Esther Cox and the Great Amherst Mystery

Summary

Morbid Podcast: Esther Cox and the Great Amherst Mystery

Hosts: Ash Kelley & Alaina Urquhart

Date: October 13, 2025

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Episode Overview

In this episode, Ash and Alaina dive into one of Canada’s most famous—yet often overlooked—paranormal mysteries: the haunting of Esther Cox, also known as the Great Amherst Mystery. Blending creepy history and true crime with their trademark banter, the hosts explore Esther’s tumultuous life in 19th-century Nova Scotia and the infamous string of supernatural events that made her the center of a national obsession. As always, the episode is research-rich but light on the gloom, bringing both skeptical analysis and ghostly glee to this classic case.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Setting the Stage: Who Was Esther Cox?

• Esther Cox was born in 1860 in Upper Stewiacke, Nova Scotia.
• Suffered family upheaval: mother died shortly after birth, father remarried twice, and series of moves (08:14).
• By 18, Esther lived in Amherst with her sister Olive, Olive’s husband Daniel, their children, and Esther’s sister Jenny (09:08).
• Descriptions of Esther: not considered conventionally beautiful; “I cannot help being unlike other people.” (11:18, Alaina quoting Hubble)

2. Trigger Event and the Bob McNeil Incident

• Summer 1878: Esther, then 18, caught the attention of Bob McNeil, a local shoemaker with a violent background.
• On August 28, McNeil took her to an isolated area, threatened her with a revolver; accounts differ on whether he assaulted or merely threatened her.
• Esther returns home traumatized; McNeil leaves town and is never seen again. He had a reputation for cruelty—even animal abuse (16:33–17:17).

3. The Supernatural Begins

• Following the trauma, Esther displayed anxiety and depression, then physical symptoms: swelling, rigidity, red face, and sensations of bursting (18:59–21:12).
• Noises, banging from under the bed, and violent shaking episodes alarmed the entire family (20:28).
• Objects began moving and flying across the room. Family members, and later a physician (Dr. Carrit), witnessed these incidents first-hand (29:10).
• Writing appeared on the wall: “Esther Cox, you are mine to kill” (29:55).

4. Escalation and Community Reaction

• As word spread, locals gathered outside the Teed house to try and witness the paranormal events (32:21).
• Esther’s health would improve or the activity would cease whenever she was removed from the house, strengthening the view that she was the epicenter.
• When the spirit seemingly “warned” of an impending fire, a match fell from the ceiling, igniting Esther’s bed linens (35:58).
• Attempts were made to communicate with the spirit, using knocks (1 for “no,” 3 for “yes”)—classic communication method reminiscent of séance (37:15).

5. Publicity and Investigation

• The story attracted significant media attention and skepticism. Some believed in supernatural causes; others thought Bob McNeil was still tormenting her, possibly even hiding in the house (39:50).
• Walter Hubbell, actor and amateur paranormalist, investigated the case hoping to expose Esther as a fraud but left convinced of genuine phenomena (47:07).
• Esther and Hubble even arranged a lecture tour, but were faced with public hostility and protests, especially from religious groups (50:22).

6. Attempts to Rehome and Ongoing Phenomena

• Esther was evicted multiple times as paranormal activity followed her from house to house: at the Whites, then the Van Ambergs, and finally the Davisons (53:08–54:24).
• Fires and flying objects persisted, leading to Esther being charged with arson and serving a month in jail (54:04).
• The activity ceased entirely after Esther eventually married (twice), moved to Brockton, Massachusetts, and settled into a more private life (56:36).

7. Interpretations, Theories, and Legacy

• Skeptics point to attention seeking and psychological trauma as likely causes. One theory: Esther, reeling from personal tragedy and sexual assault, acted out or lost control in a culturally repressive era (63:24).
• Others believe McNeil may have secretly tormented her even after leaving town.
• The supernatural explanation persists; many believe Esther’s case involved true poltergeist or demonic activity—especially given multiple independent witnesses (60:37–60:45).
• The hosts discuss the enduring mystery, ask how such dramatic events could be faked, and share their own minor paranormal experiences for context (61:18).
• Legacy: Esther’s story is commemorated annually at “Estherfest” in Amherst, Nova Scotia, complete with live music, parties, and ghost-themed events (68:53).
• Notably, host Ash is shocked to learn Esther lived her later life in Brockton, MA—“the most random town.” (57:00)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Esther’s description:
  “As though constantly asking, ‘Why do you look at me?’—‘I cannot help being unlike other people.’”
  —Alaina quoting Walter Hubble (11:18)

