DIY History | Transcribe | Campus Culture | Reuben Gaines' memoir, undated

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Page 39

PAGE 39 Buxton.
In the early days of Buxton when I was 12 years old there was a Ghost problem. During this time nobody went anywhere alone; but there were groups that traveled through town with shot guns, revolvers and windchesters looking for the Ghost which was seen about every night during the Summer by one group or another and also in different forms. Old people as well as young people believed in this Ghost apparition and some were well founded from the Halluciations that were handed down by legend from anciant times. Walter Williams and myself with a few other children [insertion] were [/insertion] on a small blue grass strip with our feet lowered into the plowed ground which was Gaines' potato patch where the weeds had grown at least five foot high. The position was exactly in front of Jack Williams house; but suddenly something white appeared over the top of those weeds and was increasing its height to 10 or 12 foot high. Some one had hollered "Ghost" and ofcourse by this time I was half way home. I rushed in the house all excited and my mother wanted to know what was the matter and I told her "I just saw the Ghost in our potato patch" and she wanted to know what it looked like and I explained that it came right out of the ground and was ten feet tall. It did not seem to bother her too much so she left my two sisters and I in the living room and went out of the door; but in a minute or two something started beating on the window panes and for safety I started for the bed room and my older sister got in the way so I knocked all of the wind out of her and it must have hurt her seriously for her face was all contorted and twisted out of shape and looked exactly like "Uncle Toms Face In Harriet Beechers Book in "Uncle Toms Cabin" when Simon Legree was beating Uncle Tom to death. My Mother was angered because I had hurt my older sister but I told her it was no fault of mine when I had just seen the ghost and was trying to get to a place of safety when you went out-side and knocked on the window to throw us all into a stampede or panic. It was all of two weeks before I found out about the Ghost for it was Jack Williams oldest daughter who was about three years older than Walter and myself for she had gotten a ten foot pole and put one of her mothers sheets on the pole like a tend and raised it up out of the weeds in the Pota to patch. Half of the stories that parents told their children were Ghost stories, some serious and other to cause fear to keep children under control. I had not got to a point at this time that I did not believe anything that I could not understand; but later I was convince that there was no such thing as a ghost and there never was and never would be any contact between the living and the dead. I am now 21 years old and my mother had passed away a few days over two months and I had constantly worried about my mother eversince  her death. The time was about four O'clock in the evening and there were black clouds on the horizon but were not too high which did not interfere with the natural or normal lighting throughout the house

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PAGE 39 Buxton. In the early days of Buxton when I was 12 years old there was a Ghost problem. During this time nobody went anywhere alone; but there were groups that traveled through town with shot guns, revolvers and windchesters looking for the Ghost which was seen about every night during the Summer by one group or another and also in different forms. Old people as well as young people believed in this Ghost apparition and some were well founded from the Halluciations that were handed down by legend from anciant times. Walter Williams and myself with a few other children [insertion] were [/insertion] on a small blue grass strip with our feet lowered into the plowed ground which was Gaines' potato patch where the weeds had grown at least five foot high. The position was exactly in front of Jack Williams house; but suddenly something white appeared over the top of those weeds and was increasing its height to 10 or 12 foot high. Some one had hollered "Ghost" and ofcourse by this time I was half way home. I rushed in the house all excited and my mother wanted to know what was the matter and I told her "I just saw the Ghost in our potato patch" and she wanted to know what it looked like and I explained that it came right out of the ground and was ten feet tall. It did not seem to bother her too much so she left my two sisters and I in the living room and went out of the door; but in a minute or two something started beating on the window panes and for safety I started for the bed room and my older sister got in the way so I knocked all of the wind out of her and it must have hurt her seriously for her face was all contorted and twisted out of shape and looked exactly like "Uncle Toms Face In Harriet Beechers Book in "Uncle Toms Cabin" when Simon Legree was beating Uncle Tom to death. My Mother was angered because I had hurt my older sister but I told her it was no fault of mine when I had just seen the ghost and was trying to get to a place of safety when you went out-side and knocked on the window to throw us all into a stampede or panic. It was all of two weeks before I found out about the Ghost for it was Jack Williams oldest daughter who was about three years older than Walter and myself for she had gotten a ten foot pole and put one of her mothers sheets on the pole like a tend and raised it up out of the weeds in the Pota to patch. Half of the stories that parents told their children were Ghost stories, some serious and other to cause fear to keep children under control. I had not got to a point at this time that I did not believe anything that I could not understand; but later I was convince that there was no such thing as a ghost and there never was and never would be any contact between the living and the dead. I am now 21 years old and my mother had passed away a few days over two months and I had constantly worried about my mother eversince her death. The time was about four O'clock in the evening and there were black clouds on the horizon but were not too high which did not interfere with the natural or normal lighting throughout the house