Autobiography of the Demon

By Ann Tracy Marr

The demon has an endless capacity for hate, and he hates humans. This is the memoir of a demon: a minion of Hell. Through folklore and the movies, he has become famous as the Bell Witch of Tennessee, but the demon wants more. The true story has not been told. Because we don’t know the truth of the haunting of Betsy Bell, we can’t appreciate his genius. Here, in his own words, the demon tells the story. He corrects inaccuracies, explains the inexplicable, and satisfies the curious. He reveals some of the involvement of the demonic in our politics, our environment, our lives. This is your chance to learn the truth about the Bell Witch haunting and get a glimpse into the workings of Hell. Warning: the demon won’t be censored. At best, he is crude. At worst, he is profane.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Ann Tracy Marr
• Release date: Nov 11, 2021
• ISBN: 9781005309206

Ann Tracy Marr

Ann Tracy Marr is a wife, mother, former secretary, executive assistant and computer consultant. She started writing in school, where teachers praised her talent. Being as stubborn as any member of her family, she ignored them. But when her kids were in high school and the threat of college tuition became a promise for the future, Marr plopped herself in front of her computer and opened Microsoft Word. Since romance novels were a large section of the publishing world, she started there. Still being as stubborn as any member of her family, she scorned writing to formula. She took the basic plots of Regency romances and turned them on their heads. Arranged marriages always resulted in love? Nonsense. Gentlemen always treated ladies gently? Pooh on that idea. Thus, four fantasy romance novels were born. Tuition bills came and went. (They moved in more than they went away, of course.) Next Marr turned to a family story that intrigued. How did her great-great-grandmother's two brothers end up in prison? That blot on the system of justice produced Van Buren's Scandal, a thoroughly researched history of a year in Van Buren County, Michigan for two brothers named Barker. When someone mentioned the Bell Witch haunting to Marr, she knew immediately the author of that period was a demon. She dug deep in her imagination (or was she inspired by the Almighty or Lucifer's legions?) and psychology classes to figure out what the demon was up to and why. Imagine this dumpy, grey haired member of the middle class sitting in the local diner, asking everyone for their favorite and most exotic swear words. That is how this book came to be written. On top of all that, Marr has researched and published several genealogy books of no interest to anyone other than her family and other genealogists. Tucked in there somewhere is the diary she kept while undergoing treatment for breast cancer. If you like any or all of the books she has written, Marr would deeply appreciate reviews. Those reviews really help sell books, and tuition bills graduated into medical bills, etc.

Book preview

Autobiography of the Demon

Ann Tracy Marr

Published by Ann Tracy Marr

[e-mail]

Copyright 2021 by Ann Tracy Marr

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without the written permission of the publisher except where permitted by law.

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. It may not be re-sold or given away to other people.

If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient.

This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to real people, living or dead, is accidental, other than historic figures, whose actions may be entirely fictional.

This book is also available in print.

Martha complained that she wasn’t mentioned in the credits.

No, kid, you don’t get credit. You get a thank you.

Much more valuable in the long run.

Table of Contents

Copyright Page

A note from the Publisher

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Nicknames used by the Demon

Glossary of Demonic Entities

Credits

About the Author

Other books by Ann Tracy Marr

A note from the Publisher

This book is the product of meetings between a demon and a ghostwriter. Per his contractual demand, all wording in the manuscript is as it came from the mouth of the demon. The only exceptions are notes and clarifications provided by the ghostwriter, which are contained within brackets.

As happens, the dictation of this book commenced in a formal, stilted manner. As the demon developed a fondness, for lack of a better word, for the ghostwriter, he became more expansive. In the general process of ghostwriting, the writer would have corrected this unevenness. We remind the reader that the demon forbade editing.

Due to the corrupted process, the demon increasingly directed his words to the ghostwriter. This was unsolicited and unwelcome. When you read about Esther, be aware that the demon is addressing the writer.

