I could barely sleep that night. It was an excitement much like a four-year-old on Christmas Eve. I dreamed of roads, houses, and history that all had to do with Charleston. During the drive there, I felt as if we were going home. And as we took in the marshlands and plantations along our route, Chuck’s energy became lighter and happier.
“This all looks familiar to me,” he kept saying over and over.
“Me too,” I said with a smile. I knew that Poe was sitting in the backseat of the car looking all smug, so I didn’t dare turn around and give him any satisfaction.
Once we crossed over the New Cooper River Bridge that led us to Charleston, I was filled with emotions ranging from excitement to anticipation. We immediately found our hotel, tucked away on a quiet street only a block from the waterfront and an easy stroll to the City Market and the Battery. I had chosen the Anchorage Inn, which was located in Charleston’s historic French Quarter district. Originally built as a cotton warehouse in 1840, it was turned into a B & B in 1991, and it had no references to hauntings on any websites. I was trying to keep my end of the bargain. Although I was a ghost magnet and had an entourage of spirit guides with me, I could only keep the promise going so far.
After checking into our hotel, we raced into the town to catch our horse and carriage history tour. As soon as we parked and I looked around at the marketplace, I began to sniffle. I looked over at Chuck to see if he had the same emotion and was instead met with an odd stiffness, like preparing to go in front of family that you haven’t seen since an argument. It was only 10:00 o’clock in the morning, but the temperatures were already beginning to heat up, and being that both Chuck and I were animal lovers we thought about canceling as we couldn’t get over the fact that the poor horses would have to carry us through the streets in the heat. But we ended up going anyhow after the tour company promised us that they would stop several times to give them water and some rest in the shade.
As we began down the brick streets, our guide gave us a bit of Charleston history. And both Chuck and I began to tear up. It was hard to explain, but we knew we were home. Not of this lifetime, but another.
In 1670, a group of British settlers arrived at the tip end of the Charleston peninsula, which today is referred to as Battery Park. Within just a few years, the settlers began to construct the charming city that was originally called Charles Town to honor England’s Charles II. It became one of America’s leading cities.
At that same time, pirates began to take advantage of the waterways. One of the most infamous, Blackbeard, earned a reputation as a ruthless pirate. He terrorized sailors and ambushed passenger and cargo ships. Many times the crew would simply surrender without a fight. The time was duly referred to as the reign of terror. The climax of Blackbeard’s reign of terror was in May 1718, when Blackbeard held a weeklong blockade at the port in Charleston, South Carolina. Blackbeard commanded over 400 pirates and several ships of which he lined up across the bay in Charleston. For several weeks he held the city hostage, demanding food, money, and supplies. Legend had it that Blackbeard had a dramatic flair and would dress as a woman, high heels and all, and go into town.
Following the reign of terror on Charleston, Blackbeard surprisingly surrendered and promised to stop his criminal ways. He married his fourteenth wife and took up residency in the Outer Banks of North Carolina, but it wasn’t long before he was back at his pirate ways, frightening sailors enough that they wouldn’t take to sea. He was finally captured and killed at sea in the Outer Banks.
Besides the pirates, the military and the shipping industry took advantage of Charleston’s prime location of rivers and its proximity to the Atlantic Ocean. They utilized it for slave trade and rice shipments. In 1861, the first shots of the Civil War were fired off the peninsula at Fort Sumter.
Today, Charleston is known for paper and cigar manufacturing. Its rich history and architecture make it a tourism gem. With an eclectic culture, Charleston is also known for being one of the friendliest cities in America.
As the carriage rounded the corner, it came to a complete stop at Battery Park, also known as White Point. On one side of the street stood stunning mansions overlooking the park with cascading palmettos and large oak trees, cannons from the Civil War, and the waterway. The guide further pointed out that White Point was where dozens of pirates were hanged from oak trees and gallows in the early 1700s and left dangling from their nooses for days to try to scare off other potential pirates. But it wasn’t the potential pirate hauntings that caught my attention, but one particular mansion. She stood in all of her glory, hidden ever slightly by amazing landscaping and gardens. Honeysuckle vines dressed the wrought iron fence that protected her from tourists. Before I could say anything, the carriage was on to its next destination. I was caught up in my thoughts when the guide’s next words caught my attention.
