Ep. 50: The Bell Witch
Gina (00:10)
Just saw in the notes you have a multi-part wendigo update.
Kathryn (00:14)
Yeah, it's not as dramatic as it sounds. But yes. I, I, well maybe, I don't know. But I did not.
Gina (00:17)
Okay, because it sounds like you encountered multiple Wendigos.
Kathryn (00:24)
this banter is gonna be unnecessarily long so...
Gina (00:28)
it'll be fun, those are always the best ones. And we have wine today, so that's gonna be the whole episode. Are you drinking today? What do you have? Okay, yeah. Yeah, yeah, you did say yeah. Okay, well I'm sorry, I do have wine. ⁓ But anyway, welcome to I Scream You Scream, y'all. This is your weekly, are we doing the whole thing?
Kathryn (00:33)
No, I'm just drinking coffee because I'm determined to clean my office and I won't if I drink wine. Next time. Next time.
We can, yeah why not?
Gina (00:55)
⁓ Weekly scoop of chilling histories mysteries, paranormal shit. ⁓ I'm Gina.
Kathryn (01:01)
I'm Kathryn
Gina (01:02)
And our topic for October is witches. And we technically should have ice cream cake, but neither of us do because we thought we were recording hours later than we were actually scheduled to. It's a long story. It's not our fault. Don't blame us. As a reminder, if you love bonus content, exclusive merch, and you want the chance to vote on which topics we cover on the pod, come and join the cool kids on Patreon. The link is in the show notes. We would love to see you guys there. It's a really fun, some say bumping community. I don't know. Other people say it. I don't say it. Yeah, Sports Illustrated did an article about it. It was kind of weird. But fine, yeah. I did send them a signed headshot, so it kind of makes sense. But anyway, until then, grab a spoon and let's dig in. What's your Wendigo update, dude?
Kathryn (01:34)
⁓ do they? We did not approve, but we approved that it happened, you know?
Hahaha!
Alright, okay, so this is not as dramatic as it sounds, but I do have a, it's not really a wendigo update, but I didn't know how else to write it down so that I could remember this story. So item number one, unrelated to this podcast with people who do not listen to this podcast, I have had multiple, like several separate discussions about cannibalism this week and I have not started a single one of them.
Gina (02:27)
What?
Kathryn (02:32)
And that's part one of the update. I'm just really unsettled by it and I needed to get it off my chest because I'm like real scared that something cosmic is happening and it's leading to like an increase in discourse on cannibalism. So brace yourselves. This is my warning to all of you. like, well, part of what it is is a lot of the horror books that are coming out or like new horror releases this year, a lot of them have to do with cannibalism in one
Gina (02:41)
Yeah.
Kathryn (03:02)
shape or form, is upsetting to me because I really enjoy horror books but I cannot read any of these because of the aforementioned not wanting to fucking talk about cannibalism. ⁓ So that was largely what the...
Gina (03:03)
⁓
Yeah.
Kathryn (03:22)
discussions were kind of born out of a lot of these discussions happened at the bookstore. leads me to another part of this update, and that is last night I was working an event, the bookstore, and guy was lovely. I'm not going to say his name because I didn't read his book and I feel bad because he was really nice. But I
Gina (03:41)
Hahaha
Kathryn (03:44)
like opened to the summary flap on the inside and it's about a fucking Wendigo. I had no idea. Yes, yes. And for context, for everyone, we just recorded the Wendigo episode like the other day. So like this is immediately after the discussion about Wendigo and cannibalism, which leads me to,
Gina (03:50)
Really? Wow.
Kathryn (04:06)
part three of my Wendigo update, which isn't really related to Wendigos at all, but we're transitioning to the bookstore. My manager at the bookstore discovered our podcast, and he will not talk to me about anything but our podcast. So.
During one of my discussions at the bookstore, I don't remember if it was about Wendigos or not, he said he would be very excited to get a shout out on the podcast and he didn't even mind if I was talking shit about him. So I've been trying to find a way to talk shit without getting my ass fired and I can't think of it. So I just have to give, I literally was going to say I just have to give a regular shout out. But if you can think of anything, Jason.
Gina (04:43)
I can do it.
What's your manager's name?
Jason.
Kathryn (04:56)
Please don't get me fired. really like this job.
Gina (05:03)
The best I can come up with is my mom
could beat up your mom.
Kathryn (05:06)
I don't know his mom. Your mom could definitely beat up him though, for sure.
Gina (05:09)
My mom could beat you up, Jason.
Kathryn (05:11)
Yeah, that's true. There you go. Shout out to Jason. So now,
Gina (05:13)
You little bookworm.
I'm just kidding, thank you for listening Jason, I appreciate all of your support and for keeping my best friend employed.
Kathryn (05:21)
That's gonna be the real test to see if he's actually listening because he started at the beginning So now we're gonna see if he's gonna listen all the way through or if he's gonna jump to the beginning ⁓ The follow-up update is Was inspired by the fact that he started at the beginning so guess who went back and listened to our first episode So I've good I have good news
Gina (05:31)
⁓
Really? How was it? What did you think? Okay.
Kathryn (05:50)
The good news is we've gotten
so much better at editing. Holy shit. Listen.
So, lots of coughing for some reason that we did not edit out. A lot of, ⁓ like, like we started every sentence with, but here's why. we do now...
Gina (06:07)
Mmm. good Lord.
Kathryn (06:11)
that we edit out is we take a water break between our ice cream and telling the story, which we did not do previously. So we would go from eating our ice cream to talking for an hour straight with no palate cleanser. So that's a good news. We've gotten better at editing. Bad news, for me personally,
Gina (06:20)
Okay.
Ew.
Kathryn (06:33)
I like I've gotten a little bit worse at storytelling. I was like real invested in Elizabeth Bathory and now I'm like, what the fuck? I even remember my last episode. I feel like I was just rambling. ⁓
Gina (06:46)
I remember the Jure Grando episode better than I remember any of my other ones.
Kathryn (06:50)
that's interesting. Yeah, that's probably true for me for Elizabeth Bathory, but remember that's because we were researching those for like months straight. Anyway, so that's my multi-part Wendigo update.
Gina (06:59)
Yeah, because we were so scared. Yeah. That's so funny.
Wow, you took me on a journey there.
I also have thoughts about your manager listening to the podcast, but it's mostly fear. Because even though he's not my manager, I'm still scared.
Kathryn (07:20)
One thing I can say with confidence is you do not have to be scared of Jason. long as you're not chatting with your friends up at the front desk, you're safe.
Gina (07:29)
If you got time to lean, got time to clean. That's what I always say.
Kathryn (07:32)
my God, yeah, he always says that too! Okay, moving on from Jason. I don't have an exciting supernatural update, but we got so much feedback.
Gina (07:34)
Of course he fucking does, because he's a manager.
Yes.
Kathryn (07:48)
about Supernatural from the last episode that I feel real bad about myself for not watching this show. So I've not watched it. I haven't had time since our last recording, but I want everyone to know that it's in my queue and I will be watching it. And I'm so sorry. I also misspoke. I thought it came out way after it actually did. I was not. I have no excuse for not watching this. I was not in Chicago. I did. I did have access to cable when it came out. I'm so sorry. I would like to publicly apologize to everyone for not watching the show. So I did take a test. I took a BuzzFeed quiz to see which one I was, Dean or Sam. I'm curious, what is your guess as to who you think I might be?
Gina (08:27)
Okay, which one are you?
Kathryn (08:34)
I won't be offended.
Gina (08:35)
Mmm, I don't...
Kathryn (08:39)
I got Dean, yeah. I need to watch, I, yeah. Which like, based on my research, I think it makes sense, but I still need to watch.
Gina (08:40)
Dean.
I'm a Dean girl.
It took me a while to answer because I could genuinely see you going either way.
