National Park After Dark - A Haunted Historic Tour of Antietam National Battlefield

Episode Date: October 21, 2024

Today we go to the national park unit that preserves the bloodiest day in American History. During the civil war, 23,000 people were killed or wounded in a single day. Today, this area may contain the spirits of those who lost their lives.For a full list of our sources, visit npadpodcast.com/episodesFor the latest NPAD updates, group travel details, merch and more, follow us on npadpodcast.com and our socials:Instagram: @‌nationalparkafterdarkTikTok: @‌nationalparkafterdarkSupport the show by becoming an Outsider and receive ad free listening, bonus content and more on Patreon or Apple Podcasts. Want to see our faces? Catch full episodes on our YouTube Page!Thank you to this week’s partners!IQBAR: Text PARK to 64000 to get 20% off all IQBAR products and free shipping.‌Jack Black: For 10% off your order & FREE Shipping, head to JackBlack.com/NPAD and use code NPAD.Quince: Use our link to get free shipping and 365-day returns.Liquid IV: Use code NPAD at checkout to get 20% off you first order. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Some are good, some are grand, some are sad, and others are boring and easily forgotten. But some days are so horrifically ingrained in our history, like that of the Battle of Antietam. It's so horrific that it cannot be forgotten and lives in the remnants of land, buildings, writings, and inspired poems. Landscapes turned red by Stephen W. Sears paints a vivid picture of what that deadly day was. Of all the days on all the fields where American soldiers have fought, the most terrible by almost any measure was September 17, 1862. The battle waged on that date, close to Antietam Creek at Sharpsburg and Western Maryland, took a human toll never exceeded on any other single day in the nation's history. So intense and unsustained was the violence.

A man recalled that for a moment in his mind's eye, the very landscape around him turned red. Welcome to National Park After Dark. Well, well, well, a story I have nothing and no idea about, I don't know anything about this battle. Nothing at all. No. It's really interesting that you say that because this battle is very reminiscent of Gettysburg. And that one is so popular. Yeah, popular. Remembered. Yeah. Yeah. Remembered. Yeah. I definitely don't know much about this. And I know you're doing a paranormal angle. I sure am. It's spooky season. Hello, everybody. And for spooky season, there are so much that has happened with the Battle of Antietam. And there are so many stories, so many avenues that you can go down. But for this one, because it's October, I wanted to turn this episode. into a haunted historic tour of different haunted sites within the National Park because Antietam National

Battlefield is part of the National Park Service and is a national park. Lovely. And now we can get into our spooky season haunted episode, which there's some like not only, the battle itself is like pretty horrific and some weird things happened, which I don't get super, super into the battle, but I get a lot into the histories of the locations of where the battle was happening. But of course, like you, I was not super familiar with the Antietam Battle and wasn't super familiar with the Antietam National Battlefield. So I wanted to, before we get into the historic tour, give you an idea of where this place is, what it is and what it is commemorating as a national park. So Antietam National Battlefield is a national park in Sharpsburg, Maryland that commemorates the battlefield of the

bloodiest day in history that took place during the Civil War. After a 12-hour battle on September 17, 1862, between the Union and Confederate armies, over 50,000 rounds of ammunition were fired, and 23,000 soldiers were left dead, wounded, or missing. When the smoke cleared, a three-mile line of bodies lay in its place. The amount of casualties on each side was horrific. Northerners were about 12,410, and Southerners accounted for about 10,700 people. When the battle was over, the landscape turned into a hospital and a massive burial ground. The park today is located in the foothills of Appalachia near the Potomac River and consists of the battlefield site, Burnside's Bridge, a visitor center, a national military cemetery, and a field hospital museum.

The park was established in 1890 and overseen by the War Department until 1933, sorry, and it was designated as a national park in 1978. Now there are several locations throughout this national park that are said to be very haunted. And of course, you know why there were 23,000 people who died here within 17 hours. Yeah, that's an incredibly high number. And so you said that was the highest death toll in American history? In the short span, yeah, of time that happened. Yeah. So it's been deemed the deadliest day because we haven't had that much of loss of life within a period of a day ever, ever before that and ever since. So also, before we dive into the history and the haunted places, just as a little reminder

for the Civil War, I know most of us are pretty familiar with it. We learned about it in school and the history is pretty well known. But in case you need a refresher, because it's always nice to have some context before you get into places and things and events that happened. I just wanted to talk about the Civil War for just like a quick little moment. Of course, please. floor is yours. I know we've talked about it a lot.

We did Gettysburg. You did the hospital at Gettysburg that episode that you did. Was that the crossover with Two Girls One Ghosts though? Yeah. So I don't know which one was on our feed. It was about a year ago now. So I don't really remember. I don't remember.

Go listen to Two Girls One Ghosts if you want more Civil War haunted history. And your story was so interesting about the hospital and how they ran things and how unsanitary it was and the horrific things that they were doing there. It definitely, that was definitely on hours. Was it? That one. I'm pretty sure. And then I did a follow up one about, I feel like it was spiritualism in the wake of the Civil War. I did on their feed.

But again, it was a year ago. I don't quite remember. But the hospitals, the makeshift hospitals and the way that they treated their dead and things like that. I don't know. Maybe I'm just making a fool of myself and I don't even remember exactly. But yeah, we definitely have covered the Civil War at length at some point. Yeah, we covered the Civil War. And those, so this story, a lot of the stuff I don't go into in the way that you did with Gettysburg.

