Speaker 1: A poultergeist, often called a noisy ghost, is a supernatural
Speaker 1: entity believed to cause physical disturbances, from unexplained noises to
Speaker 1: objects moving on their own. In eighteen seventy eight, a
Speaker 1: young woman became the center of one of the most
Speaker 1: chilling and well documented poultergeist cases in history. It became
Speaker 1: known as the Great Amherst Mystery. What began as a
Speaker 1: strange knocking in whispers soon escalated into terrifying attacks, spontaneous fires,
Speaker 1: and violent paranormal activity that shook an entire town. This
Speaker 1: is the haunting Tale of Esther Cox.
Speaker 2: My name's Ben, I'm Nicole, and you're listening to Wicked Ingram,
Speaker 2: a true crime podcast material.
Speaker 1: Audience listeners, big massive news in the true crime community
Speaker 1: and minor news in our true crime community. We're not
Speaker 1: doing it to true crime case today, We're doing paranormal.
Speaker 1: That's our minor news. We're taking it from true crime
Speaker 1: to something a little bit, you know, a little more
Speaker 1: haunting today.
Speaker 2: Just for fun, what did you call the ghost.
Speaker 1: Poultrygeist, poultry geist, poultergeist.
Speaker 2: Okay, I don't think I've ever heard.
Speaker 1: That, You've never heard the term poultry ghist.
Speaker 2: Last night right before we're about to go to sleep.
Speaker 2: You're like, the case is this, and I was like.
Speaker 1: What you have heard? You've heard of that because you
Speaker 1: like the Amityville horror. That's a poltergeist.
Speaker 2: Oh okay, maybe I'm just not retaining that name.
Speaker 1: Then apparently not, but it's also known as a noisy ghost.
Speaker 1: Basically the ones that like, yeah, it's like stuff.
Speaker 2: Moves, and the ones that are like a real menace.
Speaker 1: Yeah, those are Poultergeist.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So that that's our minor news is that we're
Speaker 1: not doing true crime today. We're going to talk about
Speaker 1: a Poultergeist. But the massive true crime news this week
Speaker 1: is that they may have identified Jack the Ripper, which
Speaker 1: is wild.
Speaker 2: That's a big one, eh.
Speaker 1: It is. I'm not going to go into a whole
Speaker 1: lot of detail about who it is or anything like that.
Speaker 1: It takes a quick google and you'll find it. I
Speaker 1: can even put a link in the description of this
Speaker 1: episode if you're interested in going and finding it out.
Speaker 1: But basically, they did the whole like genetic genealogy thing
Speaker 1: mm hm, and they found distant family members of this
Speaker 1: individual who they believe is Jack the Ripper, not one
Speaker 1: hundred percent confirmed. Yet it's basically like they have a
Speaker 1: suspect and they have evidence, and he's if he were alive,
Speaker 1: he'd probably be handcuffed. Now he's got to go to
Speaker 1: trial that sort of thing. Okay, so he hasn't been
Speaker 1: tried and found guilty yet, but they have what they believe.
Speaker 2: Is enough evidence, enough evidence, which is wild crazy. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I mean, gosh, you have to sometimes you have to
Speaker 2: be thankful maybe for this like ancestry stuff, hey, because
Speaker 2: it is solving a lot of cases.
Speaker 1: It really is. This ancestry stuff is helping a lot.
Speaker 1: So if if you have nothing to hide, maybe it's
Speaker 1: worth putting your DNA in this data bank because you
Speaker 1: could potentially convict one of your relatives.
Speaker 2: A which is probably something you'd rather know, yeah.
Speaker 1: Most most certainly, and be make the world a little
Speaker 1: bit safer too. So yeah, I'm going to leave that
Speaker 1: up to you though, if you want to do it
Speaker 1: or not.
Speaker 2: But because yeah, I was kind of all, well, not
Speaker 2: against them, but I was like, oh no. But then
Speaker 2: now that they're solving cases and I have nothing to hide,
Speaker 2: I'm like, uh, okay, maybe this isn't too bad.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So now let's go back from Jack the Ripper stuff.
Speaker 1: Back to our little story today.
Speaker 2: Okay, well, we have some patrons to thank first.
Speaker 1: Oh, I guess we should probably thank our patrons.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we sure do.
Speaker 1: Em will slipped right past that. Thank you for the reminder.
Speaker 1: Shout out to Lauren Franklin and Vivian Green, who both
Speaker 1: signed up on Patreon this week. They get the hole
Speaker 1: behind the scenes, they get the exclusive episode you name it.
Speaker 1: Speaking of which I should probably start looking at which
Speaker 1: exclusive episode is going to come out at the end
Speaker 1: of the month.
Speaker 2: I know that's next week?
Speaker 1: Is it already?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Is it next Friday? I believe? I think wow, Yeah.
Speaker 1: Which means if we're if it's next Friday, that means
Speaker 1: we're getting into marchall soon. So Springs just around the corner.
Speaker 2: Ring is here. Basically it's minus twenty right now, so
Speaker 2: I can't say that.
Speaker 1: Oh gotta love Canada. But yeah, let's talk about a poultergeist. Okay,
Speaker 1: So yeah, a poltergeist is yeah, a noisy ghost, like
Speaker 1: you said, those ones that are a real menace. And
Speaker 1: the case today is a Canadian case that we're talking about.
Speaker 1: Amherst is over on the East coast of Canada, and
Speaker 1: this is probably the most well documented poltergeist case in
Speaker 1: history period.
Speaker 2: Okay, which is insane, and how long ago?
Speaker 1: We are going back quite a way where we are
Speaker 1: going back to the eighteen hundreds from okay, well yeah,
Speaker 1: so yeah, are you ready for it? Let's do or okay,
Speaker 1: So we're heading back not just to the eighteen hundreds,
Speaker 1: but specifically to the eight year eighteen seventy eight. We're
Speaker 1: heading to a little quiet town known as Amherst in
Speaker 1: Nova Scotia, Canada.
Speaker 2: I like that name.
