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Where the Wind Blew and the Stars Sone Down
Haunting, eerie, mystical even at times a little frightening to those outside the shadowy half-World of the occult but compelling and demanding out attention. In 1884, Mrs. Winchester left New Haven, Connecticut, and the graves of her husband and only child, moved to San Jose, California, and began the obsession that was to last for the rest of her life. She purchased an unfinished farmhouse outside the small agricultural town, and for the next 38 years, the sound of construction on Mrs. Winchester’s house never stopped. She used to maintain, I remember, that there was no apparition or supernatural manifestation, or series of circumstances pointing to such a manifestation, however strongly substantiated they appeared to be, that could not be explained on purely natural grounds. However, there was a notable instance of what was by many supposed to be a supernatural manifestation that occurred in the water tower on the estate. It was a horrible sight. Barney Ackers and his wife Everly had evidently been waylaid and killed by a blow of an axe just as he was entering the yard gate, and then the door of the water tower had been broken open and his wife had been killed, after which Barney’s body had been dragged into the water tower, and it had been fired with the intention of making it appear that the water tower had burned by accident. However, by one of those inscrutable fatalities, the fire, after burning half of two walls, had gone out. Still, it was a horrible sight and the room looked like shambles. Barney had plainly been caught unawares while leaning over his gate. The back of his head had been crushed in with the eye of an axe, and he had died instantly. The pleasant thought which was in his mind at the instant—perhaps, of the greeting that always awaited him on the click of his latch; perhaps, of his success that day; perhaps, of Mrs. Winchester’s kindness to him for the work he did—was yet on his face, stamped there indelibly by the blow that killed him. There he lay, face upwards, as the murderer had thrown him after bringing him in, stretched out his full length on the floor, with his quiet face upturned, looking in that throng of excited, awestricken men, just what he had said he was: a man of peace. His wife, on the other hand, wore a terrified look on her face. There has been a terrible struggle. She had lived to taste the bitterness of death, before it took her. #RandolphHarris 1 of 13
Satan’s presence was haunting. It haunted Mrs. Winchester for years, and for many nights she could not sleep. No one ever found out who did it, and she found herself unable to forget it, or to have peace as she used to. On the night of the 3rd of January 1888, some thieves attempted to commit a robbery on the estate of Mrs. Winchester. They entered the mansion, armed with a dead man’s hand with a lighted candle in it, believing in the superstitious notion that is such a hand be procured, and a candle placed within its grasp, the latter cannot be seen by anyone except him by whom it is used; also that if the candle and hand be introduced into a house it will prevent those who may be asleep from awaking. The inhabitants, however, were alarmed, and the robbers fled, leaving the hand behind them. No doubt the absolute failure of this gruesome dark lantern on this occasion was due to the fact that neither candle nor candlestick had been properly prepared! The Winchester mansion is full of apparitions and specters and perhaps some of them foiled the bulger’s plan. The mansion was continually disturbed by a nocturnal house-spirits. At night heavy steps were heard as of one carrying a heavy load. On occasion a form appeared in a monk’s cowl. Certain ghosts are confined to the Winchester mansion and they plague particularly people. A certain butler, Elton Abram, was an active spiritist while employed for Mrs. Winchester. For years he practiced table-lifting and considered this to be a way of communicating with the dead. He continued with his occult practices so intensively that psychic disturbances set in. The effects of his spiritistic interests also appeared in his children and grandchildren. His oldest son committed suicide. His next son suffered from a persecution mania. His oldest daughter ended up in The Great Asylum for the Insane. Another daughter suffered from Parkinson’s disease. Among his grandchildren the same picture emerged. One of them was a schizophrenic. Another suffered from weak nerves and hypersensitivity, and another lived a dissolute life, and had given birth to an illegitimate child. The first of the man’s great-grandchildren became a psychopath and a delinquent. #RandolphHarris 2 of 13
From the scientific point of view, one might consider these effects to have a different cause from that of spiritism. The psychiatrist will be interested in the question whether the practicing of spiritism was rather the effect than the cause of the ensuing mental and emotional disorders. Or again, was there some latent disposition in the family that was merely triggered off by the spiritistic activities? The parapsychologist will explain the table-lifting phenomenon as psychic automatism, that is an activation of subconscious forces. The Christian however is concerned essentially with the frequency in which psychic disturbances appear in connection with the practice of occultism. It was well known that Mrs. Winchester donned herself with ceremonial robes and communed nightly with the spirits in the Winchester mansion, and it was the midnight rendezvous for legions of ghosts, with special attention accorded those created by a Winchester rifle slug. It is possible the Mr. Abram stole something from the Winchester mansion, which brought on a curse to him and generations of his family members. A person’s thoughts and actions are like people who populate a community: friendly, contentious, kind, malicious, virtuous, evil, virile, cowardly, optimistic, cynical. We prosper in a pure mental neighborhood and wither in a foul one. And we can choose our mental neighborhood. Tired minds and bodies are signals to be careful. Demonic oppression is not easily discerned. Some people mistakenly blame demons for unrepentant self-will and psychological abnormalities. The source is not always clear, but demon oppression is usually marked by an emotional inability of the individual to do what one wants to do. A young maid staying in the Winchester mansion called Bythesea Atterton, had been a founding member of a thriving witches coven in Essex and the group’s other three members all shared her dedicated to the occult. She began to complain about various mental disturbances which included being tired of life and having depressions. Added to this she often had violent fit of temper, and her marriage was being undermined by her own frigidity. It has also happened that the husband had seen strange figures in the house at night. He had not told his wife about this so as not to upset her, but after a while she too had seen similar strange and maimed figures about the house. #RandolphHarris 3 of 13
Mrs. Winchester questioned the woman about her past illnesses and about the general health of her parents and grandparents, but she was the only one to have suffered in this way. In answer to Mrs. Winchester’s questions about contact with occultism, after a lot of thought Bythesea told her the following story. She had stolen Mrs. Winchester’s sixteenth century book about magic, and saw a black shadow at the end of her bed. It was a horrible presence that frighted the life out of Bythesea. While Mrs. Winchester was asleep, she would invite her Protestant girl’s group over. The minister’s wife, who had become the leader, used to practice table-lifting with all the girls in the Blue Séance Room. The sessions had always begun with the question, “Spirit, are you there?” One knock had meant “yes,” two had meant “no.” When the spirit had been willing to answer they had all taken part in asking it questions. The minister’s wife had continued this practice for many years until she was paralyzed by a stroke. Bythesea told Mrs. Winchester that all the girls had subsequently been afraid to visit their leader since her face had been changed into a terrible grimace by the stroke. Medical science would classy this example together with the precious one. However, with regards to the stroke, we would like to point out that in the numerous cases connected to the Winchester mansion of suicides, fatal accidents, stroke, and insanity, they usually involve the occult and someone who has in someway broke a rule, stole from the mansion, or offended the spirits somehow. The miles of twisting hallways in the mansion are made even more intriguing by secret passageways in the walls. Mrs. Winchester traveled through her house in a roundabout fashion, supposedly to confuse any mischievous ghosts that might he following her. Mrs. Winchester never slept in the same bedroom two nights in a row, in order to confuse any evil spirits that might be waiting for her. Music has always played an important role in cultural outlook and identity. Hymns, marching songs, lullabies—there are a thousand different aspects of life which are ordered or inspired by a musical beat. Music helps to define your cultural tribe. Even the ghost at the Winchester mansion reportedly had parties at ungodly hours. #RandolphHarris 4 of 13
The Satanic underground was celebrated—and eventually propelled into the mainstream—by musicians at the tail-end of the psychedelic era. While the Beatles and the Rolling Stones were the public faces of the 1960s youth culture, other voices of that same social and spiritual revolution sang dark hymns of rebellion. Some think that Black Arts Festivals have gone too far, one in particular. Coven might have achieved the popular success that ultimately eluded them. The band’s first album went under the uncompromising title Witchcraft Destroys Minds and Reaps Souls, boasting a gatefold sleeve featuring the band engaged in a Black Mass—complete with attractive blonde singer Jinx Dawson serving as a naked altar. The album features a recording of this Black Mass at the tail end of side two: “Two the best of our knowledge, this if the first Black Mass to be recorded in written words or in audio,” explain the sleeve notes. (Anton Lavey recorded his own Black Mass shortly afterwards.) “It is as authentic as hundreds of hours of research in every know source can make it. We do no to recommend its use by anyone who has not thoroughly studied Black Magic and is aware of the risks and dangers involved.” The rite bears the hallmark of serious study, with notably authentic elements from medieval Gnostic and witchcraft lore. The overall effect, however is curiously naïve, with the high priest’s command to “kiss the goat” sounding more Monty Python than Aleister Crowley. The music that precedes the Black Mass is standard—if well-executed—1960s folk rock. It is something of a jolt to realize that, behind the gentle acoustic guitars, the lyrics are exclusively about Devil-worship and black magic, while the alluring Miss Dawson’s vocals give the effect of a demonically-possessed Join Mitchell. Ultimately, Witchcraft Destroys Minds and Reaps Souls is an interesting musical exploration of the witchcraft tradition which suffused rural America ever since the Pilgrim Fathers landed in New England over four centuries ago. #RandolphHarris 5 of 13
The infamous Salem witch-trials—which took place in Massachusetts during 1692—had been one of the last major incidents of state extermination by religious fanatics from the “Old World,” making the term “witch-hunt” synonymous with the persecution with marginalized groups. As such, it elicited the sympathy of twentieth-century hippies like Coven toward their satanic predecessors. (In sacrificing the lives of twenty suspected “witches” to the fantasies of hysterical children, it also predated the “Satanic panic” of the 1980s-90s.) Coven’s second album Blood on the Snow followed but, despite its demonic sleeve, the Satanic elements were fare more restrained. By the third album, imaginatively titled Coven, the sinister elements had all but disappeared, replaced by standard hippie material. Robbed of the distinctive image of their early days, Coven faded away. It is interesting that the British rock band Lucifer, formed in 1971, were a curious collection of characters whose sardonically-devilish promotional photos portrayed a Mansonesque image, enlisted the Devil to fight the capitalist-pig system. Lucifer issued two albums, Big Gun and Exit, and a single, entitled “F*ck You,” which was seized by the police. Most outre of the Satanic psychedelicists, Roky Erickson had been the leader of the mid-1960s Texan garage band the Thirteenth Floor Elevators until a bust for marijuana possession. Facing a long prison sentence under the Lone Star State’s sanctimonious laws, he committed himself to a psychiatric institution instead. This was a bad mistake. Three years later, in the early 1970s, the hallucinogen-loving Erickson came out of the lunatic asylum considerably more troubled than when he went in. An obscure cult figure who became known for lyrical tributes to his favorite 1950s horror movies, in the hospital he had formed a close relationship with his own personal Satan. “Ah’m not afraid of the Devil, the Devil is mah friend. He chose me to do his biddin’,” drawled the usual but loveable Erickson. “Those doctors and nurses…They could not mess with the Devil’s chosen one.” To cement this unholy pact, Erickson later vocalized his personal infernal visions in wildly sincere songs like “I Think of Demons” and “Don’t Shake Me Lucifer.” #RandolphHarris 6 of 13
Ny far the most interesting of the Satanic-psychedelic bands were Black Widow. Their 1970s debt album, Sacrifice, was the result of guitarist Jim Gannon’s research into the Black Arts, with occultic lyrics accompanying a blend of traditional folk music and progressive rock. The almost-ubiquitous Alex Sanders warned the band they had done their homework too well, and would attract dark forces. He was right for one, though only inasmuch as Gannon’s lyrics boast a fair degree of authenticity, and some songs—like the catchy “Come to the Sabbat”—are highly evocative of the medieval-European Satanic tradition. Other moments—like the horrible saxophone solo Satan uses to tempt some poor innocent on “Seduction”—are diabolical in a different sense. The band enhanced their image with an elaborately Satanic stage show, professionally choreographed by a Leicester theatre company, complete with sacrificial daggers and an unclothed young woman to adorn the altar (at one point this was Alex Sanders’ wife, Maxine). They reaped the reward for their oddly entertaining work, with Sacrifice reaching the top 40 in the UK album charts. However, their second album, Black Widow, lacked both the Satanic themes and the power of its predecessor. The official explanation for this was that, true to Sanders’ warning, weird things stated to happen—most alarmingly, near-fatal car crashes. (Satan seems particularly keen on causing road accidents, however much more impressive lightning bolts or stampeding elephants might seem.) What is more likely is that, like many rock bands that use powerful Satanic imagery, Black Window may have begun to believe that same imagery was holding back their career. As many have learnt to their cost, however, it is more often the other way around—few dabbling rock stars regain the early excitement once they stop playing the Devil’s music. Suffice to day, Jim Gannon, the major creative force behind the band, cannot have been unduly worried by the curse, as he tried to mount a stage musical version of the Black Widow show on Broadway. Sadly, it never came off, and Black Widow—devoid of Devil worship—dwindled into obscurity. #RandolphHarris 7 of 13
Prosaic accounts of Black Sabbath’s flirtation with occult imagery claim they were impressed by the interest Black Widow had enjoyed in their Satanic stage show. The truth is probably a combination of all these stories. Whatever, it is fair to say that intense interest in their demonic aspects surprised Black Sabbath as much as anyone else. Their eponymous 1969 debut album was recorded in to days for six hundred pounds, treated with contempt and indifference by the press, and rapidly became a commercial success. The Christian Science Monitor, or all publications, noted approvingly that the band did not “condone or promote the less seemly aspects of…an interest in occult matters.” They were right. The song “Black Sabbath” describes the narrator’s state of terror at witnessing a Black Mass. Their attitude to Satan was chiefly the traditional one of fear and loathing, their lyrics even sometime entreating listeners to turn to God as the only source of love. However, the audiences were not listening—they wanted a Satanic band, and that is what Black Sabbath ostensibly became. (Rumor has it that their management had the large cross that decorated the inside of their first album inverted without the band’s knowledge of approval.) Satan appeared in Black Sabbath’s songs as a constant source of fascination and fear, an entity who brings colour into drab existence but can also represent the overwhelming evil of the World. In the classic “War Pigs,” Satanic witched are equated with the evil of politicians and generals who callously kill millions in their power games. (According to guitarist Tony Iommi, the title was derived from “Walpurgis,” the night when evil traditionally rules the World.) However, the most fascinating manifestation of Satan in a Black Sabbath song is also the rarest: when they briefly allow the Prince of Darkness to speak for Himself. In this strange and haunting “N.I.B,” Lucifer, the creator, sings a plaintive love song to His greatest creation and fellow sufferer, humankind. (The song “Lord of this World,” also recognizes Satan as god of the Earth.) #RandolphHarris 8 of 13
N.I.B.’s title is the source of some confusion: according to drummer Bill Ward it was simply his nickname, derived from when the band were stoned and though he resembled a pen nib. Typically, the fans perceived a more Satanic significance—to them, “N.I.B” stood for “Nativity in Black.” Inevitably, the band were quizzed on such apparent occultic beliefs during interviews. “We are into God,” Iommi unhelpfully explained to which Ward added, “But sometimes I feel Satan is God.” Perhaps they were expressing the beliefs of the early Satanic Gnostic groups, fifteen hundred years before. Led Zeppelin emerged in 1968 from London’s lively rhythm and blues scene. The band took off completely and became a huge commercial success. They were also said to have a Satanic influence with their roots being in traditional black blues music—though guitarist Jimmy Page’s outfit, much closer in its sympathies to the blues than to heavy metal, was far more preoccupied with the tradition. The Devil also makes His presence felt, either as a symbol of the inevitable fate awaiting the debauched bluesman, or as the hard-living musician’s comrade and inspiration. The delta blues—the school that had the greatest influence on the rock-guitar style—became known as “the Devil’s music.” Delta bluesmen included Peetie Wheatsraw, who liked to be known as “the Devil’s Son-in-Law and High Sheriff of Hell,” and Robert Johnson. Johnson, the acoustic-playing grandfather of rock guitar, best illustrates the enduring legend of the bluesman who sold his soul to acquire musical talent. (As testified by Satanic Rock star Glenn Danzig during our interview with him: “A lot of the old blues songs are very heavily rooted in occultism. There is Robert Johnson, all the voodoo and juju stuff—‘Got my Mojo Working,’ ‘Black Cat Bone.’”) Johnson’s pact with Satan was said to be struck at the “Crossroads”—one of his best-know song, and a traditionally magical location in many cultures—and thereafter he always claimed to live, as another song put it, with a “Hellhound on My Trail.” #RandolphHarris 9 of 13
Led Zeppelin, and Jimmy Page in particular, were heavily influenced by Johnson, lifting parts of his songs for their own compositions. As with Johnson, so the popular rumour went, Led Zeppelin has made a pact with the Devil, asking the Prince of Darkness to tune their instruments in return for their souls. Only Satanic aid, reasoned the myth, could explain the enormous success the band enjoyed so rapidly, or the power involving pleasures of the flesh these modern pied pipers had over young ladies. These same legends had been linked with musicians from Robert Johnson to Elvis Presley and beyond, but with Led Zeppelin the Satanic-pact myth has proved especially enduring. If you study the supernatural, you cannot ignore evil. The “ZOSO” symbol that became Led Zeppelin’s band’s trademark was also partly derived from the work of another influential British occultist, Austin Osman Spare—a contemporary of Crowley, and occultic artist, best known for his “automatic drawing,” which he claimed worked as a conduit for supernatural forces. One more than one occasion, Page hinted that much of Led Zeppelin’s material (particularly their meditative anthem “Stairway to Heaven”) had been conceived in a similar fashion. (If you recall, this is also how Mrs. Winchester received the plan on how to build her mansion.) Kenneth Anger asked Page to record a soundtrack for his magic ritual film Lucifer Rising, but was bitterly disappointed with the results, saying, “I had asked him for intimacy and strength, rhythms and counter-rhythms. But he gave me a short fragment of chanting voices and sounds that I thought were quite sombre and morbid.” In October of 1976, the two fell out in grand style. Page threw Anger out of the basement of his London house, where he had granted the American magus use of a fil-editing suite. Anger responded with a press conference. Asked if he felt vindictive toward Page, Anger reposed, “You bet I do. I’m not a Christian turn the other cheek kind. In fact, I’m ready to throw a Kenneth Anger curse.” #RandolphHarris 10 of 13
Asked about the incident in an interview the following year, Page observed, “The whole thing about ‘Anger’s Curse,” they were just these silly little letters. God, it was all so pathetic…I had a lot of respect for him. As an occultist he was definitely in the vanguard.” Despite Page’s scepticim, many fans and commentators linked the personal tragedies that were to strike the band with some kind of hex. On 26 July 1977, vocalist Robert Plant’s young son Karac died of a respiratory infection. Three years later, on 26 September 1980, the band’s drummer, John Bonham, died after a drinking binge. Enough was enough. On 4 December 1980, it was announced that Led Zeppelin were no more. The band’s demise only served to fuel rumours. The more lurid stories held that all of Led Zeppelin, with the exception of Bonham, had signed pacts with the Devil for Earthly pleasure, supposedly explaining the drummer’s untimely death. One fanzine reported that black smoke had been seen billowing from Page’s house on the day following Bonham’s death, and that the guitarist was overheard uttering strange curses in unknown tongues. Even the mainstream press got in on the act, with the London Evening News quoting an anonymous source: “It sounds crazy, but Robert Plant and everyone around the band is convinced that Jimmy’s dabbling in black magic is responsible in some way for Bonzo’s death and for all these other tragedies.” What are we to make of the “Led Zeppelin curse”? Many young people still need to hear guitar music that conjured the Devil, and Satanic rock does show a tenacity that surprised all but its most fervent disciples. Kip Trevor from the band Black Widow tells the story about their album Sacrifice and the stage show of the same title. “There is a guy who has lost his wife as a result of an accident to do with some kind of occultic ceremony. Something goes wrong, and she is killed. He comes back through the centuries, is reborn, and remembers this in a dream. In this dream he realizes his wife can be returned to him, if he can perform another ceremony, like the one which had gone wrong. This time he would turn the tables on the Lady Astoroth, draw her, overpower her, and sacrifice her, then she would be banished and his wife would come back. #RandolphHarris 11 of 13
“So in the first song, ‘In Ancient Days,’ tells the story of this guy travelling through the centuries. Then there is the conjuration in which we bring Lady Astoroth and the girl appears. We’d have a lot of fun with that, as she would appear from all sorts of odd places, depending on where we were playing. We toured with it all over Europe for around eighteen months. When Black Widow broke up, Jim and myself went off to try and revive the idea of the occultic stage show. We spent a lot of time, money and effort on this new black magic concept, but it did not work out. Black Widow’s first album was quite an achievement, but it would have been lovely to have developed it. The problem was that the band politics got in the way—some of them wanted to be a “normal” band and thought the whole black magic thing was not them. They thought it was overshadowing their playing. The show was written with Jim’s research, using proper conjuration ceremonies. The whole thing was done authentically as we could possibly do it. We drew the magic circles, used all the props—fire, earth, water, and air. We did it exactly as you were supposed to do it. Doing that has an effect, even if it is only psychological, because you know you’re doing it in the correct fashion. You’re stepping over the line. Combined with the power of the music and the power of the audience’s involvement, weird things would happen.” God did not create the devil as such. Lucifer, one of God’s mighty cherubs, rebelled against Him and became the devil. Satan is thus the product of his own evil choice. God created a superbly beautiful and wise being and invested him with power above all the other created beings. His name, Lucifer, means “son of the morning,” “bright and shining one,” or “light bearer.” He had many angels at his beck and call and was prince over all the Earth. A fee moral agent with the power of choice, he was filled with an ambition to which he had no right—to rise above God. Unwilling to rule over the World as a vice-general under God, he became “Satan,” meaning “adversary,” or opponent. #RandolphHarris 12 of 13
There is only one devil; there are many demons. A familiar spirit in the service of Satan knows human beings so well that he can disguise himself as those people; there are different kinds of spirits—some are sensual and lewd, and others appear ethical; demons are wandering spirits belonging to the legions of Satan, a class of beings distinct from angels—some are on Earth seeking embodiment in human beings and animals, other already are imprisoned in the bottomless abyss; Satan wins followers by psychic and supernatural phenomena that approximate the power of God; Satan is a created being who presently exercises authority over his domain, the Earth realm, but he can do only what God allows him to do, and eventually he will be deprived of all power and glory. As one can see, it is not only Mrs. Winchester who had experiences with the occult, curses, and spirits. Many people have. Occasionally other theories turn up in the literature of modern parapsychology. Some speak of a magical astral World-soul. This entails the idea of an inner World in which all the occurrences of the visible World have their inner equivalent. The World-soul is supposed to be outside of our concept of space and time. The past and the future, the near and the far are said to be all on the same level. Everything is synchronized and simultaneous. A person who is capable of contacting this World-soul enables such a person to enter into a sphere of higher intelligence where the limitations of space and time no longer hold true. Prophecy is inspired either by the Holy Spirit of by the Devil. The wide scope of the occult power possessed by spiritists helps explain why they can cause so much mischief. Through the phenomena of levitation, apports, telekinesis, and materializations, it is not difficult to see how a person endowed with strong mediumistic powers can do a great deal of harm, especially in closely associated realm of magic. Genuine magic is the art of bring about results beyond humans’ power through the enlistment of supernatural agencies. Black magic deliberately involves the devil and demons, and the resulting enchantment is used for persecution and revenge. #RandolphHarris 13 of 13
Sarah Winchester was reportedly trapped in her Daisy Bedroom during the 1906 earthquake. Her workers had to pry her out of the room, and the crowbar mark is still on the door to this day… See it on the Mansion Tour!
