 Today we're visiting a house that's so scandalous, so haunted, and so demonic that it doesn't even have a name. It is simply known by its address. Now before we get started, you know what to do. Hit that subscribe button and give us a like. Welcome to Esoteric Atlanta. My name is Bryce, and today we're talking about 432 Abercorn Street in Savannah, Georgia. Street is the epitome of the myths and legends and, yes, curses that seem to surround the city of Savannah, Georgia. The city was built up on top of and around burial sites. Yes, at first it was Native American burial sites that the city built itself upon, and then over time houses started to be built on top of slave burial sites. And in fact, times that I've been in Savannah, Georgia, I've heard many people say that as you walk down the streets of Savannah, Georgia, you are literally walking on top of hundreds if not thousands of dead bodies. With this curse, people say that's why Savannah has been involved in almost every war that has happened in the United States since it's been established. Logically, you could say that yes, because Savannah was one of the original cities in the colony, so of course it was involved in almost every war. There was also outbreaks of yellow fever. We talked about that in the Gone with the Wind episode that was part of the reason why Godfrey Barnsley bought the land in northwest Georgia was to escape yellow fever. Now, could this be because of a curse? Or could it be because it was a river town and diseases like that just kind of spread in that environment? This area of the United States also had malaria when the colonists first got here. We since have gotten rid of malaria, but it was there. So I don't know if that was specifically because of a curse or just because of conditions and circumstances. However, this curse plays into our next story. Calhoun Square is an area of Savannah, Georgia that is host to a lot of paranormal activity. Calhoun Square was the final of the three big squares that were built in Savannah and it was named after John C. Calhoun. Now John C. Calhoun was a man from South Carolina. In fact, in Charleston, you have the Calhoun House. There's a lots of other places that honor this man. John C. Calhoun was a senator and he was also the vice president to John Quincy Adams. In 1851, Calhoun Square was finished. Calhoun Square also offered the Massey Common School and this was the first ever Georgia public school and this does play into our story. So that's something of historical value big time in Calhoun Square. But in 1868, a Civil War veteran named Benjamin Wilson decided that he was going to build the most expensive, most exquisite house. You see, Benjamin Wilson was also a bit of a social climber as my parents would probably call him new money. He wanted to show off his money. He wanted to be taken seriously. He wanted to be a man of prominence in Savannah, Georgia. So he bought a lot in Calhoun Square on Abercorn Street and he began his building. The family then moved into the house in 1869 and soon after, unfortunately, Benjamin Wilson's wife passed away of yellow fever. At this point, Benjamin Wilson fell into a deep depression mourning the loss of his wife. Apparently, he turned into a very abusive and strict overbearing father to his daughters. When I read this, part of me thought about Captain Von Trapp in the sound of music. However, as the story continues, you will see that Benjamin Wilson made Captain Von Trapp look like a carebear. So this is when the Massey School comes into our story. Again, this school was the first ever public school in the state of Georgia. However, it isn't what you think of now when you think of public schools. The school hosted children who were extremely poor, children who were orphaned, as well as freed African American children. For a high society family or a family striving to be high society, this was not the playground that you wanted your two daughters to be playing in. And of course, this does not reflect my personal opinion. This is just part of the story and how society viewed public school systems in the 1860s. But let's continue. Because the Massey School was so close to the Wilson home, 432 Abercorn Street, his daughter, one of his daughters, had the habit of going outside and playing with all the children who were part of this public school. Well, for a social climber like Mr. Wilson, this was not acceptable. So one day, as his daughter was coming home from playing outside with her friends, her father continued to berate her and beat her and told her never to be seen playing with those children again. Well, this little girl had some tenacity and decided that she was going to continue playing with her friends. And so she did. The very next day, she went right back outside and continued to play with her friends. Well, of course, this made her father, Benjamin Wilson, irate. And when his daughter came home, he grabbed a chair, placed it up in her bedroom window, which overlooked the school and sat her in the chair, tied her wrist and her ankles to the chair and forced her to sit out there and watch the kids play. This punishment went on for days. Mr. Wilson left his daughter sitting in a room tied up. Apparently, according to the story, you could hear her screaming from her bedroom begging for forgiveness. Now, during this time as most of the year in the deep south, we experience extreme heat and extreme humidity. Even in modern times where we have air conditioning, sometimes the heat can get overwhelming. In my bedroom we sleep with, in the summertime, we sleep with the air conditioning on and usually two fans on. That's how hot it is. So here's this young girl in the 1860s, or now the 1870s, who is in a petticoat tied to a chair for days in the savannah heat. And unfortunately, this heat killed her. She passed away, tied up to the chair. Eventually, Mr. Wilson went up to check on his daughter and realized her body was lifeless. He untied her arms and legs and before Rigamortis set in, she collapsed onto the floor, dead. Now, what Mr. Wilson technically did was