Re: New Contest...........TN's Best Liar!!!
Gypsy has, as expected, accepted my bribes. Now you will hear the whole story. I haven't told this story for years and I may decide to delete it at any time. I thought I would never tell it again. I'm about to tell the story of the "Witch's Grave". The only reason I post it here is because everyone on this thread is ready to listen to if not believe you. No one would finish reading this if they thought I was being serious. I assure you though, I am being serious. You can believe me or not but I would heed any warnings you receive by reading this.
How many of you have ever been to Yazoo City, Mississippi? I went there some years back with a friend of mine to do some relic hunting. We had heard that there was a mass grave of unknown Confederate soldiers buried at the Glennwood Cemetary and we were planning on doing some night time grave robbing of sorts. We were young then and had no respect for the dead, especially Confederates.
What we didn't know is, in this very same cemetary was a witch's grave. I'll not say the name of the witch but you can research it and, should you learn her name, I suggest you never let it slip from your lips.
On our planned evening we drove to the end of the road and parked the pickup far back into the brush so as not to be seen. We decided to leave our detectors at the motel room because we figured, if we got caught, they would be taken away by the law and we were going to dig directly into the graves and keep everything anyway. Didn't need a detector this trip.
Back in those days we didn't have mini-mag flashlights so we crawled through the darkness sort of feeling our way to the old, rusty wrought iron fence that surrounded the cemetary. We didn't want to turn on the flashlights that we did have as they were too bright and may have drawn attention to ourselves.
We crawled towards the back of the cemetary as that was the oldest part with the oldest graves. The fence was in major disrepair so we just crawled over a section that had fallen over years ago. I later learned that the Confederate graves all over the country were being left in unattended condition. This started soon after the Civil War as you can see by the following.
Excerpt from the annual message of the Governor of Ohio to the 67th General Assembly, January 4, 1887.
The confederate cemetery near Columbus.... The title to it is in the United States, and that Government should care for these graves; but it seems to have overlooked them. The fence that encloses the lot is in a dilapidated condition, and the entire burial place is overgrown with weeds and thistles and briars. It is recommended that unless the United States Government can be induced to do so, an appropriation be made to rebuild the fence and clean up the grounds and put them in orderly repair and condition.
The same should be done for the last resting place of about 200 Confederate dead who are buried on Johnson's Island. The hatred and detestation that all loyal people must and should ever entertain for the destructive political doctrines that these men fought for ought not to stand in the way of either a cordial feeling toward the living who have abandoned such heresies, or a proper regard and Christian respect for the graves of the dead who, although wrong, yet heroically and valorously contended for the convictions they entertained.
It's only when men, Northerners such as this governor, started speaking out about honoring the dead and their graves, no matter which side of the war they fought on, that grooming of these resting places began. There are still sites though that are neglected by all and visited by only the curious or would-be thief. The graveyard is a very noisy place if you listen long enough.
The graveyard we were digging was a mass grave, many soldiers side by side. We figured that, in those times, the graves were hastily dug, especially the mass graves, to get them in the ground before decay set in. We also figured they were buried shallow due to the quantity to be buried. They wouldn't take the time to dig the assumed 6 feet. We were right.
My friend, not even his first name to be revealed here, decided we should get on each side of the oldest area and dig towards each other. As I started digging with a military-style foxhole shovel, I immediately hit what seemed like a flat stone only about 2 inches down. No matter which way I went it was this flat, continuous stone. After about 20 minutes or so my buddy shouted at me with a whisper. "Hey, check it out" he said excitedly. He crawled half way to my location and then tossed a soldier's belt buckle to me. "I want that back" he whispered as he crawled back to his excavation site. I set the buckle on the flat stone I was unearthing and continued looking for an end to the thing. Finally I came to an edge of the stone and began digging down it. Again, more whispered shouts from my friend. "Holy crap man, I think there's a sword in here!". Now I'm beginning to feel I'm gonna be left out on finds and began to dig frantically. All of a sudden, about 6 inches down, there was a narrow, cave-like space exposed under the stone. I then began to systematically drag shovel after shovelfull of dirt from under the stone carefully feeling and straining my eyes in the darkness looking for any artifact I might unearth. "Yep, it's a sword!" I heard my friend exclaim.
After a while the shovel was worthless for digging under the stone so I began loosening the dirt with my pocket knife and then pulling the loose dirt out by hand. Suddenly my arm was caught on something way back under the slab. No matter what I did, I could not get my arm out from under this huge slab! "Dammit" I said. "Get over here and help me get out from under this thing" I called in a nearly panicked voice. My buddy came over and grabbed hold of my arm and together we pulled with everything we had until my arm came flying from that dark hole. "Holy krist, I don't know what I was stuck on but I couldn't budge" I exclaimed. My buddy took hold of my shirt sleeve while asking "What's this?". "Hell, I don't know, hold on" I said while reaching in my pocket for my Zippo. As I flicked my Zippo (no Bics in those days) we simultaneously exclaimed "Holy CRAP!!" Wrapped around my shirt cuff by the button were human finger bones. Funny thing was it was all 3 bones of the finger, they didn't separate. My partner looked directly into my face, called me a wuss and crawled back towards his diggings. I pounded on the finger bones for what seemed like an eternity until they finally broke and fell to the ground. I took a deep breath, looked back into the hole and slowly exhaled. I can do this I told myself and began to pull dirt from the hole again.
