Chapter 1. The Ghosts of Peachtree Street
The death certificate, when Mom and I finally found it, gave the time of her death as 11:58 p.m., September 21, 1911.
100 years she had been dead; ironically, her centennial death day fell in the same year as the Civil War sesquicentennial. Of course, that shouldn't be too surprising. She lived though the Civil War, after all. I'm sure that there are innumerable families throughout the country that can make the same claim.
My great-great-great grandmother was sixty-six years old when she died. The mother of five children total, she had buried three before she herself passed away, along with three husbands. But after that, we know little else about her. Our family, like many others, is particularly proud of its history; in fact, we're so proud that we have an entire book written to encompass all of our ancestors' dirty laundry. It never fails to amuse me that what would have made them writhe in agony to imagine publicly disclosed causes their descendents' sides to split in laughter. If only the stories were true. But they are nothing if not amusing - the ones featuring my great-great-great grandmother in particular. She must have been an extraordinary lady, because we're still talking about her. Even today, a hundred years after her death to the day, we still bandy about the name of Scarlett O'Hara Butler.
I've been asked before if I've always known that I wanted to teach eighth grade history, and my answer has consistently been yes. Open further inquiries, I give the standard reasons for choosing one's profession, for instance, that I feel called to teach, that I enjoy giving young people interesting food for thought as they mature into young adults - little caterpillars midway through their journey towards butterfly-dom. All those reasons are valid, absolutely. But I must admit, I do what I do because of Scarlett…why, you ask? Well, because it is my firm contention that someone whose life has been the topic of endless discussion of every single Christmas and birthday is worthy of serious study. So I went to college at Emory in Atlanta and spent my weekends poking around my grandma's big old house on Peachtree Street searching for anything and everything that could be considered valid historiographical research. Nothing. I can't even show a picture of her to my eighth grade class because (again, according to family legend) she didn't allow anyone to photograph her after she hit thirty. I hit thirty two weeks ago, and some days, I know exactly how she felt.
But back to the matter at hand - I have volumes of oral tradition at my disposal, but no hard facts. I have names on a page, but no blurbs, no archived facebook statuses I can go back and peruse. I only have the word of my eighty-seven year old grandma who refuses to remodel her house because Grandma Scarlett wouldn't like it.
Did I mention that Scarlett haunts the house and grounds?
Well, her, and her third husband, and her lover that he allegedly shot in the foyer, and of course her second husband who supposedly died under mysterious circumstances - I'm not sure how he got there, since it wasn't his house, but I digress - and then of course there's the full bodied apparition of a little girl in a blue velvet dress that my grandma swears used to torment her as a child. She used to tell us that she began seeing her after her father died. Him I know about, Charles Wade Hamilton, Jr., Atlanta based real-estate tycoon. We actually had a working plantation in our family, fully restored by Charles Wade Sr. and fully functional until Charles Wade Jr. sublet it and sold it off, acre by acre. I've driven up to Clayton County with Mom and Grandma twice. These days the land that was the grand plantation is a lovely subdivision called Tara Oaks, and right smack in between two big houses rest our people. Sixteen graves in all, the headstones dating back to 1864. It was all I could do to get the Georgia Historical Society to chip in on a proper fence to prevent the graves from being vandalized by the neighborhood kids.
But anyway, back to Charles Wade, Jr. According to the family tradition, of which you already know my reservations, Charles Wade, Jr. was the third in a line of bitter and angry men, each a little worse than the other. Wade Hampton Hamilton, his grandfather, born 1862, was the first. He supposedly spent some time in the State Pen for assaulting his stepfather with a buggy whip. Now, I can't find the records for that incident, but I do know a little about the stepfather that might have warranted such an assault.
According to the police report - you wouldn't believe how many hours at the State Archives it took to dig it up - a Mr. Ashley Wilkes was called to the home of his longtime friend and husband to his sister-in-law (my great-great-great grandma, to be exact), to discuss a matter "of great importance". The police noted that Mr. Wilkes's son and co-owner of their lumber business told them that his father decided to call on the suspect that very night, saying "I'd better go see what he wants. He has been so very despondent lately and may require a favor of me."
Its not known what sort of conversation the two men had or in what manner Mr. Wilkes was received, but several witnesses passing by moments prior to the shooting heard calm talking, even laughter between the two gentlemen and one woman (from the report, she seems like some sort of prostitute) who saw the two conversing civilly through her open parlor door. Wilkes was standing on the piazza poised to leave and Scarlett's husband, a Rhett Butler, was sitting, obviously relaxed.
According to grandma, and she got her information from the two Charles Wades and them from Wade Hampton, that Wilkes had said goodbye and then turned to leave. Butler had stopped him and he turned around and without a moment's notice, he pulled the trigger and Wilkes's jugular vein was severed instantly. Death was swift, and Ashley Wilkes breathed his last with his accuser's name on his lips, and now his restless spirit walks aimlessly around the mansion in which he was slain. And that's all she wrote…
Well, not quite. If you recall the second husband I mentioned, the one who supposedly haunts Grandma's house too - it's said that Butler killed him as well, under the guise of a Klan raid. In an interesting turn of events, it appears that our Mr. Butler was passionately in love with Scarlett before he became Husband Number Three, and shot Husband Number Two in cold blood, freeing her. All this time (supposedly) she's in love with said Ashley Wilkes. Well, Butler knew that, apparently, and intended to kill him that night, but conscience kicked in and he let him off with a flesh wound.
Ah…families. There are more, I'm sure, but the murders are always the ones I select to tell my students around Halloween. You know thirteen and fourteen year olds, anything with a little blood and guts!
