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The Rhode Island Vampire and the Legend of Sarah Tillinghast

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After the death of Sarah Tillinghast, the family started complaining about her coming back for them at night, draining the life out of them. The family members fall dead to consumption and thinking that Sarah was a vampire, they dug her up and burned her heart. 

In the shadowy folklore of New England, where fog drifts through ancient graveyards and legends cling to weathered headstones like ivy, few tales unsettle quite like the vampire panics of the 18th and 19th centuries. 

Read More: Check out all ghost stories from USA

While the name Mercy Brown often takes center stage in these grim histories, she was far from the region’s first alleged vampire. Nearly a century before Mercy’s exhumation in Exeter, another tragedy gripped a Rhode Island farming family — that of Sarah Tillinghast, a young woman whose death and eerie posthumous reputation would earn her a ghostly place in America’s darkest folklore.

Exeter, Rhode Island in the 1700s

In the late 18th century, Exeter, Rhode Island was a small, isolated farming village, nestled in the wooded hills and fertile valleys of southern New England. Like much of colonial America, Exeter’s people lived in fear of both earthly and supernatural forces. Disease was an ever-present specter; outbreaks of consumption, now known as tuberculosis, were especially dreaded.

Tuberculosis was a wasting disease — one that slowly robbed its victims of their strength, appetite, and vitality. Without the medical knowledge we possess today, it seemed to New Englanders of the period that the illness spread like a curse through families. And in a world shaped by superstition, when science failed, folklore filled the void.

The Death of Sarah Tillinghast

The story of Sarah Tillinghast is shrouded in between fact, folklore and local legends. Her person has also been romanticised, but truth is, we don’t know a whole lot about who she was when she lived. 

According to local lore, Sarah Tillinghast was a young woman that a source described as quiet, pious, and beloved by her family. Her description in the first written source was a comely elder daughter. How she really was like though has largely been lost to time, and now she is mostly remembered as one of the first vampires of New England. 

Her father, Stukely was a prosperous farmer in the small Exeter community, living with his wife, Honor and their fourteen or twelve children. Often Sarah is said to be the eldest daughter, but she had at least five older siblings. Her father was called Snuffy Stuke because of the brown jacket he wore and made his living by selling apples from his orchard. In 1799 towards harvest season however, everything changed. It was said that Stukely had a dream where half of his apple trees in the orchard died. When he woke up, he believed it to be an ominous warning. Some sources claim that his daughter Sarah called out for him in his dream as well. 

His daughter, Sarah returned home, feeling uneasy. Some embellishments of the legend claim that Sarah also had an uneasy feeling and confessed to her father that she had an ominous sense of death looming over their family. A strange claim, but not long after, Sarah herself fell ill.

She was stricken by consumption, a wasting sickness that sapped her strength and left her a ghostly wisp of her former self. Some think that she had the galloping kind, where it can be latent in your body for years before consuming the sick fast when it breaks out. Despite her family’s care, Sarah died — and, as the legend says, death didn’t end her role in the family’s misery. She was only 21 or perhaps as young as 19. 

In the weeks that followed Sarah’s burial, Sarah’s sister began to feel sick. It’s not said which sister, and some sources say that it could even be her brother James, only nine years old. The family lot where they are all buried are missing some tombstones, and it’s difficult to say the exact sibling. But fact was, the disease was spreading. 

According to the story, it wasn’t just the disease that terrified her — it was the whispered stories from the sickbeds. She claimed she awoke in the night to find Sarah’s ghostly figure standing by their bedsides, her cold gaze fixed upon them, her presence heavy and suffocating. She said her dead sister caused her pain as she sat on her body. As quickly as Sarah did, she died, and four more of Stukely’s children followed suit.

New England’s Vampire Superstitions

It’s important to remember that during this period, the vampire in New England folklore was not the same creature popularized by Bram Stoker or Hollywood. Instead, these were restless corpses or spirits that drained vitality from the living, usually from within their own families.

The typical signs that one of the dead was to blame included multiple deaths in a family from consumption, reports of the deceased visiting the sick, and tales of disturbing, half-preserved corpses found during exhumation. The solution? A gruesome ritual: exhume the suspected corpse, check for signs of unnatural preservation (fresh blood, ruddy cheeks, or a heart full of blood), and burn the heart or other organs believed to be causing the harm.

Cases like this were shockingly common throughout 18th- and 19th-century New England, particularly in rural communities where tuberculosis outbreaks were frequent and poorly understood.

The Exhumation of Sarah Tillinghast

Faced with death after death, and driven to desperation, Stukely Tillinghast turned to his neighbors for counsel. Together, they arrived at a grim decision: Sarah’s grave must be opened. They went to the cemetery and dug up all six children, just to make sure.

Everyone of the coffins had what they deemed normal, a decomposing and dead corpse, except for Sarah. When they exhumed her body, legend holds that it appeared unnervingly lifelike. Her eyes were open, her hair and fingernails had grown. Some versions claim her cheeks were still flushed and that a small amount of fresh blood lay at the corner of her mouth — classic folkloric signs of a vampire. Whether this detail was added by later tellers of the tale or was a genuine observation from the exhumation remains lost to history.

This was for the small farming community, proof that she was a vampire and that Sarah was to blame for the deaths in the family. To stop the deaths and end Sarah’s malevolent influence, her heart was removed and burned — the standard ritual believed to sever the undead’s grip on the living. The ashes of the heart may have been buried or scattered, though records (such as they are) do not agree on this point.

According to some versions of the story, the deaths in the Tillinghast family ceased after the ritual. Other versions suggest a few more family members succumbed before the outbreak burned itself out, as diseases often do.

Regardless, the tale of Sarah Tillinghast became etched into Rhode Island’s oral history, predating the far more famous Mercy Brown case by over a century. Both stories showcase how deeply fear and folklore entwined themselves with the harsh realities of life and death in early America.

Historical Truth or Folkloric Fiction?

Unlike the well-documented Mercy Brown incident in 1892, the case of Sarah Tillinghast is murkier. No contemporary records — such as town documents or church logs — confirm her death, exhumation, or family history. Her story has been passed down primarily through oral tradition and local legend, and most written versions appeared in the 19th and 20th centuries.

Folklorists, including Michael E. Bell, author of Food for the Dead: On the Trail of New England’s Vampires, have noted how many of these vampire panic cases share similar narrative patterns: multiple family deaths, reports of supernatural visitations, an exhumation, and a grim ritual of heart-burning. Sarah Tillinghast’s legend fits neatly into this mold, whether or not the specifics are historically accurate.

And if he didn’t find the article written in 1888 by Sidney Rider, the story might have been lost. 

The Forgotten Grave: Rhode Island Historical Cemetery Exter #14 in Stutley Tillinghast Lot, there are a lot of unmarked graves forgotten by time. One of them is probably Sarah Tillinghast’s.

A Forgotten Haunting

Today, Sarah Tillinghast is an obscure figure, overshadowed by more famous “vampires” like Mercy Brown. But her tale remains one of the earliest and most unsettling examples of America’s vampire folklore — a testament to how communities, gripped by grief and terror, can turn on the dead themselves in a desperate attempt to survive.

She is put to rest in the small and overgrown Rhode Island Historical Cemetery, Exeter 14, containing only 25 burials on a mossy hill. Beneath an unmarked grave of weathered stones and wind-swept grass, echoes of these old fears linger. And while the name Sarah Tillinghast may have faded from history books, her spectral legend still haunts New England’s darker corners — a chilling reminder that when science fails and death comes calling, superstition is never far behind.

So if you ever find yourself walking past an ancient graveyard in Exeter as dusk falls, listen carefully. They say some restless souls never quite stay buried.

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References:

The Vampire Case of Sarah Tillinghast – Online Review of Rhode Island History

https://rihistoriccemeteries.org/newsearchcemeterydetail.aspx?ceme_no=EX014

https://eu.newportri.com/story/entertainment/theater/2013/10/23/hope-gory/12775893007

https://books.google.no/books?id=aTw8AQAAMAAJ&pg=PP9&hl=no&source=gbs_selected_pages&cad=1#v=snippet&q=vampire&f=false

RHODE ISLAND’S FIRST VAMPIRE? Sidney S. Rider (1833-1917) and the Story of Sarah #3 – vampiresgrasp.com – Powered by Doteasy.com

https://www.findagrave.com/cemetery/2288060/memorial-search?firstName=&lastName=Tillinghast&includeMaidenName=true&page=1#sr-32561577

Sarah Tillinghast (1777-1799) – Find a Grave Memorial

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The Hunderprest: The Vampire Monk of Melrose Abbey

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A devious and unholy monk called The Hunderprest, was said to haunt the countryside on the Scottish border as well as Melrose Abbey. Was this specter really a bloodsucking vampire?

