Case #2: Spectral Garden

This is not fan fiction. These are real events that have been written down for other’s benefit to the best of my ability. This is an account of two women who saw past the normal boundries of our world, albeit briefly.

3 WEEKS AGO:

A lady we will call Jane was visiting an acquaintance of mine we will call Nancy at her home which is located in the country about 15 miles from Spring Hill, Florida and is in the area known as Baily’s Hill. Jane is in her 30′s, married with no children, and holds a public and prominent job in a local community. Nancy is in her 60′s, retired and has grown children. Neither has any diagnosed mental illness and neither is on any medication (I ask questions of that sort right off the bat when investigating, it is important to know what types of folks I am dealing with).

Event:

Jane went for a walk alone through the woods surrounding Nancy’s home after they had eaten lunch (2pm or so) and came across a very well maintained stone pathway about 3 foot wide lined with a variety of flowers types all in bloom and made up of smoothly worn apparently limestone blocks of even size (1 foot square or so). She thought the path was very pretty but thought it strange to be out in the middle of nowhere. The path continued from where she stood about 50 yards she said and then curved out of site around a thick clump of trees so that she couldn’t see the end of the path. Jane didn’t walk along the path, but thought to go back to the house of her friend she was visiting, so that the friend could see the path as well. Both returned about an hour later and had no trouble locating the path again. Nancy has lived in the area many years, explored the woods often, but had never seen this before, they were only a 1/4 mile or so from the house. Both decided to follow the path to see where it led. Soon after this though and only a few steps down the path (approaching the tree clump but still unable to see the path’s end) both were overcome with terrible feelings of dread and what Jane described as “wrongness”. Both got off the path and returned to the house.

The next day after Jane had left, Nancy was visited by one of her grown children and described the incident to him. Both went into the woods looking for the path but could not locate it, despite locating it easily the day before and being familiar with the area. They did locate where, according to Nancy, the path had been, pointing out the dense clump of trees and walking around them and the surrounding area several times (about 2 hours total).

Investigation:

Nancy was unable to describe what had happened and after consulting with Jane, remembered what I did and called me up a few weeks back. Last week I went to Florida to visit my Grandmother and work out some family affairs. I was only there 3 days but took the time to visit Nancy at her earlier request and check things out. I met with and spoke to both Jane and Nancy separately.

On my search through the woods I found nothing out of the ordinary. I walked a circular search pattern starting with Nancy’s house at the center to about a 1/2 mile radius (a 4 hour walk). I found the dense clump of trees, which is a rough oval and about 75 yards long and 30 yards wide at it’s widest point. The whole area is all Florida sand and pine scrub forest which is really sparse tree coverage with a lot of underbrush and grass with large open areas, then clumps of oak trees like the one described every so often (this is due to logging about 50 years ago). There are no houses within 3 miles of Nancy’s.

I researched the area at the local library and found there had been more houses in that area and on old maps found a house marked very near where Nancy’s is today, but they were all abandoned and torn down (7 in all) about 75 years ago. The area has a long history of violence, being the site of a Civil War skirmish and much earlier a large battle between two waring Native American tribes (there is a monument to this along the road about a mile from Nancy’s). There are also mining pits about 4 miles from the home which are still active and mined.

Conclusions:

I had to consider a few things first. Nancy is a woman who is very “in to” this type of thing and easily believes a lot but Jane did see it first and corroborate what Nancy said and Jane is a much more skeptical and analytical person; I considered these aspects of the people among everything else. I feel something did happen in the woods that was supernormal in nature. The experience was a shared one and most strangely was the the event lasted or reappeared a while in normal time, existing for more than a single glance and lasted enough time to be viewed on separate occasions. The walk to and from the house for Jane was about 45 minutes (she spent some time explaining and getting Nancy to come see). I sure couldn’t find anything and spent 4 hours really looking and using a search pattern, not looking at random. Jane had a watch on, so the 1/2 mile radial area I searched would most definitely cover where the path should have been or it would have taken Jane much longer to walk there and back.

With no houses in the area for some time, but one close to where the path had been in the past, they might have experienced some form of temporal memory, seeing a moment of the past, maybe something that existed there long ago. This is somewhat less believable though when something of a stone path should remain even after a hundred years (it isn’t something you raze or that gets broken down, rocks just stay) but there wasn’t a trace or suggestion of any previous path.
I would conclude, with the feelings of dread accompanying two folks after stepping onto the path, that this wasn’t a temporal memory but rather something created from a sentient though incorporeal nature for unknown reasons. Seemingly sinister in nature though does not suggest that this instance was intended specifically for the witnessing individuals. Reasons and relevance are unknown and can’t be concluded.

Related posts:

1. Case #4: The Witch’s Circle
2. Case #3: Donut Shop Ghost
3. Case File: Haunted Hotel Rooms
4. Published Case #1: A Demon’s Passing Interest