“And right over there is Fort Sumter, well-known to any Edgar Allan Poe fans. This was where he was stationed.”
How didn’t I realize that? I thought. Poe did have a Charleston connection. And here I was just indulging in my own past life not realizing that there might be dots to be connected. I would have to come clean with Chuck. Although not a psychic, he had great intuition and good detective skills. And he believed in me.
The history tour continued for over an hour and let us out right where we began. I went over and gave our horses a final pat goodbye when the company announced they were going to close for the rest of the day because of the high temperatures. All I could think was that I almost chose a later time, and something told me to book it early. Was it pure luck or universal synchronicity?
“What now?” Chuck asked, looking around, as if soaking everything into his memory.
“Let’s do lunch and go shopping, then maybe a nap so that we aren’t dead for tonight’s ghost tour. No pun.”
Chuck grinned and grabbed my hand as we walked around the center of town. We finally agreed on a small diner that offered sandwiches with thick, homemade bread, cold cuts, and freshly grown tomatoes.
A large black lady with rosy cheeks smiled wide at me across the counter. “Welcome home, Kristy!” She was an older woman with her hair held tight with a hair net and she came around the counter and offered me a welcoming hug. Her drawl was mixed with a Jamaican and Southern accent. She simply smiled at me, said she was happy to see me, and went back across the counter.
“Excuse me?” I asked, looking at Chuck to see if he was paying any attention, but he was busy studying the menu.
“What can I get you?” She continued smiling warmly at me.
I slowly shook my head, sure that I must’ve imagined it. I ordered a ham with cheddar cheese on white bread with tomatoes and Chuck ordered corned beef with coleslaw.
“Did you hear her?” I whispered, looking over my large lemonade.
“Yep, she knew your name,” my husband nonchalantly said, as if it were no big deal. “Kristy, stop trying to figure it all out.”
“Did you say my name when we came in?”
Chuck gave me a warning look and just shook his head. “Nothing surprises me with you anymore, I don’t know why it does you,” he laughed.
Maybe he was right, but to feel as if I was plopped in the middle of a Twilight Zone episode was freaking me out just a tad.
When she delivered the food to our small two-person table, she still wore her huge smile. “I’m Rose, if you need anything else.” And as I ate, I watched her with the other customers. Although she was friendly, her smile wasn’t as large nor did she call them by name, and she certainly didn’t come around from the counter to give any of them a hug.
It was the best sandwich since my mom made me a similar one years ago before her passing. Something I missed badly about my mom—her cooking. As we were throwing our crumbs and napkins away in the wastebasket,
Rose called out a southern goodbye to us, but added my name again. Only my name. I looked her in the eyes and smiled my farewell.
The moment we stepped out into the street the sweat started to pour down our foreheads, so we decided to stroll through City Market, four blocks of an open market with vendors selling sweet grass baskets, jewelry, and everything in between. We found some prints of Charleston that we purchased along with some postcards to send to the kids. I chatted with several of the vendors who were curious as to where my accent was from.
At one point, I felt as if I was being watched and looked up to see a seated heavy lady dressed in a floral-patterned sundress and large brimmed hat staring at me. Sweet grass baskets and palmetto flowers were her expertise. I smiled and nodded at her, but she continued to stare at me with what seemed to be a knowing. Finally, after what felt like ages, she broke into a smile that felt reminiscent of a pained friend who felt abandoned but couldn’t hold on to the anger for fear of losing the love. I smiled back, tears forming in both of our eyes. I stopped to compliment her on her gift. She simply continued smiling as if to say that I had finally returned home. After an hour of perusing trinkets and knickknacks, we grabbed a Coke and decided to make our way back to the water and find some shade to sit. Every so often I checked to see if Poe was with me, but I didn’t see him, nor did I see Alto, and I wondered what trouble they might be causing.