But I do want to preface that this, all the same stuff that was going on in Gettysburg was going on here, including the hospital stuff where they were just chopping limbs off and hoping for the best and no antibiotics. Soap isn't used. Sepsis is happening left and right. Like it was a, it was a really horrific time. But anyway, going into the Civil War itself, it began in 1861 after the country had longstanding conflicts about American life and politics. And of course, the most well-known and prominent issue that began the Civil War was, of course, the abolishment of slavery. And to show like what side everyone was on, the North wanted to abolish slavery while the South largely did not. But it was also a little bit more involved in that. So the Southern states were fighting the federal

government for control to govern their own states so that the federal government could not interfere and change laws that they didn't agree with, such as ones that could make slavery illegal. So they basically wanted their own they wanted the states to have full power the southern states also wanted to expand slavery into the western states which at the time the newly formed republican party was very very against they did not want slavery to go out into the western states like the south was trying to do but part of what made part of the difference between the northern states and the southern states was that the southern states their primary and i maybe not primary but a huge economic resource for them was cotton and it was a very valuable resource for them. So the states were essentially fighting

to keep enslaved people because it was unpaid labor, which made them make more profits. In the north, up here, we didn't have cotton. It was the midst of the industrial revolution and the need for hard labor and fields was non-existent. And unpaid labor wasn't needed, which was part of why the northern states opposed it was because one, they had no stake in it, but also because of the morality of it. For them, it was obviously like not people fought over. You can't enslave people. Right. So that was the reasons why the Civil War began. And battles all over the South broke out. But the Battle of Antietam was the first attempt of Robert Lee's Confederate Army to take the battles into the north. This episode is brought to you by Prime. Obsession is in session. And this summer, Prime Originals have everything you want.

steamy romances, irresistible love stories, and the book to screen favorites you've already read twice. Off campus, L, every year after, the love hypothesis, Sterling Point, and more. Slow burns, second chances, chemistry you can feel through the screen. Your next obsession is waiting. Watch only on Prime. The Battle of Antietam took place across an area roughly encompassing a few thousand acres, with the most intense fighting concentrated around a 30-acre cornfield considered the epicenter of the battle, where both sides clashed repeatedly.

What makes this battle especially violent was by the means that it took place. There was a heavy use of muskets, which required soldiers to reload after each shot. And also to note for muskets, they had a range to a shooting range of under 200 yards. and an accurate shot, it had to be about 100 yards. So they had to be shooting very close proximity to other people. So obviously makes the violence of that go up considerably when you're face-to-face with someone killing them. And also, it wasn't just purely fought with weapons.

Much of this battle was hand-to-hand combat, which included knives, swords, axes, like whatever they had. They were fighting people one-on-one because they were actually charging and storming on foot and battling it out hand in hand combat. So it was a very, very violent battle that was taking place. Over this 12-hour battle, there are several places that stand out in history and are also said to be some of the most haunted. So let's take you to that day on the battlefield and meet some of the spirits that have never

left. So first, I want to go to the scene of one portion of the battle that left thousands dead. Today, this location within the park has been named Bloody Lane. So Bloody Lane is also known as Sunkin Road, which is exactly what it sounds like. It's this sunken road with hillsides on either side of it within the Antietam battlefield, within Sharpsburg, Maryland. And is now a 1.6 mile hiking trail for visitors. So it's a very common place for people to visit. And soldiers who survived the battle that happened to be here referred to the area as the road of death. The battle began just after dawn on September 17, 1862. when Union soldiers were attempting to cross from the eastern side of the battle area to the western side. One of the most notable groups of soldiers crossing were known as the Irish Brigade. In the Civil War, more than 150,000 Irish immigrants, most of whom were not yet U.S. citizens, joined the Union Army, and in Antietam alone, over 4,000 Irishmen died.

So they just really laid their life down for a country that they were barely even established in. At Bloody Lane, they were crossing the cornfields in attempts to intervene with the left flank of the Confederates, and they did this with over 5,000 soldiers. And to get here, they had to wade through a creek and go across land. So it was kind of tough getting to this area to begin with. The Confederate soldiers countered their attack with them coming and approaching them along the sunken road. Battle raged on for about three hours where soldiers fired continuously at each other. Eventually, the Confederate soldiers were overrun and their bodies began to pile up along the road. When it was done, 5,500 men were killed, wounded and killed on both sides. The carnage was said to be so extreme that the sunken road flowed like a stream with blood.

Oh, God. Yikes. Yeah. The National Park Service wrote about the battle saying, quote, for more than three hours, the combatants slugged away at one another at point-blank range, gravely outnumbered, the Confederates attempted to reinforce the hollowed out road with little success. At approximately noon, after numerous federal assaults, the thin gray line broke. Union forces seized the road and drove the Southerners towards the Piper Farm.

