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SITE-GEIST

The word Zeitgeist, of German origin, means “the spirit of the time.” Site-geist is a word we invented to mean the spirit of the location.

When dealing with a place like the Franklin Castle, where paranormal activity is said to occur, it’s appropriate to inquire about the history of the location and what happened there. Many believe that past events, trapped at a place in time, may cause a “residual haunting” or create an emotional presence. An example that comes to mind is the battlefield at Gettysburg.

Some have wondered if the Tiedemann house was built on an Indian burial ground. That is unknown but seems unlikely, as no remains have ever been located during any excavation on the site. The closest known Native American burial ground rests near the intersection of Lorain Avenue and Gehring Street, across from the West Side Market.

The known history of the Franklin Castle property begins when it was surveyed as part of the Connecticut Western Reserve. A large tract of land, originally part of Brooklyn Township, then known as Ohio City, was purchased in 1850 by Jacob Perkins, a son of surveyor Simon Perkins. His property was designated as the Jacob Perkins Subdivision. This contained Lot 94, an oddly-shaped triangular parcel on which Hannes Tiedemann would one day build.

Perhaps it was because of its strange shape, but it took Jacob Perkins ten years to find a buyer for Lot 94, a Canadian named Alfred Wolverton.

Alfred Wolverton’s father, Enos, was born in New York State in 1810, and seven years later, Enos moved with his family to Huron County, Ohio, where his father, Robert, ran a stage line from Sandusky to Cleveland. The family migrated to Michigan in 1825 and immigrated to Ontario, Canada, in 1826, where Enos married Harriet Newell Towl in 1834. They had two girls, Roseltha and Melissa, and five boys: Alfred, Daniel, Alonzo, Jasper and Newton. They settled in Blenheim Township, Oxford County, where the village of Wolverton was later named for them.

In 1855, Enos built a magnificent three-story brick house named Wolverton Hall, which had fourteen rooms and was adorned with a cupola. He also purchased one thousand acres of timber land in Walsingham Township, Norfolk County, and built a large steam sawmill. His wife, Harriet, died unexpectedly in 1856, and shortly thereafter, the general economy collapsed. Enos rented out Wolverton Hall and took his family to Walsingham to run his lumber business. Tragedy struck again in 1858, when his son Daniel was killed in a lumbering accident.

During that time, Enos Wolverton was selling lumber across the lake in Cleveland to a company called Thatcher, Burt and Company. Traveling there on a trip with his father, Alfred thought it a wonderful place to receive an education. Unlike the village of Wolverton, there were no schools in the lumber woods of Walsingham, so in 1858, Alfred and Jasper Wolverton were sent to Cleveland for their education.

April 1860 found Alfred and Jasper at the head of their class at Eagle Street Grammar School and looking to attend West High School in the fall. They’d been living in a boardinghouse but planned to build a home. At the end of the school term, they were joined by their youngest brother, Newton. Alfred spent much of his time looking for a site on which to build. One of the salesmen at Thatcher, Burt and Company, a retired lake captain named Joseph J. Cartwright, told Alfred of some lots that were available just up the road from his own home on Franklin Street. That July, the oddly shaped Lot 94 was purchased by Alfred Wolverton for $500, and construction commenced.

Enos Wolverton shipped the lumber for the project to Cleveland, where Thatcher, Burt and Company received, unloaded and delivered the materials to the building site. The house would be a two-story frame home with clapboard siding and wood shake roofing shingles. Another structure being erected was a sizable carriage house at the northwest corner of the property, just behind the home. Joining the Wolvertons that fall was their brother Alonzo, who stayed through the winter before retuning to Ontario to help his father in the lumber mill.

By winter, the house was taking shape and, although not completed, was habitable. Also residing at the new house was their former housekeeper from Ontario, Mrs. Grimes, who, like Alonzo, also remained until the following spring. The Wolverton boys had dubbed the house Bachelors’ Hall, and it bore the address 283 Franklin Street. Construction on the house was piecemeal and took time. This was because the boys were full-time students and part-time builders.

In May 1861, Alfred and Jasper Wolverton were at the top of their classes at West High School; their brother Newton had been named valedictorian at Eagle Street Grammar School.

That April, the Civil War began, and money was growing tight. The Wolvertons had invested much into their house on Franklin and decided that enlisting with the Union army would be a great way to earn some money to continue their educations. Most agreed the war wouldn’t last longer than a month or so, and the boys believed they’d be back in their classrooms that fall. On July 21, 1861, Alfred, Jasper and fifteen-year-old Newton Wolverton enlisted with thirty-five other men. They were attached temporarily to the Fiftieth New York Infantry and sent to Washington, D.C. Once there, they were transferred to the quartermaster’s department as teamsters.

Shortly after his three brothers enlisted, Alonzo returned to Cleveland to finish the house they’d been building on Franklin. After completing the house, Alonzo visited his brothers in Washington and took employment with the quartermaster’s department. Throughout the summer, Alfred sent money back to Cleveland to a friend named Alexander L. Beswick, who made payments in his name to help settle debts that arose from building Bachelors’ Hall.

