Higby House – Contribution

08/01/2004: This story was submitted by Renee, thank you to her for sharing her experience. It takes place in Richmond Dale, which is located in Ross County. Renee tells about a house that she and her husband were thinking of purchasing until something frightened their daughter and followed them home. They did not end up buying the home.

About seven years ago, my husband and I were looking to buy a bigger house. Well, we found one all right…one that we both will never forget. It sat on top of a hill all by itself, peaceful it seemed. Big brick farmhouse and the barn was just as big. We pulled up the hill and got out of the car to take a look and I had a very strange feeling come over me just as I shut the door of the car. We started to look around and my four-year-old daughter started to scream and ran to my husband, claiming she saw a girl…she was still crying as we looked around; I looked through the front door and as I did, I saw a beautiful spiral staircase and that is when it all started. I couldn’t see anything but could feel the presence of something there. Although it was empty (so we thought). I just stood there staring, I could not move. As I stood there, I was saying to myself, “If you’re there, prove it.” Biggest mistake of my life…my granny used to say don’t mock the dead or they go to bed with you at night. My husband and I believe that now. Later at home, I told my husband what happened. Needless to say, a few nights later, I awoke with a woman at the end of my bed! A lot started to happen, I really don’t want to get into it all, but we didn’t buy that HOUSE and my daughter for a very long time talked of the girl.

08/24/2005: James Davis, a former resident of the Higby House, sent us this next story. James tells about running in face-to-face with a ghostly little girl at the top of the stairs while living there in the early 1990s. He also experienced the feeling of being held down by something while in bed and the entire room being black.

I lived there in the early 90s, there being the Higby House. I was in the 6th grade, so I had to have been no older than 12-years-old. My parents were renting the home from the Dreshach’s at the time. I remember seeing the house for the first time and thinking to myself, as any child with an overactive imagination, “This house has ghosts.” Little did I know how true my thoughts would become. The first encounter that I had with the “prior inhabitants” of the home actually happened in the mid-day. I had an argument with my mother in the kitchen over something trivial and stormed to my room. My room was located at the top of the “spiral staircase” that Renee had spoken about seeing in an earlier submission you had. As I stormed up the stairs and rounded the turn towards my room, I was frozen in my tracks. What I saw still haunts me to this day. There before me was a young girl…maybe no more than 7-years-old. She was wearing dingy (what I call) turn-of-the-century / Little House On The Prairie clothes. The one detail I remember the most was her eyes. They were there…but they were not. They seemed to be black with no signs of life in them. It seemed an eternity, this confrontation, but I know it was no more than a few seconds. When I finally managed to muster a scream, still frozen in my tracks, she turned around and walked into the next room towards what used to be the old maid’s quarters, which during our time there had always been abandoned, and disappeared. I never saw that little girl again.

Now my family was not a rich family, hence why we were renting the home. And during our time in this home, I shared a bedroom and bed with my younger brother. After my initial “meeting” with the little girl, I became terrified of the home and more specifically, with the home at night. I was given a night light which I kept plugged into the wall at the foot of my bed just for the extra bit of security. I awoke one night feeling as if I was being held down by something. I could not move…could not talk…could not scream and more important to me, I could not see my night light. All I saw was black. It felt as if I was being held down by something or someone…I was petrified…and as quickly as it had awoken me…it was gone. I pushed a scream out and my sight came back to me. During this whole time, my brother lay next to me fast asleep and I was not able to see him nor my night light. The whole area…the barn Renee spoke of…the house and the woods surrounding the home have a certain “feeling” about them. I often times found myself feeling as if I was being watched or as if someone was there. The whole area definitely has a feeling about it. My father has heard stories of the home from personal friends in the area about murders being committed in the home around the turn-of-the-century but has not been able to find any supporting facts to that effect. I have often stopped by the home, not sure why, but for some reason, I am often times drawn back to that house.