Ghosts, Pirates and Halloween
by Barbara Rimkunas
This "Historically Speaking" column appeared in the Exeter News-Letter on Friday, October 27, 2017.
The Historical Society inbox is once again filling up with questions about ghosts. Must be October. No one ever asks about ghosts in April. Ghost stories have been popular throughout history and, aside from the comfort we derive from wanting our departed loved ones near, there’s deep enjoyment in the creepier stories we hear. In 1845, there was a series of ghost stories published in the Exeter News-Letter not in October – as you would expect – but in December. Perhaps Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, published two years earlier, had inspired ghost stories near Christmas. In any case, like Dickens the stories were decidedly secular and involved human-like ghosts.
The first two stories involved the ghost of a sycamore tree. The tree, apparently well known in town, stood somewhere near today’s Swasey Parkway. In the first story, the writer spends the day reading German fantasy stories (yes, really. The Zauber Bibliothek by Conrad Horst) and decides to take a midnight walk through Exeter down Water Street. When he arrives at the steps of the Baptist Church, which at that time stood near the base of Spring Street, he’s approached by a figure. “whether man or spirit, ghost or goblin damned I could not tell, he came in guise so questionable. ‘Young man,’ in me you see the Ghost of yonder Tree, which yesterday waved in beauty above the dust and turmoil of the busy street, but which today unhallowed hands have stricken to the ground.” The tree-ghost then bawls the man out for several paragraphs until, “just then a cock crew from a neighboring barn and the Ghost without giving further vent to his indignation fled foaming to the church-yard and I fled on winged footsteps home.”
The next edition of the News-Letter contains a similar account, most likely from the person who cut the tree down. In this story, the writer seeks out the ghost and waits in front of the church. When the tree-ghost appears it mocks the previous writer, “I amused myself a little at his expense, telling him in confidence, what he has since made public. O! how gloriously I hoaxed him.” The tree was old, it explained, “Day and night I moaned, ‘I am weary, I am weary.’ I whispered of my weariness and of my wish to depart and now I am at rest.” At this point, the ghost is dismissed, as are the objections of the sanctimonious first writer. These two stories were clearly written not as actual ghost stories, but as a means to air a local controversy. “Hear! Hear!” you say, “so much more civilized than a modern Twitter war!” I applaud their efforts.
The third story is unrelated to the tree controversy. Called “Tower Hill Ghost Story” it contains a slightly creepy tale of a ghostly visitor – or maybe just a weird unknown guy – who makes vague comments about a long-abandoned house on Tower Hill. “Tower Hill” is the part of town just over the Great Bridge as you’re approaching Portsmouth Avenue. A Captain Briscoe once lived in a house on Tower Hill – and “lived much in style” according to the teller. “His wealth was accumulated in troublous times among the Islands of the West Indies. Some think he had to do with those piratical receivers in Port Royal Jamaica.” At this point, we know we’re getting something good. “Captain Briscoe died in 1729 and…his will not being duly carried out, a certain influence was exerted whereby the inhabitants of the house were much disturbed.” They were disturbed by windows and shutters that opened and closed of their own accord. They leave the house and it remains empty for forty years. Then one afternoon, a neighbor was approached by a “spectre unearthly in white,” which approached her, pointed his arm towards the house and said, “Mine.” Then it “pointed to the garden that was in front, saying “money there.” “And it was the last time anything unearthly has been seen to disturb the inhabitants of Tower Hill. The story does not say, but heavily implies, that no money – no pirate’s gold – was ever found on Tower Hill.
The fun part of this story is that Captain Robert Briscoe was a real person and his story is actually quite interesting. An English seafaring man, he and his wife left England around 1687 because of religious differences with the Church of England. The History of Beverly also teases us that his wife , Abigail, “was of a noble family; but marrying contrary to the views of her friends, they were induced to come to America.” In Beverly, Briscoe made his fortune trading in the West Indies. Whether there were actual pirates involved we do not know, but certainly any commerce in Jamaica in the 1680s and 90s would have included working with the pirates who at that time illegally governed the island. After Abigail’s death in 1624, Briscoe married Elizabeth (Leavitt) Dudley of Exeter and came to live in town. This is the thin sliver of time Briscoe left his mark in town. He died in 1728. Contrary to the story, however, his will was proved. He left money to the poor of Beverly and Exeter. He was even ‘kind’ enough to leave Cato, his enslaved boy, a cow and a promise of freedom when he reached the age of 24. The Town of Beverly named a street and a school house after Briscoe. He even left £10 to Exeter’s Reverend John Odlin, who quickly married Briscoe’s grieving widow. He was free enough with his money that it is unlikely that he buried any in the front garden. And more to the point, when you have an actual story of a slave owning wealthy sea captain who dealt with pirates in the West Indies, yet cared about the poor in two separate towns, why bring a ghost into it?