The demon did not dictate events in chronological order; he did not appear to consider time a constraint on his activities.

The manuscript should have been burned, but that was not an option due to a signed legal contract. All concepts, thoughts, ideas, and words expressed in this book belong to the demon; they do not reflect the views of the writer or publisher in any manner.

Chapter One

Millions watched the movie. Countless others did the Google thing to learn more and found a pitiful handful of prejudiced web pages. You might be familiar with the story of the Bell Witch, but until you absorb my modus operandi, you won’t understand what really happened. You can’t appreciate my genius.

In the tradition of Hollywood celebrities, I throw open my journal and field notes to present to you my autobiography. I use that term loosely, mind. This is not a year by year accounting of my life. I have no intention of dictating a series of books longer than the all the words amassed on the Internet. How many years has it been since God wrought the heavens? Take that moment and add eons. That is the length of my existence.

If you want to be titillated by the tale of my birth, my life, my death, the information I have to share is wasted on you. How I came to being is of no concern to anyone but myself. How I spend my energy will be made clear. There is no death for one such as me. If you think in reading this book you will gain insight into your own existence, curse you. Insight is for ants, scurrying to maintain a useless life. My existence is dedicated to bringing you to smell the rightness of the way. That is why you should read this book – to learn and follow the way.

The truth will raise me to the heights.

I am a well-traveled fellow. Some of the stories I could tell would melt the marrow out of your bones. But I withhold the all in favor of recounting one short period of time. As humans count, it was four years. So be it. You will read about the events that happened to one family by the name of Bell over a span of four years.

Read here to learn the truth. Doing so, you, the reader, have a chance to admire the working of a superior mind.

I am an Accuser, spectral in nature, created by the Lord God Almighty. Once, I had a body and fed on the smoke of sacrifice. Evolving, I became like a ghost, with the range of motion I now possess. Seeing me, you might think you are in the presence of an apparition. I am wispy, immaterial. Other entities share these attributes; it is a standard form. I could list those beings and give you detailed synopses of their functions, but they are not important here. The classification of Accuser is what matters. It is the focus of my existence. It is also my passion.

Where do I fit in the cosmos? That is an impertinent question and I will not respond. I refuse to get bogged down in matters beyond your understanding; you will have to be satisfied with the statement that I am a spectral Accuser.

As an Accuser, my job is attacking deceitful witnesses that uttereth lies. I expose pride and punish the prideful.

I can smell the direction your rancid brain takes. Like all of your emptyheaded race, the first thing you thought was that my purpose is to lure man into satanic dominion. Do try not to be simplistic here. Lucifer has better things to do than randomly collect human specimens; I, his servant, am too busy to play Scooby Doo and the Evil Ghost. I am fully occupied ferreting out humans who do not follow the cardinal virtues.

What are cardinal virtues? Think seven deadly sins. If you don’t follow the cardinal virtues, you have broken one or more of the deadly sins and put yourself on my To Do list. So it is simple, if not simplistic; there are more than enough evil people to work with. I don’t need to tempt good people to do evil.

The number of Accusers is limited and our responsibilities vary. Those at my level deal with the cardinal virtues. Other of my fellows work with high and mighty bastards or those climbing ladders over the backs of others. Me? I look for people who think they are great just as they are. That is pride, which is one of the deadly sins. I developed my talents on the job until I can smell pride. I smell it and I smash it.

Do you have a boss who thinks his ideas are better than anyone’s? Is your neighbor’s nose in the air because his grass is greener? Does your father boast of his buying power? They are prideful and can come to my attention. My skills enable me to smell the weakness of faith that encourages people to embrace evil because of that pride. So if your boss shreds the memo that proves the proposal was your idea, if your neighbor calls the cops to complain about your trashy car, if your father joins the yacht club to impress your in-laws, I might meet them.

Take it one step further. I am attracted to people who warp their environment to conceal their vice. So if your boss steals your bonus, if your neighbor burns a cross on your lawn, or if your father uses his high-falluting salary to buy his way onto the city council, they have taken pride beyond acceptable limits. I promise I will find them.

