Witches, ghosts, and vampires – the chilly air and darker nights of autumn-time bring their stories to life in a way no other season can. Even cemeteries can’t escape the tendency toward the spooky and macabre this time of year; in fact, as quiet places to reflect on memories, mortality, and the meaning of death, they may be more prone to such tales than anywhere else.
Some cemetery legends are more sensational than others, but all seem to grow around the stories of regular people who, for one reason or another, became the targets of rumor and superstition.
In the case of Colonel Jonathan Buck, it’s because a mysterious outline of a leg appeared on his grave monument in Bucksport, Maine.
So, what’s the story? There are a few versions, but most of them go something like this: Colonel Buck once condemned a woman to die for witchcraft. Before her untimely demise, she cursed him to bear her mark on his tombstone forever. Not a very dire curse—but then again, the witch story has effectively overshadowed the true details of Colonel Buck’s life, so maybe she was on to something. Is there any truth to the tale? Probably not. Colonel Buck lived decades after the peak witch trial era, and Maine has no history of executions for witchcraft anyway. The legend almost certainly appeared after the outline of the foot did, a tall tale to explain the mysterious leg-shaped stain that keeps coming back, no matter how many times it’s removed.
The legend of Laura Fereday’s grave is due to the achingly beautiful weeping woman sculpture that grieves over her resting place in Spanish Fork City Cemetery, Utah. Laura’s husband, Horace, had the stone made to memorialize Laura after her early death at age 32. It perfectly captures the heartbreak of losing a wife, mother, and loved one too young. When he died 45 years later, he was buried beside Laura under the statue of the weeping woman. According to legend, if close your eyes while wandering the cemetery, you might hear the statue weeping.
Julia Legare was another young wife who died very young, only 22 years old. She was laid to rest in the J.B. Legare family crypt at the Edisto Island Presbyterian Church in South Carolina. The legend gives a grim fate to poor Julia. Allegedly, she was mistakenly buried alive, a fact that was only discovered years later when the family opened the tomb for another burial and discovered her collapsed remains behind the door. From then on, Julia’s spirit was said to push the door open whenever it was closed. In the end, the door was left permanently open to give Julia the freedom she sought in life and in death.
If you head toward Resurrection Cemetery in Chicago, you may meet “Resurrection Mary,” a young blonde woman in a party dress and dancing shoes who’s been said to hitch rides in the area. Just don’t be surprised if she disappears mid-drive—she tends to vanish when you get close to the cemetery. As with many ghosts, Resurrection Mary’s story is a sad one. A night out dancing, an argument with her boyfriend that led her to run outside, a tragic hit-and-run that ended her young life. Did it really happen? Who is the real Resurrection Mary? Some believe Mary Bregovy could be the famous ghost, though some details of her story don’t match the legend. Whatever the truth, keep an eye out for Mary if you’re near Resurrection Cemetery (and consider fulfilling some of the open photo requests while you’re there!).
The origins of some grave legends need little explanation, as in the case of George and Kitty Smith’s grave in Merseyside, England. Some say a vampire lies within, and with its eye-catching coffin shape and the skull, bat wing, and snake motifs, it’s easy to see why.
But each carefully carved image on this gravestone has symbolic meaning intended to communicate something to the viewer. The skull is a Memento Mori symbol, urging visitors to remember that they too will die someday. The wings, though batlike in appearance, represent the ascension of the soul from this earthly plane to a higher one. And the snake, formed in a circle and eating its own tail, is an ouroboros: a symbol of the continuous cycle of life, death, and rebirth. Harder to see is the faint curtain behind the skull, representing a veil between this life and the next. Come for the spooky vampire rumors, stay for the beautiful symbolism.
Legends like these reflect some of the ways humans cope with life, and especially with death. After all, even the spookiest ghost stories still hint at some version of immortality. Whether you spend some time in cemeteries this year for the chills and thrills or simply wish to pay your respects to the departed, dress warm, stay safe, and be mindful of the real lives memorialized beneath the stones.
Do you know of similar legends in cemeteries you’ve visited? Gone on any deep dives to learn the history behind them? Let us know in the comments!