• On Esther’s haunting symptoms:
  “Her entire body was rigid and contorted, her face was bright red, and her eyes appeared to be bulging out of her head.”—Alaina (19:57)

• On the writing on the wall:
  “Then they watched in absolute amazement as writing began to appear on the wall above Esther’s head. And it said, ‘Esther Cox, you are mine to kill!’”
  —Alaina (30:09)

• On poltergeist communication:
  “They tried to get like a system going where it was like one knock for no, three knocks for yes kind of thing.”
  —Alaina (37:37)

• On skepticism and rational explanations:
  “Instead of helping her, the people who should have helped her turned her personal crisis into a public sensation.”
  —Alaina quoting Lori Glenn Norris (63:51)

• On hauntings and disbelief:
  “I believe in hauntings, like, 150 percent, but I’ve been to a lot of haunted locations and nothing ever gets thrown...and I desperately want to.”
  —Ash (60:23)

• On the town’s reaction:
  “God forbid a woman get attention.”
  —Ash (48:42)

• On Esther’s legacy and festival:
  “Esther Fest is apparently a celebration of the paranormal and horror... inspired by Esther Cox and her story.”
  —Alaina (68:50)

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Important Timestamps

| Timestamp | Segment | |------------|--------------------------------------------------------------------------------| | 07:45 | Introduction to Esther Cox’s early life | | 15:47 | The Bob McNeil incident | | 18:59 | First supernatural incidents: screams, moving objects | | 21:12 | Dramatic intensification: physical symptoms and the house shakes | | 29:55 | Writing on the wall: “Esther Cox, you are mine to kill” | | 32:21 | Crowds begin gathering, public hysteria rises | | 35:58 | Match falls from ceiling; spontaneous fire | | 37:15 | The family communicates with the spirit via knocks | | 47:07 | Walter Hubbell investigates, is converted from skeptic to believer | | 53:33 | Fire destroys the Van Ambergs’ barn, Esther charged with arson | | 56:36 | Esther marries, moves to Brockton, and the hauntings cease | | 63:24 | Theories: trauma, attention seeking, and mental health crisis | | 68:50 | Details about Amherst’s annual “Estherfest” festival |

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Tone and Takeaways

Ash and Alaina maintain their signature tone throughout: skeptical, compassionate, irreverent, and open-minded. Skeptics and true believers both find food for thought, and the hosts deftly avoid overcommitting to any one explanation.

In the end, they highlight the complexity of Esther Cox’s experience—trauma, possible mental health crisis, community pressures, and the unknowable mix of supernatural and psychological that makes the Great Amherst Mystery an enduring classic.

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Conclusion

This episode offers a rich retelling of the Esther Cox haunting, filled with humor, empathy, and curiosity. Whether you’re a die-hard skeptic, a ghost enthusiast, or just love a well-researched storytelling session, Ash and Alaina provide plenty of context, debate, and delight. Esther’s mysterious legacy lives on—a reminder, as Ash says, to “keep it weird… but not so weird that you don’t go party your ass off at Estherfest and make things fly, baby.” (70:09)

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For further reading:

• Walter Hubbell, The Great Amherst Mystery: A True Narrative of the Supernatural
• Lori Glenn Norris, Haunted Girl

Estherfest info: Held annually each October in Amherst, Nova Scotia.

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Keep it weird!

Transcript

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[Alina]

Hey weirdos. I'm Alina. I'm Ash and this is morbid.

[Babs]

Oh my God. I've done this before.

[Alina]

I have also done this before a few times.

[Babs]

It's like deja vu.

[Alina]

Ermicard Deja vu all over again.

[Babs]

What's up girl?

[Alina]

I actually Mikey thought of a very funny thing that I forgot to mention in our last episode.

[Babs]

Oh my God. Yo, please, please go forth and conquer.