And the Piper Farm is something that I'll talk about later in this as well. But it's no wonder that with all the death and violence that have occurred here that visitors have reported ghostly happenings from the spirits who maybe have never left this battlefields. In an article that I found on odyssey.com, a park ranger at Antietam was quoted saying, there are times it's eerie to be in the battlefield. I've never seen anything, but it's more of a feeling because some terrible things have happened here. Which I think is a sentiment that a lot of us can relate to if you haven't had a ghostly encounter, but you're somewhere and you're standing there and you're like, I know the air is heavy here,

something really bad is still in the atmosphere in this landscape. Yeah, the energy is just shifted a bit and you can, you can sense it. It doesn't necessarily mean to have, I think, to have a paranormal encounter. It's clearly better to have some sort of visual because then you can, it registers differently. Questionable. Well, for the validity, I mean, like, especially in your own mind, if, especially if you saw something or something. Versus just a feeling. Yes. Versus just some sort of shift in how you're. sensing the environment. But I mean, there's a lot of credence, I think, to that as well. So, I don't know. That's still something. It is for sure. I mean, I've definitely been in several locations and we've talked about it. I feel like a lot frequently because it's spooky season. And we've just been, we've had interviews and we did our live show in New Hampshire. We're

we did spooky stuff and we've just talked about feelings and locations that things have been off. So we've definitely experienced it. I do remember this has not. thing to do with like a spook. I don't think it's spooky and you certainly didn't seem like you thought it was spooky as well. But when we were, you came to visit me in Washington like right after Ian passed away and something happened to you in my, in our house. And you didn't tell me about it for like a couple months. I didn't know if it was real. I was like, I don't know. But it like was in my head where I was like, the feeling was so strong that I eventually was like, I have to say something. Yeah. And it was, just for some context, Cassie came to see me in, I don't know, like a month maybe after. You were there around on Father's Day because that was a whole other shit show. But yeah. So that's what June, sometime in June. Yeah. And a June. Yeah. So it was like about a month and a half or so after Ian passed away and Cassie came to visit me and I was in the shower. And.

She was just hanging out and she had a feeling that Ian came to see her. And she didn't tell me until, because she didn't know, think it was real and or didn't want to upset me or whatever. Yeah. I just, I didn't want to say something that wasn't valid in such like a critical time too. I was just like, I don't know if this is real. I can't say something that's fake unless I really think it's real. And then it just was like eating at me for a while. And I feel like I have to, I have to say it. Yeah. And it was. And it was. And it was. And it was. And it was. so special. And I would count that as some sort of paranormal experience that you have, even though you didn't see anything visually. You felt it, you sensed it, you got like a mess, like a, some type of... Definitely paranormal. Yeah. Definitely paranormal. But it's like, I don't know. But like that's fine. I always say I don't want hauntings, but like Ian's cool. Ian doesn't scare me. You know Ian. Like he can haunt me. That's totally fine. It's not going to freak me out. Yeah, same. He's a friendly ghost. Yeah, for sure. But anyway, going into the hauntings that are happening here at the battlefield, specifically at Bloody Lane. Like I said, it is a area where the atmosphere feels specifically very, very heavy. And people have either felt that way or they've seen the eerieness that is here. And some actually say that Bloody Lane is the creepiest place in the entire battlefield. Visitors have reported here. the faint sounds of phantom gunfire. Others have been walking the Bloody Lane Trail and have been

overwhelmed by the smell of gunpowder. And even some guests have reported seeing the soldiers themselves. Guests have reported seeing Civil War reenactment soldiers storming the sunken road, as they would have that's that very day. And when they've gone to ask about these reenactments, it is common to find out that there was nothing happening, that there was no one out there. Others have been walking and briefly caught the sight of a man in a civil war uniform before that person just disappears entirely. But one of the most well-known hauntings happened to a group of schoolchildren who were visiting for a field trip. They were given a tour of the area and taught the history of what happened there. During the tour, they learned about the Irish Brigade and how they would shout Fa'a Bala, meaning in Gaelic, clear the way at incoming fire.

So they would shout this to each other in Gaelic to be like incoming, we're getting shot at cannons, whatever's happening. And a lot of times, following that cry, people would die. After this tour, when they learned all about the Irish Brigade and the area that they were in, they were told that they could walk around the field adjacent to sunken road, and they were asked to write a brief description of what they learned that day. While the kids found a good spot to sit down and complete their writing assignment, they began to hear some type of chant, around to them. They couldn't find where it was coming from, but it sounded very similar to fa la la la la la. Like in a Christmas carol, deck the halls like fa la la la la la. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I got that tune. But you know what I mean. Back the halls with them, some like,

la la la la la la. Yeah. So they're hearing the sound and it was really strange because they're like, it's not Christmas. It's not even close to Christmas. What's like, why are we hearing that? and they're looking around, looking around. There's no people around. There's no one they can see that could be chanting this. It feels very off, but all the kids are kind of just like what is going on. But soon they realized that what they were actually hearing was faaba law, just as the Irish brigade had yelled that September day.

Interesting. Very interesting was what they were hearing. So definitely remnants of soldiers that are there, remnants of the history that's there. I said, there was a three-mile long line along this trail along this road that was just dead bodies. Yeah, that's an insane amount of length. Like, if you think about getting in a car going 60 miles an hour for three miles, like for a distance of three miles, that's a lot of distance for so much death to be on. Yeah. And something that you said triggered another memory that I should have said during our, we just finished our,

Or a couple days ago, we just did a Patreon live stream from a haunted hotel. And we asked people for haunted hotel stories, anything that they've experienced. And people were sharing. And Cassie shared one of hers. And I was like, I don't have one from a hotel. But I think I do from the Driscoll. Oh, okay. And it was just remember when we were.

I know what you're going to say. Yeah. The scent. The scent of something. So Cassie and I went to the Driscoll in Austin a couple of years ago. and we knew that it was a historic hotel, but we didn't know the history yet. We just picked it. And I say we, I chose it because it was old and beautiful and kind of centrally located. So we stayed there for a night or two. And we were exploring the hotel the first afternoon we got there and we just got into this room.