Spirits exist: 1-When I was 20, a close friend committed suicide and his Spirit inhabited my car for five weeks. 2-I worked at a Royal Canadian Legion, built by ancient Indigenous gravesites, so I experienced Spirits many times. As a genealogist I visit cemeteries but I have a stronger connection with one. From 2008-2018 I was a Tour Bus Driver for the Vancouver Trolley Company. Every October I drove the “Hallowe’en Ghost Tours” which included parking at the Mountain View Cemetery in Vancouver, BC, then walking my passengers through a section while telling stories. A few times I appeared on a CTV Morning Show telling viewers about the trips and told some famous local Ghost stories.
Yes, spirits exist. As an amateur genealogist for nearly 60 years, I know of several who’ve felt their influence including me. They want to be remembered.
Omg how spooky
I love these creepy old graveyard stories. They map onto our “prey animal avoiding being a predator’s dinner” instincts.
What about the Black Angel in Oakland Cemetery in Iowa City, Iowa.
The Curse Generations of University of Iowa students and locals have passed around spooky urban legends about the monument. Popular tales claim that kissing or touching the statue—especially at midnight or on Halloween—brings sudden misfortune, severe accidents, or death within seven years.
I will add the Witch Bonney of Lowell Massachusetts. Of course the story is all B.S. since she lived much later than the witch trials, but still fun if you are into that sort of thing. Her memorial is https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/32598224/clara-lilley which as you can see is a hard to miss striking monument in the cemetery. But do an internet search for “Lowell Witch Bonney” to read the story.
My mom saw spirits since quite young. Her mom also did and told her to only accept those she felt comfortable with. It you say ‘no’ most will just disappear. I too have had several. some were absolutely terrifying while others (the man at the end of the bed). was comforting. I felt he was telling me he would protect me from the others. glad the house is torn down.
I too see ‘solarized’ images, sometimes, at my bed’s end. They were at first frightening, but then I realized they were ‘my’ thoughts.
They seemed friendly.
As a guy who visits cemeteries several times a week, I can appreciate these & others stories about myths, ghosts and spirits. Funny how a cemetery gives me both a feeling of peace & peace of mind…
That’s how I feel when I visit my son’s grave. It’s serene and comforting. The cemetery is in the middle of town on a busy street. There’s a pond with swans swimming and if you get there around the hour the bells chime. Canadian geese are all over in there. My son passed at just 26 in 2001. I go often, holidays, birthdays and on his Angel day.
That’s great to hear. I visit my little girl 3-4 times a week, & as soon as I drive thru the entry gates, not matter what’s going on in life, I leave it there while I visit her & pick it up when I leave. The cemetery is definitely my sanctuary.
I too find graveyards very peaceful places and not in any way spooky as some people feel. Personally I don’t believe in spirits, I guess only because in 78 years I have never encountered one.
If you want spooky, check out Eternal Silence, alternatively known as the Dexter Graves Monument or the Statue of Death,[1] is a monument in Chicago‘s Graceland Cemetery and features a bronze sculpture of a hooded and draped figure set upon, and backdropped by, black granite. It was created by American sculptor Lorado Taft in 1909.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternal_Silence_%28sculpture%29
Thats a great one. Thnx. It says -l- One folktale claims that looking into the eyes of the statue’s hooded figure causes the viewer to see a vision of his or her own death.
