In the 1990s, an off-duty firefighter claims to be the first person to have actual damage after hitting her, and along with the damage, has an incredible paranormal experience including a second ghost being seen as well. Read this account, from wikipedia.com (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Union_Cemetery_%28Easton,_Connecticut%29):
"People who have "hit" the White Lady with their car have never had any damage turn up on their vehicles, except in the case of an off-duty fireman in 1993. He was driving his pickup somewhere between Union Cemetery and Stepney Cemetery, which is ten miles away, when the road in front of him took on a reddish glow. In those few surreal seconds, he saw a farmer with a straw hat sitting beside him and a lady in white approaching in the roadway with her hands reaching out toward him. He slammed on the brakes, but it was too late. He heard a thud and even ended up with a dent from the impact, yet no trace of the woman, or the farmer who had been sitting beside him, was ever found.The fact that he heard and was left with physical evidence of the impact is most unusual in cases of cars driving through or into apparitions."
It's so well known that in one of my college courses, 'Death and Dying', my professor (who's a RN) asked us how many have heard of the white lady or tried to see her- more than half of the class raised their hand. A good handful claimed to have actually seen her apparition.
There are other things seen and heard in this cemetery, including a pair of glowing red eyes that follow along those who walk. They can be read about in the wikipedia link above, along with a woman heard crying.
Union Cemetery is connected to Stepney Cemetery in Monroe by Route 59, as seen in this map:
I was determined to travel between the two cemeteries to see if we witness anything. Stepney Cemetery (in Monroe) is supposedly haunted by it's own white Lady- Hanna Cranna, ex-witch. Read about her here: (http://www.monroehistoricsociety.org/hannacranna.html)
I researched neighboring towns as well, and read of quite a few places in Redding that are apparently haunted.
"Nothing had so much annoyed Putnam and his officers during the campaign of the previous summer on the Hudson than the desertions which had thinned the ranks, and the Tory spies who frequented the camps and conveyed information to the enemy. To put a stop to this it had been determined that the next offender(s) of either sort captured should suffer death as an example.
On February 4th, 1779 Edmond Jones, previously from Ridgefield, was tried at a General Court Martial, found guilty of being a spy, and was accordingly sentenced to death by hanging.
Similarly, on February 6th, 1779, John Smith of the 1st Connecticut Regiment was found guilty of desertion, and sentenced to be shot to death.
General Putnam determined to execute both persons at once...... "make a double job of it," The lofty hill dominating the valley and the camps (known to this day as Gallows Hill) was chosen as the scene of the executions. Following the hanging/shooting, every soldier of the three brigades was ordered to march by a look at the mangled remains."
I also read on another site that none of the soldiers wanted to step up and kill their peers, and that General Putnam ended up taking over and doing the deeds himself. I also heard that they chose the spot on Gallows Hill because one of the boy's mother lived within view; and that it was her house that the soldier had deserted to in the first place resulting in the treason.
I wish I knew the exact spot in the area where the executions took place (on the highest point, which is hard to determine during night), but I know Gallows Hill Road is the road I want to travel.
Then there's this bridge on Diamond Hill Road (from this site: http://reddinghistory.wordpress.com/2010/01/12/haunting-in-connecticut):
"Diamond Hill: Just below the Mark Twain Library there is a super hot area where three people drowned in two separate floods…a couple died in 1955 after their car was caught in the swollen river, and a man died in 1982 attempting to clear the falls in a raft.
At the Diamond Hill Road bridge, Edward Arthur Phoenix, 53, and his wife, Veronica, 47, of Fox Run Road lost their lives when their car was swept into the river below the bridge. Mr. and Mrs. Phoenix were coming home from dinner at the home of Mr. and Mrs. Matthew Blair of Great Pasture Road.
A three and one-half hour frantic and near successful attempt to rescue Mrs. Phoenix from a tree, after her husband had been swept to his death, made the tragedy even more horrifying. While volunteer firemen and neighbors tried vainly to reach her in the darkness she clung doggedly to the tree, aware of the efforts to save her. But at length her strength failed and she fell into the river and drowned. At one time the rescuers were within 20 feet of the tree but were turned aside by the tremendous force of the torrent.
