The Haunted Insane Asylum

The thoughts or mention of an insane asylum conjures up in most peoples mind fear and loathing of a place where no one would want to be. A few years back the Aware Foundation investigated an empty mental hospital in a New England state. There had been many reports by security guards hearing disembodied moans, cries and screams from the deserted passages and rooms of the many buildings on the property.

One such building was named after a lovely area of the state, the Pleasant Valley dorm, the horrors that we would uncover made the name a mockery. This building was adjacent to the Phoenix lab where the bodies of the deceased residents would be brought there by the massive dark underground tunnels that connected each of the buildings with the lab and each other.

We had made arrangements with the owners of the defunct mental facility to investigate a few of the buildings, especially the Pleasant Valley dorm and the lab area. We met the gentleman that would be our guide for that evening just outside the Phoenix lab. He ushered us into a small room that was painted a drab yellow, a single light bulb hung in the middle of the room, barely illuminating our surroundings.

What we could see was a very dismal sight, paint was peeling off the walls and there were huge water stains on the walls and ceiling. There were a few benches along one wall, but what caught our eyes and made us draw in a deep breath was the stainless steel doors that lined the back wall. There must have been 12 of these cold impersonal doors and behind each door, our guide told us were the slabs that the deceased would lie on. There were identical doors on the other side of the wall in the autopsy room, these doors here were for friends and family members that wished to come and see their loved ones before they were to be autopsy.

He went over to the door and pulled one of the drawers out, it made an ominous grinding sound as it slid along the rollers, and a very loud metallic crunch as it came out fully. I gave an involuntary shudder as I thought of all the uses this drawer must have gotten in the life time of the hospital.

The Insane Asylum was started in the late 1800s to early 1900s before much was known about mental illness. During that time mental illness was thought to be a scourge on society and families with mentally ill members never talked about their loved ones, rather they shut them away in facilities like this one hoping no one would find out and many times leaving their loved ones there until they saw them again as they were slid out for viewing on one of these drawers.

We moved around to the other side of the wall with the doors and were greeted by the sight of the autopsy table, looking much as it did when it was still being used. It was a very cold looking metal table that did not seem wide enough for a body to lie on. There were two pieces of metal that formed what looked like a trough on either side, I imagined that this is where all the body fluids flowed down to a grate over a hole in the floor. At the top of the table was another trough this one was larger than the two side ones and once again I could only imagine that is was some type of draining system.

There was not too much else in this room except for a desk and small metal table and some cabinets along a wall. These cabinets were empty but one could guess what they held at one time.

Our guide walked us out of the room much to our relief and down a flight of stairs. To a large room he told us that this was the start of the tunnels that ran under the streets of the facility to all the buildings. He said that when a person died their remains would be loaded on a stretcher and taken to the Phoenix Lab through these tunnels. This way the other residents of the facility would not see a dead body being pushed along the roads to the lab.

The tunnels loomed before us in the semi-darkness of the room, the guide told us to walk on down and to see what we could feel, hear or see. As we entered into the tunnel a surge of energy flew past us, this energy had the feeling of confusion and fear. I began to see a young man dressed in what appeared to be some kind of a pajama type garment. I could see that he had down syndrome and that he was afraid and very confused. It appeared that during his time he had been locked down here in the tunnels as a prank by some orderlies on his ward. They thought it was funny to see how frightened he was as they turned the lights off and on. I do not believe that he passed down here, rather I believe that it was his fear that left this psychic impression on this area of the tunnel.

We soon turned down another tunnel and I was greeted by the sight of a stretcher with a body with a sheet pulled over it, it appeared that this was a vision of how a deceased was transported to the lab and what it might look like. Seeing this I felt a very profound sadness for this life that had ended. I felt almost as if it were a family member of mine. This vision stayed in front of me as I walked down the tunnels, it lasted a good five minutes before it vanished. I later found out that my great grandmother had indeed been a resident in this hospital in the early part of the 1950s.

She had fallen and fractured her hip and when she came out of the anesthesia she was confused and disoriented and like they did for many elderly people that were in that state they placed her in this facility. At that time they did not have the nursing homes that they have now or the ability to care for the confused elderly as they do now.