Speaker 1: That's cute Amhurst, isn't it. It sounds cozy. It's very
Speaker 1: cottage core.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: You know. Now, back then Amherst had only about three
Speaker 1: thousand people living there. Now today that number is only
Speaker 1: grown to around nine thousands. So it's not exactly you know,
Speaker 1: explosive population as far as where the place is. But
Speaker 1: small then small, Now that's my point. It's peaceful. It's
Speaker 1: a picturesque place full of charming homes. It had, you know,
Speaker 1: nice little, neatly kept lawns and all the perfect little
Speaker 1: places to live. Not exactly the kind of town you'd
Speaker 1: expect to become the setting for something straight out of
Speaker 1: a horror movie. But this summer. I like, how that
Speaker 1: this coming this summer? It's very horror movie.
Speaker 2: Kind of pretty much.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but this summer, seriously darkness took root in this
Speaker 1: town and something that people would later call was from
Speaker 1: the work of the devil himself.
Speaker 2: WHOA Okay, so we're like really in for it here.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So let's talk about a perfectly ordinary house in
Speaker 1: Amherst that lived on and was perched on Princess Street. Yeah.
Speaker 1: If things couldn't get perfect enough.
Speaker 2: This has this been made into a movie, because it's
Speaker 2: already sounded like one.
Speaker 1: Honestly, I wouldn't be surprised if it had. I didn't
Speaker 1: do enough research to find, you know, what's come out
Speaker 1: of it as far as like Hollywood and books and
Speaker 1: stuff like that. But I would not be surprised if
Speaker 1: this had been if it birthed some productions and'd say
Speaker 1: that yep. Now, this house on Princess Street was a nice, cozy,
Speaker 1: two story cottage where Daniel and Olive Teed lived with
Speaker 1: their two little boys, Willie and George. Also sharing the
Speaker 1: house were Daniel's brother John and Olive's three sisters, her
Speaker 1: brother William Cox and her sorry three siblings her brother
Speaker 1: William Cox and her two unmarried sisters, Jane and Esther Cox.
Speaker 1: Now the Teed's and the Coxes were a close knit
Speaker 1: family together, they were well liked and they were well respected.
Speaker 1: Esther was the youngest of youngest sister at eighteen years old,
Speaker 1: and she was known for helping out with her nephews
Speaker 1: while Olive kept the house running smoothly. To everyone who
Speaker 1: knew them, they were good, decent people, making what happened
Speaker 1: next even more shocking. So it was on August twenty eighth,
Speaker 1: eighteen seventy eight, that Esther came home in a terrible state.
Speaker 1: She was shaken absolutely to her core. See that evening
Speaker 1: she had gone for a carriage ride with a man
Speaker 1: by the name of Bob McNeil. He was a young
Speaker 1: man who was a shoemaker who had been courting her
Speaker 1: for the last little while, so this should have been
Speaker 1: a pleasant outing. However, it turned into something more of
Speaker 1: a nightmare. See, Bob drove her and himself far beyond
Speaker 1: the limits of the town to this carriage ride out
Speaker 1: into the woods, and while there alone secluded, he suddenly
Speaker 1: pulled out a revolver and ordered her to get out
Speaker 1: of the carriage. Or else. Esther was terrified. The man
Speaker 1: that she had trusted now was about to kill her,
Speaker 1: or so it seemed. But before he could do anything,
Speaker 1: and before Esther could react, the sound of an approaching
Speaker 1: wagon was growing off in the distance. Without a word,
Speaker 1: Bob jumped back into the carriage and drove them back home.
Speaker 1: She arrived home safe, soaked from the rain, trembling, and
Speaker 1: barely able to speak a word. She went straight to
Speaker 1: bed and wasn't seen again until morning. Over the next
Speaker 1: few days, she kept her distance, avoiding the house and
Speaker 1: wandering the streets or visiting neighbors. Her family assumed that
Speaker 1: she and Bob had fought and you know, had given
Speaker 1: her some space, not realizing the truth of what had
Speaker 1: really happened between the two. They hoped that she'd get
Speaker 1: over her her heartache in time, but every night they
Speaker 1: could hear her crying herself to sleep.
Speaker 2: Oh that's so sad.
Speaker 1: Isn't it. Then, exactly a week after the carriage ride,
Speaker 1: things started to get strange. That night, Esther and her
Speaker 1: sister Jane were drifting off to sleep when a noise
Speaker 1: from under the bed jolted them awake. At first, they
Speaker 1: thought that it was just a mouse, so they searched
Speaker 1: for it, but found nothing. The same thing happened the
Speaker 1: next night. This time they traced the noise to a
Speaker 1: wooden box filled with patchworks stored under the bed. And
Speaker 1: by patchwork, you're looking at probably things along the lines of,
Speaker 1: you know, making quilts and that sort of thing. So
Speaker 1: so kind of box, right, yeap. When they found this box,
Speaker 1: they were expecting a mouse to scurry out. They pulled
Speaker 1: the box out into the middle of the room and
Speaker 1: waited to see what would happen, seeing if the mouse
Speaker 1: would run to the corner, run under the bed or what.
Speaker 1: And they could try and you know, get it, capture it, whatever.
Speaker 1: And that's when something happened that neither of them could explain.
Speaker 1: The box suddenly leaped into the air, about a foot
Speaker 1: off the ground before landing on its side. No mouse
Speaker 1: and no logical explanation for what just happened. Terrified Jane
Speaker 1: hesitantly set the box back in place, and it immediately
Speaker 1: leapt again into the air. This clearly wasn't a mouse,
Speaker 1: this wasn't a rodent, this wasn't anything natural. Panic set
Speaker 1: in and the girls screamed for their brother in law, Daniel,
Speaker 1: to come into the room. Now, Daniel wasn't exactly thrilled
Speaker 1: about being dragged out of bed in the middle of
Speaker 1: the night, And when Jane and Esther breathlessly told him
Speaker 1: about this mysterious jumping box in the room, he just
Speaker 1: kind of shook his head and chuckled and shoved it
Speaker 1: back onto the bed like nothing had it.
