The soft breeze stealing over the stone veranda on which I stood, and the errant sun glistening in the glass of the beautiful stained-glass doors when they suddenly opened to welcome me home.  Embosomed amid trees, with its corbie-stepped gables peaking picturesquely into the sky, it is a beautiful home. I love houses made in this fashion, with a wide central hallway, a grand staircase, and large square rooms in perfect balance on either side. And rather characteristically Victorian, with blue Persian carpets, and books in mahogany cases and shelves rising to the ceilings in all the main rooms. Only a few ornate mirrors recall the antebellum period, and a little harpsichord in the corner. It is like a private club. The overall atmosphere is unmistakably inviting. It feels good here. And through many of the French door, one can catch the greenery outside, a great sprawling net swallowing up the blue sky. A curious discovery was made as I sat quietly writing in my study. The door would open. I found the obvious explanation of a draught to be absurd. Draughts do not turn door-handles—and, on my life, the handle would turn as the door opened, and no hand was visible. The housemaid told me that she had seen a small, old man creeping about the house, but there was no such person to be found. There was, however, a common reputation and local tradition that a farmer had strangled a child in the vicinity of my home. However, no one knew anything about a child having been strangled here, except the vague tradition that a farmer had committed such a crime in the vicinity some years earlier. #RandolphHarris 1 of 5

Yet, the doors in the house kept opening without physical agency, and I employed an expert to investigate the matter. An ashen twilight was deepening over The Winchester Mansion. The sky was scarcely visible anymore. The evergreens had become black and dense, the shadows beneath them broadening to eat the last of the warm summer light that clung to the sky. Folger sat in a chair in the front gallery. He had finished the Winchester history, and felt raw and exhilarated to sleep in the house and investigate the matter. The darkness gathered itself everywhere now in the mansion, the distinctive walls gathering so that he could no longer make out the pathway through the mansion, but only see the yellow twinkle of lights from the chandeliers. Each sound, scent, and shift of color aroused him in a deluge experiences. But it was an agony, this silence, this waiting, this many thoughts crowding his brain. As we proceeded down the hallway, puzzling flashes of light flicked across the mansion, illuminating portraits on the wall. Folger looked back fixedly at the portrait of Oliver Winchester, who seemed suddenly to be alive and staring at him. “What is it?” I said. “I thought that I..” he looked at the portrait. “What?” “The light made him look as though he had moved,” replied Folger. “You will see many unusual things in this house,” I said. “You will pass through empty rooms only to double back because you think you have seen a figure moving, or a person staring at you.” After a few nights, the expert became unhinged. #RandolphHarris 2 of 5

“Mrs. Winchester,” he said. “I will tell you what I know. Black Magic was used here. You called upon the spirits of the dead? “Well, yes, Folger, I suppose I have. Why?” “They are endowed with evil,” he replied. “How dare you accuse me of wickedness, you man!” “But Mrs. Winchester, the ghastly figure of a boy appeared. I saw his ghost running through the house when a man grabbed him. He strangled him near a large window on the second floor. The boy kicked him and the man lost his grip. The boy fell out of a large window died.” “Folger, I do not believe a word of this foolishness!” “I believe what I have seen, Mrs. Winchester. I saw a man with dark hair. He wasn’t a human being. He was some sort of beast. He was Satan.” I turned my back and walked to the right of the wall, by the fireplace, stopping to gather my thoughts. “Black magic and evil spells. This is all recorded here. All this and more,” said Folger. “Enough of this blasphemy! You speak of nothing more than dread beliefs and fearful imaginings. It is just a curious coincidence. Leave my home this instant!” “Mrs. Winchester, you punish me for tell you the truth, you punish me for merely telling you what you wanted to know.” The silence was sweltering. I did not know how long I can stand this attack. “Mark what I say, Mrs. Winchester. Your home is filled with horrors. You mask it behind all this beauty and wealth, but there is a great, ancient evil here. Something very malevolent!” I stepped backwards. My hand tightening uncomfortably on the lamp which was now hot from the burning wick, so hot that I could barely hold it any longer. #RandolphHarris 3 of 5

