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The Richmond Vampire and its Mausoleum in Hollywood Cemetery

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In the pre-civil war Hollywood Cemetery in Richmond, Virginia, the mausoleum of W.W Pool is said to be the grave of The Richmond Vampire. A more recent urban legend is now also connected with The Church Hill Tunnel collapse. 

In Richmond’s historic Hollywood Cemetery, where Confederate generals, U.S. presidents, and thousands of the city’s dead lie beneath elaborate monuments and crumbling headstones, whispers persist of a vampire lurking among the graves. 

Read More: Check out all ghost stories from the USA

The origins of this legend from Richmond, Virginia, trace back to a real, grim disaster in 1925 — and an even older mausoleum said to house something inhuman that still draw people wanting to check out the alleged vampire lair. 

Vampire Mausoleum: William Wortham Pool’s grave in Hollywood Cemetery is thought to be the vampire lair of the Richmond Vampire. //Source: Wikimedia

The Legend of W.W. Pool Mausoleum

Local legend held that W.W. Pool was no ordinary Richmond citizen. Some versions of the tale claimed Pool was an 18th-century Englishman exiled for vampirism, or a practitioner of the dark arts who had achieved unnatural longevity. His tomb, marked with ominous Masonic symbols and resting in one of Richmond’s oldest graveyards, was said to house either Pool himself or the ancient vampire from the tunnel.

Locals nicknamed the creature “The Richmond Vampire” or “The Hollywood Vampire,” and it became a fixture of local ghost tours and urban legend lore. At first the lore centered just around the grave of this mystic man with only initials inscribed at his tomb. WW, looking almost like fangs. There were also the Masonic and Egyptian elements to the grave, making it stand out. People also thought it was strange that for a grave for a man who died in 1922, it was strange that it had 1913 inscribed. 

Read More: Check out all ghost stories from haunted cemeteries

According to one of the stories, a broken glass was found inside the locked and sealed mausoleum. The question was, where did the famed Richmond Vampire go?

Hollywood Cemetery: Variations of the story grew into legend and it has become to be that W.W.Poole is a vampire that haunts Hollywood. Whether the sources mean just the cemetery or if the legend has reached Hollywood, LA yet is not mentioned. Some say he only comes out when there is no moon.

Who was W. W. Pool?

But who really was the man inside the mausoleum? In real life, his name was William Wortham Pool and lived 721 28th St, in Woodland Heights and worked as an accountant. He was in fact not in exile from England, but born in Mississippi and lived seemingly a normal and quiet life. 

He had built the tomb for his wife, Alice who died after an illness in 1913 and as an accountant, he chose to just use his initials, as you paid by the letter. William died and joined her in their mausoleum in 1922 when he died of pneumonia at the age of 75. 

Perhaps for those looking into the story a bit more, it would have ended there, but instead the vampire lore grew. As the Hollywood Cemetery is adjacent to the Virginia Commonwealth University, the story became popular from the 1960s and especially from the 1980s when it grew almost a cult-like group around the mausoleum, and in the end, another tragedy from the town would merge with the story. 

Since 2001, the story of the vampire has been told together with the collapse of the Chesapeake and Ohio Railroad’s Church Hill Tunnel under the neighborhood in the east called Church Hill and is rarely told without. 

The Church Hill Tunnel Collapse

On October 2, 1925, disaster struck as a work crew attempted to reopen the long-abandoned Church Hill Tunnel, a 4,000-foot passage beneath Richmond’s Church Hill neighborhood. They had problems with the tunnels since they started in 1871. The soul was soft and slippery and buildings above it would tilt or sink. Sometimes workers are said to have just vanished. 

During excavation, a section of the tunnel collapsed, burying several workers alive in a sudden, suffocating wave of rock, soil, and debris. A section above the work train collapsed, entombing engineer Tom Mason together with around two or three hundred laborers.

According to legend, when they were building the tunnel, they awakened something evil that lived there and was the reason for the tunnel crashing. 

Church Hill Tunnel: The inside of the eastern entrance to the Church Hill tunnel in Richmond, Virginia, in 1981. The tunnel collapsed in 1925, and is sealed off at this end by the wall visible in the distance. // Source: Wiki

In the chaos that followed, rescuers and onlookers reportedly saw something horrifying: a blood-covered, grotesque figure with jagged teeth and hanging skin, emerging from the rubble, crouching as if feeding over the victims. The creature — with exposed flesh and sharp, animalistic features — allegedly fled from the tunnel, making its way toward Hollywood Cemetery.