Speaker 2: Didn't believe them, Hey, No.
Speaker 1: Didn't believe them whatsoever. And in all honesty, who's going
Speaker 1: to believe you when you say I have a jumping
Speaker 1: box under my bed?
Speaker 2: Yeah? I feel like most people probably would be very
Speaker 2: skeptical of that.
Speaker 1: Hey, one hundred percent. I would be inquiring as to
Speaker 1: what you drank before bed? Was it niquill? Was it
Speaker 1: something stronger? I don't know.
Speaker 2: Can I have some exactly? Now?
Speaker 1: The girls knew how ridiculous it sounded. They weren't, you know,
Speaker 1: blinded by their own words and perspective. They knew what
Speaker 1: they were saying sounded wild, but they weren't sure what
Speaker 1: they just witnessed themselves. They're like, what, what's going on?
Speaker 1: This wasn't our imagination? Was it?
Speaker 2: Like?
Speaker 1: We're not making this up? Something strange had happened. They
Speaker 1: knew that but whatever it was, it's definitely wasn't over well.
Speaker 2: The fact that both of two people saw it is
Speaker 2: kind of helpful. At least they can kind of lean
Speaker 2: into each other exactly.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Now, the next night things took a much dark turn.
Speaker 1: Esther woke up feeling awful. In the middle of the night.
Speaker 1: She shook Jane awake, panicked, creeping into her voice, She's screaming,
Speaker 1: I'm dying, I'm dying. Jane fumbled the light and trying
Speaker 1: to turn on a lamp, and when she turned she
Speaker 1: saw her sister, and she looked horrible. Esther was now
Speaker 1: standing in the middle of the room, completely rigid. Her
Speaker 1: short hair bristled standing on end as if it electrified.
Speaker 1: Her face was deep red, almost almost the color of blood,
Speaker 1: and her eyes bulged unnaturally, as if they were ready
Speaker 1: to pop out from her sockets. She gripped the back
Speaker 1: of a wooden chair so hard that her nails were
Speaker 1: digging into the wood. Jane screamed for help, and within
Speaker 1: moments the rest of the household rushed into the room.
Speaker 1: They tried to lead Esther back to bed, but she
Speaker 1: fought them off, shrieking in agony, then in a voice
Speaker 1: that was barely human. She gasped, I'm swelling up. I
Speaker 1: know I'm going to burst.
Speaker 2: Oh wow, okay, Right.
Speaker 1: Before the eyes of everyone in that room, her hands
Speaker 1: and face began to swell grotesquely, her skin burning hot
Speaker 1: to the touch. The red drained from her face and
Speaker 1: was now replaced by a deathly pale hue. She writhed
Speaker 1: and gnashed her teeth, her entire entire body ballooning to
Speaker 1: an unnatural size. The family was frozen in horror, unsure
Speaker 1: whether to call a doctor or a priest. Then came
Speaker 1: an explosion. A deafening boom shook the house so loud
Speaker 1: they thought lightning had struck the roof, but when Olive
Speaker 1: peered outside, there was no sign of any storm or
Speaker 1: nothing striking the home.
Speaker 2: Okay, I thought for a second that was Esther the
Speaker 2: big boom.
Speaker 1: I was like, Oh, it definitely wasn't so. Just as
Speaker 1: she turned back inside to look from as from looking outside,
Speaker 1: another blast, this time even loud, rattled the very walls
Speaker 1: of the room they stood in, and just like that,
Speaker 1: Esther collapsed onto the bed. The swelling vanished, her body relaxed,
Speaker 1: and within seconds she was fast asleep, as if nothing
Speaker 1: had happened.
Speaker 2: Holy that can you imagine just like witnessing your loved one?
Speaker 2: Like whatever is going on there?
Speaker 1: Hey, yeah, that's not a picture I think anyone could
Speaker 1: imagine ever seeing, And if it is ever going to
Speaker 1: be possible, no one would want to see that. No,
Speaker 1: so this night was only the beginning. Strange noises soon
Speaker 1: filled the house. Knocking, banging, rustling sounds came from seemingly
Speaker 1: out of nowhere and everywhere, all at once. Four nights
Speaker 1: after Esther's terrifying episode, it happened once again. She swelled up,
Speaker 1: She was screaming in pain, and as soon as she
Speaker 1: laid down, the blankets this time were ripped from her body,
Speaker 1: as if by some unseen force, and they were flung
Speaker 1: into the far corners of the room. Olive, trying to
Speaker 1: comfort her, sister, rushed over and tried to grab these
Speaker 1: blankets and putting them back on her. However, the bedding
Speaker 1: was yanked away from her hands and a second time
Speaker 1: they were thrown. This time a pillow shot from under
Speaker 1: Esther's head and straight into john Ted's face. That wasn't enough.
Speaker 1: That was enough for John He bolted from the room,
Speaker 1: leaving the others to huddle around Esther's bed, physically holding
Speaker 1: blankets down on her to try and keep them in
Speaker 1: place as they were trying to be yanked and thrown
Speaker 1: once again. The chaos went on for minutes before another
Speaker 1: tremendous bang shook the room, just like before. Everything then stopped.
Speaker 1: Esther's body returned to normal, and she drifted into an
Speaker 1: exhausted sleep once again.
Speaker 2: Well, I can only imagine what this is doing to
Speaker 2: her poor little body.
Speaker 1: Hey, ooh, the toll something like this would take ye now.
Speaker 1: The next day a doctor was called in. He arrived
Speaker 1: that evening determined to diagnose whatever mysterious illness was affecting Esther.
Speaker 1: After a brief examination, he concluded that she was simply
Speaker 1: suffering from an extreme nervous excitement, like likely triggered by
Speaker 1: some kind of emotional shock. Nothing supernatural, nothing unusual, Just
Speaker 1: a girl overcome by anxiety. That was his diagnosis when
Speaker 1: he witnessed her. But he didn't witness the act.
Speaker 2: The acts the I'm like, that's not like any anxiety
Speaker 2: I've ever had.
