New Ulm weekly review. [volume] (New Ulm, Minn.) 1878-1892, 1885-08-26
TRUE GHOST STORIES.

In 1870, III and '72, in q house on
Columbia heights, Broo klyn, there lived
four ladies, all of them writer's, and all
but one of them Miss Rebecca W..
Easterbrooks, an author of consider
able promise, who died in 1879 now
alive. Their names are Miss Caroline
| B. LIE Ross, teacher Of elocution at
Vassar. college; Mrs NJ. F. Butts, q
| well-known writer and journalist, who
resides at Westerly, r. l., and Mrs.
Eleanor Ames, better known to the
| literary world as eleanor Kirk.
The ladies are willing to attest to the
| truthfulness of thefollowing narrative:
| 1t was a pleasant brown stone, cost
ly-furnished abode, bearing every ex-
ternal and internal Indication of
peace and comfort. There was
/ nothing to distinguish it from other
houses on Columbia heights, save that
its inmates were all bread-winners,
and so occupied the day and evening as
to leave very little time for the claims
of society. Three of them were con-
trlbutors to the New York daily news
papers. These ladies worked and did
not entertain much; the other ladies
in this aristocratic locality entertain
ed more and did not work But there
was a greater difference between them,
one so puzzling, so entirely off the COM
mon, SO exciting, so opposed to all
known laws, as to furnish a constant
theme of speculation, and persistently
to worry and alarm the members of
the household. This house on Column
bla heights was even a more wonder
full place than that of John Wesley, or
| of the grandfather OF Elizabeth Stuart
Phelps. Our four literary feminine
bread-winners displayed no seeking af-
ter the supernatural, and had there
been inclination for such seeking there
was no time for it.
Two of the ladies, sisters, occupied
the front alcove room on the second
story, and a third occupied the back
room on the same floor. The perfor-
nance opened one night about u
clock, soon after they had moved
t into the house, with the sound OF
shuff1ing footsteps in the rooms. A
Light was struck and the noise ceased.
The; doors leading to the hall were
locked, and no intruder was visible.
The gas was turned down again and
silence had reigned for few moments,
when the same singular shutting was
distinctly heard, accompanied by a
new sound, like the dragging of stiff
silken skirt on the carpet. This was
followed by loud knockings in different
parts OF the rooms. Sometimes on
the doors, and again on the floor and
the window panes, and winding up
with whacll, a crash, and a bang.
With fear and trembling the gas was
| again turned up, and with the same
result as before. Nothing nornobody
anywhere. ," A midnight conference
was held, and when the ladies
again retired the gas was left burning
full blast. All was quiet, but upon wax
! ing in the morning a strange sight met
their astonished eyes. Chairs were
! turned upside down, bureaus were dis
mantled, cushions and mats, hair-pins
and hair receivers were strewn about
the floor, and, worse than all, the gar
I'ments, which had been carefully ar
ranged for the morning, together with
the slippers and stockings-in fact, all
the paraphernalia of three wardrobes
were so mixed up and churned to-
gether, that it was almost impossible
to separate them.
This was a house-warming. with O.
! vengeance, and the quartette ofbread-
/ winners met at the breakfast table is a
state OF wonder. and nervous anxiety
impossible to describe. A careful in
quiry as to the kind OF night that had
been passed by the other members of
the family elected nothing unusual
On this occasion no one had been dis
! turbed but the ladies on the second
| floor and the occupants of the ada
i cent houses, who called in to ascertain
the cause of it. These exercises
! proved only to be an overture; for
i during the whole year spent in the
1 house there was literally no rest from
these strange phenomena About
| three nights in q week the same noises
were heard on the second floor, with
the same aggravating mixing up Of
| clothes and overturning of furniture
One day about the LIST of June the
lady of the house, returning from her
New York office, rang the door bell.
| The door was Immediately opened
indeed, quicker than fash-by tall,
strange woman III black She wore q
large cameo at her neck, and on her
head q three-cornered piece of lace,
trimmed with lavender bows. There
was nothing in the least ghostly about
her appearance with the exception of
the singular way in which she backed
from the vestibule into the parlor.
Wondering who this woman could be
who had taken upon herself the Office
of door-opener, the bread-winner
| followed her instantly into the parlor,
Nobody there. Up stairs, down stairs,
!, in every nook, closet and crevice the
seeker hunted and peered without the
least trace OF a human or spiritual
being. In short, there was not per-
son in the house save she who had
inst entered. Even the servant, find
ing that she needed some article for
dinner, had locked the doors and gone
out to get it. This was the first and