Witnesses claimed it disappeared into the Mausoleum of W.W. Pool, a real tomb located within the cemetery, dating back to 1913. This bizarre incident quickly fueled rumors that a vampire had been awakened by the cave-in.

When this version merged with the existing vampire story is uncertain, but some say it was from the start. Historians and folklorists largely attribute the origin of the vampire tale to the tragic story of Benjamin F. Mosby, a 28-year-old railroad worker caught in the tunnel collapse. He had been shoveling coal into the firebox of a steam locomotive of a work train with no shirt on when the cave-in occurred and the boiler ruptured. Mosby, suffering from severe burns and catastrophic injuries, staggered from the wreckage — his flesh hanging from his bones, blood covering his body — and reportedly died shortly afterward at a Grace Hospital. He was buried at Hollywood Cemetery.

The day laborers Richard Lewis and “H. Smith”, Engine 231 and the ten flatcars remain buried inside the tunnel of misery.

Church Hill Tunnel: This is a picture of the western end of the tunnel. It is completely closed off, unlike the eastern end, and there has been speculation that it deserves better upkeep. Over the years, it has been somewhat forgotten and is now overgrown with weeds and tall grasses

Witnesses in the panic and gloom of the disaster likely misinterpreted the ghastly appearance of Mosby’s mortally wounded body as something supernatural. Over time, as Richmond’s storytelling traditions took hold, Mosby’s tragic death merged with older vampire folklore, birthing the legend of the Richmond Vampire.

Yet despite rational explanations and lack of primary sources, the myth persists and contemporary records only state that Mosby died without any of the other details. If not him, what was the thing they say lurked in the tunnels? To this day, people claim strange sightings around Hollywood Cemetery, eerie noises near the Pool Mausoleum, and spectral figures wandering the grounds at night.

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References:

https://web.archive.org/web/20220523135807/https://www.wtvr.com/2013/10/31/holmberg-how-a-vampire-came-to-haunt-a-richmond-cemetery/

https://web.archive.org/web/20230415234115/https://richmondmagazine.com/arts-entertainment/richmonds-reputed-nosferatu/

William Wortham Pool – Wikipedia

Church Hill Tunnel – Wikipedia

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The Haunting of Lincoln Park Zoo from Six Feet Under

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Lincoln Park Zoo in Chicago offers one of the more haunted places in the city as this is the place where thousands of people were buried in the old cemetery. The park and the zoo were built on top of it and it is said ghosts from the remaining bodies are haunting at night. 

Lincoln Park Zoo, one of Chicago’s most beloved attractions, has a darker side that many visitors may not know about. According to legend, the place is haunted because of the many thousands of people who are buried underneath the ground. 

Read More: Check out all ghost stories from the USA

The Lincoln Park Zoo was founded in 1868 inside of Lincoln Park and is one of the small zoos that have free admission where you can see penguins, gorillas, lions and tigers. And if we are to believe the rumors, ghosts as well. 

The Old Chicago Cemetery

Lincoln Park is one of the oldest neighborhoods in Chicago, watching it rise through the settling times, gang violence to the big city of today. From 1843 to 1859, the land where the zoo now stands was once the city’s main cemetery on the southern end of the Lincoln Park, home to around 35,000 bodies. This number is what is mostly put out, but some historians claim that it is more likely between ten and twelve thousand. 

Most of the remains were eventually moved due to concerns about water contamination of cholera. Caskets were buried close to the water and marsh land and would wash to shore every time the water rose. It was also contaminating the drinking water. 

Read More: Check out all ghost stories from Haunted Cemeteries

The cemetery itself was also almost completely burnt the ground during The Great Chicago Fire on the night of October 8 in 1871. After this, they decided to build a lakefront park above it and didn’t move the remaining people from the underground. 

Chicago Old Cemetery: Rush of fugitives through the Potter’s Field toward Lincoln Park; Based on a Sketch by Theo R. Davis, from Harper’s Weekly, November 4, 1871.

Bones from the graves did reemerge from the ground though and workers would collect the bones to a shaman who would rebury them to keep the spirits from haunting the place. But did this even help at all?

