It is probable that everybody who is at all a constant dreamer has had at least one experience of an event or sequence of circumstances which have come to one’s mind in sleep being subsequently realized in the material World. Victorian people were superstitious. Stories like the one about the Angels of Mons were encouraged, even fostered by the High Command because they suggested that the Almighty fought on their side. I had gained my expertise in spiritualism. I had witnessed an exorcism performed in Madagascar. I had studied apparent accounts of demonic possession in Suez and French Equatorial Africa. I knew enough to suspect that the occult was both pernicious and widespread. I believed in the miracles of God. So I could easily believe in the miracles of Satan. November of 1887, the afternoon, like every afternoon, was spent in the parlor. I was unescorted in my home. The stairs were treacherous under my feet as I made my way through the labyrinth. I was half-lost. It was cold, of course. It was a raw November, cold and always damp. I walked the chilly hall which smelled of wood polish and holy water. I closed my eyes and pictured basking in the sun. I opened my eyes. But the mood would not lift from me. The mansion gave that dark word, loneliness, the depth of an abyss. In the reluctant recesses of my soul, I could tell that there was something more dangerous lurking about than my encounter in Africa had been. A smile twitched on my face in mellow firelight. The flames from the grate were fading in their fierceness now. In the coroner was a Victrola phonogram. My mind had been leaping from one conclusion to the next with such rapidity that I had not realized how far I had come. Despite the two candles and the glow of the fire, the shadows behind the furniture—two armchairs, a wooden settle, various other chairs and cabinets of mahogany—were very dark indeed. #RandolphHarris 1 of 8

I shone the lantern around the room, striking more shadows from the Lincrusta-Walton wall covering. And how long would the oil last? Abruptly, the Victrola began to play.  It was an obscure song by a Vatican composer, written in praise of the Almighty, rightly infamous as one of the few songs recorded by the last surviving castrato. When Wiliam was trading in Africa, I think he became involved in magic. Powerful magic. He had a hypnotic power. I believe he passed something to me. Let us call it capability. I turned the lantern down as low as I could bear and lay awake for hours, as it seemed, with fear crawling through my veins, until I sank into an exhausted sleep, and woke half-frozen in the gray light of dawn. Two carriages were due to return at eleven—the carpenters had, I gathered, refused to remain at Llanada Villa overnight. There was a crowd breakfasting on tea and toasts, prepared over the kitchen’s fire. Feeling acutely self-conscious, I assured everyone that I was entirely recovered from my faint, and had slept quite well, and allowed for myself to be settled by the fireside and waited upon by Hattie, the parlormaid. A ripple of shock ran through the room. It seemed a few hours passed, but really they were seconds, for time is measured by the quality and not the quantity of sensations it contains. I saw it all with merciless, photographic detail, sharply etched amid the general confusion. No one else stirred, though Hattie clattered noisily with the cups, making some sudden impulsive gesture with her hands. A liquid fear ran all over me, the more effective because unintelligible really. Yet I felt that if I could know all, and what lay behind, my fear would be more than justified; that the thing was awful, full of awe. #RandolphHarris 2 of 8

I could not figure out what had been living within the walls of my home. Sorcerers? Necromancers? Wizards. Practicers of Black Magic. I studied everything. The rhythm. The solar, lunar, stellar rhythm. The sidereal aspect. The astrological significance. It is said that if you offer blood to the dark gods, they grant boons. Yes, if a blood offering is made at the proper time—when the moon and the stars are right—and with the proper ceremonies—they grant boons. Boons of youth. Eternal youth. Sure as the stars, all the hauntings correspond to certain astrological rhythm pattern. Later that evening, I noticed Hattie’s eyes were as red as maraschino cherries. She teetered back and forth regarding us very gravely. This made me wonder about the secret lives of my servants—their secret lives beyond the care of the estate. How many of them were playing a part, concealing something Who here would worship Hecate and grant that goddess the dark doon of blood? Hecate is a mysterious divinity sometimes identified with Diana and sometimes with Proserpine. As Diana represents the moonlight splendor of night, so Hecate represents its in darkness and terrors. She is the goddess of sorcery and witchcraft, and is believed to wander by night along the Earth seen only by the dogs, whose barking told her approach. Even Aeson and Norman could be masquerading. The mood was upon us all, for a moment. I saw questions flicker in the circle of eyes around the room. Aeson stood there, and I could swear he was fully conscious of the situation he had created, and enjoyed it. I wondered idly just what was really wrong with him. Why he had this odd fixation with Hecate. Maybe he was hiding secrets, too. #RandolphHarris 3 of 8