In the Scottish Borders, the ruins of Melrose Abbey have stood since the 12th century as a brooding, atmospheric relic of medieval piety and power. Melrose is a seemingly picture perfect place, drawing people in as the best salmon and trout fishing in the country. 

The Melrose Abbey is on the north east side of the town center and some of the more iconic buildings from the area. Behind its beautiful Gothic arches and solemn grave markers lies a dark legend: the tale of the Hunderprest, or the dog priest, a vampiric monk whose foul deeds and undead existence chilled even the most devout.

The Mysterious and Magical Melrose Abbey

The Abbey was founded by a colony of Cisterian monks in 1136 by the River Tweed. Once, it was said a miracle happened here, when the corn in their cellar multiplied in the time of a great famine, and the monks could feed them all. This and more miracles were said to have been performed by Abbot Waltheof, the stepson to King David I of Scotland. 

Through its time of operation it was one of the wealthiest monasteries in Scotland, but through all the years of war on the Scottish border it was badly damaged by the English in 1385 and rebuilt in the late 14th century. 

Melrose Abbey: A view of the interior of the ruined Melrose Abbey, Scotland. Heath’s Picturesque Annual 1835 by Roger Griffith

Today it’s a museum, although a big part of it is now lichen-covered ruins. In the Chapter House there is a burial casket of a heart, thought to belong to King Robert I, also called, The Bruce. In 1812, an old stone coffin was found close to the altar, thought to be the final resting place of Michael Scot, the mysterious Scottish wizard from the 13th century, said to have changed the River Tweed with his staff and turned the single peak of the Eildon Hills to the three we see today.

But not all miracles were as magical as these wonderful things. Some say that the magic happening around the cloister was also the work of evil, perhaps even a bloodsucking vampire. 

The Hunderprest of Melrose Abbey

According to medieval chronicles, the Hunderprest was a monk of Melrose Abbey during the 12th or 13th century. The Cistercian monks who lived and worshipped there had built the Abbey, the first Cistercian Abbey in the country, at the behest of King David I. They were famous for their Melrose wool they sold to the rest of Europe. 

Though little is known about his mortal life, legend says he was a man of great vice and depravity, a predator hidden behind a habit, whose sins were so grave that even in death, the earth rejected him.

Melrose Abbey in 1800, when part of the abbey was still in use as the parish church

Exactly what his sins were is not explicitly said always, but he was often claimed to have been a womaniser and drunkard, bringing shame upon his order. The region was a place of unlawfulness though, being controlled by independent clans called The Border Reivers that often clashed together in violence. It was both a time and place of ruthless lawlessness. 

Some say that in life, he used to be a chaplain to a lady who lived nearby. He was given the name Hundeprest as his favorite thing to do was hunting on horseback as a pack of howling hounds followed him. 

Howling Hounds: Often in William Newburghs tales of the undead, there is a pack of dogs following as the dog motif has been connected with death for ages in European mythology. The black dog is a supernatural, spectral, or demonic hellhound. It is usually unnaturally large with glowing red or yellow eyes, is often connected with the Devil, and is sometimes an omen of death.

Some accounts claim he practiced the black arts in secret, while others allege unspeakable acts committed under the guise of spiritual authority. The locals whispered of his unnatural appetites and sinister nature — rumors that seemed confirmed after his passing.

The Undead Haunting of the Abbey

Because of his sins in life, there was no way he was getting into heaven, and his soul could not find any peace. Livestock were found drained of blood, villagers claimed to see a shadowy figure lurking near graves, and monks reported being stalked by a ghastly presence within the cloisters at night.

He tried to enter the Abbey in the night in the form of a winged bat, only driven away after vigorous prayer and rituals from the monks. Because he was unable to cross the threshold to the holy ground, he needed another place to torment.

He found the cottage to a woman who he had known when he was alive. Said to be the woman he had been the chaplain for in life. She was also rumored to have been his lover. Her neighbors reported that a vampire roamed around her house, moaning and screeching at her, scaring her. Every night he returned to torment and terrorize, lusting after her blood. Because of this, they decided to summon an elder monk from the abbey for an exorcism. 

The Exorcism of a Vampire

Determined to put an end to the terror, the abbot of Melrose called upon the services of a particularly devout and courageous monk, often believed to be William of Newburgh, a respected chronicler of supernatural events. He ended up writing about a lot of monsters and ghosts in the middle ages. 

William of Newburgh: Many of the tales about the British vampires comes from the 12th century historian, William of Newburgh. William’s major work was Historia rerum Anglicarum or Historia de rebus anglicis (“History of English Affairs”), a history of England from 1066 to 1198, written in Latin. It is written in an engaging fashion and still readable to this day, containing many fascinating stories and glimpses into 12th-century life. He is a major source for stories of medieval revenants, animated corpses that returned from their graves, with close parallels to vampire beliefs.

According to the old accounts, a group of monks were put to task and went to the grave of the priest to investigate. As the day waned, the priest appeared like he was levitating out of his grave. They managed to shove the vampire back with a staff. Sometimes this is changed to a mighty axe the monks swung at him. The earth swallowed the Hunderprest like nothing had happened, the ground undisturbed again. This is when the elder monk knew they were dealing with a vampire and knew what to do. 

They waited for daylight and dug up his grave again. They exhumed the Hunderprest’s corpse and what they found only deepened their horror: though dead for some time, the monk’s body was fresh, his face ruddy, with blood at his lips curled up to a grin, classic signs of the undead in medieval folklore.

It was also said it was through praying and fasting that they managed to defeat him. How they killed the vampire, although not named as such in the early sources, varies. Did they stake him through the heart? Probably not, but they do mention setting him on fire and burning him to ashes as most of the stories of the undead mentions. The legend of the stake came later. 

Revenant: The term vampire or the undead was not used in medieval time, but several of the stories about the Revenant, Sanguisa or the bloodsuckers of folklore bear resemblance to what the modern world would classify as a vampire legend. In folklore, a revenant is a spirit or animated corpse that is believed to have been revived from death to haunt the living and was in medieval times used interchangeably with ghosts. They come from various cultures like the Celtic and Norse, some reminding more about a classic ghost story, some more of a vampire legend. Although today a mixed version of the western and eastern European mythologies of the undead.

After they burned him to ash, they took him to Lammermuir Hills where the wind carried him to the north along the borders. 

To this day, visitors to the hauntingly beautiful ruins of Melrose Abbey claim to feel a chilling presence lingering among the weathered stones. Some report seeing a shadow moving through the broken cloisters at night, or hearing faint whispers in the darkened archways.

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Legend of the “Hunderprest” Vampire of Melrose Abbey

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The Hunderprest: The Vampire Monk of Melrose.

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Jure Grando: The First Named Vampire in European History

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Who was the first vampire in history? There are many legends claiming to be the first. And one of them is said to be the Croatian Jure Grando, who terrorized his village for over a decade before they took measures to vanquish this štrigon. 

In the dimly lit annals of European folklore, few figures loom as ominous as Jure Grando, a 17th-century peasant from the small Istrian village of Kringa — in what is today Croatia. His story, still whispered in the shadowy streets of Kringa, marks one of the earliest and most documented accounts of vampirism in European history.

Jure Grando’s name is forever bound to the ancient Slavic concept of the štrigon — a revenant, or vampire, who rises from the grave to torment the living. And his tale is a particularly chilling one. The tale of Jure Grando is notably recorded by Johann Weikhard von Valvasor, a 17th-century Slovenian historian, in his 1689 work The Glory of the Duchy of Carniola. Valvasor’s account lends the story a degree of historical credibility, as he was a reputable chronicler of the customs, folklore, and strange happenings of the region.

Istria: Istria is the largest peninsula within the Adriatic Sea, shared by three countries: Croatia, Slovenia, and Italy. 90% of its area is part of Croatia. The wealthier coastal towns cultivated increasingly strong economic relationships with Venice and by 1348 were eventually incorporated into its territory, while their inland counterparts fell under the sway of the weaker Patriarchate of Aquileia, which became part of the Habsburg Empire in 1374.

The Death and Unholy Return of Jure Grando

According to local legend, Jure Grando Alilović, born in 1579, was a stonemason who lived in Kringa together with his wife and two daughters according to town records named Ana and Nicola. Not much is known about his life, some say he was just an ordinary man doing his best, some say that he was an awful character. Some say that to become a strigoi, you were actually dabbling in dark arts and feeding on the blood of children when alive. 

Kringa from Valvasor’s book were Jure Grando lived.

 Some say that he was actually a good man and more of a tragic figure. He was in love with Ivana, or Rose in some variations, and was planning to marry her in a time where the “jus primae noctis” rule was in place. This was a law and custom where the lord of the land has the right to have the first night with the bride, and all the maritals “duties” that entailed. Jure opposed this, defying the monks of St. Paulines who controlled Kringa. 

