Kentucky Hauntings

by Roberta Simpson Brown

  “How do you know that was why they swarmed?” she asked. “Did you see them leave the hives?”

  “No, but I saw where they went. It was really strange, “he said.

  “Where did they go?” Tina asked him.

  “The Leach family thought the custom of telling the bees about a death was just silly superstition,” he told her. “They ignored it and made arrangements for the old man's burial several miles from his home. Most of us in the neighborhood went to the funeral. After the service was finished inside the church, he was carried to the graveyard next to the church, where he was to be buried. A few of us stayed behind after the coffin was lowered into the ground and covered with dirt. People left enough fresh flowers to completely cover the grave, so we placed them over the top.

  “Then we heard an odd sound, like a buzzing or humming of some kind. As it got closer and louder, we looked up and saw a dark mass of something approaching from the sky. We were surprised to see that it was a swarm of bees. They landed right on top of Mr. Leach's grave! We stood there and stared in shock for a few seconds, and then we all scattered in every direction.”

  “Maybe the bees were attracted to the fresh flowers on the grave,” Tina suggested.

  “Some people thought that,” he said. “You know, the unbelievers. But the flowers hadn't been on the grave long enough to attract the bees. The bees had to have started flying before we put the flowers on the grave because the hives were several miles away. Some of us left immediately and went to Mr. Leach's house. We checked the hives, but they were deserted. The bees that came to the graveyard and landed on his grave were his bees. I'll never understand it, but they knew by some unknown means where to find him.”

  “Would you tell your bees if someone in our family died?” Tina asked.

  “Yes, Tina,” he answered. “I would definitely tell them.”

  A few months after this conversation with Tina, Josh learned he had cancer. When he died over a year after that, nobody in the immediate family thought to tell the bees. Tina thought of it during the funeral, and when it was over, she hurried to the hives to check on the bees. They were all gone already. Like their keeper, they had gone to a new home.

  The Pie Supper

  We were not in our teens yet when pie suppers were popular, so although we never baked any pies for these events, we did share in the pie eating. Miss Mildred, the teacher at the local one-room school, shared a particularly heartbreaking story of one pie supper long ago.

  In early times, local churches and schools would hold pie suppers to raise money for the things they needed that did not come under regular budget funds or taxes. In fact, pie suppers provided a major source of funding for many of Kentucky's one-room schools in the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

  At the pie supper, women and girls would provide their homemade pies to be auctioned off to the highest bidder. The person who bought the pie not only got the pie, but also got to eat it with the pie maker. Pie suppers thus had romantic elements, with young men often competing for a pie.

  No names were on the boxes containing the pies, but each box had distinctive decorations. The bidder did not know the identity of the pie maker unless he had some inside information from the girl or her family. Sometimes a girl who liked a certain young man would give him a hint about which box to bid on by secretly revealing some detail about the decorations of her box.

  The ladies decorated their pie boxes with ruffles, ribbons, and flowers, mostly made from cloth or crepe paper purchased at the five-and-ten-cent store. Without hints, an element of mystery or surprise was added to the sale. If more than one young man liked the same girl, the competition in bidding would raise the price of the pie beyond the usual cost. Five dollars was considered a high price. Regardless of who purchased the pies, the money went for a good cause and most people had fun. Unfortunately, now and then there would be an exception. One such exception was always remembered.

  Fred Doss and Bernice Swanson first met at a pie supper and kept steady company after that. She was sixteen and he was seventeen when it all started, but the romance blossomed and grew for four years. During that time, Houston Holleran had his eye on Bernice, too. Fred always knew (probably with a hint from Bernice) which pie was hers. He always managed to outbid Houston and end up with Bernice.

  But the year Fred turned twenty-one was different. He had enlisted in the army and was leaving the day after the pie supper, so it was especially important to Fred and Bernice to share this last pie supper before Fred went off to war. It was equally important to Houston to outbid Fred on this special night. Bernice wanted to make sure Fred bought her pie, so she gave him a big hint.