A slightly fictionalized account of the Wolvertons’ lives in Cleveland and the army can be found in the book Four Went to the Civil War by Lois E. Darroch, Alonzo Wolverton’s granddaughter. This book is mostly composed of the brothers’ letters to their sister Roseltha and offers a good picture of Cleveland at the time, as well as certain events of the war. Another good source is the book Dr. Newton Wolverton, an Intimate Anecdotal Biography of One of the Most Colorful Characters in Canadian History, written by Newton’s son, Alfred N. Wolverton.

Just a few months after enlisting, seventeen-year-old Jasper Wolverton died from typhoid fever on October 12, 1861. Alfred was given a furlough and took Jasper’s body back to Canada for burial.

Around that time occurred an incident known as the Trent Affair, in which a Union gunboat, the USS San Jacinto, stopped a British vessel named the Trent and removed from it two Confederate emissaries. Pressure was put on President Lincoln to declare war on Great Britain, as it appeared to some that the British were aiding the South. This greatly concerned the nearly fifty thousand Canadians serving with the Union army. A war with Britain meant war with Canada. Fearing war, these Canadians sent the now sixteen-year-old Newton to meet with President Lincoln to voice their concerns.

Newton Wolverton, circa 1877, and Alonzo Wolverton, date unknown. Courtesy of the Archives of Ontario and Cristine Bayly.

“Mr. Wolverton,” the president told him, “I wish you to go back to your boys and tell them that Abraham Lincoln appreciates the value of their service, and that so long as Abraham Lincoln is president, the United States will not declare war on Britain.” The president was true to his word.

During the Civil War, disease killed more soldiers than combat. Such was the case with twenty-four-year-old Alfred Wolverton, who died at Kalaranna Hospital in Washington, D.C., on April 24, 1863, from smallpox. Newton had visited him that morning, but when he returned in the evening, he was told that Alfred was dead and buried. Smallpox victims were interred as quickly as possible. Originally interred at Columbian Harmony Cemetery, a paupers’ graveyard, Newton orchestrated Alfred’s reburial in Glenwood Cemetery, in grave no. 67, with a beautiful cedar tree and stone at his head.

Newton stayed in Washington for a brief time after his enlistment expired. During that time, he became acquainted with another boarder at the rooming house where he resided, the noted actor John Wilkes Booth.

Following Alfred’s death, Alonzo received a letter from his father asking if he’d done anything about the Franklin Street property, selling or exchanging part of it, to make it square. As previously stated, it was an oddly shaped lot, narrow in the front and wide in the back. The answer to his father’s question was no. He’d leave that to the next owners to correct.

On June 29, 1863, Newton left Washington, returning home to Ontario, where he served as an officer with the Twenty-Second Oxford Rifles. While enlisted in this militia, Newton was stationed in nearby Woodstock, Ontario, and befriended a man from Ohio who was working for the railroad named Thomas Edison.

That fall, Alonzo traveled back to Cleveland, where he briefly resided at the Franklin Street house. During his stay, he purchased the property from his brother Newton, his sisters Roseltha and Melissa and their respective husbands. The following January, he enlisted with the Twentieth Independent Battery, Ohio Light Artillery. He was captured in combat but escaped. That October occurred a skirmish in Dalton, Georgia, where again he was taken prisoner and held at Villanow, Georgia. He was paroled after signing a form stating that he would never take up arms against the Confederacy, though neither side tended to honor such agreements.

On November 30, 1864, came the battle at Franklin, Tennessee. Although it only lasted a few hours, there were many casualties. Among those injured was Alonzo. One shot grazed his left cheek, and another struck him in the leg. Despite these injuries, he remained on active duty.

Two weeks later occurred the battle of Nashville, Tennessee, where again Alonzo distinguished himself. The next day, he was promoted from corporal to second lieutenant and reassigned to the Ninth U.S. Colored Heavy Artillery, Company D, where he remained until receiving his discharge on August 2, 1865.

In April 1865 came the news that President Lincoln had been assassinated. This greatly upset Newton Wolverton, as it was President Lincoln who’d assured him that the United States wouldn’t declare war on Canada or Great Britain. To make matters worse, the president’s assassin was Newton’s former neighbor, John Wilkes Booth.

Word spread that Booth might try to seek refuge in Canada. Newton was contacted by U.S. and Canadian officials and was requested to come to the border to inspect people crossing into Canada. Newton would have no trouble identifying Booth. He arrived at the border to learn that Booth had already been killed.

Newton became a Baptist minister and taught mathematics at Woodstock College. He worked briefly in Brantford, Ontario, where he befriended Alexander Graham Bell and assisted him in his workshop. Newton established a meteorological observatory and later became president of a black Baptist college in Texas. Today, Newton Wolverton is recognized as the father of modern meteorology in Canada. He died on January 31, 1932, in Vancouver, British Columbia.

After receiving his discharge, Alonzo Wolverton returned to Cleveland and stayed for two and a half months. The Franklin Street house was now empty. Gone were the sounds of laughter and the happy times that he’d spent with his brothers in a city that changed their futures. There was nothing left for him but somber memories of times long ago.

Alonzo Wolverton sold Bachelors’ Hall and returned to Ontario, where he married, raised a family and worked in his father’s lumber trade. He died at Wolverton Hall in 1925.

This is quite a surprising back story about one little property on what was just a small street that ran along a sandy ridge in Cleveland—odd that none of it has ever been mentioned in relation to tales of the Franklin Castle until now.