The monks feared others would follow suit by his example, and got the leader of the town, Miho Radetić to kill him. Although he hit him with a hammer, it only knocked him unconscious. People thought he was dead and buried him. When he woke up, he started shouting for help. To cover their tracks they claimed he was a vampire and killed him, properly this time. 

It’s a fanciful story, perhaps not true at all. He did however die in 1656 and it could even have been natural causes as he was getting quite old by some of the sources. But unlike other villagers, his death did not mark the end of his story. 

For 16 years after his burial, it is said that Grando would rise from his grave at night, prowling the narrow paths of Kringa. He would walk and sometimes he stopped in front of doors, knocking on it, waiting for those inside. It was believed that if he knocked on your door, someone would die in the house in the following days. 

Villagers reported seeing his pale, grinning face in their windows. They started to call him a štrigon, a variant of the Slavic myth of a blood sucking entity closely knit with the vampire lore. With its close ties to Venetian word strìga, meaning witch. The case of Jure Grando was one of the first real people described as such.

He would even come back to haunt his widow, Ivana. With a grotesque smile permanently fixed on his face he was standing outside looking in. According to what she told the authorities, he also climbed inside. Sometimes, he would even attack and rape her.

The hauntings became so unbearable that the villagers, driven to the brink of hysteria, sought help from the local priest, Father Giorgio. Some say that Father Georgio was actually one of the monks of the order and had his own encounter with the vampire.  

Juro had appeared before Father Giorgio when he held a mass at his graveside. Some say that he was actually hunting down the vampire to put a stop to his terror. He had panicked and put a crucifix in Jure’s face and shouted at him to stop terrorizing the villagers. It seemed to work and Jure turned and ran back to the graveyard. County Prefect Miho Radetić was also there and tried to stake him with a hawthorne, but it simply bounced off his chest. A much more heroic character in the other version of Juro’s death. 

Gathering a group of nine brave men, armed with tools, stakes, and crosses, the villagers including County Prefect Miho Radetić and Father Giorgio, marched to Grando’s grave under cover of darkness in 1672.

The Vampire Hunt

Upon opening his tomb, the men reportedly found Grando’s body unnaturally preserved — his face serene and blushed, with a sinister smile upon his lips. Shocked and terrified, the priest attempted to banish the evil with holy water and prayers, but it had no effect.

The villagers then attempted to pierce his heart with a wooden stake, but even this effort reportedly failed until one man present in the vampire hunt, Stipan Milašić, decapitated the corpse with a saw or an axe. A horrible howl came from the grave and the vampire reportedly started thrashing and twitching in its grave before being vanquished. 

It is said that peace was restored, but the world was rattled. His children fled the city their father had terrorized for years and went to Italy according to some sources. 

How True is the Story of Jure Grando?

Now, how true was this story actually? By all accounts, Juro Grande has been treated as an actual person. And although there are in depth details, names, dates and the legend is very well known, there are still a lack of primary sources. 

About the other legend of him being a victim of the monk order trying to uphold the law of a jus primae noctis, there is still something that seems to be rooted in a fanciful story than an actual account as well.

By monk order, this probably means The Order of Saint Paul the First Hermit, commonly called the Paulines or Pauline Fathers, a monastic order of the Catholic Church founded in Hungary in the 13th century and held much power in Istria. How much they controlled the Kringa area and had anything to say in a law of “jus primae noctis” is dubious. But it is true they were a powerful order throughout Europe, especially in Istria. 

The claim of  “jus primae noctis” being a law was certainly a popular tale and perhaps to an extent a tradition throughout the world. But, scholars don’t think it was as widespread or lawfully right as the myths and anecdotal stories about it were. With that said, who really does now, it is perhaps more easy to believe than in a vampire legend?

Legacy in Kringa and Beyond

Today, the village of Kringa openly embraces its morbid history. It’s a small place with around 300 people living there today. In this typical Istrian village, consisting of a church, stone houses, ancient Roman dry-stone walls. Today, it is believed that his grave is located under a stone path behind the church, near the current cemetery in Kringa and that the church has more information that they are willing to share. 

Kringa: Source/Petr Štefek

Visitors can find bars and shops playing upon the vampire theme, and tales of Jure Grando’s nocturnal wanderings continue to fascinate those drawn to Europe’s darker legends.

Some say that the story of Jure Grando could have contributed in inspiring John William Polidori to create the vampire archetype in his story „The Vampire“. Even if it wasn’t a true story, it certainly seems like it inspired real people. 

Some still claim that it really was a true account, and he might have been one of the first true vampire accounts we have. And in the quiet cemeteries of Istria, some still claim that when the wind howls just right, you can hear the knock of a long-dead hand upon your door.

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References:

Vampire of Kringa – Secret Dalmatia Blog – Travel Experiences in Croatia

Jure Grando

Croatian ‘Dracula’ revived to lure tourists – The Mail & Guardian

Strigoi – Wikipedia

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The Curious Case of Annie Dennett and the Vampiric Vines

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Growing out of coffins and decaying corpses, vines was a local superstition that marked a vampire grave of those who had died of consumption. This was the case of young Annie Dennett, who was thought to feed on her ailing father. 

In the shadowy folds of early 19th-century New England, where superstition clung stubbornly to the edges of even the most respectable communities, tales of vampires didn’t always come cloaked in foreign mystery. Sometimes, they arrive on your neighbor’s doorstep. Or in the family crypt. Or — as in the case of poor Annie Dennett — in the quiet graveyards of rural New Hampshire.

Read More: Check out all ghost stories from USA

While names like Mercy Brown have gained infamy for their role in America’s vampire panic, Annie Dennett’s story is a more obscure, though no less fascinating, chapter of this eerie history. For many years, the Reverend who wrote it down, called her Janey Dennit and she was for a while, quite a mystery. And what makes it particularly noteworthy is the presence of a well-respected minister who not only witnessed her exhumation but left behind a haunting record of the event.

New Hampshire: Deep lakes, dark forests. The New England countryside used to be ripe with superstition and panic. Just a century after the witch panic in Salem, a fear for vampires took hold over the locals.

Consumption, Fear, and Desperation

Annies family had been in New England for generations when her ancestors settled in New Hampshire in the mid 1600s. Through their trade as blacksmith, their family was at one point one of the richest in Portsmouth. 

She grew up in a house filled with siblings as her parents had eight children, on the high ground in the woods. Her father, Moses, wanted to make his own way and had moved from Portsmouth to Barnstead, working as a tailor. 

Like many young people of her time, Annie Dennett succumbed to tuberculosis — the dreaded “consumption” — at just 21 years old in 1807. Tuberculosis was not merely a disease back then; it was an enigma that hollowed out families and devastated entire communities, slowly claiming its victims with a wasting grip that no one could seem to stop.

Faced with its horrors, it’s no wonder that desperate families sometimes turned to folklore for answers. The prevailing belief, particularly in rural parts of New England, held that a deceased relative could, through some malevolent post-mortem influence, drain the life from the living. Rumors started to go around that she could be one of the undead. That night, she rose from her grave and returned to her family to feed on them. This was something that they believed could be the cause of the consumption illness. And when the family started to show symptoms of having it as well, it was also believed that the bodies of the undead held the cure. 

And when medicine failed, spades came out.

The Vampire Hunt in Plain Sight

What makes Annie Dennett’s case especially intriguing is its documentation by a man of the cloth. Enoch Hayes Place, a Freewill Baptist minister from Vermont, happened to be in town when Annie’s family made the grim decision to exhume her body in 1810, three years after Annie was dead and buried.

Her father, Moses Dennett, was gravely ill with tuberculosis, and in the absence of a cure, the family clung to the desperate hope that digging up Annie’s remains might reveal signs of vampiric influence — a heart still full of blood, perhaps, or some unnatural preservation of flesh.

Old Graveyards: A serene graveyard in New Hampshire reflects the eerie history of vampire folklore in early New England.

Enoch Hayes Place attended the exhumation and recorded the scene in his diary. His words capture both the grim spectacle and the uneasy blending of religious authority with old-world superstition:

“They opened the grave and it was a Solemn Sight indeed. A young Brother by the name of Adams examined the mouldy Specticle, but found nothing as they Supposed they Should…. There was but a little left except bones.”

Unlike some of the more infamous exhumations of the era, Annie Dennett’s disinterment was anticlimactic. No blood-filled heart. No unnatural preservation. Just a young woman’s decayed remains, bones already claimed by the earth. It was noted that there were vines growing in the coffin that were discussed in several of the exhumations of the believed vampiric graves.

The Vampiric Vines

One of the tell tale signs of vampirism was a body not decaying and bodily fluids like blood still found in the organs. Another sign of vampirism here was vines growing on the body. 

In 1784, there was a newspaper article from Connecticut about a foreign quack doctor that said that these vines or sprouts growing on the body would also be a cure to burn and consume, often together with other organs. 