Haunting at the Lincoln Park Zoo

Disturbing burial grounds has long been a trope in horror stories, and Lincoln Park is no exception. Since the cemetery’s relocation, countless reports of paranormal activity have arisen from the Lincoln Park Zoo grounds. Famed parapsychologist Ursula Bielski, who has conducted investigations at the site, called it “without a doubt the most active site” she’s ever explored. 

This reputation is reinforced by numerous sightings of apparitions, shadowy figures, and inexplicable events over the zoo’s 150-year history. From 2013 there have also been a ghost tour in the zoo that have reinforced the belief that this place is indeed haunted. 

People have experienced cold spots, feelings of being watched, and strange disembodied whispers. Some claim to see ghostly figures wandering the grounds, especially at night. Phantom shapes, believed to be the restless souls of those whose bodies were never moved, are said to occasionally be spotted near the zoo’s edge, gazing forlornly into the distance.

The Haunting in the Lion House

One of the more prominent stories that comes from the Lincoln Park Zoo is the ghost that is apparently lingering by the women’s restroom in the Lion House. The lion house was built in 1912 at the heart of the zoo close to the entrance. 

Women using the bathroom keep reporting about seeing the ghosts of people in Victorian clothing when looking in the mirrors. When they turn back, there is no one there. There are also stories coming from the staff members hearing voices, someone even hearing the words: “Get out”.

The Lion House: This part of the zoo is said to have a lot of paranormal energy. Especially the women’s bathroom. //Source: Richie Diesterheft

Some ghost hunters claim this is because of the mirrors themselves, lined up on two lines facing each other. They claim that this traps the ghosts inside of the mirrors. 

The Haunting of the Barn

In 1962 the Lincoln Park Zoo was building a barn and was digging in the ground. They then found a body, most likely from the cemetery. They discussed at length what to do with it, and the zoo director, Dr. Lester Fisher decided to return the body. The building didn’t stop though and they simply built the barn on top of it. 

According to people visiting, there is supposedly paranormal activity going on there as well and paranormal hunters frequently investigate these parts. 

The Suicide Bridge

Lincoln Park covers more than just the zoo, and there are more places around it that are said to be haunted. In the late 1800s there were also rumors about the park being haunted, but not from the cemetery. Most reports told about the High Bridge that was nearby from 1894 to 1919 just passed the zoo’s parking lot today. It was initially built for sightseeing in the park, but got a much more ominous reputation. 

They called this the Suicide Bridge and it is said around 50 to 100 people ended their life from this bridge. 

The Suicide Bridge: Postcard from Chicago were they even called the bridge by its local name, the Suicide Bridge. This was said to be haunted right after it was built and people started to spot something more ominous than the beautiful scenery.

The sightings of the ghosts were so common that newspapers started to publish stories about it and cops that were working in the Park in the night kept asking for transfers because of all the scary paranormal experiences they had. 

The Couch Tomb

There was also the case of the Couch Mausoleum. A strange mausoleum left untouched by the fire near the Chicago History Museum. This is the tomb of businessman Ira Couch who died in 1857. But is he really inside? According to official records, the tomb has never been opened. There was once a man who claimed he went inside it when he did some work. He claimed that it was empty. Couch’s grandson saw the news articles about it and claimed that it should be around seven people inside of the grave. Who is right? We simply don’t know.

The Couch Tomb: Couch Mausoleum in Lincoln Park, Chicago October 2013. A lot of mystery of what and who actually is buried there remains. It is also the only mausoleum remaining. Why wasn’t it removed together with the rest of the tombs that used to stand next to it? //Source: Wikimedia

In the 1880s there would be reports in the newspaper about a local legend that people told about the tomb. It said that at the stroke of midnight you had to face the tomb as you looked up at the name Couch. Three times you had to say: “The graves belong to the dead, not the living,”

If you did this, the door would open and a big white ghost would come out of the tomb and greet you. 

The Haunting of The Lincoln Park and the Chicago Zoo

Whether you’re watching the playful antics of the animals or strolling through the park, be aware that you may not be alone. The spirits of those buried long ago still seem to have a presence in Lincoln Park Zoo, making it not just a center for animal life but also for paranormal activity. So, next time you visit, keep an eye out for more than just the zoo’s famous lions and tigers—there might be more eyes watching you than you think.

