Haunted Savannah: America's Most Spectral City

by Caskey, James

  As happens so often in a tourist town, John’s bar was not long-lived: it only lasted about a year. Another bar quickly took its place, a joint called Pour Larry’s Bar, complete with new staff and owners. When I dropped by to talk to them about the space they now occupied, one of the bartenders turned very pale as I spoke. After I was done relating the history of the bar, she said in a weak voice, “Is that what that burned smell is? No joke: I’ve been smelling it from the very first day I picked up my application.” Other members of the bar staff quickly related their own experiences, including things smashing on their own and a ‘bad vibes’ sensation.

  It is easy to see why there would be spirits in turmoil associated with the property. This unrest springs almost certainly from one of the most divisive issues to ever face our country: the legality (or not) of one man to own another. It took a conflict spanning over four years and over three-quarters of a million deaths to resolve it, in the form of the Civil War. It is also easy, with this historical backdrop, to ascertain the identities of our resident ghosts in the downstairs bar. The first spectre is almost certainly John Montmollin, he of the burned smell and the frightening aura. Those sensitive to such things can still feel his rage at his property, which was built for the express purpose of enslaving the black race, being used instead to enrich and educate the former slaves.

  What of the other, playful ghosts? Almost without any doubt, these are African American. The only question remains: are they the children who were educated in this property, perhaps completely unaware of the past use of the building? Or are they the former slaves, now set free? Could that tinkling sound be the moment that they were freed from their manacles?

  In a story fraught with irony, the final balancing twist is this: the dark presence still felt today is the light-skinned man. We are catching echoes of his nature and not his color, and he had the very darkest of hearts. The bright shiny presences are the dark-skinned ones from history, yet they are innocent as the pure driven snow. It was here that they experienced not the rings of slavery, but the ringing of a school bell announcing their freedom.

  And what of my own balance, the one between grim history and humor? It is with considerable zeal that I now stop my pub crawl outside of Pour Larry’s Bar and tell the story of John Montmollin: Savannah’s original stick in the mud.

  Presence at 441 Barnard Street

  In a lovely three story 1860 stucco-over-brick townhouse located on Barnard Street, several odd supernatural occurrences have been noted. The structure’s calm exterior and happy current residents belie a deeply troubling melancholy which permeates the home. A presence has been felt by several people, including both a current owner, as well as myself, in 1998.

  I was recently out of art school, and was making a decent living as a decorative and portrait painter. I was referred to my new clients at 441 Barnard Street by an interior decorator. Right away, I hit it off with my prospective clients—my ideas seemed to mesh exactly with what the couple envisioned for their home. One small project suddenly became many, including a few large-scale decorative works. I painted a floor to look like marble, and did some faux finishes—including woodgraining and faux brickwork. The clients seemed very happy with my work, and began to treat me like a member of the family, albeit a well-paid one. I often listened to music as I worked, and the couple and I found that even our musical tastes coincided, so I began at their request to unplug the headphones and let the music play. We all seemed to enjoy the old greats, like Nina Simone, Billie Holliday, Louis Armstrong, and even more modern favorites like Eric Clapton and the Foo Fighters.

  A Lyrical Haunting

  Several of the projects were large-scale enough that I needed to stay late, and the couple became accustomed to leaving me in their house while they attended parties and dinners, always just telling me to lock up behind myself and drop the key through the mail slot when I left. One night, leaving to attend a society function, my patrons left me behind in their living room working high up on a ladder. My CD player had been switched off while they had been talking on the phone earlier in the evening, and I remember quite vividly taking the CD out of the player and placing it back in the jewel case. As the shadows grew darker, and I grew closer and closer to finishing, I had an experience that I will never forget—and to this day just the thought of it gives me chills: I began to hear slow, sad music beneath me. The CD player had turned on by itself. At first I thought I was imagining it. And yet, Nina Simone’s sultry voice issued forth, incredibly singing from the mix CD I had removed from the player, and it wasn’t the first song in the queue she sang; but the third. There was no way not to take it personally—I felt that this song had been selected because of its specific lyrics.

  I put a spell on you

  ‘Cause you’re mine

  I ran from that house about as fast as I’ve ever run before, and I’m a former college baseball player. I fled as a man chased by bees must run, grabbing the key as I ran past the table by the front door, locking up and throwing the key through the mail slot below before running again to my car. Only then did I stop, panting, and then and only then did I wonder if there was any logical explanation to what had transpired. Could the couple be putting me on somehow? Was it a joke? Or had I just had a strange encounter with something I couldn’t explain? I didn’t let that thought linger, as I put the car into drive, and jammed my foot on the gas pedal.

  With some trepidation, I went to work the next morning. The lady of the house was fixing coffee as I entered timidly. Everything was as I had left it the night before, including one of my prized brushes, which I had left loaded with paint, and so the bristles had dried in an ugly glob. I opened my CD player and saw what I had suspected—the player was indeed empty. The CD was snug in the jewel case. I asked her if she or her husband had been listening to any music, and she said, “No, we like our mornings pretty quiet... no music or TV before ten or so.”