Kathryn (08:58)
I mean, based on my research, me too. But like, I think I tried to answer as purely as possible from a, like, if I was watching this show, when it came out, who I was, not necessarily from me right now, I think she would have liked Dean based on my limited research.
Gina (09:01)
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Same. was a dean. These days I would be a Sam girl. But at the time that I was watching it, for sure, Dean.
Kathryn (09:25)
Yeah.
That's kind of what I'm suspecting is gonna be my personal truth, but I don't know. But also I'm a little fucked up because Sam Dean in Gilmore Girls, whom I fucking hate. Absolutely not team Dean, Gilmore Girls. That guy was the worst one and anyone who thinks otherwise, I just don't wanna hear it because we all know that it's
Gina (09:38)
Bye.
Okay.
Kathryn (09:48)
so sorry.
Gina (09:48)
⁓ I will
be very interested to hear what you think about. I'm kind of tempted to watch it alongside you because it's been such a long time.
Kathryn (09:52)
Yes, I will start.
We should. A lot of people are rewatching it right now and that's why so many people had such a strong reaction because it's the, what is the anniversary? It's the 20th anniversary this year. It premiered in 2005 apparently. So a lot of people are rewatching it right now. So we should rewatch it. You should rewatch it. I should watch it for the first time along with everyone. Yeah.
Gina (10:01)
I don't know. is it really? Wow. Okay.
How?
Fuck yeah. ⁓ my god, cool.
Sweet.
Speaking of watching things...
Kathryn (10:20)
Yeah.
I was gonna say, what do you have to tell me? I'm very excited about this one.
Gina (10:26)
I finally watched a scary movie and it turned out it wasn't actually scary at all. ⁓ Midsommar was fucking phenomenal. It was so goddamn good. was such a one, such a beautiful film. Two, Florence Pugh can do no wrong. She knocks it out of the park and everything that she is in. I hated every single man in that movie. Every single one was a piece of fucking shit. And so when it got to the parts that I thought were going to be like scary, they were just like.
Kathryn (10:34)
So good.
truly.
Classic.
Gina (10:55)
vindicating. Like I was just so excited that they were getting fucked up because I hated them. ⁓ Such a lared movie. I had a really great time afterwards reading about it online because when I'm watching when you're watching it for the first time you're just so caught up. There's so... yes.
Kathryn (10:57)
Mm-hmm.
was just gonna say you should do that. Sorry I didn't interrupt, but I was literally gonna say
I'm curious to know your thoughts on like... thoughts on it. Yeah.
Gina (11:16)
There's
so much about it and I still need to like get deeper into it because people have written like essays on this movie and the symbolism in it and the different parts of society that it speaks to you. Because the first time, like when I was first thinking about it, I was like, this like to me obviously has like a feminism angle to it. Like that's one of the, you know, the subtext of this is like a feminism thing. And then I was reading about it and people were writing about its commentary on ⁓ like race.
Kathryn (11:23)
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Gina (11:42)
and experiences with racism. And I was like, shit, I totally didn't clock that. So then I was reading into like the moments in the movie where people see that. And there's all different types of things. Like there's just so much that was being said within that movie, but wasn't being explicitly said. And it just feels like a rabbit hole. can go down for forever. And I love it.
Kathryn (11:59)
Mm-hmm.
So there you go, that's horror movies in a nutshell. You secretly like horror movies.
Gina (12:05)
I dig it.
I'm a scary movie lady now. That's my update.
Kathryn (12:08)
Cool. You are.
The joy I felt, so for those who don't know, we have, ⁓ is it a shared notes doc, or do I just have it? Of Gina's horror movie adventure. And I felt a lot of joy checking Midsommar off the list.
Gina (12:18)
It's shared, yeah.
I got a notification when you did that and it made me smile.
Kathryn (12:31)
Man, I didn't for a little while because I wanted you... rephrase. I didn't want you to do it because I wanted to do it, but I wanted to give you the chance to do it. But then when you didn't after a day or two, I was like, I'm going to do it. You can do the next
Gina (12:46)
Check. But yeah, anyway, I would love to hear a story if you have one.
Kathryn (12:50)
very proud of you.
Introduction to the Bell Witch
I do have one. In fact, I have one of my favorite ghost stories and one of the most confusing and talked about and just what the fuck actually happened type of ghost stories in American history. So I'm very excited to talk about it. Today, we're going to be discussing the Bell Witch. Do you know anything about the Bell Witch?
Gina (13:11)
Okay, damn.
Mm-mm.
Kathryn (13:23)
Perfect. I was hoping you wouldn't.
Gina (13:24)
I feel like I never know anything about anything in this podcast.
Kathryn (13:29)
We know like opposite things like I never know anything about yours
Gina (13:33)
You're right.
Kathryn (13:35)
Anyway, okay. Blah, blah, blah. So this story is often disputed and the actual events are...
widely theorized because what happened to the Bell family of Adams, Tennessee was never completely officially known. We'll dive deep into that toward the end. But what we do know is they were tormented for years. Legend has it, it was by the spirit of a woman named Kate Batts, aka the Bell Witch.
Who was Kate Batts?
So who's Kate Batts? We're not exactly sure when she was born, but some sources indicate it may have been somewhere around the year 1750-ish, possibly, and probably a little bit later, but we don't have record. She was born to John and Farah B. Murphy Williams, right?
Gina (14:33)
ain't that an old name.
Kathryn (14:35)
Ain't that an old name? Yes. I had to like make sure that was actually the name, but yes, Farabee Murphy Williams. And she was born in North Carolina and her full name was Mary Kathryn Williams, but she went by Kate. Another classic name. ⁓
So again, there's not much record of her childhood or upbringing. America was not even America yet. So records of like middle and working class people are pretty scarce from that time period. But what we do know is that her grandparents were relatively wealthy farmers. They weren't like soups, dupes rich. They're still like working class people, but they they were very successful planters. So they had an operating and
well-oiled machine type farm. Like they were big in the region, they were successful farmers. So they were comfortable. She had a standard comfortable upbringing.
Kate would go on to marry a man named Frederick Batts and together sometime in the early 1800s, historians estimate somewhere between 1800 and 1810, Frederick and Kate would make their way out to Adams, Tennessee, which has of the 2024 census, has a population of 666 people. Yes, isn't that wild? Right? I know.
Gina (15:55)
Fuck off. That's crazy Wow, all right
Kathryn (16:00)
So weird. I wonder if they do it on purpose, because this town eats this story up. So it's possible that they're kicking people out and having babies to like, you know. Yeah, exactly. Sorry, you have a three-person family, you got to go across the road. I'm sorry. that's very small. In 2024, 666 people. So imagine in 1800, 1810, there were five people in this town.
Gina (16:10)
Your baby's gotta live across the river, sorry.
Hehehehehe
Yeah.
God damn.
The Batts farm
Kathryn (16:28)
So the Batts family built and ran their own farm out in Tennessee similar to the way her family did in North Carolina. And I'm not sure what kind of farm my assumption is. They also were planters. But I also know Tennessee is big in candle. Candle? What? I meant cattle. Cows.
Gina (16:46)
Candle farming.
Kathryn (16:49)
None of this matters. I'm just rambling. ⁓ But they too were farmers and they had six children, kind of small for that time period. I was expecting the standard eight or nine, but only six kids. don't was good. They had their own land, their own farming business. Frederick would work out in the farm. Kate would take care of the family, keep up the house and property, blah, blah. Business as usual.
Gina (16:51)
Hehehehe. Hehehehehe.
Kate Batts steps up
Kathryn (17:17)
Until one day, Fred had an accident and he was working on the farm and there was some kind of misstep with some type of farming equipment. I don't know what kind. I don't even know if anyone knows. But it is said that there was an accident with a piece of equipment and that would ultimately leave him completely paralyzed basically for the rest of his life. So, yeah, he was unable to tend to the farm moving forward. So Kate stepped up. She was like, you know why I'm losing my land?