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References:

Wild Nights: Ghosthunting Chicago’s Lincoln Park Zoo 

Chicago Hauntings: The Mysteries Of The Couch Mausoleum In Lincoln Park And Who, If Anyone, Is Entombed There

Lincoln Park Zoo – Wikipedia

The Bridge of Sighs: Chicago’s Lost Suicide Bridge 

1894-1919—Lincoln Park—Bridge of Sighs 

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Paris’ Haunted Père Lachaise Cemetery

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The mysterious grounds of Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris is the final resting place for many celebrities and if we are to believe the rumors, ghosts! Walk among the strange haunted graves of Jim Morrison and Marcel Proust as well as graves may or may not belonging to a vampire.

Have you heard about the mysterious tales of hauntings at Père Lachaise Cemetery? Located in Paris in France, this historic cemetery has been a popular tourist attraction for centuries and is the largest one in the city. 

Famous people like Jim Morrison and Marcel Proust are buried there and if we are to believe the legends, there is a ghostly tale or two that have become part of its history.

Read Also: All our ghost stories from France

The History of Père Lachaise Cemetery

The Père Lachaise Cemetery was established in 1804 by the French Emperor Napoleon as the first cemetery of its kind. Throughout the centuries, it has grown to become a vast necropolis that covers more than 110 acres of land. 

Here, you’ll find graves and monuments of notable public figures such as Oscar Wilde and Édith Piaf — among many others. The history of this site certainly adds to its mysterious allure, and is part of what draws tourists from around the world to experience it first-hand.

Read also: More ghost stories from haunted cemeteries from all around the world: Here

The holy cemetery was also the location of a battle and the fallen soldiers are said to still linger.

Ghosts of the Père Lachaise Cemetery

There is not only one ghost that are talked about at the Père Lachaise Cemetery. Tourists have reported being chased away or startled by mysterious figures among the graves and mausoleums — like the former prime minister of France, Adolphe Thiers, who doesn’t seem to get any rest around his tomb. People working in the cemetery have also ghost stories to tell about multiple of the souls resting here. 

There are also peculiar tales behind some of the graves you can find in Père Lachaise Cemetery, like the Polish composer Chopin who was buried without a heart because he was scared he would end up being buried alive. 

The Cemetery as a Battle and Execution Ground

Although the idea of a cemetery is that it is supposed to be a place of eternal rest, living life often comes in conflict with it. 

Within Père Lachaise Cemetery you will find the Communards’ Wall or Mur des Fédérés. This is the site of a bloody murder as 147 of the Communards were executed by the French army in what would be called The Bloody Week. 

A place for execution: Once a group of rebel soldiers were lined up and shot to death inside the cemetery. The wall they used for the executions of the revolutionaries are now called the Communard’ ‘Wall.

The semaine sanglante or the Bloody Week was a weeklong battle in Paris from 21 to 28 May 1871, when the French Army recaptured the city from the Paris Commune. The Paris Commune was a French revolutionary government that seized power in Paris from 18 March to 28 May 1871.

Read Also: This is not the only haunting connected to the Paris Commune: The Red Man haunting the Jardin Tuileries in Paris

One of the last remaining strong points of the National Guard was the cemetery of Père-Lachaise that was defended by about 200 men. In the army used cannon to demolish the gates and stormed the cemetery. There was a bloody and savage fight around the tombs until nightfall, when the last Communards were taken prisoner.

The prisoners were taken to the wall of the cemetery and shot and then buried with them in a common grave. This group include one woman, the only recorded execution of a woman by the army during the Bloody Week. The wall is now called the Communards’ Wall, and is the site of annual commemorations of the Commune.

This was the final battle of the Paris Commune and it is believed that in that one week between 10 and 15 thousand people died.

The Ghost of Jim Morrison by his Protected Grave

One of the more famous ghosts said to haunt the cemetery is Jim Morrison. He was the lead singer of the Doors until his death in 1971 when he was only 27 years old. Still today the exact cause of his death is unclear, however, many speculate that it was drug-related. 

He had moved to Paris not long before his death to focus on his poetry writing after making hits like Light My Fire, Riders on the Storm and People are Strange.

His grave is covered in graffiti in Père Lachaise Cemetery as he is still a legend to many and the bust was even stolen in 1988, and ever since, a security guard protecting the grave. But during the night, people claim to have seen his ghost wander around the cemetery. 

