Thursday! I grew up in Manhattan, and never heard of this house and its fascinating history.
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The Morris-Jumel mansion
There is a (supposedly) haunted mansion in Manhattan! The Morris-Jumel mansion has quite a history. It was built as a summer cottage in 1765 by British Colonel Roger Morris and his American wife, Mary Philipse Morris. It is a beautiful house in the Palladian style.
General George Washington used the mansion as his headquarters during the Battle of Harlem Heights in the fall of 1776. It was the first Revolutionary War battle during which the Continental Army was able to force a British retreat. Shortly thereafter Washington and his army had to flee further north, leaving the mansion in the hands of the British Army and Hessian mercenaries hired by the British.
For further historical reading:
Letter Tied to Fight for Independence Is Found in Museum’s Attic
The Morrises, as British loyalists, returned to England after the Americans won the Revolutionary War.
As President, George Washington returned to the mansion in 1790, and presided over a dinner for members of his cabinet, including John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, Alexander Hamilton, and Henry Knox. The house was an inn at the time, called the Calumet Inn.
In 1810, the mansion was purchased by Stephen Jumel, a French wine merchant from Haiti, and his wife Eliza Jumel.
The Parlor
Stephen Jumel died in 1832, and his wife Eliza became a very rich widow. And that is when things began to get more interesting...
Eliza Jumel and children
The Jumels spent a decade in France after purchasing the house, but then returned to New York to live. Eliza allegedly had an affair with Aaron Burr, and married him with undue haste after Stephen's sudden death. Burr was aged 77 at the time. The Jumel-Burr marriage was not a success, and Burr filed for divorce. After the divorce, Eliza became an unkempt recluse, and eventually suffered from dementia. She died in 1865 at age 92 or 93. And may have never left...
The city purchased the imposing mansion in 1904 to open as a museum. Tours are offered by day, but some still said that spirits roamed the place by night. In 1964, several writers reported a woman wearing a violet dress appeared to half a dozen schoolchildren who were touring the house. They identified her from her portrait in the house as Eliza. She had shouted at them to "Shut up!" Never since has there been so dramatic a sighting.
One ghost, however, may have left:
GHOST #1, STEPHEN JUMEL: When a mansion curator started hearing pitiful moans about the place, she did what any normal 1960s curator would do. She sent for a psychic.
The famous Hans Holzer answered the call. Never one to shy from a good haunting, Holzer conducted two seances at the mansion, and in the second of these, the moaner appeared on cue. He revealed himself to be none other than Stephen Jumel, and he had an accusation to make: that his death in 1832 had been no accident. Sure, he had fallen on that pesky pitchfork and all, but he would have recovered from that had Madame Jumel not removed his bandages and watched in glee as he bled to death.
The dramatic statement conflicts with older accounts which blame his death on a fall from a hay wagon, but no matter. Having divested itself of this information, Jumel's spirit was free to fly. It hasn't been seen at the mansion since.
However, Eliza Jumel's ghost apparently has lots of company:
The oldest ghosts, according to eyewitnesses, are revolutionary soldiers, who, like Eliza, seem reluctant to leave the opulent luxury of the hilltop mansion. It is not uncommon for curators and visitors to suddenly find themselves among a group of uniformed men cavorting in the elegant dining room, or to interrupt Eliza entertaining various soldiers in her lavish bedroom. One terrified woman recalls standing in front of a large gilded portrait of a fully decorated revolutionary soldier, when, to her horror, the figure stepped out of the painting and rushed toward her. She suffered only a mild fainting fit, but a less fortunate woman suffered a fatal heart attack after being confronted by a hostile revolutionary ghost.
Sources (in order of block quotes):
The Morris-Jumel Museum
Haunted Crime Scenes
The Morris-Jumel Mansion: New York City's Oldest Haunted House
The Widow of Washington Heights
If you only read one link, "The Widow of Washington Heights" has a lot of information without being too lengthy.
The Morris-Jumel Mansion is located at 65 Jumel Terrace, New York, NY 10032, in Washington Heights at 161st Street. It is open Wednesday-Sunday from 10 am to 4 pm. Closed Mondays and Tuesdays.
If this seems a bit discombobulated, it's because I accidentally left the page without saving it when it was finished (even the TAGS!) and all I wanted was a picture of Eliza Jumel. I had to retype a great deal of it, and retrace my links through the history. I was NOT happy.
Hope that everyone has a wonderful day!