Or my business just because of some accident. So she takes the helm of the family farm. And it is worth noting because this is kind of the part of the story where we would be like, yeah, independent woman. Wow. Taking care of the farm and her family working in the field. Rough and tough. ⁓ That is partially true. She was the head of the household at this point. Like physically she was running things because her husband could not. But keep in mind, this was a Tennessee farm in the early 1800s, there was nearly a 100 % chance that they were slave owners. So I don't wanna like, there's a lot of rhetoric about like the whole independent woman situation, which again, like I don't want to gloss over that was true, but let's keep it relative. So just wanna, this was a like, you know, slave owning region slash everywhere in America was at the time. So.
Gina (18:20)
Mm. Yep, okay, yeah.
Yeah, okay.
Kathryn (18:45)
all relative is all I'm saying. she's busy, regardless. She's running things. She's kind of like the spokesperson for the family and the family business at this point.
As was the case with any woman who did anything outside of the house at this time, Kate was described as eccentric. She was very loud, very confident, commanded attention of whatever room she was in, as is the case with so many of our stories.
Gina (19:14)
A woman with a personality,
God forbid.
Kathryn (19:15)
I know. ⁓
And she had to be. She had to be eccentric and strong and commanding because she was running this farm. So she was doing business with trade the local grocers and all of that. She had to become basically the businesswoman of the family.
⁓
Because she was kind of forced into this role, we actually don't know how naturally boisterous and confident and loud she was. A lot of people suspect that she wasn't really naturally that way, that she just kind of felt like she had to be because of this new role that she had in her family.
So it is suspected that, you know, this wasn't her natural personality, that she was very uncomfortable in this role. She just like did what she kind of had to do. It is said that even though she didn't have any formal education,
past a certain point. think she stopped schooling when she was very little, which was normal for people who grew up, you know, on family farms at the time. She would often attend to use
What? I said that weird. She would often tend, not attend, sorry. Wait, it's so weird that I just did that because this is literally what I'm describing. She was known to use words and language that was kind of considered above her quote unquote class or education level. So she would often misspeak. She would often use big flowery language, but she would stumble over her words or she would misspeak or she would use words incorrectly.
Gina (20:30)
Hahaha.
Okay.
Kathryn (20:56)
And people, don't know if they would call her out for it, but they certainly talked about it. It was kind of discussed that she was like, I don't want to say trying to be something she wasn't, but it was clear that she was kind of playing this role, if you will.
And even when or if people would correct her, she would kind of just accept it and like shrug it off and be on her way. Like it didn't appear to bother her when people would like call her out for certain things or like point out she was like trying to act above her class or whatever.
Gina (21:24)
man.
Kathryn (21:29)
One of the most notable personality traits that kept popping up in a lot of the stuff I was reading, which was very surprising to me because you don't really hear it a lot when you hear this story. And that's the fact that she was known as
being very kind and like a good neighbor. She was known for really deeply caring about like the community that she lived in, which makes sense. I mean, it was a very small community and still is. And she was kind of the epitome of it takes a village. Like she was always the first person to lend a helping hand to her neighbors or if they needed food or supplies or farming equipment, she was always willing to loan it to them.
or, you know, help them out however they needed. ⁓ She would always go out of her way to be good to those who were good to her. It's a very important detail because if you were not good to her, she was extremely quick to match that energy, which when you hear this story is the version that you tend to hear because she had no problem calling people out if she felt like she was being cheated or if someone was being shitty.
Gina (22:26)
Okay.
Kathryn (22:43)
They don't love when women speak up for themselves. So that's kind of the reputation that Kate got. It was like people weren't paying attention to the, know, if you're good to her, she'll be good to you. They were paying attention to like, if you're not good to her.
Like she's not going to be good to you. So she kind of got this reputation as someone who would quote unquote instigate arguments with people on a very regular basis. My guess is she was probably just sticking up for herself in those instances. But who am I? I don't know. I wasn't there. again, this is kind of how the rumors started. And people started to quote unquote notice and suggest that any time anyone crossed Kate, or did something that she didn't like, unfortunate things would happen to them.
The Bell Family
Neighbors would claim that their animals would randomly go missing or fall ill and eventually die. Crops would get diseases and dry up, leading to either unfruitful harvests or, pretty much no harvest at all, while neighboring farms were perfectly fine and healthy. So people learned to fear her, for better or worse. It became known that you don't want to cross old Cape Bats because if you did, there would basically be hell to pay.
And one neighboring family is said to have learned that the hard way. And that was the family of Kate's aunt Lucy. A little bit of background on Lucy. Lucy was born in North Carolina, just like Kate. And she would go on to marry a man named John Bell. Hopefully that name sounds familiar because we are talking about the Bell Witch. So while we don't know for sure.
Gina (24:07)
Hmm
Okay. Mm-hmm.
Kathryn (24:31)
Hold on to your butt, I forgot to do a content warning for the fact that we don't know for sure, but many records slash accounts suggest that Lucy married John when she was 12 years old, which let's pause to digest. Because listen, even in the 1700s, that is fucking young. Like,
Gina (24:34)
Okay.
Yeah.
Kathryn (24:58)
You're not even like a childbearing age at 12, which was like why people got married young back then.
Gina (25:04)
That's disgusting.
Kathryn (25:06)
That's like deeply fucked up, yes.
Gina (25:08)
Yeah.
Kathryn (25:09)
Spoiler alert, we hate John Bell, just so you know. Yeah, we as an us two. A lot of people don't talk about how shitty he was when they tell the story, but he was like objectively a piece of shit. So I'm very purposely framing this story in the way that I am to spread the narrative that I am. Yeah, fuck John Bell, truly.
Gina (25:12)
Okay, cool. Yeah, good.
It doesn't surprise me.
Fuck John.
Kathryn (25:33)
Yeah, we're going to let that sink in and deal with the trauma of knowing this detail about Lucy's age at a later date ⁓ and move on to the fact that Lucy and John moved out to Tennessee in about 1804. Some people do speculate that they left to go to Tennessee because of the fact that John may have been getting shit for marrying a literal child. ⁓
Gina (25:59)
Mm-hmm.
Kathryn (26:01)
We don't know that is a guess that people are making retrospectively. There's no official indication of that, but it's possible. Based on the time frame, though, I will say it's, I don't want say more likely, I think two things can be true at once, ⁓ but it is likely that. ⁓
just a big chunk of the family moved from California, Jesus, North Carolina to Tennessee at the same time, because that would have been within the timeframe that Kate and her husband moved out there as well. So it's possible they just were expanding the family farm, essentially. ⁓ But we don't know. For whatever reason, everyone moved on out to Adams, Tennessee.
Gina (26:32)
here.
Kathryn (26:48)
John and Lucy would have their own farm similar to the Williams family back home in North Carolina and the Bells would be known as one of if not the most successful planting families in that area. And needless to say for many reasons Kate fucking hated John. That is known for sure.
for all the reasons we've already discussed. But in addition to that, some people also say that she could have been jealous of his family's farming success. you hate when your enemies succeed, right? Like we hate to see it. So that could have come into play. Others think she just hated him for the fact that he was likely not that good to Lucy.
Gina (27:23)
Yeah.
Kathryn (27:35)
was
a piece of shit, so it's possible that he just wasn't a good husband and wasn't good to the kids, et cetera, et He was known to be really pompous, so it could have just been as simple as that.
Worth noting, John also hated Kate. He didn't like how loud and confident she was. ⁓ So there was just like a big, like there was bad blood between them. And at a certain point, their hatred for each other kind of escalated and came to a head. And there was a pretty significant feud between Kate and John. usual, I'm going to be saying this time and time again, just because this is the nature of the story. We don't know exactly what the feud was about.
We just know that it escalated and they were like at each other's throats metaphorically, but like maybe physically as well. I don't know One of the most prominent
Gina (28:23)
Okay.
