Dreadful Places

by Aaron Mahnke

  Something did not seem right.

  They moved their search to the cargo deck and discovered more dead. There, the corpses all seemed to be frozen in place, arms outstretched, faces pointed toward the sky. Each body was the same: mouth gaping wide, as if in horror at some invisible thing.

  There were no survivors on board. But neither were the bodies injured in any visible way. No matter where they looked or whom they examined, there was no logical explanation for the death of so many men.

  During an attempt to search the cargo bay below deck, one of the crew noticed a fire that seemed to have broken out minutes before. The rescue team was evacuated as quickly as possible and was soon back aboard the Silver Star. Within minutes, the fire triggered an explosion, and the ship, along with its mysteriously dead crew, sank into the ocean.

  No one knows what killed the men aboard the Ourang Medan. No one knows what might have happened to leave each man with a face twisted by an unseen horror. No one is even sure what cargo or mission the ship was entrusted with. There have been conspiracy theories about government shipments, experimental weapons, and even an encounter with extraterrestrial life. But seeing as how the only witnesses to the real events aboard the ship now lie at the bottom of the Indian Ocean, all we can do is guess.

  Safely back on the Silver Star, one of the men in the rescue party told the others of one final mystery he had seen while there. He had seen a dog. It had been standing among some of the bodies inside the ship. At first he had thought it was alive, but quickly discovered that it, too, was frozen in place on its four legs.

  Its head had been turned upward, lips pulled back in a snarl, with eyes that seemed locked on nothing but thin air.

  ON DECEMBER 15, 1900, the SS Archtor was somewhere off the northwestern shore of Scotland. It was the middle of the night, and the fog was thicker than most of the crew had ever experienced before. But they knew where they were.

  In fact, they were nearly certain that they were within a few hundred yards of Flannan Isle, a tall, mountainous island that stands sentry against the cold, dark northern Atlantic. What was unusual, though, was that the lighthouse there—barely a year old—was not lit. The night was completely, utterly dark.

  The lighthouse was operated by three men at a time, adhering to a standard set in place a century before, following the tragedy at the Smalls Lighthouse off the coast of Wales. So it stood to reason that the lack of light was just a brief glitch, and there was no need to worry. Still, it was unusual.

  The Archtor didn’t investigate, though, and for more than one reason. First, it would have been nearly impossible to try and dock against the rocky base of the island at night. Flannan Isle resembles a footstool in some ways. Tall, vertical cliffs thrust out of the water and end hundreds of feet above. And while a staircase had been carved into the stone face, finding it at night, in the fog, with the waves pushing them around…well, it would have been suicide.

  The second reason they didn’t try to reach the lighthouse was more practical. A relief team was scheduled for just five days later, and they would be bringing in fresh supplies, new lightkeepers, and materials for repairs. Why stop now when everything they needed would arrive in a few days? So the Archtor sailed on.

  EMPTY HALLWAYS

  When the relief crew arrived on December 20, they expected to see a flag flying above the lighthouse. This was a sign that the keepers had spotted the ship as it approached and were headed down to the dock to greet them and help with supplies. But the flagpole was bare, and when they rowed over to the staircase, it was empty.

  They blew the whistle on the ship, but no one answered. So two of the sailors were given the task of climbing into a rowboat and making their way over to the island to see what might be going on. The two men, Joseph Moore and Jim McCormack, rowed to the stairs and exited their boat, and Moore climbed to the top of the island.

  He found the lighthouse door locked. Being part of the crew sent to relieve the current lighthouse keepers, he had a key, so Moore unlocked the door and stepped inside. What he found was equal parts confusing and disconcerting.

  The living area was empty. No fire burned in the fireplace, and the beds were empty. The clock on the wall was even silent, frozen on some previous time.

  Most eerie of all, though, was the kitchen table, where a meal had clearly been prepared and served but still sat cold on the plates. And one of the chairs lay on the floor, almost as if someone had stood up too fast and knocked it over.

  I don’t think Moore knew what he was getting into. How could anyone expect to find a lighthouse, built out on the edge of civilization in the North Atlantic, to be missing all three men? James Ducat, Donald Macarthur, and Robert Muirhead—all three veteran keepers—were just…gone. So Moore ran.

  THE INSPECTION

  An inspection was mounted, and more clues were found, but they didn’t help paint a picture that the sailors could understand. Inside, they noticed that a pair of oilskins, the waterproof outerwear that the keepers would wear outside in bad weather, had been left inside. If anyone had gone outside, they had done so without the proper gear.

  Lamps were freshly filled, the house was clean, and a proper logbook had been maintained. And so the crew went outside to look around. They found that a storage building near the lighthouse had been broken open, almost as if something had exploded or collided with it, and the contents were strewn all around the grounds.

  Metal railings near the pathway up from the dock, as well as in other places, were bent, twisted, and—in some cases—ripped from the concrete. There was even a portion of the island, nearly thirty feet of rock and soil, that seemed to have been torn right off and into the sea.

