Wicklow Goal

The jail in Wicklow, Ireland was built at the beginning of 1702 conditions for prisoners were harsh, appalling and compared to modern facilities would likely frighten even the most hardened of men. The original gates to the prison are still in the building, known as the Gates to Hell,
In the 1840’s to 50’s the Irish Potato Famine struck, the number of inmates swelled to around 780, prisoners were crushed into cells with 17 people saying to be said sharing. Those starving on the outside would commit petty crimes to get put in there just to get food, with supposed accounts that there were rotting corpses in the road and cannibalism being a thing just for people to try to survive. Over the centuries the dark history includes starvation, disease, and mistreatment.
One story of the jail is about and old and sick man put into solitary confinement, the cell meant no food, or even straw and he was found dead because the staff had forgotten about him. In the main cell blocks visitors and workers have witnessed seeing blood on the floor, a remnant from the early days of the prison when torture was implemented.
An addition to the prison finished in 1843. In the 1900’s the prison closed, it re-opened again in 1918 during the Irish War for Independence. In 1924 it once more closed and was partially demolished in 1954.
A woman saw a picture of Mary Morris, a matron at the jail. The woman said she had seen her, in the 19th century dress and was younger. So had she actually seen her? Another ghost is that of a little girl, she haunts the schoolroom and pokes the visitors or pulls their clothing. The young child is said to be dressed in rags and visitors from young to old, across the history of the tours being given have reported her sporadically.
There are reports of people being touched by unseen hands, of hair being pulled, at some point a staff member was shoved out of the gates. Quite a few times a mist has been seen on the walkway to the second-floor cells.

Paranormal investigators have been in and out of the place and alongside general public reports they also have their own to add. Season Two, Episode 1 of Ghost Hunters International filmed there.
If you should like to visit the jail it is open for tours.

Wicklow Jail Website

Well To Hell

The Well to Hell is a borehole in Russia, it is said to have been drilled so deep that it broke through into hell, it’s an urban legend. It has been circulating around the internet since around 1997 and it was first brought into English in 1989 thanks to a US Domestic TV Broadcaster, Trinity Broadcasting Network.

The story goes that a team of Russian engineers were led by “Mr Azzacov” and they drilled a hole in Siberia that went 9 miles down, they broke into a cavity and were intrigued to find that when they lowered a microphone into the well there were the horrific noises of tormented screams, they were sure that it was the noises of the damned in hell. The Soviet Union had in fact drilled 12 kilometers down in the Kola Peninsula and the temperature there meant drilling became too expensive.

The sound recordings were later found to be a looped recording of various sounds, they are sometimes quoted as being from the 1972 movie’s soundtrack for Baron Blood. The United States ran the story, it had been traced back to Christian groups but the full origin of the story has not been identified. Thanks to the internet the story was cited a few times too and then somehow it ended up with TBN (Trinity Broadcasting Network).

Rendalen was the men that called it out originally and then wrote back to them to say that the story was real and a bat-like apparition was said to be seen. He then deliberately mistranslated a Norwegian article and referred it over to his name, address and telephone number along with a pastor friend, the pastor said he knew about the hoax and would November, 1930 when journalist Emmett E Kelleher wrote for the expose it to anyone seeking validity about the story. TBN did nothing to validate the claims and ran with the story regardless. An alternative of the story has set it in Alaska where 13 miners were killed, following Satan coming roaring out of hell.

I have put a couple of links in here but honestly turn the audio down – it’s not very pleasant loud

Deaf Bill

William Lee became known after his death as the Alton Mummy from Illinois, USA. His final resting place is St Francis of Assisi Church where he was buried June 24^th, 1996. He was born around 1863 and died in 1915, he was a poor hard-of-hearing fisherman who had a name for delivering drunken riverbank sermons. His exploits landed him jail on more than one occasion.

Bill Bauer, a funeral home owner who operated a ferry that crossed the Mississippi River and got to know Lee. When Lee got older it was Bauer that signed him into the Madison County Poor Farm, ‘Deaf Bill’ died there 13^th November, 1915 at age 52.

