S19 Ep1: Ghosts of Gettysburg and other Civil War Battles (Sn. 19 Ep. 1)
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How do you make an Airbnb a Vrbo? Picture a vacation rental with a host who's showing you every room like you've never seen a house before. Now get rid of them. There you go. No host ever. Now it's a Vrbo. Make it a Vrbo. Good evening and welcome to Monsters Among Us. I am your guide, Derek Hayes.

Who made it, folks? This is the official kickoff of Season 19, which I'm already labeling our best season ever. Just you wait and see. And to kick things off here this evening, I have a special episode that'll send you ghost enthusiasts into a tizzy, and it'll send you history buffs into something else altogether, because you're both going to be pleased with the theme of tonight's season premiere episode.

Now I get a lot of calls about a lot of places, but none nearly as often as I hear about the location of tonight's deep dive. An infamous battleground that hosted one of the bloodiest days in U.S. history. A location near a tiny town in southern Pennsylvania. A rolling field where 33,000 men were seriously injured or maimed. A battleground where some 7,000 souls were taken from Wednesday, July 1st

To Friday, July 3rd, 1863. Tonight, we're talking all about Gettysburg. The battle that took place there. And the Civil War that spurred on that engagement. We'll be discussing ghosts and psychic experiences. Haunted houses. And even time slips. And we're going to kick it all off with a story from Kate. From Warehouse. But the state of Pennsylvania. Pennsylvania.

Hi Derek, my name is Kate from Pennsylvania. I have quite a few stories from when I was a ghost tour guide in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, and I thought I would share one with you guys today.

So I had a tour out and we would go to three locations. And one of the locations was a bridge that was notoriously very haunted. I had lots of experiences there. I'm very skeptical myself, but I can't really explain a lot of the things that happened. Anyway, so one night I was out and I was with this family.

I had set up my laptop because we had like a voice recorder EVP type thing on the laptop and it kept turning off on its own and it was fully charged. So I was kind of getting this weird feeling that I shouldn't be there that night. And I felt pretty comfortable there. I was there almost every night leading tours.

But this night, I just felt a really weird presence and didn't feel super comfortable there. I really wanted to leave, but I was leading a tour and I can't tell these people that I'm scared. They're a tour guide of exactly what they're there to experience. So I just kind of wrote it off and was like, okay, it's fine.

But my computer just kept turning itself off. So I just kind of played into that and was like, oh, could you please stop messing with my computer? I'd really appreciate it if you would stop doing that, please. And the family was like eating that up, you know. And then all of a sudden, my laptop slammed shut completely on its own. Nobody was touching it.

And so again, I was leading a tour and I couldn't run screaming. So I opened it back up and I said, oh, please don't do that. I'd really appreciate it if you didn't shut my laptop. And I just pretended to laugh it off, even though inside I was freaking out. And then my laptop like moved really fast, like three inches towards me.

So I said, okay, I guess you don't want my laptop to be here tonight. And I put the laptop away. Then we got out some other equipment and we moved around and we talked on the bridge a little bit. Eventually I did say to the family, I'm so sorry. I'm just feeling this really weird presence here tonight. It really feels like

something doesn't want us here. And the family at the same time was like, oh my God, thank you so much. I'm so glad you said that. We are really uncomfortable. We really want to leave here. So we did and we went to the next location. But it was interesting that everybody was getting the same vibe from this place that I was at very frequently. I never really felt quite like that. But something was definitely telling us that it wanted us to leave. And when I got home that night and I opened up

my bag to go through all of my equipment and change out batteries and stuff. There was this huge wolf spider just sitting on all of my equipment, which is not paranormal in the least, but it just added to the total creep out factor that I just felt very uncomfortable that night. And there was definitely a different presence there than normal. So I love your show. Thanks so much. Bye, Derek.

Thank you, Kate, for kicking us off here this evening. A ghost encounter on a ghost tour. Surprisingly, I don't think that happens all that often. But of course, it would happen in a place like Gettysburg. Now, the news channel CNBC ranked Gettysburg as the second most haunted city or town in America, right behind the infamously haunted Savannah, Georgia. And as Kate had mentioned,

Like any good haunted town, Gettysburg, too, has its ghost tours. Now here's a little of what you might expect from one of these tours, courtesy of WPMT, Vox 43, out of Harrisburg.