[Alina]

This is just a.

[Babs]

It's a continuation.

[Alina]

If I had shame, this would be embarrassing. But I don't.

[Babs]

No, I don't think it's embarrassing at all. Even if you did have shame. I think this is so funny.

[Alina]

Pretty funny. So we told you guys last in the bonus episode that we got to go to New York with Sirius XM and we got to like do Advertising Week for a couple days there. It was a lot of fun. We met a lot of cool people and one of the people Accessibility Shortcuts.

[Babs]

19 items Voice Guide what Accessibility off yo girl it's not your pod.

[Alina]

Keep it in.

[Babs]

That was the television.

[Alina]

That was. I hit the remote by accident.

[Babs]

Guys, Old Morbid is just coming at you live without us even trying.

[Alina]

It's just organically happening.

[Babs]

We would have gotten fired for that before, but now it can be left in.

[Alina]

Would have seen some consequences for that one, but we're gonna leave that one in.

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Yeah.

[Alina]

Because you know what? You know who else I saw in Ad Week?

[Babs]

Yes.

[Alina]

Yes. It was Al Ro.

[Babs]

I was gonna say the exact same thing. First name, Al.

[Alina]

Middle name. I was in this. I got my microphone put on, and then I was standing in this tiny little alcove, like a hallway, and. And Ash was in this little closet getting her microphone put on, and he walked. He, like, brushed by, like, right there. I know. I just. Literally just, like, I put my hand up. Like, I didn't touch him. Don't worry. But I, Like, I. I was like.

[Babs]

I rested my hand upon Al Roker's.

[Alina]

No, I did not touch him. But I said, I love Al Roker. And I said it in his eyes.

[Babs]

His face.

[Alina]

Eyes on eyes.

[Babs]

Like, we locked eyes.

[Alina]

He locked eyes on me. I locked eyes on him, and I said, I love Al Roker right in his. My face. Set it into his face. It was. We had. We were connected in that moment. And he go. And then I was like, oh, my God. I just said I love Al Roker to Al Roker in my head.

[Babs]

At least you said more than I did in my little alcove closet. I just went, al Roker.

[Alina]

I just said I love Al Roker to his face. And he said, thank you so much. And he put his hand on his. He was very. He was touched by my incompetence. And so he.

[Babs]

Do you have a hole in your face? I do.

[Alina]

I just figured that out, and now I can't stop. I'm so upset about it. Yeah.

[Babs]

You can change them if you need to.

[Alina]

I might change them. I get it. I don't think I can handle this. I understand.

[Babs]

She fixed her.

[Alina]

So I fixed my socks and. But yeah, it was a real moment when he. When he walked away, I said. I said, so nice to meet you. And he said, you too. And then he kept walking.

[Babs]

I didn't even hear that part.

[Alina]

And I said, I can't believe that was the interaction I had with that. It felt right.

[Babs]

It did.

[Alina]

It really felt right. I don't think I could. I don't know what else I would have said.

[Babs]

Al Roker is adorable.

[Alina]

I love Al Roker.

[Babs]

I've loved Al Roker since I was like, born.

[Alina]

Me too. That's the thing. I was like, this is a deep love. And I, I don't feel like I can just say like, wow. And I felt weird being like, wow, I love you. Like, I. Yeah, that's weird. That's weird. So saying I love Al Roker to.

[Babs]

Al Roker is much better. I love it. I mean, the first time I met Andrew McMahon when I was 14 years old, he had lost his voice. And I literally just said, I love you. And he was like. He nodded emphatically.

[Alina]

He was like, wow, I wish we have yet to tell that story to his face.

[Babs]

He was like, wow. Fifteen years later, I'll meet you and it will be a lot different. You'll be a little more normal, a little more.

[Alina]

Just a smidge. We have to tell that story to his face someday.

[Babs]

I think we, I think we did.

[Alina]

No, I don't think we did. Because you were too stressed about.

[Babs]

Was I too embarrassed by that?

[Alina]

You can't tell him that story. It was a little embarrassing and I wasn't gonna out you like that.

[Babs]

I thought we told him.

[Alina]

No, I don'. We have yet, Andrew.