And I could not shake the smell of cigar smoke. And I asked Cassie a couple times, I'm like, are you smelling this? Are we, like, near a billiards room is what it reminded me of. Or like when you're at, I don't know, like a bowling alley and there's a smoking section and you're not in it, but it's wafting towards you. Adjacent to it. Yeah. And I don't know. I just, it just smelt like a cigar around me and I couldn't shake it.

And to me, I smelled nothing. Right. And then we found out later that the room we were in used to be the, what was it, like the cards room or something? or like the where the men would go and smoke and drink and have manly conversations or whatever. Manly conversation. So yeah, so I thought that was really interesting because that had never happened to me before. The impressions of a scent has never been my experience in any haunted location. Yeah, I definitely think that's a haunting.

That's a nice haunting. It's just a small one that you realize later. Yeah, but I hate the smell of cigars. I don't get it when people are like and they like put it up to their nose and smell. See, I don't. Some of them, not all of them, but some of them I think smell nice. I think clothes smell nice. Yeah, you know, they're like not cigarettes, but they're not. See, I'm the opposite.

Clothes make my stomach turn. I don't know what it is, but it makes me queasy every time. We're such the same but different on everything. I'm like, yes, but no. And I'm like, no, but yes, yeah. Yeah. Okay, anyway, sorry to interrupt, but it just reminded me of that. No, I love haunted stories.

That's what this episode is all about. Next, we're going to another location within the National Park. And this time we're going to head to the Pry House Field Hospital Museum. And this was a civilian home and farm that was commandeered by the Union soldiers to use as a base before the battles began. And in the aftermath, it was used as a hospital. Today, it is part of the park and has a museum commemorating its history. It is also supposedly a hotspot for paranormal activity. So before we get into the hauntings, let's dive into the history behind this house.

The home itself is this beautiful brick colonial building, and it sits on higher ground overlooking Antietam Creek and rolling hills of, and it looks out to rolling hills of Maryland. If you can look it up, it's just like, it looks like something you would find in New England, but we're in Maryland. but it's not that far from here. The original owners were Philip and Elizabeth Pry. Philip had inherited the land from his father in 1844, and Philip and his brother had originally built the home to live in.

When Philip married his wife in the later years, his brother moved out so his home could be used for his wife and then the five children that they would raise together. With the home, they built a large barn with stalls and feeding managers for livestock as they also used the property as a farm, and they grew their own vegetables, they had their own livestock. They had the children worked on the farm.

Essentially, their children at the time of the battle ranged from 2 to 14, so the older kids would help out on the farm. On the property, there was also a fresh spring and a root cellar, which was an underground cellar used to store crops such as vegetables that they had grown. Now, two days before the battle began on September 15th, the prize were startled to hear a loud pounding on their front door. When they opened it, a union soldier stood there. and informed them that the Union Army was taking their farm as part of the war efforts.

There was nothing they could do or say to stop it. Shortly after, 15,000 soldiers arrived and settled onto their property. Oh, yeah, I was commenteered. We talked about that too in my, that with the Spangler farm. I don't know if you remember that. Yeah. Yep. And the Gettysburg one.

Yeah, it's so, it mirrors it a lot with this. And I just can't imagine you're sitting at home eating lunch with your family or what have you, breakfast and a soldier knocks on your door and they're like, hey, we have to use this. And you're like, what? And then suddenly there's 15,000 men storming your property. Yeah, well, and they, a lot of times, I know that it was for war efforts and it was a different, it's a different thing. But it still was devastating to a lot of families because they wouldn't fix anything. They'd destroy the property just from the sheer amount of people there. They'd use all the resources and then leave. And the owners of the,

property had we're left to pick up the pieces essentially yeah and that is part of the history of this house too that i'll get into more details of as well but basically they show up 15 000 people show up they start setting things up and one of the first things that they did was they hauled out prize the family's best parlor furniture and put it outside put it under tents that they built and they used it as seating for telescopes that they had to look over out because i said it an overlook of the hills so they could see incoming soldiers or anything. It gave them like a good vantage point from where they were. So they had systems telescopes to look out and they used their furniture. They're like, we're just going to throw your furniture outside that you paid good money

for and we're going to use it to sit on your lawn. So they did that. And then the following day, officers and the commander, General Brinton McClennan moved into their home. So the first day, they put 15,000 people in their yard. The second day they kick them out of their house. That same day, they set up headquarters for the medical department on their property, where they geared up for any persons wounded in battle by bringing in ambulances to transport them to the battlefields. And of course, this is the 1800s. Ambulances are not what you hear today. They are basically just carts that were wheeled out by other people or horses or what have you. But they had that set up because they anticipated a lot of death. Elizabeth and the children left to stay in neighboring towns, while Philip stayed and watch. as they took over his home. And he actually ended up staying there throughout the battle. And he ended up leaving. I think he either left like the night the battle was over or like the following day. But he was there during it. When the battle was over and thousands were wounded, the home barn was turned into a hospital. About 1,200 soldiers were treated inside the barn over a period of two months, many of whom succumbed to their injuries. The house was used as a hospital for officers and commanders, where Major General Israel Richardson, who led the union attack at Bloody Lane, arrived after he was shot in the foot. His wound ended up getting infected and he went septic and died November 3, 1862 in a bedroom upstairs. And like I mentioned earlier, the same thing in your Gettysburg episode where you talked about

that they had these horrific living conditions. It was the same. There was no running water except for the spring outside that did give them fresh water. But they didn't have a lot of necessary medical stuff that we know of today. If someone had their foot shot, they just chopped it off. Same thing with an arm. Chop it off. There's no antibiotics. It's just you hope you recover. Meanwhile, you're laying in your own feces. And it was, it was really, really horrific conditions that were here. I also did want to note that during this time, that it was a hospital and all these deaths were happening, especially when this major general died. After that, Abraham Lincoln came to visit the injured union soldiers there.