Amanda was glazing at the kitchen, waiting to make a break for another pot of tea. And then it happened—a truly wicked sight—like watching a universe in action, yet all contained within a small square foot of space. Aeson wobbled horribly, then with that queer sideways motion, rapid yet ungainly, he stepped forward into the middle of the room and fell heavily upon his face. His eyes, as he dropped, faded shockingly, and across the countenance was written plainly what I can only call an expression of destruction. He looked utterly destroyed. I caught a sound—from Amanda?—but this time not of laughter. It was like a gulp; it was deep and muffled and it dipped away into the Earth. Again I thought of a troop of small black horses galloping away down a subterranean passage beneath my feet—plunging into the depts—their tramping growing fainter and fainter into buried distance. So far from this being a strange thing, it would be odder if this fulfillment did not occasionally happen. The butler picked Aeson up and carried him to a guest room. He recovered even before the doctor came. However, the queer thing to me is that I was convinced the others all had seen what I saw, only that no one said a word about it; and to this day no one has said a word. And that was, perhaps, the most horrid part of all. From that day to this I have scarcely heard a mention of Aeson. It seemed as if he dropped suddenly out of life. The papers never mentioned him. His activities ceased, as it were. His afterlife, at any rate, became singularly in effective. Certainly he achieved nothing worth public mention. #RandolphHarris 4 of 8

The wind was rising outside, tearing the shroud of fog to ragged shreds. The shadows crept up about listen. Amanda talked about ritual killings and prolonging the life unnaturally—a very fantastic tale. Superstitious dread possessed me; I turned to flee, but my foot slipped on some fallen plaster, and a board creaked loudly. The shadow darkened and seemed to rise up the opposite wall, and Mr. Hansen appeared before me. “Ah, Mrs. Winchester. Forgive me if I startled you—and for taking the liberty of exploring your house. This is, I gather, the room you wanted to extend?” He was not wearing his tinted spectacles, and his eyes gleamed faintly in the light from the doorway. “Yes, sir, it is.” He gestured toward the doorway, as if inviting me to examine something, stepping back as he did so to make room for me to enter. Politeness compelled me to obey against my instinct, and a moment later I was standing by the writing table, with Mr. Hansen between me and the door.” “What was it you wanted to show me, sir?” I asked, unable to suppress the tremor of fear in my voice. His expression was all but concealed by his beard and moustache, but it seemed tome that there was a glint of amusement in his eyes, which were so dark that the irises, as well as the pupils, seemed almost black. “Mrs. Winchester, I can see it glimmer with glass and silver, windows opening to the grade front of the house, and a tower that stands three stories,” Mr. Hasen said. Quite inexplicably, my heart sank at his words. I felt as if I had come up with the design myself. In silence we passed through the hall, and mounted a great mahogany staircase with many corners, and arrived at a small landing with two doors set it in. He pushed one of the doors open for me to enter, and closed it behind me. Now I knew that my conjecture had been right: there was something awful in the mansion, and with the terror of nightmare growing swiftly and enveloping, I laid in bed and closed my eyes. #RandolphHarris 5 of 8

The next morning, I felt that indefinable sense of ominous apprehension that I am accustomed to before thunder. However, tea pursued its cheerful course. I looked round the room with a certain sense of proprietorship, and found that nothing had changed. And then with a sudden start of unexplained dismay, I saw a life-sized oil painting of a man I did not recall. A rather secret and evil-looking man of about thirty. His picture hung between the windows, looking straight across the room to the other portrait, which hung at the side of the sofa. At that I looked next, and as I looked I felt once more the horror of nightmare seize me. Evil beamed from the narrow, leering eyes: it laughed in the demonlike mouth. The whole face was instinct with some secret and appalling mirth; the hands, clasped together on the knee, seemed shaking with suppressed and nameless glee. There came a tap at the door and Martin enter. “Mrs. Winchester, have everything you want,” he asked. “Rather more than I want,” I said, pointing to the picture. He laughed. “It is scarcely a human face at all. It is the face of some warlock, some devil.” He looked at it more closely. “Yes; it isn’t very pleasant,” he agreed. “Scarcely a something to look at, eh? I’ll have it taken down if you like.” “I really wish you would,” I said. He used the annunciator, and with the help of another servant, they detached the picture and carried it out on to the landing, and put it with its face to the wall. “By Joke, the picture is heavy,” Martin said, mopping his forehead. “I wonder if he had something on his mind.” When Martin looked at his hand, there was blood on it, in considerable quantities, covering the whole palm. #RandolphHarris 6 of 8