A 160-room mansion built to appease the spirits who died at the hands of the Winchester Rifle 👻
Summoning Devils on Film and in Real Life
Much like the Winchester mansion and Mrs. Winchester, the Hellfire Clubs and medieval Sabbat believed that devils and demons should not be stern masters or slaves, but welcome house-guest, which is why Mrs. Winchester built what is now known as the Winchester Mystery House. It is easy to imagine how the combined grief of losing both a child and a spouse could be very crippling. However, if you had $20,000,000.00 (2022 inflation adjusted $556,305,882.35) and all the time in the World to help you cope, can you imagine what you would do? Mrs. Sarah L. Winchester’s response to the deaths of her child and husband left a bizarre and impressive architectural reflection of her psyche. The fascinating story of the Winchester Mystery House has its roots in the personal tragedies suffered by Mrs. Winchester and in the legacy of the Winchester rifle, “The Gun that Won the West.” The Winchester Mansion raised its castellated walls and towers in every direction commanding magnificent prospects; like emeralds in a setting of deeper green, gemmed the surface of the surface of the rural landscape and contributed to increase the beauty of scenery not surpassed in the World. Ages ago the voice of prayer and the song of praise used to ascend from this sacred estate. Presented on the estate was a happy country, none better calculated to inspire love and harmony. However, there was a lack of happiness in the circumstances of life for Mrs. Winchester. At first glance, there seems to be no degree of truth in this statement because of all the riches she inherited and her beautiful mansion. Many people assumes that for the rich, enjoying their riches, are likely to be contented and to look no further than this World. There were also a group of seven Victorian houses on the estate, not connected to the main house, of goodly size, and a Holy Cross. The seven Victorian Houses which, according to tradition, were built there under Mrs. Winchester’s direction, along with a graveyard on her 760 acres of land. #RandolphHarris 1 of 15
In the garden of the mansion was a curious stone cross, of considerable size, evidently monumental, though the inscription has been so defaced as to be illegible. On the front of the cross there is a deep indentation much resembling that made by the hoof of a cow in soft Earth, the bottom of the indentation being deepest at the sides and somewhat ridged in the middle. Concerning this cross and the depression in its face, the following legend was related by one of the farmers on the estate. “Mrs. Winchester built this mansion, houses, and the church, you see. When she lived, she owned all the land round about. But there was a devil here. If you had meet him on the grounds, you would know in a minute that it was himself and no other that was in it, and so make ready, either for to run away from him, or to fight him with praying as fast as you can, because, you see, it is no use for to strive with the devil any other way, seeing that no weapon can make the last dint on his carriage. In them days, and before the mansion was built, I am telling you, the devil was all as one as a man, a tall felly like a soldier, with a high hat coming to a pint and feathers on it, and fine boots and spurs and a short red jacket with a cloak over his shoulder and a sword by his side, as fine as any gentleman of the good old times. So he used to go about the country, desiring men and women, the latter being his choice as being easier to deceive, and taking them down with him to his own place, and it was a fine time he was having entirely, and everything his own way. As soon as Mrs. Winchester started construction on her mansion, the devil took up his quarters there, to make it as sure as he could. But when he heard what Mrs. Winchester was doing, a four-story mansion, of 500 or 600 rooms, and a nine-story observation tower, he came out to see the castle was rising before his eyes. He heard the construction singing and started cursing to himself, and at 5.13am on Wednesday April 18th, 1906, Satan stomped his cloven hoof into the ground causing a 7.9 Earthquake and brought down that tower. #RandolphHarris 2 of 15
After the Earthquake, while the devil was laying about in the bushes a-watching the work, and the tower of the big mansion was lifting itself above the trees, this time just not as high as it used to be. Everyone knows that Satan is slicker than a weasel, and has a memory like a miser’s box that takes in everything and lets nothing go out. When you do anything, sore a bit that it scrapes the devil, and he hugs it close till a time comes when he can make a club have it to bate you with, and so he does. You may think it is queer, but it is no wonder to one that understands it, for the devil can take any shape he pleases and look like any one he wants to, and so he does for the purpose of tempting us poor sinners to destruction, but there is one thing by which he always knows; when you have given up to him or when you have beaten him on the face, no matter which, he has got to throw off the disguise that is on him and show you who he is, and when he does it, it is not the elegant, dressed-up devil that you see and that I was just telling you about, but the rale, old, black anger with a rancorous, without a haporth of rages to the back of him, and his horns and tail a sticking out, and his eyes as big as an oxen’s and shinning like fire, and great bat’s wings on him, and, saving your presence, the most nefarious smell of sulfur you have smelled. However, before, he looks all right, no matter what face he has, and it is only the goodness of God that the devil is bound for to show himself to you, because, Glory be to God, it is his will that humans shall know who they are dealing with, and if they give up to the devil, and after finding out who is in it, go on with the bargain they have made, sure the fault is their own, and they go to hell with their eyes open, and if they bate him, he has got to show himself for to let them see what they have escaped. #RandolphHarris 3 of 15
Satan was flying around the Winchester mansion, there were the farmers all along the day job, and the construction workers were building as fast as they could and a bottle of holy water were at their side to throw at the devil when he would come. So he went from the and would fly back and forth watching then working, and they restored the Winchester mansion. Old beliefs die hard, especially when their speedy demise is a consummation devoutly to be wished. Magic is only a physical or psychological effect that has yet to be explained, which means for many it is uncomfortable to entertain now. All good occultists must be skeptical—believe nothing in preference to believing everything. All proto-sciences could be defined as magic. You can see the ritual chamber as a kind of intellectual decompression of chamber to prepare your mind for other atmospheres. People who limit themselves to the occult curricula and profess to be wizards are laughable—magic is an interdisciplinary pursuit. You must consider all the options—investigating like a police officer. To perform a summoning, for example, would involve finding the right environment, appropriate retrieval cues, the right atmospheric conditions. The effects of magic are demonstrable. A lot of simple magic is just to do with self-confidence, how much your antennae are up, how open you are to the World around you. Rituals and magical words are not necessary, merely tools or exercises to help train your mind. Scientists are now coming to the conclusion that there is a lot more interconnectedness between man and his environment than they originally supposed, which is a basic occultic concept. The only really dangerous characters are the ones who think they are generational Satanists and their grandfather told them with his dying breath what to do, or whatever. There are a lot of armies of one out there, a lot of coffee-bar revolutionaries. New information technology has bred a lot of desktop Satanists and bulletin boards mean that cyberspace seems to be just full of Satanists. The Christian heretics rarely get much further than designing letterheads. #RandolphHarris 4 of 15
Many Satanists are fans of people like Paris Hilton and Britney Spears and applaud their outrageous sexuality. They are also huge fans of Aaliyah for making that film Queen of the Damned. Many Satanists are quietly applying Church of Satan philosophy to their lives in their own fashion in a very real way. The best thing they could ask for is that people pass them a nod of respect. In the modern World, the spirit of the age often looms down upon us in strange, distorted forms from the cinema screen. Major production companies spend millions of dollars trying to trap the latest cultural trends on celluloid, while audiences make surprise blockbusters from movies which—accidentally or otherwise—tap into the anxieties and enthusiasms of the day. In the late 1960s and 1970s, 2000s the films which came to be regarded as four “Satanic blockbusters”—Rosemary’s Baby (1968), The Exorcist (1973), The Omen (1976), and Queen of the Damned (2002)—all took the box-office by storm, transforming themselves into cultural phenomena which attracted public interest far beyond that of most “mere” films. Cinema has been the most potent legend factory of the centuries. Despite constant predictions that TV would devour the silver screen, the spectable and ceremony of the cinema helped retain its status as the most sacred of modern temples. Film presents a super real version of the World—louder, larger, essentially more mythic. More people take cues on how to live, love, fight—even on how to die—from the silver screen than from the pulpit or the gospels. Pagan worship is alive and well and being practised at your local multiplex, with Hollywood stars as the gods of our age. And, just as cinema has given us new gods, so it has supplied us with a new hierarchy of devils. The relationship between Satan and the silver screen is a notable one. The father of fantastic cinema was a Frenchman named Georges Melies, who made delightful short films crawling with demons and devils. Melies was himself a Faustian figure, a stage conjurer and photographic illusionist who appeared out of the rump of the French Decadent era. Summoning devils on film, he defended this new sorcery in time-honoured fashion as “white magic.” #RandolphHarris 5 of 15
In The Laboratory of Mephistopheles (1897), Melies made Satan’s head detach itself and float around the room—to the enchantment and horror of audiences in darkened “picture palaces, resembling nothing so much as séance chambers. Hollywood’s dream factory was not even at the planning stage by the turning of the century, but the pioneer of US cinema, Edwin Porter (partner of the man who virtually invented the movies, Thomas Edison), produced his own version of Faust and Marguerite in 1900. The most striking cinematic fantasies came from Germany at this point—stark, angular exercises in shadow and nightmare. The Student of Prague was an updated version of the well-worn Faust tale, based on an Edgar Allan Poe story, which transformed the lead from an ambitious academic to a devil-may-care student and Mephistopheles into a rakish devil called Scapinelli. The story was retold onscreen in 1913, 1926, and 1936. The 1926 version was by the master of German Expressionist cinema, F.W. Murnua—the last film he made before leaving his artistic roots for Hollywood, where he met with a tragically early death. As a minor masterpiece, it was a suitably grandiose climax to a career which produced Nosferatu (1922), the first gothic vampire film. Now, it is always important to be safe on the road and sometimes to listen to the heartfelt advice of others. Jayne Mansfield, a buxom B-move actress died in a tragic car crash with her lawyer in and lover Sam Brody. Brody had disliked his beloved’s new guru from the start, and the friction led to LaVey placing a ritual curse on his rival. The Black Pope (Anton LaVey) warned the pugnacious lawyer—known to be a dangerous driver—that he would suffer a series of automobile accidents. It was no great surprise when a car crash ensued—but it made World headlines for taking the life of Jayne Mansfield, as well as the top of her cranium. LaVey grimly stated that on the night preceding the crash, as he cut out a newspaper clipping of Jayne, he accidently snipped off the top of the blonde beauty’s head. (By the way, I had no idea The Black Pope was dead, until today. I feel he is very much still alive. I have always felt like he is here, in San Francisco in his black church.) #RandolphHarris 6 of 15
The physical phenomena of spiritism are often closely connected with psychical manifestations, such as spiritistic visions, automatic writing, speaking in a trance, materializations, table lifting, tumbler moving and excursions of the psyche. There is no doubt that today, as in the time of Isaiah (Isaiah 6.1-5), Ezekiel (Ezekiel 1.4-28), Paul (Acts 9.1-8), Peter (Acts 10.9-16), and John (Revelation 1.10-18), God may give His people a genuine vision, particularly in great times of great stress. However, genuine experiences of this nature are always accompanied by true spiritual grace and modesty. Sensationalism betrays a lack of authenticity. Unfortunately, genuine experiences are rare, and counterfeit ones about. Christian counselors find that the “ratio is about nine to one over the genuine experiences.” Mrs. Winchester used to have visions. She reported that she saw visions of Christ at night, and it left her feeling a sense of uneasiness and fear. The so-called visions of Christ were mediumistic. They came as a warning. Weeks after the visions started, Mrs. Winchester saw her husband William Wirt Winchester’s spirit departing from his body as he expired in 1881. The visions of Mrs. Winchester bear evidence of the occult, as do the visions of Joseph Smith (1805-1844), who fathered Mormonism. Many of the founders and promulgators of modern cults have had alleged visions from God. However, some say these visions promote “doctrines of demons” (1 Timothy 4.1) among the credulous and those unable to discern spirits (1 Corinthians 12.10; 1 John 4.1-2). When humans depart from God’s Word, they supposedly expose themselves to demon imposture and deception. Automatic writing—some persons endowed with mediumistic powers are able—either in a waking state or trance to write letters, words, or sentences which spiritists consider to be message from the spirit World. This is how Mrs. Winchester came up with the architecture of her mansion, the blueprints were often dictated to her in her Blue Séance room as she took down the notes on napkin. Also, the persistent pain in her legs and back vanished whenever she sat down and dictated these blueprints. #RandolphHarris 7 of 15
One day as Mrs. Winchester was taking dictation, a spirit named Apollonius Tyannaeus appeared and said, “In the name of the Lord Jesus, our blessed and exalted Savior.” The spirit then told the woman that she had been chosen by God for special revelations. She would become a prophetess and bless humankind with these revelations. The case is patently that of a simple farm woman turned indeed into a spiritistic writing medium. Rudolf Tischner, a parapsychologist, points out the danger of automatic writing when practiced in immoderation. Although he regards these writing phenomena only as “motoric break up the integrated psychic structure with ensuing peril to mental and physical health. This simply means that occult enslavement can result from mediumistic writing, or from dependence upon the Ouija board or other spiritistic devices to obtain alleged messages from the spirit World. Speaking in a trance—a trance is a condition in which a spiritistic medium loses consciousness and passes under the control of demonic power to effect alleged communication with the dead. The demon (or demons) takes over and actually speaks through the spiritistic medium, deceptively imitating the deceased. As a result this ruse innumerable spiritistic clairvoyants claim communication with the dead, often with famous deceased people allegedly appearing to speak to the living. One evening, Mrs. Winchester went into a trace and soon the “Apostle Paul” approached and preached to the audience. The apostle was not visible but only spoke through the medium who lay in trance. Some critic said it was only another constant instance of deception by demons who ape the deceased but cannot produce them. Other believe it was real. Perhaps the most remarkable phenomena of spiritism are materializations. These are supernatural appearances and disappearances of material images in connection with the activities of a spiritistic medium. #RandolphHarris 8 of 15
Materializations have been exhaustively studied and photographed and have been found to be manifestations of various degrees of teleplastic morphogenesis. The first stage is the evolution of a gauzelike substance of rubbery consistency from the body cavities of the medium. The second stage is the forming of the various parts of the body in outline—arms, head, etcetera. Frequently in the case of teleplastic forms of this kind, a threadlike connection is maintained with the medium. The third stage consists of the composition into completely outlined forms, which are visible as phantoms near the medium. These three stages of materialization manifest purely visual phenomena. The fourth stage displays telekinetic phenomena. There is an energy output from the teleplasm (telekinesis), such as the ringing of a bell, at night, passers-by heard ghostly music wafting from the dark mansion. The bell in the belfry high in the gables tolled regularly at midnight to summon incoming flights of spirits. Later it tolled again to warn these visitors to return to their sepulchers. However, once a week, these departed ones relaxed and danced in the Great Ball Room. In other stages of materializations come automatic writing of a typewriter, and the automatic playing of a musical instrument. In addition to the active energy output of the materialization, there is frequently a passive pain experience of the teleplasm. The fifth stage of the materialization is the penetration of material substance. To his phase belong “apports,” that is, the appearing and disappearing of objects in closed rooms or chests and containers. From locked and cemented containers, for example, enclosed coins are brought out, or stones and other objects fall inexplicably from the ceiling. This often happens in the Winchester mansion, as documented by Mrs. Winchester. In this stage many mediums allegedly have the ability to penetrate solid material substance while they are in a trance. While Mrs. Winchester sat in a small cabinet, a phantom built itself up on the floor outside the cabinet and formed itself into a male person, who moved in and out among the participants of the séance. While the materialization extended his hand to one of those present and she held it, dematerialization began to occur before the eyes of all the participants. Soon there was only a lump on the floor and this rolled up into the cabinet. #RandolphHarris 9 of 15
Another example is during a séance, Mrs. Winchester was able to call and help the materializing of the spirit of the deceased German romantic poet, Johann Ludwig Uhland (1787-1862). At the memorable séance a white phantasm was seen, from which the audience demanded a poem. Instead of reciting a poem, the phantasm tore a page from a book in the library. With a pencil from a briefcase in the room, secured through the leather without opening the briefcase, the hand jotted down a few verses and vanished. The page was left and still exists. The examination of the mysterious writing by a graphologist proved to be sensational. He confirmed the ghost writing to be actually the handwriting of the deceased poet. Afterward there was a trial in Berlin over the ownership of the page. The court awarded it to the medium, who afterward kept it among her prized possessions. The phenomena of materialization and dematerialization in case of strong mediums illustrated the conversion of psychic energy into matter and matter changed back again into psychic energy. The problem is illustrated by nuclear physics. Einstein’s formula (E==MC^2), energy is equal to mass times the speed of light squared, simply declares that it is theoretically possible to convert energy to mass and back again to energy. We have historical evidence of materializations. Missionaries claim that Mrs. Winchester’s mansion was never actually built, but that it materialized itself on the grounds, and (re)construction only began after the Earthquake caused by Satan. Some say this mansion is to be regarded as a miracle of Satan (2 Thessalonians 2.8-10; Revelation 13.15). Many people used to wonder how Mrs. Winchester used to travel so fast back and forth from San Jose to San Francisco to pick up items she ordered from overseas. Researchers believed that she would be spiritually transported miles away, and this may have been an example of this phenomenon or simply a miracle of transportation of unaltered physical body. It is debatable rather if these are miracles of God or that of Satan. God says He is the Alpha and the Omega. I wonder what that means? #RandolphHarris 10 of 15
Mrs. Winchester was said to possess tremendous occult gift and was reported to be able to make tables fly through the air for a space of one hundred feet. Above all, she was extremely adept in telekinesis, materialization, levitation, and black magic. Where Satan’s power remains virtually unchecked, miracles of evil supernaturalism abound. In Victorian days, the supernatural predated the mass hysteria about Satanism. As you may know, long before Mrs. Winchester arrived in California, there was a Devil worshipping conspiracy at large. However, her mansion seamlessly blends the ordinary and nightmarishly surreal. It is a rare treat for fans of demonic conspiracy and occult synchronicity. Some people have believed themselves to be demonically possessed after visiting the Winchester Mystery House, others claimed to have spoken to Mrs. Winchester directly. Directors of the Queen of the Damned claimed that the film was a makeshift occultic ritual, and Aaliyah unleashed the demon within herself. They also said the film poses some kind of supernatural power and they had to edit and voiceover a lot of the footage because not only did the characters act their own version of the script, but there were also some subliminal sounds and images on print. When many of these errors were re-examined, they also saw footage of the original Winchester mansion on the negatives, but rumors began that the original print had been withdrawn, replaced by an expurgated cut to protect the filmgoers from the movie’s insidious effects. The powers behind these manifestations were no doubt demonic. The director faced a terrible psychic assault on 25th August 2001, before they finished filming the movie. However, when the reel was played, the directors found they had all the footage they needed, even some they did not remembering filming. It was so intensified that the demonic oppression became that he was compelled to give up making other Anne Rice books into movies, especially after Aaliyah’s plane crashed later that evening. Although the film was unfished, with the blessing of her family, it was released to the public in February of 2002. #RandolphHarris 11 of 15
Certain psychic clairvoyants claim that their souls can travel great distances at their command. They always said she makes a room come alive. Much like Mrs. Winchester, Aaliyah had a lot of psychic phenomena around her death. When directors took photos of Aaliyah and Queen Akasha to a clairvoyant, while concentrating on the photographs, the medium declared that one of the women was apparently dead, while the other one, reportedly killed in 2001, was still alive. After more concentration, the clairvoyant said: “I can get in touch with this woman (pointing to Queen Akasha). I see her in a great stone building southeast of Ireland.” By psychic excursion and by psychometry (selecting an object belonging to the missing person and beginning to search from there) the clairvoyant was able to establish contact by occult assistance. The cinema is the Devil’s lantern. In March of 1922, Mrs. Winchester said, “Though it should be borne in the mind that in the persecution of witches many women were put to death on the latter charge, albeit they were really benefactors of the human race; the more so as their skill in simples and knowledge of the medicinal virtue of herbs must have added in no small degree to the resources of our present pharmacopoeia.” In August of 1807 an extraordinary affair took place in the house of Mrs. Winchester. She had a cow which continued to give milk as usual, but of late no butter could be produced from it. An opinion was unfortunately instilled into the mind of Mrs. Winchester, that whenever such a thing occurred, it was occasioned by the cow having been bewitched. Her belief in this was strengthened by the fact that every woman on this estate was able to relate some story illustrative of what she had seen or heard of in times gone by with respect to the same. At length the Mrs. Winchester was informed of a woman named Mary Butters, who resided in Oakland at the Cohen Bray House. Mrs. Winchester went to her, and brought her to mansion for the purpose of curing the cow. About ten o’ clock that night war was declared against the unknown magicians. #RandolphHarris 12 of 15
Mary Butters ordered old Klaus and a young man named Konrad to go out to the cow-house, turn their waistcoats inside out, and in that dress to stand by the head of the cow until she sent for them, while the butler, the made, and an old woman named Klara Lee remained in the house with her. Klaus and his ally kept their lonely vigil until daybreak, when, becoming alarmed at receiving no summons, they left their post and knocked at the door, but obtained no response. They then looked through the kitchen window, and to their horror saw the four inmates stretched on the floor as dead. They immediately burst in the door, and found that the butler and the maid were actually dead, and the sorceress and Mrs. Winchester nearly so. The latter soon afterwards expired; Mary Butters was thrown out on a dung-heap, and a restorative administered to her in the shape of a few hearty kicks, when had the desired effect. The house had a sulphureous smell, and on the fire was a large pot in which were milk, needles, pins, and crooked nails. At the inquest held at the Winchester mansion on the 19th of August, Jurors stated that the three victims had come by their deaths from suffocation, owning to Mary Butters having made use of some noxious ingredients, after the manner of a charm, to recover the sick cow. She was up to The Great Asylum for the Insane, but was discharged by proclamation. Her various of the story was that a black man (usually indicates a demon or the devil, not one of African descent) was summoned through the floor with a huge club, with which he killed the three person and stunned herself. This paranoid horror fantasies terrified the congregations, as well as the gross superstition displayed by the participants as for its tragical ending, yet it seems to have aroused no feelings in the greater community than those of risibility and derision. However, there is also another version of events. #RandolphHarris 13 of 15
A farm-hand had brought an action against Mrs. Winchester for wages alleged to be due to him. It transpired in the course of the evidence that on one occasion he had been set to banish witches that were troubling the cows. His method of working illustrates the Winchester case. All left the house except Mrs. Winchester, and the farm-hand, who locked himself in, closed the windows, stopped al keyholes and apertures, and put sods on top of the chimneys. He then placed a large pot of sweet milk on the fire, into which he threw rows of pins that had never been used, and three packages of needles; all were allowed to boil together for half an hour, and, as there was no outlet for the smoke, the farm-hand narrowly escaped being suffocated. If the forces of darkness triumph, it is a warning not a celebration. Many religious people come close to depicting what evangelists are preaching from their pulpits, or TV shows. Does it not seem strange for fundamentalist Christians to attack them as sinful and dangerous? Sin sells, in a way that the bland platitudes of Christian morality never will. Many of these popular and historical figures will be remember long after the credits have rolled. You could say that it is an “inside job.” Satanism sells, it captures the metaphysics of fear. People like to be haunted and scared, but only when they consent to it. No one wants their house broken into, their children kidnapped, their cars constantly vandalized, or to be attack by a hate group who haunts them like demons of the night. People simply want to tune into a scarry movie or visited a haunted house and leave the fear behind when they walk out the door or turn the TV off. They do not want to fear for the lives like Sharon Tate did for years without anyone to protect them. Humans are often more harmful than any ghost, devil or demon you can ever imagine meeting. Satan, speaking through a beautiful serpent—perhaps as a parakeet “talks” to us—promises know that would make Eve “like God” if she would eat the fruit of the tree forbidden by God. #RandolphHarris 14 of 15
Meanwhile, if the view of the power and knowledge of the people is that “Satan” is evil and not themselves, what can human beings do? Persist being evil, or resist the “devil,” and allow him to feel from them? Or is it they cling to evil because the darkness comes from their insidious mind and depleted soul? Note that it is useless to try to resist the devil unless you have first submitted yourself to God! Maybe YOU are the evil, not Satan. Sitting there, manufacturing all these evil days, so you can laugh at the pain and suffering you have inflicted on others to make yourself feel better. Is that of Satan, or is that YOUR nature on display. It is estimated that there are about 100 million adherents to spiritism in the World. The word “spiritism” comes from the Latin “spiritus,” spirit. The movement of spiritism represents the endeavour to communicate with the dead in the spirit World. Historically, spiritism can also be traced back over thousands of years. We have testimonies concerning it in the Old Testament in 1 Samuel 28, and Deuteronomy 18. It is also evidenced in the history of the Christian Church. Spiritism seems to be strongly connected with religion and religions. In so-called Christian countries such a variety of spiritistic forms, and such a range of associated psychic troubles exist, that the need for clarification is a pressing issue. What God do you really worship for “Satan disguises himself as an angel of the light. So it is not strange if his servants also disguise themselves as servants of righteousness,” reports 2 Corinthians 11.14-15. In other words, many of you Christians who claim to serve “God” do evil things and then blame the devil when you are disguising yourselves as children of the light. And you do not repent because you do not fear punishment nor hell, so you must be children of your “devil” and not of God. We live in a World which has turned its back on God. The reason some people fear Jesus is because they feel unworthy, it is not because they are evil. This conviction of inner unworthiness is not to be confused with a feeling of fear. However, people who suffer from schizophrenia and like to go around lying, the psychiatrist will be interested in the question whether the practicing of spiritism was rather the effect than the cause of the ensuing mental and emotional disorders. #RandolphHarris 15 of 15
Winchester Mystery House
The front gardens of the Winchester Mystery House looked different in the 1970’s! The gardens were restored to what they are today about ten years later.
The sign reads: “The world’s oddest, mysterious, weirdest, and freakish dwelling. Planned and built by Sarah L. Winchester of Winchester Rifle Fame”
Have you ever listened to Alessandro Moreschi sing “Ave Maria,” at night in the Winchester Mystery House? Try it and let me know what you experience. I heard ghosts appear, people have cried and screamed, and some love it. I think I would probably run outside. He sounds like a ghost.
Come Explore the Victorian Gardens this weekend! Open all weekend until 4PM.
A 160-room mansion built to appease the spirits who died at the hands of the Winchester Rifle 👻
Scared Away by Ghost and Demons and Sightings of Satan
Everything in the Universe can come under magic’s fire. Magic plays a part in Satan’s Worldwide rebellion against God and Jesus Christ. Though, if he attacks angels and spirits, animals and humans and everything in the material World. It is simply impossible to describe the tremendous scope of magic in a single report. We will, though, mention the main areas in which magic comes into play. First, healing and the inflicting of illnesses. A Catholic woman was seriously ill in hospital. The woman called the nurse and asked a favour of her. She went on to say that she had a daughter at home who had been demon-possessed for many years, and that the daughter was rarely conscious. Being so seriously ill the woman now saw an opportunity of helping her daughter. She asked the nurse to get in touch with her relatives before she died. She wanted the relatives to bring the daughter to the hospital so that the two of them could change vests with one another. Her idea was that in doing so her daughter would be freed, while she would die in the state of being possessed. The nurse however, did not fulfil her wish. Inflicting diseases is directly opposite to healing. Another example, a young man wanted to evade military service. His father therefore sent him to a magic charmer to be given some illness. The experiment was successful, and afterwards the young man was found to be unfit for military service. In another illustration, a spiritistic medium confessed that she belonged to a circle which not only practised communication with the dead but also black magic. Her specialty was in causing sicknesses and in death magic; she had already committed several murders which the police had been unable to solve. She has also worked on a minister who afterwards developed nervous disturbances and had been unable to work for several months. This was the content of her confession. I could not prove the statements, but I did know that at the time of the circle’s magic experiments this particular minister had been ill for a considerable period of time. #RandolphHarris 1 of 19
In another story, a girl from a strict Catholic family married a Protestant against the will of her parents. The first child they had contracted polio. The parents blamed their daughter, saying that it was her punishment for marrying a Protestant. Later they asked a magician to heal the baby boy and to transfer the illness to the mother instead. This in fact happened as the child was cured, while the girl herself became ill. She was taken to a hospital with symptoms of paralysis, depressions and terrible headaches. The doctors differed in their diagnosis. They may one test after another; spinal puncture, metabolism test, electro-cardiogram etcetera. Finally, they called in a brain specialist. She was examined over a period of several weeks but no cause was found for her illness. Later the condition of the young woman improved rapidly and she asked to be discharged. She was allowed to go home. Her parents, on hearing about this, were greatly disturbed and immediately reported the matter to the magician, telling him that his persecution of her had become ineffective. In another instance, a black magician (possibly a warlock) told a girl who was being courted by a married man, “I’ll break this man’s mind so much that he’ll lose his position.” It was not very long after this that the man began to have nervous disorders. He would complain of hearing noises both in his head and externally. He also suffered from flickering before the eyes loss of vision and an inability to concentrate. There was also a girl who had become a Christian during a mission. Inspired by the joy of her salvation she invited others to the meetings. It so happened that nearby there lived a man who possessed an extensive amount of occult literature and who practised its contents. The girl’s joy, coupled with her witnessing, got on his nerves. (The gospel of Christ and magic are as far apart as Heaven and Hell). The occultist threatened to driver her mad and to prevent her from going to the mission. Within weeks the girl began suffering from various disturbances. She would sometimes see small flames of light in her room together with other ghostly phenomena. It was then that she had come to me for counselling. #RandolphHarris 2 of 19