[Babs]

No, but question mark.

[Alina]

We'll let him know. Well, yeah, Question mark.

[Babs]

All right, so we need.

[Alina]

Yeah. It's so good to be happy. That was. It is nice to be, to be happy and filled, you know, all that stuff. But it is October. October. It's Proctober. It's not Proctober. Last. Last.

[Babs]

Yeah. I was like, what are you talking about?

[Alina]

It's October. And so we're going to have a lot of spooky stuff and this is one of them. This is also a little true crimey. It's got a lot of different elements to it.

[Babs]

You get the best of both worlds.

[Alina]

Precisely. So I think you're really gonna like it. This is Esther Cox and the Great Amherst Mystery. Ooh.

[Babs]

Also, are you five? Are you a 13 year old boy?

[Alina]

It was just funnier, right? A 13 year old boy has entered. The ch was just.

[Babs]

We're in a goofy mood.

[Alina]

Went with the tone. All right, so we're going to, we're going to get into this. Okay? All right. Get your spooky pants on, girl. They stay on. They are on all year round, girl.

[Babs]

My pants are always spooky.

[Alina]

So let's talk about who Esther Cox was. Now this.

[Babs]

It's a great.

[Alina]

I'm going to have to say this a lot.

[Babs]

It's a great drag name.

[Alina]

All right.

[Babs]

Hello.

[Alina]

So let's Talk about who.

[Babs]

Hello.

[Alina]

So let's talk about who Esther Cox was.

[Babs]

Let's.

[Alina]

So Esther was born on March 28, 1860, in Upper Stewiak. I looked up how to say it. Stewie. AK it's an unincorporated region of southeastern Nova Scotia. Nova Scotia. There you go. Just a few weeks after she was born, though, tragedy struck because her mom died of an undisclosed illness, which is really sad. Oh, damn. Only a few weeks. Yeah.

[Babs]

Damn.

[Alina]

Years after that, Esther's father, Archibald, which is a great name, Archie Archibald, he remarried and he moved the family to East Machias. I looked up how to say that as well. That's in Maine. That was to live with his new wife. So they all moved in with the new wife.

[Babs]

I hope she was nice.

[Alina]

There was. There's really like almost no account of Esther's life as a child because remember, it's in the 1860s. But it is known that her father eventually married a third time. And that was followed by another move.

[Babs]

Dang, Daddy.

[Alina]

Because of all these major events happening in relatively quick succession, it would be pretty fair to say that her childhood was a lot of upheaval. Yeah, you know, I mean, it wasn't very consistent.

[Babs]

Yeah.

[Alina]

In the summer of 1878, she was 18 years old and was living in Amherst, Nova Scotia, in the home of her sister Olive. Olive and Olive's husband, Daniel T. I.

[Babs]

Think Olive is the cutest name ever.

[Alina]

Very cute name. Also in the home at this time were Olive and Daniel's two children, five year old Willie and one year old George and Olive and Esther's sister Jenny. So it was a full house. Yeah. Whole shebang. Yeah. Daniel was a shoemaker and a foreman at the local factory and he was very widely respected around town. They weren't super wealthy, but they were definitely comfortable financially. Author Walter Hubbell wrote, he never owed a dollar to anyone if he could pay it and never allowed his family to want for any comfort that could be provided by his hard earned salary. All right. He was just a good provider. Yeah. In fact, as far as anyone could tell, the house was really happy. It was filled with mutual support and they all kind of just pitched in whenever they could. It was like a really good little family in there.

[Babs]

Yeah, it sounds like it.

[Alina]

Now around town, 22 year old Jenny Cox, the sister, was considered the quote, village belle. Stop it. She was an unmarried woman of what was said to be considerable beauty. Hubble described her as, quote, quite a beauty with light brown hair, eyes of grayish blue, and handsome teeth. Handsome teeth.

[Babs]

Girl, your teeth is Handsome.

[Alina]

Handsome teeth.

[Babs]

What is that? That's the first thing you said to Drew?

[Alina]

Yeah, I said, you have handsome teeth, sir. I love Drew's teeth.

[Babs]

Yeah, I do, too.

