Haunted by History: The Bell Witch's Enduring Curse

What if a ghostly force could shatter the tranquility of your home and torment your family for years? Get ready to uncover the spine-chilling legacy of the Bell Witch, a tale that has baffled and intrigued enthusiasts for over two centuries. Join me, Carole Townsend, as I take you to the heart of Adams, Tennessee, where John Bell and his family encountered a malevolent entity that turned their lives into a nightmare. From strange animals lurking in the shadows to violent attacks on John and his daughter Betsy, the legend becomes undeniable when even neighbor James Johnson encounters the paranormal firsthand.

Explore the witch's eerie influence beyond the Bell home, impacting John Bell Jr. and his brothers during the Battle of New Orleans and catching the attention of Major General Andrew Jackson himself. The relentless torment of John Bell Sr. culminates in his mysterious death, which the witch claims responsibility for, while Betsy Bell’s life is turned upside down, leading to a broken engagement. We ponder the possibility that the Bell Witch could have been something more sinister or symbolic, reflecting the historical and emotional turmoil of the time. As a special treat, I’ll also introduce our next tale of Southern lore: the tragic case of Floyd Collins in a Kentucky cave. Don’t miss this deep dive into stories that continue to haunt and fascinate us.

Chapters

• 0:06 The Legend of the Bell Witch
• 15:55 The Haunting of the Bell Witch
• 27:00 Unraveling Southern Tales of Lore

Transcript

Carole Townsend: 0:06

The town of Adams, tennessee in Robertson County, is a bucolic, quaint little burg located just north of Nashville on the fringe of Appalachia, with a population of about 650 people. Its rolling green hills and rural flavor invite visitors to slow down just a bit to take in a part of Tennessee that almost seems to have stood still with the passage of time. In spite of its small, quietly conservative population and pastoral ambience, adams Tennessee has its own place in the annals of shadowy Southern history. Ghost hunters, priests, amateur detectives, historians and paranormal enthusiasts flock to this tiny town every year in search of its most infamous resident, the Bell Witch. The Bell Witch.

Carole Townsend: 1:07

Here in the South we love our stories. We begin in childhood huddled around campfires, whispering of things best spoken in the dark, confiding in our small trusting circles. Why is that, do you suppose? I have researched and investigated southern history for more than 20 years and I believe it has to do with this region itself. There's a lot that hangs in the ether here and much that is buried deep in the soil. There's beauty here in the south. There's beauty here in the South and shame and courage, and, make no mistake, there is evil. There's always been the element of the unexplained, the just out of reach that we can all feel but can never quite describe, and the best place for telling tales about such things is the comfort and safety of an old front porch. So I invite you tonight to come up here with me, settle back into a chair and get comfortable, pour yourself a drink if you like, and I'll share with you some of the tales best told in the company of friends, tales that prove that truth really is stranger than fiction, and I'll turn on the light. You're going to want that. I'm Carol Townsend. Welcome to my front porch.

Carole Townsend: 2:39

The following podcast contains material that may be disturbing. Listener discretion is advised. The legend of the Bell Witch, now more than 200 years old, has been called America's greatest ghost story. You and I both know that to live up to that billing, this tale must indeed be something spectacular. But is the Bell Witch simply a folk tale? Is the witch something conjured by someone's imagination 200 years ago? The stories passed on from one generation to the next? Or were there actual events, true things that were witnessed by so many people that their retelling was, and still is necessary? Well, sit back and get comfortable, pull that blanket a little tighter around you as we examine the remarkable legend of the Bell Witch.

Carole Townsend: 3:42

Back in the early 1800s, john Bell and his family moved from North Carolina to Red River, now Adams, tennessee. John, his wife Lucy and their children lived in a large farmhouse on several hundred acres of land and they farmed much of the rich river bottomland. In a short time John was ensconced as elder in the Red River Baptist Church. By all accounts, the Bell family was happy. They were hardworking and they were a tight-knit clan well-respected in their community. In 1817, the family's well-being would change. In 1817, the family's well-being would change. One late afternoon, when John was surveying his land and inspecting one of his cornfields, he spotted a strange-looking animal sitting in one of the rows of corn, staring intently at him. It was rather large, with the body of a dog but with the head of a rabbit. Startled, john shot at the creature several times. Sure, he had hit and probably killed the animal. He was shocked to see that it had simply vanished instead. We read in several handwritten accounts later that John's sighting of this unusual creature was likely the very first manifestation of the entity that became known as the Bell Witch.

