Halloween is this Saturday, and what better way to bring in the season by reading ghost stories? Or as I like to call them, stories that prevent me from sleeping. We sent out a poll to all high school students and asked you to send in your best ghost stories, and we got some spooky, and crazy, responses. It seems that many of our students have allegedly seen ghosts, so here are some of the stories, told by our students:

“When I was a kid, my best friend Cole and I used to hang out at his house and little wind up toys would start moving on their own. We would also hear kids running around upstairs.” – Helena Izmirlian

“My great aunt, Bobbie Jo Ashley, lived in a big, white house in Cave Spring, GA. She was married to “Big” Jim Morris. The previous owner of that house was a plantation of Mr. John Paris (Paris Farm). There was a window at the top of that house, where he was known to sit and watch his slaves work in the fields in his wooden rocking chair. Decades after, Jim Morris bought that house. They later decided to move to a different house also in Cave Spring, which is visible today from the highway. They took things from the Paris Farm, including the rocking chair. As they settled into their new house, they began experiencing abnormal things. The old rocking chair was put in the attic, dismantled. One night, they heard strange noises coming from the attic. Thinking it was a rodent, they brought flashlights and brooms to the attic to inspect. The noise was still in action. What they found was no rodent. They found the old, wooden rocking chair, put together, rocking towards the window in the back of the attic. Of course, they sprinted down the stairs. This wasn’t the worst of the events. Although many things happened, the most evil happened to their maid, Adelaide Simmons. They heard loud yelling coming from the kitchen. Adelaide, obviously possessed, was told to do something by ‘voices’. She was told to drink butter milk, gag herself and throw it up in a frying pan, fry the vomit, and eat it. She did so as ‘commanded’, but retired shortly afterwards. This is a true story according to my mom’s side of the family, who had lived in Georgia for centuries.”  – Tommy Atha

“At the gym I used to do gymnastics in, there was a ghost. He supposedly died there and his spirit would walk the hall from one locker room to the other. One night, we had a lock-in there and at 2 a.m., I heard his feet shuffling down the hallway as I was walking down the hallway.” – Avery Smith

“I was at home one evening with my family and the lights flickered, the unplugged blender came to life, and its blades started spinning. Later that night, the doors of the house randomly opened and closed.” – Kathryn Chunn

“I was locking up buildings at my parents’ summer camp and the last building to lock up had a ghost in it. I went up the back staircase, which is outside, to lock the building. (There was a window in the door.) When I looked in the window, there was a face and shoulders looking down at the ground on the other side of the door. The person on the other side of the door had grey hair, a wrinkled old face, and a denim button-down. It looked up at me but it was blank. There was no face, no eyes, ears, mouth, none of that. Just nothing. Then it turned sideways and started to walk downstairs, after the first step it went away. It just vanished from mid air like you see in the movies.” – Luke Johnson

As expected when you send out a poll, we got some fake ghost stories, which were actually pretty funny. We decided to add them in this article just to lighten the mood:

“Well, It was September 4th and I had just gotten onto tumblr when I remembered that Troye Sivan had just released his new EP ‘WILD’. When I first heard the song ‘Fools’, I saw my soul leave my body. It was life changing.” – Amelia Allen

“One stormy Halloween night, I was patrolling the graveyard. From about 10-12 every year, there was usually a group of hoodlums that come along and defaced the tombstones, but this year, I would be there to stop them. Around 11:15 p.m., I heard some laughter on the other side of the hill. I headed over there to investigate and I saw a few kids with paint and hammers knocking over the markers. I approached them, yelled at them to get out of there, but they didn’t seem to acknowledge me. I walked up to the boys just in time to see it: their friend, whom had just hammered-in a marker, was suspended in the air. Behind him was a green, transparent apparition. As I approached the figure, I recognized its face; it was my grandmother! I called out to her, begging that she release the boy and return to her eternal slumber. She looked straight at me, smiled, and placed the boy back on the ground. He took off after his friends that had abandoned him. My grandmother then smiled and sunk back into the ground, but not before winking and dropping me a key. I immediately recognized it as the key to the old lock box that was found under her mattress. I raced home to where my father was keeping it. I got out the box and inserted the key. I opened it and saw what had been kept secret for so long: a note with a message addressed to me saying, “lol get rekt nerd”. That was the last time I would visit my grandmother’s grave.” – Herren Burgess

We also asked if our faculty have heard any ghost stories relating to Darlington and our campus:

“Not sure I really believe in ghosts, but working late one night alone in Sydenham Hall, I had the strangest sensation that I wasn’t alone. The movement down the hall from my office startled me and when I called out, no one was there. I got a cold chill and quickly decided that whatever I was working on could wait until tomorrow.” – Vicki Vincent  

“Apparently, many, many years ago, a student committed suicide on the third floor of Sydenham Hall and his ghost still visits at night. I have been in that building alone at night and heard the thumps coming from the third floor.” – Jan Harrison

“There are stories from students and staff who have lived in the oldest of the girls’ dorms at Darlington. In the past, ‘Maggie the Ghost’ has spoken to staff children and things have gotten bumped in the night in past school years. One staff mother many years ago actually says she saw the ghost talking to her son.” – Chris Allen

“Thornwood, the old, white house at the old lower school, was built by Alfred Shorter and Martha Harper Baldwin in the 1850’s. Well, the Civil War broke out and the Union used this house as a hospital (it wasn’t burned by Sherman’s march through the South). After moving away for refuge following the war, the Shorters moved back into the house to go on with their lives. Since Martha couldn’t provide any children, they took in their nephew, Charles Harper, and their niece, Martha Harper. One stormy night, Martha Harper, was awoken by a sound coming from the attic of the old, creaking house. She climbed three of the staircases in candlelight, towards the attic. There was nothing in the main attic, but she noticed a little door off to the side in the midnight darkness. She opened the door and raised her candle to find dead, Union soldiers lying on the wooden floor covered in blood. They were either forgotten or abandoned after the war. Martha dropped the candle, unable to scream or breathe, and sprinted through the attic. As she ran down the attic steps, she slipped and fell over the railing, falling three floors all the way into a chandelier; her neck instantly snapped. Her death was silent, but still painful and horrible. Her family did not find her body until the morning where it was still swinging on the chandelier. Multiple encounters have come up between other buyers, Thornwood School students, and teachers at Darlington Lower School. Whether the encounters be Martha, or one of the many soldiers who died in that house, is unknown.” – Tommy Atha

There seems to be a lot of versions of that Martha story. Some people say that the little girl heard her father coming home from the war, and got excited, causing her to fall over the balcony. Others say that she got mad at her father for not allowing her to date and fell down the stairs. Either way, it’s still scary to think about.

We hope you enjoyed our collection of scary, not-so-scary, and funny ghost stories. Also a thanks for those did send in any ghost stories, we enjoyed reading them all. Please feel free to share with your friends and family about these ghost stories and at late night bonfires.