Years back, 1960ish, a friend and I were spending the day together. Don’t remember why but we went to the house of a good friend of hers who lived there with her parents. All 3 of us were roughly 20ish. It was a very old house on a large piece of property. The house had been a stagecoach stop sometime in the 1800s and also was connected to a group who were helping runaway slaves escape & there was an underground tunnel leading from the house that the runaways could use if they were about to be discovered. Was the only time I ever met this friend of a friend & I don’t remember exact year or what her name was though MY friend was Kathy. Will not tell her last name as not sure she would want me to make this public (with names). It was a fantastic 1800s home, and this is where the other gal grew up. I will tell you right here, If I was the one reading this story I would not believe it for a minute & I don’t REALLY believe in ghosts, though I am open to the idea. I just want a friendly one! LOL Anyway the girl spent a bit of time with us telling us the ghost stories she had experienced. Too long to remember exact details but they involved things like finding yard furniture, a lounge chair type thing out in the yard on top of the snow, with a book sitting open and think a drink in the holder. Not a single footprint in the snow. The chair and other items had not been out there the preceding day. I know she described other incidents that she experienced. She came across as being completely honest about it all. It has been too long to remember much more about that day about 66 years ago, but it was the closest I ever came to ghosts. Wow, had not thought about that day in years. I did consider that her family could have been having fun and spooking each other, but I could not ever come up with any logical ideas of how they could have done it. Don’t remember exactly where it was but roughly 30-40 miles NW of Chicago in the boonies. Not positive I knew that day just which town we might have been close to, but it was not all that far from small towns like Barrington or Palatine, or Schaumberg. More inclined to think Schaumberg might have been the closest but not sure why. I am still on the fence about ghosts, though I do enjoy spooky tales. Know this is lacking a lot of details but I promise any details I did remember are the truth. Oh, & NO I did not see any ghosts! Marian Lee Pierson
That is a really interesting story!!! That house obviously has a lot of history & more than likely some souls who for whatever reason still hang about. Thanks for telling it!!
I have experienced haunting and ghosts or spirits. People who don’t believe can say what they want but furniture moving and spirits with a top and no bottom standing at the bed are not alive. I am glad they tore that house down. A six plex building was built there but i was in every inch of that space while living there. I wouldn’t live in that building rent free.
Well I wouldn’t want to end up like Julia Legare
Growing up in the Lowcountry of South Carolina, very close to the Edisto Island Presbyterian Church I was always told that Julia LeGare’s fingernails were actually imbedded on the inside of the door of the J.B. LaGare family crypt. After being entombed as the family thought she was deceased when she was actually still alive, she tried to claw her way out of the tomb.
There is a lot of Pre Revolutionary War history in the cemeteries & graveyards of the Lowcountry of South Carolina.
Does no one proofread these things for accuracy? Your story of Laura Fereday says her husband had the stone made in her memory, and then died 45 days later. The link you yourself provided for the husband, Horace, indicates that he died many decades later, after remarrying.
The blogpost does say Horace died 45 years later. Mistakes can happen from time to time though. We appreciate your reaching out.
I fail to see the problem……proofreading? Come on………these stories aren’t hurting anyone. If you don’t like them, don’t read them. Personally, I love hearing them.
I’m with you!!! A good haunting story, ghost story, spirit encounter, whatever you wanna call it is scary fun!!! No one’s ever captured an actual ghost or spirit on camera that can be positively identified as such, but seeing and reading about them is great!!
Reading the stories is great. Living with them not so much. So many people that don’t seem spirits believe you are lying. thanks to my mom whose both parents saw spirits knew I wasn’t making it up. I had some good experiences as well so it isn’t all bad.
Really enjoy reading these stories and seeing the headstones. Hope you will do it again
There is a wonderful compendium of ghost stories and regional lore by Alabama journalist Kathryn Tucker Windham. It includes one of a young woman whose fiancé died & a woman’s silhouette with bowed head now stains his stone at Musgrove Chapel. Or the Kentucky judge who forbade a gravestone, but after his death, a monument was erected anyway. More than once, the monument toppled off its base for no reason.
It was a horrible thing that happened to Julia, it’s too bad they didn’t have a stained glass window in the Mausoleum, she could have broken it and climbed out!
Our city’s cemetery has a vampire grave. In Lafayette, Colorado, a poor immigrant and coal miner Teodor Glava from Transylvania, Romania passed away in 1918, probably from the Spanish Flu. The grave marker is simply a concrete slab with the info etched in. People leave trinkets on that gravestone. There’s even a page on Wikipedia for the “Lafayette, Colorado Vampire” talking about how they myth evolved and has grown every year. He’s very popular.
I heard that after Julia and other met the terrible fate of being buried alive, some people were buried with a bell or cord attached to a bell so they might possibly be “saved by the bell!”
Yes but it didn’t work very well. By the time they would be dug up they would have died from lack of oxygen. Others had bottoms of coffins that swung out and an escape route. One person, sorry forgot the name, had them stab him in the chest to make sure he wasn’t buried alive. Edgar Allan Poe was terrified of being buried alive. He wrote, fall of the house of Usher. I do think it would horrible. So would be being alive during cremation.
