A few years ago, I decided to try my hand at recording EVP’s because I was sure that there was a logical explanation for this phenomena. I was able
to record an EVP the very first time I tried, and have recorded literally hundreds.
I live in an area that is rich in Civil War history and I decided that a location about a mile from my house would be the perfect place to record some
EVP’s. The location in question was the Ellwood house, which is located in Virginia near the junction of Rt 3 and Rt 20, about ¼ mile from the
Wilderness Battlefield.
Ellwood has a long and interesting history, it served as a headquarters and for a time as a hospital during the civil war and so many people died
there that they buried them in the yard. I thought that if there was ever a place that should be good for EVP’s, this would be it.
The grounds were open on the weekends at that time of year, so I stopped by there to see what I could find out. The house was undergoing ( and still
is I believe ) renovations and is not currently open to the public. You can walk around the house and grounds and look in the windows, but you can’t
go inside the actual structure. There were some people there that day from a local organization that was trying to raise funds to help pay for the
renovation project. One particular gentleman, I can’t recall his name, had a little setup that demonstrated Civil War medicine and I decided to talk
to him about what I was interested in doing. Instead of thinking I was bonkers, he told me stories about some of the things they has seen there. All
I can recall now is the story of a little girl who appeared to be 9-10 years of age that numerous people had seen cross the yard dressed in period
clothing that would just simply fade away.
This piqued my interest even more, and this led me to the park rangers at the Chancellorville Battlefield site, who instead of trying to have me
committed, pointed me to another Park Ranger who was in charge of security for the Fredericksburg area civil war sites. The initial phone call to this
man did not appear to go very well, his main concern was that someone would be injured while walking around after dark on park property. He told me to
fill out a request form for access to park property after hours and he would run it through.
Needless to say, I was surprised to receive a letter in the mail about 3 weeks later granting me and up to 2 other people unlimited, unescorted access
to the Ellwood grounds from 6pm to 6am for the purpose of “recording night sounds”. The stipulations were that because the grounds were locked at
night, I had to leave my car parked at the gate with a copy of my approval taped to the window so any curious rangers/police would know what we were
doing there. And of course, we were not allowed inside the house, and as the house is alarmed, should we accidently set off the alarm, we were to
remain on site until a ranger arrived. (No, we never set off the alarm).
If you have read my previous post here on ATS in this forum about how to record EVP’s, then you know that I believe that anybody can record EVP’s
anytime, anywhere they so desire. This time was fairly early in my EVP experimenting, and I was going around to different places recording EVPS. I
asked for permission to do this at night for 2 reasons: 1., No other people would be around, and 2., there would be less background noise at
night.
This transpired in the fall of 2005 and it was cool enough in the evenings by then that the bugs were quiet at night, some nights is was down right
cold sittin out there recording. My daughter went with me most every time I went, and after a few trips, we got used to the nuances of the old house
and the pops and creaks and what not.
All of my recordings were done on the front porch, you can see the porch in the link posted at the end of the story.
Although we never physically saw anything out of the ordinary, it’s almost impossible not to get creeped out after sitting there in the dark knowing
so many people died all around the very spot you were sitting.
One thing I do want to mention is the cold spots. At first they were kind of uncomforting, but we got used to them after a while. They appeared to
be about the size of a bowling ball, and would move around you, almost as if they were checking you out. If you put your hand into one of the spots,
you could easily tell there was a temperature difference of at least 5 degrees of so. To this day, I have no explanation of what this was, but I can
say that I never felt threatened. I remember one specific instance of feeling one of these spots checking me out (for lack of a better description)
and it moved up my body and drifted by my face. Like I said, there is no other description than to say it was simply a area of air that was somewhat
colder than the air only a few inches away.
My daughter and I experienced these cold spots every single time we went to the house, and it always seemed that the spots were just as curious about
us as we were of them.
I took my son with me one night, and for being 25 years old, he was the biggest chicken you have ever seen. I wound up calling him Turkey Boy cause he
couldn’t keep still and was constantly raising his head up and looking around like a wild turkey does. The first time he got a cold spot, he
totally freaked and almost lost it... I never took him back
I don’t recall how many trips we made, or exactly how many EVP’s I recorded, but I do remember 2 of them, and I will never forget them. They were
both recorded on the porch.
The best one was a voice that was actually recorded backwards… that was my first reverse recording and one of the clearest EVP’s I have ever
recorded. The phenomena was recorded shortly after me asking the question “ If you stayed in this house, can you tell us how long you stayed
here?” Although the EVP had nothing to do with the question, when I was listening to the playback, I distinctly heard something that sounded like a
voice, but was garbled. When it was reversed, you could clearly hear a man say…. “shot me in the back”. This wasn’t a whisper, it was a
voice. The second EVP was a personal favorite of mine and had me quite perplexed for some time. This EVP was a long slow whisper, almost as if it were
a effort for it to be said….. my first impression was that it was someone whispering “Wild Bill Hickcock” in a long drawn out manner.
[edit on 24-8-2008 by RickinVa]