  “My pie box will be decorated in red, white, and blue in honor of your going into the army to serve your country,” she said.

  Houston figured Bernice would give Fred advance information, so he sent his little sister Alberta over to Bernice's house to spy. Alberta often went to the house to play with Bernice's younger sister, so Bernice thought nothing about the visit. Alberta learned what kind of pie Bernice had baked and even saw the decorated box. This was the information Houston needed. Then Alberta had her mother help her decorate a box that looked like Bernice's box. Alberta changed one tiny detail on the side of the box that nobody but Houston would notice. At the pie supper, Houston placed his sister's box ahead of Bernice's while everybody else was playing games and not paying attention to him. Then he waited.

  When the pie auction started, the auctioneer picked up Alberta's box and opened the bidding. Thinking it was Bernice's pie, Fred started to bid. Houston bid against him at first to fool him and to run the bidding up. Then Houston let Fred make the final bid. Fred didn't realize that he had bought the wrong box until Alberta stepped forward and revealed that it was hers. Later, when Bernice's box came up, Fred didn't have enough money left to buy it, so Houston won the bidding with ease.

  Everybody thought it was unfair, but the rules of the pie supper were clear. The guy who bought the pie ate the pie with the girl who brought it. On the evening that was supposed to be their own special time, Bernice and Fred had to eat with other people. Houston thought it was hilarious, but the young couple was very disappointed. When Fred walked Bernice home later, she was literally in tears.

  “Don't cry,” Fred told her. “Houston pulled off a mean trick, but I promise you that no matter what, we'll be together at next year's pie supper!”

  Bernice quickly forgot Fred's promise because Fred had to leave for training the next day. She missed him terribly and refused invitations to go out with Houston. She wrote to Fred every day and prayed every night that he would not have to go overseas to fight. She did not realize that prayers are often answered in ways we do not expect. One day, word came that Fred had been killed in a training accident in boot camp. He would not be going overseas to fight, but he would not be coming home to be with her either. Bernice was devastated. She stayed home and grieved the loss of her sweetheart.

  Months passed, and Bernice still refused to attend any social events. Finally, the time came for the annual pie supper. Her parents reminded Bernice that the school needed to raise funds, so she finally agreed to go with them. She covered her box with black crepe paper and added one white rose. Houston decided right away that it was hers, so he bought it when it went up for auction.

  Bernice tried to be cheerful afterward while they ate, but Houston knew she was remembering the previous year. Sadness was in her eyes. He felt a twinge of conscience about the way he had acted the year before and tried to make casual conversation. Two other couples joined them and tried to cheer Bernice up.

  Suddenly, they heard a noise behind them. It sounded like someone stepping on dry twigs. They all looked around and gasped at what they saw. They couldn't believe their eyes. A figure in an army uniform stood there smiling and gazing at Bernice. There was no doubt about his identity. Fred had clearly kept his promise that they would be together at this pie supper. Bernice fainted and Fred's ghost v
anished.

  Bernice was never the same after that night. She refused to eat or have visitors. She began to waste away and was dead in a few weeks.

  The story goes that as long as they had pie suppers at that school, a ghostly couple could be seen standing off from the crowd. If anyone approached them, they would vanish!

  The Whittler's Trail

  Some of Russell County's finest whittlers, Mr. Hughes, Mr. Ash-brooks, and Mr. Wilson, gathered on the porch of our little country store and exchanged tales as they whittled. All three could have told this story, but Mr. Wilson probably told it most often. Both the telling and the whittling could be considered art.

  Whittling has been around almost as long as mankind itself. It is not a part of Kentucky life now like it used to be, but the tradition is still carried on by some skilled whittlers. In whittling, one cuts or shapes wood, usually into toys, bowls, and the like, using only a knife. The knife is usually a light, small-bladed knife or pocketknife, and the whittler usually whittles objects as a hobby.