I had a couple of spooky happenings in two homes while living in Waukegan, IL. Both of our houses were near Ray Bradbury’s childhood home, the spooky science fiction author! It’s also Jack Benny’s hometown, but I don’t think Jack was involved at all since it wasn’t funny happenings or required a cheapskate! Lol At one house, my parents went out for the evening with relatives leaving me, my siblings, & cousins at home. We were all teenagers hanging out in my bedroom with the door closed, when all of a sudden the door knob started turning back & forth. Then seconds later the lampshade on my small dresser lamp popped off up into the air. We all screamed & ran downstairs to the living room where we stayed until the adults returned. More than likely there was a reasonable explanation for what happened, but at the time it was very scary as a kid lol. As for the other spooky event at our other house, I was awoken by a horrible & scary sound outside of my closed bedroom door late one night. I could hear low moaning & clinking noises slowly coming down the hallway. Then it stopped. I thought maybe it was my brothers playing a trick on me or my cat making the sound, so I slowly got up & peeked out. I didn’t see anything so decided to look in on my brothers & parents in their bedrooms. It appeared they were all sleeping heavily, so I waited a bit to see if they would start laughing or move, but no one did. This was their best acting if they were faking being asleep lol. I didn’t see my cat either. So I got back in bed, and soon the sound restarted even louder with heavy chain dragging & clinking sounds like Jacob Morley in Scrooge, but this time it seemed to start at the beginning of the hallway. The hallway was L shaped with my bedroom being at the end, but before it got to my bedroom door I flew out of my bedroom screaming into my parents bedroom scaring them awake. My dad checked the hallway, but nothing was there. My brothers still didn’t wake up with all of this commotion going on next door They never did confess or start giggling if they did make the spooky noises to scare me, but I’m still a little suspicious of them Afterwards it never happened again.
Just remembered I have one more spooky event! One time when I woke up early I glanced into my bathroom and saw something strange. There was a young woman sitting on the side of my garden tub sobbing with her arms wrapped around a small girl standing in front of her. They were both dressed in long calico dresses & bonnets like early pioneers. I closed & opened my eyes, but they were still there. They didn’t seem to notice me. I was unsure what to do so covered my head with my comforter & rolled over. In a little bit I rolled back over & peeked out. They were gone! I didn’t tell anyone about seeing them and just chalked it up to dreaming until my young daughter saw them too one night after sneaking in my bed while I was asleep. She told me the the next morning she saw an old timey woman and little girl in my bathroom, and the woman was crying. I asked her why didn’t she wake me up and tell me? She said she was sleepy and decided to go back asleep instead so rolled over lol. I’m unsure what we both saw on 2 separate occasions, but maybe it was the sunlight & moonlight playing tricks through the big garden window over the tub? Anyway, apparently rolling over makes them disappear. Guess that’s my contribution for spooky stories!
I totally believe you. My mom saw spirits but my dad never once said a word. My mom’s sister Bessie loved much so much. Mom was getting ready for bed and she looked up and aunt Bessie was standing there She lived 50 miles away. Mom just said, “I just looked at her smiling and Bessie said, “I just came to say goodbye Bobbie, I’ll see you later.” The next day when she was sitting in the living room the phone rang. I went to answer it and mom said, “they’ll be calling to tell me Bessie died.” That’s what the call was.
A little Halloween joke —
I was at the cemetery today putting some flowers down. As soon as I walked away a lady came up and said “How are you today?” I said, “Oh geez, you can see me?!” She freaked out and ran off!
That’s hysterical!!! 😅 😂
Five years to the day after my father died, my mother was getting ready to go out, and a photo of my parents suddenly tipped over on her nightstand.
East Greenwood Cemetery, in Weatherford, Texas has a “witches tomb.” People used to swear it glowed on certain days and that witches were buried there. However, it’s a sea captain’s grave. The grave has been vandalized, heavily over the years, due to it being the “Witches Tomb.”
I wish there was a place/tab on find a grave’s website, maybe somewhere on the cemetery page, for ghost stories, myths, and legends. I think that’d be pretty cool. (There might be, and I just have yet to find it.) Maybe even an events tab, as some cemeteries have events at them during some months, like “Walking Tombstone” Tour.