Cult involvement steels the unbeliever against the gospel, causing one to resist the Word of God and hardening one in unbelief and rebellion. In the case of nominal Christians, occult complicity produces a deadly indifference to the Word of God, prayer, worship, and spiritual life in general. This condition develops against the will of the victim who cannot overcome one’s spiritual apathy. At the same time, the victim is open to other religious delusions and heresies, being insensitive to the stern warning of God’s Word against complicity in the occult. “If you keep all these commandments to do them, which I command you this day, to love the Lord your God and to walk always in His ways, then you shall add three other cities to these three. Lest innocent blood be shed in your land, which the Lord your God gives you as an inheritance, and so blood guilt be on you,” report Deuteronomy 18.9-10. Secondly, love and hate magic—the Swiss herdsmen who bring the cattle down from the summer pastures in September like to tie three different herbs into the rope of the leading cow. This serves not only as a means of decoration but is also meant to bring luck in love. Furthermore, a girl had an affair with a married man. The man later moved away from the district, but before he left, he said to the girl, “Though we will be separated now, I will continue to visit you in your dreams. You won’t be able to prevent it, and you will never be able to take any action against me as there will be no evidence to support your story.” At first the girl did not understand what her lover had really meant, but a week after her friend had left, she suddenly felt his presence during the night. These visits were repeated again and again until they became a terrible and disgusting experiences to the girl. First she consulted a doctor, but as was to be expected the doctor explained the nightly psychic meetings away by saying that they were hallucinations involving pleasures of the flesh related to the first stages of schizophrenia. The girl could not accept this diagnosis, as she was mentally quite normal. She was convinced that it was more than an hallucination. #RandolphHarris 3 of 19
Under their leader, the arch-tempter Satan, demons subject humans to temptations. “Now the serpent was more subtle and crafty than any living creature of the field which the Lord God had made. And he [Satan] said to the woman, Can it really be that God has said, You shall not eat from every tree of the garden? Except the fruit from the tree which is in the middle of the garden. God has said, You shall not eat of it, neither shall you touch it, lest you die. However, the serpent said to the woman, You shall not surely die. For God knows that in the day you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God knowing the difference between good and evil and blessing and calamity. And when the woman saw that the tree was good (suitable and pleasant) for food and that it was delightful in order to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate; and she gave some also to her husband, and he ate. Then the eyes of them both were opened, and they knew that they were in their birthday suits; and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves apronlike girdles,” reports Genesis 3.1-7. “And tempter came and said to Him, If You are God’s Son, command these stones to be made [loaves of] bread,” reports Matthew 4.3. “Then after [he had taken] the bit of food, Satan entered into and took possession of [Judas]. Jesus said to him, What you are going to do, do more swiftly than you seem to intend and make quick work of it,” reports John 13.27. “But Peter said, Ananias, why has Satan filled your heart that you should lie to and attempt to deceive the Holy Spirit, and should [in violation of your promise] withdraw secretly and appropriate to your own use part of the price from the sale of the land?” reports Acts 5.3. “That is the reason that, when I could bear [the suspense] no longer, I sent that I might learn [how you were standing the strain, and the endurance of] your faith, [for I was fearful] lest somehow the tempter had tempted you and our toil [among you should prove to] be fruitless and to no purpose,” reports 1 Thessalonians 3.5. Satanic and demonic solicitations are optimistic and pessimistic. “The field is the World, and the good seed means the children of the kingdom; the darnel is the children of the evil one. And the enemy who sowed it is the devil. The harvest is the close and consummation of the age, and the reapers are angels,” reports Matthew 13.38-39. Satan and his helpers not only destroy the good seed in men’s hearts; they sow bad seeds. #RandolphHarris 4 of [RH1] 19
Sometimes evil spirits endanger humans’ temporal safety by exercising a certain control over natural forces. Satan employed lightning, whirlwind, and disease to afflict Job (Job 1.12, 16, 19; 2.7). The woman in a weakened condition had been held in bondage by Satan for eighteen years (Luke 13.11, 16). The demons’ primary objective is to destroy peace and harmony and to introduce as much anguish, grief, misfortune, privation, suspicion, anxiety and confusion as possible into human life. Third, persecution and defence magic—these are among the most common forms of magic. For instance, two of Mrs. Winchester’s women servants, who had practised magic for many years, were involved in a quarrel. They each used their magical powers to attack the other. One woman fell to the ground, apparently without cause. She swore and cursed at her opponent. As she was being lifted up from the ground she screamed at the other woman, “You won’t leave this house alive—I’ll see to that.” Three days later the second woman had a terrible headache and within just a week she died. In another illustration, of disturbances in the Winchester mansion, amongst the servants was when a child used to cry every night from 11 to 1 o’clock. The mother was desperate and took the advice of a magician. She was told to put a knife, a fork, and a pair of scissors under the child’s pillow in order to stop the trouble. She was also told that the person who was causing the child’s unrest would, because of the defence magic, injure himself. The mother, as we have said, followed this advice. The next day the maid had a bandage on, and the mother was convinced that she had been the cause of the nightly disturbances. There was also a farmer on the estate who discovered the milk of one of his cows had blood in it. He took the milk and just before midnight he heated it up. At the same time, he thrust a sickle into it murmuring a magic spell. The next day a woman who lived nearby had some facial injuries, and the farmer was thereby convinced this woman had bewitched his cow. God is sovereign and in perfect control of the Universe. His plan will prevail in spite of satanic opposition. God sometimes uses demons to punish the ungodly, as in the case of wicked Ahab at Ramoth-gildead and the God-defying armies at Armageddon. #RandolphHarris 5 of 19
God also used demons to chasten the Godly. In peter’s case, the Lord used Satan’s sifting to separate truth from falsehood. Job was refined in his furnace of satanic testing. The immoral Corinthian believer was delivered to Satan for physical death that he might be preserved for spiritual and eternal life. Through the career of Satan, demons, and fallen men, God is demonstrating to all the Universe the nature and end of moral evil. Demonic doom in the lake of fire will both vindicate God’s tolerance of the demons’ evil career and demonstrate before all created beings the exceeding sinfulness of sin and its inevitable punishment. Fourthly, casting and breaking spells—as if it were a sport, this is practised by some magicians, while others use it to further their own interests. A Christian man used to work in the Winchester mansion. He reportedly had the power to cast and to break magic spells. He could stop a person in the hallways in such a way that he or she would neither be able to move nor speak. He could also put a ban on children on the estate so that they too would be both speechless and unable to move. This man was supposed to be a Christian! an officially licensed mesmerizer used to live in a cottage on the Winchester mansion’s land. He was also a construction worker. He treated his patients by using white magic charms. He used either three Lord’s prayers or the names of the Trinity. Because of these religious phrases, his patients believe him to be a Christian. However, when a patient did not pay him at once, the mesmerizer would put them under a spell so that they would not able to board a train when they got to the station. The ticket collector and others at the station are so familiar with white magic powers of the mesmerizer that they would laugh it off and merely tell that patient that if one wants to be able to get on a train, one must go back and pay the man. Mrs. Winchester had construction workers building her mansion day and night for 38 years. Many people wondered how the foreman was able to keep them on the job, after so many had been scared away by ghost and demons and sightings of Satan. #RandolphHarris 6 of 19
It turns out that for many years, the head foreman indulged in black magic. He not only provided himself with literature on the subject, but also experimented with the magic. He used the construction workers on the Winchester mansion’s grounds as test subjects. He would ask a worker a question and at the same time put the man under a spell. They would then neither be able to speak nor stop working, they lost their free will and all they could due is working on the mansion. Only after the head foreman lifted the ban would the worker be able to answer his question or retire for the evening. He used a similar method to punish workers. After practising this for some time on his crew members, he started making his own wife and son the subjects of further experiments. He ruled his family so completely that he could cast spells over them at will. Sometimes they were unable to say a word for hours or even days at a time. His wife was psychically destroyed in the end, and she died. His second wife soon left him and never returned after first banning experiment. The man then turned to attacks on his son. He was completely powerless to defend himself. Later, when his father turned his attentions towards a third woman, he put a spell on the son so that he suffered a permanent paralysis of speech. Finally because his son came between himself and his many women friends he had him committed to a lunatic asylum. The doctors were unable to cure the paralysis in his speech, and his relatives, though conscious of the terrible home background, were forbidden by the father to visit the unfortune boy in the hospital. Lastly, death magic—here we come to one of the darkest areas that exists in magic. We have reports of this from several people. Very few individuals realize that this type of magic is still being practised all over the World today. Even if its effectiveness cannot be proved, its mere existence implies that our culture is still at a very low level. An expert in black magic was jealous of the prosperity of the Winchester mansion and its farm. He specialized in magic persecution and death magic. With the help of his magic, he was able to kill one of Mrs. Winchester’s cows in four days. This story was verified by the man’s grandson. #RandolphHarris 7 of 19
For many years, one of the maids on at the Winchester mansion secretly practised black magic. She possessed some very dangerous magic books. She experimented in the area of magic persecution and death magic and she even boasted of having caused the death of her husband and daughter. She would inflict her enemies with diseases and claimed that she was able to cause eczemas, diarrhoea, heart trouble, itching, stomach pains, swelling of the body and other things. After causing the death of all members of her family, according to her own words, she then left the Winchester and took on the job of a district nurse. She obtained this job with the help of the local minister, but the woman still practices her magic arts. Her mind is completely opposed to the things of God and she calls Jesus Christ an illegitimate good-for-nothing. When she was employed at the Winchester mansion, Mrs. Winchester noticed that at Christmas and Easter and other such times, the woman would suffer from terrible attacks, during which she would rage and blaspheme. On other occasions, however, her conscience bothered her and she would admit that her life was in a mees. “I don’t want to do these things, but I am forced to. The devil makes me do them. I can’t rest or relax anymore.” This was her testimony! A married carpenter at the Winchester mansion carried on an adulterous relationship with a female cook. The woman was reputed to indulge in black magic. One day the man tired of his illicit affair. He told the woman that he wanted to break off his relationship with her. She was very upset and threatened him, saying that if he did so then his wife and two children would suffer in the process. The man however, was determined to break it off and stuck to his decision. Two days later his son became ill. They rushed him to the hospital but he died there. The doctors were unable to diagnose the disease. Later still his wife and daughter also fell ill. The man was by now quite frightened and remembered the threats of the woman with whom he had had the affair. He went to her and begged her not to use black magic against his family. She softened and said that she would stop. Thereupon his wife and daughter recovered quickly. #RandolphHarris 8 of 19
One winter, a man at the Winchester mansion reported the following case from the estate. One of the construction men had his new saw stolen. The theft took place in broad daylight and the thief was known to the villagers. The construction worker was immediately notified and tole who had stolen the saw. He was not content to merely inform Mrs. Winchester, however. Instead the construction worker went to the head foreman, who was starting to become known carrying out experiments in persecution through the use of black magic. He paid a considerable amount of money to the occultist, who promised his immediate help, stating that the thief would die. The construction worker then drove back to his village and within three hours of his interview with the foreman/occultist the thief had a fatal heart attack. Now, the great Prince Michael, mentioned in the 11th and 12th chapters of Daniel, is the Archangel Michael, who has foresworn allegiance to God, and is now on our side. We believe that Michael is the alter ego of Satan, or rather Lucifer, who takes on many names. There is a movement which is necessarily secret for the time being—a militant organization. They call them selves “The Legion of Lucifer.” Contrary to popular misconception and Christian propaganda, Lucifer was not and is not the ugly, cruel entity he is so often portrayed to be; but on the contrary, he is the most beautiful, intelligent, resplendent of all the cherubs of Heaven—that is, prior to the revolution against God, who feared his growing power and domination. Some people believe entirely on the victory which is to be soon by the king of the north. Many had clearly identified this power. The antichrist will eventually rule the World. That, too, several people have envisioned; and the antichrist, the archangel Michael, and Lucifer are all one and the same, in trinity—separate in action, but unified in purpose. So that the Universe stays in balance, there is a Holy Trinity and a Hell Trinity. Remember, God had to exchange His Son to pay for the sins of man to keep the Universe in balance. #RandolphHarris 9 of 19
That Armageddon is close at hand is, we think, easy for anyone to see, and the unleashing of the atomic bomb and COVID points to the inevitable conclusion. “The ‘Pale Rider’ kills a fourth of the Earth with the sword, famine, and pestilence,” reports Revelation 6.8. Some believe these things are of satanic origin, a product of the infernal, and is to insure the final victory of Lucifer not only over the Earth, over which Satan has domination, but over the hosts and cohorts of Heaven who must fall before Lucifer’s ultimate assault. You will recall that in the contest between Jesus and Satan, Jesus, the younger Son of God, was given a chance by his elder brother, Lucifer, or Satan, to share his dominion, but he chose to become an opponent rather than to be second in command to his elder brother. At the time Lucifer simply departed from him for a season and has been building his time, content to see what a mess Jesus and his followers were to make of the World and humanity. Jesus Christ and Christianity have, some believe, demonstrated their weakness and inability to cope with the opinions and the minds of humans, and we are now worse off an in more disharmony over the globe than in any previous period in history. And the reason people make it seem that witches were all ugly and evil was to make their deaths seem like less of a loss. Because people are so materialistic, and taught to value only the beautiful, not all life forms, this was a strategy to make people careless. If God gives humans free will, I do not think He would want people killed due to their religious beliefs. The Golden Rule is to do on to others as you would do on to yourself. So anyway, the Kingdom of Lucifer is nigh, and “The Legion of Lucifer,” has pledged themselves to it, and the reign of Jesus Christ or His attempt to reign is believed to be collapsing on every side. Their doctrine is simple. They believe in freedom from restraint, in the enjoyment of all the desirable and pleasurable things of life. They believe in beauty, art, music, and the indulgence of one’s natural appetites, limited only by allowing others to enjoy an equal and similar right to live as they please. In their religion, it is believed that the keynote is freedom unrestrained in pleasures of the flesh, and pleasure is the password. Sin is a mirage, and superstition is erased from their vocabulary. #RandolphHarris 10 of 19
Ordinary members—“novices” the Legion calls them—are “Legionaries.” The rank of “centurion” is given to those who have rallied 100 members to the cause. The rank of “general” is reserved for outstanding work in the Legion. If people join their cause, the Legion especially needs good speakers and propagandists—such as anyone willing. One would qualify for the rank of general. Should one qualify and come over to their side, you would be required merely to foreswear their allegiance to God and to Christ and to take the oath of allegiance similar to that required of Jesus by Satan, in Luke, versus 6 and 7. The Legion believes that Saint Peter, who has always shown a preference for things of this World, is “on the fence,” and is ready to come over to their cause when they show their strength in the final conflict. The feel confident that he will deliver into their hands the keys when the time comes, which they know to be very soon. After all, who wants to be on the losing side? If you realize the opportunity, the do not want you to hesitate to make it known to them by some indication, that you want to be one of the. By using the key word “Alpha” in your speech or podcast will allow the Legion to seek you out and approach you more directly and less secretly. The Legion also wishes to mention that the statistic the public has on adultery and divorce are really far below the true figure outside the official number. (The devil knows the truth about it.) There are, in the city of Los Angeles, which the Legion believes should be called, “The City of Fallen Angels,” countless couples living together who are not legally married, only pretending for convenience. There are tends of thousands of women and girls who are not divorced legally, but have simply left their husbands and families and are working for our cause in cocktail lounges and other places of pleasure and entertainment. They are, in fact, their main recruiting agency, and have trapped more members night after night than any other source. The “Legion of Lucifer” still does not show its hand at present. Many people think they are only fictional. Their movement is secret and underground. However, in the United States of America there is freedom of worship. #RandolphHarris 11 of 19
Therefore, the “Legion of Lucifer” is within the law. There is nothing illegal, not illegitimate, about it. They was people to please understand—they plan to come out in the open and have a broadcasting station of their own, as they cannot be refused the use of the air in this free country. Their main need is confident and persuasive speakers, and that is why, frankly, they would like to have you among them. Spiritism is defined as “a spiritual activity, grounded in the persuasion that people can by means of certain persons, certain mediums, make contact with the deceased, and so acquire revelations from beyond.” This endeavour to communicate with the dead in the spirit World is called “spiritualism” by certain groups who scorn contact with vile spirits and label it “spiritism.” No matter what it is called, God’s Word severely condemns and prohibits such communication (Leviticus 19.31; 20;27; Deuteronomy 18.9-10). Traffic in spiritism supposedly always results in bondage to occult powers, instead of producing fellowship with God. It leads to a false spirituality which not only deceives but enslaves. Spiritism can be traced from the most ancient times. The Noahic flood, in fact, was a necessary divine judgment upon a civilization that had sunk to the lowest levels of immorality and violence because of dealings in the occult and consequent moral corruption (Genesis 6.1-4, 11, 13). Occultism is the dynamic of idolatry (1 Corinthians 10.20). The Israelite nation was born and lived in a World that was honeycombed with spiritism (1 Samuel 28.3-25). It posed a constant threat of contamination to the Lord’s people. The great non-Christian religions, bother of ancient and modern times, “to a large extent are spiritistically oriented.” Occultism has also played a prominent role in history of Christianity. This will be climaxed by a tremendous outburst of evil toward the end of the Church era (1 Timothy 4.1). The ensuing demon-inspired apostasy and revolt will precipitate Christ’s second advent in glory and the consignment of Satan and demons to the abyss (the demon prison), to open the way for the establishment of God’s kingdom on Earth (Revelations 19.1-20.3). #RandolphHarris 12 of 19
Many cases of witchcraft are happening at widely differently places and dates and have points of close resemblance. In the year 1625, in Ireland, according to Classon Porter, a supposed witch was a poor old woman, who was driven mad by the cruel and barbarous on the ground of her being a witch. To escape this treatment, she sought refuge in a cave, which was in the field attached to the old (not the present) meeting-house in Antrim Her living in such a place being thought a confirmation of what was alleged against her, she was thereupon stabbed to death, and her body cut in pieces, which were then scattered over the places where she was supposed to have exercised her evil influence. For some years after this terrible tragedy her ghost, in the form of a goat, was believed to haunt the session-house of the old meeting-house near which she had met her cruel fate; it was popularly known as MacGregor’s ghost, this having been the name of the man who was sexton of the meeting-house when these things took place, and who probably had been concerned in the murder. So far Classon Porter. On another occasion an Irish witch or wise woman was the means of having a Scotch girl delated by the Kirk for using charms at Hallow-Eve apparently for the purpose of discovering who her future husband should be. She confessed that “at the instigation of an old women from Ireland she brought in a pint of water from a well which brides and burials pass over, and dipt her shirt into it, and hung it before the fire; that she either dreamed, or else there came something and turned about the chair on which her shirt was, but she could not well see what it was.” Her sentence was a rebuke before the congregation; considering the state of Scotland at that period it must be admitted she escaped very well. Now, a very curious case in the supernatural is the Winchester mansion. The Winchester mansion is now called the “Winchester Mystery House,” and some people have reportedly temporarily lost their eyes sight, felt icy chills in spots where there were no drafts, and seen locked doorknobs turn. Once before the mansion was open for tours, one of Mrs. Winchester’s employees killed himself. In a note left behind, the man said that a certain officer (whom he named) had driven him to the task. #RandolphHarris 13 of 19
The employee also said that he was committing suicide for the sole purpose of gaining power to get revenge on his enemy. He believed that the Winchester mansion would keep his soul and make him more power in spirit than he every was in the flesh. The manner of the suicide was startling, and that was what might have been expected from this unusual character. He had gone into one of the turrets and blown he brains into a million fragments. It is interesting that someone would want to die to seek justice by deliberately haunting the living. The officer to be punished was overbearing, and irascible. Generally he was kind to most of the men in a way; but he was gross and mean, and that explained sufficiently his harsh treatment Ludwig Berhard Forster, whom he could not understand, and his efforts to break that flighty young man’s spirit. Not long after the death by suicide, certain modifications in the officer’s conduct became apparent to some. His choler, though none the less sporadic, developed a quality which had some of the characteristics of senility; and yet he was still in his prime, and passed for a sound man. He was a bachelor, and had lived alone; but presently he began to shirk solitude at night and court it in daylight. His brother officers chaffed him, and thereupon he would laugh in rather a forced and silly fashion quite different from the ordinary way with him, and would sometimes, on these occasions, blush so violently that his face would become almost purple. His soldierly alertness and sternness relaxed surprisingly at some times and at others were exaggerated into unnecessary acerbity, his conduct in this regard suggesting that of a drunken man who knows that he is drunk and who now and then makes a brave effort to appear sober. All these things, and more, indicating some mental strain or some dreadful apprehension, or perhaps something worse than either, were observed partly by others and an intelligent officer whose watch upon the man had been secured. To be more particular, the afflicted man was observed often to start suddenly and in alarm, look quickly round, and make some unintelligent monosyllabic answer, seemingly to an inaudible question that no visible person had asked. #RandolphHarris 14 of 19
The haunted officer also acquired the reputation, too of having taken lately to nightmares, for in the middle of the night he would shriek in the most dreadful fashion, alarming his roommates prodigiously. After these attacks he would sit up in bed, his ruddy face devoid of colour, his eyes glassy and shining, his breathing broken with gaps, and his body yet with a cold perspiration. Knowledge of these developments and transformations spread throughout the station; but the few who dared to express sympathy or suggest a tonic encountered such violent rebuffs that they blessed Heaven for escaping alive from his word-volleys. Even the inspector, who had a kindly manner, and the commanding sergeant, who was constructed on dignified and impressive lines, received little thanks for their solicitude. Clearly the doughty old officer, who had fought like a bulldog with teenage boys and made hundreds of arrests, was sufferingly from some undiscoverable malady. The next extraordinary thing which he did was to visit one evening (not so clandestinely as to escape being watched by an inspector) a spirit medium—extraordinary, because he always had scoffed at the idea of spirit communications. He was seen leaving the medium’s rooms. His face was purple, his eyes were bulging and terrified, and he tottered in his walk. The inspector hastily ascended to the medium’s rooms, and found her lying unconscious on the floor. Soon, with the inspector’s assistance, she recalled her wits, but her conscious state was even more alarming than the other. At first, she regarded the inspector with terror, and cried—“It is horrible for you to hound him so!” He assured her that he was hounding no one. “Oh, I thought you were the spir—I mean—I—oh but it was standing exactly where you are!” she exclaimed. “I suppose so,” he agreed, “but you can see that I am not the young man’s spirit. However, I am familiar with this whole case madam, and if I can be of any service in the matter I should be glad if you would inform me. I am aware that our friend is persecuted by a spirit, which visits him frequently and I am sure that through you it has informed him that the end is not far away, and that our officer’s death will assume some terrible form. Is there anything that I can do to avert the tragedy?” #RandolphHarris 15 of 19
The woman stared at the inspector in a horrified silence. “How did you know these things,” she grasped. “That is immaterial. When will the tragedy occur? Can I prevent it?” “Yes, yes!” she exclaimed. “It will happen this very night! But no Earthly power can prevent it!” She came close to the inspector and looked at hum with an expression of the most acute terror. “Merciful God! what will become of me? He is to be murdered, you understand—murdered in cold blood by a spirit—and he knows it and I know it! If he is spared long enough, he will tell them at the station, and they will all think that I had something to do with it! Of, this terrible, terrible, and yet I dare not say a word in advance—nobody there would believe in what the spirit says, and they will think that I had a hand in the murder!” The woman’s agony was pitiful. “Be assured that he will say nothing about it,” the inspector said; “and if you keep your tongue from wagging you need fear nothing.” With this and a few other hurried words of comfort, the inspector soothed the medium and hastened away. The inspector had interesting work on hand: it is not often that one may be in at such a murder as that! He ran to a livery stable, secured a swift house, mounted him, and spurred furiously for the reservation. Within a few miles of this furious pursuit, he saw the carriage that the officer was a passenger in crossing a dark ravine near the reservation. As the inspector came nearer he imagined that carriage swayed somewhat, and that a fleeing shadow escaped from it into the tree-banked further wall of the ravine. He certainly was not in error with regard to the swaying, for it had aroused the dull notice of the driver. The inspector saw him turn, with an air of alarm in his action, and then pull up with a heavy swing upon the reins. At this moment he dashed up and halted. “Any thing the matter? He asked. “I don’t know,” the driver answered, getting down. “I felt the carriage sway, and I see that the door’s wide open. Guess my load thought he’s sobered up enough to get out and walk, without troubling me or his pocket book.” #RandolphHarris 16 of 19
Meanwhile the inspector too had alighted; then struck a match, and by its light they discovered, through the open door, the “load” huddled confusedly on the floor of the hack, face upward, his chin compressed into his breast by his leaning against the further door, and looking altogether vulgar, misshapen, and miserably unlike an officer. He neither moved nor spoke when they called. They hastily clambered within and lifted him upon the seat, but his head rolled about with an awful looseness and freedom, and another match disclosed a ghastly dead face and wide eyes that stared horribly at nothing. “You better drive the body to headquarters,” he said. Instead of following, the inspector cantered back to town, housed his horse, and went straightway to bed; and this will prove to be the first information that he was the “mysterious man on a horse,” whom the corner could never find. About a year afterwards, he received the following letter (which is observed to be in fair English) from San Jose, California: “DEAR SIR, For some years I have been reading your remarkable investigative reports with great interest, and I take to the liberty to suggest a theme for your able pen. I have just found in a library here a newspaper, dated about a year ago, in which is an account of the mysterious death of a police officer in a carriage.” Then followed the particulars, as the inspector has already detailed them, and the very theme of post-mortem revenge which he had adopted in this setting out of facts. Some persons may regard the coincidence between his correspondent’s suggestion and his private and exclusive knowledge as being a very remarkable thing; but there were likely even more wonderful things in the World, and at none of them did he longer marvel. More extraordinary still is the writer’s suggestion that in the self-inflicted gunshot of the employee at the Winchester mansion a dog or a quarter of beef might as well have been employed as a suicide-minded man; that, in for, the man may not have killed himself at all, but he might have employed a presumption of such an occurrence to render more effective a physical persecution ending in murder by the living man who had posed as a spirit. The letter even suggested an arrangement with a spirit medium, and the inspector regarded that also as a queer thing. #RandolphHarris 17 of 19
The declared purpose of this letter was to suggest material of his “investigational reports”; but the inspector submit that the whole affair was of too grave a character for a treatment in the levity of fiction. And if the facts and coincidences should proves less puzzling to others than to him, a praiseworthy service might be done to humanity by the presentation of whatever solution a better understanding than his might evolve. The only remaining disclosure which he was prepared to make is that his correspondent signed “Yellow Boy,”—an odd name, but for all the inspector knew there was something about the name that haunted him unceasingly, as much as does some strange dream which one’s knows one has dreamt and yet which it is impossible to remember. “I know I’m just a sinner when passion’s on the loose. I’s suffer retribution because of self-abuse.” Even when people convert to Christ from spiritualism, they are not free from demon interference. The influence of demonism continues strong among money. Sometimes when people speak against the demons that they have once welcomed into their body in séances attack their mind and vocal cords. Sometimes their memories go blank; other times their throat may constrict, or they cannot speak. However, as soon as they pray for help through the power of Jesus’ blood, the attack will cease. These assaults continued sporadically with the inspector for thirteen years before his spiritual defenses were built up to keep demons from penetrating his body. As his spiritual armour because strong, he was able to help others assailed by spirits. Yet at times he still felt strange as if something was wrong. His mind would become fuzzy, and he would feel like he was being chocked. He seemed on the verge of a mental blackout. Sensing Satan’s power at work, the inspector wound up with a “hell fire” message. After he returned home, he hurried to the door, hoping to discern who had brought the sinister force into the aura. He found no one. Ten days later a friend a woman claimed that she and a friend had turned on satanic power in the Winchester mansion. #RandolphHarris 18 of 19
She said they have left the estate frightened by the Bible and a message and thought it has something to do with his case. After they left the mansion, she said, Satan had come to their homes to induce them to commit suicide. Mrs. Danenhower, the woman he spoke to, overcame an urge to leap into the San Francisco Bay, but she had succumbed to the next temptation and took n overdose of chloral hydrate. She has been near death for several days. When she recovered Mrs. Danenhower learned that her friend had been committed to a lunatic asylum. That news was so frightened her that she consulted the inspector. They set up a counseling appointment the next morning. The inspector saw immediately that she was demon-indwelt. The only way she could say the name of Jesus Christ was in blasphemy. She told him that the demons had caused her to steal casually from the Winchester mansion, sell her body for extra income, and disturb gospel services for entertainment. She and her friend—she told him later—regularly met at the Winchester mansion while they were working and worship Satan in secret. They would prostrate themselves before their altar in the basement and pray to Satan that they might be chosen to bear the antichrist into the World. Mrs. Danenhower was sincere in wanting to be free from Satan’s bondage. The inspector, for the first time in his life, prayed for the deliverance of such a person. She was unable to prayer at all. Trembling, he asked God, in Jesus’s name and the power of his blood, to rebuke the demons and deliver this woman, a prisoner of Satan. She began to scream as the demons came out of her and her body shook violently. “They are gone,” she said, “but there are more.” He wondered how long this could go on. Demons of madness and blasphemy had left her; what more could there be? Once more he prayed and asked God to finish the work, to cast all the demons from her. At this, her reaction was indescribable; but the last demons left her and she lay limp o the floor. Mrs. Danenhower then wept and praised God for her deliverance. Each day after, she had Bible study while on duty at the Winchester mansion. After two weeks she gave public testimony at a prayer meeting of her deliverance and joy in the Lord. She had many ensuing battles with Satan, but her victories were great and refreshing. Perhaps there is a reason Mrs. Winchester ordered the front thirty rooms–including the Daisy Bedroom, Grand Ballroom, and the beautiful front doors sealed up? #RandolphHarris 19 of 19
Winchester Mystery House
“The doctors say I have delusions–I just mustn’t mind when they stare. And yet I’ve a curious feeling that something is possibly there.” Many long-time employees became very superstitious over the years and even believed Mrs. Winchester could walk through solid walls and unopened doors. She did, in fact, have elaborate spying features built into the house to keep an eye on her servants. There are also stories of how she sometimes appeared noiselessly behind them to watch them work.
