Where Spirits Linger: Huntsville’s Haunted Past

By Jacquelyn Procter Reeves

Where Spirits Linger by Jacquelyn Procter Reeves digs deep into the historic past of the locations of these stories to discover the mysteries of who haunts the location and why. By researching historical documents and local lore and with the talent of a medium, we learn that phantom children sing a haunting tune about an event that killed millions. We also learn that a silent crowd walks slowly down a city street and that the ghost of a man who was lynched for murder in 1904 attacks police officers.

A prominent businessman murdered two people, but why? What is the message a WWI soldier wants us to know about an attack in the Forest of Argonne? What does the Confederate colonel want from those who visit his grave? The answers to these questions and many more can be found in this fascinating book.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: May 31, 2019
• ISBN: 9781728311180

Jacquelyn Procter Reeves

Jacquelyn Procter Reeves, author of true crime, history, and ghost stories, has thoroughly researched the history of the people and places that encompass Huntsville’s haunted past. If a place is haunted, she tells you who and why, and her descriptive writing puts you there! Jacque is the past president of the Huntsville-Madison County Historical Society and frequently gives programs to OSHER Lifelong Learning Institute, Learning Quest, various churches, historical organizations, libraries, and schools. She conducts themed tours in Huntsville, Maple Hill Cemetery, and the historic Donnell House where she was curator for 11 years. She has been featured on national television programs because of her extensive research. In addition, Jacque has been the editor of three local publications and frequent contributor to books and magazines.

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© 2019 Jacquelyn Procter Reeves. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse  05/31/2019

ISBN: 978-1-7283-1119-7 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-7283-1118-0 (e)

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models,

and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Contents

Introduction

A Slow Descent into Madness – the Ghost of William Frye

The Ghost of Private John Zych

Wholesale Devastation

The Ghost of J. Emory Pierce

A Frenchman in America’s Revolution

Death on the Devil’s Backbone

Killed in the Line of Duty

Double Murder

The Phantom Children of Walker Street

Good-bye

The Confederate Colonel

Shadows of a Different Century

The Blood of Betrayal

Anger Haunts the Bibb Mansion

Where are the Arms and Legs?

The President’s Visit to Huntsville

The Angry Ghost of Horace Maples

She Didn’t Know Her Place!

About the Author

Introduction

S everal years ago, I received a phone call asking if I would consider putting together a ghost walk for a fund-raiser. It would probably be a one-time event, and I was invited to make it all up. For those who don’t know me, that was the one thing I could not do. Having heard talks, taken tours, and read information that was presented as historic but clearly wasn’t, I knew if I didn’t put together a historically accurate ghost walk, someone would do it wrong.

Why do I care? As it turned out, I was on the way to Gettysburg to visit the Civil War battlefield. My husband and I took a ghost walk while we were there and we were rather disappointed. The young tour guide told her group that she saw the ghost of a Union soldier walking toward her one night and he was very handsome.

Helloooo! I’m ovulating! she claimed to have said to the ghost. The tour was ruined. I was compiling a list of what not to do on a ghost walk.

As soon as I got back, I started researching. As my proposed go date grew closer, I enlisted the help of my husband, Robert Reeves, and good friend, Kevin Thompson, both with valuable skillsets. Our experiment turned into a tight partnership. While we planned to alternate guides every night, on the third night, we had over 300 people show up for a tour. It was abundantly clear that we needed to hire more guides, and in my opinion, we have the best.

The most important ingredient, in my opinion, is to be respectful of the people and events of the past. The stories must be told with dignity and reverence, as we hope our own stories will someday be told.

The history can be found in books, records, deeds, and even photographs, but how does one prove a ghost? With the help of an outstanding medium that I met by coincidence, the last ingredient necessary for a good ghost story was finally included. Other mediums have taken our tours and confirmed the same thread – the ghosts want us to tell their story, not just the textbook version.

After ten years of giving ghost tours, it seemed to be the right time to put some of our stories down on paper. What you hear on the tour is simply a snapshot, but the entire story takes more than a two hour tour can possibly provide.

I tell visitors that they don’t have to believe in ghosts to hear about them or read about them. At the end of the day, there is a lot of verified history explained, hopefully, in an engaging manner. And finally, who doesn’t like ghost stories?

For more information, see huntsvilleghostwalk.com.

A Slow Descent into Madness – the Ghost of William Frye

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T he ghost of a madman, wringing his hands in despair, has been seen in the upstairs window of the home where he taught a talented young lady how to paint more than a century and a half ago. William Frye, a portrait artist from Europe, inadvertently brought about his own madness with an innocent habit. He spent his final years in an Alabama insane asylum. His afterlife, it seems, is spent in Huntsville.