  She went on: “I thought you were getting close to being finished with that project last night... did you get tired?” I told her that I hadn’t felt very inspired the previous night, and left pretty quickly—in fact that was the truth. Nothing could uninspire me quite like what may have been a message from a ghost. I watched her carefully to see if she or her husband appeared to be having fun at my expense, but saw no guile in their expressions.

  As casually as I could manage, I asked, “Is this place haunted?” She didn’t even pause in her pouring of the coffee: “Oh, yes. I feel the presence sometimes in the late evenings. My husband doesn’t agree—,” he ruffled his morning paper right on cue—“but I often feel like there’s a black girl... a cook, maybe... in here from a long time ago. I’ve even seen her a few times,” she said earnestly, “or at least I see a quick flash out of the corner of my eye and then she’s gone.”

  She went on to explain that she sometimes got the impression of a deep, silent sadness as the shadows lengthened into gloom. Nothing ever overt, just a impression of someone who had a bitter place in her heart.

  I never explained to my clients what had happened the previous night, but I am pretty sure they could tell that something had transpired. I suppose I was afraid of losing them as clients—at the time I did not research ghosts and tell ghost stories for a living. I still considered people who believed in ghosts to be slightly off, and was worried that they might assume the same. I never had the opportunity to work late into the evening in the upstairs ever again, as my project moved me into a different area of the house, complete with different hours. But the question has always lingered since that strange happening: what could have caused that CD player to turn on by itself and play music with no CD inside? A check of the townhouse’s history reveals no likely suspects in the search for the mystery woman seen and sensed by the lady of the house.

  If it was indeed a message from beyond, what did it mean? Nina Simone’s song is about a woman at the end of her rope: she’s torn up inside
by a man who cheats, yet she still loves him. Was this spirit relating to the lyrics? Perhaps the message expressed in Nina Simone’s old song could be truly universal.

  The Downstairs Presence

  After my work in the upstairs was completed, I was asked to work in the downstairs apartment. The floors, my patron couple explained, were concrete, and they planned on using area rugs throughout that level in the house. Wouldn’t faux marble look wonderful in between the rugs? At twenty-four dollars an hour I couldn’t have agreed more.

  Unfortunately, the only part of my plan I hadn’t considered was that the only time a floor painter can work is when his surface is dry to the touch, and the paint had a drying time of six hours, which meant I’d be working all sorts of strange times. Working alone at all hours of the night is never comfortable, but in Savannah the ‘witching hour’ can often take on a whole new meaning. I began to hear things— I often heard disembodied footsteps as I labored on the floor. Understand that I knew I was all alone in the area, but nevertheless I could hear and feel someone near. In one notable instance, I heard the distinct heavy tread of someone come down the outside stairs from the townhouse above, pause on the sidewalk, and then walk towards the open door of the downstairs in which I was working. I raised my eyes to ask a question to either of my two employers, and the question died on my lips. I was completely alone.

  On another occasion, a slithery scratching sound worked its way down the back door. Thinking one of my upstairs patrons needed something, I opened the back door, and no one was there.

  I mentioned the strange noises once to a plumber who had come to work on the toilet in the downstairs bathroom. He not so politely told me that perhaps I should open a window or two, because the paint fumes were obviously getting to me. But I was not the only one to hear them. A contractor who came in to do some electrical work turned to me and said, “I don’t know how you can stay here all hours of the night. I hear people who aren’t there walking around all the time down here.”

  I began to wonder who exactly would be renting this haunted space—and wondering if the new tenants would stay for long. One afternoon I got my answer: the lady of the house came down to check my progress, and mentioned that the space was going to be a short-term rental space only. Specifically the downstairs would be rented to doctors, who come from out of town for short stays at a local hospital from one to four weeks.

  I remember musing to myself at the time that the doctors had better be cardiologists.

  The Willink House

  426 E. St. Julian Street

  The small house located on the northwest corner of Price and St. Julian Streets, built in 1845, is unusual because it is so well-traveled. It was originally built for Henry F. Willink, but it stood just south of Oglethorpe Avenue, at the corner of Price and Perry Streets. It was moved later to its present location. The structure is indicative of a type of building that was popular from the late 18th to mid 19th century in Savannah: small, simple, and mobile if need be.

  Henry Willink was a shipbuilder, and lived in the house for roughly ten years. He is an important figure in Savannah’s history because he served as one of the chief contractors in Savannah whose services provided ships for the fledgling Confederate Navy. When the C.S. Navy was formed, the Secessionists had not one single ship. But Willink helped change all that, and quickly helped build the Confederates a fighting force with his shipyards. He built two of the three ironclad vessels produced in Savannah. Unfortunately, the technology of building ironclad warships was so new, that while the armored ships were impressive to view, the seaworthiness and effectiveness were less than satisfactory.

