by S.E. Schlosser
This Halloween, you may want to check out some of these haunted spots throughout New Jersey.
Ringwood Manor
If you wander the halls of the Manor House at night, you might meet the ghost of a housemaid who haunts a small bedroom on the second floor. They have heard noises coming from the empty room – footsteps, sounds of heavy objects dropping, soft crying. And they keep finding the bedroom door ajar and the bed rumpled.
Behind the Manor pond is the grave where General Erskine is buried. The local people are afraid to come to this place because at dusk General Erskine can be seen sitting on his grave gazing across the pond.
And it is said there is an unmarked grave filled with the remains of French soldiers who fought with Rochambeau during the Revolutionary War. During the day, all you can see is a depression in the grass near the General’s grave. But after dark, the dead come to the Manor pond to walk along the shore. Sometimes, you can hear soft, sad voices speaking in French.
Washington Rock
The car reached the top of the hill and started around the long C curve that took them through one end of the Washington Rock State Park. The park was dark and still. The whole family automatically looked to their right, out over the gorgeous view of the New York City skyline. They all saw the small park cart, sitting next to the road just inside the park boundary. It was parked directly underneath the only streetlight, where you couldn’t fail to see it. And inside the vehicle….
The girl started trembling fiercely. Inside the vehicle was a tall, handsome blond man with eyes full of ferocious anger, terrible evil, and malevolent malice. It was the man from her dream. The man everyone said was the Devil!
Read the Story: The Devil on Washington Rock.
Long Beach Island
Have you seen my love? I have searched for him everywhere, but I cannot find him. Can you tell me where he is? I ask the questions of everyone I see; reaching out to touch their shoulders or their arms, but my hand goes right through them as if they were made of mist. Most people act as if they cannot see me at all, merely shuddering as if they were cold and walking quickly away. Sometimes, a person will scream when they see me, as if they have seen a ghost, and then run in the opposite direction. They never answer my questions.
The beach seems endless as I walk from one side of the island to the other, down the long, long miles and then back again. He must be here. I know he is here. He would never desert me. Perhaps he is injured! Perhaps he is ill. My fear presses me ever onward. I stop each person I meet to ask the same question over and over: Have you seen my love?
Peapack
A run-down Italianate mansion with twenty-six fireplaces that used to be owned by nuns sits on fifty acres of property, including beautifully terraced grounds. Eyewitnesses have seen a glowing feminine figure in the third story window.
Rumor also claims that a crazy Mother Superior became a pagan and tortured and killed her fellow sisters when they refused to join her evil practices? She chopped them up and scattered pieces of their bodies throughout the mansion. There was blood everywhere when the police came to investigate! The Mother Superior’s ghost is supposed to haunt the terraces at the back of the house. They say she tries to lead you into the mansion in order to torture and kill you.
Read the story: The Figure in the Window.
Atlantic City
Captain Don Sandovate voyaged from Spain to the New World in search of treasure, which he found in abundance. But his crew did not wish to share the new-found wealth with the monarchs of Spain. They mutinied and tied their captain to the main mast, and refusing to give him food or drink. Broken in spirit, Don Sandovate begged: “Water. Please. Just one sip of water.” But he was left to die of thirst and exposure. The new captain left the body tied to the mast as the ship plundered its way up the coast. Finally, a massive storm drove the ship deep into the Atlantic, where it sank with all hands, the body of Don Sandovate still tied to the broken mast.
Shortly after the death of the mutineers turned pirate, a ruined Spanish treasure ship appeared along the coast near Atlantic City. Its mast was broken, its sails torn, and the corpse of a noble-looking Spaniard was tied to the main mast. The ship was crewed by hideous skeletons wearing the ragged sailors clothing. As it passed near the shore, the skeletons stretched out bony hands and cried: “Water. Please. Just one sip of water.” But no one can help them, for the crew of Don Sandovate are eternally doomed to roam the Atlantic in punishment for their terrible deeds.
Read the story: Ghost Ship of Captain Sandovate
Morristown
George Washington was driving back to Morristown from Summit when a blizzard came blowing down upon his carriage. The snow was blowing so hard that it was difficult to see. They were driving slowly down the road when the General looked through the window and saw a poor child – a pretty little brown-haired girl – staggering through the rapidly deepening drifts of snow. Washington called to my driver to stop and pick her up, thinking he could give her a ride to her home. The carriage stopped beside her. Then, just as the driver got down from the carriage, she vanished. The men looked around for her, and realized there were no child’s footprints in the snow.
Puzzled, they stopped at a local house to inquire after the child, and lea
rned that the little girl had been drowned in a cistern several years ago, and her ghost continued to walk the section of the road on which they had been traveling that evening. It was said that the little girl had sometimes saved other children from accidents, and that her spirit was there to protect travelers. While he was still assimilating this information, General Washington received word of a British ambush that was foiled by the revolutionaries loyal to the General. If he had not stopped the carriage to speak to the ghost, General Washington would have been caught in the ambush and captured or killed.
