investigations

Park Tour Bridge of Crawford Rd.
~After much research, I have come to a final conclusion. The bridge at Crawford Road is determined unknown. The following will tell you why I have came to that conclusion. About 6 months ago, I worked this case with the National Park Service. First off, they won't confirm or deny anything. The reason being for this is that they do not wish to damage this park's reputation for being professional. I cannot blame them, much is the same with my real job in life, the military. So I looked into outside or nearby sources. I asked door to door along the road and they spoke of hearing rumors and stories of their own. I did some research in the library and came across nothing with old news articles. If there was a story, it might sound like it was either gang related or a tragic accident that found itself away from the actual scene of the crime. Most rumors involve "a hanging figure", with "your vehicle shutting off" placing at second. All in all, it's a spooky place to be on a friday night, especially if it's misty.

**Update**
I did a reinvestigation and actually got some pics of some ghost (whatta-ya-know...)
I'll be sure to reevaluate the investigation again later on in late February of 2002.

To see the pics, click here.

The Ghosts of Old Iron Mill Rd.
~Now this story was received from a friend of mine and is still being worked on. The story goes somewhat like this...
"A long time ago, there was an old farm community in outside Smithfield, Va. This farm community was like most others, quiet, friendly, and distant neighbors. At one time there was one particular family that had developing problems. The family most likely had problems with their crops or the wife slepted with another man. Wel to continue on, the Man of the house snapped one night and went out to the shed to grab a lumber axe and sluaghtered his entire family. He then went from house to house in the night killing off all his neighbors.
When morning arrived, the milkman came into the community and became horrified to see his customers all slain. An investigation soon took place and found the assaultant dead in his own house. The people of the neighboring communities felt it was best to burn everything to the ground to forget all that has happened there.
However, after all was set aflame, the house with the killer still stood erect, and to this day, still stands, barely..."
I was very intreged about this story and sought to look into it. We went late at night with a partial moon providing some light overhead. The air around us was near freezing and provided some frost on some roadside vegeation. When we came to the dirt and gravel road, we saw mist craling over it. This right-away freaked me and some others out. Not many times you drive along a road that looks like it came from a horror movie. During this time I was trying to make sense into the matter with the mist. The only solution that I got was that the road cooled down slower than the vegitation around it.
We finally came to the area that we believed might lead to the house. We all got out and decided to look around. I took a snapshot with my digital camera and was baffled. Apperantly, the mist seems to be 6 feet in the air, and all I can get was mist. I took out my huge flashlight and shined it around and sure enough, I was right. After spending an hour walking around in the area that we were told that it might be, we found nothing. Soon after, we got in our cars and took off calling it a night.
The day after the next, I returned to the area to find some clue what was down the dirt path that we were on. Sadly my time was shortened by accidently bumping my "locked" door shut, thus locking my keys in wallet in my car. Luckily I came to the aid of a soil analyst who was checking for acidics in the soil to lay down fertilizer for a customer. He managed to jimmy my little vehicle with those little orange flags, that one may find to mark the ground (they have foot-long metal wires), in about 2 hours flat.
*screams in agony*
I could've done it with a coat hanger in a tenth of that time.
Anyhow, I managed to finish my work before the sun went down. Well, what I found at the end of that road didn't surprise me... Cows. So, angerly, I stomped back to my car. I did some more looking around and got nothing as well. Pretty much, I wasted 4 bucks in gas and my time.
After some reasoning on the way home, I decided to tell my friend to find out more from his source, ask if they could find it and point it out. One of the reasons why I said this is because I saw alot of empty farm homes that were in some of the farm fields around the area. Also the area around the farms was also a hunting and lumber area (they have a clear-cut forests). I'm sure that one way or the other, I'll get to the heart of the matter.