Calling on fans of all things spooky, ghostly and haunted. If you're lucky enough and you're active, you're taking enough photographs, you spend enough time in Gettysburg, you will see something eventually. This spooky season, book yourself a tour with Gettysburg Ghost Tours to learn about the haunted past of the Civil War town. You're going to go out to a couple of different locations, walk around, talk about the history of that location, what happened there and why some of the spirits might still be hanging around because of it.

Some locations you will genuinely start to feel something that's not normal. It's a place filled with ghostly and haunted history. The day the battle happened, we have diary entries of soldiers talking about seeing ghosts here. And if you're lucky, you may get a chance to see the paranormal yourself. We call it a lot like fishing.

And so I cannot absolutely 100% guarantee that you are going to see something while you're on the tour. However, we take you to the best stops, we give you the best bait, and we tell you exactly how to cast a line, and we will give you the best opportunity you are going to get to try and see activity as you walk around. I think it goes without saying, if you find yourself in Gettysburg, you'd best take the tour.

Now I'll be right back with more stories from not only Gettysburg, but a few other Civil War stories peppered in there as well. So don't touch that dial. Now when you picture spring cleaning, do you also think about cleaning out your sock drawer?

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Now as I was assembling this episode, I realized I'd likely be a couple of calls short of a full show. Now I have a lot of these Gettysburg entries, but apparently not enough to round it out. And as a result, I've decided to pepper in a few other stories that involve the American Civil War as well. So let's share one of those right now.

From parts unknown, please welcome this stranger to tonight's program. Hey, Derek. So, this takes place in central Kentucky, kind of middle of nowhere, small town. You know, some small Civil War battles happened around here, so I really think this is part of that. Growing up, my grandma lived in a house that had three apartments in it and a really creepy, dirty basement and a bug problem for years.

Every few nights, she would wake up and hear arguing, like right outside of her window, which the bed was right across the room, and it was a small room. She would hear arguing, a scuffle, a gunshot, a thump, and then dragging. And she would hear that every few nights for the few years that she lived there.

probably three, four, five years. I was really little, around like first, second grade. So I don't know exactly how long she lived there. We used to trade stories about things we've seen, things we thought, and that was the one that always stuck with me. There was a lot of other things that happened in that apartment. She really thought it was spheres of Civil War soldiers meeting each other at an opportune time, you might say. So, all right, thanks.

Thank you, caller, for ringing in. Now, there were a number of battles in the Bluegrass State, like our caller had mentioned, but many of them were much smaller skirmishes. But there was one battle that amassed nearly 1,400 deaths on a hot, dry October morning back in 1862, nine full months before Gettysburg, an engagement now known as the Battle of Perrysville.

And coincidentally, this battle took place right smack dab in the center of the state, exactly where our caller had mentioned the odd activity originates from. So does that prove anything? I doubt it. But knowing that a battle did take place near there, at the very least, leaves the door open for some validation. So thank you again, caller, for sharing that entry.

Now, folks, if you have a story you would like to share here on the program, a true story, give our hotline a call at 888-608-NIGHT. That's 888-608-N-I-G-H-T. Or shoot me a voice memo to MonstersAmongUsPodcast at gmail.com. Regardless of how you reach out to us, we cannot wait to hear from you. Now, next up, we venture back to South Central Pennsylvania, where Ocean lives.

is waiting with a story. Hey, I'm Ocean. I am from Pennsylvania. So when I went to Gettysburg, it was pretty scary. Actually, I wasn't that scared, but we got a ghost hunting team on site and it was my birthday when I went. I was turning 11. This was actually stories from a few people who went there.

But before I tell you about what I saw, I'm gonna give you some backstory on the ghost. So the ghost is actually somewhere around her 70s, and she portrays herself as a 45-year-old woman named Margaret. She's a nice ghost, not one of those very mean ones, but hey, enough backstory, let's get to the experience.

So what happened is that I was at the stove, I was just kind of walking around the kitchen and stuff, and the stove started turning on and off, on explicitly, for no reasoning. And it just turned on and off, like one burner turned on and then another burner, and eventually it stopped.

