House on Montgomery St.

From: Todd Dillinger (tntpub@juno.com)
Story type: Ghost
Location: Rhinebeck, NY
Source: Form Submission

Growing up, I lived in an old three story house that I, several of my friends, and people who rented an apartment in the house all considered haunted. There were at least two ghosts present in the house, along with poltergeist activity.

The poltergeist would hide things from us, and do annoying things, like break glass objects, and the bane of all females, leave the toilet seat up (I was falsely accused many times!).

The ghosts were much more unsettling. Many nights I'd wake up when something would tickle my foot or I'd wake up feeling a presence looking at me. Rentors reported the same thing happening.

One day, during a heavy afternoon thunderstorm, I came in from the front porch, and looked up the stairs. On the second story landing was an old woman looking back at me. I had only glanced up there, and when I looked back, she was gone. Just then a loud crash came from the closet at the top of the stairs. I went up and looked, and a metal free standing clothes rack had fallen over all by itself.

Another time, one of my friends stayed over, and we started out sleeping upstairs. It was in August, and at 3 in the morning, we both woke up to a room that was freezing cold (we could see our breath), and the blankets pulled back and folded neatly at the bottom of the bed. We heard strange noises coming from the attic, and ran down the stairs and spent the rest of the night on our front porch.

Our rentor, a 68 year old woman, swore that she saw a man standing on the second floor landing, and when she spoke, he just dis- appeared. Other people have reported looking out the windows on the second floor, and have seen a man looking back at them.

One day, several of my friends went to the attic, and in a dark corner, found a brick wall. No other part of the house had any brick in it. As we approached the wall, the temperature got cold, and the light went out. We had a feel- ing of impending doom, and left without finding out what was behind the wall.

We moved out several years later, and while cleaning out the cellar (which was divided into 8 seperate rooms), found an old sea chest belonging to a retired sea captain who had died there in the late 1800's.

On the last day I was there, as I was looking around to make sure we had not forgotten anything, I felt a presence watching me, and felt that if I didn't leave soon, I would get hurt in some way. As I left, a light fixture fell from the second floor landing and missed me by inches. I left, never to return.