The Bacon Family Gravesite
~This has to be one of the least comfortable investigations that I am still doing. The case started when I came across a certain grave area on a topographical map that I picked up from the NPS (National Park Service) awhile back. The grave site was in an area that was closed down to the public, and not just parking. So in seeing this I wanted to be safe and got the highest form of Park Pass that is possible, The eagle membership, it allows me to visit any park, wildlife preservation, or reservation, for free. Of course I know that this excludes the places closed off to the public, but the "lost tourist" routine always works, hehe. So, I gathered some supplies and headed out. The time of year was early spring, guessing around March when I went there. So it was a little chilly, but the new leaves were starting to bud in.
I took my at least a 2 mile hike to get where I needed to be. To be on the safe side, and not walk along the parkway that braches Yorktown, Williamsburg, and Jamestown, I took into the woods, but close to the road. After playing Davie Crocket for almost an hour cutting through the woods, I reached my destination. I finally understood why it was closed off to the public for 2 reasons: one, the road was all tore up by construction equipment, and two, there was construction going on (but luckily, not when I was there, heh go figure). Well, like many other times before, I started the investigation. I was quickly halted when I took notice that the trail was overgrown and lead off to nowhere. The were some old wooden stacked fences, but they too look as if the would break into dust at any moment. After spending a half hour searching for anything that would resemble a grave I was about ready to give up. As I stood looking over a small cliff that overlooked the York River, I thought to myself that the graves probely fell into the river. No sooner did I look a around than I caught glimpse of a plastic PVC pipe sticking out of the ground straight up. Now out of all the strange places to find junk, this beats them all, but this pipe was no ordinary pipe it was a marker. I looked around for another and sure enough, I did. These two pipes marked a special part of land, and sure enough, just behind me, I saw flat, park-lawn styled tombs. Sadly, these tombs had trees grown around them, but not any old than about 10 years though, so they were somewhat upkeeped.
However, even though this was interesting and all, on thing caught my interest more than the others, ruins. Just beyond the graves, towards the road, I saw a an old brick foundatio that had crumbled from age. The bricks were old red clay, and nothing like those made in the seventies or late sixties. Some other interesting aspects of the place is that it had hexegonic tile slab piece that jutted out laying above the ruins, suggesting that this house was either two story or had a basement. If given enough time, one may even possibly find some hidden treasures in here, if you feel like digging through flor slabs and forest debris. As for myself, I hate spiders, especially those hiding underneath rocks. So that pretty much overides my treasure hunting ideals. Other than that, this area is an ideal place to perform a full investigation on. Some of the areas to look for is a small fenced in sqare area, some open graves, the ruins, and the graves themselves. All I ask is treat everything with respect, especially the NPS.

The Williamsburg Hospitality House
~Unlike many other cases that I have come across this one is a bit more odd and interesting at the same time. Now as many of the local area might know, the area of Williamsburg Virginia has a good amount of haunts in different locations. Some places are part of the college campus of William and Mary, while others are old homes that are occupied by everyday residents. The story I am about to share to you is another place that has been keeping its ghosts quiet for some strange reason. How do you know that its even haunted if it has no ghosts? Good question, let me give you my reasons why it could.
During the days of the colonial period, the spot that was once the Williamsburg Hospitiality House were the grounds to lay people to rest. That's correct, a cemetary, and not any ordinary one at that, only the rich and famous rested in there. Such people were knights, dukes, goveners, and some wealthy merchants. Most of these people originated in England and were apart of the the capitol of Virginia, which was at that time, Williamsburg. Sometime later, the church relocated and so did the graves. During the dawn of the 20th century, the foundation of the Hospitality House was being established and still stands till this day.
The building itself, believe it or not, is 5 stories above groand and 3 stories below. At that time the the land of the basement was not all to different from the surrounding land, just that the structure was partially bult into the side of a steep hill. Other than that, the place itself is visited by many people far and wide for being, as I say, the Hyatt of Bed and Breakfast.
Well, now that you know a little of its history, I will continue on with my findings. A few months back, a friend of mind, and a friend to the CPRA (my paranormal association) used to work at the tavern on the Lobby level of the Hospitality House. Outside, one may see this tavern as Christopher's Tavern. During his work there, he used to pull double shifts, for his job with bartending paid well in tips there. He occasionally got a room in the Hospitiality House to catch a few z's before his next shift. One time when he was sleeping there, he thought that he heard loud stomping outside his door and looked outside to see who was making it. To his surprise he saw noone there. When he got onto his second shift, he spoke with some of the veterans that work at the Tavern about what he heard and asked if they too had anything like he had. Some agreed, others spoke of a an old grandfather clock that stopped on the hour for unusual amounts of time and started back up again on one of the higher levels. Never the less, if there were ghosts, they were not being a nucense to disturb anyone.

What Haunt's General Cornwallis's Cave?
~Along the shores that face the York River, near the Coleman Bridge, one might find the park exhibit of General Cornwallis's Cave. During the last moments of the revelutionary war, this cave was believed to be a secret hideout for General Cornwallis and his top officals to plan and stage attacks towards the Americans and the allied French divisions. There is also some history from either before or after that states that the cave was used for brigands, bandits, and occasionally pirates. Now none of this is written on paper, or is it entirely true, but the stories were main found by local historians and books.
Well, at this time, we were anxious to test out our EVP recorder and sought no better place to chose than this. So we stashed the recorder on the inside of the cave late one night and took some shots of the area around the cave. We mananaged to get a few orbs, but nothing all to exciting. Our EVP Recorder turned up nothing unusual as well. When we spoke with the park staff, they told us that they haven't heard anything about the cave, but then again, they are not supposed to talk about any ghostly events for it can ruin a park's reputation even though others like my group are fascinated over such events. However, since there are some unaccounted records that visitors have spoken about hearing voices, we'll let you decid