  The first ironclad produced in the Willink shipyard, the C.S.S. Georgia, was so heavily armored and underpowered that she could scarcely move. She had to be towed into position, and was much more effective as a floating battery than as a fighting ship. But Willink should not shoulder the blame for the vessel’s shortcomings; this was an experimental technology, and was called “The Ladies Gunboat”, not because of any perceived shortcomings to the craft, but because she was paid for by $115,000 raised by the Ladies’ Gunboat Association. The problems with Willink’s vessels were common amongst the new ironclads, be they produced by the North or South.

  The second (and last) ironclad produced by Willink’s shipyards was a monster called the C.S.S. Savannah. While fearsome in her armament, she was also brutal on her crew. One sailor wrote of the conditions aboard another ironclad, which is indicative of the experiences of all Confederate sailors forced to live aboard such ships: “There is no ventilation at all. I would defy anyone in the world to tell when it is day or when night if he is confined below without any way of marking time... I would venture to say that if a person were blindfolded and carried below and turned loose he would imagine himself in a swamp, for the water is trickling in all the time and everything is so damp.” This would be a sign of of the conditions of the seagoing iron monsters produced by Willink, as well. The Savannah was destroyed by Rebel seamen to avoid her capture by Union forces in late 1864.

  The occupying Union forces charged Willink with aiding the enemy. Mr. Willink freely admitted to that charge, which so impressed the authorities that they let him go.

  “...she took a misstep and plunged into the swift Savannah current.”

  Tragedy in the Shipyards

  While Willink had a successful career making ships for the Confederate Navy, one area of his life still pained him: his wife’s death in a visit to the shipyards years before. While visiting him aboard ship, she took a misstep and plunged into the swift Savannah current. Unable to swim, she drowned. Her death was a tragic and senseless accident.

  Henry was devastated. He absorbed himself in his work, often times pacing the floor of his little cottage. He sometimes left for work at odd hours, slamming the door to his house and trudging down to the river to work out his frustrations in the middle of the night.

  It has been previously reported that the small cottage would sometimes be the scene of this nocturnal ritual of Mr. Willink’s: from time to time the phantom sound of the door slamming shut has been heard, by neighbors and passersby, when no one can be seen leaving the dwelling. This occurred before the house was moved to its present location in 1964—perhaps the change in scenery has calmed the nervous energy, or perhaps Mr. Willink has finally found the peace that eluded him so many years before. Or is it possible that the two lovers are rejoined?

  A Place of Learning

  However, it is from the time period after Willink owned the house that some residual energy still lingers. In the years before the Emancipation Proclamation, it was considered illegal to teach slaves to read or write. It has been said that the house became an illicit school for African-American children in the years spanning from 1855 to just before the outbreak of the Civil War. A white female teacher began teaching the slaves to read and basic math skills, even though this was prohibited by law at the time. She taught the slave children to calculate by using sweets, which if added properly became that child’s reward for solving the problem correctly.

  She was eventually found out, and was given an option by the authorities: she could face arrest and a fine, or she could leave town. Either way, her school was gone forever. The teacher reluctantly agreed to leave the city, and she bade farewell to her students and departed Savannah, never to return. This sad chapter of American history faded into the past.

  Or did it? Subsequent owners have reported finding sweets moved from their kitchen into other areas of the house such as the living room. Those same bits of candy have been found arranged into what appear to be rows of simple mathematical problems. Could the essence of these children be revisiting the house they knew as a school so many years before? Could they be engaging in that familiar activity, perhaps hoping to receive those same remembered rewards?

  This house has known tragedy in the form of Henry Willink’s ill-fat
ed wife, but the greater tragedy is those children, denied a proper education because of ignorance and racism. Maybe those young ones make an appearance from time to time to let us know that they have not forgotten their lessons, or their teacher’s kindness. It seems the education they received taught them math and writing skills, but the lesson they had taken to heart was their teacher’s compassion.

  Rene Rondolia

  Foley’s Alley (near East Broad)

  The often-told story of Rene Rondolia (some add the surname ‘Asch’), the seven-foot killer who is said to have terrorized Savannah in the early days of the 1800’s, is a tale that has become a Savannah tradition. Many different versions have been told throughout the years. Some have likened the story to a real-life monster, elaborating on the central theme of Mary Shelley’s misunderstood (and fictitious) killer in her seminal book Frankenstein. Others have compared him to Lenny, from Steinbeck’s classic book Of Mice and Men. But exactly how much truth does this story contain? And does it really have ties to classic literature?

  The Legend

  If you were to take a ghost tour in Savannah, you’d likely hear a variation of the following story:

  On the far eastern side of Savannah in the early 1800’s, there was an area that used to be known as Foley’s Alley, existing near East Broad Street around Warren and Washington Squares. It was the blue-collar district, where the tradesmen (carpenters, shipbuilders, iron workers, brick masons, etc.) lived. The terror began there, because in September 1804 a doctor was summoned in the middle of the night to Foley’s Alley to deliver a child. Now in those days, doctors did not deliver children; that was a job for midwives. But this woman, Marie, was in agony. She had been in labor for 3 days, and she began begging for the doctor.