Speaker 1: No, when he was looking at her, when he was
Speaker 1: examining her and you know, diagnosing her, none of these
Speaker 1: supernatural things were occurring. He just simply saw Esther in
Speaker 1: her state of you know, aftermath sort.
Speaker 2: Of thing, right, kind of like how you said she
Speaker 2: was exhausted, tired, and exactly.
Speaker 1: So he's sitting here talking to the family saying, yeah,
Speaker 1: you know what, she's in an emotional shock state. Something
Speaker 1: must have happened. And you told us, you know she
Speaker 1: whatever with the boyfriend. Yeah, so clearly something's going on.
Speaker 1: She's just very anxious. And he's delivering this diagnosis to
Speaker 1: the family and to Esther there presumably as.
Speaker 2: Well, which could be right to some extent too. Oh,
Speaker 2: definitely she did have like that traumatic event. I'm sure
Speaker 2: that gave her some anxiety for sure too.
Speaker 1: Well for sure. However, just as he was delivering this
Speaker 1: diagnosis and speaking on what he's you know, seeing, that's
Speaker 1: when something happened. The pillow that was under Esther's head
Speaker 1: suddenly slid out and without anyone touching it. The doctor
Speaker 1: watched it as the pillow just shot out, but then
Speaker 1: dumbfound it. Before he can even react, the pillow moved
Speaker 1: again and it went right back under her head. John
Speaker 1: reached for it, but as soon as his fingers brushed
Speaker 1: the fabric, it once again jerked away and flew away,
Speaker 1: his hair on his on his head, and arms just
Speaker 1: stood on end, just like before with the static electricity.
Speaker 1: Then came the same banging. Loud insistent pounding echoed through
Speaker 1: the house, shaking the walls as if invisible sledgehammers were
Speaker 1: striking from all sides. The beds, blankets were all ripped away.
Speaker 1: And this time all this was happening right in front
Speaker 1: of the doctor.
Speaker 2: Okay, this is good that it's happening in front of someone.
Speaker 1: Else, right exactly now, the most horrifying moment was yet
Speaker 1: to come. A sharp scratching noise soon filled the room,
Speaker 1: like something was carving into wood. Everyone turned around and
Speaker 1: looked at the wall right above Esther's head, right above
Speaker 1: the headboard of the bed, and there, as if etched
Speaker 1: by an unseen hand, were the chilling words carved on
Speaker 1: the wall saying, quote Esther Cox, you are mine to kill.
Speaker 2: Oh gosh serious, Yeah, this does.
Speaker 1: Not seem real, it doesn't. But this is documented. Shit,
Speaker 1: this is what I mean.
Speaker 2: We are going back quite a way terrifying.
Speaker 1: But there are people who documented these events, claiming to
Speaker 1: have witnessed it, claiming that these things actually occurred. Then
Speaker 1: as if to drive the message home, a chunk of
Speaker 1: plaster tore itself from the wall, flew across the room,
Speaker 1: twisted mid air and changed direction, and then landed neatly
Speaker 1: right at the doctor's feet. The pounding continued, the walls
Speaker 1: trembling as if caught in an earthquake. Esther lay motionless,
Speaker 1: wide eyed with terror in the bed. The others stood frozen,
Speaker 1: helpless against whatever forest had taken hold of their home.
Speaker 1: For two agonizing hours, the nightmare raged on until without warning,
Speaker 1: silence fell. Esther slumped into unconsciousness, sinking into what looked
Speaker 1: like the deepest sleep of her life so far. The
Speaker 1: doctor was present the whole time. He was pale and
Speaker 1: visibly shaken, and had no words for what just happened.
Speaker 1: He couldn't explain what he had witnessed, but he promised
Speaker 1: that he was going to return the next day with
Speaker 1: medicine to try and calm Esther's nerves.
Speaker 2: Oh okay, I feel like they need something more than that.
Speaker 1: Hey, well, what are you gonna do?
Speaker 2: I know he wants to help, but it's like, what
Speaker 2: can he do exactly?
Speaker 1: The next evening, the doctor did return and gave Esther
Speaker 1: a very powerful sedative, hoping that it would put an
Speaker 1: end to whatever was happening. Now that didn't really do anything,
Speaker 1: If anything, honestly, things only got worse.
Speaker 2: I'm actually surprised that he came back, because I feel
Speaker 2: like I'd be like, yeah, i'll see you tomorrow.
Speaker 1: And then never heard from again. Just fuck this shit,
Speaker 1: I'm out sort of situation. Well, I can understand that
Speaker 1: I'd probably be in a similar situation. I would have
Speaker 1: left my shoes in place while I'm running down the path. No,
Speaker 1: just ran right out of them. But that night, the
Speaker 1: banging returned louder and more violent than before. Reports from
Speaker 1: the time claimed that the doctor, as he returned to
Speaker 1: give esther this medicine, had actually even been standing as
Speaker 1: far as two hundred yards away from the house and
Speaker 1: could hear pounding echoing from it. It sounded as if
Speaker 1: someone was on the roof hammering with a sledgehammer, trying
Speaker 1: to break through the shingles. But every time someone checked,
Speaker 1: there was no one there. There's no damage, there's no.
Speaker 2: Ex Okay, I was just going to say, like, there's
Speaker 2: literally no damage to the house.
Speaker 1: No word of all. This quickly spread, and I'm sure
Speaker 1: it did as many people would have been hearing these loud,
Speaker 1: banging clouds coming from the home as well. Soon all
Speaker 1: of Amherst knew that something unexplainable was happening at the
Speaker 1: Teed household. Someone or sorry not someone. People whispered about ghosts.
Speaker 1: They whispered about demons and curses. Meanwhile, the phenomena continued
Speaker 1: for wee and the doctor returned night after night, desperate
Speaker 1: to offer Esther any kind of relief that he could.
Speaker 1: The more time passed, the more the family became convinced
Speaker 1: that whatever was tormenting them wasn't random noise or trick
Speaker 1: of the mind or anything like that. It was clearly
Speaker 1: something conscious. It could hear them and chillingly, it could
Speaker 1: respond okay it was. It seemed to be sentient.
