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For the complete story of the Bell Witch --- and haunted Bell
Witch Cave --- Click on the Book Cover above for Troy Taylor's
Season of the Witch
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There is no greater ghost story in the
history of American than that of the
Bell Witch of Tennessee. It would
require an entirely separate book to
chronicle the strange haunting that
occurred in Robertson County between
1817 and 1821 (and I have written one --
see my book Season of the Witch for the
complete account) but in short, the
family of a local farmer named John Bell
was plagued by a mysterious and violent
spirit for nearly four years. The
haunting involved spectral creatures,
disembodied voices, unbelievable
violence and even resulted in the death
of John Bell --- all at the hands of the
infamous Bell Witch.
The haunting began in
1817 when the Bell family began
experiencing strange phenomena in their
home. First, the house was plagued with
knocking and rapping noises and
scratching sounds. |
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Blankets were
pulled from beds, family members were kicked and
scratched and their hair pulled. Particularly
tormented was young Elizabeth Bell, who was slapped,
pinched, bruised and stuck with pins. At first, John
Bell was determined to keep the events secret, but
soon confided in a friend, who then formed an
investigative committee. John Bell's friends soon
learned that the strange force in the house had an
eerie intelligence. It soon found a voice and from
that day on was seldom silent.
The spirit identified itself as the "witch" of Kate
Batts, a neighbor of the Bell's, with whom John had
experienced bad business dealings over some
purchased slaves. "Kate" as the local people began
calling the spirit, made daily appearances in the
Bell home, wreaking havoc on everyone there. People
all over the area of soon learned of the witch and
she made appearances, in sounds and voices, all over
Robertson County.
The ghost became so famous that even General Andrew
Jackson decided to visit. He too experienced the
antics of the witch and his carriage wheels refused
to turn until the witch decided to let them.
John Bell fell victim to bouts of strange illness,
for which Kate claimed responsibility. While he was
sick in bed, the spirit cursed and prodded him,
never allowing him to rest. One day, he went to bed
and never recovered. He was found senseless in his
bed one morning and a strange bottle was found
nearby. Bell's breath smelled of the black liquid in
the bottle, so a drop of it was placed on the tongue
of a cat and the animal dropped dead. John Bell soon
followed suit and Kate screamed in triumph. She even
made her presence known at his funeral, laughing,
cursing and singing as the poor man was buried.
Kate didn't vanish immediately after the death of
her proclaimed enemy, though. She stayed around,
threatening Betsy Bell to not marry the man that she
truly loved, Joshua Gardner. The witch would never
say why, but she did allow the girl to later marry
the local schoolteacher, Richard Powell. Kate soon
left the family but promised to return in seven
years. She did come back and plagued the family
again for two weeks. She soon departed but many
believe that she may not have gone far.
Who was the Bell Witch? Was she really a ghost, who
claimed to be connected to a living person? Or did
the resentment and the hatred of the real Kate Batts
create an entity of its own? Or could the haunting
have been poltergeist activity linked to Betsy Bell?
No one will ever know for sure -- but whoever, or
whatever, the Bell Witch was, many believe that she
has never left Adams, Tennessee at all.
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Near the Red River, on
the former Bell farm, is a cave that has
been called the "Bell Witch Cave".
Thanks to local legend and lore, many
people have come to believe that when
the spirit of the witch departed from
the torment of the Bell family, she went
into this cave. Others (myself included)
believe that the cave marks the entrance
to a doorway through which Kate came
into the world, departed, and perhaps
even returns today. Who knows? But I can
tell you that with the large number of
bizarre incidents reported in and around
the cave in modern times, notions of the
witch returning may not be as odd as you
might think.
While the cave has become
quite famous in recent years, there is
little mention of it in contemporary
accounts of the haunting. It is believed
that the cave might have been used for
the cool storage of food in those days,
thanks to the fact that it remains a
constant 56 degrees. It was also
mentioned in some accounts that Kate’s
voice was often heard nearby and one
day, Betsy Bell and several of her
friends had a close encounter with the
witch inside of the cave.