There are a few areas that I know of where spirits haunt. One is a restaurant where a lot of soldiers were killed in Dorr’s rebellion and the house that inspired the movie, The Conjuring. I stayed in a haunted hotel room and had a physical experience there—skin tightening and feeling extremely sleepy (like being drugged) and an eerie quiet—of absolute silence. The last time was in a hallway in a Salem hotel. That one scared me! I sensed a presence that made my hair stand up on my arms, and I ran out of there, sensing it was not friendly. They exist! The problem is the denial of their existence. We shouldn’t talk to them because we really don’t know WHO we are talking with! But we don’t have to fear if we just leave it be.
Black Diamond Mines
Antioch, CA · Miscellaneous
Two ghosts are said to reside here. One is called the White Witch. According to legend, she was executed for being a witch when the children she was caring for all died of illness. The second ghost is Sarah Norton, a woman who was said to have been run over by a carriage. Both women appear in white, so it is thought that they are often confused by those who see them.
My late father used to say that ghosts didn’t exist, although he had three experiences with spirits, the first was when he worked nights in an art gallery in London, he would come home and tell us that while walking through a particular room he would always hear footsteps behind him, but No one was there, then one evening the daughter of the on-site custodian was sent to get something by her mother, dad was in another room when the girl screamed, her parents and my dad ran to her and she said that she had just seen a man walking around the room, her father took her to a display case and asked if the man was wearing the clothes and carried the walking cane the case , she said yes he was, he then took her to view a painting of a man in the clothes, and asked his daughter if that was the man she had seen, again she said yes, the custodian then explained that it was the spirit of the artist and he would come most nights just to visit the paintings by him that were hanging in the room, so he could see that they were being looked after, my dad then told him about the footsteps behind him ,and the man said yes that would be him as well. He didn’t have anything else happen for year’s , then one night about 1 am, he was driving through a village and this girl walked out in front of him, and he hit her with the van he was driving, but when he went to see if the girl was ok she wasn’t there, he remembered there was a Police car sitting just on the outskirts of the village and so he went to report to them what happened, they smiled as he approached them and said to him that he had just hit a girl crossing the road, he said yes how did they know, they replied that was why they were sitting there at night, it turned out that the girl had been with friends in the village pub and at the end of the evening when they left, she walked through the village cemetery which was between the pub and her house, and when she came to the cemetery entrance opposite her house she stepped into the road and was hit by a car and killed instantly, and now her spirit repeats this event at least 3 times a week, and it’s the same thing she steps out and is hit by a vehicle and when the driver gets out to check on her she is gone.
When I was in high school, 1964, for lack of anything better to do, two or three couples would load into a car at night and visit out-of-the-way old graveyards. We did it for the spooky effect and back then it wouldn’t have crossed our minds to vandalize any of the stones. One night it was perfect for a graveyard visit, full moon, wind, and a very secluded, unkept graveyard. We had to drive down a one lane rutted dirt road to get there and three couples unloaded to explore. We finally all met and found a grave of a man who passed in the late 1800’s. The epitaph on the stone freaked us all out and we left in a hurry. I have always remembered that verse: “REMEMBER FRIEND AS YOU WALK BY, AS YOU ARE NOW, SO ONCE WAS I. AS I AM NOW YOU WILL ALSO BE SO PREPARE FOR DEATH AND FOLLOW ME. “
Love the stories I do believe in good and bad spirits some are bound here to roam. When I was young a little girl visited me and later found out she died in my parents’ house at 9 years old and it was like she was stuck in my parents’ house wandering.
You can pray that the parents come and retrieve the child. It does work.
Don’t forget Black Aggie, formerly buried at Druid Ridge Cemetery in Baltimore. The name on her pedestal was Agnus, I believe. She was a seated, draped, hooded monster, larger than life, forged in black metal,the very embodiment of death, sitting in judgment of all who passed by her.Her statue was removed and taken to a secret place because she had attracted too many visitors. It is said that fraternity boys tried to spend the night sitting in her lap, and many died mysteriously afterwards. Her haunting black-eyed stare followed you from under her hood. There was no escaping it. As a child, I sometimes woke up during the night, certain that she was in my room, gazing at me with her horrid metal eyes.Even now, 65 years later, I can almost feel the terror that I felt then.