This we also see with the case in Willington of two bodies in relation to a Mr. Isaac Johnson. There was also a case in Dummerston, Vermont and upstate New York. 

It was also a superstition that said when a vine was growing from a coffing to the next (most often another family member), another one would die.The only way to break the curse was to break the vine and dig up the body to burn their vitals.  

Exhumation: A group of men performing an exhumation ritual under the moonlight, reflecting early 19th-century beliefs in vampire folklore.

The ritual, meant to save her ailing father, did nothing. He would, like so many others, eventually succumb to tuberculosis.

But the very fact that the ritual occurred, and that it was recorded by a minister, speaks volumes about the cultural grip these beliefs held even in “enlightened” New England. Science and folklore shared uneasy quarters in early America, and when grief met fear, it often leaned toward the old ways.

A Forgotten Chapter in New England’s Vampire Lore

While Mercy Brown’s story would capture international attention decades later, Annie Dennett remains largely forgotten — a footnote in folklore studies, though no less telling. Her story illustrates that these rituals weren’t isolated anomalies but part of a broader, if uneasy, social custom. The fear of consumption and its deadly march through families often blurred the line between superstition and faith.

And perhaps, most chillingly, it shows how even ministers weren’t immune to the lure of old beliefs when confronted with death’s relentless hand.

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References:

Vampires – American Myths, Legends, and Tall Tales: An Encyclopedia of American Folklore

http://apps.vampiresgrasp.com/Blog/?d=01/2010

Food for the Dead: On the Trial of New England’s Vampires 2011933367, 9780819571700 – DOKUMEN.PUB

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The Blood-Soaked Tale of Sava Savanović: Serbia’s Most Famous Vampire

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Hiding in the old watermill in the little Serbian village of Zarožje, one of the most famed vampires from the country is said to reside. The legend of Sava Savanović and his reign of terror has frightened Serbians for centuries, and according to local lore, perhaps for centuries more. 

Hidden deep within the rugged hills of western Serbia, in a remote corner of the Valjevo region, lies a forgotten mill, its timbers splintered and its wheel long since stilled. This is no ordinary ruin — it is the alleged lair of Sava Savanović, Serbia’s most notorious vampire, a sinister figure whose legend has cast a shadow over the Balkans for centuries.

While vampires are often associated with Transylvania and Bram Stoker’s Dracula, Serbia harbors its own blood-curdling stories that continue to live in local legends, and few are as unsettling as that of Sava Savanović.

The Vampires of Zarožje

The story of Sava Savanović centers around an old watermill near the village of Zarožje, perched beside the cold, fast-flowing Rogačica River on the slopes of the Povlen mountain. Today, there are around 600 people left, and it is growing smaller and more abandoned every year. The village is in the midst of forests and meadows and one of the things they have in abundance is potatoes, raspberries and old watermills. 

Zarožje Village: A view of the serene landscape surrounding Zarožje, Serbia, known for its vampire legends. // Wiki

According to local legend, Sava was a reclusive figure who owned the mill centuries ago in a narrow and dark ravine overgrown with tall beech trees. The villagers whispered that he wasn’t quite human — and they were right.

The village was no stranger to vampire legends before the 18th century. According to one, Saint Sava, in order to save people from terror, turned a local vampire into stone. The vampire was then buried, with only his teeth protruding out of the ground, as a warning to the sinners.

The Legend of Sava Savanović

Then it became the reign of Sava Savanović. Not much is known about his life or exactly when this happened, but at least before the mid 18th century. Some say that he was a successful cattle trader and a brave hajducke. According to one version of the legend, Sava Savanović came from the village of Ovčinja, neighboring Zarožje, where he was buried near the ancient walls. He died in the Zarožje mill where he worked, and as a vampire he returned to his old workplace and strangled his heirs. The legends are many, but they all trace back to this one man who became a monster.

Sava Savanović: Imagery often used to advertise for the local legend.

In most versions of the legend, he was unmarried and lived with his brother. In some versions of the legend, he was caught up in a tragic one sided romance. It is said he grew old an ugly, but fell in love with a much younger girl who rejected him time and time again. 

She is in some versions the daughter of a local merchant in the village. One day she was tending to her sheep or cattle, when he again made his advances and proposed. She declined and turned her back to him, angering him so much he pulled his pistol and shot her dead or strangled her.

His brother Stanko saw it all and they started fighting about his weapon. The gunshot attracted shepherds who saw the two men fighting and the dead girl. When Stanko tried to flee, they shot him in the back, thinking he was a thief. Not all versions of the brother die. When the local villagers realized the whole story, they beat Sava to death with hoes and mattocks. In some versions, he shoots himself when he realizes what he did. 

After his death, it was said that Sava Savanović rose from his grave as a vampire. Some versions claimed he was laid to rest in the local cemetery. Some say that because of his crimes, he was buried close to the scene of the crime and the mill. Some say his grave was in a crooked ravine under an elm tree and after years, was forgotten.

The Undead Butterly Vampire

The look of a vampire was far from how they are portrayed in today’s media. His skin blackened by death, but still moving, more monster than man. By night, he would return to the mill and wait for weary travelers and millers seeking to grind their grain. Those unfortunate enough to venture there alone after dark would never be seen again. Sava would reportedly drain his victims of blood, leaving behind only pale, shriveled corpses, their faces twisted in expressions of terror.

Some stories claimed Sava could transform into mist or a black dog, a common motif in Balkan vampire folklore, and that he possessed superhuman strength and speed. The old watermill earned the grim moniker of “the vampire’s lair.”

The villagers decided they had to take action against his reign of terror that had gone on for years and they started to look for his grave again. Some claim that his grave was found in 1880 or around there as the short stories based on these legends were first published that year. 

When they dug him up, they found his body as he had died. They staked his heart with a hawthorne stake as the ritual demanded. When they staked him, a butterfly flew out from his corpse and the priest was not quick enough to pour holy water in time. The butterfly or moth in Serbian folklore is often thought to be the vampire soul, and if the butterfly escapes, it can possess another person. 

After this, it was the butterfly that plagued the people, suffocating newborns across western Serbia for 30 years. Perhaps it found another host. Some say that the spirit or revenant of the butterfly or Sava Savanović even does to this day. 

Serbia’s Historical Vampire Hysteria

The legend of Sava Savanović didn’t exist in isolation. Serbia was a hotbed of vampire hysteria during the 18th century, with well-documented cases like Arnold Paole and Petar Blagojević. These incidents were taken so seriously that Austrian authorities performed official exhumations and issued written reports on suspected vampires, fueling Europe’s growing fascination with the undead.

Read More: Check out more about the vampire cases of Petar Blagojević and Arnold Paole

It’s interesting that we don’t really know if the legend of Paole and Blagojević or Savanović came first. But for Serbians, Savanović is certainly the most well known and considered Serbian’s first vampire where a lot of popular culture is based on the legend. As the story of Paole and Blagojević became known through Austrian reports in German, and is therefore much more known in the west. 

The Jagodići’s Watermill’s Real-Life Legacy

Milovan Glišić: (1847–1908) was a Serbian writer.

The infamous watermill of Zarožje, believed to be Sava’s lair, stood for centuries as a chilling monument to the legend. This is where he lived or where he snuck in to feed on people sleeping inside.  Located in the Valjevo region, it remained a link to Serbia’s vampiric past 3 kilometers from the Bajina Bašta-Valjevo road. There is a legend that vampires are found around mills in Serbia, especially in Roman myths. This is also the case with the small town of Grocka in Podunavlje in Serbia. 

Sava Savanović’s legend was immortalized in Milorad Pavić’s 1880 novella “After Ninety Years”, widely considered Serbia’s first vampire novel. As he was from the neighboring village, Valjevo, he probably heard this and other vampire stories growing up. 

For the last several decades the watermill associated with Savanović has been owned by the Jagodić family, and is usually called “Jagodića vodenica” (Jagodići’s watermill) and was in operation until the 1950s. After it closed it became a tourist location and slowly broke down. 

The legend  was later adapted into the cult horror-comedy film “Leptirica” (The She-Butterfly) in 1973. The film, with its eerie soundtrack, desolate forest setting, and nightmarish vampire figure, remains a cornerstone of Balkan horror cinema.

In January 2010, the city of Valjevo selected the mythical Sava Savanović as the touristic mascot of the city and the entire Kolubara region because the writer Milovan Glisic was from there. Zarožje and Valjevo are on the opposing sides of the Povlen mountain, but both claim Savanović as their brand. The local community of Zarožje threatened to sue the city, but ultimately only reported to the police in Bajina Bašta that Savanović was “stolen from them”.

In 2012, the mill tragically collapsed, sparking fears among villagers that Sava’s spirit had been released once again and the sale of garlic boomed as people became genuinely worried. The local council even humorously issued a public statement warning residents to hang garlic and holy crosses to ward off the vampire’s wrath — a folkloric custom deeply rooted in the region’s superstitions.

