On remarking on his family overseas, the witch suddenly began to mimic his English parents. The witch replied with his grandmother’s accent, “Hut tut, what has happened now?” In another account, an Englishman stopped to visit and offered to investigate. John Johnston, a son of James, devised a test for the witch, something no one outside his family would know, asking the entity what his Dutch step-grandmother in North Carolina would say to the slaves if she thought they did something wrong. As another amusement, the witch shared gossip about activities in other households, and at times appeared to leave for brief moments to visit homes after an inquiry. The entity was well acquainted with Biblical text and appeared to enjoy religious arguments.
#ANDREW BIRD BELL WITCH FULL#
With the emergence of full conversations, the spirit repeated word for word two sermons given 13 miles apart at the same time. The apparition began to speak out loud and was asked, “Who are you and what do you want?” and the voice answered feebly, “I am a spirit I was once very happy but have been disturbed.” The spirit offered diverse explanations of why it had appeared, tying its origin to the disturbance of a Native American burial mound located on the property, and sent Drew Bell and Bennett Porter on an unproductive search for buried treasure. That morning he told John Bell it was a “spirit, just like in the Bible.” Soon word of the haunting spread with some traveling great distances to see the witch. After retiring for the evening at the Bell home, Johnston was awakened that night by the same phenomena. The Bells turned to a family friend James Johnston for help. Soon the entity pulled hair and scratched the children with particular emphasis on Betsy who was slapped, pinched and stuck with pins. The phenomena grew in intensity as sheets were pulled from beds when the children slept.
About this time John Bell began experiencing paralysis in his mouth. The family heard sounds of gnawing on the beds, invisible dogs fighting, and chains along the floor. Activity moved to the Bell household with knocking heard along the door and walls.
Dean, a slave of the Bell family, reported being followed by a large black dog on evenings he visited his wife. John’s son Drew Bell approached an unknown bird perched on a fence that flew off and was of “extraordinary size.” The daughter Betsy observed a girl in green dress swinging from the limb of an oak tree. Bell fired at the animal but it disappeared. The haunting began sometime in 1817 when John Bell witnessed the apparition of a strange creature resembling a dog. The physical activity centered on the Bells’ youngest daughter, Betsy, and her father, and ‘Kate’ expressed particular displeasure when Betsy became engaged to a local named Joshua Gardner. In his book An Authenticated History of the Bell Witch, author Martin Van Buren Ingram published that the poltergeist’s name was Kate, after the entity claimed at one point to be “Old Kate Batts’ witch,” and continued to respond favorably to the name. Contemporary artistic interpretations such as in film and music have expanded the reach of the legend beyond the regional confines of the Southern United States.Īn artist’s sketching of the Bell home, originally published in 1894 (shown below). While not a fundamental element of the original recorded legend, the Bell Witch Cave in the 20th century became a source of continuing interest, belief, and generation of lore. Other researchers consider Ingram’s work a nascent folklore study and an accurate reflection of belief in the region during the 19th century. In modern times, some skeptics have regarded Ingram’s efforts as a work of historical fiction or fraud. The individuals recorded in the work were known historical personalities. The book is widely regarded as the first full-length record of the legend and a primary source for subsequent treatments. Ingram published his Authenticated History of the Bell Witch. Some accounts record the spirit also to have been clairvoyant and capable of crossing long distances with superhuman speed (and/or of being in more than one place at a time). According to legend, from 1817-1821, his family and the local area came under attack by a mostly invisible entity that was able to speak, affect the physical environment, and shapeshift. John Bell Sr., who made his living as a farmer, resided with his family along the Red River in an area currently near the town of Adams. The Bell Witch or Bell Witch Haunting is a legend from Southern United States folklore, centered on the 19th-century Bell family of northwest Robertson County, Tennessee.
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