Now, let's go on to my grandfather's side. So what he saw was a full body apparition. He was walking in the hallway with one of the owner's cats, and he and the cat saw a full body apparition of a little girl that appeared for a second, then disappeared. The girl appeared right in front of the two in the hallway. The cat and my grandfather just looked at each other like, what the heck did I just see?

Thank you, Ocean.

I would love to see those images. MonstersAmongUsPodcast at gmail.com if you happen to have them. And of course, if I do receive them, I'll be sure to put them up in the show notes. And this is yet another testament of just how creepy that place can be. And we will certainly touch more on that as this episode progresses further. But first, another Civil War story. This time, from Gavin in the Mitten State.

Hey, Derek. This is Gavin from Petoskey, Michigan. And I have a really strange sighting. I don't know exactly what it was, but I believe you might have an idea. So it was maybe three months ago. I'm 18, for reference. I just got back from a trip to Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, the famous battleground. And as I was in the camper, I was trying to go to sleep, and I feel like something...

Get in the camper. It's really weird. Like, you can feel the whole camper move for a second. I know it's not my grandparents because they're outside and they usually slam the door. But no door slamming, nothing. I just feel the whole camper shake a little bit. And also that same day, I had bought a Civil War-era bullet.

They were fired and I had them in my hat next to me on my bed. I was just kind of looking at them before I went to bed, but anyways, that's neither here nor there. But then after I felt this thing get into our little area, I looked to my left and turned my head so I know it's not sleep paralysis. There's this old uniform with brass buttons. It was kind of like a grayish blue almost. And there was this guy wearing

He had this really big beard, really big eyebrows. He was a really interesting looking guy. But the thing that was weird about him is that he had a hat and it was like a Calvary officer's hat. It was like put up on one side. The weird thing is where his arms were, on his left arm, he was just missing from the shoulder down. And then his right arm was perfectly fine. Same with his legs.

The really weird thing is that where his arm was supposed to be, where his shoulder ended, where his left arm should have been, it was like covered in, I don't want to say blood, but covered in something. I couldn't identify what, but, and I look at this thing, the thing looks at me, it's trying to say something, I don't know what it's trying to say, it must not have been a good thing, it walked away, and it kind of went, sigh, and I had like a really deep sigh, and

So thank you for listening.

Have a good one, and thank you, Derek. Thank you, Gavin, for calling in. You just might have unlocked a whole new level to all of these Civil War hauntings. The act of bringing artifacts home. Artifacts that just might have something or someone attached to them. Now, for the record, if you were to find an artifact somewhere along the battlefields of Gettysburg, you cannot keep it.

But I do believe they suggest contacting a ranger to come take a look at it. They do a pretty good job over there of preserving everything for the next generations. But I should point out that Gavin mentioned that he purchased his mini-balls, one of the most popular style of bullets used in the Civil War. But does that safeguard you from any sort of attachment to the trauma and tragedy of the war?

Now, if you would like to test that theory yourself, you can still buy a genuine Civil War mini-ball on eBay for something like $10. There's a link in the show notes. But regardless of how or why the spirit was there, Gavin, it sure sounded like you saw something to me. The description was spot on, down to the hardy hat that the entity was said to be wearing, a sort of wide-brimmed hat with one side that sticks straight up.

Think of Robin Williams as Theodore Roosevelt in Night at the Museum. He wears a similar hat as that character. And the hardy hat was indeed used in the Civil War, worn primarily by Confederate 1st and 2nd Cavalry regiments. It was a hat popular during those times. And that bluish-gray color that Gavin described the Spectre as having, well, that falls in line with the color that most Confederate soldiers wore during the war.

So either you had one hell of a realistic dream, Kevin, or you saw the genuine article. Either way, thank you again, sir, for calling in. Thankfully, spring is finally in the air. And know what's not in the air at my house? The smell of a stinky litter box.

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Now Gavin is not the only one to have laid eyes on one of these Civil War spirits. JB in Texas, too, had a similar experience. Hi, my name is JB. I live in Central Texas. I was about eight years old and I was visiting relatives in East Tennessee.

We were staying at my aunt and uncle's house. They just built this house up in the mountains. In the middle of the night, I got real thirsty and I woke up. I guess I woke up from the thirst. And this is probably 3 o'clock in the morning. I went downstairs and went in the kitchen and got a glass out of the cabinet and filled it up at the sink. And so I stepped back and was just sitting there drinking the water. There was a window right above the sink. And I looked up...