When the home was finally returned to the prize, the farm was ruined, like you mentioned before. The soldiers had wreaked havoc on everything they owned. They burned their fences for firewood, fed all their grain and hay to the army's horses and mules, tore up their fields, ate all the food they had stored away, and stole their horses and livestock. And I don't think I mentioned this, but they had been in their home for about two months, total. I think you did, actually. Oh, I did. Yeah.

Okay. Philip, after this, he shows up at his house and he's like, wow, everything. things destroyed, ruined. So much has gone. He was told that he could file a claim with the government to be paid the losses for his contributions in letting his home, letting, quote unquote, letting his home be part of the war efforts. So of course, he files this claim. And he was given $4,243 and $53 to recoup those losses. But the payments to get to him took 10 years before they got there. And was it $4,000, not today? Not today's money. Okay. Yeah. So that's still, I mean, 10 years is a long time.

10 years is a long time. And when you have to front that money right away, and they destroyed everything, they took all their food that they had saved and their house was destroyed. You know, it was just, it was a lot. And to add a little bit of salt to the wound after they finally paid him out the full 4,000 and some change, they actually sent him a letter stating that the government had overpaid him and forced him to return 1,219. and $38 of the money that he was given. Oh, no. It's like, just let him have it. Let him have it. Look what they did.

I mean, yeah, it's just like they butchered his livestock. They got rid of all his food. They cut down. It's just like, he deserved the money. What are you talking about? And it took you 10 years. Call it interest.

Like, yeah, it's like, can he have five years to pay back then? Or what's the deal with that? I'm sure he did not. I'm sure he had to give it back right away. And of course, it was a devastating blow to them. the family was never able to financially recover from their losses. And eventually the property sold and they moved to Texas.

Elizabeth died in 1886 and Philip passed away in 1900, but both of them were brought back to Maryland not far from their old home at the Fairview Cemetery in Kittiesville, Maryland, at their own dying request. They wanted to be back near their original home. Today, the home and farm have been preserved within the national park and has even been a rebuilt after or parts of it have been rebuilt after there was an electrical fire in 1976 that burnt a good portion of parts of the house. And that fire is actually where the beginning of recorded paranormal happenings is documented. That's so interesting. I'll let you explain, but there was

nothing recorded before 1976 there. Nothing that I could find. Okay. Nothing that I could find. So potentially, but this is the first like paranormal. I. that has been recorded in like eyewitness accounts. Okay. So firefighters who arrived on site while the building was still in flames claim to witness a woman in period clothing standing and looking out the window of the second floor. Obviously, they were concerned if there was a woman in this burning building and they swept the building trying to find her, but discovered that no one was there. And they're not the only ones who have witnessed the woman. There have been also several other accounts from the same window of the second floor.

There is even an account from the curator's son who saw her while he was inside the room. He said that she looked at him before turning and walking through the wall, which he was a little boy and thought was weird. So he actually later asked his father how the woman was able to walk through walls. Oh, that's creepy. Yeah. Not walking through the wall, but a child coming up to you and being like, hi. So how do I walk? through walls like that lady did.

Yeah, and that's why children were going through like exorcisms. Yeah. Back in 1800s. They're like, my kid's super creepy. Can we do something about this? And so this woman, many people believe to be Israel Richardson's wife, the major general who died in that very room because she had been there by his side when she died, when he died.

I personally think that it might be Elizabeth Pry. watching the owner. The owner. Like maybe she's just watching her place go up in flames. Like, I don't know. I don't know either. Yeah. But it's in the second floor, the same area of the general and all that.

Yeah, where he died and his wife. It is interesting, though, that if we are truly going with the theory or going along with the narrative that there hadn't been any reports of paranormal activity until this electrical fire, that makes me more apt to believe. that it's the owner because that's an event, another like serious event and change to her home, which I feel like would spark that type of entity. Some type of activity. Yeah.

Versus I feel like if it was the general's wife, that was something, maybe an apparition or activity that probably would have been documented before if, you know, I don't know. Potentially. It is the 1800s and documentation isn't as well. No, like people were documenting things, but maybe just never got out. Who knows? Up until 1976. Yeah, that is a long time.

That's a long-ass time for things to not be going around. The 70s aren't that long ago. Our parents were alive and that, yeah. So, but I feel like part of me feels like it's the owner. Like I feel like she showed up to be like my house is in flames and then people saw her in the window. Yeah, I agree with that. to be, she was buried not far from there. So the fact that she found her way back to her house, I feel like it could beat her. Yeah, I would agree with that. Yeah. So while a woman, whoever she is,

apparition is often seen in the home, the barn experiences the most amount of activity, so much that paranormal investigators love to visit this area. It is really common for strange lights to be reported coming from the barn at night, but upon investigation, there's nothing on. Other people have experienced the lights flickering while walking around inside and others have reported hearing disembodied voices with moans and cries and sometimes even singing. I will pass on the singing, but depends what they're singing, I guess. I don't know. I'm, I think singing is a creepy sound to hear when you don't know where the source is. Yeah. So it's again, it's a song though. Like if someone's singing like happy birthday to you in a really scary voice, that is scary. But if a Whitney Houston