Kathryn (28:28)
theories or reasons people think that it escalated and they were in this big fight was that Kate felt cheated out of a land sale deal between them. maybe John didn't pay her what she thought this piece of land was worth or what she thought she was owed. It was trying to take advantage of her. Others suggest that it wasn't...
like land property, actually an enslaved person that they were in like a sale battle over. there were other claims that it didn't actually have anything to do with Kate at all, but instead the dispute was between
Gina (29:00)
Okay.
Kathryn (29:09)
a man named Benjamin Batts, who was Kate's brother-in-law, so Frederick's brother. And he was the one that felt cheated out of some type of business deal with John. And Kate was like, pissed off that he was fucking with her family. So she like lost her shit and like, yeah.
Gina (29:26)
I respect that.
A feud is born
Kathryn (29:29)
So whatever it was, all stories lead to John cheating Kate out of something, which I do want to point out. There's not a lot of rhetoric about her being the aggressor in this situation. But who knows? We do not know what this fight was about.
it was, Kate had officially had enough and she decided to confront John. So she marched her ass over there and was basically just like, fuck you, you suck. I curse your family and upon my death, I will haunt you until the day that you die. So like, uh-oh.
she was known throughout the community that you do not cross Kate Batts and this declaration was very straightforward and it was officially like bad news for John.
so it is said that after this confrontation with Kate Batts, somewhere around, I'm gonna say 1817 is the year that is cited, but like, again, we don't know for sure, but I'm gonna say 1817, John Bell had some unsettling experiences on his property.
It all started when he was out in the field one night and he saw what he described as a rabbit headed dog, like stalking his property. was almost like it was keeping an eye on him and kind of scoping out his land and keeping tabs on what he was doing. It was like observing him. So he freaks out and he's telling everyone about it. And he's like, there's this weird monster on my land. It's a demon. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
People are kind of like, okay, I'm eyeroll. This guy sucks, he's probably lying.
But then he continues to see it and after a while, neighbors also claim to see the exact same being, thing, entity, whatever it is, both on their property and while visiting the Bell family. So this holds a little bit more weight. It's always helpful to have an eyewitness.
Right off the bat, can like, know, Hindsight's 2020, they live in the wilderness of Tennessee. It could very easily have just been like a strange animal that they had not come across yet. But people swear high and low that it was just this strange, otherworldly, like demonic thing. And then John's son, Drew, ended up seeing, like kind of having a similar experience, but with a bird. He was on the property one day and he saw this bird sitting on the fence post. And as he got closer, he realized that it was like abnormally large and kind of oddly shaped. And again, this could very easily just be, you know, just a bird. Like it could have been a giant hawk or eagle or something that they just had not discovered yet.
But he said that he got like weird energy from it and it seemed unnatural. Like it felt very strange. Like it was like an unsettling animal to come across for whatever
Shortly after the bird instance, one of the enslaved people that worked on the bell farm was walking to, I believe it was his wife's cabin, because she lived elsewhere on the property. So he was walking through the farm slash woods that were on the farm. And he noticed that there was this large black dog that kept following him. And same thing, this man Dean, he kept saying like he felt extremely unsettled by this. Like it didn't seem like like he knew what a wolf looked like. He knew what a dog looked like. And it just felt like off. was like a dog, but a little bit not. You know what I mean? It was like that uncanny valley type like
Gina (33:26)
Hmm.
Kathryn (33:30)
It was like an unsettling encounter and the dog was behaving in a way that felt too like aware of him and too intelligent to just be any old dog.
Gina (33:38)
Hmm.
Kathryn (33:42)
So people are like, OK, what the fuck is going on? is like too many instances of a family who lives, yes, they're farmers, but they live in basically the wilderness. They should not be this afraid of animal sightings. You know what I mean? So it was like people are starting I don't want to say believe them more, but for lack of better phrasing, they were starting to like pay attention more, I guess I should say.
Betsy Bell
Then it was around that time that one of the Bell daughters, whose name was Betsy, we'll be hearing a lot more about her in a little bit, claimed to see an apparition of a young girl in green swinging from a tree on the property, which is kind of like an opposite vibe of what the other people were experiencing. That's like a very playful, childlike.
Gina (34:31)
That's fun.
Kathryn (34:32)
Vision to have yeah, exactly and Betsy was young but she was like teen years young. She wasn't like a tiny child probably like mid teens I would say and But it still was very ominous, you know, like it is relatively play. Hey, was relatively playful compared to the other sightings but like It's also like why is this weird ghost chick swinging in my yard, you know, that's still unsettling
Gina (34:42)
Okay.
Hehehehehe
The Bell Family’s Experiences
Kathryn (34:59)
So they don't know what to do. They're like, something weird is happening. This is unsettling. What the fuck is going on? There's not really much they can do. So they're just like, OK, let's just keep tabs on this and try to keep each other safe. And that is when the weird vibes moved into the house.
Gnawing sounds
Late one night as the family was sleeping, Betsy heard a strange noise coming from under her bed. And yeah, and it sounded, I know, just wait. It sounded almost like the sound of like a rat or a mouse gnawing on the bed post, like near the floor. So.
Gina (35:27)
that.
Okay.
I'm going to take my feet off
the ground real quick.
Kathryn (35:44)
I was literally, I saw your shoulders
shift. was like, she's getting ready. She's gonna lift them. My feet don't reach the floor, so I'm safe.
Gina (35:48)
Blech.
Kathryn (36:03)
So, so Betsy, and I will say this is another thing, like it is disputed who experienced what first, but most of the stories point to Betsy because most of the experiences were had by the daughter Betsy. So I'm going with the story that she's the one that experienced it all first inside the house. So she gets up to check thinking she's going to find exactly that, you know, a mouse or a rat or something gnawing on the bedpost and nothing is there. OK, she's thinking whatever rats are sneaky and must have just like, snuck away but it keeps happening she keeps you know all through the night it's like she's hearing a gnawing sound she'll try to catch whatever it is and then it just stops and like it gets to the point where she's like there's no fucking way i'm not catching it like based on the timing
It's like, what is that? There's no time for this creature to escape in the amount of time it stops and starts again. But she keeps hearing it night after night.
Knocking sounds
And as the days go on, as the nights go on, the gnawing sounds turn to knocking.
So very classic, we've had a few knocking stories. And not only did the sound grow from the gnawing sound to the knocking, ⁓ but the rest of the family started hearing all these things as well. So it wasn't just growing in sound, but it was growing like from person to person. And it was like...
Gina (37:11)
Mm-hmm.
Kathryn (37:29)
It wasn't just a knock. It would knock on the wall. And then like two seconds later, you'd hear a knock in the ceiling and then on the floor. It was like everywhere at once, essentially. So they were hearing it like all throughout the night and all throughout the day.
Dog sounds
They also started to hear the sound of dogs fighting in the house, which made no sense because they didn't keep dogs in the house. There were no family pets inside the house. ⁓ And again, it was one of those things where you could hear it. You could tell it was inside. You could tell it was coming from within the house, you couldn't tell where. It was just like.
Gina (37:48)
⁓
Kathryn (38:07)
in the ether, right? Like in the void. So the sound is growing, the sound is escalating. My favorite thing that they heard, because I'm like, what the fuck was that, is they started to hear the sound of chains dragging on the floor, kind of like Jacob Marley vibes in A Christmas Carol. Like it sounded like a shackled chain being like dragged across the floor.
Gina (38:27)
Yeah.
Physical encounters
Kathryn (38:33)
They're freaking out thinking what the hell is going on. They have no idea where this could be coming from or what these sounds could be. And it just continued escalating from there to the point where they weren't just hearing things, but they were physically experiencing things as well. My least favorite ⁓ sheets would be pulled off of them in the middle of the night. I know. Isn't that the worst? Ugh, the worst. I know. Awful. So gross.