An Army helicopter spotted the woman’s body Monday Morning, 1,500 feet from the Diamond Hill Bridge. Mr. Phoenix’s body was recovered early Tuesday about 50 feet further downstream."
Finally, the last place I wanted to visit, Topstone Road. Shadowlands.net describes there being a small lit tent that people have observed disappearing next to train tracks that you cross over:
(http://theshadowlands.net/places/connecticut.htm)
So our journey finally begins..
We travel up route 7 in Redding, and off of route 7 to the right is Topstone Road. Now my boyfriend is one not to linger or take his time while touring. If it were up to me I'd probably drive very slow and maybe get out of the car if the feeling hits, but Joe just coasted along the road- nothing to be seen. No tent apparition, nothing creepy really at all.
We then headed for the Diamond Hill Bridge. Diamond Hill Road itself was quiet and pretty dark, just mildly creepy. The little bridge itself wasn't anything huge, the water below didn't look too far below or two deep-from our view it seemed to be more like a creek. Hard to imagine it being a powerful, scary current like it was on the day the couple plunged in- but remember, that was during a flood. There was nothing too creepy driving over the bridge, nothing seen, felt or heard. Had I gotten out and stood on it though, perhaps the story might've went differently.
The best part of the night was Gallows Hill Road. A super long road, Gallows Hill went on forever, narrowed down, widened up, and turned into a dirt road at one point as well. We felt very strange and creeped out on this road.
The visual of the road alone was creepy, but there was a cold, anxious-type feeling I felt in my core, and the cold feeling ended up being physical as well. We recorded a 10 DEGREE DROP in temperature. Joe's volvo read outside atmospheric temperature being at 50 degrees fahrenheit just outside of the road, then once on the road it lowered itself to 40. This was by far the strangest thing to have happened all night.
We finally made our way to the end of the road, which spilled out to route 59, then headed up towards Stepney Cemetery.
As previously mentioned, people claim to have run over the White Lady on all different spots stretching out along 59, so the more we got to travel this route, the more confident I felt for seeing something.
It is a nice creepy and semi-darkly lit road, but nothing on the way up. Stepney Cemetery disappointed me somewhat- it's situated right in a downtown-ish area, in a well lit spot that's in plain view, so we definitely weren't able to linger for long. Joe was a little irritated, feeling like it was a waste of time driving those five minutes up route 59 to where we were, but I knew we now had another good chance of seeing something by going back down 59 towards Union.
The ride down was uneventful, there were a few other cars on the road, the time then being around 12:15 am. Nothing scary to report, sadly. It seemed like any other back-country road. As we reached the bottom, with Easton Union on our right, Joe simply stopped at the stop sign, and took the left towards Merritt Parkway. I wish I could've circled around a little more, maybe park for a second- but we were all aware of the police's presence in the area.
Behind the cemetery (which situates itself on the corner of the four-way intersection) is a road. The only other time I came up to Easton Cemetery I parked on that road, about halfway down, and pulled the windows down a bit. I listened for anything I could hear, and besides the quiet all I heard was an animal stepping on a branch and cracking it. I heard this sound coming from my left, which wasn't the side of the road of the cemetery, it was opposite. Maybe that sound is what creeped me out, but before and after hearing it, I felt like something was wrong with that area, even though it wasn't part of the actual cemetery.
Later on I researched the area I parked in, and discovered that two separate victims of murder were dumped in a sinkhole where I heard the sound. (http://bansheeparanormal.com/union-cemetery-ct.html)
While getting onto the merrit, we mentioned how funny it was that the real creepy spot of the night turned out to be Gallows Hill, because of that incredibly noticeable cold spot. I hope to return again soon, before Halloween, but wish I had a EVP recorder.
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P.S: I found the spot of the executions on Gallows Hill.
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