George Wilhelm Frey was born in Reslau, Germany in 1822 and grew up in Vienna, Austria. While in college in Prague, he and his friends devoured books written by the famous American novelist, James Fenimore Cooper, a New Yorker who wrote the Leatherstocking series as well as his most famous book, The Last of the Mohicans. Europeans were consumed with tales of the American Indians, though Fenimore Cooper admitted that he had no real knowledge of how the Indians actually lived. Nevertheless, young Wilhelm Frey and his friends made a pact to come to America to see the American Indians, in person. They decided to leave after the Christmas holidays when they would be flush with gift money from family.

Wilhelm and his friends agreed to meet upon a certain date – without telling their parents – and board a ship to America. On that date, Wilhelm showed up alone. While his friends lost their initial enthusiasm, but most likely their nerve, Wilhelm boarded a ship and came to America alone. His voyage lasted three months over a stormy sea. He found his cousin, a German Consul to New York, Count Johann Schmidt, and it is believed that he lived those early years with him.

Wilhelm Frey, who Anglicized his name to William and changed the spelling of his last name to Frye, started his career as an itinerant portrait painter to support himself. His cousin wrote letters of introduction to influential people to get him started. In turn, a friend of his cousin wrote letters of introduction to influential people in Huntsville. William established a studio in Louisville, Kentucky in 1845; in March, 1847, he opened a studio in Huntsville, Alabama. His advertisement in the Southern Advocate announced that his studio was at the Bell Tavern.

His future in Huntsville was sealed when he married Huntsville resident Virginia Hale on May 18, 1848. The following year, he became a U.S. citizen. Over the next few years, the location of his studio changed from time to time and he dutifully announced the new address in the local newspaper. Frye left the state for extended periods of time, perhaps in search of new clients and deeper pockets. But he always returned to Huntsville. He and Virginia became parents of three daughters and one son and lived on the outside edge of downtown Huntsville and the Old Town residential district.

Only the wealthiest residents could afford to commission an oil painting. While the cost depended on the size of the canvas, the average price was about $100 per painting and another $100 for an ornate frame, but some would pay as much as $300. The heads he painted, especially of children, tended to be overly large for their bodies, but he gave his subjects an ethereal quality through lighting and shading that set him apart from other painters. His detailed delicate fabrics and lace were most notable.

Advertisement%20for%20portraits%20by%20William%20Frye%20(A%20Slow%20Descent%20into%20Madness)Huntsville%20Democrat%20Newspaper..jpg

Advertisement for portraits by William Frye

Frye painted very few landscapes. One was the earliest known scene of Huntsville’s Big Spring, where founder John Hunt built his cabin. Frye painted two scenes of the Big Spring – one of which was damaged when a boot went through the canvas (it is now part of the collection at the Huntsville Museum of Art), and the other is in a private collection outside of Huntsville.

The golden period of Frye’s work is considered to be between 1850 and well into the 1860s. During the Civil War, Huntsville was occupied, off and on, by the Union Army. While they were in town, officers had their portraits painted by Frye. In the intervening periods of time when Confederate soldiers occupied Huntsville, their officers had portraits painted as well. Times were hard though, and in 1868, he advertised a 25% reduction of his usual fee due to the difficult economy.

In 1865, the Kentucky Legislature announced that bids would be taken to paint the life-sized likeness of Henry Clay to be displayed in the Senate Chamber. The three-time presidential candidate, considered one of the five greatest U.S. Senators, died in 1852. Clay served as Speaker of the House for three terms and was admired by Abraham Lincoln who called him my ideal of a great man. While Frye won the commission to paint Henry Clay, as well as a handsome payment of $3,000, the image of Clay’s head lacked the three-dimensional quality of his earlier subjects. Nevertheless, the money was excellent and the portrait was placed in Kentucky’s Senate Chamber of the old state capital in Frankfurt, Kentucky.

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Portrait of Henry Clay painted by William Frye

Toward the late 1860s, the quality of Frye’s work began to change. The balance between the subject’s head and body became even more inconsistent. One customer was so unhappy with the way she looked in her painting that she ordered it destroyed.

The colors of William Frye’s paintings were vivid and bold, and perhaps it was the brilliant hues that eventually led to his painful and untimely death. Paint contained lead, a compound that contributed to the depth of color well known in Frye’s work. Early painters mixed their own colors using lead, mercury, cadmium, and other toxic items, unknowingly ingesting fumes or allowing the toxins to seep into the pores of their skin. For that reason, lead poisoning is sometimes referred to as painters’ colic.

But Frye had an additional bad habit. He would dip the brush into the paint, transfer it to the canvas in creative strokes that resulted in beautiful portraits and vivid scenes, and occasionally, but far too often, put the paintbrush to his mouth to create a point that would allow the fine detail he was known for. The lead, over time, poisoned the organs of his body, his bones, his brain, and ultimately, his central nervous system. Lead accumulated