Once I identify a subject, I infiltrate his life and test his faith. If that faith shatters, he is mine to do with as I will. If the faith cracks, but does not break, I am forced to withdraw. Mark the perfect man, and behold the upright: for the end of that man is peace. But the transgressors shall be destroyed together: the end of the wicked shall be cut off. Those are words from Holy books. Pay close attention to them, pinhead.

Some of my fellows adopted mottoes. I had no interest in doing so, but one of my web mates said one particular line of a psalm was appropriate to my working style: Thou hast shewed thy people hard things: thou hast made us to drink the wine of astonishment.

I like that. Yes, I bring out hard facts and yes, my subjects drink the wine of astonishment. I don’t tiptoe around sin. People brought to my notice would do well to heed the psalm. I’m not someone to fuck with.

I have worked with legions of sinful humans, but the chance of you recognizing a name from my records is as good as a five-year-old finding Bode’s Galaxy in the sky. [Bode’s Galaxy is not visible to the unaided eye, but amateur astronomers can easily find it.] Most of the people I test are as common as buckles in a steampunk bar. Unscrupulous bastards have no imagination. It is easier to steal a co-worker’s customer than to find your own. Why not poison the neighbor’s bird stalking cat? Bribing unions with false promises to earn votes is only a means to an end, but the ultimate results are not what the pervert envisions, not once he deals with me. I turn him inside out and it hurts. Oh, yes, I smash his pride. And it really hurts.

I am a highly specialized spectral Accuser.

Do you really need further definition? Do you want to know how your society views me? A spectral Accuser is known to the paranormal researcher as a demonic haunt.

Yes, I am a demon.

Laugh, or better, build a shed and hang yourself in it if you disbelieve. You won’t be alone. During the time of Jesus, there were those who witnessed miracles and could not believe. During the time of Gregory XXII, which is still to come by your calendar, there are those who doubt the proven. If your twenty-first century mind refuses to wrap itself in the occult, if you can’t comprehend the existence of beings beyond your experience, that’s fine with me. As The Master Lucifer said, Secrecy is a tradition of our society; it has served us well for millennia.

With the coming of the new age, as promised by the Mayan calendar, I abandon Lucifer’s secrecy for new methods of investigation and experimentation. Maybe new procedures will advance our agenda. After all, the world Jesus walked is vastly different than the world you know. Just as automobile manufacturers have to adapt to a world threatened with global warming (as you think), the minions of Hell must adapt to the computerized psyche.

Another demon is comparing Twitter and SnapChat. My adaptation might be through publishing. This book is an experiment. The case is unique. It is the only time one of my kind has succeeded in killing his subject. Not gained a convert, not seduced a human to revel in the darkness of bestiality, but killed the inbred bugger. It is a great victory. I leave it to the students of psychology and philosophy to decide whether this triumph should be accredited to the explosion of the Digital Enlightenment or if it issued from a last gasp of ignorance beforehand.

Are my words too hard here? What I mean is this: does using computers and smart phones make humans more susceptible to demonic influence or is it a natural result of generations of nontechnical life being shoved unevolved into modern life? It has been argued both ways. My opinion is that with or without machines, my accounting of the killing of John Bell was made possible by the steady strengthening of our cause.

Either way, it is my success – and the reason I have been permitted to write this book. I and no other.

Let us set the scene of the Bell Witch haunting. It is Robertson County, Tennessee, the year 1817 as determined by the human calendar, that inaccurate tabulation of time limited by chronology. It is a trifle east of the New Madrid Seismic Zone, to borrow your terminology, as I will throughout this book. Earthquakes add a bit of interest. If I can start one at the right time, all things become possible. Underneath is limestone bedrock.