There are lots of suicides too, in the Peachtree house. Wade Hampton, his son Charles Wade, Sr., and his son, Charles Wade, Jr. for starters. And then there's the story about Wade Hampton's sister allegedly being frightened to death by the apparition of her dead father. Strange, strange.
And Grandma still swears by her story of the little girl. She's about four and is wearing blue velvet. Grandma started seeing her when she (Grandma) was eleven. Her own father had just died by his own hand. We know that he swallowed a large quantity of opium and self-inflicted the wounds that would cause his death with a razor.
Cheery? Cheery.
It's a beautiful early fall day in Atlanta as I jump into my '97 Corolla and head to Grandma's. Speaking of despondent, she's been despondent for thirty years, since Grandpa died and left her alone in that God-awful house that seems to be the boiling pot of our family's misery over the past hundred plus years. I gave up on figuring out its secrets long ago - it can keep them. I just want to see Grandma.
Later, as I'm writing this, I'll remember that I was delayed in my trip by Julia Jeffries's mom, who wanted to talk to me about a room parent meeting. I'll send you an email, I say, smiling.
I get into the car and begin to drive, recalling with pleasure my students' faces as I reenact the murder of Ashley Wilkes. That ought to be a country ballad. The Murder of Ashley Wilkes. It would be heavy on steel guitar and mandolin.
Grandma's house is the oldest on the street. It's a Swiss-style chalet that has undergone very little renovation since it's completion in 1869. It was in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution a few years ago, when it was recognized as the oldest house in its district. My diminutive little Grandma smiled proudly for the paper. The caption underneath was short and sweet: "Octogenarian Melanie Hamilton Crouch, daughter of real estate baron Charles Wade Hamilton, Jr. stands before the 1869 mansion she has lived in her entire life. The house has remained in the Hamilton family since its construction nearly a century ago."
That's all. Short and sweet, no mention of ghosts or haunting or murders. For all the revenue gleaned by haunted houses and the like, the mention of ghosts or their ilk in serious conversation tends to ignite some primitive dread within us. Myself, I'm a historian. I deal with old things all the time. You can call it residual energy or ghosts or the beyond - makes no difference. Is my great-great-great grandmother walking around her house? Let me spare you the anxiety of wondering: I think not.
Or so I did on that day.
I knocked on the gigantic door (we always called it the Frankenstein door when we were kids) and was greeted by Marta, a big Hispanic lady that sits with Grandma and keeps her company.
Grandma is sitting in the parlor, which would be completely decorated according to nineteenth century standards if not for the 52 inch plasma television. I'm not going to lie, it spoils the effect somewhat.
"Victoria!" she greets me, standing up with the help of her cane. The cane is a new addition; it just came last year.
"Grandma!" I hug her. She's lost weight. Oh boy - I need to start coming more often.
"I was just finishing this special about Lincoln. You know that quote, you know Victoria, the one that that man started after his death?"
I do know.
"'Now he belongs to the ages?'"
"That's the one. Well, originally, it was, 'Now he belongs to the angels!' Can you imagine that, Victoria?"
Oh the what-ifs of history.
"That would spoil it, wouldn't it, Grandma?"
"Indeed." She puts her head close to mine and whispers conspiratorially. "Marta thinks that I'm crazy."
"What? Grandma! She thinks no such thing."
"She does so, Victoria. I saw Bonnie again last night. You know, you know who I mean, don't you?"
Bonnie is the name she's assigned to the little girl in the blue dress.
"I know, Grandma."
"She wants me to follow her. I told her that it was quite impossible. But she runs out toward the carriage house and then, poof, she's gone. I wish that you would play with her, dear. You're much closer to her age than I!"
"I'm thirty, Grandma," I remind the old dear. "I think I'm a little too old to play with Bonnie too."
"Tut tut," she says. "You think I'm crazy too, don't you?"
"Not at all, Grandma-"
"I want you to walk out to that garden and see if you don't see her. She's there plain as day, all the time. Marta doesn't see her because she's not family. Bonnie only shows herself to our people."
I humor the old gal, but I'm thinking Mom may be right about her needing to go to a home sooner rather than later.
I push the squeaking gate open and walk into Grandma's Japanese garden, the other relatively 'modern' feature of the house. This is ridiculous, I think to myself. Absolutely bonkers. I'm an Emory graduate and a teacher of history, I'm not my silly little grandma who is perpetually lonely and delights over the nocturnal visits by the apparition of a little girl who delights in rocking particular chairs and stopping the mantle clock.
But then I saw her.
Out of the corner of my eye, she was standing there. But she wasn't a little girl.
She was very much a woman, wearing a white nightgown, her black hair brushing her shoulders.
Her eyes widened as she noted my presence.
"Who are you?" I call out.
She flees toward the carriage house and I follow her. She's not getting away that easy! Besides, I need an explanation. My feet seem to know the path, though I never venture out of the main house and out back. It creeped me out as a child, and for good reason, apparently!
But I press on, following the nightgown until she disappears into the carriage house. I enter the decaying building, weary of spiders or any other creepy crawlers. I see nothing. She's gone.
I begin to laugh. I'm as bad as Grandma.
. . .
Sounds of girlish laughter on a warm September day awakened Scarlett as she lay napping away the pleasant afternoon. She jerked upright in the big bed as she placed a hand protectively on her stomach, her condition only barely noticeable.
"Rhett!" she cried. "I had the dream again."
Author's Note: Dear Readers All, I've been dying to do a GWTW story for the Halloween season for eons. The RBA is slow going, but its going, I promise. The idea for this fic has been in my mind forever, and I would LOVE to hear what you guys think. Happy Fall!
*9/22: Thank you, A. Nonymous. I thought that looked off. I fixed the date, so it should compute now!