As we walked, without any map in hand or knowledge or direction as to where we were going, we came upon a graveyard. Large trees acted as a canopy from the heat and the bright sunshine, so we snuck away to take some photos. When we heard a roll of thunder in the distance, we glanced at one another and laughed at the spooky irony. But before we could even decide on what to do, lightning lit up the sky and the thunder grew more intense. Rain didn’t fall, but the loud rumbling in the heavens made for quite the atmosphere as I perused gravestones of those I believed to be my ancestors from a life undocumented. Was it perhaps a sign or was I overdramatizing it? We continued on our journey through the graveyard that almost appeared to be abandoned with its tall grass and out-of-control shrubs. After exploring, we decided to head toward the park.
Just as we found the park, the storm intensified and we found ourselves sitting on an aluminum bench in a haunted park under a bunch of trees. Not the smartest place to be in a storm, but it lasted mere moments. We watched as the dark clouds blew out to sea and we were left once more with bright sunshine and an awful humidity.
“I think our house is around here,” I said simply and with confidence.
“I think so, too. Shall we look?”
I nodded. I couldn’t tell if Chuck was just trying to appease me or if he was truly feeling the past life connection, and I didn’t much care to debate it. We began to walk hand in hand, carefully examining each mansion and checking in with my intuition. I knew that the house I was looking for didn’t have a clear view of the water, but that the park was in front of it, so it helped to limit our search. I felt pulled to an antebellum mansion on Broad Street and instead of feeling satisfied, I began to cry with a soul ache that spanned lifetimes. Chuck just held me.
“I’d like to find out the history of this house,” I said. And just as I finished the sentence a woman, who had on a shirt representing a local tour, passed by and offered us a suggestion of how to go about doing that.
I didn’t want to appear too crazy, but I started rambling about a past life, and she nodded and smiled. “I get it. That is why I moved here from New York. I get it.” She wished us luck and continued on.
I jotted down the address and snapped a photo. Then we decided to head back to the hotel and take a nap, catch dinner, and then await the ghost tour.
Walking along the waterfront toward our inn, I felt a pull across the waterway where the tour guide had pointed out Fort Sumter.
“Reynolds,” the wind whispered.
I whipped around to see if someone was around me, namely Poe, but saw nobody in human or spirit form except for Chuck, who was sitting on a park bench taking photos of a squirrel that was eating someone’s throwaway lunch.
I shrugged, thinking I was possibly energy raw from the past few days. I joined my husband and we began walking again, hand in hand, enjoying the salt air and warm breeze when I once again heard the name called out. This time it came out teasing and sing-songy, but again, nobody was there. I shook my head, wondering if I just needed to see a doctor when I returned home—either a psychologist or a neurologist or both.
Between the tears and the varied emotions, I dozed quickly into a soundless nap and woke up to my alarm. After a hot shower and a change of clothes, we made our way to the entrance of the ghost tour. Now, even though I give ghost tours myself and I am a medium, I like to go more for the history of the haunt, and not necessarily to see anything. In fact, it was rare that I ever saw anything on these types of tours.
We met up with the tour guide, who was all decked out in costume and carrying a gas lantern, along with a handful of people, including one woman who was just plain pissed off that her kids talked her into going.
“There’s no such thing as ghosts,” she exclaimed two dozen or more times until another on the tour finally told her to either join us or shut up. And surprisingly it wasn’t Chuck! She quieted, but her energy was dark and her eyes continued to roll around in her head as our tour guide dramatically told the stories.
The guide first took us into two alleyways. The first narrow, cobblestone alleyway was where Colonial and Revolutionary men would fight with pistols and swords to their death. The last was named Lodge Alley after the Freemasons and was paved with Belgian blocks. It allowed access for sailors to and from their homes and the wharf. As I listened to the guide’s tales, I could feel a presence in Lodge Alley and felt the need to snap a photo when the lady who continued to spout that ghosts were figments of anyone’s imagination yelped.
