Most Haunted Places in America: Halcyon House
This beautiful Georgian style mansion was built in Washington DC by Benjamin Stoddard, who was the first secretary of the Navy. Although he died in 1813, he is believed to still reside here. Being a lover of the sea, he named his beloved house after the mythological bird who, as legend goes, has the power to calm the seas. Ever since Stoddard’s death in the house, several paranormal happenings are said to occur frequently. Many witnesses report seeing an apparition of a heavy-set elderly man dressed in a tan suit fitting the description of Benjamin Stoddard in various places in the house, usually gazing out the windows or enjoying the comfort of a captain’s chair.
During the Civil War, the Halcyon House was used as a stop on the Underground Railroad. During this turbulent time, many slaves, exhausted by their long journey to freedom, died in the house’s cellar. In the 1930’s, a man named Albert Adsit Clemons acquired the historical mansion. It is unclear whether or not he was already mentally unstable upon moving into the house or if the house itself drove him to madness. He began a series of irrational renovations on the house that didn’t end until his death in March of 1938.
When Clemons moved into the Halcyon House, he turned the attic into a religious shrine in which he worshiped a mysterious religion all his own. He surrounded himself with death with the transformation of the coach house into a crypt and by turning the property’s beautiful garden into a cemetery for mummies. On the heads of the beautiful stone angels that adorn the Halcyon House property, Clemons fastened pie tins.
The renovations didn’t end there. He ordered stairways that lead to nothing, doors that open into walls, and rooms without doors built, yet he wouldn‘t allow electricity to be put in. He felt these changes to the house would lead to spiritual immortality. Perhaps he was correct in his thinking, because he is still seen roaming the halls dressed in black. His plans for the house were complete upon his death, but his last wish was never granted. He wanted to be buried with a silver stake pierced through his heart, but nobody was courageous enough to realize that wish.
In the 1930’s and 1940’s, owners of the beautiful Halcyon House were plagued with a series of electrical problems that made the house nearly impossible to reside in. During the period of 1963 through 1972, three separate cases of levitation were reported, all of which occurred in the second floor bedroom. Today, the supernatural occurrences are as frequent and terrifying as ever. Along with the ghostly apparitions of Benjamin Stoddard and Albert Clemons, the form of a mysterious woman is seen. Moans, rattling in the walls, and footsteps are commonly heard from all areas of the mansion.
Doors and windows open and close on their own and lights turn on and off, seemingly at their own will. One story tells of a woman coming home to the house to find one of the pictures she had mounted to the wall had fallen on the floor. Nonchalantly, she re-affixed the picture to the wall. The next time she entered the house to find the same picture on the floor, a large black “X” was drawn on the wall in the picture’s place. The Halcyon House and the historic resident that remain there make the this House one of the most haunted places in America.
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