Plans were set in motion to rebuild the mill as a tourist attraction, preserving the story for future generations while still paying respect to its eerie history. By December 2022, the mill was renovated, but wasn’t operational (“dry docked”). The doors of the “watermill of fear” are always open. Despite the lack of roads, organization, guides and still unfinished structure, by 2022 some 16,000 people were visiting the watermill yearly.

Wiki

But what do the locals think about it today? Many feel conflicted and the church even warned about using such an evil entity as the trademark, even for tourism. Many don’t like the dark shadow it casts, either because of the fear about the legend, or the silliness of it all. Some think the legend was created by thieves in the 19th century to scare villagers and prevent them from looking into it when they were breaking into people’s homes. 

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References:

Vampire Sava Savanovic Is On The Loose, Serbian Village Council Warns (Seriously) | HuffPost UK News

Сава Савановић још чека да постане бренд

The Vampire of Zarožje: The Legend of Sava Savanović

Ko je bio taj Sava Savanović? – ČASOPIS KUŠ!

“Код Саве си био? И по ведром дану тамо је тама и чују се гласови”: У селу СРПСКОГ ВАМПИРА влада СТРАХ (ФОТО)

Zarožje – Wikipedia

Sava Savanović – Wikipedia

Vodenica Save Savanovića u Zarožju i danas uliva strah meštanima: “ČUJU SE ČUDNI ZVUCI, PROLAZI SAMO KO MORA”

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Arnold Paole: The Soldier, the Vampire, and the Blood-Soaked Village of Medveđa

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One of the first vampires that sparked the vampire panic throughout Europe in the 18th century, was Arnold Paole. A former soldier in the Serbian village Medveđa, often nicknamed Vampire Zero. 

Tucked away in the shadowed valleys of what was once the Habsburg-occupied Balkans, in a small Serbian village named Medveđa, a chilling tale took hold in the early 18th century. In late 1731, a field surgeon from the Austro-Hungarian Regiment, Johannes Flückinger went all the way to the Serbian village Medvegya on the border. A series of deaths had been reported and people were frightened that it was because of vampires. 

Flückinger traced the deaths many years back to what was believed to be Vampire Zero, a soldier called Arnold Paole. Arnold Paole’s story was so disturbing, so widespread, that it sparked one of the earliest vampire panics in the Western world, and left a trail of unease that still lingers in Balkan folklore to this day.

A Soldier Haunted by the Undead

Years before Flückinger made his reports, Arnold Paole was an Albanian soldier stationed on the frontiers of the Ottoman Empire. The hajduks were seen as either bandits or freedom fighters during the Ottoman Empire depending on what side you were looking from. After the Habsburg takeover, they were recruited for border protection in exchange for land. While serving in Greece or Turkey (accounts differ), Paole reportedly fell victim to a vampire attack. He sometimes mentioned Gossowa which might have been Kosovo. 

Terrified of becoming one himself after death, Paole sought to protect his soul. He allegedly tracked down the creature that had bitten him, killed it, and consumed a portion of its grave dirt, a ritual believed to ward off vampirism.

After leaving military service, Paole came to the village of Medveđa, a town located in the Jablanica District of southern Serbia. It’s uncertain if this is were he was born and returned, or someplace new he settled. There, he lived a relatively quiet life, but his peace was short-lived. In 1726, Paole died in an accident and some sources claim he fell from a hay wagon, others that he broke his neck. He was buried in consecrated ground, and life in Medveđa carried on.

That is, until the strange deaths began.

Illustration of a Hungarian Hajduk, from an 1703 book from Bavaria.

Within weeks to forty days after his death, villagers began reporting night-time visitations by Paole’s ghostly figure, pale and bloated, attacking them in their homes. Four villagers at least complained that he had come to them at night. Several residents fell ill and died in rapid succession. Fear gripped the village, and suspicion turned inevitably to vampirism.

The Exhumation and Horrifying Discovery

A local tribunal, terrified by the events and well-versed in vampire lore, ordered Paole’s exhumation, something the administration, or hadnack allowed. When his coffin was opened, those present reportedly recoiled in horror. His body, though buried for over a month, showed no signs of decay. His skin was ruddy, his nails and hair appeared to have grown, and fresh blood stained his lips. Fresh blood poured from his eyes, ears and nose.

This, according to folklore tradition, was the unmistakable sign of a vampire.

Read Also: Not too far from this village around the same time, another Serbian border town struggled with another case of vampirism that would reach the ear of western European as well. Read about Petar Blagojević: The Death That Sparked Europe’s Vampire Panic

Without hesitation, the villagers drove a wooden stake through Paole’s heart. Eyewitnesses claimed he let out an audible groan and a stream of fresh blood gushed from his mouth. His corpse was then burned to ashes and scattered.

A Second Outbreak of Vampirism

For around five years, the peace was restored to the village, although the fear lingered. That was until the vampire infection started to spread as a new epidemic happened in the winter of 1731. 

The villagers believed that the cattle Paole had bitten before his own destruction had risen as vampires themselves. Although they were slaughtered, it was too late, and they believed the infected cattle further created 17 new vampires who had eaten the animals. 

The locals held night watches and people started talking about leaving their homes and lives in the village for good. 

Another investigation was ordered. This time by Austrian authorities attempting to quell the region’s vampire hysteria. When the contagion physician Glaser arrived in Medveđa on 12 December, Initially he was there as an expert on contagious diseases, but he found no known causes that would explain the deaths in a scientific way. In 1732, military surgeon Johannes Flückinger was dispatched to Medveđa to document the situation.  

His chilling report detailed numerous exhumations, finding corpses in an unnaturally preserved state, blood at their mouths, and signs of vampiric transformation.

One of the first victims was Milica, A 50 or 60 year old woman. Glaser reports that the locals considered Milica to have been one of those to start the epidemic. Milica had come to the village from Ottoman-controlled territories six years before. The locals’ testimony indicated that she had always been a good neighbour and that, to the best of their knowledge, she had never “believed or practiced something diabolic”. However, she had once mentioned to them that, while still in Ottoman lands, she had eaten two sheep that had been killed by vampires. In real life she had been lean and slim, but after her death, looked plump and like she had eaten more than in life. 

Also the 20 year old woman, Stana was believed to have started the epidemic. She died after a three day illness two months before the surgeon arrived with her newborn baby. The baby had been buried behind the fence of where Stana lived as the baby hadn’t lived long enough to be baptized and was half eaten by dogs. She had admitted that when she was in Ottoman-controlled lands, she had smeared herself with vampire blood as a protection against vampires she thought was stalking her, as these had been very active there.

The sick had complained of stabs in the sides and pain in the chest, prolonged fever and jerks of the limbs. They also struggled to breathe. According to Flückinger’s report, by 7 January, 17 people had died within a period of three months (the last two of these apparently after Glaser’s visit)

Stanojka was a 20 year old wife of a hajduk who claimed to have been visited at night and choked by Miloje, a 25 year old son of a hajduk who had died nine weeks earlier. She died three days later of the disease. When they exhumed her 18 days after her death, fresh blood poured from her nose and her internal organs, skin and nails looked tough and fresh. Flückinger did point out that there was a finger-length red patch under the woman’s right ear, without, however, drawing a connection with bloodsucking.

An eight day old child that had been in the grave for 90 days, but looked fresh. As did the 16 year old son of a Haiduk after being dug up nine weeks after death. He also died of an illness in three days.  Joachim, another son of haiduk 15 or 17 years old, had the same story of a three day illness before dying, with signs of vampirism after being in the grave for eight weeks and four days. 

But there were people who didn’t fit the pattern of their corpse looking fresh. Milosava, a  30 year old woman and the wife of a hajduk was found with her eight week old child. Although their graves were like those of the vampires nearby, their bodies were completely decomposed. Rade a 24 year old man and the servant of a haiduk, was found completely decomposed. 

Also among the dead:

Miloje: A 14 year old boy

Petar: 15 year old boy

Vučica: 9 year old boy

Ružica: a 40 year old woman. 

The dead were dispatched with stakes, beheaded and burned, following the grisly protocols of local custom.

The Birth of European Vampire Hysteria

The Arnold Paole incident and Flückinger’s official report from January in 1732 he called “About the so-called vampire or bloodsucker, as seen in Medvedja, in Serbia, on the Turkish border on January 7, 1732.”, spread quickly through European intellectual circles, feeding an insatiable curiosity for vampire lore. It was one of the first recorded cases to feature systematic investigation, written documentation, and public execution of suspected vampires — long before Bram Stoker’s Dracula or even the Gothic literature of the 19th century.

The case of Arnold Paole cemented the Balkans as the epicenter of vampire mythology and inspired a wave of vampire-related pamphlets, academic debates, and terrified imaginings across Europe.