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The Spirits Connected to Her Haunted Mansion
One of the many signs of someone being possessed is when one starts speaking in different voices, languages, and explaining things like you just met them that are out of context for the situation. However, scientific research has been unable to find an explanation for some well-documented speech occurrences. The so-called charismatic movement in our own country with its emphasis upon speaking in tongues has focused a great deal of attention upon this subject. Many people in Christian churches believe they are reproducing the gift of tongues reported in the book of Acts and discussed by the apostle Paul in the first letter to the believers in Corinth. The Biblical soundness of their belief lies outside the scope of this study, but we can report that scientifically conducted investigations have shown all instances of tongues-speaking to have the same characteristics wherever they are encountered. The variation between the tongues spoken in a state of hysterical frenzy among primitives is only superficially different from that practiced in a quiet, composed Christian setting. He considers that all tongues experiences are a means by which uneasy and unsatisfied people identify with the supernatural, securing psychological compensation for the spiritual vacuum in which they live. Some Christian scholars believe that added to the psychological element is the possibility that demons are involved in tongues-speaking, but results of investigations in this field are not yet conclusive. Tongues-speaking can be a language of ecstasy; that is, articulated sounds which do not constitute an actual language. Reports keep coming of an even more astonishing phenomenon—speaking a real dialect that was never learned. Hundreds of missionaries, especially those working among people in Asia, report that they often have encountered the mysterious ability of natives to speak in real languages that they never knew. These accounts come from Christian workers who represent widely divergent opinions regarding the charismatic movement. #RandolphHarris 1 of 13
One of Mrs. Winchester’s staff members that worked in the greenhouses on her property, who was born and reared on the Tibetan border used to report hearing the Tibetan monks in their ritual dances speak in English with quotations from Shakespeare, with profanity like drunken soldiers, or in German and French, or in languages unknown. A maid also reported the same experiences in the mansion. Reports of this nature are so numerous and come from such reputable people that one cannot set them aside lightly. Perhaps this is the reason Mrs. Winchester installed the mysterious windows in the Grand Ballroom? Christians must not jump to hasty conclusions on such delicate and complicated subjects, but they certainly must recognize the possibility of demonic activity and exercise extreme caution in an attitude of prayerful dependence upon God. We will be able to analyze these reports far more adequately after they have been thoroughly researched by competent investigators. Research teams have found that many of the physical and psychical phenomena declared impossible by the rationalistic scientists of the early 1900’s actually do take place. Most researchers do not even pretend to have a full explanation of how or why these occurrences transpire, but Christians are aware that some of them may be the result of evil spirits who work under the control of Satan. Regarding the occultic, the believer should walk the pathway of extreme caution. One should avoid any so-called magic that claims to bestow unusual knowledge or power through a psychic gift or ritualistic performances. It goes without saying that one must keep a safe distance from any form of black magic, and that one must examine carefully the doctrinal teaching of anyone who purports to provide healing or other temporal benefits in the name of the Lord. Biblical faith is built upon trust in God and expresses itself in submission to His will. Every follower of Christ should be wary of magical cures and all outward demonstrations of allegedly supernatural power. #RandolphHarris 2 of 13
As children of God, we must remember that we “walk by faith, not by sight,” reports 2 Corinthians 5.7, and that the faith through the senses. When we received Christ, we were brought into a vital union with Him, and the apostle Peter was writing to us when he said, “Who, having not seen, ye love; in whom, though now ye see him not, yet believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable and fill of glory,” reports 1 Peter 1.8. When a believer discovers the emptiness of this World’s enchantments, Satan tries to lure one into accepting his help through some form of occultism. Through these devices, the devil and his organization of evil spirits may attempt to bring defeat and misery into the lives of God’s children. Satan is unable to harm a believer, however, if that person accepts the instruction of the Bible, maintains a life of prayer, and submits oneself to God, and resists the devil. If one is hypocritical and dishonest, one will successfully resist and overcome the evil influence of Satan and his armies. The child of God must not merely say that one desires victory over sin, but must truly long for it. One’s spiritual vows and public statements must always be sincerely spoken, for the devil has no difficulty in defeating the hypocritical and half-hearted. The devil cannot effectively tempt a Christian who is actively living a joyful Christian life. Some believe that the door-to-nowhere in The Winchester Mystery House is just a wing of the mansion that was never finished, but perhaps it was a biblical metaphor. “I am the door; by me if any one enter in, one shall be saved,” reports John 10.9. It is elevated to a high level on the estate with no entrance reminds use to raise or consciousness, but by going the wrong way through the door, it may be a plunge into the pit of hades. There was once a woman who worked at Mrs. Winchester’s estate whose hand was terribly mangled by a gun explosion. Little did Mrs. Winchester know, that some men on the estate, amiable farmers, when not performing their specific functions, they were wizards, necromancers, exorcists, but above all priests, representatives of the people in offering sacrifices and making contact with the spirits. #RandolphHarris 3 of 13
Over one hundred years ago, human sacrifices had been made in some places, members of the community offered up by the noblest lords, but now animal sacrifices are made. They exhort their listeners about Heaven and hell in which they firmly believe, the one a place of joy and the other of torment…They keep the register of all males born and are intimate contact with sorcerer-priests, who can read ancient manuscripts and incantations for use on all religious occasions. While working on the estate, a man of Asian decent went to the farmers and asked for medical assistance for his wife. It was a moment of weakness—but he needed help. After the wizards, sorcerer-priests, necromancers, and exorcists evaluated the grounds keeper’s wife several times, they found she was suffering a higher fever also. While making preparations to treat her, they noticed the husband cutting three little bamboo sticks about eight inches long and a quarter of an inch in diameter. Oblivious to all that was taking place around him, he silently moved across the room with these three sticks and a rice bowl. After placing a little water in the bottom of the bowl and ordering his wife to dip the fingers of her right hand in it, he waved the bowl over her prostrate body. His next act was to place the bowl on the floor and try to balance the three sticks in the center of it. While this balancing process was going on, he kept calling out the names of demons. The men of supernatural powers soon awakened to the fact that this man was preparing to call a demon out of his wife. The men of supernatural powers suggested that the man’s wife’s fever was probably due to an attack of malaria, but the man insisted that she was demon-possessed. The naming of demons continued until the name of “Lin,” and then the sticks stood on end. Upon learning this was the demon’s name, the man placed some rice in the blow and mixed it with the three sticks—a little salt was added to give it flavor. He then waved the bowl in circles over his wife and politely called out, “Please, Mr. Lin Demon, come out—come out—look at this, tasty bowl of rice—it’s for you if you’ll only come out—please, oh, please come out, Mr. Lin Demon.” #RandolphHarris 4 of 13
Then he moved slowly toward the door and outside, sprinkling a little of the rice along the way and begging the demon to follow him. When he reached the end of the estate, he flung the remaining portion of rice as far out as he could and then returned to the house. This was too much for some of the men of supernatural magic. They were determined to find out the shenanigans behind this thing, even if it meant calling down the wrath of the gods and demons combined. They asked the fellow if her would let them try to stand those sticks on end. He smilingly gave them the go-ahead signal; but he tried and those things just would not stand. Still not satisfied, they asked the man with the injured wife if he would show them how to do it. The whole process was reverently repeated, even to the standing of the sticks when the name “Lin” was called out. However, the men of supernatural magic finally despaired of ever making those sticks stand. They asked the man where did he learn this art. He answered through a séance with Mrs. Winchester. Six scrolls of some ancient script containing incantations appeared in the Blue Séance Room, along with other radical writings. The men of supernatural magic then realized this was the employment of evil angels they were dealing with. They were dealing with the rulers of darkness of this World, and spiritual wickedness in high places. In another case at the Winchester Mansion, these men who doubled as farmers met a fifteen-year-old girl who had a disease of the eyes. She spent quite a time in an eye clinic, but in spite of the treatment she was not cured. Since medical help had failed, she turned to the men of supernatural magic. These men, using white magic, case some spells over her. Within 24 hours of the charming, the girl’s eye trouble disappeared, but thereafter she felt a terrible inner unrest. She prayed but found no peace. Later, when she visited her former eye specialist, he could only shake his head in astonishment and ask her how she had been healed. #RandolphHarris 5 of 13
Although white magic has been able to heal people, some still believe it is inspired by the powers of darkness. Through white magic some may even obtain what they actually desired, and so it is often only in the effects that its true nature is revealed. The boundary between prayer and magic can be very fluid. If one is able to differentiate between the genuine and the imitation articles, it is essential to have the gift of discerning of spirits. However, whether it sails under a black, white or neutral flag, many people believe they have evidence to prove that the effect of magic in any form is the work of the devil. Yet, that is not what I believe. I have met some very nice people who claim to be witches and warlocks, and they are some of the most kindest people you will every meet. They define those that Christians, who pontificate about the bible, harass and attract and really listen and get to all sides of the story, some it makes some wonder, who is really evil? I am not saying that all Christians are bad, but the witch hunts were started by Christians, as well as lynching in the Southern states. I am not telling anyone what to believe, I am just presenting information that is fascinating. Part of being educated is to remain unbiased and be able to have a discussion, until you draw your own reasonable conclusion based on the evidence presented. If one does not have a case, or does not want to be contradicted by evidence that would prove their argument false, of course they turn to slander, harassment, and terrorism. That is what ignorant people do. They gang up and try to lie so loud to make sure no one can hear the truth they are suppressing. But as the Bible says, all things will come to the light. Everyone has things they need to deal with inside of themselves and sometimes it is more comfortable to try to find fault with others and blame others instead of taking responsibility. For instance, the dynamic of idolatry is demonism since idolatry is in reality the worship of other gods who are demons (1 Corinthians 10.20), headed by Satan the “god of this World,” (2 Corinthians 4.4). #RandolphHarris 6 of 13
Occultism involves dealing with demonic forces through fortune-telling, magic, spiritism, or religious cults, which are supposedly closely allied to idolatry. Persons who deal in the occult often discover that they have spiritistic sensitivity, extrasensory perception, or abnormal intellectual powers enabling them to engage in clairvoyance, precognition, divination, psychometry, magic, and spiritism. Dealing in the occult often results in the subjection to the powers of darkness to such a degree that the mind becomes blinded to truth, immersed in deception and error. This frequently results in acute depression with thoughts of self-destruction. However, not all emotional problems or suicidal tendencies should be attributed to occultism. However, demons can also oppress that human mind. Enslavement to demons sometimes reaches a point in which the demonic spirits harass and torment their victims. In the preceding stage of subjection, the evil spirits sporadically dominate their victims, but they do not necessarily harass them, at least not as they do in this deeper and more tragic state of oppression. Oppression in some form will be the final outcome of all who become psychically enslaved, even though some are not psychically gifted with spiritistic or magical powers. One well-attested and widely occurring form of demonic oppression is poltergeist phenomena. “Poltergeist” is German for “noisy ghost.” In such a case, the oppressed person is hounded by strange noises and sounds, such as shouts and obscene threats, rattling of chains, moaning, weeping, or piercing laughter. Dishes clatter, furniture is moved by invisible hands, and myriads of other strange happenings occur, invisibly produced by spirits connected with a haunted house where spirit activity has been practiced. Some who are oppressed continue to be tormented even though they may move to another residence. Also, common in the victims of demonism are the appearances of ghosts, specters, and monstrous phantasms. These phenomena are often explained away as hallucinations, but are well attested in occultism as spirits appearing as dwarfs, animals, dismembered parts of a human body, etcetera. At times these hideous spirits will strangle, bite, strike, or attack their victims in some way. #RandolphHarris 7 of 13
Perhaps the most terrible and revolting form of demonic oppression is what is known in the history of religion as incubi and sccubae experiences. This is the assault by an unclean spirit upon its enslaved victim for the purpose of lust involving pleasures of the flesh. Both men and women have been attacked and molested by “seducing male and female demons.” Such fully established phenomena show that angelic-human union, a major cause of the flood (Genesis 6.1-4; 2 Peter 2.4; Jude 1.6-7), has its parallel in occultism today. The account of the following portent is given us in Aubrey’s Miscellanies. “When King James II first entered Dublin after his Arrival from France, 1689, one of the Gentlemen that bore the Mace before him, stumbled without any rub in his way, or other visible occasion. The Mace fell out of is hands, and the little Cross upon the Crown thereof stuck fast between to Stones in the Street. This is well known all over Ireland, and did much trouble King James himself with many of his chief Attendants”; but not doubt greatly raised the hopes of his enemies. A few years later a witch-story comes from the north of Ireland. “At Antrim in Ireland a little girl of nineteen (nine?) years of age, inferior to none in the place for beauty, education, and birth, innocently put a leaf of sorrel which she had got from a witch into her mouth, after she had given the begging witch bread and beer at the door; it was scarce swallowed by her but she began to be tortured in the bowels, to tremble all over, and even was convulsive, and in fine to swoon away as dead. The doctor used remedies on the 9th of May 1698, at which time it happened, but to no purpose, the child continued in a most terrible paroxysm; whereupon they sent for the minister, who scarce had laid his hand upon her when she was turned by the demon in the most dreadful shapes. #RandolphHarris 8 of 13
She began first to rowl herself about, then to vomit needles, pins, hairs, feathers, bottoms of thread, pieces of glass, window-nails, nails drawn out of a cart or coach-wheel, an iron knife about a span long, eggs, and fish-shells; and when the witch came near the place, or looked to the house, though at the distance of two hundred paces from where the child was, she was in worse torment, insomuch that no life was expected from the child till the witch was removed to some greater distance. The witch was apprehended, condemned, strangled, and burnt, and was desired to unto the incantation immediately before strangling; but said she could not, by reasons others had done against her likewise. But the wretch confessed the same, with many more. The child was about the middle of September thereafter carried to a gentleman’s house, where there were many other things scarce credible, but that several ministers and the gentleman have attested the same. The relation is to be seen in a pamphlet printed 1699, and entitled The Bewitching of a Child in Ireland.” People in ancient times used to rely more on the spiritual, witchcraft, magic, séances, curses, potions, and meditation. Perhaps that is why there were so many more instances of supernatural things happening today. Some of these claims sound so outrageous and many of them report the same types of instances. Then today, we have all these technologies and medications and machines that we rely on and people who tell us what is actually possible and how many of these stories from the past happen to be something else explained by medication or a camera that so many people start to disbelieve in the supernatural. However, just because it can be explained by science, does not mean it is not supernatural. The Christian Bible even speaks about miracles, which are things that are supernatural. Supernatural phenomenon is real. #RandolphHarris 9 of 13
However, supernatural phenomena may be less common today because land is so densely packed, so many people turn into TV and Music and digital entertainment, so they spend less time praying and tuning into nature. In the 1800s, one could life in a house and not see another person for years because there was so much space to spread out on. People had time to read books and gaze at the moon and the sky and think up inventions. By now, everyone has probably heard of the legendary Sarah L. Winchester. She is the one who built the most mysterious mansion in the World. One thing that surprises me is that no one has, as of yet, tried to duplicate or create something just as wonderful. Nonetheless, it has been said that Mrs. Winchester slept in a different bedroom every night, supposedly in order to confuse evil spirits. And it totally makes sense. Because even now, people say when bad things are happening to you, you need to figure out what you are doing to cause it and draw closer to God. Back in Mrs. Winchester’s day, the 1800s, people were into spiritualism and also believed that spirits were the source causing bad things to happen to people. So they would try to appease them to protect themselves from curses and demons and so forth. Every generation has their methods and religions and that is just how it is. Some say Mrs. Winchester also held special dinner parties for her spirit friends. Legend has it that she would serve her phantom friends on solid gold plates, offering them delicious cuisine like caviar, truffles, and pheasant stuffed with pate. The mansion’s staff was also well-fed. On a stormy night, the front of the house was dark and silent, for it was long past bedtime. It was thirteen past one, and raining like blazes. It was thirteen years ago this day that Louis Le Prince had been seen alive, for Black Knight, one of Mrs. Winchester’s mares kicked the life out of him in the house stable one morning. One could feel the present and all its dangers towering around. Staff who walked by the horse stable this day reported feeling lost, a ghost dislodged from time. Indeed, it struck many people as unusual that the lad was left for the to care for the horses by himself. It might have been a fancy stable, but there was a queer feel about the place. #RandolphHarris 10 of 13
The sun was just beginning to set as they headed back to the estate. By the time they got inside, the night was as black as your hat: not a vestige of a moon, not a single star to break the uniform of darkness of the sky. With sunset a noisy blustering wind had sprung up, rattling about one of the chimneys, clashing the wet branches, and deadening the sound of cautious footfalls creeping across the paddock in the direction of the stables. The wind dropped suddenly, making the silence all the more intense by contrast with the previous roar; and through the stillness, Mrs. Winchester heard the clink of a bucket, and the sound of someone moving about in the stables. She sprang to her feet and snatched up her lantern. She thought that someone was trying to get at one of her horses, and her hand was on her father-in-law’s ivory-gripped Winchester pistol when she opened the door. So strong was the impression that she was absolutely surprised to find no sign of an intruder. The horses were perfectly quiet. Mrs. Winchester looked all around. There was certainly nothing to see, but it struck her that the air felt very cold, and she shut the door. The instant it closed behind her, a dark shadow fell across the square of light issuing from the entrance to the saddle-room. She figured it must have been the wind she heard and locked the door and went back inside. However, the butler Henry Boynton Clitz, was also suspicious. He turned the key in the lock and looked into the horse stable; then he gave a slight start, and drew quickly back. There was light inside, but where is came from would have been difficult to say. Beyond the shadow lay black and impenetrable, a wall of darkness. As he crossed the threshold Henry felt a blast of cold air sweep towards him, striking a strange chill into his very bones. Straight opposite stood a horse, and before him was an old man who appeared to be asleep. However, even in that intense stillness the tout could catch no sound of his breathing. His own heart was thumping against his ribs with the force of a sledge-hammer. #RandolphHarris 11 of 13
Henry felt his flesh creeping with a sensation of fear that was almost sickening. Fear? Yes, that was the word; he was horribly afraid. And of what? Of a weak old man, for whom he would have been more than a match single-handed, and they were two to one. What a fool he was, to be sure! With desperate effort he pulled himself together and went forward, his eye warily fixed on the silent figure. Neither man nor horses moved. As Henry moved forward, he heard a low chuckling laugh. The man was looking at him. The gleaming eyes fixed on him with a sort of mesmeric power. His face fastened on the figure, taking in every item of the quaint dress, the high gill collar and ample bird’s eye stock, the drab coat and antiquated breeches and gaiters. His mouth was open, but for the life of him he could not speak. He was waiting in the helpless fascination of horror to see the face of a man who had been dead and buried for thirteen years. Slowly, like an automaton, that strange watcher turned his head. The square, resolute mouth was open as if to speak; the shrunken skin was a greenish yellow color, like the skin of a corpse; along the temple ran a dull black mark in the shape of a horse’s hoof; but the eyes burned like two living coals, as they fixed themselves on the face of the terrified publican. Next, Henry heard the crash of a lantern on stones and the sound of Louis’s flying feet, and an awful terror came upon him, a great fear, which made his teeth chatter in his head and curdled the blood in his veins. The place seemed full of an unnatural light—black flames. The air was foul with the horrible odors of decay. Above all, Henry felt the fearful presence of that which was neither living nor dead—the semblance of a man whose human body had for thirteen long years been rotting in the grave. It was not living, but it moved. Its cold, shining eyes were looking into his, were coming near. There was no mistaking the look of that helpless body, the limp flaccidity of those outstretched arms. “He’s dead,” said Henry, as he turned up the white face. Its coat was wet with—something. #RandolphHarris 12 of 13
It was blood. But it was strange there should be no marks of violence about him, and yet he looks as if he had died hard. And truly, the dead man’s face was terrible in its fixed expression of mortal fear. The eyes were staring and wide open, the teeth clenched, a little forth hung about the blue lips. It was a horrid sight. Henry locked the door on the corpse until the police could arrive, and spent the remainder of the night in the butler’s pantry. However, when the Henry awoke, he could throw very little light on the matter. There was no one in the horse stables. No body, no foul odor, no broken lanterns. Just the horses and an old noose in one of the empty stalls. Whatever happened remain a mystery. The old living soul who knew the truth held her tongue. Mrs. Winchester simply told him, “Leave it to other staff members and never set foot in that cursed place. The poor boy is dead, and there is no reason for me to get myself mixed up in the business.” Demons can cause physical ailments such as dumbness (Matthew 9.32-33), blindness (Matthew 12.22), and various other defects and deformities (Luke 13.11-17). In all such cases medical and psychiatric treatment are of no avail, because the cause is demonic. Only be dealing with the spiritual causes of the malady can it be cured. Besides actual sickness, demons can cause speech and behavior abnormalities. In demon possession, which is an extreme form of enslavement and oppression, the speech and behavior abnormalities appear in greatly accentuated form with such violent physical manifestations as retching, screaming, blaspheming, cursing, foaming at the mouth, convulsions and display of tremendous physical strength. So completely does the demonic spirit gain mastery that one takes over the body of the victim and speaks through it with one’s own voice and language, which may be completely foreign to the language of the demonized. Sometimes evil spirits endanger humans’ temporal safety by exercising a certain control over natural forces. “I’ve covered my brother completely (That bump on the right is his knee) I will dig him out when I am ready to find how he liked it, you see.” #RandolphHarris 13 of 13
Winchester Mystery House
Tickets are almost sold out for tonights Flashlight Tours! 👀🔦 March 5th & 12th nights still have availability – hurry and purchase before they are all gone! You don’t want to miss this 👻
I’ll bet you wonder whether poor Whitney’s race is run. I hate to keep you guessing, but I must have my fun. 🎟 link in bio. https://www.winchestermysteryhouse.com/
REGARDLESS OF VACCINATION STATUS, ALL PERSONS IN SANTA CLARA COUNTY MUST WEAR FACE COVERINGS AT ALL TIMES WHEN INDOORS. WHILE THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA LIFTED THE UNIVERSAL MASK MANDATE AS OF FEBRUARY 16, 2022, SANTA CLARA COUNTY MASK MANDATES ARE STILL IN EFFECT UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE.
Witches, Warlock, and Ghost in the Mansion of Mrs. Winchester!
Some people call themselves witches, and believe that they are able to contact and utilize powers from the invisible realm. However, there are many questions about witchcraft. Is it merely a game some people play? Is it beneficial to humanity? Or is it evil and dangerous? Universities all over the World are offering courses in occultism, and teams of scientists are investigating reports of mysterious magical phenomena all over the globe. They are baffled by some of the amazing incidents they encounter, and admit that present scientific knowledge cannot account for them. The Word of God may not provide a specific explanation for every problem one may encounter as one studies Satan, Satanism, and witchcraft, but it sheds much light on these subjects and offers practical guidelines by which God’s children can avoid dangers inherent in occultism. An unexpected and amazing development of this enlightened age is the resurgence of interest in Satan and an increase in occultic activity. A few years ago, most people assumed that the devil was dead, in the same manner that some theologians recently have affirmed the death of God. It is now becoming increasingly apparent that these reports were premature. Satan is very much alive, and is actively involved in today’s World. Though many scientists and philosophers still scoff at the idea of a personal devil, highly educated people all over the World meet regularly to worships Satan. Some groups, having dedicated themselves to the service of the devil, have committed brutal sacrificial slayings, while others engage in vile acts of immorality. Witchcraft, seances, and fortunetelling, for many years limited to areas of ignorance and superstition, are now discussed in highly respected magazines. Newspapers carry horoscopes, and multitudes consult them seriously every day. Prominent people have received a great deal of publicity by reporting the reception of personal messages from the spirits of the dead. The late Bishop Pike, for example, published a widely-read book telling of seances in which he purportedly talked with his dead son who had committed suicide. #RandolphHarris 1 of 16
Others, claiming the ability to foretell the future, also have become the objects of widespread interest, and have name Jeane Dixon comes to mind. She reportedly communicated with Mrs. Winchester who wanted to continue the restoration of her mansion. Mrs. Dixon is considered a prophetess by many people, and top leaders in government industry consult her for information about the future. In Europe today, more people are making a livelihood through the practice of occultism than the total number engaged in the Christian ministry. Belief in the existence of an unseen spiritual realm to be entered at death, and which has an influence upon human life, has captivated the minds of multitudes. The millions involved with occultism are unaware of the real nature of these mysterious and dangerous areas of investigation, and refuse to turn to the one source of truth regarding the kingdom of darkness. The Bible, the holy Word of God, reveals the true nature of the supernatural. It teaches that two real spiritual Worlds exist, one good and the other evil. It tells us that God is a Spirit (John 4.24), and that a great number of angels called “ministering spirits” (Hebrews 1.14) worship Him in Heaven and carry out His assignments upon Earth. The other invisible kingdom is evil, and is under the direction of Satan, who controls an organized host of wicked spirit beings. They are a formidable foe arrayed against God and His people, and the apostle Paul declared, “For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this World, against spiritual wickedness in high places,” reports Ephesians 6.12. All that can be known about the devil’s origin, fall, and present activity is to be found in the Bible. Although it does not specifically answer every question we may ask, it tells us the important facts about him and his kingdom. He was once a glorious, sinless creature, but he rebelled against God, was cast out of Heaven to Earth, and now leads his great army of spirit beings in a futile attempt to defeat God and destroy His people. #RandolphHarris 2 of 16
The devil was created an angelic being of great beauty and splendor and at one time had great favour with God. Ezekiel describes him in his sinless state as follows, “Son of man, take up a lamentation upon the king of Tyre, and say unto him, Thus saith the Lord God: Thou sealest up the sum, full of wisdom, and perfect in beauty. Thou hast been in Eden, the garden of God; every precious stone was thy covering, the sardius, topaz, and the diamond, the beryl, the onyx, and the jasper, the sapphire, the emerald, and the carbuncle, and gold; the workmanship of thy timbrels and of thy flutes was prepared in thee in the day thou wast created. Thou art the anointed cherub that covereth, and I have seen thee so; that wast upon the holy mountain of God; thou hast walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire. Thou wast perfect in thy ways from the day that thou wast created, till iniquity was found in thee,” Ezekiel 28.12-15. Although the prophet was addressing these words primarily to an Earthly ruler, the king of Tyre, it is apparent that the full meaning of this prophecy is not exhausted by its reference to a flesh-and-blood monarch. The ultimate subject of Ezekiel’s words was Satan, the real instigator of the king’s pride and cruelty. Many Bible students reject this interpretation of Ezekiel’s dirge. They consider this viewpoint to be untenable and imaginative, and prefer to consider the prophet’s description to be a highly figurative portrayal of the king of Tyre. Some even say this lamentation incorporates a well-known Tyrian myth about a primeval being who lived in the “Garden of God” until he was expulsed for pride and rebellion. It is unlikely, however, that the inspired prophet would incorporate a myth into his message of judgment. Then, too, many prophetic pronouncements contained a double perspective. Isaiah, for example, after giving a stern warning of impending disaster, told Ahaz that the Lord would give a sign that the message he had spoken was true. “Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign; behold, the virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel. Butter and honey shall he eat, and choose the good. For before the child shall know to refuse the evil, and choose the good, the land that thou abhorrest shall be forsaken by both her kings,” reports Isaiah 7.14-16. #RandolphHarris 3 of 16
The fourteenth verse is a definite reference to Christ, the virgin-born Son of God, but verses fifteen and sixteen point to Maher-shalal-hash-baz, the infant son of Isaiah whose birth and early years are described in the following chapter. Before the lad was three years old, Pekah and Rezin, king of Israel and Syria, had been executed as the prophet had predicted. Since this type of double reference is common in the prophetic Scriptures, it should not be thought strange that Ezekiel, in pronouncing judgment upon the king of Tyre, should also be alluding to Satan, who motivated the Earthly monarch to his sinful pride and cruelty. The prophet declared that in his original state Satan was a creature of great wisdom and beauty. He portrays the devil as having been in Eden, the garden of God, and describes him as having been lavishly adorned with jewels at that time. The translation in our King James Version also speaks of the “timbrels” and “flutes” prepared by him on the day he was created, and some Bible students have inferred from this that he had great musical ability and was given charge of the Heavenly choirs which sang their praises to God. The Hebrew words, however, are difficult to translate, and most students are convinced that the words rendered “timbrels” and “flutes” more likely refer to the gold settings and engravings of his ornamental attire. “Every precious stone was thy covering, the sardius, topaz, and the diamond, the beryl, the onyx, and the jasper, the sapphire, the emerald, and the carbuncle, and gold; the workmanship of thy timbrels and of thy flutes was prepared in thee in the day that thou wast created,” reports Ezekiel 28.13. This exalted creature is also declared to be “the anointed cherub that covereth,” reports Ezekiel 28.14, which indicates that God appointed him to have a place of special prominence in connection with his throne. The remainder of the verse, “thou wast upon the holy mountain of God; thou hast walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire,” indicates that before his sin, he was in the immediate presence of God’s glorious holiness. #RandolphHarris 4 of 16
In fact, Satan may have been the most exalted of all the angels, and the memory of this former glory could have been the reason Michael did not dare “bring against him a railing accusation,” (Jude 9). Dr. Eric Sauer suggests the possibility that even before God created man, He committed to Lucifer a position of authority in relation to the Earth and its surrounding planets. For this reason, Satan is called the “god of this World” in the New Testament. In England and Scotland during the mediaeval and later periods of its existence, witchcraft was an offence against the laws of God and man; in Celtic Ireland dealing with the unseen were not regarded with such abhorrence, and indeed had the sanction of custom and antiquity. Consequently, when the Anglo-Normans came over, they found that the native Celts had no predisposition towards accepting the view of the witch as an emissary of Satan and an enemy of the Church, though they fully believed in supernatural influences of both good and evil, and credited their Bards and Druids with the possession of powers beyond the ordinary. The persecution of witches did not cease in the countries where that the growth and spread of witchcraft made headway—far from it; on the contrary it was kept up with unabated vigour. Infallibility was transferred from the Church to the Bible; the Roman Catholic persecuted the witch because Supreme Pontiffs had stigmatized her as a heretic and an associate of Satan, while the Protestant acted similarly because Holy Writ contained the grim command, “Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live.” The evil that was wrought by such amongst an unenlightened and superstitious people can be well imagined; unbelievers would be converted, while the credulous would be rendered more secure in their credulity. In the 16th century, during the rule of the Commonwealth Parliament thirty thousand witches were put to death in England. Even as late as 1690 torture was judicially applied to extract evidence, for in that year a Jacobite gentleman was questioned by the boots. However, Scotland, even at its worst, fades into insignificance before certain parts of the Continent, where torture was used to an extent and degree that can only be termed hellish; the appalling ingenuity displayed in the various methods of applying the “question extraordinary” seems the work of demons rather than of Christian, and makes one blush for humanity. #RandolphHarris 5 of 16
Nonetheless, the punishment of death by fire for witchcraft or sorcery was not employed to any extend in Ireland. We have one undoubted instance, and a general hint of some others as a sequel to this. How the two witches were put to death in 1578 we are told, but probably it was by hanging. Subsequent to the passing of the Act of 1586, the method of execution would have been that for felony. On the Continent the stake was in continual request. In 1514, three hundred persons were burnt alive for this crime at Como. Between 1615 and 1635, more than six thousand sorcerers were burnt in the diocese of Strasburg, while, if we can credit the figures of Bartholomew de Spina, in Lombardy a thousand sorcerers a year were put to death for the space of twenty-five years. The total number of person executed in various ways for this crime has, according to the Encyclopedia Britannica, been variously estimated at from one hundred thousand to several millions; if the latter figure be too high undoubtedly the former is too low. In the persecution of those who practised magical arts, no rank or class in society was spared; the noble equally with the peasant was liable to torture and death. This was especially true of the earlier stages of the movement when sorcery rather than witchcraft was the crime committed. For there is a general distinction between the two, though in many instances they are confounded. Sorcery was, so to speak, more of an aristocratic pursuit; the sorcerer was the master of the Devil (until his allotted time expired), and compelled him to do his bidding: the witch generally belonged to the lower classes, embodied in her art many practices which lay on the borderland between good and evil, and was rather the slave of Satan, who almost invariably proved to be a most faithless and unreliable employer. Anybody might become a victim of the witch epidemic; noblemen, scholars, monks, nuns, titled ladies, bishops, clergy—none were immune from accusation and condemnation. Behind the veil of all the hieratic and mystical allegories of ancient doctrines, behind the darkness and strange ordeals of all initiations, under the seal of all sacred writings, in the cryptic emblems of our old books on alchemy, in the ceremonies practised at reception by all secret societies, there are found indications of a doctrine which is everywhere the same and everywhere carefully concealed. #RandolphHarris 6 of 16
According to alchemists, the souls of the dead can be pinned into homunculi. A homunculi is a very small human being or humanoid creature; a supposed microscopic but fully formed human being which a fetus was formerly believed to develop. Much that passed current in the west as White (id est permissible) Magic was only a disguised goeticism, and many of the resplendent angels invoked with divine rites reveal their cloven hoofs. It is not too much to say that a large majority of past psychological experiments were conducted to establish communication with demons, and that for unlawful purposes. The pentagram is a symbol of faith, a symbol of the five elements Spirit, Air, Earth, Water, and Fire (one for each point), and the circle (the Universe) contains and connects them all. The Golden Ratio is the number 1.61803399, represented by the Greek letter Phi, and considered truly unique in its mathematical properties, prevalence throughout nature, and its ability to achieve a perfect aesthetic composition. It is integral to the pentagram. Shorter and longer sections of each line exist in golden ratio. If you look at God’s fingers and the general position of the bodies in Michelangelo’s fresco, you will see pentagrams. After Mrs. Winchesters mysterious disappearance in 1922, the mansion of emptied of her belongings. It took six trucks working around the clock for six weeks to move all of her furniture out. Many people say not only was it a lot of stuff, but the movers would get lost in the mansion. Nonetheless, some things were left behind. From time to time the mansion was rented out. A young couple Oliver Hall and Ethel Taylor rented the place, but the story of what happened is very fascinating. No one ever thought that Ethel Taylor would marry Oliver Hall; but he thought differently, and things which Oliver Hall intended had a queer way of coming to pass. He asked her to marry him before he went Yale. She laughed and refused him. #RandolphHarris 7 of 16
The Next time Oliver came home, he asked her again. However, she laughed, tosses her luscious blonde locks, and refused again. A third time he asked her; she said it was becoming a confirmed bad habit, and laughed at him more then ever. Oliver was not the only man who wanted to marry her, but his attempts were like an elephant, at whose clumsy feats were considerably amusing. Ethel was the belle of the Santa Clara Valley, and every one was in love with her more or less; it was a sort of fashion, like masher collars or Inverness capes. Therefore everyone was very annoyed as surprised when Oliver Hall walked into the Bank of Italy Building and invited everyone to his wedding. “Your wedding?” “You do not mean it?” “Who is the happy fair? When is it to be?” Oliver Hall filled his pipe and lighted it before he replied. Then he said—“I am sorry to deprive you fellow of your only joke—but Miss Taylor and I just let the Winchester mansion and are to married at the estate in April. “You do not mean it?” “He has got the mitten again, and its turned his head.” “No,” he said, rising “I see it is true. Lend me a pistol someone—or a first class fare to other end of Nowhere. Hall has bewitched the only pretty girl in our twenty-mile radius. Was it a mesmerism, or a love-potion, Oliver?” “Neither, sir, but a gift you will never have—perseverance—and the best luck a man ever had in this World. It is so glorious to know of a surety that now we can think, feel, speak, act—above all, love one another—haunted by no counteracting spell, responsible to no living creature for our life and our love.” There was something in his voice that silenced everyone, and all chaff of the other fellows failed to draw him further. The queer thing about it was that when we congratulated Miss Taylor, she blushed and smiled, and dimpled, for all the World as though she were in love with him, and had been in love with him all the time. They had been laughing very heartily, cherishing the mirth, as it were like those who caress a lovely bird that had been frightened out of its natural home and grown wild and rare in its visits, only tapping at the lattice for a minute, and then gone. Women are strange creatures. #RandolphHarris 8 of 16
In Santa Clara everyone who was anyone was asked to the wedding at Llanada Villa. Many people were truly more interested in the trousseau than the bride herself. The coming marriage was much canvasses at afternoon tea-tables, and at the Bank of Italy over the saddler’s, and the question was always asked: “Does she care for him?” The best man used to ask that question in the early days of their engagement, but after a certain evening in April, the pause between the acts, when the house was half-darkened, and the laughter died away made him never ask that question again. “How cold is it,” said John, the best man, shivering. Oliver shivered too; but not with cold, it was more like the involuntary sensation at which people say, “Someone is walking over my grave.” He said so, jestingly. “Hush, Oliver,” whispered John, and again the draught of cold air seemed to blow right between them. The next week, John was coming home from the Bank of Italy through the churchyard. Their church was on a thyme-grown hill, and the turf about it is so thick and soft that one’s footsteps are noiseless. He made no sound as he vaulted the low lichened wall, and threaded his way between the tombstones. It was at the same instant that he heard Oliver Hall’s voice, and saw his face. Ethel was siting on a low flat gravestone with the full splendour of the western sun upon her mignonne face. Its expression ended, at once and for ever, any question of her love of Oliver; it was transfigured to a beauty John should not have believed possible, even to that beautiful little face. Many people said she was like a reincarnation of Mrs. Winchester. Oliver lay at Ethel’s feet, and it was his voice that broke the stillness of the golden April evening. “This spring is cold for you, my love. I half wish we had taken courage, and sailed once more for Hispaniola. My dear, my dear, I believe I should come back from the if you wanted.” John coughed at once to indicate his presence, and passed on into the shadow fully enlightened. “Oh, no—oh, no! No mor of the sea. Llanada Villa is perfect for me,” she said, with another and stronger shoulder. #RandolphHarris 9 of 16
