Many people, when they hear the term "haunted house" immediately think of people in costumes jumping out at others for entertainment. That is not what I think of when I hear the phrase. I think of the genuine paranormal locations around the globe that are filled with history and capture my curiosity about whether ghosts exist.
Many who know me know I am a firm believer in the paranormal. I love to explore haunted locations, go on ghost tours in different cities, and even investigate physical locations overnight. My curiosity for the metaphysical started at a very young age due to some personal experiences I have had. Many people do not believe in my encounters or think I am crazy when I tell them my story, so if you do not believe me either, that is okay. I know what I experienced is my truth, and I cannot convince anyone else that their thinking is not their truth.
About eleven years after my first encounter with the paranormal, I found myself moving to one of the most haunted cities in the United States, Savannah, Georgia. Known as the "city buried on its dead," this city has experienced many important battles like the Siege of Savannah in 1779, to the American Civil War’s Savannah capture by General T. Sherman. Due to these battles, many bodies got left to lay scattered on the grounds decompose where they had fallen. Also, since Savannah is one of the oldest cities in the United States, it has faced many challenges, such as disease. In 1820, Yellow Fever decimated a tenth of Savannah’s population, and nine more epidemics followed after that. Savannah has also undergone destructive fires, mysterious murders, and savage slavery times. That is how Savannah got the creepy nickname. Even more recently, known throughout the community, that over time as the oak trees' roots stir up the earth underneath, human bones have been seen and recovered throughout historic Savannah.
So, after all this devastation and death that Savannah has encompassed, why should anyone not think it's haunted! While visiting the city, Savannah plays up its dark history. Offering walking ghost tours, investigations, haunted pub crawls, and even hearse tours. Whether you like it or not, when visiting Savannah, you will hear something about the ghosts that roam the area.
The tourist destinations allow me to segway into what this blog post is about, the Sorrel-Weed House. Also known as the Francis Sorrel House, the Sorrel-Weed House is a historic landmark within the city of Savannah. Known as one of the largest houses in the city, this house sits in the heart of Madison Square. Open to the public for historic Savannah tours during the day since 2005, the home also offers experiences at night. Those night experiences include haunted ghost tours and investigations. This house is acknowledged, throughout the country, by being featured in many films and television appearances. Some include the opening scene of Forrest Gump, which was filmed from the Sorrel-Weed House rooftop, being investigated by TAPS during a special 2005 Halloween episode of Ghost Hunters, featured of HGTV's "If Walls Could Talk" in 2006, and also investigated by the Ghost Adventures crew in 2014.
What makes the Sorrel-Weed House haunted? Well, legend has it that when the house was constructed in the early 1840s, the owner, Francis Sorrel, a wealthy plantation owner, married Lucinda Moxley after he emigrated to the United States. Lucinda, being the ripe age of 17, was from a wealthy family that did business with Francis. Five years into their marriage, Lucinda, unfortunately, died from a sickness. Only two years later, Francis married another woman, Matilda. Matilda Moxley, Lucinda's younger sister. As Francis' business grew, he quickly rose to be one of Savannah's most prominent and wealthy men. However, Francis did have a deadly secret. He was having a long, ongoing affair with a young slave girl named, Molly. Many people wonder whether this affair was consensual due to the nature of the relationship between master and slave. Francis arranged for Molly to have special quarters set up above the carriage house to keep his personal life private. However, Matilda found out about the affair and committed suicide by leaping from the second-story balcony of the house. Mysteriously, a few weeks later, Molly was also found dead in the carriage house from what appeared to be suicide by hanging.
So with all this hauntingly horrifying information, what did I do? Of course, I spent a night there! In a true full-blown investigative fashion. To be correct, I investigated it twice. Both times, being two very different experiences.
The first time I investigated the Sorrel-Weed House was in the summer of 2016. I had already lived in Savannah for about a year, and my family was visiting from up north. My brother, sister, and I are all ones who love the paranormal, so we all wanted to have an authentic experience while in one of the most haunted places in the United States. My mom, who is more of a skeptic, was ready to have the experience with us but went into it with the thinking that the investigation was a tourist trap and probably faked. My dad is the total opposite. Due to some childhood experiences in his childhood home, he is a firm believer in the paranormal and could not wait to see what would happen during the investigation. You could say this event was a family affair.
The night started with the employees of the Sorrel-Weed House explaining how the night was going to work out and what paranormal activity was experienced in certain areas. The investigation began at 11 pm and went to 1 am. The Sorrel-Weed House provided the equipment to help collect our findings, and all we had to do was show up.