Carole Townsend: 5:14

That very evening, the house dark and its inhabitants sound asleep. The family heard beating sounds on the outside of the log home. The frequency and intensity of the pounding sounds increased in the coming nights, with John and his sons reaching for their firearms and running outside to catch the culprit or the prankster, who seemed to take such delight in disturbing and frightening the family. Not once did they find anyone lurking outside or running away in the dark cover of night. In the weeks that followed, the disturbances grew more threatening, with the Bell children waking in the night, crying that someone had hit or scratched or pinched them. Their covers were being pulled off their beds as they slept and they heard gnawing sounds on the bedposts. When their parents would come running to their aid, they too heard sounds like rats chewing through wood.

Carole Townsend: 6:19

In time, the entity found a voice. It began speaking in faint, feeble tones, and sometimes it just whispered. At other times the voice sounded like an old woman singing hymns. And then something else changed. The spirit began attacking the bell's youngest daughter, betsy, slapping her and pulling her hair. The attacks were clearly painful ones, leaving welts and bruises on the young girl's body. The entity appeared to begin to focus its hatred and its malevolent intent on Betsy and on John specifically. Now being an elder in the church.

Carole Townsend: 7:06

John swore his family to secrecy about these strange, terrifying occurrences. His fear was that he would be removed as a church elder and that his family would be shunned from their religious community. Two hundred years ago, that punishment was the equivalent of death itself, as the church was the lifeblood of all such small communities. Eventually, though, the attacks became so brutal and so upsetting that John confided in his neighbor and closest friend, james Johnson. Johnson also served as a pastor in the small community. Served as a pastor in the small community, skeptical James appeased his friend by promising to bring his wife and spend the night in the Bell home. By doing so, he could either witness the manifestations himself, or he could comfort and soothe his friend and convince him that all of the occurrences could be rationally explained.

Carole Townsend: 8:07

On the night that James and his wife spent in the Bell home, the evening began peacefully enough, with the families enjoying supper together before retiring to bed after dark. It was then, however, with everyone tucked away in bed and sleeping, that the Johnsons experienced the same terrifying disturbances that the Bells had been enduring. Their covers were ripped away from them and flung across the room, and James was brutally slapped in the face, as the story goes, he jumped out of bed and shouted in the name of the Lord, who are you and what do you want? And after that, it is said, there were no disturbances for the rest of the night. The next morning, before James and his wife left, he explained to his friend that he believed that the culprit was likely an evil spirit, the kind that the Bible talks about.

Carole Townsend: 9:05

Word began to spread throughout the valley that there was an invisible being of some sort at the Bell home, and soon people began traveling to the home to see the phenomenon for themselves. It's said that John never once turned away a traveler, often letting them stay overnight and even feeding them. Many of these travelers would ask the spirit the same questions that James Johnson had asked Once. The witch answered that she had been happy at one time, but that her grave had been disturbed and her bones scattered. Another time, the witch answered that she had been searching for one of her teeth, which she claimed was thrown under the floorboards of the house, and she couldn't rest until she found it. These claims later brought to mind a memory that had, at the time, seemed insignificant.

Carole Townsend: 9:59

One of John Bell's farmhands, while out clearing land, one day, discovered a mound of Native American graves. John Bell said that the graves were likely those of Indians and he instructed his men to work around the marked area as best they could. However, a few days later, john Jr told one of his friends about the discovery and the boys went back to the site and dug disinterring the bones. And the boys went back to the site and dug disinterring the bones. They were looking for relics that they had heard Native Americans buried with their dead, but they found none. Instead, they took a jawbone out of the grave and carried it to the house, where John Jr's friend, in frustration, threw it against a wall. The jarring blow knocked out a tooth and that tooth fell between the cracks of the floorboards.

