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Gus's Ghost Story

The following is an article that appeared in the August 16, 1902, issue of the Hamilton Herald. Brother’s Robert B. and John M. Harris established the newspaper in August 1889, and it became Hamilton’s first one-cent newspaper, making Hamilton into a three-newspaper town. The Hamilton Spectator, started in 1846, and the Hamilton Times, 1859, were the other two papers at the time — the only remaining daily newspaper today is the Spectator. The Herald lasted until 1936; the Times until 1920.

Interestingly, parts of the story, namely the pulling of bedclothes, appeared in other accounts of ghostly occurrences reported by both men and women. What I couldn’t determine is if these other tales were related to this original haunting experience that Nelson reports.

His Weird Experience with Tricky Spook

The House Is Said to Be Haunted

Whether or not you believe in the truth of the following story, told by Gus Nelson, of this town, it is certain that the teller of the story is convinced of its truth. As he told it to a small group of friends one evening this week, he had not fully recovered from the nerve-shaking effects of his experience. He said:

“On the night of Wednesday, August 6, I went to bed in my boarding house on Park Street about half-past ten. Not being tired or sleepy, I lay for some time in deep thought. Suddenly, I was disturbed by a curious, weird sound, as if made by the rattling of chains or someone trying to open the door. This noise increased, and was followed by a louder sound, as of someone hitting the head of an empty barrel with a mallet. Being slightly alarmed, I sat up in bed and called out, ‘Get to the dickens out of this,’ though I could see nothing. Presently, as if by magic, a light appeared in the hallway, which just as suddenly disappeared again. Then I felt something pulling at the bed clothes. Reaching under the bed I seized a slipper and fired it at the apparition. Scarcely had I lain down again before the clothes again moved. I grasped them tightly, but the ghost also pulled. For a time it was difficult to tell which would gain the mastery. Again the light appeared and the pulling ceased. For a long time I lay in a state of bewilderment and great fatigue. I fell asleep. I awoke, with a feeling of nervousness, about 4:30 a.m. I looked, and there was the light again. It came and went at intervals, positively without human agency. Upon recovering myself sufficiently afterwards, I found a pair of old socks on top of my head and the bed clothes lying in the center of the room on the floor.”

In the group of persons to whom Gus told his story was Night Watchman Jamieson, who is well known to be an authority on ghosts and several other important matters. Mr. Jamieson exhibited no surprise over the story. The house, he said, had been haunted for some time, that condition having been brought about by the fact that a man had hung himself there some seven years ago. Ever since then the apparition of a man had occasionally been seen walking about at midnight sometimes with a small electric light in one hand and sometimes pounding on an empty barrel with a drumstick. One night, says Jamieson, a policeman saw the apparition. He immediately fainted and was restored to consciousness by Jamieson himself. The next night the policeman was not on that beat, and it was reported that he was sick.

Gus Nelson says that a young man who had slept there before he came said the bed actually walked over to the door, and that such things as Gus described were of common occurrence. To say that, Gus, who was [illegible] frightened is but mildly expressing it, and money could not induce him to return to his boarding house, as he is quite positive that it was a ghost he saw. No one can make him believe different. A certain gentleman to whom Gus was relating his experience, says that he had often been visited by ghosts, and that the only way to get rid of them was to stand a bottle of whisky and a glass in front of the bed. They would then take a drink and depart without touching the bed clothes. This is about the best remedy I have ever heard of to banish ghosts, and if any ever bother me I think I shall take this means of disposing them.[1]