So they placed her in this facility in fact in the Pleasant Valley dorm, she passed away only a few months after she was placed in there. So perhaps this vision of the body on the stretcher was meant for me, that it was a vision of my great grandmother. I will never know as the sheet did remain over the body during the whole time of the vision.

We continued on our tour and we came across a child crouched under a set of stairs in an adjacent room near one of the tunnels. This child was about 9 years old and very frightened. He had brown hair and eyes and a large hole where his mouth and nose should have been, the medical term is hair lip. His parents had placed him in this facility because of this deformity we later learned that this was a common practice back in the 1920s, parents just did not know what to do with severely deformed children. They felt that they were safer there than to be made fun of or stared at in public, too bad they did not know the truth.

This young child was crouched there fearing being discovered by one specific ward guard, we later found out that the ward guards were like security guards for each ward, they were above the orderlies, they had the responsibility of locking down a ward if things got rough between the patients.

We also later found out that during the 1920s there was a rumor that was never substantiated that one of the ward guards was abusing a group of deformed children. This was the ward guard that the child was hiding from, he was afraid of being abused another time. He pleaded with me to help to take him away from there, my heart broke because I could not do that, I could not help him.

We continued our tour in the Pleasant Valley dorm, here the energy was very thick and very negative. The halls were long and dark, black shadows slithered in and out of ones view. Strange noises could be heard in far away room, the sound of wind coming through a broken window or was that a low moan coming from some long ago resident? There was the sound of something dropping from one of the floors above us, the sound of footsteps coming up a stair way and the very faint distant crying as if someone's heart was breaking.

Bars still covered the windows as the moon light streamed in through it making a pattern on the floor giving this place an eery look to it. We could not imagine what it must have been like to be placed in one of these rooms. Not having any freedom, always looking out at the world but never being a part of it.

As we walked deeper and deeper into the building the negative energy seemed heavier and heavier. More and more black shadows began to form, we felt as if we were being watched by angry eyes. The energy became more and more menacing as we continued to explore the various rooms, by the time we reached the third floor it became almost unbearable. The negativity around us was beginning to bother everyone in our team. We began to feel as if we were trespassing and felt that we should get out as quickly as we could.

We finished our tour of the two buildings and felt that the hauntings were a direct result of the energy that was displaced from the residents with the mental illnesses, the abuse; by the staff and other residents, and the overall depression that this place held. Many people had resided in this facility in the 80 years that it was in operation, many people had also died in that time to. Some had died of loneliness and despair leaving a sad feeling in this place. Still others had died at the hands of other residents or even by neglect their energy is here too. And then there is the negative energy that seems to strive here, that once fed off of the residents feelings and illnesses. This energy was left alone to grow and feed and soon it began to fill up the emptiness of the rooms.

We gave our findings to our contact person, they thanked us and told us that they would take this under consideration as to what to do with the buildings. We have yet to hear what has been done, the buildings still remain empty, there is now a no trespassing sign on the entrance.

The Gambler

I know this story seems far fetched especially the part of being hit by the same semi three times in one day but it's true.

Dave Simmons was an ordinary man, who thought that his run of bad luck was just that bad luck, he never expected that any thing demonic was responsible for what he was going through.

Dave had grown up in a family of five; he was the middle child with two older brothers and two younger sisters. In addition, being a middle child Dave just figured that statistics was against him. His parents were hard drinkers and most weekends both parents were drunk, as he grew into adult hood he began to drink just as they did.

Dave married right out of college but this marriage was not to last long, his young wife could not take the drunken binges that began on Friday night and would end on Monday morning when he left for work, soon they divorced.

Crushed by the divorce Dave sought help for his addiction to alcohol through Alcoholics Anonymous or AA. Through a program Dave found that he did not have to depend on Alcohol to get him through the weekends, slowly he began to stop drinking. This was fine except that he began to replace his drinking with gambling at the local casino, every Friday he would take a portion of his pay and gamble all weekend long.

At first Dave was very lucky with his gambling he actually was making money and with this run of �luck� he began to gamble more and more of his pay. Soon he was gambling all of his pay away. Oh, he still made some money but not as much as he originally had.

At work he had met a woman that he was interested in and who was interested in Dave, she and he began a relationship and they eventually moved in together. Susan had her own home and was more than happy to share it with Dave. He had kept the fact that he had this gambling problem from her.