“I’ve cut myself somehow,” he said. Martin gave a little startled exclamation. “Why, I had too,” said John. Zip, had come out of the house, as the servants and I were in the garden. The door behind us into the hall was open, and a bright oblong of light shone across the lawn to the iron gate which led on to the road outside, where a mahogany tree stood. I saw that Zip had all his hackles up, bristling with rage and fright; his lips were curled back from his teeth, as if he were ready to spring at something, and he was growing to himself. He took not the slightest notice of me or the servants, but stiffly and tensely walked across the grass to the iron gate. There he stood for a moment, looking through the bars and still growling. Then of a sudden his courage seemed to desert him: he gave one long howl, and scuttled back to the house with a curious crouching sort of movement. I walked to the gate and looked over it. Something was moving on the grass outside. There was a thunder in the air, as I shivered and brooded on the casting of that brain-blasting shadow, something creeped out of the Earth’s supreme horrors. It had come down from horribly ancient eons before the World was made. The beast had a humanoid head, large teeth, globular eyes, and was covered with scales. His hands were claws like a lion. Some bright light had been flashed in my face, though it was now pitch dark. Overheard the thunder cracked roared, and when it ceased and the deathly stillness succeeded, I heard the rustle of movement coming nearer me, and more horrible corruption and decay. My galloping heart had no reassurance. And then a hand was laid on the side of my neck, and close beside my ear, I heard quick-taken breathing. I ran back to my house as fast as I could. #RandolphHarris 7 of 8

But the breathing still came closer to me. At that, the terror, which I think had paralyzed me for the moment, gave way to the wild instinct of self-preservation. I hit wildly with both arms, kicking out at the same moment, and heard a little animal squeal, and something soft dropped with a thud beside me. I took a could of steps, put my right hand on the wall which was nearest to me, and noticed that there were Sumerian markings and occult symbols all over the walls and ceilings of the darkened parlor. One of the kitchens was adored with demonic imagery. Martin, the butler, said “I was looking for you—Good heaven there’s blood on your shoulder.” I stook there, so he told me afterwards, swaying from side to side, white as a sheet, with the mark on my shoulder as if a hand covered with blood had been laid there.” Then there was silence; he had passed out of my sight behind the open door. Next moment he came out again, as white as myself, and instantly shut it. How I got to the basement I hardly know. An awful shuddering and nausea of the spirit rather than of the flesh had seized me, and more than once he had to place my feet upon the steps, while every now and then he cast glances up the stairs. The air was still, but so bitterly cold that breathing felt like inhaling splinters of ice. Finally upstairs, I sat with Martin in the library by the fire, wondering if I should ever feel warm again. It was the art of all devilry that had been done here. The mist, I noticed uneasily, had grown much thicker—and so we returned to the gallery. The echoes of the ghosts sounded horribly.  I wished there was something I could do, other than wait and shiver, and try to shake off the sensation of being watched. #RandolphHarris 8 of 8

The Winchester Mystery House

Thomas Edison theorized that energy, like matter, is indestructible. He became intrigued by the idea of developing a radio that would be sensitive enough to pick up the sounds of times past—sounds that were only audible to the psychically sensitive. Mr. Edison hypothesized that the vibrations of every word ever uttered still echoed in the ether.

If this theory should be established, it would explain phenomena such as the restoration of scenes from the past. Just as the emotion of certain individuals permeate a certain room and cause a ghost to be seen by those possessing similar telepathic affinity, so it might be that emotionally charged scenes of the past become imprinted upon the psychic ether of an entire landscape.

An alternate theory maintains that souls or energy emotionally held to an area may telepathically invade the mind of a sensitive person and enable one to see the scene as “they” one saw it. At The Winchester Mystery House, some say that they have seen a dark shadow following them into the place; still others say they hear things in the back room—things like silverware moving about with an odd tinkling sound. A young employee, who was playing videos games during his break, ran back into the lobby screaming that he had seen a woman in the garden half in and half out of the ground.

For further information about tours, including group tours, weddings, school events, birthday party packages, facility rentals, and special events please visit the website: https://winchestermysteryhouse.com/

Please visit the online giftshop, and purchase a gift for friends and relatives as well as a special memento of The Winchester Mystery House. A variety of souvenirs and gifts are available to purchase.  https://shopwinchestermysteryhouse.com/

If you forget to purchase something during your visit, you can order any gift item by calling 408-247-2000 and charging them to your credit card. You can also place an order through the mail. Be sure to include a daytime telephone number with area code.