And there, standing in the window, was a man with a crinkled-up looking hat on and a big old black beard and long, kind of scraggly looking hair. And he just had this blank look on his face and just staring at me. Of course, I freaked out. I dropped the glass, screamed, running upstairs.

I got my uncle. My uncle actually worked at a prison at the time. He was a big, big man, like 6'6", 300 pounds, big guy. I was crying. I was hysterical, really. I was telling him what I saw, and he was like, wait a minute, wait a minute. What did you see? And I said, Uncle Ben, there was a man standing outside of the kitchen window right above the sink looking at me. And I explained what it looked like. He's like, JB, come with me.

And so we walked around outside, we put our slippers on and walked around the side. I'd never been to this house before, so I didn't realize this, but when we walked out, we walked out the front door, walked on the side of the house. The house was on the side of a mountain. When I'd gotten there that evening, it was already dark and I didn't get a chance to see really around the house. Well, he walked around and pointed it to me and the kitchen window was on the second floor. It was two stories up. There was no way someone could have been standing there.

Thank you, JB.

You know, there were a handful of Civil War battles that occurred within the confines of the Lone Star State. A few of the major engagements were the Battle of Galveston, the Battle of Sabine Pass, and the Battle of Palmetto Ranch, so we can at least put soldiers in the area. But a harder pill to swallow would be the fact that the Ghost, or whatever this was, was floating about 10 to 12 feet off of the ground.

Now that could suggest that the ground was much higher around 160 years ago. Or that there was once a structure of some sort that would have been used while the soldier was living. Or perhaps it's as simple as ghosts can fly. Whatever the hell you saw that night, JP, we can't thank you enough for sharing the details about it here with us. Thank you again for making the call. Now, back to Gettysburg we go by way of Garrett.

from the Keystone State. Hey Derek, this is Garrett from South Carolina. I grew up in southwest Pennsylvania and my family decided we wanted to take a trip down to Gettysburg for the weekend. Nothing super special about it. I, at the time, am probably four or five years old. So I remember this trip happening. I remember some of the events of it.

I don't remember all of the events, so my dad has since retold this story a few times, though. So starting from what I remember, we were in Gettysburg. We were staying in a hotel off a main road there. Some point in the middle of the night, I woke up and I heard what sounded like a bunch of cannon wheels or carriage wheels, metal wheels of some sort, rolling down the road.

Again, four or five, so imagination just probably running wild. But it really sounded like, holy ****, I hear like an army marching right by outside. Odd that that really happened. Some to none. My dad doesn't remember that, but in my memory, I remember talking to my dad about that. What we really do remember, though, or what my dad really remembers, and my mom as well,

We were in a little pull-off overlooking a battlefield, just kind of a thing that has a little plaque. Here's what happened at this particular skirmish in the larger battle that was the fight for Gettysburg. And kind of out of nowhere, a soldier comes up to us. He's dirty and disheveled. I know my dad said, I'm not sure if he was Union or Confederate. He looks like he's dressed really historically correct.

He's a really good reenactor. And he's really playing the part. She walks up to us and he's like, oh man, they're giving us hell today. That's what my dad explicitly remembers him telling us. And then she went into detail about what was happening that specific day of the fight. At least that he was reenacting, trying up the air quotes there.

What he was telling us, though, was not auxiliary information to what was on the plaque right there. It was not about this specific battle. I guess it was about a separate day in the larger fight for Gettysburg. And so it was really cool. My dad is a huge history buff, so he was just loving it.

And then eventually he points to some house or tree. I don't know. He points to something and we all look over there and he's explaining it to us. And he eventually stops talking. We're still looking at whatever it was that he tried to get us to look at. Then we turn around and the dude is just gone. Apparently both my mom and my dad, and I would imagine me and my brother also really looked kind of everywhere for this guy. Like where the hell did he go?

That was impressive. Until we realized, like, dude, we're standing in a parking lot. We're the only car there. And it's just grass all around. Like, there's a little tree here and there. But, I mean, it's going to get there in five seconds or less. So my dad is rather convinced that this was a ghost at Gettysburg explaining what was happening on some specific day in the fight. Which is really cool.

but not anything out of the ordinary for Gettysburg. As you know, that's kind of what it's known for. But it's just cool to have that experience, especially for my dad. Yeah. Thank you, Aiden. Thank you, Garrett. Now, you touched on something there that I've heard in other experiences in and around the area. Reports of a ghostly soldier communicating with present-day park visitors. In fact, there is a very famous story that details just such an encounter.