Carole Townsend: 10:53

Seeming to gain amusement with her antics, the Bell Witch would later change her own story, claiming this time to be an early immigrant who had brought a large sum of money to the area but had then died. Before divulging its location to anyone, she claimed to have returned to make sure that Betsy Bell got all of that money. When people then begged the witch to tell them where the money was buried, she happily provided very specific instructions on how the exhumation was to be performed. She named certain people in the town that she wanted to do the digging and she specified James Johnson, whom she called Old Sugar Mouth, to be the guardian of the money and see that the right thing was done with it. The team set out the next morning and worked until they were exhausted, but no money was found. Later, it's said, the witch would tell that story again and again, cackling loudly and getting those listening to laugh too.

Carole Townsend: 11:56

Interestingly, the bell witch seemed to be very fond of Lucy, john's wife and the children's mother. She spoke kindly to Lucy and always took her side in any family disagreements. Another interesting development was the witch's ability to mimic all of the area preachers. Her knowledge of biblical scriptures was vast and she often sang hymns while those preachers were present. Another favorite demonstration of the witch's powers was her willingness to answer questions that people asked about others in the town. Once Lucy asked the witch what one of her neighbors was doing at that very moment, the witch replied that she didn't know but would be right back. Within less than two minutes the witch reported back to Lucy exactly what the neighbor was doing trying to scrub mud off of a pair of new work boots, having just finished his breakfast. Later, lucy asked her neighbor whether this was true, and astonished, he answered that yes, it was.

Carole Townsend: 13:05

People talked as they will far and wide about the witch that inhabited the Bell home. People of all walks continued to visit the home. Detectives, confident that they could expose the mystery, offered all kinds of possible explanations. Some took the witch at her word, believing her to be a Native American whose grave had been disturbed. Some claimed the entire matter to be witchcraft, not that of a witch who inhabited the home, but the work of nearby witches who were up to no good. Others claimed the Bell Witch to be an evil spirit bent on driving the Bell family and eventually, others mad. Still others claimed that the Bell family members themselves were up to some trickery in the hopes that the spectacle would draw crowds and make money.

Carole Townsend: 14:02

Eventually, and in yet another strange twist, the Bell Witch revealed that she was actually the ghost of a woman named Kate Betts. You see, john Bell had acquired some land from Kate years earlier and Kate accused Bell of cheating her on the deal. For years. She told everyone who would listen about John Bell's unscrupulous character and his theft of her land. And there's something else about John and Kate that the witch did not reveal. John and Kate, who both hailed from North Carolina, were lovers before he married Lucy. One day, kate's body was discovered next to a well near her home, but the cause of death was never determined. It was said that John killed Kate because she was such a moody, unpleasant woman and that her spirit followed him to take her revenge. Could this explain the witch's hatred for John? It could, I suppose. Could this explain the witch's hatred for John? It could, I suppose. You see, kate died in 1817, and the Bell hauntings began in 1817. Over time, the spirit's voice grew louder and stronger, often singing spiritual hymns and quoting scripture. It even carried on intelligent conversation and once it quoted two separate sermons, word for word, preached on the same day, 13 miles apart, word of the extraordinary and unexplainable things going on in that small Tennessee town began to spread and eventually, as the tale goes, major General Andrew Jackson himself got wind of the strange phenomena.

Carole Townsend: 15:55

Now John Bell Jr, along with his two brothers, drury and Jesse, fought the British Army under Major General Jackson in the Battle of New Orleans In 1819,. When Jackson heard about the disturbances in the Bell home, he decided to pay the Bells a visit and just see for himself what was really going on. When Jackson and his entourage approached the Bell homestead, it seems the wagon they were pulling got stuck, though the men could see no reason for the problem. The horses strained and pulled to free the wagon, and the men even tried to push while the horses pulled, but it wouldn't budge. Finally Jackson, exclaimed by the eternal boys this is the witch. And the witch replied All right, general, let the wagon move on and I will see you again tonight. The wagon then rolled along effortlessly.

