Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1886-06-03
THE HAUNTED FIELD.

fact-no more believe in apparitions than
they do in the man in the moon. And we
are not at all sure that we don't agree with
them.
At the same time the following story of
an apparition is such a marvellous and Pc
culiar one that we cannot do any better than
to receive it with the attention that it de-
serves:
"Young Mr.. Bligh, a lad of bright parts
and of common attainments, became on
sudden pensive, detected and melancholy.
His friends, observing the change with
out being able to discover the cause, attrib-
uted his behavior to lazness, and aversion
to school, or to some other such motive
which they suspected that he was ashamed
to avoW.
"He was induced to inform his brother,
after some time, that in field through
which he had passed to and from school!'-
that is to say, to and from Launceston
Grammar School, of which Mr.. Ruddle was
head master-"he was invariably met by
the apparition of person whom he person.
ally knew while living and who had been
dead eight years."
at this time.
"Ridicule, threats and persuasions were
alike used in vain by the family to induce
him to dismiss these absurd ideas. Mr..
Ruddle was sent for, to whom the lad in
genuously communicated the time, manner
and frequency of this appearance.
"It was field called Higher Broomfield.
The apparition, he said, appeared in female
attire met him two or three times while
he passed through the field, fitted hastily
by him, but never spoke.
"He had been occasionally met about two
months before he took any notice of it; at
length the appearance became more fire.
quent, meeting him both morning and even
ing, but always in the same field, yet inva-
riably moving out ofthe path when it came
close to him. He often spoke, but received
no reply"
To avoid this unwelcome visitor, he for
sock the field and went to the school and
returned from it through lane, in which
place, between the quarry park and nur-
sery, it always met him.
Unable to disbelieve the evidence of his
own senses, or to obtain credit from any OF
his family, he prevailed upon Mr.. Ruddle
to accompany him to the place.
II arose." says the clergyman, 1.-THE next
morning, and went with him.
'The field to which he led me guessed
to be about twenty acres, in an open coun-
try, and about three furlengs from any
house.
"We went into the field, and had not
gone third part before the spectre, in the
shape of woman with all the circumstance
es he had described the day before, so far as
the suddenness of its appearance and transl-
tion would permit me to discover, passed by.
II was little surprised at it, and though
1 had taken up firm resolution to speak to
it, had not the power, nor burst to look
back yet | took care not to show any fear
to my pupil and guide, and therefore, tell
ing him that 1 was satisfied of the truth of
his statement, we walked to the end of the
field and returned nor did the ghost meet
US that time but once.
son the 18th of July, 1865, went to the
haunted field by myself and walked the
breadth of it without any encounter. l
then returned and took the other walk, and
then the sceptre appeared to me, much
about the same place in which 1saW it when
the young gentleman was with me. 1t ap-
peared to move more swiftly than before,
and seemed to be about ten feet from me on
my right hand, insomuch that l had not
time to speak to it., as had determined
with myself beforehand
'"The evening of this day, the parents,
the son, and myself being in the chamber
where they lay, I proposed to them OF our
going all together to the place next morning.
We accordingly met at the stile we had ap-
pointed thence we all four walked into the
field together.
"We had not gone more than half the
field before the ghost made its appearance.
1t then came over the stle just before US,
and moved with such rapidity that by the
time we had gone six or seven steps it had
passed by; Immediately turned my head
and ran after it; with the young man by
my side.
1--WE saw it pass over the stile at which
we entered, and no further. stepped upon
the hedge at one place, and the young man
at another, but we could discern nothing.
Whereas l do aver that the swiftest horse
could not have conveyed himself out OF
sight in that short space of time.
''Two things observed in this days ap-
pearance-frst, spaniel dog, which had
followed the company unregarded, barked
and ran away as the spectre passed by;
whence it is easy to conclude that it was
not our fear or fancy which made the appari-
ton. Secondly, the motion of the spectre
was not by graduation or by steps, or NOV
ing the feet, but by kind of gliding as
children upon ice, or as boat down river
which perfectly answers the description the
ancents give of the motion of these spec
tres. This ocular evidence clearly convin-
ced, but witha strangely affrighted, the
old gentleman and his wife. They we'll
knew this woman, Dorothy Durant, in her
life time; were at her burial; and now
plainly saw her features in this apparition.
'The next morning, being Tuesday,
went very early by myself, and walked for
about an hour in meditation and prayer in
the field next adjoining.
"Soon after stepped over the stile into
the haunted field, and had not gone above
thirty or forty spaces before the ghost ap-
peared at the further stile.
81 spoke to it some short sentences with
loud voice, whereupon it approached me,
but slowly, and when came near, it moved
not.
81 spoke again, and it answered in voice
neither audible nor very ineligible.