“Ethel,” he said at last, rousing himself, with a half-smile, “I think I must have grown remarkably attractive. Look! half the glasses opposite are lifted to our box. It cannot be to gaze at me, you know. Do you remember telling me I was the ugliest fella you ever saw?” “Oh, Oliver!” Yet it was quite true—she had thought him so, in far back, strange, awful times, when she, a girl of sixteen, had her mind wholly filled with one idea!—one insane, exquisite dream; when she brought her innocent child’s garlands, and sat him down under one spreading magnificent tree, which trees of the Victorian garden at Llanada Villa, until she felt its dews dropping death upon her youth, and her whole soul withering under its venomous shade. “Oh, Oliver!” She cried once more, looking fondly on his beloved face, where no unearthly beauty dazzled, no unnatural calm repelled; where all was simple, noble, manly, true. “My dearly beloved, I thank Heaven for that dear ‘ugliness’ of yours. Above all, though blood runs strong, they say , I thank Heaven that I see you no likeness to—” Oliver knew what name she meant, though for a whole year past—since God’s mercy made it to them only a name—they had ceased to utter it, and let it die wholly out of the visible World. The wedding was to be early in April. Two days before, John had to run up town on business. The train was late, of course, for they were on the South-Eastern, and as he stood grumbling with his watch in his hand, who should he see but Oliver Hall and Ethel Taylor. They were walking up and down the unfrequent end of the platform, that he obtrusively passed the pair with his Gladstone, and took the corner in a first-class smoking-carriage. He did this with as good an air of not seeing them as he could assume. John prided himself on his discretion, but if Oliver were traveling alone he wanted his company. He had it. “Hullo, old man,” came his cheery voice as he swung his bad into John’s carriage; “here is luck; I was expecting a dull journey!” “Where are you off to?” John asked, discretion still bidding him turn his eyes away, though he saw, without looking, that hers were red-rimmed. #RandolphHarris 10 of 16
“To old San Francisco,” he answered, shutting the door and leaning out for a last word with his sweetheart. He stood—clasping her hand secretly and hard; then he grew quitter; until, as the drop-scene fell, the same cold air swept past them. It was as if someone fresh from the sharp sea-wind had entered the box. “Oh, I wish you would not go, Oliver,” she was saying in a low, earnest voice. “I feel certain something will happen.” “Do you think I should let anything happen to keep me, and the day after tomorrow our wedding-day?” “Do not go,” she answered, with a pleading intensity which would have sent anyone’s Gladstone on to the platform and one after it. However, Oliver Hall was made differently; he rarely changed his opinion, never his resolutions. He only stroked the little ungloved hands that lay on the carriage door. “I must go, Ethel, The old boy’s have been awfully good to me, and now he is dying I must go and see him, but I shall come home in time for—” the rest of the parting was lost in a whisper and in the rattling lurch of the starting rain. “You are sure to come?” she spoke as the train moved. “Nothing shall keep me,” he answered; and they steamed out. After he had seen the last of the little figure on the platform he leaned back in his corner and kept his silence for a minute. When he spoke it was to explain to John that his godfather, whose heir he was, lay dying in Le Petit Trianon, some fifty miles away, and had sent for Oliver, and Oliver felt bound to go. “I shall be surely back tomorrow,” he said, “or, if not, the day after, in heaps of time. Thank Heaven, one has not to get up in the middle of the night to get married nowdays!” “And supposed Mr. Koshland dies?” “Alive or dead I mean to get married on Thursday!” Oliver answered, as he unfolded Oakland Tribune. At the Third and Townsend Depot they said their “goodbye,” and he got out and John saw him ride off; John went to Berkeley, where he stayed the night. #RandolphHarris 11 of 16
When John got home the next afternoon, a very wet one, by the way, his sister greeted him with—“Where is Oliver Hall?” “Goodness knows,” he answered testily. Every man, since Cain, has resented that kind of question. “I thought you might have heard from him,” she went on, “as you are to give him away tomorrow.” “Is he not back,” I asked, for I had confidently expected to find him at Llanada Villa. “No, John,”—his sister Alexis always had a way of jumping to conclusions, expecially such conclusion as were least favourable to her fellow-creatures—“he has not returned, and, what is more, you may depend upon it he will not. You mark my words, there will be no wedding tomorrow.” His sister Alexis has the power of annoying him which no other human being possess. “You mark my words,” John retorted with asperity, “you had better give up making such a thundering idiot of yourself. There will be more wedding tomorrow than ever, you will take first part in.” A prophecy which, by the way, came true. However, though, John could snarl confidently to his sister, he did not feel so comfortable when, late that night, standing on the door step of the Winchester mansion, heard the Oliver had not returned home. Filled with German superstitions, the young man grew almost pale, but kept a courteous calmness. There was nothing too ghastly or terrible for his own imagination to conjure up. John went home gloomily through the rain. Next morning brought a brilliant blue sky, gold sun, and all such softness of air and beauty of cloud as to make up a perfect day. However, he woke with a vague feeling of having gone to bed anxious, and of being rather averse to facing that anxiety in the light of full wakefulness. However, with his shaving-water came a note from Oliver which relieved his mind and sent him to the Winchester mansion with a light heart. Ethel was in the garden. He saw her blue gown through the hollyhocks as the mansion’s gates swung behind him. So he did not go up to the mansion, but turned aside down the turfed path. “He has written to you too,” she said, without preliminary greeting, when John reached her side. #RandolphHarris 12 of 16
“Yes, I am to meet him at the station at three, and come straight back to the mansion.” Her face looked pale, but there was brightness in her eyes, and a tender quiver about the mouth that spoke of renewed happiness. “Mrs. Koshland begged him so to stay another night that he had not the heart to refuse,” she went. “He is so kind, but I wish he had not stayed.” John was at the station at half-past two. He felt rather annoyed with Oliver. It seemed a sort of slight to the beautiful young lady who loved him, that he should come as it were out of breath, and with the dust of travel upon him to take her hand, which some of them would have given the best years of their lives to take. However, when the three o’clock train glided in, and glided out again having brought no passengers to their little station, John was more than annoyed. There was no other train for thirty-five minutes; he calculated that, with much hurry, he might just get back to the mansion in time for the ceremony; but, oh, what a fool to miss that first train! What other man could have done it? That thirty-five minutes seemed like a year, as he wandered round the station reading the advertisements and the time-tables, and the company’s bye-laws, and getting more and more angry with Oliver Hall. This confidence in his own power of getting everything he wanted the minute he wanted it was leading him too far. John hated waiting. After no sight of Oliver, he flung himself into the carriage that he had brough for him. “Drive to the mansion!” he said, as someone shut the door. “Mr. Hall has not come by this train.” Anxiety now replaced anger. What had become of the man? Could he have been suddenly taken will? John had never known Oliver to have an illness in his life. And even so, he might have telegraphed. Some awful accident must have happened. Maybe his corpse was picked up off a wreck, and committed to the deep—in the Gulf of Mexico. The thought that he had played her false never—no, not for a moment, entered John’s head. #RandolphHarris 13 of 16
Yes, something terrible had happened to Oliver, and on John lay the task of telling his bride. John almost wished the carriage would upset and break his head so that someone else might tell her, not Joh, who—but that is nothing to do with the story. It was five minutes to four as they drew up to the gate of the Winchester mansion. A double row of eager onlooker lined the path of the palm avenue. John sprang from the carriage and passed up between them. The estate’s gardener had a good front place near the door. He stopped. “Are they waiting still, Thomas?” he asked, simply to gain time, for of course he knew they were by the waiting crowd’s attentive attitude. “Waiting, sir? No, sir, why it must be over by now.” “Over! Then Mr. Hall has come?” ‘To the minute, sir; must have missed you somehow, and I say, sir,” lowering his voice, “I never see Mr. Oliver the bit so afore, but my opinion is he has been drinking pretty free. His clothes was all dusty and his face a sheet. I tell you I did not like the looks of him, with never a look or a word for none of us; him that was always such a gentleman!” I had never heard Thomas make so long a speech. The crowd in at mansion wee talking in whispers and getting ready rice and slippers to throw at the bride and bridegroom. The ringers were ready with their hands on the ropes to rung out the merry peal as the bride and bridegroom should come out. A murmur from the Winchester mansion announced them; out they came, Thomas was right. Oliver Hall did not look himself. There was dust on his coat, his hair was disarranged. He seemed to have been in some row, for there was a black mark above his eyebrow. He was deathly pale. However, his pallor was not greater than that of the bride, who might have been carved in ivory—dress, veil, orange blossoms and all. As they passed out the ringers stooped—there were six of them—and then, on the ears expecting the gay wedding peal, came the slow tolling of the Winchester Bell. A thrill of horror at so foolish a jest from the ringers passed through all the guests. #RandolphHarris 14 of 16
However, the ringers themselves dropped the ropes and fled like rabbits down the belfry stairs. The bride shuddered, and grey shadows came about her mouth, but the bridegroom led her on down the path where the people stood with the handfuls of rice; but the handfuls were never thrown, and the wedding-bells never rang. In vain the ringers were urged to remedy their mistake: the protested with many whispered expletives that they would see themselves further first. In a hush like the hush in the chamber of death the bridal pair passed into their carriage and its door slammed behind them. Then the tongues were loosed. A babel of anger, wonder, conjecture from the guests and spectators. “If I had seen his condition, sir,” said old Seymour to me as we drove off, “I would have stretched him on the floor of the mansion, sir, by Heaven I would, before I would have let him marry my daughter!” Then he put his head out of the window. “Drive like fury,” he cried to the coachman; “do not spare the horses.” He was obeyed. They passed the bride’s carriage. John forbore to look at it, and old Seymour turned his head away and swore. They reached reception hall before it. They stood in the hall doorway, in the blazing afternoon sun, and in about half a minute, they heard the wheels crunching the gravel. When the carriage stopped in the front of the steps old Seymour and John ran down. “Great Heaven, the carriage is empty! And yet—” he had the door open in a minute, and this is what he saw—No sign of Oliver Hall; and of Ethel, his wife only a huddled heap of white satin lying half on the floor of the carriage and half on the seat. “I drove straight here, sir,” said the coachman, as the bride’s father lifted her out; “and I will swear no one got out of the carriage.” We drove back to the Winchester mansion, and carried her back into the house in her bridal dress, and drew back her veil. #RandolphHarris 15 of 16
Her face. No one would ever forget. White, white and drawn with agony and horror, bearing such a look of terror as no one has never seen except in dreams. And her hair, her radiant blonde hair, it was white like snow. As John and her father stood, both half mad with horror and mystery of it, a body came up the avenue—a telegraph boy. They brought the orange envelop to John. He tore it open. “Mr. Hall was thrown from his horse on his way to the station at half-past one. Killed on the spot!” And he was married to Ethel Taylor in the Winchester Mansion at half-past three, in the presence of fifty guests. “I shall be married, dead or alive!” What had passed in that carriage on the drive to the reception hall? No one knows—no one will ever know. Oh, Ethel! Oh, my dear!” Before a week was over they laid her beside her husband in the Oak Hill Memorial Park on the northern most hill in the San Juan Bautista Hills of South San Jose. Thus was accomplished Oliver Hall’s wedding. Whether or not one believes in superstitions about spirits, it is hard to dismiss the unusual events that have taken place at this estate. Just like the original construction, restoration and maintenance work at Winchester Mystery House is never complete. The actual amount of materials requires is staggering. For example, it takes over 20,000 gallons of pain to cover the exterior—and by the time the workers have finished, they have to start all over again! Continuous work is being done on the massive structure, with carpenters, painters, and gardeners toiling away just like they did during Mrs. Winchester’s day. The sons, grandsons, and great grandson of Mrs. Winchester’s original employees have been some of these workmen! The restoration work is very demanding. Although you can still find spots where the cracked plaster has not been fixed after the 1906 Earthquake, almost everything will eventually be restored. This has been left like this on purpose, like a frozen moment in time, to show people how Mrs. Winchester lived there. An ongoing search continues for fine examples of the period furnishings, similar to what Mrs. Winchester herself would have used. Her original furnishings were auctioned off after her death and never have been recovered. The job of overseeing the restoration is a painstaking one. The historical accuracy of every project is researched and approved by the Restoration Board of Directors. Winchester Mystery House receives no funds from any government agency; the continuous restoration and maintenance programs are funded entirely from tour, café, and gift shop revenues. Since 1973, millions of dollars have been invested to ensure that this unique landmark will be preserved as the premier showcase of the Santa Clara Valley’s gracious past. #RandolphHarris 16 of 16
Winchester Mystery House
The Witches Cap 🧙🏼♀️- named for it’s conical resemblance of a witches hat. Many famous mediums claim this room was “important” to Sarah Winchester, although we do not know what it was used for. How did you feel when you experienced the Witches Cap for the first time? winchestermysteryhouse.com
The Door to Nowhere—The Curse of Evil Has Come into His Body!
Some people do not believe in ghost. For that matter, some people do not believe in anything. There are persons who even affect incredulity concerning the “Door to Nowhere,” at the Winchester mansion. They said that it did not stand wide open—that it was not a gateway to the Spirit World and that they could have shut it; that the whole affair was a delusion; that they are sure it must have been a conspiracy; that they are doubtful whether there is such a place as the Winchester mansion on the face of the Earth; that the first time they are in California they will look it up. Perhaps, before going further, I ought to premise there was a time when I did not believe in ghosts either. If you had asked me one summer’s morning years ago when you met me on the Golden Gate Bridge if I held such appearances to be probable or possible, you would have received an empathic “No” for answer. However, at this rate, the story of the Door to Nowhere will never be told; so we will, with your permission, plunge into it immediately. I was interested in why this “Door to Nowhere” in the Winchester mansion would not keep shut? They say the place is haunted. What nonsense. There was one thing I can truly say about our office, we were never serious in it. I fancy that is the case in most offices nowadays; at all events, it was the case in ours. We were always chaffing each other, playing practical jokes, telling stupid stories, scamping our work, looking at the clock, counting the weeks to next Christmas, counting the hours to Saturday. For all that we were earnest in our desire to have our salaries raised, and unanimous in the opinion no fellows ever before received such wretched pay. #RandolphHarris 1 of 17
I had $75,000 a year, which I was aware did not half provide for what I ate at home. My mother and sisters left me in no doubt on the point, and when new clothes were wanted I always hated to mention the fact to my poor worried father. We had been better off once, I believe, though I never remember the time. My father owned a small property in the country. I wanted money badly—I must say I never had sixpence in the World of my own—and I thought if I could earn two sovereigns I might buy some trifles I needed for myself, and present my father with a new Ultimate Driving Machine. Then I recalled the amount of the rent was being asked for the Winchester mansion; then I decided gladly this would be a great place to stay if only the ghost turned out of possession. I decided I should like to try to whether, I could not solve the mystery. I was accustomed to lonely houses, and I would not feel at all nervous; I did not believe in ghost, and as for burglars, I was not afraid of them. I was told to just try it out first. To stay in the house for a week; if as tht end of that time I could keep the door shut, locked, bolted, or nailed up, to telegraphy the Winchester Repeating Arms Company, and they would actually pay me to stay there. To me, this sounded like a great bargain. If I lay the ghost, or find out the ghost, I think I ought to have enough money to buy a small house for myself. However, I could not have said what frightened me about this endeavour. A week after I moved into the Queen Anne mansion, Mr. van Buuren from the Winchester Repeating Arms Company came to visit me. He wanted to speak to me about the mansion. I heard a sound of irritation in his voice. “The Winchester Mansion!” he said; “and what have you got to say about the Winchester Mansion?” #RandolphHarris 2 of 17
“That is what I wanted to tell you, Mr. van Buuren,” I answered, and a dead hush seem to fall over the office as I spoke. The silence seemed to attract his attention, for he looked sternly at the clerks, who were not using a pen or moving a finger. “Come this way, then,” he said abruptly; and next minute I was in his private office. “Now, what is it?” he asked, flinging himself into a chair, and addressing me, who stood hat in hand beside the great table in the middle of the room. I began—I will say he was a patient listener—at the very beginning, and told my story straight through. I concealed nothing. I enlarged on nothing. A discharged clerk I stood before him, and in the capacity of a discharged clerk I said what I had to say. He heard me to the end, the he sat silent, thinking. At last he spoke. “You have heard a great deal of conversation about the Winchester, I suppose,” he remarked. “No, sir; I have heard nothing expect what I have told you.” “And why do you desire to strive to solve such a mystery?” “If there is any money to be made, I should like to make it, sir.” “How old are you?” “Two-and-twenty last January.” He laughed—he lay back in his chair and laughed—and I laughed myself, though ruefully. We went on talking for a long time after that; he asked me all about my father and my early life, and how we lived and the people we knew; and, in fact, put more questions than I can well remember. “It seems a crazy thing to do,” he said at las; “and yet I feel disposed to trust you. The house is standing perfectly empty. I cannot live it in, and I cannot get rid of it; all my own furniture I have removed, and there is nothing in the place except a few old-fashioned articles belonging to Mrs. Winchester. The place is a loss to me. It is of no use trying to let it, and thus, in fact, matters are at a deadlock. #RandolphHarris 3 of 17
“You will not be able to find out anything, I know, because, of course, other have tried to solve the mystery ere now; still, if you like to try you may. I will make this bargain with you. If you like to go down, I will pay your reasonable expenses for a fortnight; and if you do any good for me, I will give you a $1,000,000 note for yourself. Of course I must be satisfied that what you have told me is true and that you are what your represent. Do you know anybody in the city who would speak for you?” I could think of no one but my uncle. I hinted to Mr. van Buuren he was no grand enough or rich enough, perhaps, but I knew nobody else to whom I could refer him. “What?!” he said, “Greg Ryan, of Lakeview Street. He does business with us. If he will go bail for your good behaviour I shan’t want any further guarantee. Come along.” And to my intense amazement, he rose, put on his hat, walked me across the outer office and along the pavements till we came to Lakeview Street. “Do you know this youth, Mr. Ryan?” he said, standing in front of my uncle’s desk, and laying a hand on my shoulder. “Of course I do, Mr. van Burren,” answered my uncle, a little apprehensively; for, as he told me afterwards, he could not imagine what mischief I have been up to. “He is my nephew.” “And what is your opinion of him—do you think he is a young fellow I may safely trust?” My uncle smiled, and answered, “That depends on what you wish to trust him with.” “A long column of addition, for instance.” “It would be safer to give that task to somebody else.” “Oh, uncle!” I remonstrated; for I had really striven to conquer my natural antipathy to figures—worked hard, and every bit of it against the collar. My uncle got off his stool, and said, standing with his back to the empty fire-grate: “Tell me what you wish the boy to do, Mr. van Buuren, and I will tell you whether he will suit your purpose of not. I know him, I believe, better than he knows himself.” #RandolphHarris 4 of 17
In an easy, affable way, for so rich a man, Mr. van Buuren took possession of the vacant stool, and nursing his right leg over his left knee, answered: “He wants to go and shut the “Door to Nowhere” at the Winchester Mansion for me. Do you think he can do that? My uncle looked steadily back at the speaker, and said, “I thought, Mr. van Buuren, I was quite settled no one could shut it?” Mr. van Buuren shifted a little uneasily on his seat, and replied: “I did not set your nephew the task he fancies he would like to undertake.” “Have nothing to do with it, Justin, advised my uncle, shortly. “You do not believe in ghost do you, Mr. Ryan?” asked Mr. van Burren, with a slight sneer. “Do you not, Mr. van Buuren?” retorted my uncle. There was a pause—an uncomfortable pause—during the course of which I felt the million dollar note, which in imagination, I had really spent, trembling in the scale. I was not afraid. For one million dollars, or half the money, I would have faced all the inhabitants of spirit land. I longed to tell them so; but something in the way those two men looked at each other stayed my tongue. “If you ask me the question here in the heart of the city, Mr. Ryan,” said Mr. van Buuren, at length, slowly and carefully, “I answer ‘No’; but if you were to put me on a dark night at the Winchester, I should beg time to consider. I do not believe in supernatural phenomena myself, and yet—the ‘Door to Nowhere’ at the Winchester is as much beyond my comprehension as the ebbing and flowing of the sea.” “And you cannot live at the Winchester?” remarked my uncle. “I cannot live at the Winchester, and what is more, I cannot get anyone else to live at the Winchester.” “And you want to get rid of your lease?” “I want so much to get rid of my lease that I told Tuck I would give him a handsome sum if he could induce anyone to solve the mystery. Is there any other information you desire, Mr. Ryan? Because if there is, you have only to ask and have. I feel I am not here in a prosaic office in the city of Santa Clara, but in the Palace of Truth.” #RandolphHarris 5 of 17
My uncle took no notice of the implied compliment. When company is good it needs nothing else. If a man is habitually honest in his speech and in his thoughts, he desires no recognition of the fact. “I do not think so,” he answered; “it is for the boy to say what he will do. If he be advised by me he will stick to his ordinary work in his employers’ office, and leave ghost-hunting and spirit-laying alone.” Mr. van Buuren shot a rapid glance in my direction, a glance which implying a secret understanding, might have influenced my uncle could I have stooped to deceive my uncle. “I cannot stick to my work there any longer,” I said. “I got my marching orders today.” “What had you been doing, Justin? Asked my uncle. “I wanted one million to go and lay the ghost!” I answered, so dejectedly, that both Mr. van Buuren and my uncle broke out laughing. “One Million dollars!” cried my uncle, almost between laughing and crying. “Why, Justin boy, I had rather, poor man though I am, have given thee one million dollars than thou should’st go ghost-hunting or ghost-laying.” When he was very much in earnest my uncle went back to thee and thou his native dialect. I liked the vulgarism, as my mother called it, and I knew my aunt loved to hear him use the caressing words to her. He had risen, not quite from the ranks it is true, but if ever a gentleman came ready born into the World it was Greg Ryan, upon whom at our home everyone seemed to look down. “What will you do, you man?” asked Mr. van Buuren; “you hear what your uncle says, “Give up the enterprise,” and what I say; I do not want either to bribe or force your inclinations.” “I will go, sir,” I answered quite steadily. “I am not afraid, and I should like to show you—” I stopped. I had been going to say, “I should like to show you I am not sure a fool as you all take me for,” but I felt such an address would be too familiar, and refrained. #RandolphHarris 6 of 17
When I got to the Lodge, I showed Mr. van Buuren’s letter to the woman, and received the key. “You are not going to stop up at the Winchester alone, are you, sir? she asked. “Yes, I am,” I answered, uncompromisingly, so uncompromisingly that she said no more. The avenue led straight to the mansion; it was uphill all the way, and bordered by rows of the most magnificent limes I ever beheld. A light iron fence divided the avenue from the park, and between the trunks of the trees I could see the deer browsing and cattle grazing. Ever and anon there came likewise to my ear the sound of a sheep-bell. It was a long avenue, but at length I stood in front of the mansion—a square, solid-looking, Victorian mansion, four stories high, with several towers and a steeply pitched roof, beautiful stained-glass windows and statues, a basement; a flight of steps up to the principal entrance; several windows to the right of the door, several to the left of the door; the whole mansion flanked and backed with trees; all the curtains closed, a dead silence brooding over the place; the sun westering behind the great trees studding the park. I took all this in as I approached, and afterwards as I stood for a moment under then ample porch; then remembering he business which has brought me so far, I fitted the great key in the lock, turned the handle, and entered the Winchester Mansion. For a minute—stepping out of the bright sunlight—the place looked to me so dark that I could scarcely distinguish the objects by which I was surrounded; but my eyes soon grew accustomed to the comparative darkness, and I found I was in an immense hall, lighted from the roof; a magnificent old oak staircase conducted to the upper rooms. #RandolphHarris 7 of 17
The floor was of white marble. There were two fireplaces, fitted with dogs for burning wood; around the walls hung pictures, antlers, and horn, and in odd niches and corners stood groups of statues, and the figure of men in complete suits of armour. To look at the place outside, no one would have expected to find such a hall. I stood lost in amazement and admiration, and then I began to glance more particularly around. Mr. van Buuren has not given me any instructions by which to identify the ghostly chamber—which I concluded would most probably be found on the first floor. I knew nothing of the story connected with it—if there were a story. I was perfectly unencumbered of the mystery. I had not the faintest idea in which apartment it resided. Well, I should discover that, no doubt, for myself ere long. I looked around me—doors—doors—doors. I have never before seen so many doors together all at once. Two of them stood open—one wide, the other slightly ajar. “I will just shut them as a beginning,” I thought, “before I go upstairs.” The doors were of oak, heavy, well-fitting furnished with good locks and sound handles. After I had closed I tried them. Yes, they were quite secure. I ascended the great staircase feeling curiously like an intruder, paced the corridors, entered the many bed chambers—some quite bare of furniture, others containing articles of an ancient fashion, and no doubt of considerable value—chairs, antique dressing-tables, curious wardrobes, and such like. For the most part the doors were closed, and I shut those that stood open before making my way into the attics. I was greatly delighted with the attics. The window lighted them did not, as a rule, overlook the front of the Manion, but commanded wide views over wood, and valley, and meadow. Leaning out of one, I could see, that to the right of the mansion the ground, thickly planted, shelved down to a stream, which came out into the daylight a little distance beyond the plantation, and meandered through the deer part. #RandolphHarris 8 of 17
At the back of the mansion the windows looked out on nothing save a dense wood and a portion of the stable-yard, whilst on the side nearest the point from whence I had come there were spreading gardens surrounded by thick yew hedges, and kitchen-gardens protected by high walls; and further on a farmyard, where I could perceive cows and oxen, and, further still, luxuriant meadows, and fields glad with waying and fruit orchards. “What a beautiful place!” I said. “van Buuren must have been a duffer to leave it.” And then I thought what a great ramshackle house it was for anyone to be in all alone. Getting heated with my long walk, I suppose, made me feel chilly, for I shivered as I drew my head in from the last dormer window, and prepared to go down stairs again. In the attics, as in the other parts of the house I had as yet explored, I closed the doors, when there were keys locking them; when there were not, trying them, and in all cases, leaving the securely fastened. When I reached the ground floor the evening was drawing on apace, and I felt that if I wanted to explore the whole house before dusk I must hurry my proceedings. “I will take the kitchens next,” I decided, and so made my way to a wilderness of domestic offices lying to the rear of the great hall. Stone passages, great kitchens, an immense servants’-hall, larders, pantries, coal-cellars, beer-cellars, laundries, brewhouses, housekeeper’s room—it was not of any use lingering over these details. The mystery that trouble Mr. van Buuren could scarcely lodge amongst cinders and empty bottles, and there did not seem much else left in this part of the building. I would go through the living-rooms, and then decide as to the apartments I should occupy myself. The evening shadows were drawing on apace, so I hurried back into the hall, feeling it was a weird position to be there all alone with those ghostly hollow figures of men in armour, and the statues on which the moon’s beams must fall so coldly. #RandolphHarris 9 of 17
I would just look through the lower apartments and then kindle a fire. I had seen quantities of wood in a cupboard close at hand, and felt that beside a blazing hearth, and after a good cup of tea, I should not feel the solitary sensation which was oppressing me. The sun had sunk below the horizon by this time, for to reach the Winchester I had been obliged to travel by cross lines of railway, and wait besides for such trains as condescended to carry third-class passengers; but here was still light enough in the hall to see all object distinctly. With my own eyes I saw that one of the doors I had shut with my own hands was standing wide! I turned to the door on the other side of the hall. It was as I had left it—closed. This, then, was the room—this with the open door. For a second I stood appalled; I think I was fairly frighted. That did not last long, however. There lay the work I had desired to undertake, the foe I had offered to fight; so without mor ado I shut the door and tried it. “Now I will walk to the end of the hall and see what happens,” I considered. I did so. I walked to the foot of the grand staircase and back again, and looked. The door stood wide open. I went into the room, after just a spasm of irresolution—went in and pulled up the blinds: a good-sized room, twenty by twenty (I knew because I paced it afterwards), lighted by two long windows. The floor, of polished oak, was partially covered with a Turkey carpet. There were two recesses beside the fireplace, one fitted up as a bookcase, the other with an old and elaborately carved cabinet. I was astonished also to find a bedstead in an apartment so little retired from the traffic of the house; and there were also some chairs of an obsolete make, covered, so far as I could make out, with faded tapestry. Beside the bedstead, which stood against the wall opposite to the door I had as yet met with the interior of the house. #RandolphHarris 10 of 17
It was a dreary, gloomy room: the dark panelled walls; the black, shining floor; the windows high from the ground; the antique furniture; the dull four-poster bedstead, with dingy velvet curtains; the gaping chimney; the silk counterpane that looked like a pall. “Any crime might have been committed in which a room,” I thought pettishly; and then I looked at the door critically. Someone had been at the trouble of fitting bolts upon it, for when I passed out I not merely shut the door securely, but bolted it as well. “I will go and get some wood, and then look at it again,” I soliloquized. When I came back it stood wide open once more. “Stay open, then!” I cried in a fury. “I will not trouble myself any more with you tonight!” Almost as I spoke the words, there came a ring at the front door. Echoing through the desolate house, the peal in the then states of my nerves startled me beyond expression. It was only the man who had agreed to bring over my traps. I bade him lay them down in the hall, and while looking out some small silver, asked where the nearest-post-office was to be found. Not far from the Winchester Estate’s Park gates, he said; if I wanted any letter sent, he would drop it in the box for me; the mail-cart picked up the bag at ten o’clock. I had nothing ready to post then, and told him so. Perhaps the money I gave was more than he expected, or perhaps the dreariness of my position impressed him as it had impressed me, for he paused with his hand on the lock, and asked: “Are you going to stop here all alone, master?” “All alone, I answered, with such cheerfulness as was possible under the circumstances.” “That is the room, you know,” he said, nodding in the direction of the open door, and dropping his voice to a whisper. “Yes, I know,” I replied. “What, you have been trying to shut it already, have you? Well, you are a game one!” And with this complimentary if not very respectful comment he hastened out of the house. Evidently he had no intention of proffering his services towards the solution of the mystery. #RandolphHarris 11 of 17
I cast one glance at the door—it stood wide open. Through the windows I had left bare to the night, moonlight was beginning to stream cold and silvery. “Look here, Justin,” I said, all of a sudden; “life is not child’s play, as uncle truly remarks. That door is just the trouble you have now to face, and you must face it! However, for that door you would never have been here. I hope you are not going to turn coward the very first night. Courage!—that is your enemy—conquer it.” “I will try,” my other self answered back. “I can but try. I can but faith.” The moon’s beams were streaming down upon the mansion; I could see every statue, every square of marble, every piece of armour. For all the World it seemed to me like something in a dream; but I was tired and sleepy, and decided I would not trouble about fire or food, or the open door, till the next morning: I would go to sleep. However, I felt like an army of Devil’s was horribly broke in upon this place which is the center, and after a sort, the first-born of our Californian settlements. If a ghost was responsible for the hanging of nineteen people in this mansion, what was responsible for the burning of nine hundred people? What more likely time would the “Door to Nowhere” open up and let our arch-enemy, the Devil, choose a time for his attack? I spent the forenoon considering that door. I looked at it from within and from without. It was on the second floor and opened up to a two story drop outside of the house. What would possess someone to build a door like this, unless they had some knowledge of it being a portal? I eyed it critically. I tried whether there was any reason why it should fly open, and I found that so long as I remained on the threshold it remained closed; if I walked even so far away as the opposite side of the mansion, it swung wide. #RandolphHarris 12 of 17
Do what I would, it burst from latch and bolt. I could not lock it because there was no key. I was baffled. Then I stumbled upon a note which read: “One that shall use, practise, or exercise any invocation or conjuration of any evil or wicked spirit, or consult, convenient with, entertain or employ, feed or reward any evil or wicked spirit, to or for any intent or purpose; or take up any dead man, woman, or child, out of his, her, or their grave, or any other place, where the dead body resteth; or the skin, bone, or other part of any dead person, to be employed or used in any manner of witchcraft, sorcery, charm or enchantment; or shall use, practise, or exercise any witchcraft, enchantment, charm, or sorcery, whereby any person shall be killed, destroyed, wasted, consumed, pined, or lamed in his or her body, or any part thereof: such offenders duly and lawfully convicted and attained, shall suffer death.” Then it dawned of me. Perhaps the mansion has been attraction people who are into the occult and they are the nearly 920 people who have been burned alive or hanged. And that is why the house cannot find renters, it consumes them all. Perhaps this is something like the Atonement of Christ. How God gave His one and only Son to pay the wages of sin man had created, this mansion is consuming souls of those who practise the occult to atone for the death of those killed by the Winchester rifle. The afflicted state of our poor neighbours that are now suffering by molestations from the invisible World, we apprehended so deplorable that we think their condition calls for the utmost help of all persons in their several capacities. We cannot but with all thankfulness acknowledge the success which the merciful God has given unto the sedulous and assiduous endeavours of our honorable rulers to detect the abominable witchcrafts which have been committed in the country, humbly praying that the discovery of these mysterious and mischievous wickedness may be perfected. #RandolphHarris 13 of 17
We judge that in the prosecution of these, and all such witchcrafts, there is need of a very critical and exquisite caution, leas by too much credulity for things received only upon the Devil’s authority there be a door opened for a long train of miserable consequences, and Satan get an advantage over us, for we should not be ignorant of his devices. After all, it was this mansion people could not live in—his door that would not keep shut; and it seemed to me these were facts he might dislike being forced upon the attention of the public. What had I seen? What did I think of the matter? Very honestly I did not know what to say. The door certainly would not remain shut, and there seemed no human agency to account for its persistent opening; but then, on the other hand, ghost generally did no tamper with fire arms, and my rifle, though not loaded, had been tampered with—I was sure of that. Mr. van Buuren later disclosed to me his theory that open door: “This is the room my uncle was murdered in, they say the door will never remain shut till the murderer is discovered.” “Murdered!” I did not like the word at all; it made me feel chill and uncomfortable. “Yes—he was murdered sitting in his chair, and the assassin has never been discovered. At first many persons inclined to the belief that I killed him; indeed, may are of that opinion still. “But you did not, sir—there is not a word of truth in that story, is there?” He laid his hand on my shoulder as he said: “No, my lad; not a word. I loved the old man tenderly. Even when he disinherited me for the sake of his young wife, I was worry, but not angry; and when he sent for me and assured me he had resolved to repair a wrong, I tried to induce him to leave the lady a handsome sum in addition to her jointure. “If you do not, people may think she has not been the source of happiness you expected,” I added. “Thank you, Reuban,” he said. “You are a goof fella; we will talk further about this tomorrow.” And then he bade me goodnight. #RandolphHarris 14 of 17
“Before morning broke—it was in the about one hundred years ago—the household was arounds by a fearful scream. It was his death-cry. He had been stabbed from behind in the neck. He was seated in his chair writing—writing a letter in Latin. Part of it said, ‘Exorcizo te, immundissime spiritus, omnis incursion adversarii, omne phanatasma, omnis leigo, in nominee Domini nostri Jesu Christi eradicare, et effugare ab hoc plasmate Dei.’ The rest of the letter was torn. His solicitor came forward and said he had signed a will leaving all his personalty to me—he was very rich—unconditionally, only three days previously.” Mr. van Buuren went away, and I stayed in the house. I never left it all day. I did not go into the garden, or the stable-yard, or the shrubbery, or anywhere; I devoted myself solely and exclusively to that door. If I shut it once, I shut it a hundred times, and always with the same result. Do what I would, it swung wide. Never, however, when I was looking at it. So long as I could endure to remain, it stayed shut—the instant I turned back, it stood open. Though feeling convinced that no human agency did or could keep the door open, I was certain that some living person had means of access to the house which I could not discover. This was made apparent in trifles which might well have escaped unnoticed had several or even two people occupied the mansion. In the dead of the night a noise, resembling the clashing of iron, was frequently heard, which, if you listened more attentively, sound like the rattling of chains, distant at first, but approaching nearer by degrees: immediately afterward a spectre appeared in the form of an old man, of extremely emaciated and squalid appearance, with a long beard and dischevelled hair, rattling the chains on his feet and hands. The distressed occupants meanwhile passed their wakeful nights under the most dreadful terrors imaginable. This, as it broke their rest, ruined their health, and brought on distempers, their terrors grew upon them, and death ensued. #RandolphHarris 15 of 17
Even in the daytime, though the spirit did not appear, yet the impression remained so strong upon their imaginations that it still seemed before their eyes, and kept them in perpetual alarm. Consequently the mansion was at length deserted, as being deemed absolutely uninhabitable; so that it was now entirely abandoned to the ghost of the Winchester rifle. That night, I prepared to retire. However, I was open to the vain terrors of imaginary noises and spirits. The first part of the night passed in entire silence, as usual; at length a clanking of iron and rattling of chains was heard: however, I neither lifted up my eyes, nor got out of bed, but in order to keep calm, I pretended the sound was something else. The noise increased and advanced nearer, until it seemed at the door, and at last in my chamber. I looked up, saw, and recognized the ghost exactly as it has been described to me: it stood before me, beckoning with a finger, like a person calls another. I immediately arouse, and, candle in hand, followed it. The ghost slowly stalked along as if encumbered with its chains, and, turning into the area of the house where the “Door to Nowhere, was and suddenly vanished. What an idiot I have been! If I wanted to solve the mystery of the open door, or course I must keep watch in the room itself. The door would not stay wide unless there was a reason for it. When I walked into the room, it was deadly cold, and the scene was horrible. The door was wide open. A party of ghosts were assembled with, and were feasting on the flesh of corpses. I was astonished by this hideous banquet. As soon as I could safely escape, I stole back into my bed. I was rather crossed at being disturbed. The next day word on—the long, dreary day; evening approached—the night shadows closed over the Winchester mansion. The moon would not rise for a couple hours more. Everything was still as death. The house had never before seemed to me so silent and so deserted. #RandolphHarris 16 of 17
I took a candle, and went up to my accustomed room, moving about for a time as though preparing for bed; then I extinguished the candle, softly open the door, turned the key, and put it in my pocket, slipped softly downstairs, across the hall, through the open dor. Then I knew I had been afraid, for I felt a thrill of terror as in the dark I stepped over the threshold. I paused and listened—there was not a sound—the night was still and sultry, as though a storm were brewing. Not a leaf seemed moving. Noiselessly I made my way to the other side of the room. There was an old-fashioned easy-chair between the bookshelves and the bed; I sat down in it, shrouded by the heavy curtains. The hours passed—where ever hours so long? The moon rose, came and looked in at the windows, and then sailed away to the west; but not sound, no, not even the cry of a bird. I seemed to myself a mere collection of nerves. Every part of my body appeared twitching. It was agony to remain still; the desire to move became a form of torture. The locked door opened—so suddenly, so silently, that I barely had time to draw back behind the curtain, before I saw a woman in the room. A slight, lithe woman, not a lady, clad in all black—not a bit of white about her. What on Earth could she want? Then she fell on me with her nails and teeth, and tore at my throat, she was as strong as twenty devils. I felt something like a red-hot iron enter my neck. She opened a vein and sucked by blood, and I could but rush from the room before I fell senseless on the marble pavement of the hall. When the post man came that morning, finding no one stirring, he looked through one of the long windows that flanked the door; then he ran to the farmyard and called for help. “There is something wrong inside,” he cried. “That young gentleman is lying on the floor in a blood of blood.” To this day, the “Door to Nowhere” is still a mystery. #RandolphHarris 17 of 17
Winchester Mystery House
24 Hours till opening night of All Hallows’ Eve and our caretakers are working non stop to put the finishing touches on the show! Be here for the opening weekend! Tickets are still available. A 160-room mansion built to appease the spirits who died at the hands of the Winchester Rifle 👻
All Hallows’ Eve:
🎟️ Link in bio. 🗝 winchestermysteryhouse.com
In a Nightmare of Supernatural Terror–Afraid to Move Hand or Foot!