murder. However, because of who he was in the city who he had become, nobody pressed charges against him. But never, never fear. His own conscious got the best of him. Over time, Mr. Wilson struck with grief over the accidental murder of his daughter, would hallucinate and see her ghost everywhere. And then one day, Mr. Wilson walked right back up to her bedroom and sat down in the chair, the same chair that was sitting at the window. You see, he had never moved it. And as he sat down on the chair, he pulled a gun out and shot himself in the head. Now they say Mr. Wilson, as well as his daughter, haunt the house at 432 Abercorn Street. But that's not where our story ends. According to the legend, the death of Mr. Wilson's daughter and himself were just part effects of this curse, the curse of savannah. Again, they had built their house on top of a slave burial plot. Now in the 1960s, the house was owned by a couple who had two children. One Christmas, the couple invited a couple of friends to come stay with them, and they brought their two children as well. Now for those who are familiar with savannah, savannah like Charleston, like one of these older cities is a great walking city. You can walk to bars, walk to restaurants, that is if you live downtown in the historic district, which Calhoun Square is a part of that. So once their friends were in savannah, they would leave their four children alone at night in the house and they would go out to restaurants and bars and have a grand old time. Now again, this was the 1960s, very different time than it is today. Kids had more freedom and doors were left unlocked a lot. Just a more innocent time. While the night before the friends were due to go back home, the family that owned the house at Abercorn Street decided to take them out one last time. Now this night, they stayed out a little bit later than they normally did. When they got home, someone had broken into their house and killed three of their children, placing their bodies in a triangle. They found the fourth child, a little girl, scared and in a closet. Now this little girl apparently is the grown woman who now owns the house. Yes, the house is still privately owned, you cannot go inside of it. Locals say that she has left the house at this point abandoned, believing that anybody who lives in the house will die. But in between the murders of the children and the present-day owner of this house, they were renting out rooms at Abercorn Street. Eventually a SCAD student, again SCAD is the Savannah College of Art and Design, was renting a room within the house. Now Calhoun Square is notorious for being a place of disappearances where people just vanish. And that's what happened to this SCAD student. Apparently he just vanished. Not only did he vanish, but people believed that he fell through a portal in one of the walls in the house that was apparently a demonic wall. And in fact, it is because of this that it is rumored that Anton LeVe, the founder of the Church of Satan, wanted to buy this house in order to create a Church of Satan on the east coast in Savannah at this demonic house. Of course, he was denied this sale. Now, as I said previously, this house is still privately owned. You cannot go into the house. It is not a museum, it's not up for tours. However, if you go on a ghost tour in Savannah, most people will walk you by the house and they'll tell you these stories. However, they will remind you to be respectful to the current owners. Now here's the thing. Apparently, according to some sources, none of these stories are true. Some people say that Benjamin Wilson never committed suicide. In fact, they have record of a Benjamin Wilson dying in the late 1800s in Colorado. They have a record of two of his daughters going on to get married. There is no record of children being murdered in this house or of a SCAD student going missing in this house, although it is true that people do disappear in Calvin Square. However, if you walk by the house, you do get a very demonic feeling. I've been by the house. It's extremely creepy. And from what I could see, it wasn't abandoned as the story goes with the lone surviving child taking ownership of the house to make sure no one would live there. In fact, when I walked by it, it looked like lights were on and people were living their lives. But I've always said that where there's smoke, there's fire. If these stories are just stories, then where do they come from? Why do people fear this house? Fear it so much that they don't even have a name for it. They just know its address. Were documents forged to clear the name of Benjamin Wilson? Did he really kill his daughter? I don't know. Or is there a more sinister story that's too grotesque to disturbing to even tell? I don't know. But I do know that Savannah, like Charleston, breeds. There is a life in Savannah and Charleston and New Orleans that you can't find in a city like Atlanta. There are layers to Savannah, Georgia, not just the layers of earth that carry hundreds and thousands of bodies, not just the layers of soil that bury the bodies in cemeteries. There are layers there of a spiritual veil. In certain parts of the world, this veil is thick. Things are practical. They make sense. In other parts of the world, the veil is very thin and reality isn't so real. People who live in Savannah, who live in Charleston and New Orleans, learn to really respect the dead. And it's not because they're dead. It's because the dead live among them. They haven't gone anywhere. And is that what makes this house so thick and dark? Are there a lot of dead living there carrying on the curse of Savannah? And that's our story for today. Let me know if you've been to this house, if you've had any crazy experiences, or if there's any stories you've heard about this house that I didn't tell. I would love to hear them. Once again, thank you so much to Josh McKay for doing our music, to Todd Roderick for being our editor, and thank you to you guys for being a part of this fun little community. I hope you guys are all doing well, and I will see you next time. Bye.