Hills roll in Robertson County, hills covered with pines, chestnuts, and poplars in stretches slashed by scattered settlements and rough roads. Except for the offense to my nose, this place might have been designed by a movie director to represent the Garden of Eden. It is not dark, like my web. Much of the land is pristine, unmarked, as the Lord of Glory created it.

But it smells. The tang of jessamine can’t hide the rank smell of whiskey stills and humans. Slaves. Lord Jesus, Blackdogs says I have to hate the stench of slaves, so I do. Ptolemy Auletes’ slaves were a mixture of Roman, Chien, Syrian, and a dozen others, but they were captured in battle and they fought the yoke. They didn’t smell. The slaves of Robertson County are African black who have given up. They stink like bat fouling abominations. Never give up your free will, asshole. It is the only thing worth having. Ask Blackdog; he says he knows.

Piss on you, you narrow minded human. I can smell your disgust. Stick your nose in the air and sneer all you like. What do I care? You are assigning your weak-willed prejudices to me. For your information, I am not complaining about the slave’s skin color, or features, or texture of hair. Those distinctions are good only for describing an individual; they are as superficial as ranking political candidates by their clothing. Doesn’t matter where it counts: in the soul. It’s the quality of their souls I can’t abide. It is the stains on their souls that make them stink.

At least, that is Blackdog says and I have to go along with him. Sucking up is hard to do.

There aren’t too many people in the county, perhaps nine thousand. It’s not a suburb of anywhere because there aren’t enough people to make a decent size city, much less a suburb. Most of the white skinned humans farm, most live close enough so they could go to church on Sunday, but a lot of them don’t. Plenty that do have the courage of their religion don’t have the clean soul to back up that courage. Maggots – that is what they are. And those who own darkies; well, what do you think keeping slaves says about their state of grace? If there is anything worse than giving up your free will, it is stealing it from another.

A bonus for me in 1800’s Tennessee is a shortage of the angelic order. As many people think, angels roam the earth, overseeing and supporting humanity. Guardian angels, if you please. Angels get in my way; they petition the powers on behalf of squirming sinners. Angels can be an irritation, but not here in Robertson County. Not so many people equals not so many guardians. Not critical for my mission, since we don’t usually interfere with each other, but it is a bonus, like having your irritating neighbor head to the Bahamas for a week. You can live with him, but having him gone is relaxing.

This backwater of Tennessee is still frontier. Indian wars are a recent memory, but the Trail of Tears won’t pass over these hills until my prey is dead and buried. The fear and loathing white men feel for their darker skinned brothers draws me like a vulture to blood. If they could send a plague to Indians, as smallpox was in the time of de Leon, the white skinned bastards would crawl into Indian camps on their knees to spread the infection. The whites enslave the black, but exterminate the red.

They think they are civilized.

A pack-peddler, load on his back and gun in his belt, walks a dirt road in Robertson County. He would do better in a group; less than a mile away, three khange khodahs [Persian: screwups of God.] lurk in the woods, ready to rob him. The peddler is easy prey. Before noon, he will be dead and his murderers will own his belongings.

A few miles further down the road, a thief throws a bridle over a horse belonging to James Byrns and rides into the woods. Stealing horses or car-jacking – it is one and the same. No one likes a thief and these people don’t have cops to turn to. They handle it themselves. Like in Ferguson or San Francisco. Self-righteously, an assembly of humans aptly named Fort and Gunn intend to solve the problem of the horse thief. Meeting on the porch of Nicholas Darnley’s cabin, they shake hands. Assuming leadership, Darnley asks, Are you prepared to do what you must to catch the thief?

He means, Shoot to kill. These people take the law into their own hands, organizing a vigilante force. They stain their souls, and for what? To avenge petty theft. To assume the Almighty’s role of judge.

To the southwest, Charles Bennett goes through the pockets of the young man he just stabbed. In Rome, under the eyes of His Holiness, three criminals are beheaded. No, I do not refer to precious Jesus – it is three common criminals in the year 1817 who have their heads removed while the Pope watches. Why don’t they crucify them? It would fit the mindset. As I said, they think they are civilized.