  The men couldn’t come up with a rational theory for what they had found. Someone suggested a powerful wave, one that might have crashed up the high cliffs, pounded the island, and swept away all three keepers. There’d even been a recent storm that had been strong enough to do that, in theory. It was plausible, but hard to believe, especially when you consider two important details. First, why would all three men be outside in a storm like that, without their raingear?

  And second, if the waves that destroyed the outbuilding and railings had also pushed the three keepers off the cliffs into the sea, then there’d be no record of the damage in the logbook. Yet there, in the last entry of the keeper’s log, was a complete description of everything that had been destroyed. If the keepers had indeed been swept away, it was after the damage was done. Who or what took them, though, remains a mystery to this day.

  THE CITY OF Norwalk, Connecticut, was originally settled in 1649. It sits on the coast overlooking Long Island Sound and is split right down the middle by the Norwalk River, which empties into Norwalk Harbor. I know, creative names, right?

  Guarding the harbor, like a team of stone sentinels, are three islands. There are others, of course, but these three are the largest along the coastline, and they form a sort of wall between the sound and the city. If you look at them on a map, Chimon Island is on the right, Shea Island is in the middle, and Sheffield Island is on the left.

  Each of the three islands is roughly fifty acres in size, give or take. And they’re beautiful, no doubt about it. As beautiful, I guess, as any North Atlantic island can be. And Sheffield has the added benefit of having a quaint, antique lighthouse on the southwestern end. It’s very picturesque.

  Sheffield was originally called Winnipauk Island. Like a lot of places in New England, it started out in the possession of a Native American tribe, and was sold off to a European. In 1804, a Revolutionary War veteran by the name of Captain Robert Sheffield purchased the island and gave it the name it still carries today.

  Sheffield only lived there for a while, from what I can tell, but we do know that he loved music. Folks who tell his story say that he was known to play an instrument similar to a violin, but with a more haunting sound. It could be
heard by anyone who was traveling toward the Sheffield home, soft and otherworldly.

  Whatever it was, the music stopped just three years after Sheffield bought the island, as he passed away in 1807. His son-in-law Gershom Smith inherited the island, and in 1826 he built the first lighthouse there, with the help of the U.S. Treasury Department.

  It was Gershom’s son, Nelson Smith, who encountered the most tragedy on the island, though. One of the things that the younger Smith did was build a number of additional structures around the lighthouse. He built a barn, a place to store corn, even a hotel of sorts that they called a “house of entertainment.” And he built all of this out of the local stone found there on the island. In 1832 Smith was loading stones into his boat to move to another location when he slipped and fell. He drowned, most likely a result of hitting his head and passing out. He was just twenty-seven at the time.

  Today, the island is part of the larger Stewart McKinney Wildlife Preserve, which spans a few of the islands there. Tourists occasionally travel to see the old light and experience being off the mainland. But in the autumn of 1991, something odd happened.

  An archaeology student named Karen Orawsky was working on Sheffield Island, compiling a history of the area as part of her degree program. She was there on a daily basis. She would dock her boat, conduct the research for the day, and then take the boat home. Day after day, this went on without incident. And then something changed.

  One day, while approaching the island by boat, she heard music. It was soft, almost otherworldly, but it was clearly coming from the direction of the island. After docking, though, she was unable to find the source.

  She would frequently hear other noises as well. A faint, barely audible cry for help. The blast of a foghorn on a perfectly clear day. Wind that whistled through the trees without moving a single branch. She even felt cold spots while standing in the warm sunlight. All of these events were unexplainable, and all of them remain a mystery to this day.

  Oddest of all, though, were the stones. According to her story, she would leave the island by boat at the end of each day, and return the following morning to discover that things had changed. Specifically, stones that had randomly littered the coast before would be found rearranged in clear patterns. Some were placed in the shape of a ring, while others were lined up straight. Once they even resembled the beginning of a stone wall.

  Faulty short-term memory, or the ghost of Nelson Smith hard at work on another project? We’ll never know for sure. What we can be certain of, though, is that Sheffield Island is a place where the past floats very close to the present. And if you lean into the wind, you just might hear it.

  SOME PLACES ARE more frightening than others. It’s hard to nail down a specific reason, but even so, I can’t think of a single person who might disagree. Some places just have a way of getting under your skin.

  For some, it’s the basement. For others, it’s the local graveyard. I even know people who are afraid of certain colors. Fear, it seems, can be triggered by almost anything. And while history might be full of hauntingly tragic stories that span a variety of settings and climates, the most chilling ones—literally—are those that take place in the harsh environment of winter.

  The incident at Dyatlov Pass. The tragedy of the Donner party. Even the sinking of the Titanic in 1912, which happened in the freezing waters of the North Atlantic. Winter, it seems, is well equipped to end lives and create fear. And when I think of dangerous winters, I think of Maine, that area of New England on the northern frontier.

  If you love horror, you might equate Maine with Stephen King, but even though he’s tried hard over the last few decades to make us believe in Derry and Castle Rock and Salem’s Lot, the state has enough danger on its own. Maine is home to nearly thirty-five hundred miles of coastline, more than even California. And that’s where the real action happens.