The Ghost of the Writer Marcel Proust Looking for his Lover

The French novelist remains a legend in literature, and so many students struggle through his heavy books before finding solace in his genius writings when they finally understand its meaning. Many reading fans leave chestnuts in his honor at his grave today.

Perhaps fine way to have the afterlife, surrounded by fans still reading his works. But according to legend, this is one of the graves that are alledgedly haunted and people claim to have seen his ghosts wandering the cemetery today.

Valentin Louis Georges Eugène Marcel Proust: Marcel Proust (10 July 1871 – 18 November 1922) was a French novelist who wrote the monumental novel In Search of Lost Time (À la recherche du temps perdu).

Apparently, he is still distraught that no one listened to his dying wish. Proust spent the last three years of his life mostly confined to his bedroom of his apartment 44 rue Hamelin in Chaillot, sleeping during the day and working at night to complete his novel. He died of pneumonia and a pulmonary abscess in 1922.

Alive he had a final wish of being buried next to his lover, composer Reynaldo Hahn. 

However, he was a homosexual in a time when same sex love wasn’t considered true love, so when he died at 51 of pneumonia his wish wasn’t granted and he was buried alone. 

It is said he rises from his grave in Père Lachaise Cemetery every night to search for his lover who he dearly wanted to be buried next to. 

The Spiritualist Allan Kardec Granting Wishes from Beyond his Grave

A peculiar grave in Père Lachaise Cemetery is that of Allan Kardec, born Hippolyte Rivail from Lyon. He is seen as the founder of spiritism that took the world by storm in the 1800s and a medium with wealthy and famous clients like Victor Hugo and Sir Conan Doyle. 

On his monument it is written Naitre, mourir, renaitre encore et progresser sans cesse, telle est la loi . This means To be born, to die, to be reborn again and keep progressing, that is the law.

This is not exactly a ghost story per se, but there is definitive something mysterious stuff going on with it. According to the legends, Allan Kardec said that after his death you should put your hand on the neck of his bust on his grave and make a wish. If the wish was granted, you should come back with flowers. 

There are according to rumors, almost always fresh flowers by his grave.

A Years Stay at Elisabeth Stroganovas’ Mausoleum

Baronne Elisabeth Alexandrovna Stroganoff: painted by Robert Lefèvre.

The strangest grave though found at Père Lachaise Cemetery must be that of Baroness Elizaveta Alexandrovna Demidova (Елизавета Александровна Строганова) a wealthy Russian aristocrat from the Stroganov family who resided in Paris in her final years. When Elisabeth Stroganova died at 40 in 1818 she gave a strange clause in her will with a huge cash prize. 

Anyone who dared to spend a full year, 365 days and 366 nights inside of Elisabeth Stroganova’s mausoleum would inherit a big chunk of her inheritance. Why this was a clause is unclear. Her sense of humor? Maybe a fear of being alone? Something else?

There were at least 3 people who tried to the insane clause to try to get their hands on her inheritance. The brave, or desperate depending on how you look at it, had food served to them through a bucket, and on their own they were to stay there for a full year.

To this day there is still no one who managed to endure the challenge. People went crazy and they started seeing and hearing things. Perhaps worst of all was the retelling of how they claimed to feel the very lifeforce were sucked out of them. Could this be the ghost of Elisabeth Stroganova still being there, not wanting to be alone for eternity?

The White Lady or Vampire of Père Lachaise Cemetery

The clause in the will and challenging people to stay inside her mausoleum is strange in and of itself, but the rumors surrounding this grave doesn’t stop there. One of the so-called Lady in White ghosts that roams among the dark graves of the Père Lachaise Cemetery is most often attributed to Elisabeth Stroganova. But there are also rumors of her being something much more sinister.

Some also claim she is a vampire because of the date of her death with the number 8 being the number linked to vampires as well as wolfs head ornaments on her mausoleum, also symbolizing vampirism. Perhaps that is stretching for many, but the reasoning of keeping alive people in her mausoleum and their feeling of their lifeforce being sucked out of them has also contributed to rumours of her being a vampire.

Read Also: Another place rumoured to be haunted by vampires: Poveglia Island — The Most Haunted Place in the World

Well, that and the legend that says her body didn’t decompose as it should have. Keen to try her challenge?