  In Kentucky up through the 1900s, whittlers could often be seen whittling on the porches of their homes, at the town square, or in front of an old country store. Huley Stanton was one such whittler. He was often seen at Harmon's store, passing the time by creating images of things he saw around him. Cedar wood was mostly his wood of choice because he liked the smell of it.

  Five-year-old Danny Peterson loved to accompany his father, Lee, to the store so he could watch Huley whittle on the porch. Danny was amazed that Huley could pick up a piece of wood and turn it into a gun, animal, doll, or other toy.

  “How do you do that?” he'd ask.

  “I'll show you when you're a little older,” Huley would tell him.

  “I don't have a knife,” Danny said.

  “Well, I'll leave you my knife if anything ever happens to me,” Huley promised. “This old knife can just about whittle out things on its own.”

  Danny didn't want anything to happen to Huley, but he certainly did want a knife of his own like the one Huley had. Whenever he asked for one, though, his parents always told him he was too young. He'd have to wait until he was several years older to get a knife of his own, so Danny had to be satisfied watching Huley use his for now.

  Huley and his wife and Danny's family lived in the same neighborhood, but dense woods separated their houses. The woods belonged to Huley, and he often cut and sold timber off his land.

  Danny's parents, Hattie and Lee, worked hard on their farm, but they made time to take Danny for walks in the woods. Danny loved all the trees and animals, but he listened to his mom and dad's warning that he must never go into the woods alone. They told Danny that even though the woods held great beauty, they also held great dangers. People in those days made children aware of danger without dwelling on it.

  The Petersons lived in a world before security systems, so, like most people, they secured their doors at night by wooden latches. Danny slept in a small room off the kitchen. Lee and Hattie slept in a large bedroom off the living room. Since there were two rooms between, Lee took special care to secure the latches at night so nothing could get in and Danny would not be able to wander out.

  All was well for some time. Then one day, life in the neighborhood started off as usual, but ended up in a way nobody would have expected. The Petersons were working in their garden, and Danny was playing in the yard. In the nearby woods, Huley Stanton went deep among the trees to cut some timber. The Petersons could hear the sound of Huley's axe chopping away. A short time passed with only the axe and the sound of the hoes breaking the silence. Then a crash and a scream rendered the Petersons motionless. Huley's voice was distant, but clear.

  “God, help!” he called. “The tree fell on me. It's crushing me. Somebody help me, please!”

  They listened for the direction of the sound, but nothing more came.

  “Call for help,” Lee said to Hattie, as he ran into the woods. Danny started to follow, but his mom held him back.

  “Come inside with me,” she said. “Your daddy will help Mr. Stanton.”

  But Huley was beyond help. Other neighbors came to aid Lee, but Huley's injuries were too severe for him to be saved. By the time they were able to remove the tree that was crushing his chest, he was dead.

  Danny cried and cried because Huley was gone. He went to the funeral with his parents, but he wasn't quite sure what being dead really meant. What he did know was that his friend was gone and wouldn't be coming back. When the service was over and everyone went outside, Mrs. Stanton came up to the Petersons to thank them for coming.

  “Danny,” she said, turning to the boy, “Huley left you something. You may be a little young for it now, but he always told me that he wanted you to have his whittling knife someday. I'll bring it over to you when things settle down a bit.”

  Her words made Danny feel better. His friend hadn't forgotten his promise!

  When they got home, Danny was almost too excited about the knife to eat his supper. His mother urged him to eat because thunder was rumbling in the distance and she wanted to have supper over and the dishes washed before the storm hit.

  “Do you think Mrs. Stanton will bring my knife to me tonight?” he asked.

  “No,” Hattie told her son. “She's too sad now. Besides, a storm is coming.”

  “But I want my knife now!” Danny insisted.

  “Danny, that's enough,” his dad told him. “She'll bring it to you when she's ready. You're too little to use it now anyway. You might get hurt.”

  Danny pouted, but said no more. They finished supper in silence and went to bed before the storm hit.