[Alina]

Yeah. As soon as I saw him, he smiled, and I said, wow, great teeth. Great teeth. Yeah. And I. I st. I remain. I stand on that business 10 toes down.

[Babs]

Although we did find out that you.

[Alina]

Don'T stand 10 toes down. We did a foot thing. Literally.

[Babs]

We literally, like, did a foot thing at Cole Han. And it, like, measures your feet.

[Alina]

Actually, I do stand 10 toes down.

[Babs]

Was it Debbie that didn't. Yeah, I think I did.

[Alina]

I think you. Yeah, you. I stand all on my.

[Babs]

Oh, you are always ten toes down. Debbie was not ten toes down. She was two toes down.

[Alina]

Yeah, she was on her heels.

[Babs]

I don't remember if I was 10 toes, toes down now.

[Alina]

So. Handsome teeth. Yeah. You know, Esther, on the other hand, was. You know, she wasn't. Conventional beauty standards did not apply.

[Babs]

Well, you know what? Conventional beauty standards be damned.

[Alina]

Yeah. She was shorter. You know, she had eyes that Hubble described as. As though constantly asking, why do you look at me? Quote, I cannot help being unlike other people. That's how he wrote it.

[Babs]

I kind of get it. I cannot help being unlike other people.

[Alina]

Honestly valid.

[Babs]

What does that look like? Exactly? I'm really trying to, like. I'm trying to feel that wash over me. You just kind of look like a. When you do that. I mean, that is kind of like.

[Alina]

What the fuck are you looking at?

[Babs]

Yeah, but was it like, what the are you looking at? Or was it like, oh, don't look at me?

[Alina]

I don't know. I'd like to think that she's like, what the are you looking at?

[Babs]

Like, good for her.

[Alina]

Yeah. But what Esther may have lacked in the conventional beauty side, she more than made up for in reputation and general being disposition.

[Babs]

She was nice.

[Alina]

She was a very hard worker. She really liked housework, was very good at it. Other domestic chores she was really good at. She was always willing to lend a hand to help out anyone, especially her sister, with any of the domestic responsibilities. She was helpful. She was kind. And she wasn't just popular in her home. She was popular with her peers as well. In his account of the Amherst mystery, Hubble claims Esther, quote, had numbers of friends her own age and was always in demand among the little children of the neighborhood. She was also very kind with kids. That's cute. And they knew that she would always make time to play with them, which is. That's a good person.

[Babs]

Yeah. That absolutely is.

[Alina]

All things considered, Esther had what most around Amherst would have considered a good, you know, but simple life.

[Babs]

Yeah.

[Alina]

Her popularity with her peers and others in town aside, life in Amherst at the end of the 19th century was like, not super exciting for teenage girls, I would say. Yeah. There was monotony with household chores and scheduled trips to church. The most excitement Esther was likely to see was when 5 year old Willie would get in trouble with his mother for harassing the chickens in the yard by chasing them with a small club or throwing rocks at them.

[Babs]

We should probably talk a little bit deeper about that.

[Alina]

Thank you. My thoughts here are, should we go into Willy and the fact that he may be a little bit of a psychopath? Like, is that something we should maybe look into?

[Babs]

Me thinks, yeah.

[Alina]

I don't know. In the evenings when the men would come home from work at the factories, you know, they would come home, they would get dinner, and then the women were expected to clean it all up. So they cooked the dinner, cleaned it all up. Bullshit. Hubble wrote, one day was so like another that the week slipped away without perceptible difference. Which is like, whoa, that's sad. As one of Canada's most famous ghost stories, the story of the great Amherst mystery has been told a lot of times over the last century.

[Babs]

I don't think I've heard it.

[Alina]

Yeah, it's, it's a big story up in Canada. But no matter how or when it's told, it always begins the same way. With one exciting evening that took a very terrible and very heartbreaking turn.

[Babs]

Oh, no.