“Poor dear,” I said. “What you saw is just a figment of your imagination.” Folger looked at me, overcome with horror. As I gazed at him, his mouth turned into a dark hole, his lips slowly deteriorated. I turned and left the room, leaning against the wall, my eyes shut. When I opened them, there was music playing. Looking through a couple of doorways into the older section of the house, I noticed a fresh-faced young man—a boy, actually—standing and watching the goings-on with a peculiar look on his face. The more I watched him, the more material he stated to become. Suddenly, I could hear his footsteps walking toward me. There was something strange about them—they seemed soft and close together. Apprehensively, I made my way toward him. As I walked across the hall and approached the door that stood between us, I felt I was entering a very different World. A luminescence glow began to stretch across that the room. I froze as the light grew brighter and brighter. My heart was pounding as I reached out to touch the child’s hand, the light suddenly vanished and I found myself cloaked in darkness. There was no one there. We must have opened a door to another World. That night when the draperies were pulled against the cloister windows, and the halls echoed with dim dissonant sounds, as I was preparing to close my eyes, I heard the sound of a child crying. I was puzzled and stood still for a few moments, attempting to determine the direction the sound was coming from. When I heard the cry again, I knew that I had made no mistake. A distressed child was sobbing somewhere within my mansion. #RandolphHarris 4 of 5

I tracked the sound to a room on the sixth floor. The child cried quit vigorously as I reached the room. I pushed the door to the room open and found myself in a room completely devoid of any other living human. Moonlight passing through a large window bathed the room in sufficient light to permit an immediate evaluation. As an eerie silence fell upon the mansion, I realized I was quite alone. The ghost that roamed the house was that of an eight-year-old boy. Supporting Folger’s story, during some alterations, a window-shutter was removed, when a packet of antique copy-books was discovered, pushed into the wall between the joists and the skirting, in which the name Hoby Barrett was written. He died July 1888 of the age eight. He had been buried in the tower. When that tower was demolished, the workmen exhuming his body, found the legs to have been tied together with blue silk ribbon. The material was as fresh and bright as the day it had been tied, and the body was not decayed. The credulous country folk averred that he was a vampire. After having more terrific rows with the spectral lad, gruesome noises that suggested the strangulation of a child, I had to do something. The ghost would often awaken me at three in the morning, banging on closet doors, leaving faucets running, opening drawers and running up and down the tower stairs. I finally had the carpenters build the ghost a nursery, complete with toys at the top of the tower. Afterward the ghost behaved better. During a séance with the medium, the table raised and lowered itself to the floor. I heard a voice coming out of the darkness that we definitely thought was the Hoby’s. The spirit voice told us that he was happy and that he was pleased that we gave him toys, and then he faded back into silence. Even though my home was fully of other fiendish phantoms, I never felt more satisfied than I did during that evening in the Blue Séance Room. #RandolphHarris 5 of 5

The Winchester Mystery House

The Winchester Mystery House has the reputation of being haunted. Lovers of the marvelous declare dark figures have been seen in the Daisy Bedroom, often standing in the doorway and seemingly blocking people’s escape. As well, strange flashes of light and green orbs have been regularly seen and people have reported being touched by invisible hands. Furniture and beds have been known to move seemingly by themselves. Others have witnessed indentations on the bed Mrs. Winchester said her good-bye in, as if someone is sitting down. A dark figure has also been witnessed standing in the doorway and people have reported being violently pushed. Strange sounds have also been reported, including humming noises and something described as being similar to that of pieces of metal being dropped. Some report doors that swing open, and feelings of light headedness and strangulation on the fourth floor.

After the 1906 Earthquake, the nine-story tower was removed and most of the fourth floor was demolished, except for one wing only. If, while touring The Winchester Mystery House, you see an old-World figure of a boy, you will recognize him as Hoby by his knee-breeches, tied with a blue ribbon. Some people have reported being awoken by a woman screaming, while the oldest remaining parts of the mansion is subjected to disembodied footsteps and scratching and banging from with the walls. It is believed that the noises are caused by a young boy who has been seen at the end of the corridor on the fourth floor. Indeed, one guest has witnessed this boy walking through the wall. People have reported disembodied voices seemingly arguing as well as the sound of violins playing. https://winchestermysteryhouse.com/

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