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Woodend

John Heslop’s bloodstain on the floor at the base of the stairs of Woodend would still be visible if not for a strategically placed rug.[1] Murdered in 1891,[2] his spirit allegedly still roams the building, for-ever bemoaning the fact that his killers were not brought to justice.

The son of Robert and Diana Heslop, John Heslop was born in Cumberland, England, in 1812. Just a few years later, his family moved to North America, with the family living in New Brunswick, Washington, and Virginia before settling in Ancaster and purchasing land there in 1842.[3]

In his book Murder: Twelve True Stories of Homicide in Canada, Edward Butts describes a time when Heslop supported William Lyon Mackenzie, carrying messages back and forth for the rebels and personally escorting Mackenzie through the Ancaster area. Butts explains that Heslop managed to avoid arrest for treason, settle back into the life of a farmer, and do well for himself.[4]

Heslop was married to Elizabeth Aikman in 1844 and had a daughter named Sarah Ann, who was born the following year. In 1851 he became the first warden of Wentworth County and the first reeve of Ancaster Township.[5] In the early 1870s, he was appointed clerk and treasurer of the township.[6]

Originally constructed in 1862, the stately beauty of Woodend’s Victorian Gothic revival style — with the use of a large three-gabled front facade adding depth to the building, its steep roof, and delicate barge — all reflected Heslop’s taste and sense of grandeur.[7] Set on the top of a hill near Mineral Springs Road, the stone building was surrounded by large, beautiful gardens. It would instantly be seen as a tranquil and bountiful home, which is perhaps one of the things that led thieves to it one fateful night.

Shortly after 1:00 a.m. on January 27, 1891, John, his wife Elizabeth, and their daughter Sarah were all fast asleep, when they were suddenly awoken by a crash from downstairs.[8] Leaping out of his bed, Heslop met two masked men who had broken into the house through the back door using a piece of cordwood as a battering ram. The men had assumed that, because Heslop was the town treasurer, sums of money were kept in the house.[9]

Rather agile for a man of his age, Heslop wielded a chair against the intruders, but was shot and killed instantly, his body tumbling down to the base of the stairs.[10]

Several men were arrested, and Jack Bartram and Jack Lottridge were put on trial for the murder, but due to a combination of conflicting evidence, inconsistent alibis, and the inability of Elizabeth and Sarah to properly identify the masked men, the jury found them not guilty.[11]

The murder, its trial, and the “not guilty” verdict remained a sensation in Ancaster for many years.[12] Heslop’s wife died the following year at the age of seventy-two, and Sarah lived in the house until she sold it in 1909.[13]

The building is now home to the Hamilton Region Conservation Authority, the Hamilton region’s largest environmental management agency, which owns or manages about 4,000 hectares (10,000 acres) of environmentally significant land, as well as recreational land, and promotes environmental stewardship and education.[14]

Woodend, a historic mansion on Mineral Springs Road in Ancaster, is said to be very much alive with an unhappy ghost of the past.

Courtesy of Stephanie Lechniak.

It is fascinating that an entity that promotes and protects is now the occupant of a home in which the owner, in his attempt to protect his family, was murdered in cold blood. Perhaps the murder’s classification as an unsolved crime is why legends of John Heslop’s ghost abound.

It has been said that the ghost of Heslop and of his daughter, who witnessed his murder, can be seen as an orb in photographs of the stairway. People have also reported strange dragging noises coming from the attic as well as footsteps moving through the house.

A cleaner has reported her vacuum cleaner being mysteriously unplugged and then plugged back in and pictures constantly being tilted at strange angles.[15]

Could these reports be evidence that John Heslop’s ghost remains in the home, forever destined to restlessly move about the building, unable to attain the peace of a final rest in knowing that his murderers will never be brought to justice?