Wichita Eagle

STRANGE HAPPENINGS BACK IN THE HILLS OF BERKSHIRE.

Here Are Ghosts and Goblins Galore. Genuine Old Fashioned Spooks-Haunted Houses, Headless Wayfarers and Mysterious Sounds and Sights.

About three miles east of Great Barrington, Mass., on the road to New Marlborough, is Three Mile hill. The road runs up a mountain, which is a part of the Monument mountain, which has been immortalized in the poetry of William Cullen Bryant, who when a young man had his law office in Great Barrington. The road up the hill was about a quarter of a mile in length, and on each side were huge rocks and ravines, making it look like the primeval forest. At the foot of the hill where the road ended, and where there is a small marshy meadow, is a spot where, since the year 1819, if the statements of pious and trustworthy people are to be believed, some foul crime was committed which has not yet come to light, and may not until all men come to be judged by a higher power for the deeds done in the body.

Mr. Joseph Laird was an old revolutionary soldier who lived in Muddy Brook, about two miles east of this spot. He was a farmer, and one night about the year 1825 he had to go on horseback to Barrington after a doctor for his wife, who had been taken ill in the night.

It was just after midnight in the fall of the year, and as he came down the hill near the spot he happened to look down beside the road, and there stood a brass candlestick with a lighted candle, apparently half burned.

At this time he had never heard of anything out of the usual order connected with the spot. His horse was frightened and would not stand still, although it was one of the most reliable and steady going steeds in the neighborhood.

The thought struck him that somebody was searching for something and had left the candle there. He reined up the horse, and stepping one foot out of the stirrup he reached down to pick up the light. As his hand approached it, it disappeared like a flash, and how he ever got back on the horse and galloped to the village he could hardly tell.

He held his peace for some days, when he confided his experience to Erastus Turner, his brother-in-law, who was regarded by his neighbors as a man who "did not fear a face of clay." He asked Turner, "Am I getting to be out of my head?" when he had concluded. Then Turner had an experience to relate concerning that very spot.

A few months before that he had occasion as a school trustee to go down toward Great Barrington village to engage a young lady to teach their district school. He was also on horseback, and was riding on a walk by that very spot. It was about 9 o'clock at night. He was paying no attention to his surroundings, when all at once he saw a white object about the size and shape of a feather pillow rise apparently from the ground on one side and pass directly over his head about ten feet above, and land on the other side of the road, where it disappeared.

He involuntarily stopped to see it, and said it was in sight about thirty seconds. There was not a breath of air stirring, and the night was cloudy and dark.

Some time afterward Mix Turner, a son of the man who had seen the white object go over his head, was driving along one night rather late on his way home from the village. He had never heard of anything out of the way with the place. When he reached the spot he heard footsteps behind him. He turned around and saw a man on horseback.

He spoke and said: "I'll turn out and let you go by a piece ahead."

The rider made no reply, but, with a large black horse, drew the rein to one side, and in a narrow and difficult part of the road seemed to go by with ease. As he came up even with Turner, the latter saw that the man had no head.

The night was quite light, so that objects could be plainly distinguished. Turner, in his surprise, ejaculated, "Great God Almighty! who and what are you?" As he uttered these words the horse and headless rider disappeared into thin air.

Justus Adams and Mark Seeley were young men who worked in a woolen factory at Van Deusenville, about two miles north of Great Barrington. One night in the autumn of 1827 they took a pair of horses and a wagon to carry home some young women who worked in the factory, but whose parents lived about a mile and a half beyond this spot. On their return it was about dusk, and as they reached the place they saw a pack peddler walking just ahead of them, and he fairly staggered under his huge and apparently unwieldy burden. Said Adams to Seeley, "We will give that old critter a ride," to which the other agreed. They drove up and stopped, and Adams said:

"Jump in, old man, and we will give you a boost."

He came toward them, when they saw that the peddler had no head. Then he disappeared, and the horses, very steady ones, started and ran for about a mile as hard as they could go, and the driver and his companion were unable, because of their fright and excitement, to check their speed in the slightest degree. The horses finally stopped of their own accord.

It was noticed that these young men, who were always jolly and jovial, were after that as sober and serious as judges. It was many months before they would go down the Three Mile Hill road.

About the year 1842 the inhabitants of the vicinity were working on the road, and the roadmaster concluded that the road ought to be raised or "turnpiked" up. So a heavy plow, drawn by two yoke of oxen, was detailed to plow a deep ditch on each side of the road. One of the men had to bear heavily on the plow beam to make a deep enough furrow. Finally some queer looking bones were turned up and thrown to one side.

Everybody was amazed and could not conceive what they were doing there. At this juncture a physician from Great Barrington came by on his sulky. He was stopped, and one of the men handed up some of the bones for inspection.

"Where did you get these?" asked the doctor.

The man pointed out the spot.

"These are human bones," the physician said.

He took charge of them, and that was all that was ever done about the matter.

Dame Rumor had as one of her choicest topics about this time and soon after that a certain old and tolerably wealthy man, living between the haunted spot and Great Barrington, would never go to sleep unless he had a lighted candle in his room, and that he never could be got to go up that road on business or pleasure. One of the men previously mentioned, who had seen the queer sights, said that it was the belief of many that he never could die in peace without making a confession that would be sensational in the extreme. It was also hinted that it would be connected with the disappearance of a well known peddler, who used to carry silks, watches, jewelry and the like, and who was supposed to have many hundreds of dollars in his possession at a time.-New York Herald.