“Someone pushed me!”
But she stood there alone, arms crossed and with a scowl on her face. When I looked at my photos, it told another story. Right next to the woman was a dark shadow with what looked like a trench coat and top hat on, possibly trying to prove to her once and for all that there was something more out there than what meets the eye. She and her kids promptly left the tour. I also recognized the dark shadow to be none other than my mischievous spirit guide, Edgar Allan Poe.
I was snickering (I know, probably not nice) when the tour guide asked to see my photo, and then Chuck decided to announce to her that I was a medium. She had probably heard that a time or two and didn’t seem impressed, but we chatted about psychic experiences as we made it to our final stop—the gates of the Unitarian Cemetery.
The Unitarian Cemetery is notably haunted, and although the legends and lore vary with each storyteller, the person haunting the cemetery remains the same—Annabel Lee.
The legend begins before the Civil War when a Virginia sailor stationed in Charleston, South Carolina, met a local Charleston girl named Annabel Lee Revanel. They quickly fell in love, which dismayed Annabel’s father, who forbade Annabel to see the sailor because he was from the North. So, Annabel would sneak out to meet the sailor in the secluded Unitarian Cemetery. Their secret meetings continued until one day Annabel’s father grew suspicious and followed his daughter. Enraged at the unavowed romance, he locked Annabel in her room for several months, making any further meeting impossible. The sailor was devastated.
It was just a few months later when the sailor received a letter from a comrade who knew of his romance, letting him know that Annabel died from yellow fever. He made plans at once to attend the funeral, to give his love a final goodbye. Annabel’s father, however, blamed the sailor for the death of his daughter, for if it weren’t for that sailor he would’ve never had to lock her away and therefore she would’ve not gotten sick. In a gesture of revenge, knowing that the sailor would return and attempt to visit the cemetery and gravesite of his daughter, he ordered that there be six graves dug up in the family plot so when the sailor arrived he wouldn’t know exactly where his true love lay.
The sailor returned to the cemetery on the day of the funeral to find that his love’s father hired guards. So he went to the local tavern awaiting his time to give his final farewell. Once the memorial was over and everyone departed, he went into the cemetery to find the act of vengeance and he left with despair and sadness.
The sailor? Edgar Allan Poe. The poem he would later write was “Annabel Lee.”
As the guide finished her tale, a silent cat caught our attention. Lying on top of the roof, he simply listened to the story, his paws stretched out and looking bored. We all laughed at the odd sight. The guide wished us well and pointed toward our lodging. I was still stuck on the story, wondering why Poe wouldn’t have told me about the legend and if perhaps this had something to do with why he urged us to come.
What now? I wondered. What did it all mean, and what was I supposed to do with the information? I looked to see the tour guide standing there looking out over the cemetery, next to her was Poe, sentimentally gazing, and the cat had climbed down from the rooftop and was standing in the alleyway inside the cemetery.
I sat down on the step and shivered as the night wrapped around me.
“You cold?” Chuck asked, putting his arm around me in a protective way.
“No, not cold,” I mumbled, confused.
Chuck raised an eyebrow in question. Chuck knew that our adventure dealt with past lives, our past lives, but he was unaware of the Edgar Allan Poe connection. He knew how much I loved Poe’s work, and he knew who most of my guides were, but he didn’t know that Poe was included in my crazy group. And honestly, how does one start that conversation?
“Do you think … ? No, it’s silly to think … ” The tour guide caught me off guard.
The cat slinked from the back alley of the cemetery and sat just a few feet from us, as if joining in on the conversation.
The tour guide walked slowly to us, the cat unmoving. “You know, I tell this story every night, and every single night during the same story a cat joins in. I’ve been doing this tour for years. It isn’t always the same cat, but a cat nonetheless. I have always wondered if it was perhaps … you’ll think this is crazy,” she laughed.