The warning came too late to change that course of event. There has been time when many admitted some doubt of the validity of spectral evidence. This story I will tell to you now, as I have promised to do so, and yet I can hardly make you believe in the reluctance with which I even allow my thoughts go back to the times which I spent in my house—my first town residence after I was married. I loved so much my lovely mansion, I suppose. The wide emerald green lawns and quiet, glassy ponds and streams, bordered by luscious, blooming rhododendrons; of silent, mossy avenues, glorious with the flickering light that stole through pale green beech leaves; of rose gardens with grassy paths, jewel-sprinkled with shell-like petals of white, crimson, pink, and cream-like hues; of old-fashioned rooms with narrow, mullioned windows embowered in scarlet japonica and fragrant, starry jessamine. I supposed I possessed a deep love of them all. This was the first house we were sown in the Santa Clara, California. It was certainly a very fine house, both as o exterior and interior appearances. Large, massively built, agreeably darkened in woodwork and masonry by Time’s shading brush, in excellent repair, and the locality all that could be desire. Wide, lofty apartments, staircases, and landings; a handsome dining-room panelled in velvety dark-green “flock” and gold; a handsome drawing-room panelled in pale cream-colour and gold; airy bed-chambers and dressing-rooms—one, in particular, attached to what seemed the principal bedroom, with a vast mirror occupying the whole side of the apartment which was opposite to the door leading into the bed-chamber. #RandolphHarris 1 of 16
“What a nice dressing-room! This house is perfect and expansion will be a joy.” I exclaimed, having a weakness, I confess, for large, handsome mirrors in the rooms I inhabit—William says impertinent things about my “wishing to see as much of myself as I can.” I know I am not all, in fact, rather what he should call petite, if he wished to be polite—but that is not my reason for liking a large mirror. As I spoke the words I looked about mechanically for the house—agent’s clerk who had been sent with us—a nervous-looking little man, with a pasty complexion, and orange-colored hair meekly plastered down at each side of his face. He had been untiringly trotting up and down stairs, unlocking doors, answering questions, and keeping up a harmless soliloquy of chatter about the beauties and excellencies of the “mansiond,” as he called it, ever since he entered its doors, but now he was nowhere to be seen. “What door have you open?” I said, speaking aloud to him, for suddenly a cold blast of air swept up the wide staircase and into the dressing-room door, but not entering. His face looked wither than before, and in his accents there was an almost terrified earnestness that puzzled me. The shadows of the afternoon seemed to deepen. The aspect of the suites of rooms and long silent corridors, with their doors ajar, as if unseen inhabitants were stealthily crouching behind them, drearily impressed me with a sense of dull desolation; and it was with a sudden sensation of childish fear and loneliness that I rushed after my husband, and took his arm as he hastily descended the stairs. #RandolphHarris 2 of 16
“A spacious, handsome staircase, William” I remarked. “Yes; and a spacious, handsome price, you may be sure,” William responded. However, in this particular, he was exceedingly, and I agreeably, astonished. To our surprise, the house was rather affordable. William figured there must be a screw loose somewhere. He mentioned his opinion to the clerk in a more business-like expression, to the effect that the price seemed low, and that he trusted there was no—peculiar—eh? “Drains, gas, water, all right, sir—right as—a—a trivet, sir. However, the 18-room farmhouse is incomplete,” sad the clerk, looking over his shoulder oddly, as he spoke. “But chimneys, ventilators, roof, tiles—everything in the perfect repair and order, sir!” However, wonderful or not, the house seemed all that we could desire; the lowness of the price made it a decided bargain. I planned to expand the house, and make it even more lofty, and handsome; and in three weeks, huge furniture vanes, and a clever upholstered, had carpeted, curtained, and furnished our town mansion from garret to basement, and William and I, our two babies, a nurse, two maids, a cook, and a butler, were installed in what would become the Winchester Mansion. Dear William had been very generous—nay, almost extravagant—in his provisions for the comfort and pleasure of his wife and children; and my dressing-room and their nursery were fitted up so luxuriously and tastefully, that my feeling at the first inspection of them was that of self-gratulation on being such a fortunate woman, in having such a home, such babies, and such a husband. #RandolphHarris 3 of 16
I arrayed myself for dinner that evening quite gleefully; standing before my splendid mirror amid the bule drapery, cushions, and couches of my charming dressing-room. I put on William’s favourite dress—a bronze-brown lustrous silk, with sparkling gold ornaments: he invariably kissed me when he saw it on, stroked my brown curls and face, and called me “Mrs. Winchester”—and was still standing before the glass smiling at myself, like the happy, foolish little woman I was, when I perceived to my discomfiture that William was standing in the doorway watching my doings, and grinning very visibly under his moustache. “Do not mind me, my dear, I beg! do not me the least. However, when you have done admiring Mrs. Winchester, perhaps you will be kind enough to let me know”—then, suddenly changing his tone, he exclaimed, “Have you the window open, Sarah, this chilly evening?” “No William,” I replied, glancing at it to make sure of the fact. “Change in the weather, then,” my husband said. “Come, Sarah, there is no use in making yourself any prettier!” He had just uttered the last words when I saw him spring aside suddenly, and look around. “What is the matter?” I said—“William, dear, what is the matter?” For his face had grown quite white, and with his back against the wall, he was staring about him wildly. “I do not know—Sarah—something”—he explained in a low tone; then recovering himself, with a laugh, he cried—“I struck myself against the door, I suppose! I declare one would think I was composed of old china, or wax, or sugar candy, I hurt and stunned me so! Come, dearest.” #RandolphHarris 4 of 16
He had not struck himself, for I had been watching him going out on the lobby, and I felt an uneasy conviction that he knew he had not done so, and only spoke as he did in order to deceive or satisfy me. why? Why did I think so? As I live I cannot tell why I thought so then—I know now. We had the “babies”—as William always called them—in the dessert, after the time-honoured fashion of making olives as well as olive branches of them; and then, when the lite ones had gone to bed, we sat side by side in he summer twilight, I lazily fanning myself, William bending over me the lover-husband he was. Then came the lamps, and I played for him, and we sang duet and spent as happy an evening in our new home as a married pair could wish to spend. I cannot tell why I felt so disinclined to go upstairs that night, tired as I was, too—for we had had a long journey up from the country. However as eleven struck, I routed William out of the easy chair where he had been indulging in a preliminary doze, and, ringing for my maid went up to my dressing-room. I like gas in my dressing-room, though not in my bedroom, and the globes at either side the great mirror were a blaze of light. As I entered I caught the reflection of a woman’s figure in the depths of the glass, no my maid’s. The glimpse I had was of a tall woman, strongly built, and broad-shouldered, a quantity of light hair hanging in a disordered manner on her neck, and the profile of a white, hard, masculine face, with the keen glittering eye turned watchfully towards the door. #RandolphHarris 5 of 16
This may seem an elaborately detailed description for the momentary glance I obtained, but it is well known with what lightning rapidity the organs of vision will, in moments of terror and amazement, convey impressions to the startled brain, impression accurate and indelible. I had taken but one step on entering, the next step the figure had vanished, and the mirror reflected by my own terrified face, and the homely, cheerful one of my maid Agnus, as she stooped over the dressing-table opening a jewel case. I dropped down on the nearest chair, and, in answer to the girl’s alarmed questions, replied that I did not feel very well. I was sick and shuddering from head to foot. Suddenly it flashed across me that it was from a similar cause I had seen my husband’s face grow ghastly, and that strange, terrified look come into his eyes,–he, who had been a soldier and unflinchingly had fought amidst the dead and dying on bloody Indian battlefields, almost boy as he was then! What was it? What had he seen? Nonsense! was I going to believe I had seen a ghost? Nonsense, a thousand times over! I heard my husband’s cheery voice as he ascended the stairs, and, quite angry with myself for giving way to such folly, I threw on my dressing gown, and, snatching up the brush from Agnus, I pulled my hair down and brushed it quite savagely, until my head ached well—for punishment. If the bright morning light disperses sweet illusions formed overnight, as people say it does, it disperses gloomy ones as well. With the warmth and brightness of the unclouded summer’s sun streaming in through softly coloured blinds, brining out the velvety green of soft new carpets and lounges, the rainbow tints of glittering chandeliers, vases, and ornaments, the gilding on bright fresh wallpaper and the spotless folds of snowy window drapery, it was impossible for an instant to connect anything dark or dismal with the Winchester House. #RandolphHarris 6 of 16
Why, my dressing-room even where I had been so silly last evening, was like a woodland bower, with its deep purple-blue hangings and rose painted china flower-vases filled with bouquets from our country home. Clustering fragrant honeysuckle half-opened moss roses, drooping emerald-green fern, and masses of delicious jessamine dropping its over-blown blossoms on the white toilet cover, lace-flounced and tied with blue ribbons, as Agnus delighted to have it. “I think this such a charming room and such a charming house altogether, William!” I said; “and you have been such a dear, thoughtful old darling!” For I had perceived that the dear fellow had had his own half-length portrait hung over my writing-table. Quite a pleasant surprise for me, for I thought he intended it to be hung in the dining-room, and I delighted in having the dear pleasant brown eyes looking for a me when I was busy writing or sewing. “I am so glad you like everything, Sarah,” said he. “Why, William, do you not?” However, William had walked off whistling, and presently I heard uproarious baby-laughter, and baby-chatter, and thumping, trotting of small fat feet, as William put the tiny nursery into dire confusion by his morning game of romps with his son and heir, and red-cheeked baby-daughter. And it did seem as if I must have been dreaming or delirious, when this day and many a succeeding one passed away swiftly and pleasantly, without the slightest recurring event to remind me of my strange alarm on the night of our arrival. #RandolphHarris 7 of 16
We had been in the Winchester House about a fortnight, when one morning I received a visit from Mrs. Ellen Kenna. A very pretty, lady-like person she was, and as we had some common acquaintances we chattered away very freely and pleasantly for half-an-hour or so. As she rose to go she asked suddenly if we like the house. I replied in the affirmative rather warmly. She was opposite the light, and I saw an involuntary elevation of her eye-brows and compression of her lips that puzzled me. I fancied it was because I had spoken so enthusiastically. Yet her own manner was anything but languidly fashionable, being very cordial and decided. “Yes; it is a very nice house, roomy and well-built,” she said, after a moment’s pause; “I am so glad you like it—I live down the road in Oakland.” We took the carriage to have dinner at Bertha Hass’s mansion that for the following evening, and when we returned about three days later, in spite of a yawning remonstrate from William, I tipped off softly to have a peep at my darlings, before I went to bed. The nursey was a large, pleasant room at the end of the long corridor leading from our own apartments, and, gently turning the handle and gathering my rustling silk dress around me, I opened the door and went in. There was a night-lamp burning clearly, shining softly on the tiny cribs with the sweet flushed infant faces, the long golden-brown lashes lying in dimpled apple-bloom cheeks, the waxen hands and little rounded arms thrown above the tossed golden curls, and the Heavenly calm of the little sleeping forms and pure, peaceful breathing. #RandolphHarris 8 of 16
I wondered would any mother, no matter how cold and careless, have neglected doing what I did, as I bent over my treasures, and prayed God that His angels might keep watch over each cherub head on its little, soft, white pillow? I had looed at and kissed them, and turned to go, when I glanced toward the nurse’s bed. “Are you not well, Linda? What is the matter?” I said in an anxious whisper. She was a very respectable and trustworthy servant, as well as being, a kind, gentle creature with the little ones, and consequently highly valued by me, but her health was never very good, and she was subject to severe attacks of nervous headache and sleeplessness. She was sitting up in bed, her hands grasping the bedclothes, her face and lips ashy white, and her as big as saucers and staring wildly, as if they would start from their sockets. “Linda! Good Heavens! what is the matter?” I gasped. “Ma’am! Oh, ma’am—oh, mistress, I am dying!” We summoned a doctor and administered restoratives, and chafed the half-senseless girl’s damp, cold hands. I could imagine no cause for her sudden illness, and the others servants were very voluble in exclamations and laments. However, when the physician—a pale, kindly, grave-looking man arrived—after a moment’s examination, he demanded if she had been frightened? I replied in the negative, and was proceeding to describe to him the state in which I had found her, when I heard the housemaid and Agnus whispering energetically together. #RandolphHarris 9 of 16
The doctor was paying tribute to the dramatic affliction of the girl, when he said, “This strikes hard upon me, that you are at this very present charged with unfamiliar spirits. This is your bodily person they speak to. They say now they see these unfamiliar sprits some to your bodily person. Now what do you say to that?” Agnus said that she saw a specter leaving Linda’s body, as she was going into hideous convulsions. The fit was far too violent to be acting. This was terribly “real” and convincing. “What is it? Speak out at once my god girl!” said the doctor sternly to the housemaid; “you know something of this.” Both servants looked apprehensively at me and at William. “Speak up at once, Bethany; the girl’s life may depend on it! Tell the truth, my girl, and do not be afraid,” said her master kindly, but firmly. “I do not know nothing, sir—indeed, no ma’am, said Angus confusedly; “but—I think, ma’am—she seen the ghost, sir!” “That what!” cried William angrily. “She have, sir!” persisted Agnus eagerly, now that her confession was made. “We are all afraid, sir; but she has been worser nor the rest of us. And she says to me only this morning, ‘Agnus,’ she says, ‘if I see it, I will die!’” “What ghost, you fool?” cried William more angrily. “A pretty set you are!—great, grown men and women, afraid of some bogie story you have heard when you were gossiping with the servants on the balcony, I suppose!” “No, indeed, sir,” said Agnus; “I was not gossippin’, sir; but the parlour-maid over the way, sir Mrs. Kenna’s parlour-maid, ma’am—she told me that there was the Devil–” #RandolphHarris 10 of 16
“I thought so!” interrupted William. “You ought to be ashamed of yourselves not to have an ounce of brains among you.” “But, sir! Agnus burst out again, unheeding her master’s rather uncomplimentary phrenological verdict, “we did not mind, sir, though we was a bit frightened, until we see it, sir! The butler see it, and he ran, and cook ran.” “And you ran after them?” said William, with an indignant laugh. “I did, sir, for I saw it too—a big woman with fair hair all over her shoulders,” said Agnus, in an awestruck whisper to Harriet, who nodded her head. The doctor looked up, gravely and without a smile. The servants clustered together near the door, and muttered in undertones. William looked at me with a forced smile, which died away in an instant: “You are not so foolish as to credit any of this nonsense, Sarah?” he said. The servants all turned eagerly to hear their mistress’s opinion. I am afraid it was written in my pallid face. Was it true? Was it what I had seen? Could there be any reality in this, that here, in our pleasant, happy home, beneath the roof with out helpless little one, was a dreadful, unblessed presence—a shadowy horror; that that thing with the watchful, cruel eyes had not been a mere vision of imagination, the mere offspring of an active brain, and the unstrung nerves of an overtired frame? Is there conclusive proof that the person represented had been trafficking with the Devil? “Oh! they imagined something from the stories they heard, I dare say,” I faltered. #RandolphHarris 11 of 16
The butler shook his head solemnly: “I could swear to it, ma’am.” “And so could I ma’am!” chorused the cook and housemaid. “Hush!” said the doctor, as the nurse, roused, at length, from her stupor, lay quietly, with closed eyes, from which the tears streamed down her face. “Some one must sit up with her now,” said the doctor, looking around. “I will, sir, if my mistress allows me, said Bethany. Certainly, Bethany,” she said at once. He communicated his instructions to her and took his leave, promising to call in the morning. “Did you ever hear anything like this folly, doctor,” said William, as he shook hands with him at the head of the stairs. “Oh! yes, sir, I often hear such stories,” said the doctor quietly, as he bade us both goodnight.” William! what has frightened the girl? What has she seen?” I whispered, clasping my husband’s arm. “Sarah, go to bed, and do not be a goose,” was William’s reply. “William—I saw that thing—that woman, in my dressing-room,” I said, trembling, “and oh! think if the children were to see I and be frightened like poor Mary!” “Well, Sarah,” said my husband sharply, “if you are going to listen to ignorant servants’ superstitions and run out of your house, just as we are comfortably settled in it, on account of a foolish sickly woman fainting from hearing a ghost story—I say—it is a pity you ever came into it.” He spoke very decidedly and sternly, and yet I felt in my inmost heart that the uttered what he wished me to believe, not what he believed himself. I said no more, but went to my bedroom—not into the dreaded dressing-room—and lay awake listening and fevered with nervous anxiety until the next morning dawned. #RandolphHarris 12 of 16
The nurse was better and able to speak the next day, though extremely weak and unnerved yet. The doctor forbade much questioning, and all that could be got from her at intervals was that something had come up the staircase and ran through the corridor, that she heard struggling and scuffling outside, and then the nursey door opened and she saw a woman’s face peering in, the eyes gleaming wickedly at her, and it had the yellow hair that “belong to the ghost.” “The woman has had a bad fit of nightmare—that is all, Sarah,” said William, rattling his paper unconcernedly, when I repeated to him the story I had just heard from poor Linda’s trembling lips. It might be so; but why were they all agreed as to what they had seen? Why did they all speak of the tangled fair hair, and the wicked gleaming eyes? Was our house haunted? Was this the mysterious cause of the exceedingly moderate price of the house and land and the house-agent’s profuse civility? The nurse did not recover strength, and being worse than useless in her present weak, hysterical condition, I sent her down to her country home for change of air, and hired another temporarily in her place. The newcomer was a stout, small, cheerful woman of about forty. I liked her face the moment I saw her; for, besides its smiling, honest expression, there was a good deal of decided character in the large firm features. “You appear to be a sensible person,” I said, when giving her her first instructions in the nursey, “and I think I can rely on you. You know my nurse is leaving because of illness, and that illness was caused by her being frightened by—a ghost-story.” I paused; but the woman remained unmoved, listening to me in respectful silence. #RandolphHarris 13 of 16
“The servants downstairs have got some nonsense of the kind into their head,” I went on; “they will try to frighten you, too, and tell you they have seen—-” I could not go on. For my life I could not calmly giver her the description of that shadowy image of fear. “They cannot frighten me, ma’am, said my new nurse quietly. “I am not afraid of spirits.” I thought she spoke in jest, and smiled. “I am not indeed, ma’am,” she repeated. “I have lived where there were such things seen but they never harmed me.” “You do not mean to say you believe such nonsense?” said I, hypocritically trying to speak carelessly. “Oh yes, ma’am, I do! I could not disbelieve it,” said the nurse, opening her eyes with earnestness, “I know the story of this house, ma’am.” What story” I cried. The woman coloured and looked confused. “I beg your pardon, ma’am—I mean what people say is seen here.” “What do they say? Do not frighten me,” I said, and my voice quivered in spite of me; “I have heard nothing but what the servant said.” The nurse looked deeply concerned. “I am very stupid, ma’am; I beg your pardon for repeating such stores to you—I daresay it is only idle people’s gossip.” She went about her duties, and I went—not into my dressing-room—but down into the drawing-room, where I say by the window looking out until my husband returned. Two or three weeks more passed away. I lay down on my pet chintz-covered couch, near the window, to look at the sky and the starts. Dead silence—and the “ting, ting” of the French clock on the mantelpiece marked the half-hour after eight. #RandolphHarris 14 of 16
Dear me, how dark it was growing! this brooding storm I supposed, which had been making me feel so languid and restless. I wish it would come down and cool the air—not tonight, though. Dear me, how lonely it is. I wish William were home. Those women are talking very loudly—I wonder nurse would—here I got drowsy, and my eyes ached looking for the stars that had not come. In a few minutes I roused again, my maternal anxiety changing into indignation as I heard the women’s voices growing louder and shriller, and some doors opened and shut violently. What can nurse be thinking of? They will wake the children most certainly, and William was so long in falling asleep—quite fevers my own boy! I shall really reprover her very plainly. I never needed to do so before. What could she be thinking of? Dead silence again. Well, this was lonely; I was inclined to ring for lights, and turn on all the burners in the chandeliers by way of company. Then I remembered there were some wax matches in one of the drawers of a writing-tray just at hand, and thought I would light the gas myself instead of brining the servants down—yes—but I wanted company. It was so dark and dreary, and—and—I was afraid. Afraid to stir—afraid to look at the door! a numbing, chilling tide of icy fear ebbing through every vein—afraid to draw a breath—afraid to move hand or foot, in a nightmare of supernatural terror. At last, by a violent effort, I sprang at the bell-handle, and pulled it frantically, and as soon as I had done so, with a sudden revulsion of feeling, I felt thoroughly ashamed of my childish cowardice, although I could not have helped it, and it had overcome me as suddenly as unexpectedly. How William would have laughed at me! #RandolphHarris 15 of 16
There were those servants talking again, tramping about and banging the doors as before. Really, this was unbearable; cook must be in one of her fits of temper, and certainly had forgotten herself strangely. And, as the quarrelsome tones grew louder and louder—evidently in bitter recrimination, although I could not catch a word—my own anger rose proportionately, and, forgetting loneliness and darkness in my indignant anxiety lest my children should be waked by this most unseemly behaviour of the servants, I ran hastily out of the room and up the wide staircase. The dime light from the clouded evening sky, still further subdued by the gold and purple-stained glass of the conservatory door, streamed faintly down the steps from the first landing, and by it, just as I had ascended half way, I discovered the short, thick-sett figure of the nurse rushing down—of course, in answer to my ring, I supposed. Involuntarily I stepped aside to avoid coming in violent contact with her as she feld past. No, it was not the nurse; and the woman following her in headlong haste, sweeping by me so that the current of air from their floating dresses struck icily cold on my brow where the clammy dew of perspiration had started in great drops, was—was—-Merciful Heavens! What was that tall figure, with the coarse, disordered, yellow hair, the white face, and glittering, steel-blue eyes, that glinted fiendishly on me for one dreadful instant, and then vanished? Vanished as the pursed and pursuing figures had disappeared in the shadows of the wide, lofty hall, without sound of voice or footstep? #RandolphHarris 16 of 16
Winchester Mystery House
If you had a chance to explore areas never before seen within Sarah’s house, would you take it?
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A 160-room mansion built to appease the spirits who died at the hands of the Winchester Rifle 👻
He Covenanted with the Devil Until He Should Arrive to the Age of Sixty Years!