A whiff of brimstone comes from Sarah Hutchinson. Falling down drunk, she lashes her husband, Ambrose, with her tongue as he stops her leaving the house to refill her whiskey jug. I consider the couple, but he is staunchly upright and uninteresting. She is too easy.

If you have not guessed, let me fill you in. I am in Robertson County to choose my next project.

There is a river, stained iron red. That is something to keep in mind. Don’t want to have to cross it, but contrary to what you superstitious humans think, I can if I must. Following the river, I come to a bluff. Limestone. Behind it, an Indian burial mound stands by a sinkhole. If I didn’t know the Almighty doesn’t make my job easy, I would have thought He laid out the location with me in mind. Limestone and bones are a perfect combination.

No, burial mounds are not essential for a haunting. You can give Indian graves mystic powers, but that is all they are: graves. Christians build mausoleums, Egyptians construct pyramids, native American Indians heap dirt into piles. Three different ways to dispose of the dead, all ridiculous. A great deal of energy and resources go into making these temples of death which would be better utilized improving conditions for the living. Graves in any form are only graves. Still, the burial mound behind the bluff calls to me. I like bones.

I spiral down for a closer look.

Ah, I can smell sin. It floats down the tumbled limestone bluff, blowing on the breeze from a farm beyond the burial mound. I rise in the air, seeing corn and tobacco fields. Behind them sits a one and one half story house sided with weather-boarded logs, nearly half a mile from the river, on a slight rise. A large orchard flourishes and pear trees dot the land. Prosperous.

This place has many elements that can be drawn upon to conduct a spectacular haunting. If the humans living on the farm are typical, if my nose is accurate in sniffing the sweat of ungodliness, it may be I have found my subjects. We shall see.

Chapter Two

I pick up clues. The farm belongs to an arrogant man, well-fed and smug in his prosperity, with a row of cabins for his slaves and a roomy, well-chinked dwelling for his family. His hair is greasy gray, pushed back from his broad forehead with an impatient hand. The effects of too much whiskey line his face. Above a downturned mouth, his eyes are his most telling feature. Small, narrow, hard. If I tell you that the soul looks out a man’s eyes, what do you decide about this one?

Inside, he is equally ugly. The corruption of murder lays heavy on his soul, for this man killed another. Before he lived here, this man lived farther south in the place called South Carolina. That land was as fertile as this land, his darkies were as cowed. He had an overseer – a man to supervise his slaves. Ignoring God’s commandment, he killed the overseer. Just so. Oh, the court called it self-defense, but it was hot rage that pulled the trigger. It was murder.

Murder makes him eligible for demonic attention, but I deal in pride. Was this man’s self-regard so great that he is worthy of smashing? That must be determined. I must do a thorough investigation, following the procedures set by my superiors. But yes, here were definite possibilities.

The farmer was precisely where he should be: inspecting his fields, a rifle slung over his shoulder. Dean, he shouted. Where’s the smutty section?

A darkie pointed. Dere, massa. Right past dat ol’ stump where de lightnin’ struck.

I followed the finger to where the silvery white fungus of common smut glinted in the sun. There was the burned out stump. I changed into the form of a rabbit-headed black mastiff and hunkered down at the end of the row of diseased corn, near the blasted stump, waiting for the farmer to approach. No, I was not playing a game. The man must be tested. Tested and condemned. I had to have proof of the innate viciousness and overweening pride of my subject before I could proceed.

You frown. Yes, I mean innate viciousness. One murder does not a sadist make, you say. Wrong. Violence peels back the skin that hides a rotten core. Philip Zimbardo exposed the bone-deep malice and impairment of the human psyche when he performed the Stanford prison experiment. You don’t know about the experiment? Don’t watch much TV, do you?

A college professor with a bright idea, Zimbardo hired twenty-four psychologically balanced males and assigned them roles as guards and prisoners in