Gina (38:54)
Fuck that that's my protection. That's how I stay safe
Kathryn (39:02)
would shake, things would fall off the shelves randomly. Like it just felt very violent and kind of inescapable. Like I said, was like something would happen over here and then over there. Just your average poltergeist situation, but it was like nonstop. Then Betsy, kind of culminated in a physical attack on her.
She claimed to be experiencing slaps and pinches and even like the feeling of someone, it felt like someone was like poking her or pinching her, like poking her with like a needle or something like that. Which kind of gives poppet vibes, like it was very much like could somebody be like manipulating her, focusing on her specifically.
Gina (39:50)
Yeah.
Investigation
Kathryn (39:52)
So this is when things became a lot more public because at this point the family was like, we do not know what to do. Like they felt like they were in danger. It was inescapable and they felt like they needed, they decide to loop in their friend James, his name was James Johnson, and they had him come over. Are you laughing at the name? I do love how like names at this time are like, like, Jonathan Johns or whatever, like there was one name to be spread across all the white men in America at this time.
Gina (40:17)
Little JJ, that's kind of cute.
And then women have, what was the name that you said
at the beginning of? But there was the other one, the one that like Flanita Beebe, what was her name? Farabee, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, that was sick. Anyway, sorry.
Kathryn (40:34)
Mary Kathryn Elizabeth, those were your options. Who? Farabee, yeah, Farabee. Yeah, yes. ⁓
Yeah, so they have JJ come over because at this point they're like, we need someone to like tell us what they're experiencing because they're feeling crazy, you know? Like these are God fearing people and like they don't deserve this. What is happening? How did this happen? You know? Exactly. So it's at this point when they decide to reach out to this friend that John's
Gina (41:08)
Hmm
Kathryn (41:17)
face starts going numb randomly. He starts experiencing like numbness in his like mouth and jaw region and the parts that he could feel were painful. He described it as feeling like there was like a stick in his mouth that he like,
Gina (41:34)
Cool.
Kathryn (41:35)
They're like, this has to be related. Like something is happening to this family. Someone is doing something to this family. So again, James comes over. When he's there, he experiences all the things that the family is experiencing. He's hearing the gnawing, he's hearing the knocking, He's seeing the bed sheets fly off, blah, blah, blah, blah. He's like, holy fucking shit.
The fuck is going on here? Like the bells really have some like ghost situation going on. So he goes back home, they're like, okay, let's like take a breath and we'll devise a plan and figuring out what this is and how to deal with it. When he goes home, he experiences what the bells were experiencing at his home.
Gina (42:24)
Okay, so it's contagious.
Kathryn (42:26)
It's contagious. Yeah, so he comes back to the bell house another day and is like, yo, you guys have some evil shit. We need to figure out how to get rid of this thing. Like once and for all. So they're like, we're gonna banish this demon, whatever it is. So they start doing kind of their own little paranormal investigation. They're like, OK, there is something here. Let's try talking to it. So they do. And they ask this suspected spirit, who are you and what do you want? To which the spirit responds.
And it says, is a direct quote from places. I'm assuming this is all paraphrased. But it says, I am a spirit, very straightforward. I once was very happy, but I have been disturbed. That is what they hear in response to their question. They're like a voice. It says like something is speaking to them, yes. They're like, all right, dope. We can work with this. So they continue asking it questions.
Gina (43:19)
Like a voice. Okay.
Kathryn (43:31)
They ask the entity for its name, to which it responds, saying it is, quote, the spirit of the old witch Kate Batts. So now, the Bell family is like, aha, I knew that shit sucked. She's the witch who brought this upon us. Case closed. For whatever reason, the witch's spirit, which is what I will call it,
Gina (43:43)
Okay.
Hmm.
Kathryn (44:00)
from this point forward, unless I misspeak and accidentally call it something else. ⁓ I didn't know what to call it throughout this whole thing, but that's what I'm gonna choose to call it, because I don't know. The Witch's Spirit was super talkative, and it seemed to really enjoy drama.
Gina (44:07)
Yeah.
Kathryn (44:16)
It would often bring up hot goss from the community and around the neighborhood. And basically, it literally was talking shit about neighbors and community members and stuff. Listen, this story is fucking wild.
Gina (44:28)
Wait, that's so funny. So once
they introduced themselves, she was suddenly like, okay, well now that we're friends, you're not gonna fucking believe what Bartholomew did.
Kathryn (44:34)
once they start talking. Yes. Well, and that's the thing.
Yes, that like that was kind of the vibe. Yes, very gossipy and whatever, but still. Like attacking them, like she still didn't like them. Yes, exactly. She was just like looping in. Drama like she was like, yeah, it was very dramatic and very strange. Yes. So. You know, as the days and weeks and months.
Gina (44:43)
Okay.
but still angry. Okay, okay.
That's amazing.
Kathryn (45:02)
go on, more people are getting wind of this. And the more tests they perform, very similar to your, what was the one you just said, the cock lane ghost. It was very similar to like, like word spread. This is like a known thing that the Bell Farm is haunted and they're talking to it and they're learning things and blah, blah. Remember, there's like four people in this town. And so everyone's hearing what's going on at the Bell Family Farm. So people would come and
Gina (45:12)
Yes.
Kathryn (45:33)
you know, they would test it and see if, it was legitimate and every single test that it gave or that people would give it, it would pass. Like people would ask questions.
that the Bell family or other community members couldn't possibly know, like things from their childhood, things about like their neighborhoods from before they, know, a lot of these people are, you know, British immigrants. ⁓ So they'd ask questions about from where they came from and their old neighborhoods and, aunts who lived on the coast, like all these things that people couldn't possibly know. They would pass all the tests, like.
I don't know how, don't know how, spoiler alert, like we still don't know what this was. I will say that. ⁓ So it was just very strange and people believed it because like they were passing these tests. And this haunting would go on to last for years. This happened for, I'm gonna say like three or four years, I think would be like the bulk of it. And.
Gina (46:16)
Okay.
Kathryn (46:36)
During this time, Betsy, the aforementioned daughter, would get engaged to a local guy named Joshua. eventually, after being engaged for a little while, the witch's spirit would basically convince her to call off this engagement. So she did. It became like it was like it almost feels like it was a member of the family.
Question mark? It was strange. Yeah, it was strange. So with all of this being said, one person that seemed immune to the witch's spirit's wrath was Lucy. She seemed to have a soft spot for Lucy, the mother.
Gina (47:02)
This is so wild.
Was Kate Batts the Bell witch?
Kathryn (47:22)
She was kind of rude and pretty snarky to pretty much anyone who interacted with her, even though she would still give them information. She was still very sassy. She seemed to really care about Lucy and she mostly left Lucy alone, very specifically never gave her any trouble. This was kind of further proof that people would point to to show that it was in fact the witch quote unquote Kate Batts because they were family. And even though Lucy's family was technically also Kate's family, was said that Kate didn't really like the family because they were a result of her being with John, whom she hated. You know what I mean? So was like her loyalty was to Lucy. So it made sense that it would be Kate Batts because the witch spirit whatever seemed to have a loyalty to Lucy. So this whole Kate Batts is haunting the family became the official story.
The problem with this is the fact that Kate Batts wasn't dead. She was alive and well and her spirit was like in her physical body and like not available for poltergeisting. So. That's ⁓ a problematic point in this story. She was just at home living her life and working on the farm and not being actually ever accused of witchcraft. She wasn't actually a witch. The only accusation of her being a witch stemmed from...
Gina (48:38)
Ha ha!
Kathryn (48:59)
this haunting. Like there were whisperings of like things happening in the community, but the fact that it was tied to witchcraft came after this story. Any indication that people were having trouble on their farms or whatever, people thought it was because she was physically doing something to them. Like she would come and like steal a cow.
Gina (49:26)
Yeah,
Kathryn (49:26)
not like put a curse on the farm, you know what I mean? So
Gina (49:26)
okay.