Criticism of the Investigation and Vampire Report

Although a man of science, was Flückinger’s report on the ongoings really a reliable one?

For once it was the blatant xenophobia and classicism of the report. Serbia had for centuries been the land of Turks and had been closed off for many Europeans. Their language, religion, culture and folklore differed greatly from the German and Austrian ways and when they met, it was close to a colonial meeting. A them versus us.

 Besides, the border town was a farming one, ravaged by war and poverty. He had no problem labeling the peasants and foreigners as vampires and let them be taken by the vampire panic that swept through town. But the wealthier Hungarian families, like the wife and her newborn baby, were let off the hook and reburied without any disturbances in consecrated ground. Making his own belief in his report sway. 

But what really happened? In many of the instances, the supposed signs of vampirism, could easily be explained by natural stages of decomposition. Like the bloating on the woman that had once been slim, as gasses amasses in the body after death. 

Some modern scholars think the disease was splenic fever, and there is some evidence that something like this spread among sheep in the area in the summer of 1731. Some speculated about rabies, although this illness is perhaps too well known that trained surgeons would have explained it as vampirism. Even at the time, people had science to explain what happened. Christian Reiter, a prominent Viennese forensic scientist, believes that behind all these cases was an anthrax epidemic, a common phenomenon in the past in the periods during and after the war. Anthrax is a bacterial disease that is transmitted from infected animals to humans and is often fatal.

Medveđa’s Lingering Curse

Today, the village of Medveđa remains largely forgotten by the world, a quiet patch of Serbian countryside. But those who know their vampire history understand its significance. The ghost of Arnold Paole, the soldier turned predator, continues to cast a long and uneasy shadow over vampire folklore.

In the dead of night, when the wind howls through ancient graveyards under a blood-red moon, one might refuse to believe that the deaths were the works of vampires, but the effect it had on modern folklore through the Balkans, and even the rest of Europe, were certainly real. 

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References:

Medveđa – Wikipedia

Decomposing Bodies in the 1720s Gave Birth to the First Vampire Panic

The Origins of Vampire Stories in the Christian-Islamic Borderlands 

https://web.archive.org/web/20060315125133/http://www.vampgirl.com/visum.html

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The Baobhan Sith: Scotland’s Legendary Bloodthirsty Woman

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In the Scottish Highlands, there have been tales of a bloodthirsty creature, in disguise of a beautiful and seductive woman. The Baobhan Sith, a much older version of the vampire lore as we know of it today, still remains in between the lore and stories we tell ourselves.

In the misty glens and ancient forests of the Scottish Highlands, where the wind carries whispers of forgotten tales and the land itself feels alive with ancient magic, lingers the legend of the Baobhan Sith — a deadly, seductive vampire spirit of Gaelic folklore. 

Sometimes pronounced baa-van shee, her name translates roughly to “fairy woman”, but there is nothing benign about this creature. Beautiful yet malevolent, the Baobhan Sith was said to lure unwary travelers to grisly deaths, draining their blood beneath the cover of night.

Origins in Highland Lore

The Baobhan Sith legend belongs to Scotland’s rich tapestry of fairy and supernatural beliefs, although she might remind us more about a succubus or even a vampire-like creature. Like many creatures of Celtic folklore, she occupies a space between fairy and vampire — both a spirit of nature and a bloodthirsty predator.

The Green Clad: In addition to the Irish Banshee or the Succubus, the Baobhan Sith can also remind about the Scandinavian Huldra or Hylje. Often described as a beautiful green clad woman with animalistic features she hides before seducing men. Although the Huldra is more about luring the men into the mountains. Here from the play Peer Gynt where she is a character.

Folklore suggests the Baobhan Sith would typically appear as an enchanting, green-clad woman with long, flowing hair. But beneath her alluring appearance lay clawed hands and fangs, hidden until she chose to strike. Traditionally, she was said to emerge at night, often in the lonely Highland wilderness, where travelers, hunters, and wanderers might become her prey.

The Lure of Beauty and Dance

According to legend, groups of men traveling or hunting would sometimes wish aloud for the company of women. Their innocent desires would be answered by the sudden appearance of beautiful, ethereal women who seemed to emerge from the mists themselves. The Baobhan Sith would dance with the men — a popular motif in Celtic folklore where the act of dance carries supernatural consequences — and, at the height of merriment, reveal their true nature.

Once the men were entranced, the Baobhan Sith would use their sharp talons to slash at their victims and drink their blood, often leaving lifeless, pale bodies behind by morning. Some versions of the tale describe them feeding in groups, often appearing in fours.

In a similar tale one of the men noticed that the women had deer hooves instead of feet and fled from them. He returned the next morning to find that the other hunters had their “throats cut and chests laid open”.

In a third story the hunters took refuge in a cave. Each of the men said he wished his own sweetheart were there that night, but one of them, named Macphee, who was accompanied by his black dog, said he preferred his wife to remain at home. At that moment a group of young women entered the cave, and the men who had wished for their sweethearts were killed. Macphee was protected by his dog who drove the women from the cave.

The Story of the Men Meeting The Baobhan Sith

The story of the creatures normally goes something like this:

Four hunters, weary from a day in the hills, stumbled upon an old bothy as night fell. Inside, a fire waited, as though expecting them. As flames licked the hearth, one of the men joked, “All we need now are four beautiful women.” The wind answered with a knock.

At the door stood four stunning women in green, their eyes cold and unnatural. The men, smitten and careless, welcomed them in. Laughter turned to song, and song to dancing. One by one, the hunters twirled in the arms of their enchanting guests — all except the eldest, who grew uneasy. The fire flickered, and he caught a glimpse of something crimson.

His blood chilled. One of the women had slit the youngest hunter’s throat, her lips dark with blood. The others fell swiftly, caught in the women’s gaze as sharp nails tore them open.

He bolted into the night, the women following, their voices sweet and terrible. He dove among the iron-shod horses — the one thing they feared. The Baobhan Sith circled, hissing and begging, then cursing him with promises of death.

But dawn came. And with the first pale light, they vanished.

At sunrise, he returned to the bothy. His friends were cold and bloodless. Weeping, he vowed to tell the tale — to warn others of the green-clad death that dances in the Highlands.

The Weakness of Iron and the Protection of Cattle

Much like other fae and vampiric beings of the Celtic world, the Baobhan Sith was believed to have certain weaknesses. Iron was said to repel her, as it does with many fairy creatures in Gaelic folklore. Travelers would carry small iron charms or weapons for protection.

Another tradition claimed that taking refuge among livestock, particularly cattle, could offer safety. The Baobhan Sith was said to be reluctant to approach herds of animals, perhaps owing to their association with fertility and the natural order — realms where spirits of death had no dominion.

The Baobhan Sith in Modern Culture

Though tales of the Baobhan Sith have their roots in oral Highland tradition, the creature has enjoyed a resurgence in recent years, appearing in novels, films, and fantasy games exploring vampire and Celtic mythos. Modern interpretations often emphasize her duality — both tragic and monstrous — reflecting themes of isolation, forbidden desire, and the dangers lurking in the untamed wild.

Ultimately, the Baobhan Sith stands as a chilling reminder of the Highlands’ wild, untamed heart, where the line between beauty and terror is perilously thin. She embodies the folkloric warning against succumbing to temptation, the perils of the night, and the ancient belief that not all is as it seems beneath Scotland’s mist-clad hills.

In the modern world, her legend endures as one of Scotland’s darkest and most alluring vampire myths, a spectral woman in green forever waiting in the shadows for an unwary soul.

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References:

Baobhan sith – Wikipedia

The Baobhan Sith – Folklore Scotland

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The Case of Frederick Ransom: The Woodstock Vampire

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How did a Darthmount student from a prominent family in Woodstock, Vermont end up as a vampire? The story of Frederick Ransom shows that the belief in vampirism or the fear of the undead was not just for the simple and uneducated country folks. 

When you hear the term “vampire panic”, your mind might conjure up foggy rural graveyards, torch-wielding villagers, and folksy farmers digging up their loved ones by lamplight. But history, as it often does, has a way of proving us wrong. This was the case with Frederick Ransom — a well-educated young man from a respected New England family whose story reminds us that fear, especially of death and disease, respects neither class nor education.

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The American writer, Henry David Thoreau wrote in his journal of 26 September 1859: “The savage in man is never quite eradicated. I have just read of a family in Vermont—who, several of its members having died of consumption, just burned the lungs & heart & liver of the last deceased, in order to prevent any more from having it,”

Most likely he was referring to the vampire case of Frederick Ransom. In the early 19th century, in the cold hills of Vermont, the so-called “vampire panic” wasn’t just superstition; it was desperation along the New England coast. And not even a Dartmouth College education could save Frederick from becoming a posthumous scapegoat for a disease no one yet understood.

