The Beartown Incident of 1931
In 1921, in the kitchen of a farmhouse on Droop Mountain in West Virginia, a mother glanced out the window to see her seven-year-old daughter standing between the garden and a shed. It appeared that young Celeste was engaged in conversation with someone, even using animated hand gestures.
Celeste’s mother, Cynthia, wiped her hands on a dish towel and stepped out onto the back porch, concerned that her daughter was talking to a stranger. When she opened the screen door, she could hear Celeste talking as if she were talking to another little girl. But as far as Cynthia could tell, there was nobody out there with Celeste.
A little later, when Celeste came back into the house, her mother asked her who she had been talking to by the shed. “Oh, just a little girl named Violet that used to live in this house before she fell in the well and drowned.”
“What did you say to Violet?” Cynthia asked.
“I told her to walk toward the light,” replied Celeste.
“And did she?” her mother asked.
“Yes, she won’t be back here again; she’s with her parents and siblings now,” Celeste said.
Cynthia turned back to the kitchen sink and stared out the window. She always wondered when it would happen again in her family. Her grandmother had what, back then, they called “The Gift;” she could see and talk to those who had passed on.
In the fall of 2014, Emily Kershner, a park naturalist, led a group of people on a hike on the boardwalk through the enchanting Bear-town State Park. Beartown, for those who have never visited, is renowned for its distinctive rock formations, including deep crevasses and massive sandstone boulders.
At one point in the nature walk, an eight-year-old boy slipped away from his mother’s hand and went into a narrow slot in the rock. It was a tight squeeze, but the boy managed to get back into the crack some distance by proceeding sideways.
The boy’s mother realized her adventurous son had taken off on his own for some exploring when she heard him shout, “Mom, I found something back in this cave, come look.”
“Donny, I can’t fit back in there. If it’s not something dangerous or alive, bring it out,” said his mother.
The boy was always collecting rocks, so his mother was surprised when he held out his hand and there was a hair barrette made of finely carved ivory inscribed with the name Celeste.
The other hikers and the naturalist gathered around Donny and his mother to see the boy’s find. One woman said, “How did that beautiful barrette get back in that cave?”
When the naturalist saw the name inscribed on the barrette, she gasped. She had heard many strange stories about Droop Mountain, usually about the ghosts of those killed in the 1863 Battle of Droop Mountain. However, there was one story that particularly intrigued her, but she had always assumed it was just like the other ghost stories – a story and nothing more. The naturalist had a nagging feeling that the story, as it is generally told, is true.
Celeste Scott was born in 1914 into a loving family on a small farm just north of present-day Beartown State Park. She was the oldest of her four siblings, one brother and three sisters. Celeste’s parents, Reggie and Ethyl, never spoke openly about it, but Reggie suspected Celeste may have some mental problems, even though she excelled in her schoolwork.
Celeste was, by all accounts, a bit of a loner. Even as a toddler, her parents would hear her speaking to some unseen presence. Most often, she was alone in another room of the house. Still, sometimes she would answer an apparent question from an invisible speaker during a meal or when the whole family was gathered around the radio, listening to Fibber McGee and Molly. Celeste’s family was quite used to her eccentricities and generally ignored her soliloquies.
Celeste’s father dearly loved her and felt secure that, despite her eccentricities, the community on Droop Mountain embraced her with kindness and respect. Reggie had served in the Navy during the First World War, where he learned the art of scrimshaw. He showed his affection for friends and family by carving beautiful ivory keepsakes. For his special daughter, Celeste, he carved a hair barrette with her name on it, which she cherished.
Celeste loved to visit her grandfather, who fought in the Battle of Droop Mountain as a 16-year-old boy. She often visited on foot since he lived alone just a mile or so down the ridge. After hearing his many stories, excluding the ones about blood and gore, she would try to imagine what it was like for a young man in those dark times.
The Scotts lived in a white farmhouse a short distance from what is now Beartown State Park, and young Celeste walked past the overhanging rocks and deep crevasses on her way to visit her grandfather. Between Beartown and her grandfather’s small home, she passed a large oak tree with a massive limb that extended out from the main trunk about 20 feet.
Joe Tryndale, a prolific gossip, prone to embellishing facts, once reported seeing Celeste talking to the oak tree as if it were a human. Unknown to the loose-lipped man, she was talking to the ghost of a 17-year-old soldier killed in the Battle of Droop Mountain.
In her eyes, this young soldier, whom she knew as Jeremy, sat with his back against the base of the oak tree. Jeremy wore a gray wool jacket and trousers, with a slouch hat on his head. Cradled in his arms was a Springfield rifle and bayonet captured from a Union soldier. Celeste had conversations with the young soldier for several years.
Celeste began to look forward to her visits with Jeremy, who didn’t seem to understand that he was dead. One day, he showed Celeste a small locket that he wore around his neck on a chain. The photograph in the locket showed a kindly-looking man and woman with their hands on the shoulders of two children, a boy and a girl.
Jeremy explained to Celeste that this was his family, a family he sorely missed. She knew right then and there that she would attempt to get Jeremy back with his family, who by then were all deceased.
By the time Celeste was 17, she was a lithe, exceedingly beautiful raven-haired young woman. Her attractiveness did not escape the attention of the young men in the area, but she did not seem interested in romance; she wanted to be a writer and was a prolific reader.
At about this time, a man and a woman, Ralph and Emily Smoot, from Southern Ohio, moved into an abandoned and crumbling farmhouse, less than a mile from the Scotts. They kept to themselves, and when they did happen upon a neighbor, they had nothing to say, not so much as a nod of the head, let alone a friendly greeting.
Joe Tryndale, true to his nature and his profound inquisitiveness, made an unannounced visit to the Smoots. The tight-lipped Ralph Smoot stood in the doorway, blocking Joe from entering the house.
Joe didn’t learn much about the Smoots during his brief visit, but he did tell them all about their neighbors, to which Ralph Smoot listened intently but silently. Before Smoot slammed the door in his face, Joe noticed Smoot’s wife standing a few feet behind her husband. He would go on to say, as he made his rounds, that “Smoot’s silent and demure wife was trying to hide her face, but I could see that she had a black eye and a cut on her left cheek.”
It was the peak of the Great Depression, and times were tough, yet thefts were a rare occurrence among the tight-knit families on Droop Mountain. When a family was struggling to make it, their neighbors would pitch in and help in any way they could. The residents of Droop Mountain were hardworking people of faith and charity, but soon they would experience the intrusion of unprecedented evil.
To be continued next week.