  Danny did not go to sleep, though. He wasn't afraid of the storm's roaring and lightning. He was thinking about his knife. If Mrs. Stanton didn't want to come through the storm to his house, then he could go to her house. The more he thought about it, the more he thought that this was the thing to do.

  He got out of bed quietly and put his clothes on. He tried to release the latch on the kitchen door, but it was too high. He looked around, and his eyes rested on a kitchen chair. He moved it to the door, careful not to wake his parents. They would make him go back to bed. He climbed up on the chair and released the door latch. He didn't think about getting his raincoat. He didn't mind getting wet. It wasn't far to Mrs. Stanton's house anyway. He walked out the door into the woods while his parents slept peacefully inside the house.

  Danny hadn't gone far when he began to realize he should not have done this. He knew he was lost. The woods didn't look the same on a stormy night as they did on a sunny day when his mom and dad were with him. He decided to go back home, but when he looked around, he had no idea of where to go. He was already soaked and chilled by the rain, and he wished he had a dry place to sit and rest. He looked around and noticed a large hollow tree standing by the path. He didn't know that hollow trees were dangerous in storms, so he crawled inside the opening in the trunk and rested.

  As he sat there, the storm seemed to get a second wind. It blew with fury now, and suddenly a blast of wind uprooted the tree where Danny was resting. Danny tried to hold on, but he bounced back and forth inside the trunk. When the tree came to rest, Danny tried to crawl out, but a large branch pinned him inside. He was alone and lost, and nobody knew where to look for him. He cried and cried, and he thought he heard Huley Stanton tell him he would be all right.

  Meanwhile, the renewed energy of the storm woke Hattie Peterson. She heard the kitchen door banging in the wind, so she got out of bed and rushed to the kitchen. One look at the open door sent her hurrying to check on Danny in his room. She knew what she would find. Her son was gone. His bed was empty. She ran into the kitchen.

  “Lee, wake up!” she yelled. “Danny's gone!”

  Lee pulled on his pants and hurried from the bed to the kitchen. One look at the chair beside the door told him what had happened.

  “He's gone after that knife!” he told Hattie. “I've got to go look for him.”

  “Ho
w will you find him in the woods in this storm?” she asked.

  The answer to her question came from the darkness outside the door. Lee and Hattie both smelled the strong scent of fresh cedar right outside.

  Lee grabbed his coat and lit the lantern. He opened the door, and the light showed a small pile of shavings right there by the door, with a thin trail of shavings leading into the woods. They were cedar shavings like the ones Huley Stanton whittled.

  “Wait here,” said Lee. “I'll find him now. I have some help!”

  Lee followed the trail of shavings into the woods for a few minutes. Then they led him off the main path onto a smaller path that was seldom used. Soon he heard Danny crying.

  “Danny!” he called. “Where are you?”

  “Here,” Danny answered, whimpering now.

  The sound was close. Lee looked around, trying to locate the source, when he saw what had happened. He ran over, lifted the limb, and checked Danny for injuries. His ankle was sprained, but otherwise he was unhurt. Just for an instant, Lee felt the presence of Huley Stanton beside him. He breathed a silent thank you to the whittler, picked Danny up in his arms, and carried him home.

  Danny had to rest and stay off his ankle for a few days. He was feeling restless and bored one day when his mother came into his room and told him he had a visitor. He was surprised to see Mrs. Stanton.

  “I have your knife for you, Danny,” she said. “Your mom says you can't use it yet, but I am leaving it with her for you to use later. I brought you something you can use now, though. I found something that Huley whittled, and I know he would want you to have it.”

  She handed Danny a wooden puzzle that he had seen Huley whittle at Harmon's store. In his mind, Danny could see Huley clearly. It felt like Huley was actually there.

  It was many years before Danny used the knife to whittle. Each time he picked up a piece of cedar, he thought of the trail of shavings his dead friend had left that stormy night to save his life.