A Life Cut Short by Consumption

Frederick Ransom was born into a prominent family as the second son and had seemingly his whole life ahead of him. He grew up in South Woodstock, Vermont with his father Richard Ransom and Elizabeth Mather with loads of siblings. By the standards of his day, he was part of New England’s educated elite — a college student at Dartmouth. But tuberculosis, known ominously as consumption, didn’t care about family names or academic ambitions.

In 1817, at the age of 20, Frederick succumbed to the wasting disease. It wasn’t uncommon — tuberculosis was the grim reaper of its time, claiming more lives in the 18th and 19th centuries than just about any other illness. Entire families were ravaged by it, and lacking the scientific knowledge we have today, people turned to folklore and desperate measures.

Grave of Frederick Ransom

The family doctor, local physician Dr. Frost tried his best, but there was no cure for the disease yet, and as a result, desperate attempts and alternative cures based on the supernatural grew forth. 

His little brother, Daniel Ransom, wrote this about him: My remembrance of him is quite limited as I was only three years at the time of his death… It has been related to me that there was a tendency in our family to consumption…

Vampirism by Another Name

Vampire panics were a tragically real response to tuberculosis outbreaks, especially in rural New England. The belief was that a deceased family member could, from beyond the grave, drain the life from surviving relatives. The “solution” was grim: exhume the suspected corpse, check for signs of unnatural preservation, and burn the heart or organs to stop the so-called vampire’s deadly influence.

Frederick’s family was no exception. Despite their standing and education, fear trumped reason. After Frederick’s death, his father, desperate to protect the remaining family from the slow death of tuberculosis, had his son’s body exhumed. He was worried that his son would rise from the grave and attack the rest of the family. 

In accordance with folk belief, they removed his heart and burned it in a blacksmith’s forge. It was in Woodstock Village Green and a public place where all could see. It was common that the ashes of the remains would either be inhaled or mixed into a medicine. It isn’t confirmed that this happened to Frederick, although some sources said that his remains were given to his family. He was buried in Ransom-Kendall Cemetery.

Daniel wrote about his father: It seems that Father shared somewhat in the idea of hereditary diseases and withal had some superstition for it was said that if the heart of one of the family who died of consumption was taken out and burned, others would be free from it. And Father, having some faith in the remedy, had the heart of Frederick taken out after he had been buried, and in was burned in Captain Pearson’s blacksmith forge. 

A Futile, Tragic Attempt

Unsurprisingly, the ritual didn’t work. Tuberculosis isn’t a vampire’s curse; it’s a contagious bacterial disease. As Frederick’s surviving brother, Daniel Ransom, would later write:

“However, it did not prove a remedy, for mother, sister, and two brothers died afterward.”

In a touch of dark irony, Daniel would go on to note that it had been said the family was predisposed to consumption, and that he, too, would likely die young. But in a final, satisfying twist to this grim tale — Daniel Ransom lived to be over 80 years old. But although he was young, he would never forget the fear and desperation that had his family and community in a tight grip. 

The Legend of Corwin in Woodstock

Another vampire story often seen in connection of the Ransom incident is that of Corwin in Woodstock. The story was retold in 1890 in The Vermont Standard, many years later, and some now believe that this story was actually a retelling and much changed version of Ransom. An old woman told about the case that had happened fifty years earlier and that she had witnessed the burning of his heart herself.

According to the story, a young man with the surname Corwin died of “consumption“, “ and was buried in the Cushing Cemetery in June of 1830 corner of Cloudland Road and River Road. Six month later, the young man’s brother became ill. The newspaper claimed that local physicians, including the respected Dr. Joseph Gallup and Dr. John Powers from the Vermont Medical College, was the ones claiming this had to be the work of a vampire.

The first brother’s body was dug up and examined. His heart, which was found filled with blood, was removed, boiled in a pot, and buried in a hole with a seven-ton block of granite on top. To complete the grisly ritual, the site was then sprinkled with the blood of a young bullock.

Although not verified, it looks eerily similar to the case of Frederick. There was no boy named Corwin in the records who died, but the names of the physicians did actually exist.

Frederick Ransom’s Legacy

Two years later, The Vampyre by John Polidori was published and is considered to have kickstarted the undead and vampires in modern literature. His death and exhumation was not the first, and it would not be the last during the Vampiric Panic that threw New England back to the dark ages. 

His grave lies quietly now in South Woodstock, a reminder of the fragile line between reason and superstition, and how grief can drive even the most educated people to light the funeral pyres of old legends.

So next time you hear a ghost story about New England’s vampire past, remember Frederick Ransom — the Dartmouth scholar whose heart was fed to fire by those who loved him most. Not because they were ignorant, but because they were human.

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References:

Woodstock’s Vampire

Valley News – Among the Undead in Woodstock

Fredrick Ransom (1797-1817) – Find a Grave Memorial

Hunting Vampires in Vermont

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Petar Blagojević: The Death That Sparked Europe’s Vampire Panic

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The staking of Petar Blagojević was one of the first well documented vampire cases in modern Europe. The attention to this vampire plaguing the Serbian village caused the vampire panic that would last way into the next century, perhaps even to this day. 

Next to the Danube River and Silver Lake, the Serbian villagers in Kisiljevo are gathering around a particular grave. As they lift the coffin lid, panic erupts around them. It was like they feared, their once good neighbour and friend had turned into a vampire, an undead. With their wooden stakes held high, they pierced his heart and watched as the blood he had taken from his victim flooded out of his months-old corpse.

In the shadowy heart of 18th-century Serbia, nestled in the village of Kisiljevo, a terrifying legend took root — one that would ignite a vampire hysteria across Europe and shape the foundations of modern vampire folklore as we know it. At the center of this unnerving tale was Petar Blagojević, a simple villager whose death in 1725 was only the beginning of the true horror.

A Quiet Death… Followed by Unsettling Whispers

Petar Blagojević’s life, by all accounts, was unremarkable in comparison to the more famous vampires like Dracula’s Vlad Tepes or Madame Bathory. He was an ordinary man in a rural Serbian village, during a time when superstition clung to the edges of everyday life. But it was his death — and what followed — that would make him infamous.

He was born in Kisilova village, then on the far outskirts of the Hapsburg Empire, in 1662 and grew up to be a farmer like the rest of the villagers. Kisilova (Kisiljevo), a hamlet in the Serbia region that was returned to the Ottomans after the Treaty of Belgrade (1795) and briefly transferred from Ottoman into Austrian hands after the Treaty of Passarowitz. It was like many other post-war places, food shortage, epidemic diseases and an identity crisis between the Catholics and the Orthodox Serbs. 

But for the farmer, life went on, Ottoman or Austrian. He married, had children and lived a life without huge ripples until his death in 1725 of unknown causes. It is said he was buried with the usual Roman Catholic ceremonies.

Shortly after Blagojević’s burial, villagers began dying under mysterious and alarming circumstances after a mysterious illness took hold of them just the day before their death. In the span of eight days, nine people perished, each claiming on their deathbeds to have been throttled in the night by Blagojević himself, risen from the grave. Some say that it happened over two days. 

To make matters more terrifying, it was said that Blagojević visited his widow after the funeral, asking for his opanci shoes. She is said to have fled the village and moved away right after. 

It was also said that he returned home to his son and demanded food. The first day he came, he gave him what he asked for, but he came again and the son didn’t want anything to do with him. When his son refused, his father brutally murdered him by biting him and drinking his blood. 

The Vampire Hysteria Takes Hold

In the early 18th century, the concept of the vampire in Eastern European folklore was already entrenched, and people believed that entire villages had been taken by vampires during the Ottoman rule. But Blagojević’s case brought it into sharp, horrifying focus. Terrified, the villagers demanded action and petitioned the local Austrian authorities for permission to exhume Blagojević’s corpse.

Austrian official and Kameral Provisor, Ernst Frombald, stationed in Kisiljevo, reluctantly agreed, documenting the entire event in a chilling report now considered one of the earliest recorded vampire incidents in European history. In his written record, he used for the first time the Serbian word, Vampire that would take hold in most European languages unchanged going forward. 

The case of Blagojević was brought to his attention, ten weeks after his death. Some say he was only dead a few days before the exhumation. Some sources place the exhumation to April. Frombald is said to have wanted to wait for orders from Belgrad, but feared there would be an uproar if he didn’t act fast. 

The Unearthed Horror of Vampires

When Blagojević’s grave was opened, the villagers, the Veliko Gradiste priest who tagged along and Frombald alike recoiled at what they saw. 

The body was unnaturally well-preserved. The hair and beard had continued to grow. Fresh blood stained the mouth and lips and the skin appeared ruddy and flush, as if alive. He said: “First of all, I did not smell the faintest odor normally characteristic of the dead. With the exception of the nose, which is about to fall off, is completely fresh… Not without wonder I saw fresh blood in his mouth, which according to common observation he had sucked from the people he had killed.”