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The cave itself is
located in the center of a large bluff that
overlooks the river. The mouth of the cave opens
widely but entrance to the cavern itself must be
gained through a fairly long tunnel. The cave is not
large compared to most commercial caves; however its
true length is unknown because of narrow passages
that go beyond the 500 or so feet accessible to
visitors. Although geologically, this is a dry cave
that has been carved from limestone, in wet weather,
a stream gushes from the mouth of the cavern and
tumbles over a cliff into the river below. This
makes the cave nearly impossible to navigate and
even shouted conversations become inaudible over the
roar of the water.
In dry times, the cave has proven to be quite an
attraction to curiosity-seekers and ghost hunters.
Once you pass through the entrance passage, the
visitor enters a large room that opens into yet
another tunnel and an overhead passageway. Another
large room can be found at the rear of the explored
portion of the cave, but from that point on the
tunnels become smaller, narrower and much more
dangerous.
The Bell Witch Cave became an attraction thanks
largely to a man named Bill Eden, who owned the
property for a number of years. Eden was a wealth of
information about the cave and about the fact that
strange occurrences were continuing to take place on
the land that once belonged to John Bell. Although
he was mainly a farmer, Eden did make some early
improvements to the cave by adding electrical
lights, but that was about all.
Despite being undeveloped though, the cave managed
to attract hundreds of visitors every year who
wanted to be shown through it. Bill always obliged
although was always puzzled about how they found the
place. There were no signs to point the way at that
time but somehow people tracked down directions to
the site and they always asked to hear the stories
of the witch, and the stories that Eden spun from
his own weird experiences at the place.
Many of the strange experiences actually happened to
Bill Eden himself, while others involved visitors to
the cave. For instance, a woman came to visit one
day and asked to go down and see the cave. She had
brought a group of friends along and in all, about
fifteen people followed Eden down the rather
treacherous path to the cave’s entrance. All at
once, the woman in charge of the group abruptly sat
down in the middle of the path. One of the people
who was with her asked why she was sitting there,
and she answered that she wasn’t! She claimed that a
heavy weight, which felt like a ton of lead, was
pressing her down to the ground and she couldn’t get
up. Several members of the group managed to get the
lady to her feet and half carried her back up the
hill to her car.
Bill Eden could also recount a number of encounters
he had on his own in the cave. "You can hear
footsteps in there all the time and I saw one
thing," he once said in an interview. "Lots of
people come out here expecting to see a ghost or a
witch of whatever you want to call it. I just call
it a spirit - and it looked like a person with its
back turned to you. Looked like it was built out of
real white-looking heavy fog or snow, or something
real solid white. But you couldn’t see through it.
It had the complete figure of a person till it got
down to about its ankles. It wasn’t touching the
floor at all. It was just drifting - bouncing
along."
As Eden mentioned, a lot of people came to the cave
hoping to see, or experience, a ghost. While many of
them went away disappointed, some got a little more
than they bargained for.
Eden had taken a group of young people into the cave
one evening for a tour. They had been inside for
about an hour and had stopped in the back room where
they talked for awhile and Bill told of his
experiences in the area. As they were starting to
leave, one of the girls in the group started to make
some remarks about the authenticity of the place,
whether or not it was really haunted, and about how
disappointed she was that nothing had appeared or
had happened. She continued this monologue into the
passage connecting the two rooms, which is quite
narrow. Everyone else in the group seemed to be
having a good time and Eden was used to the squeals,
giggles and laughter that often accompanied young
people on tours of the cave. The girl who was
complaining was walking directly in front of Eden at
this point.
She was walking along and then all of the sudden,
stumbled backwards as if she had been pushed. She
took a couple of step back and then sat down hard on
the floor of the cave. She insisted that someone had
slapped her, even when Eden tried to convince her
otherwise. Eden helped the girl to her feet, still
skeptical, and they all moved to the front room of
the cave. Once there, he shined his light on her
face to see how badly she had been hurt. He looked
at her cheek and was surprised to see a red welt -
and the prints of fingers that were still visible
where she had been struck!