“Honestly, I won’t think it’s crazy.”
“Do you think this is Poe? I don’t know why I never think it is Annabel, but I don’t. Do you think it is Poe?” she asked again.
I nodded. I did. I didn’t believe that he was the reincarnated cat, but I believed his spirit visited within the cat. Poe sat on the park bench outside the cemetery gates now and the cat noticed him, walked over, and rubbed against his legs. Poe bent down and petted the cat, looked over at me, and nodded in agreement. He said, “I wish I could write as mysterious as a cat.” Then, he grinned mischievously at me. Poe loved animals and even had his own cat with his wife Virginia that he doted on, believed to be a tortoiseshell, named Catterina.
“Yeah, it makes a whole lot of sense.”
The cat, finally bored with the conversation, walked over to the gateway to the moonlit cemetery. It turned as if to say goodbye then disappeared into the night.
A fog slowly began to cascade along Archdale Street and we took that as a sign to walk back. The streets were completely empty as the three of us, deep in thought, made our way back to town. I gave in to temptation and looked back only to see the cat sitting in the center of the brick-laid street, watching, and Poe gone.
“Funny since that was the cemetery the storm began in earlier, huh?” Chuck pondered.
I could only nod.
Chuck and I said our final goodbye to our guide and made our way back to the hotel, walking in silence until we walked back into our room.
“Got something to tell me about Edgar Allan Poe, Kristy?”
“He’s a fine literary figure from our past?” I smiled, trying to look innocent.
“And anything else?”
“There’s more, that is for sure, but I need to try and put it together. I promise I will share, just not right now.”
Chuck was quite intuitive, although he would never claim to have a psychic ability. It was the intuitive bond that we both had that made our relationship strong, and sometimes even annoying.
“I don’t have a mind of my own!” Chuck would cry after I finished his thoughts out loud.
I would just shrug and laugh. But the Edgar Allan Poe part of my life, although I felt bad that I was keeping it under wraps, had to stay secret. I was still trying to connect more dots.
We both climbed in our pajamas and snuggled up in the ivory lace canopy bed that looked out over the cobblestone streets of Charleston and fell fast asleep.
Chuck and I stayed only one night in Charleston. That twenty-four hours helped put to rest some questions that were deep within my soul, but they replaced them with even more. The only disappointment was the length of time it took for me to listen to the song within my soul. Poe had led me to Chuck. He had led me to Baltimore, Asheville, and now Charleston. And although I felt at home here, I felt unsettled to know that I would have to leave without all of the answers.
On the ride home I continued to remind Chuck that I had kept my promise. We didn’t have any haunted experiences at the hotel. He just rolled his eyes in response to me.
Annabel Lee
Edgar Allan Poe
It was many and many a year ago,
In a kingdom by the sea,
That a maiden there lived whom you may know
By the name of Annabel Lee;—
And this maiden she lived with no other thought
Than to love and be loved by me.
I was a child and she was a child,
In this kingdom by the sea;
But we loved with a love that was more than love—
I and my Annabel Lee—
With a love that the wingéd seraphs in Heaven
Coveted her and me.
And this was the reason that, long ago,
In this kingdom by the sea,
A wind blew out of a cloud chilling
My beautiful Annabel Lee;
So that her high-born kinsman came
And bore her away from me,
To shut her up, in a sepulchre,
In this kingdom by the sea.
The angels, not half so happy in Heaven,
Went envying her and me—
Yes!—that was the reason (as all men know,
In this kingdom by the sea)
That the wind came out of the cloud by night,
Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee.
But our love it was stronger by far than the love
Of those who were older than we—
Of many far wiser than we—
And neither the angels in Heaven above,
Nor the demons down under the sea,
Can ever dissever my soul from the soul
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee:—
For the moon never beams, without bringing me dream
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And the stars never rise, but I feel the bright eyes
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee:—
And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side
Of my darling—my darling—my life and my bride,
In her sepulchre there by the sea—
In her tomb by the sounding sea.