song comes on while you're hanging out in there and she's belting out, I'm like, hey, girl, I don't know, you know, like that might be fun. I disagree with that. A thousand percent. You're telling me, I don't care what it is. I feel like if I heard Whitney Houston coming from a barn with no one around, I'm going. to be frightened, especially if it's somebody else singing Whitney Houston. No, it's Whitney herself. Probably not. No. She has better things to do, I think. Yeah, she definitely has better things to do than be at the Antietam battlefield. Yes. National battlefield, yeah. I don't know. Yeah, you're probably right. I'd probably be scared. Yeah. Okay. Anyway, well, next on our tour of this

national battlefield is we're going to go to the Burnside Bridge. And there's not a ton of of, there's not a ton of hauntings going on here, but there are some, there's one that's kind of significant that I think, so I wanted to bring it up. So the Burnside Bridge is this picturesque stone bridge that crosses over in Teatum Creek. And that's the same creek that I had mentioned that they had to cross to get to Bloody Lane where people were waiting through the water. But this bridge was actually the easiest and most logical way for soldiers to cross because they didn't have to go through the water and get their guns wet or anything like that. So during the battle, Union soldiers had to cross the creek to get to the Confederate soldiers strongholds and the bridge served as one

of the safer ways to cross. At around 1 p.m. that day, two brigades of Union soldiers charged across the bridge and were met with around 500 Confederate soldiers. The battle lasted for about four hours until more reinforcements from the Union's army arrived. They were able to cross the bridge but the aftermath left over 100 soldiers dead. Later, in a haste to lay them to rest, Union soldiers were buried near the bridge in unmarked graves. Visitors to the bridge are now reporting strange happenings. At night, blue light orbs can be seen dancing around the area of the bridge.

Along with that, the faint sound of drums playing in a cadence is often reported. And I thought that that one was the most interesting because if you don't know why drums are significant during the Civil War. I'll explain it a little bit. So during the Civil War, during the Civil War, drums were played as a very significant role in the battles. It was basically their whole means of communication because they don't have a lot of the technology that we have now and battles were very loud. There's gunfire, they're screaming, there's just, there's so much going on. So certain cadences were used in not in the battle, circumstances, but just to wake them up, tell them it was time to eat, to go retrieve their

mail, or even when it was time to be lights out, go to bed. But most importantly, these drums were used to communicate on the battlefield. Drum cadences indicated when it was time to march, time to attack, time to retreat. And this was a very important technique because these drums were able to be heard over these loud noises of the screaming gunfire, cannons, everything going off because otherwise without these, it could be a mess. Like, do they know when it's time to attack when they're losing? When you're in this huge mess, how do you know when to turn around if things aren't going well? So I thought that it was really interesting that people have reported being on this bridge and hearing those same drum cadences that were once happening in that same

place at that same battle on this day. That is really cool and creepy. Yeah. But I don't know, I love a good drum. Like a good drum. No singing, but drums are cool. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Drums do feel less threatening. Do you remember drumline, that movie?

Do I remember drumline? A movie. I know. There it is. Was it Nick Cannon? Yes. He was the main guy. I kind of forget the plot of it, but I like remember the, it was just all about, or Cadet

Kelly. I was a lot of drumming in Cadet. Cadet Kelly with Lizzie McGuire. Hillary Duff. Hillary Duff. Same thing. Yeah. Yeah.

And she like, she could, she has like the arms and she like twists them around and has to like perform with them. And yeah. But what? It was like the gun that she had to like twist around and like show off in the performance. Do you remember that? I thought it was ribbons. Or yeah. No, that's in Lizzie McGuire, I think.

Really? In Cadet Kelly. I do remember the gun. She had. Did she have ribbons in Cadet Kelly? I don't know. I'm looking it up right now. Me too. Yes. Yes. There was ribet. I don't know if it was her, but there's some scenes here of ribbon. Like, it looks like a ribbon battle. Oh my God. You're right. There are. I would watch that movie right now. But maybe we can on, it's probably on YouTube somewhere. How can I watch that movie again? I'll hook it up with you for you. Thank you. You're welcome. I could do that tonight for sure. I have a secret platform.

Oh. You can get like anything on. I'm pretty sure it's illegal. I'm curious to know what it is. Yeah, it's probably illegal. If it's the one I'm thinking it is, it's definitely illegal. What does it start with? What letter?

I forget. So one of our friends that we work with, she always pops it up. I forget the name of it. But she always brings it whenever we travel. She always has whatever movie we want to watch. and she plays it. And it's like, it's like a, some, it's like originates in Asia somewhere. It's like the whole company, but I don't know the name of it.

Okay. I feel like it's similar. But anyways, we can watch Cadet Kelly is basically the moral of the story. Yeah. And you're getting arrested after this episode airs. I'm not. I'm not. We know what illegal streaming service.

My lips are sealed and I'm not saying. So like lime wire. like they would randomly get certain people who were using LimeWire to download music. And then what? I don't know. They just, they sued for like a lot of money, some people. And it made everyone else like want to delete LimeWire. But they just picked, they picked, they felt like random people.