In fact, it was even featured on an episode of Unsolved Mysteries. Many of the ghosts have been reported by Civil War buffs known as reenactors. Dressed in period costumes, they restage the epic battle of Gettysburg blow by blow. Ray Hawk says he and a friend were taking a break from one of these mock skirmishes when they were approached by a haggard figure too realistic to be just another reenactor. I think I've seen a ghost.

I think this guy had original equipment on, original coat. Everything to me points out that it was original. Earl McCoy. He smelled-- he smelled extremely bad of sulfur. And he really looked tired and hollow-looking in the face and stuff. All right day, huh, boys? Yeah, it was. ROBERT STACK : Ray says a soldier handed them each two authentic-looking cartridges. When they looked up, the mysterious visitor had vanished. Where'd he go?

I simply don't know where he got to. I have no clue. This is one of the four rounds that he gave myself and my friend. Live ammunition hasn't been allowed at Gettysburg for a hundred years, but according to Ray Hawk, a university expert determined that the cartridges, powder and all, were genuine Civil War issue. Vintage 1863.

Now that clip was from season 8 episode 13 and a free link to the full episode can be found in tonight's show notes. So go watch the entire segment if you dare. And thank you again Garrett for calling in that all too familiar story. Now folks this next story keeps us in the Gettysburg area but comes to us from the land of enchantment. Please join me in welcoming Gabby to tonight's program.

Hey Derek, this is Gabby Berlante from Los Cruces, New Mexico. New fan of the show and I'm slowly working my way backwards. I just want to say so far that I really like it. I want to tell you about experience that I had with the ghosts of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. I've been there twice, but this was my first visit. So that was 2002. I think I was 13 and I was with my family.

So there's one place in Gettysburg that you kind of have to take a look at. It's the Jenny Wade House. And the Jenny Wade House is where the only civilian death during the battle actually happened. Her name was Jenny Wade. She was baking bread for the soldiers, I think. And somehow a sniper's bullet hit her.

found its way through the door of her kitchen and she was shot by that bullet. She was the only civilian death of the Battle of Gettysburg. There's been a lot of investigations there, as I understand, but the day we went there, it was kind of a warm, muggy day, afternoon-ish, I want to say. We didn't get a chance to go in because I think it was closed for renovations or something.

Well, we went around to the door where you can still see the bullet hole that killed her. Matter of fact, there were a few bullet holes. So I kind of lingered after everyone else went away. I thought, just as a little fun thing, I bent down and I peeked through the hole and I could see into the kitchen. I couldn't help but think that it was really sad that she had died just doing something that she was helping people with. All of a sudden,

I don't know if it was a bug or if it could have been something else. I felt something whiz past my ear, like very small. Suddenly I saw it looked like someone fell to the floor. My first thought was, oh no, is there someone in there? Is there an employee? Here's the thing. The skirt did not look like modern 21st century skirt.

It looked like one of the old-timey skirts that you see people wearing these days. I also realized that the skirt looked identical to the statue of Jenny Wade that's right out there in front of the house. So pretty much, I ran away from that door as fast as my legs could carry me and

Thank you, Gabby.

Now the Jenny Wade House is near the top when it comes to haunted locations in the actual town of Gettysburg. A few of the others being the Gettysburg Orphanage, the Dobbin House Inn, and Saks Covered Bridge. All places that I have no doubt you'll hit if you take one of those infamous ghost tours. But if you're not or you won't be in the area, I've linked to the Wikipedia page on this story.

There you can not only see a photo of her home as it was, but you can see a photo of Jenny herself, taken during better times. So go take a look. And of course, if you're in South Central Pennsylvania, go visit the Wade House yourself, because you never know, you might just bump into Jenny. As it appears, Gabby has done. Thank you again, Gabby, for sharing your tale with us. If what you're saying...

How do you think things play out her rookie season? How do you make an Airbnb a Verbo? Picture a vacation rental with a host who's showing you every room like you've never seen a house before. Now get rid of them. There you go. No host ever. Now it's a Verbo. Make it a Verbo. All right, listeners. This next entry can be best described as chilling. Please welcome Shelby from Parts Unknown.