Speaker 2: So is this where they call the priest?
Speaker 1: Well, let me continue. One fact became impossible to ignore.
Speaker 1: It was all connected to Esther somehow, some way. The
Speaker 1: disturbances only happened when she was in the house and
Speaker 1: stopped completely whenever she left. Whatever it was it had
Speaker 1: latched onto her, And by now she had finally told
Speaker 1: her family that yes, you know, this event had happened
Speaker 1: with Bob in the woods. And they all agreed that
Speaker 1: somehow this horrifying event triggered this nightmare that they were
Speaker 1: now living in. But how they had no idea.
Speaker 2: Yeah, because it doesn't really make sense, you know, that
Speaker 2: that would trigger this now as maybe it does, though
Speaker 2: we'll keep listening.
Speaker 1: Well maybe now. As the case garnered notoriety, well respected
Speaker 1: figures came to investigate. One of them was an individual
Speaker 1: by the name of doctor Edwin Clay, a prominent Baptist clergyman.
Speaker 1: Like the medical doctor before him, he witnessed the knockings
Speaker 1: and mysterious wall carving's first hand, and when he left,
Speaker 1: he was fully convinced Esther wasn't faking any of this,
Speaker 1: and her family wasn't helping her pull off some elaborate
Speaker 1: hoax either. He had his own theory, though, He believed
Speaker 1: that the trauma from the carriage ride had turned Esther
Speaker 1: into some kind of human battery. Now, remember we are
Speaker 1: going back to eighteen hundreds here, so like even knowledge
Speaker 1: of electricity at the time was not what we have today.
Speaker 1: So his theory of a human battery is quite far
Speaker 1: out there from our perspective today, but maybe from his
Speaker 1: it wasn't.
Speaker 2: So let me at the time. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so let me explain a little bit here. He
Speaker 1: believed that she turned into some sort of human battery,
Speaker 1: storing energy in a way science couldn't yet explain. So,
Speaker 1: according to him, invisible flashes of lightning were somehow discharging
Speaker 1: from her body, and the loud knocks that they were
Speaker 1: hearing in the home were actually miniature collaps of thunder
Speaker 1: caused by her strange electrical field surrounding her body.
Speaker 2: Okay, wow, I mean this is so far fetched to
Speaker 2: like try to comprehend, right.
Speaker 1: It really is. However, I do want to put it
Speaker 1: in this perspective. When we look at this and say,
Speaker 1: oh my god, that's so far fetched that she's a
Speaker 1: human battery and invisible electricity is shooting out from her
Speaker 1: causing these loud claps of thunder, that is so preposterous
Speaker 1: to think. However, you have to consider we are going
Speaker 1: back to the eighteen hundreds. As I mentioned, people don't
Speaker 1: have the knowledge that we do today. But we do
Speaker 1: have someone looking at unexplainable events and trying to come
Speaker 1: up with an explanation they're trying to debunk, so that
Speaker 1: that is massively important. Yeah, they're not just sitting here
Speaker 1: pointing fingers, which they're not doing like, oh my god,
Speaker 1: it's a ghost. They're saying, hold on, what could be happening?
Speaker 1: So props to them for doing that.
Speaker 2: Totally, Like, yeah, they're really trying to help, which I
Speaker 2: think is great, But they couldn't. They could be onto
Speaker 2: something in the sense of its like energy, right. So yeah,
Speaker 2: I mean, yeah, it's hard to just put yourself in
Speaker 2: these shoes because people don't experience it like this very often.
Speaker 1: No, for sure, And honestly, he's not far off from
Speaker 1: what many people believe poltergeist are today. Like, is the
Speaker 1: traumatic event charging her up with energy and then the
Speaker 1: energy being released into the home. Yeah, that's what many
Speaker 1: people believe poltergeist are today, is that you know, a
Speaker 1: traumatic event and now you are this beacon of energy
Speaker 1: and it's like being released somehow from this trauma.
Speaker 2: Okay, so it is like, actually someone had a traumatic event.
Speaker 1: Generally speaking, yes, not always do don't quote me on.
Speaker 2: That, yeah, but wow, okay, so that yeah, okay, Yeah.
Speaker 1: Now, his his topics and everything turned into lectures on
Speaker 1: the subject, and it drew huge crowds. Now, whether or
Speaker 1: not his theory was correct, he firmly stood by one thing,
Speaker 1: Esther's suffering was in fact real. Others, however, weren't so convinced.
Speaker 1: Some people in town were certain that she was a fraud,
Speaker 1: staging the events for you know, simple attention. Her family,
Speaker 1: of course, fiercely denied this.
Speaker 2: Well, that would not be attention, you would want no.
Speaker 1: But no matter what people believed, the Teed household had
Speaker 1: become a spectacle. Crowds gathered outside, hoping to witness the
Speaker 1: phenomenon for themselves. Some you know, whispered that Esther had
Speaker 1: the power to mesmerize people, making them see and hear
Speaker 1: things that weren't actually there. The situation got so out
Speaker 1: of control, in fact, that the family had to call
Speaker 1: police multiple times just to clear the streets from the
Speaker 1: crowds in front of their home. Meanwhile, belief in something
Speaker 1: truly supernatural was only growing. One night, as Esther lay
Speaker 1: in bed next to Jane, Espra whispered to her that
Speaker 1: she could hear a voice. It wasn't coming from in
Speaker 1: the room, though, but she told her that the voice
Speaker 1: was saying that it had once lived on this earth,
Speaker 1: and it had been dead for many years. Then it
Speaker 1: made a terrifying promise to her. It said that it
Speaker 1: would set the house on fire that very night.
Speaker 2: Oo. Okay, Also, can we just talk about the fact
Speaker 2: that Jane is still sleeping next to her sister, like
Speaker 2: that's that's impressive.