Kathryn (49:31)
this story is what led to her being known as the witch, Kate Batts. Not that she was accused of witchcraft beforehand and therefore was accused of, you know, haunting them or whatever. So, I mean.
After the fact, like some people said it didn't matter that she wasn't physically dead when she was haunting them. She could have been doing like witchcraft or whatever and just like throwing her spirit over into the house or like whatever. But the story was. For whatever reason.
Kate Batts is haunting the Bell family. again, to this day, nobody can really make sense of what was actually happening or what this entity actually was. So this was the one, even though it doesn't really make sense, it was the one that made the most sense. So that's the one that stuck. ⁓
Sorry, Cinnamon. Cinnamon keeps scaring me because I keep thinking she's in here and then she'll come in here and I'm like, what the fuck is coming into my room right now? ⁓ Yeah, exactly. God, what a nightmare. Anyway, so a lot of people ⁓ theorize that this quote unquote entity could have been.
Gina (50:33)
Doppelganger cinnamon.
Kathryn (50:47)
Just your average poltergeist. could have been a curse that was put on the family. Some people say alien for some reason. I don't know. It's fucking weird. Yeah, like I... Well, because it's strange because they couldn't see anything, but they were talking to this thing. So it's like, what the fuck is going on? I don't know. The biggest... Yeah, the biggest theory is that it was Kate. While all of this was happening, John's paralysis...
Gina (50:53)
Hell yeah. Fuck yes.
That is so funny.
Kathryn (51:14)
continued to get worse. Like his mouth continued to grow numb and he it got to the point where he couldn't really eat and it wasn't like like something was clearly wrong with him. And so over the course of the haunting, so about three years, ⁓ it just kept getting worse and worse and worse until he was bedridden and eventually died.
His official documented cause of death was poisoning by the Bell Witch.
Gina (51:44)
official documented? Wow.
Kathryn (51:46)
Yes. Yes. Not like Kate Batts the human poisoning him, but like the spirit that was the bell witch, it is said, was the one poisoning him. Yes.
Gina (51:57)
God, okay.
Kathryn (51:58)
To this day, this is considered the only case in US history where the official cause of death was directly attributed to a supernatural entity. There are some disputes of this because Greenbriar ghosts, people will point to, but that's not really cause of death. was exactly, yeah. Yeah. So it's not the only one where ghosts.
Gina (52:15)
but that's different. That's not... Yeah, the death wasn't caused by the ghost, yeah.
Kathryn (52:23)
were brought up in a legal case because this really wasn't a legal case they were just like cause of death which all right that makes sense bye
Gina (52:33)
think that's what I'm most shocked by is that she was the one allegedly throwing her spirit or cursing or haunting them or whatever. And it doesn't sound like there was really any.
Kathryn (52:36)
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
Gina (52:45)
I don't want to say repercussions because I don't think she was doing anything wrong. I'm just surprised that people weren't like torches and pitchforks.
Kathryn (52:50)
Mm-hmm.
Well, and I think it's because not everyone, everyone agreed that they were being tormented by a spirit. Not everyone agreed at the time that it was Kate Batts. Do you know what I mean? So like the, there was no question that there was a spirit in that house. But like, some people were keeping Kate Batts.
Gina (53:01)
Okay, okay, okay, okay. Yeah.
Kathryn (53:11)
Kate's name out of their mouths, basically. Like, it wasn't universally believed that it was her. ⁓ Even today, it's not. That is, again, just like the most talked about theory. Like, when you say the bell witch, a lot of people will say Kate was the witch. ⁓ Other people, it's just a nickname for a spirit that has no name. But the spirit did say its name was Kate. I mean, it was...
Gina (53:13)
Yeah, smart.
Okay.
Kathryn (53:38)
It did say it was Kate Batts. That's the part that some people are like, okay, maybe John was just like, aha, it's Kate, my God! But like, yeah.
Gina (53:45)
That's where my mind went at first, that it was just him being a bit shitty. But now I'm wondering, because if this was a spirit, and sorry if I'm steamrolling, but if this was a spirit who loved like drama and gossip and shit, maybe they just wanted to stir the pot by saying they were Kate.
Kathryn (53:53)
Mm-mm.
Mm-hmm.
Another huge theory, yes. Yeah, that's another very popular theory. And actually the one that I ascribe to, because listen, if I was a weird demonic spirit, I would 100 % play on their feud. You know what I mean? So especially in combination with the dog and the weird animals, if we can all agree that there was something weird going on in the bell farm. ⁓
Gina (54:03)
Yeah.
Yeah.
Kathryn (54:27)
my guess it was like some weird demonic situation which like I don't even think I believe in demons but maybe I do because that's my theory on this story and just like trying to like fuck with the two of them and blame Kate to like stir up the drama like you said yeah yes so lots of theories where this you're not steamrolling because we're getting into like the theory section of this story one thing that is worth noting is
Gina (54:43)
Yeah, yeah, okay, interesting.
Kathryn (54:57)
A weird tin or bottle or whatever of black goo was found in the kitchen, which many people say was the poison that was being used. And the family claims up and down that they have no idea where it came from. Logic will tell you.
They probably did.
that is one of the theories that it was just, the family doing something weird, trying to get rid of John for some reason, because right after John died, the witch went away.
Gina (55:31)
Imagine that. Okay.
Kathryn (55:31)
And things went back to normal. Yep. And
I will say there were a few more instances of smaller hauntings throughout the year. They'd pop up every now and then. Every few years there would be a case of haunting. She never fully left. Whatever energy or whatever was there never fully went away. just this big, it just didn't stop for three years. And then it would stop and start and stop and start.
So I think if we looked at what else was happening in the family at the time, maybe there'd be some connection. We just don't know. That wasn't documented super strongly. of the other theories people had, what did I list already? Kate Bats, obviously a big one. Just your average run of the mill evil spirit that was trying to cause a ruckus. The family trying to get rid of John.
⁓ And just to elaborate on that one a little bit, ⁓ one of the, I'm going to say more relatively recent theories was that John was really abusive, ⁓ particularly to Betsy. So it is theorized that
The reason she was so quote unquote targeted with the haunting was that it was like a trauma response to like his abuse Or she was doing it to like get back at him. The problem with her doing it to get back at him was you would think he would be the one like pinched and poked and so like he was never blamed for it while it was happening. So like if she was gonna go through all of this.
to get back at him, you would think there would be like an extra step of like him being blamed for it or something. I don't know. ⁓ But also that it could have been Lucy and that's why Lucy was just never targeted because it was her the whole time. You know what I mean? Like, yeah, I kind of like that too. Like I do ascribe to.
Gina (57:09)
Yeah.
I do love that.
Kathryn (57:25)
a of these theories just because I like all of them. don't know. I don't know what it was. I don't know what I believe with this one. That's my spoiler.
Gina (57:31)
Yeah, because even if
it was Lucy, well, then why would Betsy have been? Because that was her daughter. Why would she be hurting her daughter? Yeah, so there is always an extra thing, isn't there?
Kathryn (57:39)
Yeah, right.
Yeah, and it could have been like Lucy and Betsy were in it together and one of them needed to get the brunt for it to be more believ- like, who knows? ⁓ And that's kind of the takeaway from the story and one of the reasons this is such an infamous story in the US specifically and that's the fact that we will never know.
Gina (57:48)
Hmm.
Kathryn (57:59)
It's kind of a unique haunting in that some of the other very famous hauntings like Amity, it's up there with Amityville, Lizzie Borden, it's top three to five haunting. What's unique about this one is there are no solid facts about anything. It's all confusing from start to finish, you know what I mean?
At least with Lizzie Borden, for example, we know there was a girl named Lizzie Borden. You know what I mean? Like this was all like, it's all a question mark, you know? one fun fact that I didn't know before researching this is this story was so famous and widely believed to be true even at the time ⁓ that President Andrew Jackson made a visit to the house to like,
Gina (58:25)
Mm-hmm.