  The Maine coastline is littered with thousands of small islands and jagged rocks, ancient lighthouses, and even older legends. And all in the cold north, where the sea is cruel and the weather can be deadly.

  It’s often there, in the places that are isolated and exposed, that odd things happen. Things that seem born of the circumstances and climate. Things that leave their mark on the people there. Things that would never happen on the mainland.

  And if the stories are to be believed, that’s a good thing.

  ISLAND LIVING

  The coastline of Maine isn’t as neat and tidy as the coastlines of other states. Don’t picture sandy beaches and warm waves that you can walk through. This is the cold north. The water is always chilly, and the land tends to emerge from the waves as large, jagged rocks. Go ahead and pull up a map of Maine on your phone. I’ll wait. You’ll see what I mean right away; this place is dangerous.

  Because of that, ships have had a long history of difficulty when it comes to navigating the coast of Maine. Part of that is because of all the islands. They’re everywhere. According to the most recent count, there are over forty-six hundred of them, scattered along the coastal waters like fragments of a broken bottle.

  One such fragment is Seguin Island. It’s only three miles from the mainland, but it’s easy to understand how harsh winter weather could very quickly isolate anyone living there. And when you’re the keeper of the lighthouse there, that isolation comes with the job.

  The legend that’s been passed down for decades there is the story of a keeper from the mid-1800s. According to the tale, this keeper was newly married, and after moving to the island with his bride, they both began to struggle with the gulf between their lives there and the people on the coast. So to give his wife something to do with her time, and maybe to get a bit of entertainment out of it for himself, the keeper ordered a piano for her.

  They say it was delivered during the autumn, just as the winter chill was creeping in. In the story, it had to be hoisted up the rock face, but that’s probably not true. Seguin is more like a green hill protruding from the water than anything else. But hey, it adds to the drama, right? And that’s what these old stories provide: plenty of drama.

  When the piano arrived, the keeper’s wife was elated, but buyer’s remorse quickly set in. You see, the piano only came with the sheet music for one song. With winter quickly rolling in from the north, shipping in more music was impossible, so she settled in and made the best of it.

  The legend says that she played that song nonstop, over and over, all throughout the winter. Somehow, she was immune to the monotony of it all, but her husband—the man who had only been hoping for distraction and entertainment—took it hard. They say it drove him insane.

  In the end, the keeper took an axe and destroyed the piano, hacking it into nothing more than a pile of wood and wire. And then, still deranged from the repetitive tune, he turned the axe on his wife, nearly chopping off her head in the process. The tragic story always ends with the keeper’s suicide, but most know it all to be fiction.

  At least, that’s the general opinion. But even today, there are some who claim that if you happen to find yourself on a boat in the waters between the island and the mainland, you can still hear the sound of piano music drifting across the waves.

  Boon Island is near the southern tip of Maine’s long coastline. It’s not a big island by any stretch of the imagination, perhaps four hundred square yards in total. But there’s been a lighthouse there since 1811, due to the many shipwrecks that have plagued the island for as long as Europeans have sailed in those waters.

  The most well-known shipwreck on Boon Island occurred there in the winter of 1710, when the Nottingham Galley, a ship captained by John Deane, wrecked there on the rocks. All fourteen crew members survived, but the ship was lost, stranding them without help or supplies. As the unfortunate sailors died one by one, the survivors were forced to eat the dead or face starvation. And they did this for days until fishermen finally discovered and rescued them.


  But that’s not the most memorable story from Boon Island. That honor falls to the tale of Katherine Bright, the wife of a former lighthouse keeper there from the nineteenth century. According to those who believe the story, the couple had only been on the small island for a few months when Katherine’s husband slipped while trying to tie off their boat. He fell and hit his head on the rocks, then slid unconscious into the water, where he quickly drowned.

  At first Katherine tried to take on the duties of keeping the light running, but after nearly a week, fishermen in York on the mainland watched the light flicker out and stay dark. When they traveled to the island to investigate, they found Katherine sitting on the tower’s stairs. She was cradling her dead husband’s corpse in her arms.

  Legend has it that Katherine was brought back to York, along with her husband’s body, but it was too late. Just like the lighthouse they had left behind, she was cold and dark.

  Some flames, it seems, can’t be relit.

  FROZEN

  There’s been a lighthouse on the shore of Rockland, Maine, for nearly two hundred years. It’s on an oddly shaped hill, with two large depressions in the face of the rock that were said to remind the locals of an owl. So when the light was built there in 1825, it was, of course, named Owl’s Head.

  Give any building long enough, mix in some tragedy and unexplainable phenomena, and you can almost guarantee a few legends will be born. Owl’s Head is no exception. One of the oldest stories is a well-documented one from 1850. It tells of a horrible winter storm that ripped through the Penobscot Bay area on December 22 of that year. At least five ships were driven aground by the harsh waves and chill wind. It was destructive and fierce, and it would be an understatement to say that it wasn’t a wise idea to be out that night, on land or at sea.