These ghastly signs, interpreted through the lens of superstition, confirmed to the villagers that Blagojević had become a vampire. Even an erection was present as the account says: “and there were other wild signs, which I omit here out of great respect.”

Without hesitation, they drove a wooden hawthorn stake through his heart. According to witnesses, fresh blood spurted from the wound, and an audible groan escaped the corpse’s lips. The villagers then burned the body to ash — a time-honored method of purging a vampire from the earth.

His victims were also reburied with garlic and whitethorn placed with each corpse in their grave so they wouldn’t come back as vampires. 

A Panic Spreads Across Europe

What might have remained a grim village legend took on a life of its own when Frombald’s detailed report reached Austrian authorities in Belgrade, and from there, Vienna. Authorities didn’t really care about what happened, but the mass media certainly did. The account was printed first in Wienerisches Diarium before several newspapers across Europe wrote about it as well, sparking a wave of vampire hysteria in the early 18th century.

Similar exhumations and suspected vampire cases soon surfaced in Serbia, Romania, and Hungary. These incidents — notably the cases of Arnold Paole and Jure Grando — fueled the burgeoning obsession with the undead, leading to widespread vampire panics and numerous official investigations sanctioned by the Habsburg monarchy.

The First “Modern” Vampire

Petar Blagojević’s case holds a particularly important place in vampire lore. His story, meticulously documented and widely circulated, became one of the foundational tales contributing to Europe’s fascination with vampires.

The details of his death and supposed return share eerie similarities with characteristics later popularized in literature and pop culture. But what really happened during his death? Some have tried to attribute his death to a disease, perhaps he was patient zero of the illness that took away his so called victims lives. 

What happened with his family is uncertain though. Did his wife run away, and was his son murdered by biting him to death, or was he as well taken by the mysterious illness?

What Really Happened to Blagojević and the Vampire Panic

If it wasn’t vampires, what happened then? After centuries of urbanization, space for the dead started to become more limited ever since the 11th century really. Corpses were buried closer to the living and higher up, not really decomposing in peace as they should. The stench of decomposing flesh from overfilled tombs was warned about in the bigger cities in Europe and with it came horrible diseases like the plague, smallpox and dysentery. 

All it needed was a heavy rainstorm or dog burying in the shallow graves for them to rise from their graves, someone looking not nearly decomposed as the living wanted them to look. 

After the reformation, the notions of saints weren’t a thing anymore, and those corpses that would have been seen as holy centuries back perhaps, were now something demonic and evil. 

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References:

Decomposing Bodies in the 1720s Gave Birth to the First Vampire Panic

Kisiljevo Cemetery – Atlas Obscura

Priča o Petru Blagojeviću ili kako je srpska riječ “vampir” ušla u evropske jezike – Moja Hercegovina

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The Legend of Ireland’s Vampire King Abhartach and the Haunted Giant’s Grave

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In the rural areas of Derry, Northern Ireland, there is a small dolmen grave under a hawthorn tree. It is said to be the grave of the vampire king, Abhartach who is said to still be lusting after blood. 

Ireland’s ancient hills and mossy graveyards are no strangers to ghost stories and restless spirits. Yet among these tales of banshees and fairies lies one of the island’s oldest, darkest legends — the story of Abhartach, a tyrant chieftain whose insatiable thirst for blood refused to end, even in death. 

Thought by some folklorists to be Ireland’s original vampire myth, Abhartach’s grim story predates Bram Stoker’s Dracula, and may well have been its inspiration.

The Tyrant of Slaghtaverty

According to legend, Abhartach was a cruel and malevolent chieftain who ruled in what is now Slaghtaverty in the parish of Errigal in Derry, Northern Ireland. Although he is remembered as a vampire, the name and description of him is much closer to a dwarf. As the name suggests, he might have been remembered for his height. 

Irish Hero: In some accounts Abhartach is combined with the similarly named Abartach, a figure associated with Fionn mac Cumhaill and pre-christian irish mythology. Fionn mac Cumhaill,[a] often anglicised Finn McCool or MacCool, is a hero in Irish mythology, as well as in later Scottish and Manx folklore. He is the leader of the Fianna bands of young roving hunter-warriors, as well as being a seer and poet. He is said to have a magic thumb that bestows him with great wisdom. He is often depicted hunting with his hounds Bran and Sceólang, and fighting with his spear and sword. In modern retellings it is said the hero was called Cathán or O’Kane.

He is said to have lived in the 5th or 6th century, at a time when the Glenullin area of Ireland was a patchwork of small kingdoms of tribal warlords were the mysterious druids still lived and practiced their magic and when the catholic saints started settling on the emerald island. 

Feared by his own people, he was said to possess dark powers and a fascination with the occult. Through his practice of dark magic, he killed his subjects for fun. His tyrannical ways became so unbearable that local warriors, desperate for relief, conspired to kill him.

In one version of the tale, a neighboring chieftain named Cathán rose up against Abhartach and struck him down, burying him in a standing grave, marked by a solitary stone. Burying in a standing position was a custom at the time for high-ranking chieftains. But peace would not come so easily.

In other versions his first death was through no fault but his own and he died when he was stalking his wife. He was a jealous man and trusted no one. He thought she was having an affair and crept on the ledge outside of the castle to the window outside her bedroom. He slipped and fell to his death and they quickly buried him for the first time. But it would not be his last. 

The Undying Menace

The day after his burial, Abhartach returned — clawing his way out of the earth, demanding blood from his terrified subjects to collect in a bowl for him to consume. In some versions of the legend, his subjects were so afraid of him and submitted to him, making blood sacrifices to him, waiting for someone to save them.

Again, Cathán slew him, and again, Abhartach returned. It was then the people sought counsel from a druid or wise elder who revealed the grim truth: Abhartach was no ordinary man, but one of the neamh-mairbh, the undead. In more modern retellings of the story it was a Christian Saint giving the solution to the undead. 

Druid Forest: There are several hermitages in the area. According to tradition, these were the dwellings of particularly holy men. The most notable is in Gortnamoyagh Forest on the very edge of Glenullin, where local people will still point out the saint’s track, a series of stations near a holy well.

To stop his monstrous resurrection, he could not be buried in consecrated ground. Instead, he must be killed with a sword made of yew wood, buried upside down, and his grave encircled with thorns and heavy stones to prevent his escape.

Cathán followed the instructions, and Abhartach was finally trapped — but local legend holds that his restless spirit still lingers beneath the earth.

The Cursed Grave of Slaghtaverty

According to a lecturer in Celtic history at the University of UIster, Bob Curran, the real castle he lived in an be found between the towns of Garvagh and Dungiven, where a small hill now stands. He says that it was here that the fortress of a 5th or 6th-century chieftain with magical powers called the Abhartach once resided. 

The Slaghtaverty Dolmen: By locals called the Gian’ts grave, associated with the legend of Abhartach, under a solitary hawthorn tree in rural Derry, Northern Ireland. Strange things are said to happen around this grave.

Today, the place believed to be Abhartach’s grave is a modest site known as Slaghtaverty Dolmen or The Giant’s Grave. Nestled in a field near the village of Slaughtaverty in Londonderry in Northern Ireland, it’s marked by an ancient stone surrounded by a ring of Hawthorn trees and undergrowth. It used to be more stones as remnants of an old monument, but these have been removed over time by local farmers for building purposes.

Locals claim the spot is cursed; farmers avoid working the land around it, and strange misfortunes are said to befall those who disturb the grave. Some say on misty nights, you can hear faint whispers, or catch the flicker of a shadow moving between the trees — as though Abhartach himself still walks, searching for blood.

In 1997, attempts were made to clear the land, but, if local tradition is to be believed, workmen who tried to fell the tree found that their brand-new chainsaw stopped for no reason on three occasions. When attempting to lift the great stone, a steel chain suddenly snapped, cutting the hand of one of the labourers and, significantly, allowing blood to soak into the ground.

The Dracula Connection

We first have the legend written down in Patrick Weston Joyce’s The Origin and History of Irish Names and Places from 1870. In modern versions of the lore, the story is said to be solved by an earlier Christian, and not a druid. 

Intriguingly, scholars have speculated that Abhartach’s legend may have inspired Bram Stoker’s Dracula. Stoker, an Irishman born in Dublin, would have likely been familiar with the story of the blood-drinking undead chieftain. While Dracula is commonly associated with Vlad the Impaler and Eastern European folklore, it’s possible that the sinister figure of Abhartach left its own mark on Gothic horror’s most famous vampire.

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References:

Abhartach – Wikipedia 

The Abhartach / Irish Vampire: Terrifying Tale For 2025

Does Abhartach, the vampiric chieftain, still stalk the Derry hills?

Abhartach the Dwarf King | Emerald Isle Irish and Celtic myths, fairy tales and legends

Abhartach – Ireland’s Vampire King – by Siobhán Rodgers