Hey there, my name is Shelby and the stories I'm about to tell you actually happened in Helena, Arkansas. If you look up Helena, Arkansas, you will find out it's right on the Mississippi River and there was a battle of Helena during the Civil War and that is relevant to these stories.

Helena actually has four different batteries, which means these were places where cannons were set up. One of my friends in high school actually lived by one of these batteries. They're called like battery parks. He lived behind Battery D. And I know when we were in high school, which has been well over 10 years, they actually found Confederate caskets back there. So anyways, yeah, big Confederate town.

But this is actually one of my mom's co-worker stories. Her co-worker lived out in this big house in a field in Helena. And it's a married couple and a son. Her mother-in-law came over one day while she wasn't home. And she called Miss Tina and she was like, hey, you rearranged everything. And she's like, what are you talking about? Like, I haven't rearranged furniture.

And she's like, yeah, everything is like shifted to a different place. It's like completely different than you had it this morning. And she was like, what do you mean? So anyways, she came home and the furniture was indeed in different places than where it was originally put. So they put all the furniture back and that was the first time. So the second time Tina herself actually came home and when she opened the door, the living room, it was like a time slip.

Everything was 19th century furniture. Like the entire place looked like it just came out of a Civil War era house. And it really freaked her out. So what do you do? You just freaking leave. Nobody else was home at the time and she did. And when she came back home, everything was back to what it was. The last instance in this house, it was something that happened to her son. He was in the shower and...

Something kept poking at the shower curtain, you know, everybody's worst nightmare. And he thought that somebody was home and just messing with him. I actually think a few friends had been over prior, and that's why he thought it was someone he knew. Anyways, he finally just, like, pulled back the curtain. He was like, stop. And there was a Confederate soldier that was absolutely mangled, holding one of the Confederate swords, and the room was completely bloody.

And he freaked out, somehow got the courage to leave the room. And when he got his mom, came back and everything was fine. The last one is my story. I was in grade school and I had a babysitter. This babysitter was 16. Her mom was like super duper religious. Like they didn't miss church at all. And I think that has a lot to do with this. So anyways, we're sitting on a couch one summer and all of a sudden I see this man in a black cloak.

It reminds me of like Calivar from Halloween Town. He comes from one side of a wall and rushes into another side of the wall. Like you see the profile, he has a black cloak and there's a lot of black mist. And the girl that's babysitting like looks at me and she goes, did you see that? And I was like, yeah. So I don't know if the girl's ever missed with the Ouija board or anything just because everything was so uptight, you know, in that house. But yeah.

Anyway, to continue my Confederate soldier stuff, I have an uncle that used to be on the Memphis Fire Department. He had a piece of land about an hour and a half outside Memphis. I really don't recall where it was. I remember going there one summer. I was about nine years old. And I just had the worst feelings there. Like, I did not like being there. I mean, I was a skittish child, but this was like...

I felt heavy. I remember my mom telling me, "Oh, we should go back." And I was like, "No, let's not." But anyway, one of my uncle's coworkers, who was also a fireman, stayed up there to go hunting. It was also private hunting land, and my uncle had a stocked pond. Everything was pretty much going normal. And apparently one morning he woke up to the smell of smoke.

He went outside and he's like, what is going on? It was apparently a very heavy smell. And he comes up and turns the corner. He looked to the right over near where the pond is. It's kind of elevated. And he said that he saw a man in full Confederate soldier attire with a pipe in his mouth.

and smoking that pipe, he could see him. It was almost like there was no transparency or anything. It was like a human was just standing right there. And he tipped his hat and waved to this fireman and said,

Apparently this fireman was very big, very burly, not the type that you would think would air very easily. And being a fireman, you see a lot of stuff too. But he got the hell out of there. He sure did. Funny enough, you know, smell of smoke and whatnot, that place did burn down eventually. I'm not sure what happened. It was not intentional. It was probably electrical. But yeah, thanks for the podcast. Keep it up. Thanks. Thank you, Shelby.