He would have been buried in a potters field but Bauer claimed his corpse, he hoped he would be able to track down any of his relatives. He was experimenting with a new embalming procedure, it was used on Lee’s corpse and the body remained there unclaimed. It meant that his body ended up left dehydrating further in the air and was never claimed.

Over time he was moved to be a closet, the body was propped up for guests to view him. A travelling showman offered $2,500 for the curiosity but the morticians refused. Requests to view him would invariably go up around Halloween.

Deaf Bill was offered to the Alton History Museum but they felt it to be inappropriate and in the end it was decided that it was time to bury him. 350 people came to see William Lee on his last day above ground, six men from the Knights of Columbus Council 460, in Alton, carried his casket. Finally Deaf Bill got his burial.

Seven Gates of Hell

In York, Pennsylvania there are two legends about how if you pass through one of the seven gates there you will end up in hell. Thrill seekers will find the wooded area at Hellam Township but may well be met with the locals who feel tired of the harassment and would likely call the police. So please be considerate if you are passing through.

There are pretty much two main stories that pass through the area, and I am immediately going to say I consider them urban legend. Note that I am summarising them and have not gone into great detail because I couldn’t find more.

One legend talks of a mental institute on either Toad Road or Trout Run Road and it was made remotely so that the insane could not upset the rest of the world. In the 1800’s a fire broke out and firefighters could not get to the remote location, patients died as they were caught in the flames and those who did not escaped only to be beaten to death. The gates were erected to stop other patients from being able to get away whilst the search went on.

The other tale says that there was a physician who had a property and built the Seven Gates along the path deep in to the forest. The accounts all say only one gate is there during the day, the other six can be seen at night and no-one has passed the fifth. Should the intrepid (or unlucky) person reach the 7^th they would go directly into hell.

There is one more story for the area which says a man and his family lived in a house in the 1950’s. The man murdered his wife and children with a shotgun, before impaling their corpses on the spikes of one of the gates. The house still bore bullet holes until it was torn down.

There is in fact no Toad Road, but there is a Trout Run Toad, and there was no asylum there either. The local doctor only ever put up one gate to stop trespassers.

In 2012 a horror film based on the urban legend was made, unsurprisingly it is called Toad Road. It seems more like a story about drugs and hallucination effects not necessarily horror.

Again I state I put this all into Urban Legend. You can however let me know if you have experienced anything.

The Luminous Woman of Pirano

Anna Monaro of Pirano, Italy was an asthmatic and in 1934 the attacks had worsened. Her husband has noted that when she slept there was a bluish light around her torso and the doctors/physicians were brought in.

Her case brought local and global media interest, it prompted discussions about how and why it might have occurred. Dr Protti studied her case, they found that during the attacks her heart rate doubled, along with her breathing and despite the study could provide no exact cause.

I found a reference that Anna was married to a fisherman and had 12 children. She was small of frame and is said to have worn black all the time. Her husband was asked by Dr Protti if she could be taken to America for further studies but the Piran fisherman declined.

Between 9-19^th March she shared the ward with seven other women and they were witness to the glow. They all notified the staff about the occurrence too. Anna did report that she felt a great deal of exhaustion after the attacks too.

She was studied because some of the theories put her forward as some kind of human glow-worm, another professor from Leningrad was curious if he could use her for any sort of cancer study (though I am not sure why).

Protti attempted cinefilm capture and there were 54 frames, only 3 seconds of the film showed anything. A weak, but light, show of the event but I could not find this online so could not say how helpful this is or would be now.

Human bio-luminescence is something that is now part of modern science. All living creatures emit some form of light but most of it is not visible to the naked eye. Perhaps this is part of Anna’s story, understanding it  could help with future treatments or diagnosis for illnesses, either way I hope you found her story interesting.

Sources: www.primorci.si/osebe/monaro-anna/1784/

www.cherini.eu/pdf/Monaro.pdf

https://wellcomecollection.org/ 

The Guardian – science and research articles