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References

Featured Images: Jeanne Menjoulet/wikimedia

Elizaveta Alexandrovna Stroganova – Wikipedia

The ghosts of Pere Lachaise – le paris de Patrick

Élisabeth Alexandrovna de Demidoff | The Tombstone Tourist 

Allan Kardec – Wikipedia

Père Lachaise Cemetery – Wikipedia

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The Poltergeist of Greyfriars Kirkyard

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Tucked away in the Old Town of Edinburgh, the Greyfriars Kirkyard houses even the restless spirits of the locals. Even a poltergeist known as George Mackenzie.

Cold spots, white figures behind the graves and knocking noises from below the ground, the reports about Greyfriars Kirkyard being haunted are endless. A haunted cemetary is a must for an old town like Edinburgh and just at the end of George IV Bridge by the Museum of Scotland you will find Edinburgh’s one. At Greyfriars Kirkyard the visitors will leave wondering if it was just the wind or something more. 

The cemetery was built in 1562 by Mary Queen of Scots, also known as Bloody Mary throughout history. It is now one of the main attractions on the many haunted bus rides you can jump on in the old town. For good reason if we believe the locals. 

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Even today there is gruesome stuff going on in the Greyfriars Kirkyard. Edinburgh was a notorious place where grave robberies of bodies happened as the demand for fresh flesh for the medical schools were in high demand. Something of the past, there are not many cases of grave robbery as this today. But as recently as 2003 two teenagers were arrested for grave robbery as they cut the head from one of the corpses and used it as a glove puppet. 

Famous Graves

Many famous and notable residents of Edinburgh are buried in this place, including Hames Hutton, Robert Adam as well as perhaps the most famous local, the dog Greyfriars Bobby. 

Greyfriars Bobby: Edinburgh’s most beloved dog, Bobby is laid to rest in the cemetery.

Greyfriars Bobby was a dog so loyal to his master that he never left his side, even in death as he watched over his master’s final resting place for 14 years until he died himself and is now buried beside him in the Greyfriars Kirkyard with the queen’s permission. 

Even if they weren’t famous when they were alive, J.K Rowling made many famous today as she is said to have been inspired by the names on many of the tombstones. 

Many ghosts have been reported on this graveyard from when it was first built, however, today the Mackenzie Poltergeist is perhaps the most famed one. 

This is not the only supposed haunted graveyard we have written about. Check out these ghost stories set in cemeteries as well:

Ghost stories from cemeteries:

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Bluidy Mackenzie

In 2000 the spiritualist Colin Grant tried to lay one of the restless spirits to rest in the cemetery. A few weeks later he died of a heart attack. After his death, many attributed this death to be caused by the poltergeist of the cemetery, Bloody Mackenzie. 

Since the 19th century children believed that there was something off with this particular grave at Greyfriars Kirkyard. They used to run up to the keyhole and yell:

“Bluidy Mackenzie, come out if ye daur, Lift the Sneck and draw the bar!”

George Mackenzie was known as Bluidy (Bloody) Mackenzie when he was still living and was not remembered as a kind man. He worked as a lawyer for the King and imprisoned around 1200 protestant rebels that refused to pledge their allegiance to the catholic king. 

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The nickname comes from the horrible torture he made the prisoners he held captive in an area in Greyfriars Kirkyard known as the Covenanters Prison. It was an open area closed off by the city wall. Hundreds of people died when they went without water, food and shelter from the weather.

It is said that by 1679 there were only 48 Covenanters left alive with the rest heads on spikes along the gate.  

Although Mackenzie ran away to England and died there, he was sent back after his death. After his death he was laid to rest in a mausoleum located on the same place where so many of his victims met their unfortunate end. 

The Black Mausoleum

Apparently the activity around the mausoleum never seems to rest. Dead animals turns up around it without an obvious cause of death and mysterious fires are also often blamed on the strange activity that seems to happen around the Black Mausoleum in Greyfriars Kirkyard. 

The Black Mausoleum: The tomb of ‘bloody’ George Mackenzie in Greyfriars Churchyard from the 1840s.

The story is that a homeless man seeking shelter from the weather broke into the Mackenzie mausoleum known as the Black Mausoleum and disturbed the spirits there, making a poltergeist angry and releasing its fury. Allegedly as soon as the homeless man placed his hand on the grave the floor opened underneath him and swallowed him whole as it dropped him into a grave of plague victims.  