Because I never got caught. I mean, what are they going to do to me? I was 12. It's your parents. Or like come after your parents. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Well, I wasn't very, I have never have, I never have been up until this. I'm not very computer literate or technology literate. So I don't think I ever really got the swing of like lime wire and any of that. Like I definitely had burned CDs, but a lot of them like people made for me because I was like I don't get this at all. So see I definitely. I was like my space came out and I suddenly learned how to code and like make my own layouts. I burn CDs. I use lime wire.

but I will say LimeWire was so sketchy. Like I remember one day I was trying to download, what's that song? How to Love by Lil Wayne. Oh my God, yeah. I was trying to download that and I downloaded like a porno instead. And I'm like, Limewire. A porno or the porno? You just said like, what's the porn?

I don't know. I thought you just said the. I'm like, am I supposed to know what that is? It was just like a random thing in my 15, 14 year old self. was like, I'm just trying to listen to how to love by. That's so funny you say that because today, speaking of porn, today I was, I have a bidet, the Tushy bidet. And I love their toilet paper.

It comes like wrapped in, this is not an ad, obviously, but it comes wrapped in really pretty paper, has like pandas on it or like really nice art. I don't know. Like it just. I'm really interested how this links to porn. But okay, well, anyway, so I went to reorder the toilet paper because I was running low. And I typed in tushy.com. And I was like, oh, oops, no, not that.

Was it a porn site? Yeah, it's all about butt stuff. Oh, music code, N-P-A-D. Yeah. So I meant to, it's actually hello-tushy.com to get to the bidet stuff. I forgot the hello part. And I'm sure you're not the only one. I bet that website gets a lot of traction.

Yeah, I know. From people just like you. Just like me. Yeah. It's solely by accident, I'm sure. But anyways, okay, how did we get here from Cadet Kelly? I don't know. This is a haunted episode.

This episode will haunt us all. Yeah, truly. Okay. So last but not least on our haunted historic tour, we're going to go to the Piper Farm. which I mentioned briefly earlier. So this farm has a very similar story to the Pry farm, but the hauntings are a little bit different, and the story is slightly different.

It's the same as then it was a family home in the farm that was taken to use in the Civil War, but it's a little bit different because this house was taken by Confederate soldiers, while the Pry house was taken by the Union soldiers. The Piper family consisted of Henry Piper and his wife Betsy, along with their three children. They were also slave owners to people who were forced to work on their farm. The farm consisted of 184 acres and had the only commercial apple orchard that was in the area.

On September 15th, two days before the battle, same as the Pry House. The Confederates arrived, and General James Longstreet and Daniel H. Hill showed up at their doorstep and told them that their residents had been chosen as a headquarters for the army. Again, shortly afterwards, thousands of soldiers arrived on their property to prepare for battle. Henry Piper was a supposed known unionist in town, which I don't know much more about him. I researched a bit about him, but I'm a little skeptical that he was a unionist, and that was because one, he owned slaves. So that makes me a question if that was actually true. He enslaved people, so that makes me feel like he probably wasn't a unionist.

But also his reaction makes me question what side he was on, his reaction to when the Confederate showed up. So he was very, very hospitable to them. When they arrived, he offered the commander's drinks and dinner. And they accepted. And that night, they dined together. They drank together for the first night they were there. Like, they were giving them wine, great food, just kind of hanging out around the table. Following that and the upcoming battle, the pipers were forced to leave their home with very little that they had. One of the family members was quoted saying, We left everything as it was on the farm, taking the horses with us and one carriage. They fled to a neighboring town and then to another family member's farm. When the battle was over, the Confederate

army left their house on the evening of the 18th, and on the 19th, the Piper's return to find their home in absolute shambles. While the structures were standing, everything was in disarray. Not only that, but when they opened the door, they found two dead Confederate soldiers laying underneath a prize piano that they had. Their personal items had been thrown all over the house, and much of it was broken. Also, when they arrived, Union soldiers were butchering their livestock that were still there. So they just showed up to this happening, which was their food source. Eventually, Henry filed a claim to the government to be paid for the damages, and he was awarded $2,488. However, he never received. the payment. And the reason for that was that they wanted him to produce documentation that

proved he was a loyalist to the Union Army, and he wasn't able to do that. So they never paid him for that. I will say when I was looking further into the research of him, it looks like later he did sue the government over that decision. And part of he brought a witness on, that was actually someone who he had, who was previously enslaved that he had helped out in some scenario. And actually when the abolishment of slavery went through, he came to work on his farm as a paid employee. So he had him kind of vouch for him. And I couldn't find if he ever ended up getting paid or not. But as he fought it at least that decision. Yeah, he fought it at some point. The house remained in the Piper family until 1960. And in 1960,

the park service acquired the property for $75,000. Now, visitors who come to see the house have reported some paranormal activity. The sounds of boots stomping up and down the stairs have been reported here along with strange flickering of lights. And that is like kind of all that I could find for the hauntings that happened here. But again, for this area, paranormal investigators have also come to this house to try and find things that were going on, especially because, of the dead soldiers that were known to go there. And then through my, or known to go there, who were found there, the dead soldiers who were known to go there, who were found there. But also, when I was researching this, one of the witnesses who came in the house after said that one room was just filled with dead soldiers and covered in blood.

And it was just, it was a horrific scene when they got back. Yikes, yeah. Well, I mean, in the lineup of haunted locations and what could be happening. there, flickering lights and bootsteps doesn't seem like much, but it's still something. Yeah. If you're there and you hear disembodied, that's right, disembodied footsteps and electrical interferences and stuff that's still frightening, so it counts. Yeah, for sure.