Now sadly, the Battle of Helena saw over 230 deaths, 173 from the Confederate side and 57 from the Union. So there was plenty of bloodshed there that could manifest itself into a haunting of some sort, I suppose, if that is how all of this works, of course. And perhaps the house featured in this story just so happens to sit directly on one of these historically important pieces of land.

a battle site if you will and when shelby mentioned the civil war time slip it instantly took me back to another story that i've heard many many times and i believe even explored on an early episode of this program but this time i have the source material now i first saw this when i was likely a young teenager and the story has stuck with me to this day

So from season 3 episode 24 of the popular 90s television series Sightings I present to you the Pennsylvania Hall time slip story. This is Pennsylvania Hall during the battle it was used by both sides as a hospital. Two administrators went down the elevator

Punched the button for the first floor. It didn't work properly. They went to the basement instead. The doors opened to reveal not a scene that was cleaned up for storage, but a scene out of time and reason, a hospital scene from the time of the battle. They punched frantically at the buttons to get them out of this hell that they had descended into. Punching the buttons and eventually got up out of there.

Could you imagine opening an elevator door to a gruesome scene such as that? The pain, the anguish, probably the smell. It's no wonder that this story has stuck with me for some 35 years. And it's no wonder that your story, Shelby, very quickly reminded me of that.

So thank you again, Shelby, for not only sharing the story, but for offering a little segue into one of my favorite stories from this tragic event. Now, folks, I need to take one more break. But when I come back, we'll explore what happens when you build your house over one of these significant locations. I'll be right back. That is a tough question. I still think she... I don't care. I want this thing worked out now.

Now before I share that story I just teased you with, I have another I'd like to share with you tonight. From Parts Unknown, please welcome tonight's second anonymous caller to these airwaves. Hi Derek, I wanted to tell you about my 1999 trip to Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.

I now reside in Pennsylvania. But at the time, I lived in Chicago. But me and my two best friends, Kat and Carol, we decided we were going to go to Gettysburg. We had been there probably about 97, and we always wanted to go back. So we did. It was around Halloween. I would say it was probably the 27th or the 28th.

It wasn't completely cold. It wasn't rainy, but it was overcast. And we were in the triangle field. As we were walking down, we each kind of split off. I went straight down back where there's a rock. Kathy went off to my right from the gate and Carol went off to the left. Now, Kathy, when she was down over towards the right, she heard muttering.

Like people talking, there was hardly anyone on the field. I think we may have seen like seven people the entire day. But she thought she heard whispering. And then she thought she smelled fire, like a campfire. Again, this is autumn. It's Gettysburg and they do burn leaves and stuff down there. But my experience was amazing.

I don't know exactly how to describe it. Anyway, so I was going down right where the rock is, down at the bottom of the pass. And as I got there, I started to get swamped with emotions. Like, I was scared, but I could tell it wasn't me feeling it, but I was scared. I was angry, and I didn't understand why.

what was going on. And then I felt a pain in my left leg up right near my hip bone and my thigh. And the pain was overwhelming. I had been shot before. That is exactly what it felt like. And I just remember I wanted to see my family again. Anyway, I felt very, very swamped with emotions.

It's definitely something that has stuck with me for years. Anyway, when we were coming home, we were driving in the car and I happened to look over at Kathy and realized that she was wearing a dark blue shirt. And I looked down and I was wearing a light gray shirt.

It wasn't done on purpose. It was coincidental, you know, it's what we had because we were here on vacation. But yeah, what makes us more interesting is the fact that every year since then, somewhere between the 2nd and the 4th of July,

Thank you, caller. What an intense experience. It's almost as if she was invaded or possessed by one of these fallen soldiers.

Or she simply put herself in these young men's weathered, worn, and blood-filled shoes. Whatever the cause, it makes for an incredible tale. And it makes a good case as to why you should try to visit this national military park. I've yet to do so myself, but it's certainly a high priority. Now folks, before we duck out of here, I have one more Civil War-related story to elate you with.

Hi, my name is Tammy and I am from Missouri and I live on the land that I grew up on my entire life.

It's approximately 80 acres, and it goes over from Missouri into the Kansas side. And our house that we live in now, we built over 20 years ago. My daughter was pretty young, probably three or four years old when we built this house. And when they were digging our basement, they came to solid rock, and they told us to be able to go any further, they would need the dynamite to go down.