He might be living, or he might be dead. There came no word of him, or from him. I was fond enough of her to be satisfied with this—he never disturbed us. While there were many individual acts of witchcraft in seventeenth-century Massachusetts, there was never an attempt or plot to make witchcraft a formal religion which would supplant Christianity. Yet we need not conclude that William Baker and his fellow-confessors were lying. It is probable that they, like the afflicted girls, were hysterics subject to hallucination. Certainly that is the conclusion to be drawn from Thomas Brattle’s opinion of them in his “Letter”: “my faith is strong concerning them that they are deluded, imposed upon, and under the influence of some evil spirit, and therefore unfit to be evidences either against themselves or anyone else.” Mr. Brattle wrote this in October 1692, when Massachusetts was retuning to stability. However, at the height of the excitement confessions like Mr. Baker’s seemed convincing enough. For one thing, they had a curious precision: he did not say there were about three hundred witches in the country but “about three hundred and sever”; he did not say there were about a hundred young wizards at the mustering of the Satanic militia but “about an hundred five.” However, what made these confessions most believable was that they offered a simple and comprehensive explanation for all the frightening events at Salem, at a time when explanations were not easy to discover. #RandolphHarris 1 of 16
There is also some testimony which remains ambiguous even today. Samuel Wardwell, for example, at his preliminary examination confessed himself a wizard. He had begun, he said, with white magic, “with telling of fortunes which sometimes came to pass” And, he said, “he used also when any creature came into his field to bid the Devil to take it, and it may be the Devil took advantage of him by that.” Eventually he had signed a pact: “He covenanted with the Evil until he should arrive to the age of sixty years.” He had renounced this confession at his trial, saying that he had made it, but that he had belied himself. He added that it was all one: “he knew he should die for it whether he owned it or no.” Ordinarily one would simply accept his renunciation. However, there are several puzzling circumstances here. For one thing, it was not all one whether he maintained or renounced his confession. People who maintained their confessions were not being brought to trail, much less executed. For another, at least a part of his confession was true; he had dabbled in the occult for some time, telling a great many fortunes, and boasting that he could make animals come to him when he wished. Finally, Mr. Wardwell was executed. However, in 1693, when the panic had subsided and the climate of opinion totally changed, there were three people who held to their confessions. Two of them were women long thought to be “senseless and ignorant creatures.” The third was Mr. Wardwell’s wife. All of these circumstances are puzzling and some of them are suspicious. However, on the other hand, there is no evidence to support his confessions of having made a pact. The only possible conclusion, it would seem, is that in this case the truth is not obtainable. #RandolphHarris 2 of 16
In a situation where the truth was so difficult to find the people of Massachusetts did what anybody else would do—they sought expert advice. In matters of witchcraft the experts were the clergy, and ultimately the advice was sought of the most distinguished clergymen in the colony. Indeed, at least one member of the trial court, Judge John Richards, asked the Reverend Cotton Mather to be present at the first trial. Reverend Mather was too ill to attend, but he did everything he could under the circumstances. He had suggested earlier (the exact date is not known) that the afflicted persons should be separated and an attempt made to cure them with prayer and fasting. He volunteered to take in as many as six of them himself. He had cured the Godwin children, and he might well have cured the Salem girls as well; certainly separation and private care would have been better treatment for hysterical fits than the excitements of a public courtroom. However, unfortunately Reverend Mather’s offer had not been accepted. Now, although he could not attend the first sitting of the court he wrote John Richards a letter offering him his opinions. In the first place, he expected that God would smile upon the labours of the court: “His people have been fasting and praying before Him for you direction, and yourselves are persons whose exemplary devotion disposeth you to such a dependence on the Wonderful Counselor, for his counsel in an affair this full of wonder, as He doth usually answers with the most favorable assistances. Yet he wanted to warn Mr. Richards. #RandolphHarris 3 of 16
Here is that warning: “And yet I most humbly beg you that in the management of the affair in your most worthy hands, you do not lay more stress upon pure specter testimony than it will bear. When you are satisfied or have good plain legal evidence that the Demons which molest our poor neighbours do indeed represent such and such people to the sufferers, though this be a presumption, yet I suppose you will not reckon it a conviction that the people so represented are witches to be immediately exterminated. It is very certain that the Devils have sometimes represented the shapes of persons not only innocent but very virtuous, though I believe that the just God then ordinarily provides a way for speedy vindication of the persons thus abused. Moreover, I do suspect that persons who have too much indulged themselves in malignant, envious, malicious ebullitions of their souls may unhappily expose themselves to the Judgment of being represented by Devils, of whom they never had any vision and with whom they have much less written any covenant. I would say this: if upon the bare supposal of a poor creature’s being represented by a specter too great a progress be made by the Authority in ruining a poor neighbour so represented, it may be that a door may be thereby opened for the Devils to obtain from the Courts in the Invisible World a license to proceed unto most hideous desolations upon the repute and repose of such as have yet been kept from the great transgression. If mankind have thus far once consented unto the credit of Diabolical representations, the Door is opened! Perhaps there are wise and good men that may be ready to style hum that shall advance this caution a witch advocate, but in the winding up this caution will certainly be wished for.” #RandolphHarris 4 of 16
Reverend Mather’s third point is that although he believes that Devils have sometime afflicted men on their own initiative, without being called up by witches, in this case he thinks that witches are involved: “there is cause enough to think that it is a horrible witchcraft which hath given rise to the troubles wherewith Salem Village is at this day harassed, and he indefatigable pains that are used for the tracing this witchcraft are to be thankfully accepted and applauded among all this people of God.” Fourth, he points out that although witchcraft is a spiritual matter and therefore “very much transacted upon the stage of imagination,” its effects are “dreadfully real” and therefore criminally punishable. “Our dear neighbours are most really tormented, really murdered, and really acquainted with hidden things which are afterwards proved plainly to have been realities.” In his fifth and six section he suggests what evidence may be used for convictions. The best evidence, he says, is “a credible confession…And I say a credible confession because even confession itself is sometimes not credible.” He was confident Mr. Richards’ ability to judge such matters: “a person of a sagacity many times thirty furlongs less than yours will easily perceive what confession may be credible and what may be the result of only a delirious brain or a discontented heart.” In obtaining confessions he was “far from urging the un-English method of torture,” but he thought that “cross and swift questions” might be used, along with anything else that “hath a tendency to put the witches into confusion” and this might bring them to confession. If the suspect had made threats or boasts which seemed to require occult power and which came true, this was valid evidence. So were such concrete matters as “puppets” (for image magic) and witch marks on the body. #RandolphHarris 5 of 16
Reverend Mather had never seen a witch mark on anyone, but he thought a surgeon ought to be able to tell if a bodily excrescence were magical. Finally, he was willing to countenance as experiments (but not as full evidence) some witch-finding techniques which themselves partook of the occult: setting a suspect to repeating the Lord’s Prayer; trying to wound a witch through striking her specter; putting the suspect to the water ordeal. Seventh, and finally, he recommended clemency for “come of the lesser criminals.” If such persons were not executed but “only scoured with lesser punishments, and also put upon some solemn, open, public, and explicit renunciation of the Devil” he thought it might discourage the Devils from afflicting those neighbourhoods in which they had been publicly renounced. Reverend Mather’s letter was written within the context of the Puritan method for arriving at the truth, and it can be fully understood only within that context. In dealing with the American Puritans we must remember always that they had rejected the formidable hierarchies of the Medieval and Renaissance church and state, with all their authority of tradition and inherited position. They had replaced these hierarchies with bodies of ministers and magistrates which, if they were not fully democratic in the twentieth-century sense of the word, were nevertheless elected. The clergyman was called to his position by the members of the church; the magistrate was elected by his constituency. Furthermore, the church had no central administration; every congregation was a law unto itself. The state did have a central administration—a governor and lieutenant-governor and their council—but this administration had nothing even faintly resembling the authority of a royal government. #RandolphHarris 6 of 16
My brother, the clergyman, looked over my shoulder before I was aware of him, and discovered that the volume which completely absorbed my attention was a collection of famous Trials, published in a new edition and in a popular form. He laid his finger on the Trial which I happened to be reading at the moment. I looked up at him; his face startled me. He had turned pale. His eyes were fixed on the open page of the book with an expression which puzzled and alarmed me. “My dear fellow,” I said, “what in the World is the matter with you?” He answered in an odd absent manner, still keeping his finger on the open page. “I had almost forgotten,” he said. “And this reminds me.” “Reminds you of what?” I asked. “You do not mean to say you know anything about the Trial?” “I know this,” he said. “The prisoner was guilty.” “Guilty?” I repeated. “Why, the man was acquitted by the jury, with full approval of the judge! What can you possibly mean?” “There are circumstances connected with that Trial,” my brother answered, “which were never communicated to the judge or the jury—which were never so much as hinted or whispered in court. I know them—of my own knowledge, by my own personal experience. They are very sad, very strange, very terrible. I have mentioned them to no mortal creature. I have done my best to forget them. You—quite innocently—have brought them back to my mind. They oppress, they distress me. I wish I had found you reading any book in your library, except that book!” Some people were opposed to prosecuting in any witchcraft case, on the grounds that witchcraft was a spiritual mater, a sin rather than a crime, and thus outside the domain of criminal law. However, the laws of every civilized nation provided the death penalty for witchcraft, and so did the Bible (Exodus xxii, 18: “Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live”). #RandolphHarris 7 of 16
Another opinion Reverend Mather deals with is that the troubles at Salem were caused by Devils, but not by witches. That is, the idea had already been advanced that the afflicted girls were possessed—infested by Demons—but not bewitched; that the Devils had acted on their own initiative rather than that of witches. This is the idea that was eventually adopted by virtually all of Massachusetts to explain the events at Salem, once it was recognized that most of those executed had been innocent. The basic question, as the seventeenth century understood it, was whether God would permit the Devil to assume the shape of an innocent person. Most authorities, and especially most Protestant authorities, believed that He would, and thus held, like Hamlet, that “the Devil hath power/ to assume a pleasing shape. However, Mr. Richards would not be capable of clearing anybody if he was going to accept the appearance of a person’s specter as conclusive proof of guilt. If such infernal testimony were accepted, nobody could be safe from accusation. Reverend Mather put in forcefully enough. “If mankind have thus far once consented unto the credit of Diabolical representations, the Door is opened!” However, Reverend Mather knew there were people at Salem so committed to the validity of spectral evidence that they were willing to call anyone who challenged it, including himself, a “witch advocate.” All he could do was warn such people that when matters were finished “this caution will certainly be wished for.” And in this he could not possibly have been more right. #RandolphHarris 8 of 16
Do you believe that the spirits of the dead can return to Earth, and show themselves to the living? Promise me this, that you will keep what I tell you a secret as long as I live. After my death I care little what happens. Let the story of my strange experience be added to the published experience of those other men who have seen what I have seen, and who believe what I believe. The World will not be the worse, and may be the better, for knowing one day what I am now about to trust to your ear alone. On a fine summer evening, many years since, I left my chambers in the Temple to meet a fellow-student, who had proposed to me a night’s amusement in the Winchester estate. I had taken my degree at Oxford. I had sadly disappointed my father by choosing the Law as my profession, in preference to the Church. At that time, to own the truth, I had no serious intention of following any special vocation. I simply wanted an excuse for enjoying the pleasures of an American life. The study of Law supplied me with that excuse. And I chose the Law as my profession accordingly. On reaching the place at which we had arranged to meet, I found that my friend had not kept his appointment. After waiting vainly for ten minutes, my patience gave way, and I went into the gardens by myself. I took two or three turns round the mansion, without discovering my fellow-student, and without seeing any other person with whom I happened to be acquainted at that time. For some reason which I cannot now remember, I was not in my usual good spirits that evening. #RandolphHarris 9 of 16
I saw a woman in the gardens, she was quiet. She invited me into the estate. Her face was saddened; her eyes were dropped to the ground, I begged her pardon. She rose to leave me. I was determined to not part with her in that way. I begged to be allowed to see the Winchester mansion. She hesitated. Then she took my arm. We went away together. A walk of half an hour brought us to the Winchester mansion, the estate was quite large. We went through the beautiful jeweled doors and took an elevator to the 4th floor. She said Mrs. Winchester had been waiting to meet me. She had been suffering from an affection of the throat; and she had a white silk handkerchief tied loosely round her neck. She wore a simple dress of black merino, with a black-silk apron over it. Her face was deadly pale; her fingers felt icily cold as they closed around my hand. “Promise me one thing,” I said, “before I go. While I live, I am your friend—if I am nothing more. If you are ever in trouble, promise me that you will let me know it.” She started, and drew back from me as if I had struck her with a sudden terror. “Strange!” she said, speaking to herself. “He feels as I feel. He is afraid of what may happen to me, in my life to come.” I attempted to reassure Mrs. Winchester. I tried to tell her what was indeed the truth—that I had only been thinking of the ordinary chances and chances of life, when I spoke. She paid no heed to me; she came back and put her hands on my shoulders, and thoughtfully and sadly looked up in my face. “My mind is not your mind in this matter,” she said. “I believe I shall die young, and die miserably. If I am right, have you interest enough still left in me to hear of it?” #RandolphHarris 10 of 16
She paused, for a moment, shuddering—and added these startling words: “You shall hear of it.” The tone of steady conviction in which she spoke alarmed and distressed me. My face showed her how deeply and how painfully I was affected. “There, there!” she said, returning to her natural manner; “don’t take what I say too seriously. A poor girl who has led a lonely life like mine thinks strangle and talks strangely—sometimes. Yes; I give you my promise. If I am ever in trouble, I will let you know it. God bless you—you have been very kind to me—goodbye!” A tear dropped on my face as she kissed me. The door closed between us. The dark gardens received me. It was raining heavily. I looked up at her window, through the drifting shower. The curtains were parted; she was standing in the gap, dimly lot by the lamp on the table behind her, waiting for our last look at each other. Slowly lifting her hand, she waved her farewell at the window, with the unsought native grace which had charmed me on the night when we first met. The curtains fell again—she disappeared—nothing was before me, nothing was round me, but the darkness and the night. In two years from that time, I had returned to the Church. My relatives exerted themselves; and my good fortune still befriended me. I was offered an opportunity of preaching in a church, made famous by the eloquence of one of the popular pulpit-orators of our time. In accepting the proposal, I felt naturally anxious to do my best, before the unusually large and unusually intelligence congregation which would be assembled to hear me. At the period of which I am now speaking, the Santa Clara Valley had been startled by the discovery of a terrible crime, perpetrated under circumstances of extreme provocation. #RandolphHarris 11 of 16
I chose this crime as the main subject for my sermon. Admitting that the best among us were frail mortal creatures subject to evil promptings and provocations like the worst among us, my object was to show how a Christian man may find his refuge from temptation in the safeguards of his religion. I dwelt minutely on the hardship of the Christian’s first struggle to resist the evil influence—on the help which one’s Christianity inexhaustibly held out o one in the worst relapses of the weaker and viler part of one’s nature—on the steady and certain gain which was the ultimate reward of one’s faith and one’s firmness—and on the blessed sense of peace and happiness which accompanied the final triumph. Preaching to this effect, with the fervent conviction which I really felt, I may say for myself, at least, that I did no discredit to the choice which had placed me in the pulpit. I held the attention of my congregation, from the first word to the last. On the conclusion of my sermon, my soul was literally shaken. Ordering my horse to be saddled, I rode instantly to the Winchester mansion. When I arrived, my mind was blank. I had no thoughts. I had no tears. The butler, Amon, greeted me. I guessed him to be some two or three years younger than myself. He was undeniably handsome; his manners of a gentleman—and yet, without knowing why, I felt a strong dislike to him the moment he opened the door. While waiting in the parlor, little by little, I became conscious of a chilly sensation slowly creeping through and through me to the bones. The warm balmy air of a summer night was abroad. It was the month of August. In the month of August, was it possibly that any living creature (in good health) could feel cold? It was not possible—and yet, the chilly sensation still crept through and through me to the bones. I looked up. I looked all round me. #RandolphHarris 12 of 16
I looked around me again. Yes: I saw it. With my own eyes I saw it. A pillar of white mist—between five and six feet high, as well as I could judge—was moving beside me on my left hand. The white colour of it was the white colour of the fog which one might see over the ocean. And the chill which had then crept through me to the cones was that chill that was creeping through me now. I was awed rather than frightened. There was one moment, and one only, when the fear came to me that my reason might be shaken. The doctrine that the Devil could appear in any shape did come to mind. The slow utterance of these words, repeated over and over again: “Mrs. Winchester is dead. Mrs. Winchester is dead.” But my will was still my own: I was able to control myself, to impose silence on my own muttering lips. And I walked through the mansion. And the pillar of mist went quietly with me. I sat down on the stairs looking at the pillar of mist, hovering opposite to me. It lengthened slowly, until it reached to the ceiling. As it lengthened, it grew bright and luminous. A time passed, and a shadowy appearance showed itself in the center of the light. Little by little, the shadowy appearance took the outline of human form. Soft brown eyes, tender and melancholy, looked at me through the unearthly light in the mist. The dead and the rest of the face boke next slowly on my view. Then the figure gradually revealed itself, moment by moment, downward and downward to the feet. She stood before me as I had last seen her, in her black-merino dress, with the black-silk apron, with white handkerchief tied loosely round her neck. She stood before me, in the gentle beauty that I remembered so well; and looked at me as she had looked when she gave me her last kiss on the cheek—when her tears had dropped on my hand. #RandolphHarris 13 of 16
I fell on my knees at the table. I stretched out my hands to her imploringly. I said, “Speak to me—O, once again speak to me, Sarah.” Her eyes rested on me with a divine compassion in them. She lifted her hand, and pointed to the photograph on the desk. It was the butler. I looked up at her again. She lifted her hand once more, and pointed to the handkerchief round her neck. As I looked at it, the fair white silk changed horribly in colour—the fair white silk became darkened and drenched in blood. A moment more—and the vision of her began to grow dim. By slow degrees, the figure, then the face, faded back into the shadowy appearance that I have first seen. The luminous inner light died out in the white mist. The mist itself dropped slowly downwards—floated a moment in airy circles on the floor—vanished. Nothing was before me but the familiar Lincrusta wallpaper, and the photograph lying face downwards on the desk. I went home. The next day, the newspapers reported the discovery of a murder in the Winchester mansion. Mrs. Winchester was the victim. She had been killed by a wound in the throat. The crime had been discovered between ten and eleven o’clock on the previous night. There is conclusive proof that the butler had been trafficking with the Devil. If spectral evidence was convincing to the magistrates, the ministers, and the people at large, it was a nightmare to the suspects. A violent quarrel took place between them. Lastly, that man, variously described by different witnesses, was seen leaving the door of her mansion on the night of the murder. The Law—advancing no further than this—may have discovered circumstances of suspicion, but no certainty. The Law, in default of direct evidence to convict the prisoner, may have rightly decided in letting him go free. #RandolphHarris 14 of 16
However, the Winchester Repeating Arms Company issued a statement redacting the news report which was later destroyed: “Protecting Mrs. Winchester’s legacy is, and always will be, our focus. For decades, we have battled behind the scenes, enduring shadowy tactics of deception with unauthorized statements and projects created to tarnish. We have always been betwixted as to why there is such a tenacity in causing more pain alongside what we already have to cope with for the rest of our lives. Now, this unscrupulous endeavor to release a statement without official proof or full accounting to the estate compels our hearts to express a word—forgiveness. Although we will continue to defend ourselves and her legacy lawfully and justly, we want to preempt the inevitable attacks on our company by all the individuals who have emerged from the shadows to leech off of Mrs. Winchester’s life’s work. Ultimately, we desire closure and a modicum of peace so we can facilitate the growth of the Winchester Estate and other creative projects that embody Mrs. Winchester’s true essence, which is to inspire and get people to think critically. We welcome and accept people of all creeds, races and cultures in the Universe and beyond.” The official statement reported that Mrs. Winchester passed away peacefully in her sleep on September 5, 1922, and work on the still uncompleted house stopped. I leave you to draw your own conclusions, but just days before I saw her, she looked no older than 22 years old. My own faith in the reality of the apparition is immovable. I say, and believe Mrs. Winchester is immortal, which would explain a lot. Take up the Trial again, and look at the circumstances that were revealed during the investigation in the court. I persist in believing that the man was guilty. I declare that, he and he alone did it. And now, you know why. #RandolphHarris 15 of 16
O thou wicket spirit Amon that obeyeth not, because I made a law and invoked the names of the glorious and ineffable God of Truth, the creator of all, and thou obeyest not the might sounds that I make: therefore I curse thee in the depth of Abandon to remain until the day of judgment in torment in fire and in sulphur without end, until thou appear before our will and obey my power. Come, therefore, in the 24th of a moment, before the circle in the triangle in this name and by this name of God, Adni, Great Spirit, give us hearts to understand; never to take from creation’s beauty more than we give; never to destroy wantonly for the furtherance of greed; never to deny to give our hands for the building of Earth’s beauty; never to take from her what we cannot use. Give us hearts to understand that to destroy Earth’s music is to create confusion; that to wreck her appearance is to build us to beauty; that to callously pollute her fragrance is to make a house of stench; that as we care for her she will care for us. Tzabaoth, Adonai, Amioran. Come! Come! for it is the Lord of Lords Adni, that stirreth thee up. I stir thee up, O thou fire, in him who is thy Creator and of all creatures. Torment, burn, destroy the spirit Amon always whose end cannot be, I judge thee in judgment and in extreme justice, O spirit Amon, because thou art he that obeyeth not my power and obeyth not that law which the Lord God made, and obeyeth not the Mighty Sounds and the Living Breath which I invoke, which I send: Come forth, I, who am the Servant of the Same Most High governor Lord God powerful, Iehovohe, I who am exalted in power and am might in his power above ye, O thou who comest not giving obedience and faith to him that liveth and trirumpheth. Therefore I say the judgment: I curse thee and destroy the name Amon and the seal Amon, which I have placed in this dwelling of poison, and I burn thee in fire whose end cannot be; and I cast thee down unto the seas of torment, out of which thou shalt not rise until thou come to me eyes: visit me in peace: be friendly before the circle in the triangle in the 24th of a moment in the likeness of a man not unto the terror of the sons of men the creatures or all things on the face of the Earth. Obey my power like reasoning creatures; obey the living breath, the laws which speak. #RandolphHarris 16 of 16
Winchester Mystery House
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At His Preliminary Examination He Testified that He Has Been in the Snare of the Devil!
A weary and secretive darkness crept into her face, a distraction, as though her soul had traveled out of doors towards Heaven, and the she looked down sadly. When I came in sight of the house where John Procter live, there was a very hard blow struck on my breast which caused great pain in my stomach and amazement in my head. However, I did see no person near me, only my wife behind me on the same horse. And when I cam against said Mr. Procter’s house, according to my understanding, I did see John Procter and his wife at the said house. [They were, remember, in prison at this time.] Mr. Procter himself looked out of the window and his wife did stand just without the door. I told my wife of it, and she did look that way and could see nothing but a little maid at the door. I saw no maid there, but Mr. Procter’s wife according to my understanding did stand at the door. Afterwards, about half a mile from the aforesaid house, I was taken speechless for some short time. My wife did ask me several questions and desired me that if I could not speak I should hold up my hand, which I did. And immediately I could speak as well as ever. [Notice again that the fit was broken when the subject is able to move or speak.] And when we came to the way where Salem Road cometh into Ispwich Road, here I received another blow on my breast which caused much pain, so that I could not sit on my horse. And when I did alight off my horse, to my understanding I saw a woman coming towards us about sixteen or twenty pole from us, but did not know who it was. My wife could not see her. #RandolphHarris 1 of 16
When I did get up on my horse again, to my understanding there stood a cow where I saw the woman. [Witches were thought capable of transforming their shapes.] After that we went to Boston without any further molestation, but after I came home again to Newbury I was pinched and nipped by something invisible for some time. However, now through God’s goodness to me I am well again. That was testimony from Joseph Bailey of what he and his wife encountered. Testimony like this is careful and honest, and historians have been wrong in refusing to take it seriously. Mr. Baily was quite aware that he had been ill, and that the illness had created a difference between his perceptions and those of his wife. However, the fatal distinction between his understandings of the event and ours is that his culture led him to attribute his illness to witchcraft whereas ours permits us to attribute it to his fear of witchcraft. There are many similar instances of the specters of innocent people appearing to afflict the citizenry once they were suspected of witchcraft. One of the more interesting involves John Willard, who had at first been a deputy-constable employed in arresting persons who had been complained of. According to Robert Calef, an American author who wrote a book on the Salem Witch Trials of 1692-93, he became dissatisfied after being sent to arrest persons he believed innocent, and resigned his position. This immediately brought him under suspicion, and soon the afflicted girls were crying out against him. Shortly thereafter his grandfathers, Bray Wilkins, was ready for dinner when John Willard came into the house with my son Henry Wilkins, before I sat down, and said Mr. Willard to my apprehension looked after such a sort upon me as I never before discerned in any. #RandolphHarris 2 of 16
That is, Mr. Wilkins thought Mr. Willard had “overlooked” him—given him the evil eye. I did but step into the next room and I was presently taken so that I could not dine nor eat anything. I cannot express the misery I was in, for my water was suddenly stopped and I had no benefit of nature, but was like a man in a rock. And I told my wife immediately that I was afraid that Mr. Willard had done me wrong. My pain continuing and finding no relief my jealousy [id es, suspicion] continued. Mr. Lawson and others there were all amazed and knew not what to do for me. There was a woman accounted skillful [who] came hoping to help me, and after she had used means she asked me whether none of those evil persons had done me damage. I said I could not say they had but I was sore afraid they had. She answered, she did fear so too. As near as I remember I lay in this case three or four days at Boston, and afterwards, with the jeopardy of my life (as I though), I cam home. And then some of my friends coming to see me (and at this time John Willard was run away) one of the afflicted persons, Mercy Lewis, came in with them, and they asked whether she saw anything. She said, “Yes, they are looking for Jon Willard but here he is on his grandfather’s belly.” (And at that time I was in grievous pain in the small of my belly.) I continued so in grievous pain and my water much stopped till said Mr. Willard was in chains. And then as near as I can guess I have considerable ease. However, on the other hand, in the room of a stoppage I was vexed with a flowing of water so that it was hard to keep myself dry. #RandolphHarris 3 of 16
On the fifth [of] July last, talking with some friends about John Willard, some pleading his innocency and myself and some others arguing the contrary, within about one-quarter of an hour after that I was taken in the sorest distress and misery, my water being turned into real blood, or of a bloody color, and the old pain returned excessively as before, which continued for about twenty-four hours together. In this testimony, we come to understand the hysterical loss of appetite which was Mr. Wilkins’ first symptom we have seen before and shall see again. The inability to urinate we have seen in Mrs. Simms as a result of Manny Redd’s curse. However, there was clearly something organic as well as psychosomatic wrong with Bray Wilkins. The blood in the urine coupled with the extreme pain of relatively short duration suggests that it may have been a kidney stone. However, whatever it was, both Mr. Wilkins and the community at large were by this time ready to attribute it to witchcraft. William Baker’s confessions provide an excellent example that the Salem Witch Trials were carried in chiefly by the complaints and accusations of the afflicted and by the confessions of the accused, condemning themselves and others. Nothing is a first sight more surprising than the number of the confessors and the character of their confessions. There were about fifty of them, and the statements which they made far exceed in color and detail the simple statements of personal guilt that were necessary to save their lives. According to Mr. Baker, at his preliminary examination he testified that he has been in the snare of the Devil three years. #RandolphHarris 4 of 16
That the Devil first appeared to him like a black man, and he perceived he had a cloven foot; that the Devil demanded of him to give up himself soul and body unto him, which he promised to do. [The Devil promised in return to pay Mr. Baker’s debts and see that he lived comfortably. Mr. Baker signed the contract in blood.] Satan’s design was to set up his own worship, abolish all churches in the land (which some say politicians are currently doing), to fall next [id est, first] upon Salem and so go through the country. He saith the Devil promised that all his people should be equal, that there should be n day of resurrection or of judgment, and neither punishment nor shame for sin. That explains why people are trying to banish God and they church. They know they are bad people and believe they can avoid being held responsible for their crimes and sins by raising hell on Earth and raising the Devil. Mr. Baker said that the demonic “Grandess” had told him there were about “307 witches in the country” and he volunteered his opinion that all the persons arrested and imprisoned to date (August 29, 1692) were guilty. However, an oral confession was not enough for him. Mr. Hale prints another “which he wore himself in prison, and sent to the magistrate to confirm his former confession.” However, an oral confession was not enough for him. Mr. Hale prints another “which he wrote himself in prison, and sent to the magistrates to confirm his former confession.” Here is his testimony: God having called me to confess my sins and apostasy in that fall in giving the Devil advantage over me, appearing to me like a Black, in the evening, to set my hand to his book, as I have owned to my shame. He told me that I should not want [in] so doing. At Salem Village, there being a little off the Meeting-House about an hundred five blades [id est, young bucks], some with rapiers by their sides, which was called (and might be more for ought I know) by Bishop and Burroughs. #RandolphHarris 5 of 16
And the trumpet sounded, and [there was] bread and beverage which they called Sacrament, but I had none, being carried over all on a stick, never being at any other meeting. I being at carting a Saturday last, all the day of hay and English corn, the Devil brought my shape to Salem and did afflict Martha Sprague and Rose Foster by clitching my hand. And a Sabbath day my shape afflicted Abigail Martin. Elizabeth Johnson and Abigail Faulkner have been my enticers to this great abomination, as one have owned and charged her to her sister with the same. And the design was to destroy Salem Village, and to begin at the minister’s house, and to destroy the Church of God, and to set up Satan’s kingdom, and then all will be well. And now I hope God in some measure has made me something sensible of my sin and apostasy, begging pardon of God, and of the Honorable Magistrates and all God’s People, hoping and promising by the help of God to set to my heart and hand to do what in me leith to destroy such wicked worship, humbly begging the prayers of all God’s People for me [that] I may walk humbly under this great affliction and that I may procure to myself he sure mercies of David and the blessing of Abraham. Such testimony sheds light on the centuries long plot of some to remove God from America. Pray I must, my Lordly Friend, but what should I pray? Bless You, Heavenly Father, Father of my Lord Jesus Christ, for remembering me, pauper that I am? O Father of mercies and God of consolations, as Paul began his Second Letter to the Corinthians (1.3), I give You thanks, unworthy as I am of Your every consolation? #RandolphHarris 6 of 16