I’ve never believed in spirits or ghosts but changed my mind when I began feeling and sensing things in cemeteries about ten years ago. The first time was in Seattle and something brushed the back of my leg. I had an overwhelming urge to just leave the cemetery. Later found out from the tour guide that a young girl was buried nearby and the rumor was she walked around a lot.
Since then, I’ve encountered others, smelled things and hear babies quite often. We visit a lot of cemeteries in the search for buried ancestors. Still am not sure what’s happening but I just roll with it.
I have a spooky story my brother and his wife and myself moved in to a house the previous people were just finishing their move and asked if they could leave their piano with us because they had to have a professional piano mover move it and they could but it would be a couple of days to get it moved we said that yes they could leave it with us. Well the next day as my brothers wife and I were unpacking, both of us in separate rooms, we heard the piano playing I’m not sure what my sister-in-law was doing i thought maybe she was playing the piano although I didn’t think she played the piano as I went to the living room to see her playing the piano I bumped into her as she was coming out of her bedroom startled we both asked each other if it was one of us playing the piano. We both said no laughing we then thought maybe it was the cat walking across the piano keys so we went to check on the cat well you can imagine the scare we got when we looked at the piano the lid that covers the keyboard was down so it couldn’t be the cat and neither of us had played it and we were the only two people in the house we couldn’t wait to have it moved out of our house
I heard about Resurrection Mary from Robert Stack on Unsolved Mysteries.
Hey, what or who is “Resurrection Mary”?
I have seen two spirits, one in our house which is 125 yers old and only family have lived here. It was a woman walking past a doorway in our hallway and a man in the garden and the shed, when I saw him in the garden it was so clear to see him he had walked through a garden bed and fence then disappeared. The woman was more hazy, appeared to be old and wearing a long white nightdress. Also when I visit cemeteries to take photos for Find A Grave I can get goosebumps and all shivery when walking past some graves, it can be any grave and at random.
After WWII, my parents bought a small house, built in 1927, in a very rural area of Northern California, a short walk from the cemetery. The woman who sold it to them had donated a parcel of land many years before for the cemetery. That woman had a child who died as an infant, and she was living in the small house when that happened.
In the 1970s, my brother & his wife were living in that house with their newborn daughter, who would sleep in her crib in their bedroom. His wife woke up to hear fingers tapping on the edge of the crib.
A few years later, the little daughter was watching TV in the living room. Her mother stepped in from the kitchen and saw a man standing in the living room. She felt no alarm or fear, just went back to what she was doing in the kitchen. When she described these things to my mother, my mother said the tapping on the crib was likely that of the original owner who’d lost a baby. The man, whom she described as wearing an Eisenhower jacket, was likely the last man to work on the house in the 1930s; he died on the Bataan Death March and was buried in the nearby cemetery.
A year or two after that, my brother was alone in that small house at night when he heard the front door open and close, footsteps walk through to the back door, and the back door opened and closed.
In 1991 I moved into that house. I didn’t wish the ghosts any ill will but I also didn’t want to meet them, so I went through every room and told them they had to leave. I was never bothered by them.
Here’s one that still sends chills.
My older brother passed in 1974. He had a beloved dog “Blackjack”, they lived in Ohio. We took her home with us to Louisiana. We lived on a dead end road, but soon moved to another home, right off a major road. We had just met the neighbor children, they also had a dog and Blackjack tried to follow us across the road, she stopped for a second in the middle of the road and a pickup truck came up quickly and hit her. We ran screaming for her but she was dead. It was like loosing my brother twice….the grief was horrendous. We took her and wrapped her in red material and put daises all around her in a box. We lived right next to a wooded area and took her there to lay her to rest. That night I awoke and saw a light (no other houses are close by) and watched as the light appeared to hover at her grave. Just then a second light appeared and both moved away in the distance and disappeared. I believed then and still believe that my brother had returned for his beloved “Blackjack”
Soul mates.
Oh how sad and yet so awesome that they are together again gives hope that someday we’ll meet loved ones again