It is curious that lighthouses seem the ideal places for hauntings. That is certainly true of the Point Lookout Lighthouse in Maryland, considered by some to be the most haunted lighthouse in America.
THE FIRST KEEPERS
Point Lookout marked the entrance to the Potomac River on Maryland’s western shore of Chesapeake Bay. In the early nineteenth century the federal government thought that a light was needed there to warn ships from running aground on the shoals. The construction of the lighthouse/living quarters was completed in 1830, its first keeper a man named James Davis, who resided there with his daughter, Ann.
Alas, poor James didn’t last long at his new gig. He died a few months later. But Ann stuck it out and served as its keeper for the next seventeen years. She must’ve been seriously attached to the lighthouse, because her ghost was often reported roaming the facility and grounds after her death, and sightings continue to this day.
PARANORMAL ACTIVITY
If Ann Davis was the first specter to wander around Point Lookout, she would eventually be joined by many others. The Civil War soon dominated the area, first with a hospital built in 1862 to care for Union soldiers, then a prison camp to hold Confederate prisoners—though initially the latter were incarcerated in the lighthouse. At least 20,000 prisoners were held on Point Lookout during the war, and over 3,000 perished in the harsh conditions. How many of these tormented spirits still remain in and around the lighthouse?
Throughout the ensuing decades the lighthouse underwent quite a few physical changes, including it being raised from 1½ to 2 stories. A fog bell tower was added, as well as smaller buildings on the surrounding land. In the early twentieth century the living quarters were expanded to a duplex to accommodate a keeper and an assistant keeper. Considering the numerous reports of paranormal activity in and around the lighthouse, we can only imagine what stories these people had to tell.
A sea view of the Point Lookout Lighthouse complex.
THE END…OR NOT?
Those keepers, by the way, were a mix of civilians and Coast Guard personnel. The latter had taken control of the lighthouse in 1939. By the early ’50s the U.S. Navy had begun buying up property around the lighthouse, and finally, in 1966, the Point Lookout Lighthouse was deactivated after a buoy-like structure to warn ships away from the shoals was installed off the point. The light may have gone out, but the spirits of those who perished there continued to haunt the building and the grounds.
Subsequently, the state of Maryland acquired the lighthouse and surrounding land, from which they
created Point Lookout State Park. In 2006 the Point Lookout Lighthouse Preservation Society was created with the goal of restoring the entire complex to what it looked like in the 1920s. To raise funds the Society holds nighttime paranormal investigations once a month, the only time the lighthouse is accessible to anyone on the outside, although—according to the Maryland Department of Natural Resources website—the grounds are now open to visitors. Television shows such as Weird Travels and Mystery Hunters have aired segments on the complex.
So have these investigations revealed anything? One parapsychology group recorded two dozen separate spectral voices in the lighthouse. Two dozen! What are these poor souls trying to say? Why are they crying out? Only the trapped specters of the Point Lookout Lighthouse know the answer.