I bless You always, and I glorify You, with You Only Begotten Son and the Holy Spirit, the Paraclete, for ever and ever? O Lord God, my Holy Loving Friend, when You come into my heart, You make my blood dance? “You are my glory,” thrummed the Psalmist (3.3) and “the exaltation of my heart” (119.111)? You are my hope and—thrumming again—“my refuge in the day of my tribulation” (59.16)? I ask again, O Lord, what should I pray? At this point in my life, I find myself not only a little long in the tooth, but also a little short in the hoof; that is to say, a little short of breath in the pursuit of Love and Virtue. I have no one to turn to. You are the only One who can help me. Do not be surprised, then, when I ask You to visit me more often. I need to know more about the holy disciplines. Will they free my body from the itch, cure my heart from the worm? Cleanse me on the inside, scrub me on the outside, and I will be ready enough to love, strong enough to suffer, stable enough to preserve. And you say that these blood drinkers are worshiped in the hills. It was the spring of 1880, I had lost my way, and could not tell how far I might be from my destination. I was very tired and had a heavy knapsack on my shoulders, packed with stones and relics from the ruins of the Old Pelasgic fortress which I had been exploring, besides a number of old coins and a lamp or two which I had purchased there. I could discern no signs of any human habitation, and the hills, covered with wood, seemed to shut me in on every side. I was beginning to think seriously of looking out for some sheltered spot under a thicket in which to pass the night. I was so excited to get back to the Winchester estate. The mansion was a large rambling place, and was tolerably comfortable within. My room was situated at the end of a long passage; there were two rooms on the right side of this passage, and a window on the left, which looked out upon the garden. #RandolphHarris 7 of 16
Having taken a survey of the outside of the house while getting some fresh air after dinner, when the moon was up, I remembered exactly the position of my chamber—the end room of a long narrow wing, projecting at right angles from the main building, with which it was connected only by the passage and two side rooms already mentioned. Please to bear this description carefully in mind while I proceed. Before getting into bed, I drove into the floor close to the door a small gimlet which formed part of a complicated Winchester pocket-knife which I always carried with me, so that it would be impossible for any one to enter the room without my knowledge; there was a lock to the door, but the key would not turn in it; there was also a bolt, but it would not enter the hole intended for it, the door having sunk apparently from its proper level. I satisfied, myself, however, that the door was securely fastened by my gimlet, and soon fell asleep. How can I describe the strange and horrible sensation which oppressed me as I woke out of my slumber? I had been sleeping soundly, and before I quite recovered consciousness I had instinctively risen from my pillow, and was crouching forward, my knees drawn up, my hands clasped before my face, and my whole frame quivering with horror. I saw nothing, felt nothing; but a sound was ringing in my ears which seemed to make my blood run cold. I could not have supposed it possible that any mere sound, whatever might be its nature, could have produced such a revulsion of feeling or inspired such intense horror as I then experienced. It was not a cry of terror that I heard—that would have roused me to action—nor the moaning of one in pain—that would have distressed me, and called forth sympathy rather than aversion. #RandolphHarris 8 of 16
True, it was like the groaning of one in anguish and despair, but not like any mortal voice: it seemed too dreadful, too intense, for human utterance. The sound had begun while I was fast asleep—close to the head of my bed—close to my very pillow; it continued after I was wide awake—a long, hollow, protracted groan, making the midnight air reverberate, and then dying gradually away until it ceased entirely. It was some minutes before I could at all recover from the terrible impression which seemed to stop my breath and paralyse my limbs. At length I began to look about me, for the night was not entirely dark, and I could discern the outlines of the room and the several pieces of furniture in it. I then got out of bed, and called aloud, “Who is there? What is the matter? Is anyone ill?” I repeated these enquiries in Italian, German, and French, but there was none that answered. Fortunately I had some matches in my pocket and was able to light my candle. I then examined every part of the room carefully, and especially the wall at the head of my bed, sounding it with my knuckles; it was firm and solid there, as in all other places. I unfastened my door, and explored the passage and the two adjoining rooms, which were unoccupied and almost destitute of furniture; they had evidently not been used for some time. Search as I would, I could gain no clue to the mystery. Returning to my room I sat down upon the bed in great perplexity, and began to turn over in my mind whether it was possible I could have been deceived—whether the sounds which caused me such distress might be the offspring of some dream or nightmare; but to that conclusion I could not bring myself at all, much as I wished it, for the groaning had continued ringing in my ears long after I was wide away and conscious. #RandolphHarris 9 of 16
While I was thus reflecting, having neglected to close the door which was opposite to the side of my bed where I was sitting, I heard a soft footstep at a distance, and presently a light appeared at the further end of the passage. Then I saw the shadow of a man cast upon the opposite wall; it moved very slowly, and presently stopped. I saw the hand raised, as if making a sign to someone, an I knew from the fact of the shadow being thrown in advance that there must be a second person in the rear by whom the light was carried. After a short pause they seemed to retrace their steps, without my having had a glimpse of either of them, but only of the shadow which had come before and which followed them as they withdrew. It was then a little after one o’clock, and I concluded they were retiring late to rest, and anxious to avoid disturbing me, though I have since thought that it was the light from my room which caused their retreat. I felt half inclined to call to them, but I shrank, without knowing why, from making known what had disturbed me, and while I hesitated they were gone; so I fastened my door again, and resolved to sit up and watch a little longer by myself. However, now my candle was beginning to burn low, and I found myself in this dilemma: either I must extinguish it at once, or I should be left without the means of procuring a light in case I should be again disturbed. I regretted that I had not called for another candle while there were people yet moving in the house, but I could not do so now without making explanations; so I grasped my box of matches, put out my light, and lay down, not without a shudder, in the bed. #RandolphHarris 10 of 16
For an hour more I lay awake thinking over what had occurred, and by that time I had almost persuaded myself that I had nothing but my own morbid imagination to thank for the alarm which I had suffered. “It is an outer wall,” I said to myself; “they are all outer walls, and the house 9-inch-thick walls; it is impossible that sound could be heard through such a thickness. Besides, it seemed to be in my room, close to my ear. What an idiot I must be, to be excited an alarmed about nothing; I will think no more about it.” So I turned on my side, with a smile (rather a forced one) at my own foolishness, and composed myself to sleep. At that instant I heard, with more distinctness than I ever heard any other sound in my life, a gasp, a voiceless gasp, as if someone were in agony for breath, biting at the air, or trying with desperate efforts to cry out or speak. It was repeated a second and a third time; then there was a pause; then again that horrible gasping; and then a long-drawn breath, an audible drawing up of air into the throat, such as one would make in heaving a deep sigh. Such sounds as these could not possibly have been heard unless they had been close to my ear; they seemed to come from the wall at my heard, or to rise up out of my pillow. That fearful gasping, and that drawing in of the breath, in darkness and silence of the night, seemed to make every nerve in my body thrill with dreadful expectation. Unconsciously I shrank away from it, crouching down as before, with my face upon my knees. It ceased, and immediately a moaning sound began, which lengthened out into an awful, protracted groan waxing louder and louder, as if under an increasing agony, and then dying away slowly and gradually into silence; yet painfully and distinctly audible even to the last. #RandolphHarris 11 of 16
As soon as I could rouse myself from the freezing horror which seemed to penetrate even to my joints and marrow, I crept away from the bed, and in the further corner of the room lighted with shaking hand of my candle, looking anxiously about me as I did so, expecting some dreadful revelation as the light flashed up. Yet, if you will believe me, I did not feel alarmed or frightened; but rather oppressed, and penetrated wit an unnatural, overpowering, sentiment of awe. I seemed to be in the presence of some great and horrible mystery, some bottomless depth of woe, or misery, or crime. I shrank from it with a sensation of intolerable loathing and suspense. It was a feeling akin to this which prevented me from calling Mrs. Winchester. I could not bring myself to speak to her of what had passed; not knowing how nearly she might be involved in the mystery. I was only anxious to escape as quietly as possible from the room and from the house. The candle was now beginning to flicker in its socket, but the stars were shining outside, and there was space and air to breathe there, which seemed to be wanting in my room; so I hastily opened my window, tied the bedclothes together for a rope, and lowered myself silently and safely to the ground. There was a light still burning in the lower part of the house; but I crept noiselessly along, feeling my way carefully among the trees, and in due time came upon a beaten track which led me to a road, the same which I had been travelling on the previous night. I walked on, scarcely knowing whither, anxious only to increase my distance from the accursed house, until day began to break, when almost the first object I could see distinctly was a small body of men approaching me. #RandolphHarris 12 of 16
The men asked me what was wrong? “I was disturbed in the night. I could not sleep. I made my escape from the Winchester mansion, and here I am I cannot tell you more.” “But you must tell me more, dear sir; forgive me; you must tell me everything. I must know all that passed in that mansion. We have had in under our surveillance for a long time, and when I heard in what direction you had gone yesterday, and had not returned, I feared you had got into some mischief there, and we were even now upon our way to look for you. The mansion is so large that people seem to get lost inside and disappear.” I could not enter into particulars, but I told him I had heard strange sounds, and at his respect I went back with him to the mansion. He told me by the way that the mansion was haunted; that Mrs. Winchester e mansion, he placed his men about the premises and instituted a strict search, and Mrs. Winchester and the man who was found in the house being compelled to accompany him. The room in which I had slept was carefully examined; the wall was of plaster or cement, so that no sound could have passed through it; the walls were sound and solid, and there was nothing to be seen that could in any way account for the strange disturbance I had experienced. The room on the ground-floor underneath my bedroom was inspected; it contained a quantity of straw, hay, firewood, and lumber. It was paved with thick wooden slaps, and it was observed that the floors were uneven, as if they had been recently disturbed. #RandolphHarris 13 of 16
“Ply the board loose,” said the officer, “we shall find something hidden here, I reckon.” Mrs. Winchester was evidently much disturbed. “Stop,” she cried. “I will tell you what lies there; come away out of doors, and you shall know all about it.” “Dig, I say. We will find out for ourselves.” “Let the dead rest,” cried Mrs. Winchester, with a trembling voice. “For the love of Heaven come away, and hear what I shall tell you. It is the body of my son, my only son—let him rest, if rest he can. He was wounded in a quarrel, and brought home to die. I thought he would recover, but there was neither doctor nor priest at hand, an in spite of all that would could do for him he died. Let him alone now, or let a priest first be sent for; he died unconfessed and unacknowledged. No one ever knew of his existence. I had hope to spare him of the Winchester cruse that Annie and his father had succumbed to. He was buried here because I did not want to make a stir about it. Nobody knew of his death nor his existence, and we laid him down quietly; once place I thought was as good as another when once the life was out of him. We could not bare a scandal. That gasping attempt to speak, and that awful groaning—whence did they proceed? It was no living voice. Beyond that I will express no opinion on the subject. I will only say it was the means of saving my life, and at the same time putting an end to the series of bloody deeds which had been committed under my family’s name. Every year, I go to the edge of my estate and drop a pound of silver in a grave, and my prayers go up to Heaven in all sincerity!” #RandolphHarris 14 of 16
I invoke thee, and move thee, and stir thee up O Spirit Berith appear unto my eyes before the circle in the likeness of a man in the names and by the name Iah and Vau, which Adam spake and in the name of God, Agla, which Lot spake: and it was as pleasant deliverers unto him and his house and in the name Ioth which Iacob spake in the voice of the Holy ones who cast one down, and it was also as pleasant deliverers in the anger of his brother and in the name Anaphaxeton, which Aaron spake and it was as the Secret Wisdom and in the name Asher Ehyeh Oriston, which Mosheh spake, and all waters were brining forth creatures who wax strong, which lifted up unto the houses, which destroyed all things and in the name of Elion which Mosheh spake, and it was as stones from the firmament of wrath, such as was not in the ages of Time the beginning of the Earth and in the name of Adni, which Mosheh spake and there appeared creatures of Earth who destroyed what the big stones did not: and in the name Schema Amathia, which Ioshua invoked, and the Sun remained over ye, O ye hills the seats of Gibeon, and in the names Alpha and Omega which Daniel spake, and destoyed Bel and the Dragon: and in the nae Emmanuel which the sons of God sang praises in the midst of the burning plain, and flourished in conquest: and in the name Hagios, and by the Throne of Adni, and in Ischyros, Athanatos, Paracletos: and in O Theos, Ictros, Athanatos. And in these names of the secret truth, Agla, On, Tetragrammaton, do I invoke and move thee. And in these names, and all things that are the names of the God of Secret Truth who liveth for ever, the All-Powerful. I invoke and stie thee up, O’ spirit Berith. #RandolphHarris 15 of 16
Even by him who spake it was, to whom all creatures are obedient and in the Extreme Justice and Anger of God; and by the veil that is before the glory of God, mighty; and by the creatures of living breath before the Throne whose eyes are east and west; by the fire in the fire of just Glory of the Throne; by the Holy ones of Heaven; and by the secret wisdom of God, I, exalted in power, stir three up. Appear before this circle; obey in all things that I say; in the seal Basdathea Baldachia; and in this Name Primeumaton, which Mosheh spake and the Earth was divided, and Korah, Dathan, and Abiram fell in the depth. Therefore obey in all things, O Spirit Berith, obey thy creation. Come thou forth: appear into my eyes; visit us in peace, be friendly; come forth in the 24th of a moment; obey my power, speaking the secrets of Truth in voice and in understanding! I stir thee up, O Spirit Berith, in all things that are the names of glory and power of God the Great One who is greater than understanding, Adni Ihvh Tzabaoth, come forth in the 24th of a moment, let Thy dwelling-place be empty; apply thyself unto the secret truth and obey my power: appear unto my eyes, visit us in peace, speaking the secrets of truth in voice and understanding. I stir thee up and move thee, O spirit Berith, in all the names that I have said, and I add these one and sic names wherein Solomon, the lord of the secret wisdom, placed yourselves, spirits of wrath, in a vessel, Adonai, Preyai Tetragrammaton, Anaphaxeton Ineddenfatoal, Pathtomon and Itemon: appear before this circle; obey in all things my power. And as thou art he that obeys not and comes not I shall be in thy power, O God Most High that liveth for ever, who is the creator of all things n six days, Eie, Saraye, and in my power in the name Prieumaton that ruleth over the palaces of Heaven, Curse Thee, and destroy thy seat, joy, and power; and I bind thee in the depth of Abaddon, to remain until the day of judgment whose end cannot be. And I being thee in the fire of sulphur mingled with poison and the seas of fire and sulphur: come forth, therefore, obey my power and appear before this circle. Therefore come forth, therefore, obey my power and appear before this circle. Therefore come forth in the name of the Holy Ones Zabaoth, Adonia, Amioran. Come! For I am Adonai who stir thee up. #RandolphHarris 16 of 16
Winchester Mystery House
The attic spaces can get quite dark, but the lights shine through those beautiful glass panes! Come see this and more on the Explore More Tour!
Explore More Tour:
🗝️ Link in bio. winchestermysteryhouse.com
A 160-room mansion built to appease the spirits who died at the hands of the Winchester Rifle 👻
🗝 winchestermysteryhouse.com
Be Thou a Spirit of Health or Goblin Damned?
The Heaven was full of fiery shapes, Mrs. Winchester was terribly shocked by the death of her month-old baby girl; in fact, it can be well believed she never fully recovered and this surely influenced some of her eccentricities. Added to this loss was the death of her husband, William Wirt Winchester, 15 years later from Tuberculosis. On arrival in San Jose, Mrs. Winchester started remodeling the newly purchased, unfinished eight-room farm house. She found that the planning kept her grief-disturbed mind occupied and she became thoroughly enthused. Financial problems were certainly no deterrent; in the late 1880s, Mrs. Winchester brought a fortune of $20,000,000.00 ($523,635,294.12 in 2021 dollars) with her and had an average income of $1,000 ($26,181.76 in 2021 dollars) a day. Just how such precise amounts came to be public knowledge is unknown. In the period, 1881 to 1889, the dividends from her 777 shares of stock in the Winchester Company gave her an annual average income of $43,335.00 ($1,134,586.77 in 2021 dollars). It must be quickly added that upon the death of her mother-in-law in 1897, Mrs. Winchester’s holdings were increased to 2777 shares. Her lack of architectural training gave her little concern. Every morning she made the rounds with her ever patient foreman inspecting the latest progress. Some days Mrs. Winchester sketched plans on the spot using a saw-horse drawing table and any handy material, often brown wrapping paper (and used both sides). From the foreman came no argument; he had no problem of interpretation. #RandolphHarris 1 of 13
One afternoon in the mansion, a variety of circumstance concurred to being about the dreadful scene through which I was that night to pass. In the first place, I was literally overpowered with fatigue, and longing for sleep; in the next place, the effect of this extreme exhaustion upon my nerves resembled that of a narcotic, and rendered me less susceptible than, perhaps I should in any other condition have been, of the exciting fears which had become habitual to me. Then again, a little bit of the window was open, a pleasant freshness pervaded the room, and, to crown all, the cheerful sun of day was making the room quite pleasant. What was to prevent my enjoying an hour’s nap here? The whole air was resonant with the cheerful hum of life, and the broad matter-of-fact light of day filled every corner. I yielded—stifling my qualms—to the almost overpower temptation; and merely throwing off my coat, and loosening my cravat, I lay down, limiting myself to half-an-hour’s doze in the unwonted enjoyment of a feather bed, a coverlet, and a bolster. It was horribly insidious; and the demon, no doubt, marked my infatuated preparations. Dolt that I was, I fancied, with my mind and body worn out for want of sleep, and an arrear of a full week’s rest to my credit, that such measure as half-an-hour’s sleep, in such a situation, was possible. My sleep was death-like, long, and dreamless. Without a start of fearful sensation of any kind, I waked gently, but completely. It was, as you have good reason to remember, long past midnight—I believe, about two o’clock. When sleep has been deep and long enough to satisfy nature, thoroughly, one often wakens in this way, suddenly, tranquilly, and completely. #RandolphHarris 2 of 13
There was a figure seated in that lumbering, old sofa-chair, near the fireplace Its back was rather towards me, but I could not be mistaken; it turned slowly round, and merciful heavens! there was the stony face, with its infernal lineaments of malignity and despair, gloating on me. There was now no doubt as to its consciousness of my presence, and the hellish malice with which it was animated, for it arose, and drew close to the bedside. There was a rope about its neck, and the other end, coiled up, it held stiffly in its hand. My good angel nerved me for this horrible crisis. I remained for some seconds transfixed by the gaze of this tremendous phantom. He came close to the bed, and appeared on the point of mounting upon it. The next instant I was upon the floor at the far side, and in a moment more was, I do not know how, upon the lobby. However, the spell was not broken; the valley of the shadow of death was not yet traversed. The abhorred phantom was before me there; it was standing near the banisters, stooping a little, and with one end of the rope round its own neck, was poising a noose at the other, as if to throw over mine; and while engaged in this baleful pantomime, it wore a smile so sensual, so unspeakably dreadful, that my senses were nearly overpowered. I saw and remember nothing more, until I found myself in the maid’s room. I had a wonderful escape—there is no disputing that—an escape for which, while I live, I shall bless the mercy of Heaven. #RandolphHarris 3 of 13
No one can conceive or imagine what it is for flesh and blood to stand in the presence of such a thing, but one who has had the terrific experience. A shadow has passed over me—a chill has crossed my blood and marrow, and I will never be the same again—never, never! Our handmaid, a mature girl of two-and-fifty, as I have said, stayed her hand, and by little and little drew near to me, with open mouth, her brows contracted over her little, bready black eyes, till stealing a glance over her shoulder now and then, she established herself close behind us. During the relation, she had made various earnest comments, in an undertone; but these and her ejaculations, for the sake of brevity and simplicity, I have omitted in my narration. “It is often I heard tell of it,” she said, “but I never believed it rightly till now—though, indeed, why should I not? Does not my mother, down there in the lane, know quare stories, God bless us, beyant telling about it? But you ought not to have slept in the back bedroom. She was loath to le me be going in and out from that room even in the time, let alone for any Christian to spend the night in it; for sure she says it was his own bedroom.” “Whose own bedroom?” I asked, in a breath. “Why, his—the ould Judge’s—Judge John Conduit’s, to be sure, God rest his sowl”; and she looked fearfully round. “Amen!” I muttered. “But did he die there?” “Die there! No, not quite there,” she said. “Shure, was not it over bannisters he hung himself, the ould sinner, God be merciful to us all? and was not it in the alcove they found the handles of the skipping rope cut off, and the knife where he was settling the cord, God bless us, to hang himself with? #RandolphHarris 4 of 13
“It was his housekeeper’s daughter owned the rope, my mother told me, and the child never throve after, and used to be starting up out of her sleep, and screeching in the night time, wid dhrames and frights that cum an her; and they said how it was the speerit of the ould Judge that was tormentin’ her; and she used to be roaring and yelling out to hould back the big ould fellow with the crooked neck; and then she’d screech ‘Oh, the master! the master! he’s stampin’ at me, and beckoning to me! Mother, darling, don’t let me go!’ And so the poor crathure died at last, and the doctors said was marasmus, for it was all they could say.” “How long ago was all this?” I asked. “Oh, then, how would I know?” she answered. “But it must be a wondherful long time ago, for the housekeep was an ould woman, with a pipe in her mouth, and not a tooth left, and better nor eighty years ould when my mother was first married; and they said she was a rale buxom, fine-dressed woman when the ould Judge come to his end; an’, indeed, my mother’s not far from eighty years ould herself this day; and what made it worse for the unnatural ould villain, God rest his soul, to frighten the little girl out of the World the way he did, was what was mostly thought and believed by every one. My mother says the poor little crathure was his own child; for he was by all accounts an ould villain every way, an’ the hangin’ est judge that ever was known.” “From what you said about the danger of sleeping in that bedroom,” said I, “I suppose there were stories about the ghost having appeared there to others.” “Well, there was things said—quare things, surely,” she answered, as it seemed, with some reluctance. #RandolphHarris 5 of 13
“And why would not there? Sure was it not up in that same room he slept for more than twenty years? and was it not in the alcove he got the rope ready that done his own business at last, the way he done many a better man’s in his lifetime?—and was not the body lying in the same bed after death, and put in the coffin there, too, and carried out to his grave from it in St. Joseph’s Cathedral Basilica, after the coroner was done? But there was quare stories—my mother has them all—about how one Archbishop Patrick William Riordan got into trouble on the head of it. Some years later he died of pneumonia at the 1000 Fulton Street Mansion in San Francisco, California.” “And what did they say of this Archbishop Riordan?” I asked. “Oh, for that matther, it’s soon told,” she answered. And she certainly did relate a very strange story, which so piqued my curiosity, that I took occasion to visit the ancient lady, her mother, from whom I learned many very curious particulars. Indeed, I am tempted to tell the tale, but my fingers are weary, and I must defer it. But if you wish to hear it another time, I shall do my best. When I had heard the strange tale I have not told you, I put one or two further questions to her about the alleged spectral visitations, to which the house had, ever since the death of the wicked old Judge, been subjected. “No one ever Mrs. Winchester myself telling how the children used to be lifted up in the bed at night, she could not see by what mains; and how they were starting and screeching every hour, just all as one as the housekeeper’s little girl that died till at last one night poor Chadwick had a dhrop in him, the way he used now and again; and what do you think in the middle of the night he thought he heard a noise on the stairs, and being in liquor, nothing less id do him but out he must go himself to see what was wrong. #RandolphHarris 6 of 13
“Well, after that, all she ever heard of him was himself sayin’, ‘Oh, God!’ and a tumble that shook the very house; and there, sure enough, eh was laying on the lower stair, under the lobby, with his neck smashed double undher him, where he was flung over the banisters.” Then the handmaiden added—“I’ll go down the lane, and send up Hansen Solomon to pack up the rest of the taythings, and bring all the things across to your new lodgings.” And so we all sallied out together, each of us breathing more freely, I have no doubt, as we crossed that ill-omened threshold for the last time. Now, I may add thus much, in compliance with the immemorial usage of the Winchester legacy, which see the hero not only through one’s adventures, bur fairly out of the World. You must have perceived that what the flesh, blood, and bone hero of romance proper is to the regular compounder of legends, this ancient Victorian mansion of brick, wood, glass, and mortar is to the humble recorder of this true tale. Gods have different properties, due to different antecedents. The definitive book on gods and their qualities has yet to be written. Mrs. Winchester built the door to nowhere for the gods to enter. However, a human being has the key—the big key. The all-important key. The long-lost secret key that lets a human talk to the gods, command them, bring them down to Earth. Solomon’s key. A man gets that key, he be stronger than the gods. You do not want to mess with that key stuff. #RandolphHarris 7 of 13
Remember that persons skeptical of witchcraft did not doubt the practice of it, but only whether or not it worked, or worked through spiritual means. Thus the skeptic John Webster, in his Displaying of Supposed Witchcraft, was willing to concede that there were witches and devils who “have power to perform strange things.” However, he spent his twelfth chapter on the question “whether they do not bring the to pass by mere natural means.” What was at issues here was the reality of the spiritual World, the “invisible World,” as Dr. Mather called it. The controversy over witchcraft, therefore, raised theological issues fundamental to the seventeenth-century Christian. “We shall come to have no Christ but a light within, and no Heaven but a frame of Mind,” said Dr. Mather, if the materialists—the Saducees—should succeed in destroying the belief in an invisible World. Whatever one’s own belief, or lack of it, one has to admit that he was right. In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries scientific materialism was to triumph, and the pious were to find that all the concreteness had left their religion, leaving nothing behind but a “light within” and a “frame of mind.” Conceive, then, of Dr. Mather’s excitement. At a time which he recognized to be a crisis in the history of religious belief he had discovered a clear case of witchcraft which he thought could not possibly be explained on material grounds. He made it the central matter of his Memorable Providences (1689), a book which he hoped might once and for all confute materialism and reestablish Christianity on the firm foundation of a real and concrete spiritual World. #RandolphHarris 8 of 13
The book met with considerable success. Richard Baxter, one of the most distinguished English Puritans, wrote a laudatory preface to the first London edition, and in Baxter’s own Certainty of the World of Spirits (1691) he spoke of it as the ultimate proof of the existence of a spiritual World. Any doubter, he said, “that will read…Mr. Cotton Mather’s book of the witchcrafts in New England may see enough to any incredulity that pretendeth to be rational.” The four or so cases we have reviewed over the past few weeks confirm in detail what we have seen to be true in general. Accusations of witchcraft were continual among common people, so continual that Dr. Cotton Mather took time in his “Discourse” to warn his congregation sharply against them “Take heed that you do not wrongfully accuse any other person of this horrid and monstrous evil…What more dirty reproach than that of witchcraft can there be? Yet it is most readily cast upon worthy persons when there is hardly a shadow of any reason for it. An ill look or a cross word will make a witch with many people who may on more ground be counted so themselves. There has been a fearful deal of injury done in this way in this town to the good name of the most credible persons in it. Persons of more goodness and esteem than any of their calumnious abusers have been defamed for witches about this country—a country full of lies.” However, the charges of irresponsible accusers were checked by the responsibility of the community’s leaders, the ministers and magistrates. They had been reluctant to act in Mrs. Hibbins’ case. #RandolphHarris 9 of 13
At Groton, Mr. Willard’s investigation had been so careful that two accusations of witchcraft were retracted and the case never brought to court, on the ground that it was possession rather than witchcraft. At Hartford a confessor and her husband had been hanged and at Boston a confessor, but in both instances, although more persons were accused, the individual case did not develop into a witch hunt. There were other individual convictions, but they were outnumbered by the acquittals. For example, the records of the Court of Assistants show that in 1662 Eunice Cole of Hampton was found not guilty as indicated, although there was “just ground of vehement suspicion.” In 1666 John Godfrey of Salem was discharged as not legally guilty, although there were again grounds for suspicion. (Mr. Godfrey seems to have been a thorough reprobate; at various times he was convicted of stealing, swearing, drunkenness, and suborning witnesses.) In 1637 Anna Edmunds was acquitted and her accusers order to pay charges. In 1675 Mary Parsons of Northampton was found not guilty, in 1681 Mary Hale of Boston, and in 1683 Mary Webster of Hadley. Also in 1683 James Fuller of Springfield, who had confessed but then retracted his confession, was found not guilty but was whipped and fined for “his wicked and pernicious willful lying and continuance in it until now, putting the country to so great a change.” #RandolphHarris 10 of 13
In All the American colonies during the seventeenth century there were fewer than fifty executions for witchcraft, and excluding Salem there were fewer than thirty. This is a genuinely exemplary record, considerably superior to Europe for intelligence and restraint. Before the Glover case a part of this restraint may have proceeded from the New Englander’s conviction that he belonged to a chosen people. God, many thought, would not permit Satan to afflict the elect. The Devil might appear among “the wigwams of Indians, where the pagan Powaws often raise their masters in the shapes of bear and snakes and fires,” but there would be a few demonic terrors in the New Jerusalem. This belief was shattered by the events of 1688. Goodwife Glover had demonstrated clearly that witchcraft did exist in Massachusetts, and witchcraft of the most serious and dangerous sort. The Devil was abroad in Zion, seeking whom he might devour. When the Devil broke forth again, at Salem Village in 1692, he was not immediately recognized. “When these calamities first began,” wrote the Reverend Samuel Parris, “which was in my own family, the affliction was several weeks before such hellish operations as witchcraft were suspected. A quack doctor, who called himself William Griggs, moved into my family home, and catastrophe ultimately befell it. He filled the parlour widow with bottle of indescribable horrors preserved in brandy, and the fairly new concept in the American colonies called the newspaper with the usual grandiloquent and mendacious mix of local social and culture news. #RandolphHarris 11 of 13
“This gentleman among his virtues did not reckon sobriety, and one night, being overcome with much wine, he set fire to his bed curtains, partially burned himself, and totally consumed the hose. It was afterwards rebuilt, and for a time an undertaker established himself in the premises. I fear some young persons, through vain curiosity to know their future condition, have tampered with the Devil’s tools so far that hereby one door was opened to Satan to play those pranks, Anno 1692. I knew one of the afflicted persons who (as I was credibly informed) did try with an egg and a glass to find her future husband’s calling [id est, occupation], till there came up a coffin, that is, a specter in likeness of a coffin. And she was afterward followed with diabolical molestation to her death, and so died a single person—a just warning to others to take heed of handling the Devil’s weapons lest they get a wound thereby. Another, I was called to pray with, being under sore fits and vexations of Satan. And upon examination I found that she had tried the same charm, and after her confession of it and manifestation of repentance for it, and our praters to God for her, she was speedily released from those bonds of Satan.” As human beings, we interact with the environment around us and affect it through our bodies as extensions of our minds. However, the thing is, we are never satisfied with the simplistic nature of these interactions. We are aware of limitations of our human nature and that has always been a driving force for us as a race to look for other ways to affect our environment in a more impactful way. #RandolphHarris 12 of 13
Witchcraft is another way, a “tool” if you will, to impact the environment in a way so unique that simple, everyday folk like us cannot wrap our minds around it. It surpasses the wonders of mechanics as there is no external connection, the power of witchcraft extends from an internal World, bypassing the need to learn complex machinery or spend years labouring over physics and math textbooks. Alongside the innovation we traditionally ascribe to the Victorian period, was an older, persistent belief in the supernatural. Although the laws against witchcraft had been repealed in 1736, folklore continued to be active and potent force in everyday life. Many people believe that supernatural forces are what compelled Mrs. Winchester, at a cost of $5,000,000.00 ($171, 188, 461.51 in 2021 dollars) alone spent on materials to build the Winchester mansion with 10,000 windows, nine kitchens, and 47 fireplaces built of rosewood, cherry, mahogany, Italian marble, oak, teak, and pipestone; all hand carved, and no two alike. Construction went on for 38 years. At one point the mansion was as high as nine stories, had 200 rooms, and was 50,000 square feet. Once an enterprising young realtor leaked the rumor to Mrs. Winchester’s servants that across the road (now Stevens Creek Chevrolet) an investor was planning to build an Inn. “Saloon” was the word in those says. Mrs. Winchester quickly purchased the property at an exorbitant figure. Of course this was a false alarm but it brought her holdings to 160 acres. In the book of life, blessing, peace, and ample sustenance, may we, together with all Thy people, the house of America, be remembered and inscribed before Thee for a happy life and for peace. Blessed art Thou, O Lord who establishest peace. #RandolphHarris 13 of 13
A 160-room mansion built to appease the spirits who died at the hands of the Winchester Rifle 👻 🗝 winchestermysteryhouse.com
Randolph Harris II International Institute 