My sister, who was about 17 at the time, and I were the most shaken to the core. That was our first time doing something like this, and we did not know what to expect, so we huddled together as we walked room to room. My brother (who has always been a bit of a sensitive) leaned into his energy and started communicating with the spirits right away. He was hands-on with the equipment and asked all the questions and even sometimes receiving answers through the Spirit Box, which is a device that allows you to hear disembodied voices in real-time. My mom and dad hung back a bit just observing in the beginning, but then my dad got into the investigation as the paranormal activity started to ramp up. Meanwhile, as we are investigating, we were live-streamed on YouTube as well through Sorrel-Weed House's channel.
In many of the rooms, my family would hear, "Get Out!" yelled from the spirit box. We had heard it so often that even the employees, who were still on site, seemed to be getting concerned. My brother insisted he felt a presence in the cellar of the house as he tried to make contact and even seemed a bit shaken after we had left that area of the house. We made our way into the carriage house, which was the area of the property where the help would stay. We were up in the loft for quite some time. My dad and brother were firing questions one after another while my sister, mom, and I started to get sleepy. It was nearing the end of the investigation, and after a day of exploring the city and then the late-night exploration, we all were fading fast. We were all sitting on a bench when I had gotten up and started walking in the direction of my dad and brother when my sister jumped and started crying. My mom whipped her head in the way of where my sister was and asked her what had happened. She insisted something grabbed her hand. She explained how at first she thought it was my mom trying to get her attention, but then realized the sensation was coming from the area that was empty beside her, that my mom was actually on the other side of the bench. My sister insisted that it was not in her head, and when reviewing the live stream on YouTube later, you can see her react in a natural, surprising way for no reason. You can also see in the video that no one is around her at the time that she jumped and that we are all in different areas within the room.
My family, still to this day, will talk about that experience we all shared in Savannah. We will never forget the excitement and fear we all had felt in those moments in the Sorrel-Weed House. Other than my sister shaken to tears, we all enjoyed the experience, and I had such an alluring experience I figured why not do it again, but this time, bring my friends instead of family.
As Halloween in 2016 rolled around, my friends and I were looking for a fun event to attend. I had been telling them about my investigation with my family that happened the summer prior, and they all were intrigued. The next thing I knew, I was organizing for myself and five of my friends to investigate the Sorrel-Weed House on Halloween night. The Halloween investigation would be a bit different than my investigation with my family. This investigation would be from 11 pm to 4 am and allow us to have more freedom roaming the grounds. I informed all my friends we had it scheduled and that it too would be live-streamed on Sorrel-Weed House's YouTube channel. (You can watch our 4 hours and 30-minute investigation here.)
My friends at the beginning got a bit overzealous and excited. They did not seem to be taking the investigation seriously and thought of it more like a tourist attraction. Throughout the night, as the evidence and experiences started to grow, they took it more and more seriously, and by the end of the night, were full-blown investigators of the paranormal.
Some experiences we had that night were a lot more convincing than the previous I had been here with my family. We saw shadows in the basement crossing windows, were touched in multiple locations in the house, and got direct responses from the Spirit Box, including evidence where the spirits were saying our names and addressing us directly. The most shaken I had gotten that night was when we were in the wine cellar. That part of the Sorrel-Weed House had just been cleaned out, and many investigations had not been able to have access to this room yet, so the employees were in the space investigating with us. We were all sitting on the ground when I felt something brush my face. At first, I thought it was a draft in the cellar, but then it felt almost like someone caressing my face. It felt so real I lifted my hand to my face and just held it there. One of the employees saw this and asked me if I had just felt touched. As I responded, he expressed he was not alarmed because in the same spot I was sitting, another person had felt something similar but along their arm the night prior. I let that information soak in a bit but then felt chilled to the bone.
Each experience I have had at the Sorrel-Weed House has been different from that one I had had prior. Each night was entertaining and thrilling in their independent way. The employees are good about staying quiet, and out of your way during investigations. They only stay on property to make sure everyone is following rules and not trashing the historic home. I am sure many people assume events like this are a sham, but until you try one for yourself, do not be so quick to write it off. Many of my friends who experienced this will me were skeptics and left believers. I say, go give it a try! If nothing happens, well, make up your own opinion. At least you got to explore some history.
Sorrel-Weed House remains in Savannah, waiting to be explored by new visitors every day. If you are not able to make a trip down to Savannah, then you can always look up the ghostly encounters posted on YouTube or google images by fellow travelers. If you are looking for a good ole hauntingly exciting adventure, this overnight investigation is it. If that is a little too severe for you, then you can always look up one of their different tours here. This house has such an impact on the city that I am sure that you will see it in the future, whether it is on television, within movies, or in person.
Comentários