Hauntings
...ample, are surrounded by strong auras, invisible fields of energy that convey emotions to particularly sensitive people, such as physics and children. The auras cloaking most haunted sites usually engender feelings of sadness, fear, or loss. Animals, including domestic dogs and cats, are extremely susceptible to the auras of haunted sites and will often refuse to enter such places. An aura might also emit a strange odor, an array of colors, or even bizarre noises, all detectible by sensitives. Haunted locales usually have some dark secret or tragic history as well. The vast majority were once the site of at least one heinous murder, accidental death, or suicide. Forms of bad luck, such as sudden financial or romantic troubles, may also afflict those living near or within a haunted site. Because they are inhabited by the restless spirits, haunted sites are plagued by unexplained noises, voices, shadows, and other unnerving effects. Creaking stairs, the sounds of laughter and screaming, mysteriously vanishing keepsakes, electrical problems, plumbing mishaps, and random fires are all common to haunted sites. Those who live in haunted houses may be prone to the psychic energy generated by their ghostly neighbors and begin suffering from nightmares and the sensation of being watched. Prolonged exposure to the ghostly phenomena at a haunted site can cause eating disorders, insomnia, paranoia, apathy, fits of uncontrollable sobbing, depression, ulcers, and outright insanity. ( George, Leonard PH.D. Alternative Realities. New York: Facts On File, 1995.) A haunted house is basically any conventional building occupied by humans and restless spirits. The notorious history of a haunted house may include a brutal murder (or, in many cases, double, triple, or even mass murder), suicide or some other disaster, such as a fire or sweeping sickness, that claimed the lives of the previous residents. Not surprisingly, the ghosts present in a haunted house are generally former inhabitants. Some ghosts may also be former owners and employees of the household as is the case with the Lalaurie House. ( Cohen, Susan and Daniel. Hauntings & Horrors: The Ultimate Guide to Spooky America. New York: Peguin Putnam Books, 2002.) The Lalaurie House, one of the New Orleans’ most haunted sites, has a tragic and sordid history, even in comparison to the tales told of other ghost infested homes. The stately mansion was built in 1832 by wealthy socialite Madame Delphine Macarty Lalaurie. Lalaurie displayed her financial status by furnishing her house in the most expensive and elegant manner possible and by purchasing an enormous number of slaves. The houses gruesome troubles began in 1833, when Lalauries’ slaves began mysteriously vanishing. At the time no one questioned these disappearances, but eventually, a servant girl named Lia escaped from her room and fled onto the rooftop, where she screamed for help. Witnesses watched as Lalaurie herself confronted the girl, beating her severely with a whip, until the poor girl leaped to her death in order to escape her enraged mistress. The extent of Madame Lalaurie’s dementia became evident on April 10, 1834, when a fire brigade responded to a blaze at the mansion. When they arrived, they found an elderly black cook chained to the kitchen floor. She confessed to lighting the fire in the kitchen, claiming that she had suffered unconscionable abuse at the hands of Madame Lalaurie. To corroborate her story, she directed her rescuers to a small attic apartment, where Lalaurie’s other slaves were imprisoned. There, the fire brigade was greeted with a horrible, mind wrenching site. The attic, which was rank with decay and the smell of death, had been converted into a torture chamber, where Lalaurie kept nude victims shackled to crude and barbaric devices. A number of long-dead slaves, surrounded by flies and maggots, littered the room. Among the atrocities found in the attic was a woman gutted and tied down by her own intestines. Another woman was found wit her mouth sewn shut; when rescuers cut the stit...