Tales from the capital – DC ghosts have their own tour

WASHINGTON – Kim Lepore, 51, a contracting officer for the U.S. Department of Agriculture, jumped in fear.

As dusk fell on Wednesday, Lepore and 11 others were standing outside the Octagon Museum, peering into its windows, when a figure inside began to move.

The Octagon Museum has a ghostly history. One Octagon ghost is believed to be a male killed by Col. John Tayloe III, the man who purchased the site and had the house built at the turn of the 19th century.

“I saw him, I saw him. He is there,” Lepore exclaimed as a male figure dressed in black came down the Octagon Museum’s servant staircase.

Others in the small group nodded in agreement that they had seen the figure, too.Even though Carolyn Crouch, Washington Walks tour guide, was leading a walking tour of the Most Haunted Houses Tour in the capital, she punctured this ghostly tale.She identified the man as a staff member of the American Architectural Foundation, the organization that now owns the Octagon.

The small group strained to refocus their attention on Crouch’s tales of regional ghost lore, in the midst of Washington’s summertime heat. This was their last stop.

All sites are close to the White House, which has its own ghost stories about Abraham Lincoln and Abigail Adams. The group met at 6:30 p.m. outside the 17th Street exit of the Farragut West Metro stop.

They crowded around Farragut Square where Crouch, in a loud voice, spoke about the area’s history. Cars and pedestrians made a commotion nearby as she relayed the ghost story of a “tailor’s slain bride.”

Farragut Square was named after Union Admiral David G. Farragut, a Civil War hero famous for uttering the phrase, “Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead.” She said the Square was at one time a “high-end enclave” where people lived in mansions. Now it’s surrounded by office buildings.

Ghost lore says that one mansion was home to a tailor and his bride in the late 19th century. Every day, the tailor was seen leaving for work and returning in the evening. Neighbors began to realize that they had seen the young wife move into the house, but never saw her leave.

Crouch said when neighbors would come to call on her, “her husband would come to the door and say, ‘Oh, she doesn’t feel quite so well today.’”

This continued for weeks, and gossipy types in town said the young bride left to live with relatives. Others with more “sinister thoughts said ‘Maybe she’s died, maybe he’s killed her,’” Crouch said.

Finally, as the story goes, the tailor moved, and later tenants heard ominous scratching in the walls and high-pitched female moans.

Eventually, a man bought the home and began restoring it.Crouch said he removed a plaster wall and found the “skeleton of a woman, with one bony finger, wearing a gold ring.” Crouch told listeners that “still lodged in the ribs of skeleton was a blood-stained dagger.”The house no longer exists.

Sana Keith, visiting from Queens, N.Y., said he was unsure about the presence of ghosts and spirits. He went on a similar haunted house tour in San Francisco.

“I don’t not believe, but then again, I can’t say I believe for sure. I just like to keep an open mind,” Keith, 24, a counselor, said.

He was in Washington for a three-day jaunt. Keith said he enjoyed the tour, but the heat was a bit much.

“I figured it just sounded like something fun to do during the summer, like something all-American,” Keith said.

The tour also stopped outside the Decatur House, said to be home to the ghost of naval hero Stephen Decatur. Decatur died from gunshot wounds received in a duel that took place at Bladensburg Dueling Field in nearby Maryland.

The tour was hosted by Washington Walks, which offers a variety of themed walking and bus tours every week. Tours of Georgetown, U Street and Arlington Cemetery are also available. Prices are $10 to $30.For more information go to http://www.washingtonwalks.com