Speaker 1: It really is.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 1: Jane immediately called others into the room, including you know,
Speaker 1: the doctor.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: So, as they debated whether Esther was imagining things, hearing
Speaker 1: these voices that sort of thing, something happened that none
Speaker 1: of them could have predicted. Now, remember when I say
Speaker 1: this is a very well documented case. Okay, so this
Speaker 1: is documented to have occurred. A lit match out of
Speaker 1: nowhere fell from the ceiling and landed on the bed,
Speaker 1: setting the blankets on.
Speaker 2: Fire, just from out of nowhere, from.
Speaker 1: Out of nowhere. Now, many people can argue, sure, maybe
Speaker 1: Esther had some matches, right, and she, when everyone wasn't
Speaker 1: paying attention, lit one and dropped it. And everyone believed
Speaker 1: that a match fell from nowhere. So the flames were
Speaker 1: put out quickly, but within the next ten minutes, eight
Speaker 1: more matches fell from the air, landing on the bed
Speaker 1: and across the room in various locations. Ooh, you can't
Speaker 1: tell me that she lit a total of nine.
Speaker 2: Matches without anyone noticing exactly when really all the attention
Speaker 2: is on her exactly.
Speaker 1: Each one of these little flames from the matches was
Speaker 1: extinguished before causing any sort of serious damage, but there
Speaker 1: was no mistaking the message whatever this entity was meant harm.
Speaker 1: In a desperate attempt to communicate, Daniel began asking the
Speaker 1: spirit some questions and using knocking sounds as a response,
Speaker 1: and he asked, this entity or this spirit, this being,
Speaker 1: or whatever you want to call it, He asked it,
Speaker 1: will the house be set on fire now? According to reports,
Speaker 1: three knocks responded, which signaled yes, yes. Five minutes later,
Speaker 1: a dress belonging to Esther, which had been hanging near
Speaker 1: the door on a nail on the wall, suddenly lifted
Speaker 1: itself in the air, rolled up tightly, and flew under
Speaker 1: the bed, and before anyone could react, the fabric burst
Speaker 1: into flames. The fire was put out before it could spread,
Speaker 1: but the message was clear. This wasn't just a strange
Speaker 1: noise floating pillows anymore. This was something far more dangerous
Speaker 1: that had an intent to clearly not only kill Esther,
Speaker 1: but burn this house down with whoever else was inside.
Speaker 2: Almost like there really wasn't much they could.
Speaker 1: Do, and according to Olive, nothing but the devil could
Speaker 1: have done something so terrible. It wasn't finished with them yet, though.
Speaker 1: Three days later, as Esther and Olive were washing dishes
Speaker 1: in the kitchen, they noticed smoke rising from their cellar.
Speaker 1: Olive rushed downstairs, only to find a barrel engulfed in flames,
Speaker 1: now licking the floorboard joices above them. Panic, the two
Speaker 1: women ran out into the streets, calling for help. Neighbors
Speaker 1: and people around kind of gathered the home and panicked,
Speaker 1: Oh my god. They see the smoke now billowing out,
Speaker 1: And just then a stranger appeared, a man no one recognized.
Speaker 1: Without hesitation, he threw off his coat, sprinted into the
Speaker 1: burning house, and in mere moments he distinguished the fire
Speaker 1: in the cellar. Before anyone could thank him, he was gone.
Speaker 1: He vanished, just as mysteriously as he had arrived. No
Speaker 1: one knew his name, no one recognized him, No one
Speaker 1: knew where he come from or where he had been
Speaker 1: there at that exact moment. He was just there, put
Speaker 1: out the flames, and was never seen from or heard
Speaker 1: from again.
Speaker 2: And this I'm imagining, like it's a small community, they
Speaker 2: would all know each other exactly. Huh, Okay, so they
Speaker 2: maybe have a good spirit or entity on their side.
Speaker 1: Now potentially now By now, the town of Almherst was divided,
Speaker 1: she believed or sorry. Some believed without a doubt that
Speaker 1: an invisible force was in fact haunting Esther. Others were
Speaker 1: convinced still that she was a fraud. The fire marshals
Speaker 1: were among the skeptics, insisting that Esther had set both
Speaker 1: the fires herself. One particularly cruel suggestion floating around town
Speaker 1: was that a good raw hide whipping would put an
Speaker 1: end to her supposed tricks. Holy shit, Yeah, so they're proposing,
Speaker 1: you know, whip her into stopping these things.
Speaker 2: Oh my gosh, are those people like also per evil?
Speaker 1: Probably? Now her family, though never doubted her, they had
Speaker 1: witnessed too much. Still, the fire had crossed a line.
Speaker 1: Esther herself was terrified, claiming that the ghost had shown
Speaker 1: her a vision of a fire now in the attic,
Speaker 1: one that would burn the house down with all of
Speaker 1: them inside. For the safety of their home and their children,
Speaker 1: Olive and Daniel made a heartbreaking decision to ask Esther
Speaker 1: to leave. No Daniel's parting words to his sister in
Speaker 1: law were as follows, I don't turn you out. It
Speaker 1: is the devil of a ghost that drives you from
Speaker 1: our home.
Speaker 2: Where is she supposed to go?
Speaker 1: Well, thankfully she wasn't left to fend for herself. A
Speaker 1: kind hearted local restaurant owner named John White took her
Speaker 1: in for three weeks. She stayed in his home, and
Speaker 1: at first things seemed normal, But then, as if enraged
Speaker 1: by her attempt to escape, the entity struck again. This time,
Speaker 1: objects didn't just move, they disappeared entirely, only to reappear
Speaker 1: somewhere else moments later. One night, while scrubbing the floor,
Speaker 1: a brush vanished from Esther's hands, then suddenly dropped from
Speaker 1: the ceiling, hitting her in the head. Furniture in John
Speaker 1: White's dining saloon reportedly flew across the room, doors were
Speaker 1: torn from their hinges, and heavy objects moved without anything around.
Speaker 1: Witnesses claimed a fifty pound wooden box slid fifteen feet
Speaker 1: across the floor in broad daylight without a single person
Speaker 1: touching it. And then the attacks on Esther became more physical.
Speaker 1: She was slapped, she was scratched, she was hit by
Speaker 1: invisible hands. She was even stabbed. One night, a small
Speaker 1: folding knife appeared from nowhere and plunged into her back.