Carole Townsend: 16:58

That evening at camp, a self-proclaimed witch hunter said he had a silver bullet and regaled the men with tales of his witch hunting days. Jackson whispered to a colleague I'll bet this fellow is a coward. By God, I do wish the thing would come so I can see him run. Silence followed, and then came the sound of footsteps approaching the men from behind. The witch's voice stated All right, general, I am on hand and ready for business. She sneered and told the witch hunter to shoot, but his gun would not fire. The hunter was then struck by an invisible force, screamed in pain when being stuck repeatedly by unseen needles, cried that he had been grabbed by the nose and then fled in fear from the tent. The witch then reportedly exclaimed how that devil did run and beg. I'll bet he won't come through here again with his horse pistol to shoot me. I guess that's fun enough for tonight, general. You can go to bed now. I will come tomorrow night and reveal to you another rascal in this crowd.

Carole Townsend: 18:08

In this version of the story, jackson was eager to stay, but his party had had enough of the witch and her antics and they returned to Nashville shortly thereafter. There are no official travel records or accounts of Jackson's visit to the Bell home, and one might expect to see such records when a major general and soon-to-be-elected president had been out gallivanting around the hills of Tennessee hunting witches. Then again, the seventh president of the United States is known to have been a bit eccentric, so it's quite possible that he did indeed go out of his way to meet the Bell witch in person. We'll likely never know, as the story continues. Once the witch dispatched Major General Jackson and his men, she turned her sights back to John Bell. The witch would ridicule him, calling him Old Jack Bell and repeatedly vowing to kill him.

Carole Townsend: 19:09

In the spring and summer of 1820, john began experiencing troubling maladies. His face twitched. He couldn't swallow without a great deal of pain and by that fall he was confined to the house, having become very weak and unable to walk long distances. And even during his confinement, the witch would torture him by removing his shoes when he tried to walk, often causing him to fall. He would experience seizures and the witch would slap him. When they commenced and when they tapered off, she cursed him and she promised she would kill him. On December 19, 1820, john slipped into a coma and on December 20, he breathed his last. The witch cackled with glee, claiming to have been poisoning John all along.

Carole Townsend: 20:05

Shortly after John's passing, his wife found a strange vial of black liquid in a kitchen cupboard. When Lucy picked it up to examine it, the witch screamed that she had given old Jack a big dose of it the night before and that had fixed him. John Jr took the vial from his mother and sprinkled a few drops of the liquid on their cat's tongue. Within minutes, the cat was dead. John Jr tossed the vial into the fireplace and he and his mother both claimed to have seen bright blue flames flare and shoot up the chimney.

Carole Townsend: 20:42

With John dead, the witch seemed to grow still stronger, her powers more numerous and versatile. She continued to torment Betsy, having added her strong disagreement with the young girl's engagement to a young man named Joshua Gardner. The couple had the blessings of their parents and Gardner was well-liked in the town. The Bell Witch, however, had other ideas. Repeatedly, she would scream at Betsy, demanding she break off the engagement. Her demands became relentless, coming both day and night, and the physical abuse directed at Betsy increased. The couple couldn't stroll along the banks of the river or explore the cave on the Bell property, or even walk the fields on the Bell farm without the witch following them, taunting and nagging, sometimes pushing or kicking both of them from behind as she railed at them. The young girl became so distressed and frightened that on April 21st 1821, easter Sunday, she broke off her engagement to Joshua Gardner. Now, as it happens, there was another man in the town who had expressed interest in marrying Betsy. His name was Professor Richard Powell, a school teacher, and he was several years her senior. It has been said that he was a mathematical genius and that he dabbled in the occult and in ventriloquism.

Carole Townsend: 22:13

Clearly, there is very little that is known for a fact about the Bell Witch. It's difficult to separate actual occurrences with the inevitable changes in a story that has passed down through generations. What is known is that this legend has survived, however changed, for more than 200 years Now. I am not here to prove or to debunk the legend of the Bell Witch. Honestly, I'm not qualified to do either. I'm simply a storyteller and I'm here, as always, to tell the tale.

Carole Townsend: 22:49

I have read countless accounts of this piece of Southern folklore and each of them disputes this detail or that occurrence as I have recounted them here. But interestingly, each of them also has uncanny similarities. Two the Bell Witch legend has been referenced or repeated in dozens of films, documentaries, books and even in songs all over the world. I can't be sure why some legends persist through the ages and some fizzle and die as quickly as modern-day urban legends. I do know that the Bell Witch legend and stories very similar to the tale are set and still live on in other southern states like Kentucky, mississippi and Georgia.