In the early summer of 1977, several soldiers from
Fort Campbell, Kentucky came over to visit the cave.
Eden took the young men on a tour and ended up in
the back room, where all of them sat around talking
and Eden told his stories of the odd events on the
farm.
One of the men politely expressed some doubts about
the validity of the story. He had been to many
places that were supposedly haunted and nothing out
of the ordinary had ever occurred to him. Eden
laughed and shrugged his shoulders. The man could
believe whatever he wanted to, but as for Bill,
well, he had seen enough things on the farm to know
that something unexplainable was going on. "If
something happened, you probably wouldn’t ever come
back here again," Bill added with a grin.
The group sat and talked for a short while longer
and then they all got up to leave -- all except for
the young man who had spoke up about his disbelief
in ghosts. "Mr. Eden! Come here and help me," the
soldier said. "I can’t get up."
Eden and the man’s friends all assumed that he was
joking and they all began to laugh. It wasn’t until
Bill took a good look at the man that he realized
that something really was wrong. The young man was
now begging for help and his face was drenched so
badly with sweat that it looked like someone had
poured a bucket of water over him. When Eden took
hold of his hand to help him up, he could feel the
man’s hand was cold and clammy as if he were going
into shock.
The man continued to call for help and claimed that
he could feel strong arms wrapped around his chest.
They were squeezing him tightly, he said, and he was
unable to breathe. Eden and the other men helped
their friend to his feet and while the soldiers
supported him, Bill wiped his face off with some
run-off water from the cave. When the soldier got to
feeling better, they took him outside of the cave.
By the time they were ready to leave, the young man
had completely recovered and was suffering no ill
effects from his harrowing experience.
As he was heading to his car, he stopped and shook
Bill Eden’s hand. "Well, you were right about one
thing, Mr. Eden," the young soldier said. "I won’t
ever be back here again."
The present-day owners of the Bell Witch Cave, and
the piece of the old Bell farm made so famous by
Bill Eden, are Chris and Walter Kirby. Walter is a
tobacco farmer and Chris manages to stay busy
managing the upkeep and offering tours of the cave.
In the summer months, this task is more than a
full-time job.
The Kirbys purchased the land in April 1993. The
place had been empty for several years, after the
death of Bill Eden, but by that summer, the cave was
open again for business. Over the course of the next
year or so, they made a number of improvements to
the cave, which included new lights, a new
electrical system, an improved path to the cave,
wooden walkways to cross the most treacherous areas
of the trail, and a number of other things. These
improvements continue today.
It wasn’t long after the Kirbys moved to the farm,
and began conducting tours in the cave, before they
realized things were not quite right on the
property. They began to notice first that there were
strange noises that didn’t have an easy explanation.
"We’ve heard them in the cave and we’ve heard them
in the house," Chris has said on occasion. "I feel
like if there’s anyplace that could be haunted, it’s
this place here. First of all, it’s got the legend
of being haunted. There’s an Indian burial mound
right above the mouth of the cave on the bluff. And
the previous owner of the cave died in our bedroom."
One day, Chris and her dog were leading a tour of
the cave for a group of visitors. She was just
opening the steel gate that leads inside when she
heard a strange sound - the same sort of sound
described by Bill Eden and one of his tour groups
years before. "It sounded like real raspy breathing
sounds," she said, "like someone couldn’t get their
breath. It only lasted for a minute and then it was
gone." Chris looked back to her tour group, but they
were quietly talking amongst themselves and hadn’t
heard a thing.
The tour continued through the first room, down the
narrow passage and into the second room. Here, as is
the tradition in Bell Witch Cave Tours, Chris began
telling stories of the witch, the haunting and
strange incidents on the farm. As she was talking,
the dog suddenly reacted to something that no one
else could see. The hair on the animal’s back stood
up and she began showing her teeth and growling. The
tour group asked what was wrong with the dog, but
Chris had no idea. She was finally able to calm the
dog down, but then the animal began whining and
tucked her tail between her legs. She cowered back
against Chris and at that same moment, the
flashlight in Chris’ hand suddenly went out!