As I kept digging and removing dirt it dawned on me. I'm not getting anything at all out of here. I'm not even getting anymore bones. They wouldn't bury just a finger and, given the size of this slab over the grave, it wasn't disturbed by anything either. As I'm contemplating the situation my buddy whispers sternly towards me. "Hey, where's my stuff?" "What?" I asked. He again asks where his stuff is and proceeds to show me where he had it stashed. "Right here, it was all right here" he exclaimed. "Hell, I haven't even been near there, what the heck's your problem?" I asked.
We syncronized our silence. Something is happening here and it isn't going well for us. I again pulled out the Zippo and lit it over where the bones had fallen. They were gone. I illuminated the top of the slab where I had placed the buckle. It too was gone.
"What the hell's going on?" I asked. "Get over here" I called to my friend. (Almost said his name) I shared with him the fact that I wasn't getting anything else out of this hole. Without discussing it, we both began dragging dirt out from under the slab. "There's gotta be some stuff under here" he said just as I felt something in the cold, dry dirt. "There is" I said excitedly, "I'm getting it". Little by little I was able to work loose a small, leather bag. I was amazed at the condition of the bag but didn't make public that observation at that moment. "Let's get some dirt off this slab and see if we can figure out who's under here" I said. Not caring about artifacts anymore but more into why the items had disappeared, we began dragging the dirt off that had been covering the slab. As more and more dirt came off it became apparent that there was an inscription carved into the slab. When we felt we had finally exposed the entire inscription, we turned on one of the flashlights, shielding it's brightness as best we could with our jackets, and began reading. "Entombed here is (name) She is a witch, a black witch with a black heart. He (They always said "He" in those days when they were warning graverobbers or the such. Women weren't expected to be out digging up stuff anyway)who should release her black soul by removing this stone or he (See?) who shall speak of her name shall perish but suffer an eternity of pain." These letters were chisled into the stone in block letters. There was more writing, writing in letters that appeared to be burned into the stone, freshly burned. It read "There is no man greater than one that has fought and died for a cause. His ground is hallowed and shall remain so". Again, no mention of women but they weren't soldiers back then.
"Damn, it's that witch. She's the one that took the stuff!" my friend said angrily. I couldn't believe he was actually believing a dead witch had taken his stuff just moments ago and now he appears ready to confront her about it. Where I come from you just don't mess with that strong of mojo.
"Tell you what", I said, "Let's just put the dirt back over this slab, you go fill your holes and let's get the heck outta here." "Fine with me" he said, "But I'm coming back here some day and getting some of that good stuff. It's all over the place!"
When we got back to our motel room he just had to call his girlfriend. During their conversation he said "Yeah, some witch named (he says her name here) took all the stuff I dug up. Sword and all". My friend died the following Monday in a plane crash on his way home.
This was a terrible loss for me. He was my best friend; the only other person that I knew that liked to metal detect and treasure hunt. I just knew that he had died due to the witch's curse. I started to research everything I could about witches and how to break their spells. I never believed in them before and now I'm wanting to stop their powers. I found that planting a tree over a witch's grave will keep them intered in their tomb and they cannot do any evil as long as there is a tree above them. At the end of this post is a picture of a witch's grave with a tree planted directly on it. This grave is not the one I'm talking about, it's a witch's grave back in Illinois I believe. I'll not take any pictures of or enter the cemetary I'm talking about ever again. I returned once to plant a tree on the edge of the slab in hopes of keeping this witch in her tomb. I've told my grandchildren the story and they have promised to keep a live tree growing over this grave.
After flying out to attend my friend's funeral and getting my life back on track a little, I started going through some of the stuff that had remained unpacked from our trip. There it was, that little, leather bag, still unopened and in pristine condition. I stared at it lying there in the bottom of my carry-on bag. Many thoughts went through my mind at that moment. The dead soldiers, the witch, the finger bones, my friend, the warnings carved into the slab, the statement burned into the slab. We had completely forgotten the one thing we had managed to bring back from that graveyard.
I walked slowly towards the bed, all the while staring in at that little, leather bag. I reached in to take it out of the larger bag. As soon as my hand touched it I could feel the coldness, the same coldness I felt reaching into that witch's grave. We had tried to open this thing when we drove away from the graveyard that night but it wouldn't open so we just threw it into the bag and forgot about it. Now, without any effort whatsoever, I'm able to lift the flap on the little bag. As I look inside all I can see is a piece of, what looks like, parchment paper. The paper has yellowed but is in very good condition.
I slowly unfold the paper to reveal this message.
"You must do 3 things to receive 3 rewards.
First you must log into treasurenet.com (you will understand this meaning in years to come)
Second you must become a Charter Member and wear the ribbon proudly by your name
Third you must publically admit to attempted grave-robbing and warn others of the curse
Your rewards will be as follows;
First you will learn of many others that metal detect and treasure hunt like your lost friend (I'm really sorry about that but he said my name aloud)
Second you will be able to share with others, places to go and techniques to use in your hobby
Third, and most importantly, you will be awarded a Mighty AP Diggin Tool (Whatever that is)"
The note was signed "name here, keeper of the graves"
I swear this is all true. Google whatever you can, these places are real, the graves are real and the events are real! Just pray that the tree over the slab works. Because of the slab, I couldn't plant the tree directly over the grave.
Do I get the loot or not!?!?!?