The photo is of the Congregational Church graveyard with the caption: “Did the ghost of Captain Robert Briscoe, who is buried here in the Congregational Church graveyard, haunt Tower Hill? No. No, he did not. Stop it, and enjoy the real story of Captain Robert Briscoe.”
This "Historically Speaking" column appeared in the Exeter News-Letter on Friday, October 27, 2017.
The Historical Society inbox is once again filling up with questions about ghosts. Must be October. No one ever asks about ghosts in April. Ghost stories have been popular throughout history and, aside from the comfort we derive from wanting our departed loved ones near, there’s deep enjoyment in the creepier stories we hear. In 1845, there was a series of ghost stories published in the Exeter News-Letter not in October – as you would expect – but in December. Perhaps Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, published two years earlier, had inspired ghost stories near Christmas. In any case, like Dickens the stories were decidedly secular and involved human-like ghosts.
The first two stories involved the ghost of a sycamore tree. The tree, apparently well known in town, stood somewhere near today’s Swasey Parkway. In the first story, the writer spends the day reading German fantasy stories (yes, really. The Zauber Bibliothek by Conrad Horst) and decides to take a midnight walk through Exeter down Water Street. When he arrives at the steps of the Baptist Church, which at that time stood near the base of Spring Street, he’s approached by a figure. “whether man or spirit, ghost or goblin damned I could not tell, he came in guise so questionable. ‘Young man,’ in me you see the Ghost of yonder Tree, which yesterday waved in beauty above the dust and turmoil of the busy street, but which today unhallowed hands have stricken to the ground.” The tree-ghost then bawls the man out for several paragraphs until, “just then a cock crew from a neighboring barn and the Ghost without giving further vent to his indignation fled foaming to the church-yard and I fled on winged footsteps home.”
The next edition of the News-Letter contains a similar account, most likely from the person who cut the tree down. In this story, the writer seeks out the ghost and waits in front of the church. When the tree-ghost appears it mocks the previous writer, “I amused myself a little at his expense, telling him in confidence, what he has since made public. O! how gloriously I hoaxed him.” The tree was old, it explained, “Day and night I moaned, ‘I am weary, I am weary.’ I whispered of my weariness and of my wish to depart and now I am at rest.” At this point, the ghost is dismissed, as are the objections of the sanctimonious first writer. These two stories were clearly written not as actual ghost stories, but as a means to air a local controversy. “Hear! Hear!” you say, “so much more civilized than a modern Twitter war!” I applaud their efforts.
The third story is unrelated to the tree controversy. Called “Tower Hill Ghost Story” it contains a slightly creepy tale of a ghostly visitor – or maybe just a weird unknown guy – who makes vague comments about a long-abandoned house on Tower Hill. “Tower Hill” is the part of town just over the Great Bridge as you’re approaching Portsmouth Avenue. A Captain Briscoe once lived in a house on Tower Hill – and “lived much in style” according to the teller. “His wealth was accumulated in troublous times among the Islands of the West Indies. Some think he had to do with those piratical receivers in Port Royal Jamaica.” At this point, we know we’re getting something good. “Captain Briscoe died in 1729 and…his will not being duly carried out, a certain influence was exerted whereby the inhabitants of the house were much disturbed.” They were disturbed by windows and shutters that opened and closed of their own accord. They leave the house and it remains empty for forty years. Then one afternoon, a neighbor was approached by a “spectre unearthly in white,” which approached her, pointed his arm towards the house and said, “Mine.” Then it “pointed to the garden that was in front, saying “money there.” “And it was the last time anything unearthly has been seen to disturb the inhabitants of Tower Hill. The story does not say, but heavily implies, that no money – no pirate’s gold – was ever found on Tower Hill.
The photo is of the Congregational Church graveyard with the caption: “Did the ghost of Captain Robert Briscoe, who is buried here in the Congregational Church graveyard, haunt Tower Hill? No. No, he did not. Stop it, and enjoy the real story of Captain Robert Briscoe.”
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