Carole Townsend: 23:40

In early accounts, the spirit itself provides its origin, stating I am a spirit. I once was very happy, but I've been disturbed and made unhappy. I am the spirit of a person who was buried in the woods nearby and the grave was disturbed, my bones disinterred and scattered and one of my teeth was lost under this house. This quote was taken from a book titled Our Family Trouble, written by a member of the Bell family. Of course, this claim cannot be verified, but a number of Indian burial mounds have been found in the region. The tale of the Bell Witch then gives a nod to the shameful treatment of Native Americans in this country, particularly in the South, and particularly by Andrew Jackson. Jackson.

Carole Townsend: 24:38

The witch also seemed to have a strong dislike for the family's slaves, tormenting them day and night, beating them and refusing to allow them into the house. A Bell slave named Dean claimed that he had encountered the witch many times. It appeared frequently in the form of a large black dog or a wolf, sometimes with two heads, sometimes with no head. Dean also claimed to have been turned into a mule several times by the witch. Her attacks became so frequent and frightening that he carried with him at all times an axe and a witch ball made by his wife as protection from the witch's influence, and a witch ball made by his wife as protection from the witch's influence. Conjurers, holy men and exorcists, it is said, made the pilgrimage to the Bell home to remove the malevolent spirit from the home and the grounds, and each time the men were mocked, ridiculed and sent packing by the ever-stronger spirit and sent packing by the ever-stronger spirit. Today, adams, tennessee, has built an entire tourist industry around the Bell Witch Farm and the Bell Witch Cave which sits on that property.

Carole Townsend: 25:49

Strange occurrences have taken place inside that cave and they've been attributed to the spirit. Strange occurrences have taken place inside that cave and they've been attributed to the spirit. In one instance, betsy and some of her friends were exploring that cave. One of the boys got stuck and a voice cried out I'll get him out. The boy felt hands grasping his feet and pulling hard and he was freed. The story goes on to claim that the spirit then gave the cave explorers a lecture on recklessness.

Carole Townsend: 26:20

Has the legend of the Bell Witch become a money-making sham, something to be checked off a bucket list when traveling through Tennessee? Or was there an actual haunting that has been told and retold, getting stretched in many directions, much like that old game called gossip? Remember that one Children would sit in a circle and the first child would whisper something in the next child's ear, and so on and so forth, until the last child would utter what he had heard. Inevitably, what the first child spoke was far different from what the last child heard.

Carole Townsend: 27:00

What I think warrants a closer look with respect to the Bell Witch and, frankly, with respect to other rich tales of the South, is where and why they originate and how they remain alive for more than 200 years. Why do they fascinate us so? Psychologists and historians tell us that through these stories, the people of a region come to terms with certain historical events. By spinning such tales and handing them down, the Bell Witch legend alone gives a nod to slavery, to the treatment of Native Americans, to unrequited love, to jealousy, to dishonesty, to murder and more. Perhaps these tales tell us more than we think they do. Then again, there's always the possibility that the Bell Witch was exactly that A witch, a seer, an evil spirit, a poltergeist, a vengeful, murdered lover.

Carole Townsend: 28:09

I hope you'll join me next time when we explore the terrifying case of Floyd Collins and his tragic experience in a Kentucky cave. I'm Carol Townsend, veteran newspaper journalist and six-time award-winning author. You can find me on social media and check out my website at caroltownsendcom on social media and check out my website at caroltownsoncom. As always, thanks for listening and if you're enjoying these tales of Southern history and lore, I hope you'll tell your friends, subscribe to this podcast on Spotify, apple Play, iheart and anywhere you listen. My team and I benefited from the following research and writings to bring this tale to you. Our Family Trouble the story of the Bell Witch of Tennessee by Richard Williams Bell. Wikipedia. The Bell Witch and the Bell Witch Cave. The Bell Witch, the scariest ghost story in Tennessee, from the Customs House Museum and Cultural Center.