So in addition to these locations that I've added as part of like the haunted parts, I also wanted to add in a part of the park that I think that is really important, that the National Park Service also manages, and that's the Antietam National Cemetery, which I had a hard time finding specific things that were happening in the cemetery, but I did find tours that take you to it. So I'm a haunted tours that take you to it. So I'm sure that there are a lot of spooky stories here that just aren't maybe online for me to look at. Well, how dare you not go there and find out in person before sharing us? I should have. That would have been fun, actually. Now that I'm like looking at all I'm like, wow, this is really interesting.

It would be cool, and it's not that far away. It's only in Maryland a few hours drive, so like eight-hour drive, but still. Eight hours, really? Maryland's not far from here. Yeah. I guess it just takes like three hours to get to me from you, which that. Yeah. And it feels like we're not that far away, but I don't know.

Anyway, go on. Anyway, not that far, maybe someday. But I wanted to go a little bit into the cemetery itself because it is, one of 130 cemeteries that are part of the national cemetery system, so the national parks run them. And here there are 4,776 Union soldiers that are buried. And with that number, 1,836 of them, their names remain unknown. All of the unknown graves are marked with small square stones, and these stones contain the grave number, and some contain the number of unknown burials in one grave site.

In addition, more than 200 non-civil war dead are also buried here. Veterans and their wives from the Spanish-American War, World War I, World War II, and Korea were buried here until the cemetery closed in 1953. And recently, an exception to the closure was made for the burial of a Kittesville resident, which is the town neighboring this. Or, yeah, this might even technically be in the town. I'd have to look at a map again. But he's a local resident Patrick Howard Roy, who was in the United States Navy, and fireman

Roy was killed during the attack on the USS Cole and was buried in the cemetery on October 29, 2000. So they made an exception for him, even though the cemetery has been closed. And while the winning of the Battle of Antietam directly led to Abraham Lincoln passing the Emancipation Proclamation, which freed enslaved people, it is important to note that African-American soldiers from World War I were put into a segregated section from white soldiers within the cemetery that you can still see today. Okay. So this is a segregated cemetery?

Yes. Okay. Yeah. At least for that. I don't know. I'd have to look more into it because in the Civil War, there were African American soldiers who were fighting. And I don't know if they segregated them from the rest of the soldiers, but I know from

World War I. Interesting. Okay. They were segregated. I think that is the unfortunate reality of quite a few Civil War cemeteries. Yeah, it's like, come on. You're fighting for their rights for enslaved people to be free, but then you don't recognize that they're people and not to be segregated.

But segregation didn't happen for a long time after the Civil War. I mean, I think it was the 19, what was it, the 1940s? Segregate, 1950s segregation ended. So like there's that. But it's just like it seems so contradictory to fight and die. Alongside. Yeah. Alongside African American people.

And then still segregate. It's crazy. But there's a lot of stuff like that going on today. And there's a lot behind the Civil War where African American people aren't recognized for their contributions. And that's still something that historians are pulling up today to try and rectify that wrong that has been done. So there's a lot going on. But going back into the haunted part instead of the history behind everything, if you are headed to this area and you want to learn more about the ghosts,

there are tour companies that operate. And I found one, I have not personally used this company, so I can't personally vouch for them. But their website looks really interesting. And the tours that they're offering sound really, really cool. So I wanted to bring it to people's attention if you're going there. The tour company is called the Sharpsburg Civil War Ghost Tours, and they offer all types of civil war-related tours. They do, according to their website, they do two tours each week that are done at night time. They were mostly at 7 p.m. so it's dark. And on their website, sharpsburgtours.net, their description states, tours run 75 to 90 minutes, and have three to four remarkable, historically accurate, fully researched, and investigated stories.

We are precise and exacting in our tellings of these incredible reoccurring events. They state that they alternate two different tours each week. They state our graveyards, cemeteries and soldiers tours present three to four credible stories, a company of dead soldiers in formation, an unusual medieval style burial, a cavalry soldier who still rides, and a cemetery dog that visits its own grave. Our soldiers' passageway tour has three to four mysterious stories. some which may include a drummer boy left behind in Sharpsburg creepy Civil War Kids playing a powerful and creepy game and a seriously haunted in dating from 1864 that all happen in this area.

So I just thought the stuff that they know, the knowledge they have on the hauntings in this area seem really, really interesting. So if you are high into spooky season and you want to go check something out, like that might be a good option. Yeah. And if anybody happens to work there, tell us. up. Yeah, look it up. Look it up. Well, like I said, it's not that far of a drive. Yeah, I could be there tomorrow. Yeah. Just tell me. We could. Yeah, just tell us. Cassie's like, I don't know, maybe. I don't know. Maybe I won't be there. But then y'all will tell me all about it. I sure will. Cool. Well, thank you for sharing that. We're going strong on creepy season. And next week, I have another paranormal story from another spooky park that is abroad.

Oh, okay. Yeah. I love going abroad. A little teaser for next week. But yeah, thanks for that. And thanks everyone for hanging out and getting a little scared and going through our throwbacks of early 2000s life. Yeah. And we'll see you next week.

We hope you enjoy the view. But watch you're back. Bye, everyone. Bye. Thank you so much for joining us again this week. If you have a trail tale or story suggestion, send us an email at Stories at npadpodcast.com. Follow us on Instagram and Facebook at National Park After Dark and on Twitter at NPAD podcast. Join our outsiders-only community on Patreon or Apple subscriptions to listen ad-free, unlock monthly bonus episodes, and exclusive content.

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