At first, Dave refused to give into his need to gamble and he actually stayed away from the casino. He and Susan seemed happy together. He had a good job as a manager for a local company, so he was on the road a lot during the day but home at night. He felt that perhaps his luck was improving once again.

One day he was driving along his usual route and a semi truck plowed into his car pushing him to the side of the road, but not causing him any injuries and minimal damage to the car, so he drove on to finish his route. A short while later in the morning he was again in his car driving to another location when he stopped at a light and he was rear ended by a semi truck, the same semi truck that had pushed him off the road previously. Once again, he was not injured and there was minimal damage to the car, so he continued to finish his route.

As he finished up his route and was on his way home he was driving across an expansion bridge in heavy traffic, just before he reached the end of the bridge he was once again hit and pushed toward the side of the bridge. However, this time there was a lot of damage to his car. He was injured this time and needed to stay in the hospital over night. The strange thing was that he was hit by a semi truck, the same semi that had hit his two times before that same day.

After he had recovered at home, Dave once again began to gamble his pay and this time he began to steal money from Susan, concerned over what was going on with Dave, she began to talk with him and to try and find out what was going on with him.

She found out that there was a lot of abuse of alcohol, drugs and gambling in Dave�s family and it seemed to go on for generations. She began to research generational curses and felt sure that this is what Dave was experiencing.

Susan got in touch with us at Aware to ask if this was possible, which we assured her it was, so we made arrangements to meet with her and Dave at their home.

At first, Dave was very skeptical about what was really causing his run of bad luck, but as he related the background story of his life, a pattern began to emerge of chronic abuse and very bad luck in his family. He began to see that it was possible that there was some kind of generational curse working through his family, making it impossible for any one of them to get out of the misery that their lives had become.

As a teenager Dave had gotten himself involved in drugs, on weekends he and one of his brothers and a few friends would get themselves drugged up all weekend long. However, as Dave grew up he became involved in the alcohol and finally the gambling. He seemed to replace one addiction with another one.

He also related that most of his siblings were either alcoholics or heavily into drugs, many of them did not have good relationships and one of the siblings no longer had any contact with the family. One sister had turned to prostitution in an effort to afford her drug habit. Both parents were no longer living having drunk themselves into an early grave.

There had been some unusual noises and shapes seen around the house by both Susan and Dave, the television set had changed channels as they tried to watch a program. There had been phone calls with no one on the other end, both had seem a black shape that was the size of a large dog, emerge from the family room and run upstairs. Both had chased it up stairs as it ran into their bedroom, but upon inspection, there was nothing there.

There was the smell of rotting flesh that seemed to permeate from a corner of the living room, but nothing was seen in that area that would cause the foul stench.

Dave was determined to not let what had happened to his family happen to him, he wanted help and he was prepared to try an exorcism to see if that helped. Larry began to pray over Dave and at first, all was quiet, Susan sat next to him in their living room.

About half way through the prayer there began a loud banging sound coming from the family room, a thorough search was made of the room and out side but nothing was found that would make that sound, so we continued the ritual. The sound intensified and then stopped all together, at this point Dave looked at Larry and clenched his fist and said that he hated Larry and felt like punching him until he stopped praying, but Dave kept himself under control as Larry continued to pray.

Soon Dave was crying softly and soon all was quiet. Dave said he felt better than he had in a long while. We left Dave and Susan and told them to keep in touch with us, over the next couple of weeks Dave began to improve and soon was enrolled in Gamblers anonymous and to this day is doing great.

Unfortunately, for Susan, she suffered a stroke a few months after bringing Dave to us for help. The good news is that she had suffered no ill effects from the stroke and the doctors are amazed that someone so young could have a stroke, and that someone that had the type of stroke that she had experienced had escaped with no disabilities from it.

Dave and Susan are convinced that her stroke was retaliation from the demons for her getting help for Dave, but she said she would go through it again, just so that he was not tormented anymore by the demonic force that was around him.

Today three years later Dave and Susan are doing well, they are planning on being married soon, all though there have been a few relapses with the gambling things have improved greatly. When a relapse happens Susan will pray over Dave as he sleeps and soon he is on the right track once again.

We will continue to keep in touch with this couple.