Speaker 1: John White's son Fred, pulled the knife from her back,
Speaker 1: folded it up, and put it in his pocket, only
Speaker 1: for the knife to vanish from his pocket and reappear,
Speaker 1: stabbing Esther in the back once again in the exact
Speaker 1: same wound.
Speaker 2: Holy shit.
Speaker 1: By now, Esther's case had gained so much attention that
Speaker 1: researchers wanted to study Esther. She agreed without hesitation. She
Speaker 1: had nothing as she was trying to hide, she claimed,
Speaker 1: even going out on tour with a man named Walter Hubble,
Speaker 1: an actor and writer fascinated in the paranormal. Now, thanks
Speaker 1: to his meticulous notes, much of what we know about
Speaker 1: her case today survives. For a time, people paid to
Speaker 1: see her and hear her story. Scientists, skeptics, and believers
Speaker 1: from across Canada and United States came to witness the
Speaker 1: strange happenings for themselves. Many left convinced of what they
Speaker 1: were being told. But the controversy surrounding Esther never faded.
Speaker 1: There were still two sides to this coin one event.
Speaker 1: In fact, tensions even boiled over to a full scale riot.
Speaker 1: Now eventually she returned to Amherst, but whatever wherever she went,
Speaker 1: fires followed her. The final straw came when a barn
Speaker 1: belonging to her employer mysteriously burned to the ground. Whether
Speaker 1: people still believed in ghosts or not, their patients had
Speaker 1: run out. Esther was arrested and charged with arson and
Speaker 1: sentenced to a month in jail. After that, the strange
Speaker 1: occurrences gradually faded away. Esther moved on with her life,
Speaker 1: married twice, and eventually settled in Brockton, Massachusetts. She died
Speaker 1: on November eighth, nineteen twelve, at the age of fifty two.
Speaker 1: To this day, the case of Esther Cox the Great
Speaker 1: Amherst mystery remains an unsolved enigma. Was it an elaborate
Speaker 1: hoax of psychological phenomena or was she truly tormented by
Speaker 1: some sort of unseen force like the devil himself. Skeptics
Speaker 1: dismiss her story, but believers point to the overwhelming number
Speaker 1: of first hand accounts that were very well documented from
Speaker 1: the time. Now, whether it is fraud or fact, one
Speaker 1: thing is undeniable. Esther's story remains one of the most
Speaker 1: well documented and chilling cases of an alleged paranormal activity
Speaker 1: in history. So here we are nearly a century later,
Speaker 1: or more than a century later, I should say, actually,
Speaker 1: and people are still asking the question what really happened
Speaker 1: to Esther? And that's the story of the Great Amherst
Speaker 1: Heist and Esther Cox.
Speaker 2: Huh Okay, Well, I did think it was going to
Speaker 2: end differently. I thought that this demon or whatever you
Speaker 2: want to call it, was gonna take her life.
Speaker 1: For sure. There were no casualties in that manner. I mean,
Speaker 1: there were injuries, there were casualties in that manner, but
Speaker 1: there were no deaths.
Speaker 2: Okay, that is wild, isn't it to just think that
Speaker 2: this happened to somebody? Yeah, because I don't know that.
Speaker 2: It's so far fetched to me to think like it.
Speaker 2: It's believable to me, because why on earth would someone
Speaker 2: you know, ever do that to themselves or how could
Speaker 2: they even do that to themselves to that extent.
Speaker 1: And how could they trick that many people around them?
Speaker 1: You have people not only in one household, in multiple households,
Speaker 1: because she moved in with this guy who this other guy, right, Yep,
Speaker 1: things were happening there. You also have like when she
Speaker 1: was with employers, things happening there. You have reports of
Speaker 1: you know, people being around her and seeing shit from
Speaker 1: doctors to clergymen, like they're witnessing these things. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: you're telling me she fooled every single one of them
Speaker 1: with these very elaborate things that like, how would she
Speaker 1: have made this box move fifteen feet across the room
Speaker 1: with people witnessing it? Is she sitting there with fishing line,
Speaker 1: really strong fishing line? I don't think so.
Speaker 2: Well. Yeah, the people that aren't believing her, I think
Speaker 2: are the people that haven't, like experienced it first had.
Speaker 1: Exactly so, And we have many people claiming these sort
Speaker 1: of things are still happening to this date, not to
Speaker 1: esther in her story, but like their own stories, their
Speaker 1: own hauntings, their own poltergeist, their own events, right. Yeah.
Speaker 1: In fact, one of the ones I can think of
Speaker 1: immediately off the top of my head is Robert the
Speaker 1: doll over in Florida, right right, So he is the
Speaker 1: world's most haunted doll. Allegedly, he's in a museum. You
Speaker 1: have to ask to take a picture of him.
Speaker 2: And if you don't, bad shit happens.
Speaker 1: And they have an entire wall dedicated to people writing
Speaker 1: letters to Robert, begging and pleading for forgiveness because shit
Speaker 1: is happening to them because they didn't ask permission. That
Speaker 1: just gives you chills right now, I do I want
Speaker 1: to say one thing. I am a skeptic person. I
Speaker 1: like to play Devil's advocate. I mean, that's something that
Speaker 1: I would tray often on this podcast is playing that
Speaker 1: Devil's advocate. So to put my devil's advocacy hat on
Speaker 1: for a moment. We are talking about the time of
Speaker 1: the eighteen hundreds here, Okay, so documentation claim from this
Speaker 1: individual right that I said, you know, he came in
Speaker 1: and went on tour with Esther and that's where most
Speaker 1: of the documentation comes from. So he's doing a lot
Speaker 1: of post investigation after the fact. So people may have
Speaker 1: experienced these things let's say weeks ago, maybe even a
Speaker 1: month ago, maybe even two months ago. I don't know,
Speaker 1: but there there's these events that he's talking to people
Speaker 1: after the fact. We all know that after the fact.
Speaker 1: We've heard people blow things out of proportion many a time.