"I guessed that it was just the battery at first,"
Chris remembered, "but then a lady’s video camera
stopped working too. We were all standing there in
the dark and I’ll tell you, I was ready to get out
of there and everyone else was too!"
Chris has also reported strange apparitions that
have been seen in the cave by visitors and staff
members alike. s Some of these shapes are
misty and fog-like, sometimes appearing in different
parts of the cave, only to vanish when approached.
She also recalled another type of image they had
seen. "It looked like heat waves that come up over
the highway in the summer time," she explained. "You
can see them out of the corner of your eye and then
they’re gone."
One of the ongoing traditions (or legends, if you
will) of the Bell Witch Cave involves the removal of
any sort of artifact from the premises, be it rocks
or anything else found inside of the cave. Some
believe that perhaps the energy of the area is
imbedded in some way within the actual makeup of the
place and by removing a portion of the cave, you are
inviting the phenomena that occurs here to travel
with you. Others are not so scientific -- they
believe that the spirit of the witch will follow
anyone who removes something from the cave!
It’s likely that this tradition got started a number
of years ago when the remains of a young Native
American woman were discovered by men doing
construction work on one of the local roads. Because
it is well known that the former Bell farm contains
a burial mound, it was requested that the bones of
the Indian woman be entombed within the Bell Witch
Cave. The remains were laid out in the first room of
the cave in a shallow indention that was then lined
with limestone slabs. Unfortunately, they did not
remain there for long.
A short time later, trespassers into the cave made
off with the bones, but according to local lore --
not without a price! Gossip in the community has it
that each of the persons who removed one of the
relics suffered a series of misfortunes, accidents
and injuries within days of the theft. For this
reason, it has come to be believed that it is bad
luck to remove anything at all from the cave. Over
the last several years, I have received a number of
accounts from people who claim to have taken away
stones from the Bell Witch Cave, only to then
experience not only bad luck, but strange happenings
in their previous un-haunted homes! Chris Kirby has
assured me that she has received a number of
packages in the mail over the years that have
contained rocks and stones that were removed from
the cave. After getting them home, the folks who
removed them began to suffer all sorts of problems
and weird events. They believe that by mailing them
back to the cave, they might alleviate their
problems.
Since the late 1970s, the Bell Witch Cave has a
destination point for ghost hunters, curiosity
seekers and paranormal enthusiasts. Strange
phenomena has been reported on this property for
centuries, dating all of the way back to the time of
the Bell family in the late 1810s and 1820s. Weird
events continue to this day and anyone with an
interest in the supernatural is encouraged to make
their way to the small town of Adams, Tennessee and
seek out the Bell Witch Cave -- if you dare!
The Bell Witch Cave can be reached by exiting Interstate 24 near
Clarksville, Tennessee and following Highway 76 to Adams, Tennessee. The cave can be found
by turning left after the Amoco Station onto Keysburg Road. Go about a
half mile on Keysburg Road and turn right at sign. Admission to the cave is only $7 per person and well worth the cost.
Call ahead for tour times! (615) 696-3055 or click here to visit the
Bell Witch Cave Official Website!
THE CAVE IS OPEN FROM MAY 1 TO OCTOBER 31
CLOSED ON TUESDAYS OR IN CASE OF FLOODING
OPEN 10:00 AM - LAST TOUR AT 5:00 PM
The owners also offer tours of an authentic reproduction of the Bell
Family cabin, complete with period antiques, and recountings of the
strange events that occurred back in the early 1800s. Cabin tours are $5
per person.
On the outskirts of Adams, visitors can also see the Bellwood Cemetery. There is a large
burial plot and memorial to the Bell family. In front of the Bell School, on Highway 41,
is a road sign about the haunting. It was designated by the Tennessee Historical
Commission.
© Copyright
2001 - 2008 by Troy Taylor. All Rights Reserved.
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