Another version of the story is a criminal that hid inside the mausoleum for six months. John Hayes had apparently gone mad inside the mausoleum he only left to scavenge for food occasionally. According to him, the coffins in the mausoleum moved all on their own and he could hear Mackenzie turning inside his coffin. 

It was also here the teenagers aged 15 and 17 broke in and desecrated the corpse inside. Apparently they are rumored to even have drunk wine from the skull after they cut off the head. This incident was one of the things that made the cemetery and the Black Mausoleum famous

The Poltergeist of the Cemetery

Since then, reports of scratches, bruises and burns on people that have been there as well as people collapsing for no apparent reason in the cemetery. They claim that between 300 and up to 500 guests from the 90s to 2006 felt like they were attacked by this poltergeist. 

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References

Featured Image: Harry McGregor/Source

The Most Haunted Places in Edinburgh’s Old Town – Dickins

A Guide to Haunted Edinburgh | Authentic Scotland

Haunted Edinburgh | 23 Mayfield

Meet the Mackenzie Poltergeist of Greyfriars Kirkyard – Icy Sedgwick

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The Mausoleum of Rufina Cambacérès at Recoleta Cemetery — Buried Alive

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Marble mausoleums, famous people and haunted graves with excellent architecture. The city of Buenos Aires got more to offer than tango and good food. And in the old Recoleta Cemetery there are stories that those buried there is haunting the place. One of them is the grave of Rufina Cambacérès who were buried alive.

In the wonderful cemetery of Recoleta Cemetery in Buenos Aires, the most prominent of Argentina’s dead is laid to rest. Graves of famous people like Eva Peron, Nobel Prize winners, grandchildren of Naloleón Bonaparte and those who served as presidents have graves you can visit.

Walking through Recoleta Cemetery is an architectural wandering among the marble mausoleums with art-deco, neo-classical and neo-gothic architecture in the tombs to enjoy looking at and wondering the story of those inside.

The Recoleta Cemetery is more like a city of graves with narrow streets and cobbled ground, almost like the most quiet neighbourhood in Buenos Aires. Although the inhabitants of this city is no longer alive and the only ones roaming here are their ghosts.

Read Also: Check out all of our ghost stories around haunted cemeteries from around the world.

There are also those graves found in the Recoleta Cemetery that people got to know of the person resting there, only after the death. 

Rufina Cambacérès: The Girl who Died Twice

Buried Alive: Portrait of Rufina Cambacérès that is now buried in the Recoleta Cemetery in Buenos Aires. Photo: Source

This is the case of Rufina Cambacérès, a girl that barely reached the age of nineteen before she tragically died, twice. Although she was a well known socialite in Buenos Aires at the turn of the 1900s when she was alive, it is her death she is remembered for today and is one of the buried in The Recoleta Cemetery. Although her burial was anything but peaceful.

Rufina Cambacérès’ family rose to the upper class of society in Buenos Aires from the money they made from cattle farming in Argentina. Her father, Eugenio Cambacérès was originally from France and a sort of famous writer in the country at the time.

Her father died of tuberculosis however when Rufina was only four, giving a precedent of premature deaths in the family, like the one Rufina herself would soon suffer from. 

A Temporary Death

In 1902 Rufina died for the first time in her life. Her death happened on her birthday no less. On her 19th birthday to be exact on May 31st. Her mother threw a party at their lavish house in Buenos Aires and they were all supposed to go to Teatro Colón to see a show or the opera.

Rufina Cambacérès retreated to her bedroom before they went out. She was getting ready in her bedroom for the night when something felt off. Perhaps she didn’t even get a chance to realize what was happening. She suddenly collapsed on the floor and was deemed to be dead for everyone around, even her doctors.

The reason of death the doctors gave was by catalepsy, a classical diagnosis that they have given those who were buried alive in history, especially the dramatic temporarily deaths from literature. This is the same death that Juliet was given temporarily by the poison, and in Edgar Allen Poe’s writing: ‘A Premature Burial’, also beginning with a false death that ends in a true death in the coffin.

Catalepsy: Is a strange disorder from from Ancient Greek meaning “seizing, grasping”. It really is a nervous condition characterized by muscular rigidity and fixity of posture regardless of external stimuli, as well as decreased sensitivity to pain. It has been today linked to epilepsy, parkinson or drug related.