Speaker 2: It kind of escalates in your head.
Speaker 1: So how much of these things this fifty pound box
Speaker 1: flew fifty feet across through or fifteen feet.
Speaker 2: Sorry, I was like, oh, now it's blown fifty feet Well,
Speaker 2: exactly you know, right there.
Speaker 1: Yeah, there's a way it can blow out a proportion
Speaker 1: even accidentally. Oh yeah, so was it really a fifty
Speaker 1: pound box? Maybe it was a box that was empty
Speaker 1: that said fifty pounds on it. Maybe it wasn't fifteen feet,
Speaker 1: maybe it was well, maybe it was only five you know.
Speaker 1: Maybe someone opened a door and then it hit the
Speaker 1: box and then a loud bang. Everyone remembers this loud
Speaker 1: bang from Esther reporting these and they turn around they
Speaker 1: see the box sliding.
Speaker 2: I think there's too much though. I agree too much.
Speaker 1: I agree, but I am just wanting to say, you
Speaker 1: can't tell me that post investigation, like after the fact,
Speaker 1: and all these things are exactly right.
Speaker 2: No, oh yeah, I'm sure things have been.
Speaker 1: Even if you if you want to put it on
Speaker 1: the strong end and you say fifty percent of them
Speaker 1: are over overblown and put out a proportion, that's still
Speaker 1: fifty percent of that information. That is I fucking wi I.
Speaker 2: One thing I kind of have trouble is like how
Speaker 2: it just stopped. You know, is it something that she
Speaker 2: still kind of had to deal with all throughout her
Speaker 2: life but it maybe wasn't as drastic or she just
Speaker 2: kind of like kept it to herself for or what.
Speaker 1: I don't know, because.
Speaker 2: Yeah, just I mean, what made it stop? You know?
Speaker 2: That's that's where my head kind of goes, Like being
Speaker 2: in jail for a month gets stopped.
Speaker 1: Well, if it is this traumatic event causing some sort
Speaker 1: of energy, you know, release in someone's life, let's put
Speaker 1: it that way. You know, it's like it's a built
Speaker 1: up some form of energy, whether you're drawing the energy
Speaker 1: to you or whether you are the source of the
Speaker 1: energy or not. Eventually, Hey, trauma fades. It never leaves entirely,
Speaker 1: but it does fade, you know what I mean with time. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so maybe that's the case. You know, it's like a
Speaker 1: battery over time, it does lose its power and it
Speaker 1: slowly fades off.
Speaker 2: Or she had new trauma now that was overshadowing that
Speaker 2: other one that started this. I don't know.
Speaker 1: Maybe, I mean, she did get arrested for these events
Speaker 1: that maybe weren't her fault, and she went to jail
Speaker 1: for it.
Speaker 2: M hm.
Speaker 1: So maybe that was like something that she psychologically was
Speaker 1: able to shut it down. Who knows. Wow, Okay, people
Speaker 1: still don't know and understand what poltergeist truly are and
Speaker 1: what truly causes them. However, there is a lot of
Speaker 1: real documentation out there, including this case and many more,
Speaker 1: that suggests they are very real phenomena.
Speaker 2: And it's still even happening to this date, right, Like, yes,
Speaker 2: not just all from back then.
Speaker 1: Yes, Okay, you have people today, Like I guarantee you
Speaker 1: there are houses on the market right fucking now because
Speaker 1: people want out.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's just terrifying. Hey to think, I know, but
Speaker 2: I guess we can't live our life being scared of
Speaker 2: the unknown like that.
Speaker 1: No, you always got to take the leap, right, don't
Speaker 1: be scared of the unknown. Anyways, this was a bit
Speaker 1: of a different story. I thought it'd be fun to
Speaker 1: do something a little bit different. We've once in a
Speaker 1: while had been doing a little more paranormal here and there,
Speaker 1: just for fun seats, and I thought, you know what,
Speaker 1: now's a good time throwing in there.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it was super interesting. I just had the thought,
Speaker 2: like we almost thought about buying a house that was
Speaker 2: probably definitely.
Speaker 1: Haunted, probably definitely. Yeah, it would have been a lot
Speaker 1: of work, was the problem. It was a like what
Speaker 1: was it nineteen twenty I think or something like.
Speaker 2: That, something like that. It was stunning and it needed
Speaker 2: so much work.
Speaker 1: It was like an abandoned house, good bones, but like
Speaker 1: everything about it needed work. And it would have been
Speaker 1: several hundred thousand dollars to get this thing back up
Speaker 1: to par and yeah, it was just a little too
Speaker 1: much of a project.
Speaker 2: Well and then imagine putting all that money in there
Speaker 2: and then you do find out it's haunted.
Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, yeah, but like this house, like it even
Speaker 1: had a carriage house out back. And when we think
Speaker 1: of carriage house, we think of like, oh, like a
Speaker 1: little like house for you know, like like an airbean
Speaker 1: be or something. Yeah, or yeah, you know, like for
Speaker 1: guests and stuff. Now this was literally a house to
Speaker 1: park your horse and carriage in. It was a carriage house.
Speaker 1: It was where you housed your carriage.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it was wild, but it was really cool though. Yeah,
Speaker 1: So thank you for being here. Hopefully enjoyed that. And
Speaker 1: let us know what you think about the paranormal and
Speaker 1: maybe you think this was a little bit of a
Speaker 1: little bullshit and maybe you think it was totally real.
Speaker 1: Just a message. We'd love to hear your opinion. All
Speaker 1: our links are in the description of the podcast, and
Speaker 1: we appreciate you being here. Because of you, we get
Speaker 1: to do what we want for a living on this podcast.
Speaker 1: We're completely independent. We research, we write, we do it
Speaker 1: all on our own, and because you're here, we get
Speaker 1: to do that. So thank you so much.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we really can't thank you enough.
Speaker 1: We really can't.
Speaker 2: We can't.
Speaker 1: We can't, can we we.
Speaker 2: Can't, No, we can't.
Speaker 1: All right, thanks for being here, and until next time,
Speaker 1: stay wicked.