing definite has ever come out of the effort. The writer of this, when a youth, living in York, was given to understand that this stone was placed there to keep down a witch that was buried beneath it.

In short, no one knows the real, historically-documented truth about Mary Nasson. Although George Alexander Emery doesn't believe Mary Nasson was a witch, he adds fuel to the fire by providing yet another legend. According to this one, a disembodied evil spirit used to haunt some rooms in an old house near the cemetery. It was banished from the house, but now roams the cemetery's perimeter, waiting for Mary to arise from her grave and join it.

I don't like to debunk legends; I like to savor them, so I'll just close with a couple thoughts. First, anomalous gravestones often attract legends. Rightly or wrongly, people tend to think that strange graves must contain strange occupants. 

Second, the idea is very old that special effort is required to restrain a restless spirit. For example, in old European vampire lore a stake to the heart literally nails a vampire into its grave. Closer to home, Eunice Cole, an accused witch of Hampton, New Hampshire, was supposedly staked through the heart after death and had a horseshoe placed on top of her. It's not unreasonable (in folk belief) to think that a big rock might keep a ghost from coming out of the grave.

One last note: I am now writing a bi-monthly column for Spare Change News called Bizarre Boston. If you live or work in Boston be sure to buy an issue and help the city's homeless community. You can see one of my columns (about a Boston smallpox epidemic) here.