Kathryn (58:47)
check out what was going on, because he was from Nashville, which is like close. Yeah. So he like makes his way to the house and is like. Checking out what's going on in the Bell Farm, because it was so famous and so widely known, and it's said that he was so creeped out by like whatever he saw there that he like fucked off out of there and was like, I'm not messing messing with that demonic shit. Yeah.
Gina (58:51)
Piece of shit.
Ew, my god.
Good. I hope it followed
him.
Kathryn (59:16)
Yeah, well, I'm sure it did. Well, I won't say that. OK, anyway, Anyway, so present day, you can visit the Bell Farm. ⁓ There is a cave known as like the, I think it's called the Bell Witch Cave, like on the property that they've basically turned into like a museum of Bell stuff. ⁓
Gina (59:42)
Okay.
Kathryn (59:43)
Yeah, they have like the original, there's like stone from the original fireplace and they have like a kettle from their house. I don't know, they're just like artifacts from the family. But it's like in this cave. I don't know why I didn't dive too deep into this, but you can go. The Bell property still exists. Bell families still exist. Like there's family members and like descendants who will like talk about it.
And as far as everyone's concerned, this is real. They really were tormented. It's like a real thing that happened. also Bats family cemetery that you can visit. Unfortunately, as we've seen so many times before, you cannot find Kate's...
grave because her headstone was stolen many, many years ago. So no one knows exactly where she is, but she is in that family cemetery. And I think you can go visit. But if you do, don't be a dick. But to this day, I mean, there's rhetoric between like the Bell family and the Bats family, like because this is such a famous case that like and I think there I'm not going to speak for the Bats family. But if it were me, if I was
about. I'd be like, fuck the Bell family, because the way the story is always told is so focused on them. And like
Kate's name was kind of fucking slandered in this situation. She was trying to just like mind her own business and then all of sudden she's like known as the Bell Witch. So yeah, I don't know. I don't know if there's any like animosity with that. Like probably not. I this is like generations ago. It's not like the current Bell's fault that this was like happening. You know what I mean? So like I'd be petty about it just for posterity's sake.
Gina (1:01:28)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Kathryn (1:01:33)
But sure they're all mature about it. But it is interesting. mean, this is a very small.
town and to this day and very like unpopulated region so this is like what this region is known for ⁓ and they do embrace it like it's not like a gross another interview crew asking about the bell which like they're happy to talk about it as far as they're all concerned there really was a poltergeist or haunting or whatever it may be
So of course, as expected, this story did inspire numerous books, movies, all of I've seen one of the movies, which I didn't realize was inspired by the story. It's called An American Haunting.
I'm only mentioning it because that's the only one I've seen. I don't remember if it was good or not. I saw it very long time ago. It's probably fine. It also inspired the funeral doom metal band called Bellwitch, whom I have seen in concert. I have seen them. That's it. That's my story.
Gina (1:02:37)
Did you enjoy? Did you enjoy funeral? Funeral doom?
Kathryn (1:02:39)
I, so here's the thing. They're
a great band. I personally am not a huge fan of funeral doom metal. It makes me very sleepy. It's like, not in like a bad way. It's just like ones, they have an album where the album's like an hour and a half long and it's one song. So let me just, I'll just say that. Yes.
Gina (1:03:01)
⁓ Okay yeah yeah yeah yeah music for music people ⁓
Kathryn (1:03:08)
Yes, that concert, those concert tickets were not purchased by me. I'll put it that way. Yeah.
Gina (1:03:12)
That is cool though. Man, I have so many questions about this story, which is so hard because we have zero answers.
Kathryn (1:03:19)
So does everyone else. Yeah, I know.
Yes, it's one of those stories, which is why, yeah, I'm so fascinated by it. And it's told a lot of different ways. Like, you can get through a whole story about the Bell Witch and not mention Kate Batts at all. that's how much question there is about, like, what actually happened and what, was important and what, whatever. Yeah.
Gina (1:03:44)
I feel bad for Kate. I feel bad for Kate and I feel bad for Lucy and Betsy.
Kathryn (1:03:50)
I know I feel bad for just everyone but John pretty much. John Bell. People don't say that enough. I feel like we're starting to hate him. for too many years, it's been like, ⁓ poor Bell family. Poor John lost his mouth and died. No, fuck that guy. Fuck John Bell. I hope he is not resting in peace.
Gina (1:03:54)
Yeah, everyone but John, everyone but the pedophile I feel bad for.
Yeah.
Same, I hope he's ripping in agony. That was real violent, I'm sorry. I'm not, you can come for me if you want. That'd be kinda cool. Go for Gina.
Kathryn (1:04:20)
Just kidding. Just kidding. Go for Gina. I'm scared. Go for Gina. All right.
Scary on top
What do you have for me? I've talked enough.
Gina (1:04:37)
a story for you today. It was sent to us by Chillers and Thrillers. So shout out to Chillers and Thrillers. And I think it says that, so the title of the story is The House Doppelganger. it says that it's by user,
Kathryn (1:04:40)
Excellent.
⁓ Yay!
Uggghh
Gina (1:04:55)
Crying in Church. So I don't know if this was like a Reddit story that they found or something, but credit to Crying in Church by way of chillers and thrillers.
Kathryn (1:04:57)
Okay.
Gina (1:05:07)
This happened when I was about 13 or so. It was summertime and I was on vacation with my parents. We had hit the road and driven quite a ways to visit my older sister who lived across the country. After spending some time together and sharing supper, we decided to call it a night. My parents slept in my sister's bedroom and she slept in the neighboring room with her small son. It's important to note a few things at this point. My mother,
is a round short woman with very delicate feminine features. She has round glasses and that night she went to bed in a long blue nightgown. My sister, on the other hand, is very tall and athletically built, taking after my dad in terms of her facial features. She also has glasses, but unlike my mother, hers were square shaped. She went to bed in a shorter orange and striped nightgown.
These small but substantial differences are key.
Kathryn (1:06:11)
OK, my goodness, yes, I clock in it. Clock in. I know, yeah, I'm like, my god. This feels like an important legend. Yeah, seriously, there are notes from which you are reading.
Gina (1:06:12)
I I know, yeah. I love the way that this is written.
I know. ⁓
Right? Yeah, I was like, should I be taking notes? But I'm literally reading it. So it's like, there are notes and I'm looking at them.
Now, since all of the bedrooms were full, I was given a blanket and a pillow to sleep on the couch. Of course, like any kid, I watched TV for a few hours well into the night. And at around 4am, it dawned on me that we had plans for the next day. So I should probably try to get some rest.
After tossing and turning for about an hour or so, I gave up and just laid on my back staring at the stars visible from the nearby window. As the natural light flooded the room from the sunrise, I flipped through some photo albums. I did this for a while, not having slept at all the entire night. At this point, I was pretty bored and lonely and I was kind of hoping someone would wake up soon and talk to me. Around 8 a.m., I heard a door
slowly open and someone came out into the hallway. At my sister's house, the living room is sunken, which by the way, I fucking love a sunken living room. I want one so bad. They're so sick. So living room is sunken and a small staircase of maybe three steps leads to the raised kitchen and dining room. The hallway is also in this kind of raised area and it connects to the bathroom and the bedrooms.
Kathryn (1:07:31)
jealous. Ugh. Yeah, that's such a vibe.
Gina (1:07:50)
In the living room, there's a doorless archway that leads down to the basement and the laundry room. So basically what this means is that I could look up and see what was going on in the dining area from the couch. This person hummed a little and then was caught off guard by a table in the dining room that was full of framed pictures of my family my sister had on display. I don't know.
how to describe the way they looked at the photos, besides saying they were bewildered by them. Maybe even enchanted, letting out an occasional ooh or ⁓ I could tell it was a woman, but I wasn't sure if it was my mother or sister. And this was strange, because like I said, they looked alike, but were also very distinguishable. I also felt
Kathryn (1:08:32)
Ugh.