Well, we know that there is a cave that runs all underneath our property that is known as the Ku Klux Klan cave. So we didn't want to blast out the rocks, mainly because of money. And so we decided that we would just build our basement at that depth. So they didn't blast any of the rock out because we figured it was the top of the cave. So we built our house.

And my daughter was probably three or four years old. And she started talking to what she said was a little boy that stayed in her room. She would say she was going to go talk to him or she would tell us that she was talking to him. When we would walk in and she'd be talking to someone and we would be like, who are you talking to? And she would say that it was a little boy that lived in her closet. She also would tell us about a man that walked back and forth on the deck

right outside of her room. She would describe what he was wearing and it was, I'm guessing, maybe like not corduroy but some kind of material like that he had on pants and a vest that matched the same color brown and was maybe canvas material or something, I don't know, that she described to him. So it sounded kind of like older clothes from way back. And she would talk about this guy that would walk back and forth on the deck

We really didn't think anything about it. We just thought her imagination. Then she started telling us about this nun and she was afraid of the nun. She would tell us stories about seeing her when she'd be outside or around our house and she didn't ever want to talk about her. She would just tell us that it was a nun. So when we started looking into things, we knew that there was Civil War battles back here.

So I do believe that there could be spirits. So we just figured maybe it was a nurse from the Civil War and that that's what she was seeing, not necessarily somebody that was dressed in men's clothes because we didn't realize that she would even know what that was at such a young age. And as she grew up, she stopped talking about the little boy. I don't ever know what happened to him that stayed in our closet.

put the man on the porch she would always say he was still there and every now and then she would see the nun and one night i was upstairs and i was speaking to her and she was facing me and she said mom the nun is standing right behind you in your doorway of your bedroom and i turn around of course i don't see anything and she's probably 17 years old by then maybe older and

I said, "What is she doing?" And she said, "Nothing. She's just standing there looking at you." So, didn't think anything about it. I didn't see anything, so I wasn't really scared. But the nun always scared her. My brother is in Missouri militia group, and they come out here and do maneuvers a lot of times, and they will camp. So, it's ex-military, ex-police. They come out and they go out at night and they do whatever they do.

So he had a group that was doing training and they were all down by our creek. And he called me that night and said, what is it that Josie always sees? And I said, what are you talking about? And he said, what is it that Josie always sees when she's outside or around your house? And I kept saying, I'm not sure what you mean. He said, she sees something that scares her. And I said, are you talking about the nuns?

And when I said that, I heard grown men screaming because apparently when they were out on their maneuvers, the men were out in the woods and two of them seeing a nun floating off the ground and she was coming towards them. And the one turned to the other one and said, do you see that? And he said, yes. And they just took off running and ran back to the camp.

And then when they were telling my brother about it, I was like, what's going on? Are you guys playing a joke? And he said no. And so he called and asked me, and that's when I told him. And he said the guys slept in their truck that night because they were so afraid of what had happened. We've had several different things happen on the property, in our home. We've had furniture move, turned on its end, different things like that.

Thank you, Tammy. You know, you might be onto something with this nurse business.

I did a quick Google search and many of the designated female Civil War nurses did in fact look like nuns. Many wore long black dresses with long sleeves and white aprons or smocks that give the appearance of a nun's habit, especially from a distance. It also appears that they wore long white bonnet-type garments that also resembled a nun's veil, so I could see how someone would be instantly confused.

And if you know there were battles in the area, it's not hard to put two and two together here. But I need to know more about this cave. And frankly, I need to know why you would willingly build a house over top of it. All ghosts and spirits aside, I'd spend every hour of my life there, thinking the ground will fall out from under me at any given moment. Like one of those sinkholes down in Florida. Yeah.

Now, we certainly don't know if these truly were the spirits of the dead, returned to communicate with your daughter, though that's certainly what all this sounds like. And of course, we don't know that it's not just the child's overactive imagination at play here, either, which it certainly could be. But with the frequency at which these things were sighted, and the correlation with the battlefield and the infamous cave, and...

your brother's validating personal experience. It makes for one hell of a tale, and one hell of a way to end tonight's Gettysburg and Civil War-themed episode. I want to thank you all for stopping by here this evening. We have a lot of big things lined up for Season 19, and we're sure glad that you're here to kick it all off with us. Now, Monsters Among Us podcast is written and produced by me, Derek Hayes. Copyright Red Crow Media.

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