Around 1740 to 1770 there lived a farmer named Sigurd Björnsson at Hleidrargaard (Hleiðargarður, private) on Oefjord. He was thought a reasonable man, but very forceful.
People told that when he was young he once rode westward to the glacier to buy fish. It happened that he and the man from whom he bought the fish could not agree. The result was an argument that soon became a fight. Sigurd was a strong man, so it was no pleasure to be subject to his fists. He was able to throw his opponent to the ground, where he gave him a pair of blows. When the other man got up, he made threats against Sigurd, promising him earned reward before the next equinox; Sigurd then went on his way, returning home with his comrades where he remained on his farm.
At that time there lived a man named Hall at Krynarstad (Krónustaðir, private), the farm next to Hleidrargaard. He was known as Hall the Strong. He was a psychic, having often seen ghosts and having had dealings with them. It is said that in the fall following the summer when Sigurd returned home from his trip, Hall stood in his yard. He saw a ghost in the form of a maid coming along the road. She was small, wore a red bodice and dark brown skirt reaching just to her knees, a cap with no tassel and a casual shirt.
When the maid saw Hall, she tried to avoid him. But he stood in her path and asked who she was. She told him that she was called Sigga. He asked where she came from and where she was going. She answered, “To Hleidrargaard”.
“And what business do you have there?”
“To kill Sigurd Björnsson,” she answered. She then went on her way, leaving a trail of sparks as she went.
That same evening, Sigurd was asleep in his bed, which stood where a window was above it. The rest of the household was awake and in the bath chamber. Suddenly, Sigurd sprang out of bed, ran to the bath chamber and asked, “Who called me?” They answered that no one had called him. He returned to bed and again fell asleep.
No sooner had he fallen asleep than he again jumped up and said that someone had definitely called him. Again everyone said to him that no one had called him, and so he returned to bed but was unable to go to sleep.
When he had laid there for a while, the others saw him spying through the window and heard him say, “Aha, it’s coming from there!” and then his face turned red. He then went to the bath chamber door, stood before them and they heard him say quite loudly, “If there is someone there who wants to speak with Sigurd Björnsson – he sits there!” And he then pointed to a young boy from the poorhouse named Hjalmar who sat on a chair opposite the bath chamber door, plucking wool.
The boy was suddenly thrown down from the chair to the floor, where he screamed and twisted as though he were suffocating. Sigurd grabbed a cane and beat the boy everywhere with it. The boy became somewhat quieter, and they placed him on the bed. His body was swollen and showed signs of being struck.
The boy had these attacks two or three times during the night and later from time to time, until he died of them in early winter. His body was very swollen and bloated, and showed clearly blackened traces of the fingers of a ghost.
After this time, the ghost stalked Sigurd and his children; in fact, it stalked all of the people at Hleidrargaard. Men who were psychics often saw the maid, the “Hleidrargaard lady” as she was called because of the way her cap sat on her head. Most often, people saw her hanging upside down with legs wrapped around a ceiling beam, usually over the house entrance.
Sigurd was always able to protect himself from her, but gradually she killed his livestock and even that of the neighbor. The meat was always very mottled, bluish and inedible. It is blamed for causing the death of Sigurd of Näs, a capable farmer who had an attack of cramps and died.
As her violence increased and people feared that it would become even worse, it is told that luckily, a beggar from the glacier named Peter, or “Glacier Peter” as he was generally called, came to the area. He was an accomplished magician but used his powers only for good.
Sigurd of Hleidrargaard was a good and generous man and he supported Peter, but telling him at the same time that it was not his farm for which he would thank Peter for his help, but rather that another farmer had set this ghost after him that had caused great harm not only to his farm but also others. It would very likely continue doing so until it had caused his death.
Peter promised to free him from this devil. One night, he left and took the ghost with him. He chained it to a immovable stone at a place between Strjugs Brook and Volde in the adjacent Djupidal Valley, or Varmhagi as it is called. For a long time the ghost could do no more harm, but at night one could often hear it howling. The people were afraid to pass by too closely, as they would become dizzy and lose their way even on perfectly clear days.
Between 1806 and 1810 a priest named Sira Sigurd of Saurbær who still lives today built a feed shed near this place because it had good meadow. On the first night when it was in use, a sheep was killed. This was followed by the death of a number of others.
It was found that the sheep’s body appeared in every way like those that the ghost had killed before. So people believed that it had begun again to do its dirty deeds. Sickness and death gradually began again amongst the sheep in all of Oefjord generally. Nowadays it is called the plague, but the superstition that the ghost is at fault has since olden times taken root with the people.