Being declared dead before your time was not unheard of during those time at all and there are many examples of it throughout time. Sadly, Rufina became a part of this tragic statistic and before anyone could prove any different, she was buried, and first after her burial, she died. 

Read Also: For more ghost stories of those buried alive, check out The Buried Alive Ghosts of Château de Trécesson in the Enchanted Forest, O-shizu, Hitobashira — The Human Sacrifice of Maruoka Castle, The Mistletoe Bough – The Bride in the Chest, The Finnish Maiden of Olavinlinna Castle and The Evil Bishop Against the Maiden in Love – The Ghost of Haapsalu Castle.

Buried in Recoleta Cemetery

No less than three doctors pronounced her dead before she was put in a coffin and preparation for her birthday changed into preparing for her funeral. She was placed in her extravagant final resting place in the mausoleum already the next day in la Recoleta Cemetery. This seems extremely quick as there usually is held a wake to prevent people from being buried alive, and they really should have kept to the old customs before rushing her funeral.

Read also: The Poltergeist of Greyfriars Kirkyard or The Joelma Building and the Ghosts of the 13 Souls for more cemeteries that are supposedly haunted.

According to legend, she woke up in the coffin, dark and she was all alone far from her bedroom she was getting ready to go party. No one could hear her screams from outside the huge mausoleum that now was her prison. She tried to break free from her tomb she suddenly found herself in, trying to scratch herself out with her bare hands. The luxurious and sturdy coffin was sealed shut though and she had no chance of breaking free from it with her bear hands.

She was stuck inside as the air was slowly fading away. She must have lasted for a couple of days perhaps before eventually suffocating to death. For real this time. 

Recoleta Cemetery: a massive cemetery that houses many famous people like Eva Peron. The supposed haunted cemetery in Buenos Aires has also been hailed as the best cemetery by BBC in 2011, whatever that entails. It is known for looking almost like a little city within the city with streets and doors to the many mausoleums.

A cemetery worker allegedly noticed the lid of her casket was broken a few days later when he was around checking the many graves. The fact her grave was disturbed could also be attributed to robbers, since she was very likely to have been buried with her expensive jewelry because of her high status and riches.

But not according to those subscribing to the more macabre version, it was worse, it was the signs of her trying to escape from the coffin when she awoke from her shallow death and took one last shot at living. 

The Final Death of Rufina Cambacérès

Another legend tells that Rufina even managed to get out of the casket and ran through the cemetery at night. She managed to get to the gates, but there she died of a heart attack from the fright and had to be put back inside the coffin. 

More rumors about why she collapsed in the first place have been told throughout the years, creating more drama leading up to her collapsing. Among other things, her friend supposedly told her a secret so gruesome that it knocked her out so hard that they thought she was dead. According to her friend, the boyfriend Rufina was seeing was also together with Rufinas mother, or even worse, his own. A true scandal for a Tela Novela and would certainly send everyone into a shock. 

No matter the origin of the story and what really happened that day before going to the opera, the statue outside the mausoleum is solemn enough to create a number of haunted rumours as the statue really looks like she is trying to escape.

The Haunted Mausoleum: The mausoleum of the young girl Rufina Cambacérès, completed with a statue, representing her, with her hand on the door, her eyes looking, almost with a longing look, away from her tomb in Recoleta Cemetery.
Photo: Source: Tim Adams

Her family spared no expense on her mausoleum and Rufina Cambacérès final resting place is the only mausoleum made of marble from Milan and is decorated with beautiful ornaments. The young girl, supposed to be the young girl with one of her hands on the door, almost escaping, never able to see her 20th birthday or the exit of la Recoleta Cemetery.

According to some, the ghost of Rufina Cambacérès can still be seen roaming in the Recoleta Cemetery, still trying to get out of her shallow death.

Read Also: Another haunted cemetery with a strange Mausoleum is found in the story of Paris’ Haunted Père Lachaise Cemetery

So many legends surround the cemetery to this day like we find in Recoleta Cemetery. Among some of the ghosts supposed to haunt the place, is a cemetery worker, destined to linger in this place forever, as well as a woman in white, roaming the place. Perhaps trying to get out? 

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References

008. rufina cambacérès ◊ – AfterLife 

The Tomb of Rufina Cambacérès – Buenos Aires, Argentina 

Catalepsy

The girl who died twice and other secrets of Argentina’s La Recoleta cemetery