Gina (1:08:45)
this weird feeling because everyone in my family had seen these photos many times and I'd even say may own a few copies of their own of those exact same photos. So why act amazed by them? So I said, hey, ma, what are you doing? In a nervous yet warm voice. No response. Okay then, it was my sister. I said, hey, good morning, sister's name. It was omitted from the story.
Kathryn (1:08:56)
Mm-hmm.
Gina (1:09:13)
What are you making your dear sibling for breakfast? No response. Hmm. I knew I was definitely loud enough. They had heard me for sure. And that uneasy feeling in my stomach grew stronger now. And I had no idea why. The likeness of my sister and mother was there. So it wasn't like it was a stranger or something. But then I noticed something very
off. They were wearing a knee-length blue and orange striped nightgown. Their height wasn't short, but it wasn't tall either. It was average. They had a muscular build, but they couldn't really be called skinny. The hair was the same color as both my sister and my mother's, and so was the skin color.
My heart skipped, and I thought, who the hell is this? Maybe someone stayed overnight, but how could they? I had laid right beside the front door all night long. When they turned around and went to inspect another photograph on a wall near that staircase, their face made my heart sink. It was a hybrid.
of my mother and sister's most discernible features with glasses that were round on the bottom but squared on the top. eyes were not my mother's or my sister's. They were very wide and unnerving and darted all around the walls very quickly, very excitedly. It was as if my mother and sister had been Frankensteined together into one person.
Yeah, dude, this is a fucking creepy story. My knee-jerk reaction after seeing their face was to scooch my legs in and pretend I was sleeping. I could feel the veins in my neck beating very hard and my breathing became loud and labored. Whoever the hell it was came down the stairs and looked around the living that same excitement. I don't know how
Kathryn (1:10:53)
Ew.
Yeah.
Gina (1:11:21)
to explain how scared I was as it came closer to me. I thought maybe if I stayed quiet it would pass by me, and I was also scratching and pinching myself at this point in case I was asleep without realizing it. But the pain was real. I was definitely awake. The thing I watched with my eyes squinted took up an interest in a photo album I had left on the table very close to me. Then,
Kathryn (1:11:35)
Mm-hmm.
Gina (1:11:51)
Probably the worst thing that could have happened, happened. sister's portable home phone rang. My sister had answered a call last night and had put the phone on the couch's frame between the wall and its cushions. The thing's face became very alarmed and it turned in my direction and saw me on the couch and became very, very angry.
I opened my eyes fully and looked at its face and it just stared back with my entire body trembling. Its eyes were pure black, total darkness like two huge pupils staring right at me and furious. It opened its mouth unnaturally wide and screamed, no at me.
and then turned and darted down the stairs to the basement where I heard a door slam shut and it just kept saying, no, no, no, no, no. I know, I know, it's so scary, I know, yes, I know. I stared at the archway for a long time, still shaking and digging my nails into my arm, begging to wake up because I was so afraid it would come back, wishing I was just dreaming.
Kathryn (1:12:55)
Jesus Christ! What the fuck? What?
Gina (1:13:14)
I literally could not move because I was too scared to get up in case it came back or was waiting at the arch, and I couldn't speak for the same reason. My brain had abandoned me. And then they put like a little frowny face, which is sad, yeah. An hour must have passed like that. I didn't move. It had stopped yelling, and this was for some reason even scarier than when it had been yelling.
because at least then I was sure it was downstairs and not slowly climbing back up the stairs to filet me alive. I heard a door open again from the hallways upstairs and stared at it, full of adrenaline at this point. But it was my mom, exactly herself and in the right nightgown. She was humming as she put on some coffee and started making toast. Another door opened, my sister this time.
Kathryn (1:13:41)
Yeah.
Gina (1:14:08)
exactly as she had looked before heading off to bed. She and my mom talked for a bit and I just stared at them. My sister eventually saw me staring at her over the banister and said, what the hell, why are you staring at me? Why didn't you just say something? And I replied back in a very shaky voice, I did, twice. They looked at each other as if to say, I told my mom I hadn't slept yet.
and she said that that was a big mistake, etc., doing the mom thing, I ate breakfast with them and then realized eventually that I was actually fully awake and no, I wasn't gonna wind up getting any sleep. I decided against my better judgment to tell them what had just happened in case it came upstairs to hurt them. They pretty much laughed at me, told me I had just fallen asleep or imagined it or maybe I was nuts.
My sister told me to go sleep with my nephew and asked me to try and fix the screen in her room while I was at it, because somehow it had fallen out of the window and onto the floor in the middle of the night. On my way to her room, I walked by that table in the dining room and noticed that all of the frames had been moved. I pointed this out very excitedly to my mother and sister as if to say, see, see? And my sister just shrugged it off.
and said that her son liked looking at them. I kept pressing the issue, so my sister, much to my hysterical protest, went to every room in the basement just to make me shut up about it. And she didn't see anything unusual. I laid in the bed and I did not sleep a wink. I still think about it from time to time and I never slept on that couch again, opting instead to sleep on the floor of my parents' room and locking the door.
I have been questioning reality ever since.
Kathryn (1:16:07)
As you should! What the fuck?
Gina (1:16:08)
Right?
Fuck
Kathryn (1:16:11)
fucking freaky as fuck.
Also, what's fucking me up is like this thing seemed afraid of this person. Like it didn't want to be seen, which is weird. I was not expecting that because it also, yeah, like it wasn't, it shouldn't have been caught. So now I'm like.
Gina (1:16:28)
Yeah, like the no, no.
Mm-hmm.
Kathryn (1:16:36)
What the fuck was that thing afraid of? Was it like scared of getting in trouble for being seen?
Gina (1:16:42)
I don't know, like maybe it was like kind of a demonic frogger situation where it just wanted to, yeah, just live in the basement and hang out and look at like pictures of humans with normal eyes. And then somebody saw it and it freaked out, which makes me feel kind of bad for it.
Kathryn (1:16:47)
Yeah, that's what I'm thinking.
Also, like, why the fuck are you mimicking my mom and sister? Like, yeah.
Gina (1:17:02)
Yeah, the hybrid thing, that's fucking- and the fact that it was
was mimicking like the clothes they had worn to bed as well.
Kathryn (1:17:09)
That's fucking freaky as fuck because that's like...
Do you do this every night? Like, what are you? What the fuck? You know what this also kind of reminds me of? Because of the sentiment of never sleeping on that couch ever again, it reminds me of Brooke's story from way long time ago. Do you remember that? Yes. She says the same sentence. Yeah.
Gina (1:17:14)
Right? Yeah. Like, were you watching us?
Hmm.
I thought the same exact thing. Yes, same exact thing. Mm-hmm.
Yeah, because that was her first encounter with sleep paralysis, wasn't it? And she saw that spiky blob thing. Yeah. Yeah, fuck that.
Kathryn (1:17:41)
that couch. Yeah.
That's fucking scary.
Gina (1:17:46)
Well, thank you to chillers and thrillers for that by way of ⁓ crying in church. That sounded like a funny sentence. User crying in church. ⁓ anytime.
Kathryn (1:17:51)
Yeah.
I know. Thank you for crying in church.
Don't we all?
Gina (1:18:05)
But yeah, I think that's all we have for you this week. As a reminder, please feel free to send your stories in. We love reading them, even when they're very spooky and scary like this one. And if you don't want your story read on the podcast, that's completely OK. Feel free to send it anyway. Just tell it to keep it between us, and we will. Also join our Patreon, because Patreon is really, really fun, and all the cool kids love it. Other than that, until next time, Little Spoons, keep it cool.
Kathryn (1:18:23)
And keep it creepy.
