10/23/2012: Thanks to Susan Stone for sharing a few of the strange things she experienced while living at a home in the 400 block of South Broadway in Owensville; Clermont County. Susan’s family moved into the home when she was 8 years old. Not long after they moved in, Susan would sneak up to the attic to explore the things the previous owner had left behind. One day Susan noticed the name Sally Evans written in chalk on one of the walls. She thought it was strange that she had never noticed it before. Some time later, she found more writing that may have served as a warning that rats were going to invade the house! Later, Susan would see the apparition of a woman wearing a pale green dress along the staircase. Susan experienced several more strange things at this turn-of-the-century home and is considering writing a book about them!
My parents bought the residence on South Broadway when I was only 8 years old. It was a home built just after the turn of last century. We only lived there for 3½ years, thank goodness! There are too many stories to relate regarding living in this house, but I will entertain you with a few.
The first story is about a ghost named Sally Evans. She first made her presence known a few months after we moved in. I loved to go up to the attic to explore as there were all kinds of old things left by whomever owned the house before us. My mother did not want me to go up there, but when she and my father would go out bowling and my grandmother was left to watch us, I would sneak up there to have a look around. I found old gowns, old war stamps, letters, holiday decorations, and some old furniture to name a few things. I loved playing up there and would frequent the attic as often as I could. One day while up there, I noticed some writing in white chalk on the wall facing west. It was a name: Sally Evans. Weird, I hadn’t noticed it before. I told my mom about it, and I got yelled at for being up there. That didn’t stop my from my weekly visits. I wondered who Sally Evans was? Maybe she had worn one of the dresses that I played in? Geez…did she live here…or die here as well? I couldn’t find anything out, so I just kind of ignored it for a little while. Things started getting a little weirder though when one time I went up to the attic and there was different writing on the wall. This time it said something I couldn’t read. I took my mom up to the attic and she said it looked like Latin maybe? It said, “Rabide ratis.” We couldn’t find those words in a dictionary anywhere, but it kind of made sense a little while later what it meant to us. Not long after that, we had rats in the house! I have goosebumps just remembering this! My dad went crazy and shot one…INSIDE the house! There was a bullet hole in our upstairs wall connecting the bathroom to the bedroom in which my sister and I shared. It was a scary time, but my parents got rid of them and I remember only having seen two the whole time. The rats came and went. I always wondered if Sally Evans was warning us of the rats or what that writing on the wall meant? There wasn’t any other writing that I can recollect after that.
The next story regarding the house was about an apparition I saw about a year and a half later. I was coming downstairs from my room early one morning and as I turned the staircase, there was a beautiful apparition of a woman wearing a pale green dress at the bottom of the stairs. She was there for a few seconds and then dissipated. It seemed that she was absorbed into the staircase. I went to get my mom, but it was too late. I never saw the apparition again.
The last story I will relate to you is not as harmless. I was in the upstairs bathroom washing my hands when there was a sound coming from inside the mirrored medicine cabinet which was mounted on the wall just above the sink. In a few moments, the mirror shattered from the inside out as if there had been a strong force from inside. A mirror shard cut my toe and I went to tell my mom what had happened and show her my toe. She believed me because, by that time, enough weird things had happened in that house that anything was possible. We cleaned up the mess and bandaged the toe. Funny enough, the next day I had no cut whatsoever on my toe.
Many other occurrences happened at that residence while we lived there. I may end up writing a book of my own someday. It would be interesting to know if anyone else had strange occurrences who may have lived in that house. It would definitely be worth some research!