True Ghost Stories of the Shoals Vol. 3: Skeletons in the Closet, #3

By Debra Glass

Explore real-life hauntings steeped in legend and truth with author and historian, Debra Glass, in this third collection of True Shoals Ghost Stories. The tales include, among others, the Civil War legend of a Winston County woman who refuses to rest until she wreaks vengeance on the men who murdered her husband, buried treasure guarded by a spectral horse, the mysterious bloodstains marring the floor of a remote Lauderdale County plantation, the tragic tale of a phantom mother who still searches for her lost child, a Civil War doctor who seems to be with us yet, strange occurrences at a local radio station, and the haunting of the historic Muscle Shoals Sound studio. True Shoals Ghost Stories, Vol. 3 features over a dozen spine-tingling, real-life ghost stories with photos and historical accounts. But only the reader can decide whether or not to believe…

• Language: English
• Publisher: Debra Glass
• Release date: Oct 5, 2015
• ISBN: 9781519984395

Debra Glass

DEBRA GLASS is the author of over thirty-five books of historical and paranormal romance, non-fiction, young adult romance, and folklore. The recipient of the National Society of Arts and Letters Alabama Screenwriter Award in 1992, she went on to win the NSAL Empire State Award for excellence in screenwriting. She holds an MAed with emphasis in history from the University of North Alabama.Debra is a member of Romance Writers of America and the Professional Authors’ Network. She is also a member of RWA’s Heart of Dixie and Southern Magic Chapters.She lives in Alabama with her real life hero, a couple of smart-aleck ghosts, and a glaring of diabolical black cats.

Book preview

True Shoals Ghost Stories

Vol. 3

DEBRA GLASS

Copyright © 2015 Debra Glass

All rights reserved.

ISBN: 1508730822

ISBN-13:  978-1508730828

DEDICATION

To my readers who inspire me and so generously share their stories, to fellow history lovers, and to those who are thrilled by things that go bump in the night, this book is for you.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

This book would not have been possible without the help of Bonnie Bak, Ed Balch, Amy Batton, Bobby Bugg, Sandra Calvert Terry, Mary Carton, Jason Cothrum, Bell Ezekiel, Micky Ezekiel, Lee Freeman, Jennifer George, IrixGuy, David Havens, Pat Bevis Kelly, Bonnie Carr Kerr, Heath Mathews, Gary Moody, John McWilliams, Jackie Quillen, Naima Simone, Keith Sims, and Brooke Sizemore.

Cover art by Tricia Pickyme Schmitt

AUNT JENNY

Rich with mineral deposits, and situated in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains, Winston County, Alabama has boasted a long and tumultuous history. A great portion of the 614 square mile county is home to one of four Alabama National Forests, the William B. Bankhead National Forest, named after US Representative William Brockman Bankhead from Lamar County Alabama, and father of noted actress, Tallulah Bankhead.

Winston County was originally established as Hancock County on February 12, 1850, and named for the famous signer of the Declaration of Independence, Massachusetts governor, John Hancock. But in 1858, the county was renamed Winston County in honor of Alabama governor, John A. Winston.

Just prior to the onset of the Civil War, when the states began seceding from the Union, Winston County elected a young, staunch Unionist schoolteacher named Christopher Sheats to represent the county at Alabama’s secession convention. Once there, he rejected the secession ordinance, refusing to sign it. Sheats was expelled from the state legislature, and even imprisoned for treason.

This didn’t dampen the spirits of Winston’s Tories, those opposed to secession. They met at Looney’s Tavern and passed three resolutions, lauding Sheats’ determination, denying Alabama’s right to secede, but stated that if Alabama had the right to leave the Union, then Winston County had the right to secede from the state.

To this day, some still refer to the county as the Republic of Winston, or the Free State of Winston.

Winston’s secession from Alabama and the Confederacy was so well-known, it was mentioned in Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird.

Because the rugged landscape is replete with steep hills and deep ravines, the terrain was ill-suited for cotton farming. Very few slave owners inhabited Winston County. Instead, the backbone of Winston’s economy was made up of small-time, hard-scrabble farmers who struggled to cultivate the rough land.

When Winston County seceded from the Confederacy, its citizens hoped to remain neutral in the conflict between the North and South, however, the area became a hotbed of violence that lasted well after the war was over.

Confederate supporters sought to suppress the Unionist sympathizers in the area, and writs of arrest were issued throughout the county to those who were disloyal to the Southern Cause.

Those old enough to fight were conscripted by the Confederate government, but many fled, and still others helped Unionists escape to the safety of Federal lines to avoid being forced to fight for the South.

With many farms left unprotected, bands of Confederate foragers road roughshod through the hills and canyons, taking whatever they pleased, including food and livestock. These raiders often tortured and hanged Union sympathizers.

Sometime in late 1863 or early 1864, the Confederate Home Guard received word that a boot and saddle maker by the name of Willis Brooks Sr. was aiding Winston County Unionists.

A band of eight Confederates rode out to the tavern Brooks operated on Byler Road. There, they tortured and hanged Brooks, and when his eleven year-old son tried to intervene, one of the Confederates shot him dead.

It is said that Brooks’ wife, a beautiful, blue-eyed, half Cherokee woman, Louisa Elisabeth Jane Bates—or Jenny, as she was known—gathered her young children and newborn baby around the two corpses and together, they bathed their hands in the blood of Willis Sr. and Willis Jr.

Jenny swore to avenge their deaths, and bade her sons to do the same. She pledged not to rest until all eight of the men responsible for her husband and son’s deaths were killed.

Jenny taught her sons to shoot, and bragged in her later years that she’d wasted many a keg of powder teaching my boys to shoot.

Louise Elizabeth Jane Bates

Of the eight Confederate raiders present that day, seven would pay with their lives, over the course of a thirty year feud, for their part in the murder of Willis Brooks and his son.

Legend attributes two of the men’s deaths to Jenny herself. And when she killed their leader, she cut off his head, boiled it, and saved his skull to use as a soap dish.

Jenny, who became known as Aunt Jenny in the community where she lived, was said to have carried a hickory cane in which she cut a notch for each of the men her sons killed.

All of Jenny’s ten sons were killed in their relentless quest for vengeance, and Jenny boasted that she was proud that all of her boys died like men, with their boots on.

Aunt Jenny outlived every one of her sons. Family members claim that, on her deathbed, her pastor asked if there was anything he could do for her. She declared that she’d like to