[Alina]

According to Esther's brother in law, Daniel, on The afternoon of August 28, 1878, Esther agreed to go for a carriage ride into the Tantramar Marsh with Bob McNeil. He was a local man who, according to Daniel, quote, had been paying her much attention. The plan was that they were going to drive through town and then come back to the house a short time later. But halfway through their ride, McNeil changed course and drove the wagon towards an isolated grove of trees. Daniel said when they had reached the grove, McNeil dropped the reins, leaped from the buggy and drawing a large revolver from the side pocket of his coat, pointed it at her heart and commanded her to get out of the buggy or else he would kill her where she sat. What the fuck? Now, what happened next is not exactly known. Like the details of. Obviously McNeil either robbed Esther at gunpoint or, or he sexually assaulted her, or both. Yeah, it seems like the consensus was that she was absolutely assaulted in Hubble's account of the events supposedly told to him by Daniel Teed, her brother in law. It was nothing. It was. He claims that it was nothing more than aggressive threats. Doubt it. Hubble wrote she was very much frightened but refused to leave the buggy, telling him to get in and drive her home and not act like a madman. McNeil made more threats, but when he heard the sound of another buggy coming down the path, he got back in and drove Esther home without further incident.

[Babs]

Oh, I didn't see that coming.

[Alina]

Yeah. So he drove her home. When she arrived home, Esther was soaking wet and according to Daniel, quote, in a hysterical condition from excitement. Yeah.

[Babs]

So I would say that she probably didn't just sit on the bug.

[Alina]

No, definitely not. The next day, Bob McNeil left town and was never seen again. Wow. So he definitely assaulted her. Yeah. There appears to be little information known about Bob McNeil and since he ran away and never came back. Like many of the young men in Amherst, he was a shoemaker. He worked at the shoe factory managed by Daniel Teed. And according to Hubble, he was a very average height and weight, had black hair and eyes and wore a mustache. Wore a mustache. He just like he was that guy.

[Babs]

He was that 18 year old guy wearing mustaches.

[Alina]

He. To me, he seems like he looks like every other 1800s guy. Hubble describes him as, quote, fine looking.

[Babs]

Fine.

[Alina]

He's fine looking fine. But when it came to his personality, not so fine. Those who knew him described him as a, quote, rather a wild fellow and he had a very cruel disposition. Yeah, I'm sure in his childhood he was known to. And this is a big trigger warning for animal cruelty. I'm sorry about it ahead of time. So you can skip probably 10 seconds if you want to. Yeah.

[Babs]

Do 30 just to be safe.

[Alina]

You might as well just. Yeah. In his childhood, Bob was known to, quote, skin cats alive and allow them to run about and suffer in that condition until death came to their relief.

[Babs]

How dare you say that to me?

[Alina]

I told you I can't leave my job. I know. Oh, that's.

[Babs]

No, I hope. Oh, I hope the same happened to him. I hope he's in hell and it's happening to him all the time.

[Alina]

Well, I mean, and Esther didn't know this about him. Him obviously, like his childhood. And so she had always kind of been fond of him, like she found him attractive. You know, we, we all fall for sometimes. Oh, yeah, but what happened in that grove, whatever it was that happened in that grove that night changed everything. It Changed her forever. Oh. Now, Esther's experience with Bob had clearly deeply shaken her. And in the days after it, she was depressed. She was very anxious. Like, clearly something bad happened. It wasn't just threats. On the evening of September 4, she helped her sister with the household chores. Then around 7pm she said she wasn't feeling that great and went to bed to lie down. Jenny arrived home a few hours later and went up to bed. It was the room she shared with Esther, and less than an hour had passed when Jenny was jolted out of sleep because Esther was screaming. She said she could feel something moving in the mattress. What? Jenny jumped up and lit the lamp, and the girls inspected every inch of the bed, but they found nothing. Okay. So this scene replayed itself the next night with Jenny being woken up by Esther screaming at the top of her lungs. So she's thinking it might be a mouse. So they light the lamp again, investigate the room, and find nothing. They even pulled out all the boxes from under the bed. And while they were standing in the middle of the room, Jenny and Esther watched as one of the boxes they'd pulled out from under the bed that contained quilts seemed to jump up and dump its contents onto the floor.

[Babs]

What?

[Alina]

This caused Esther and Jenny to scream a second time, which drew Daniel from his bedroom. Esther and Jenny explained what they saw, but Daniel just laughed at them. And after pushing everything under the bed, he was like, that was a bad dream. Bye.

[Babs]

Yeah, like, he's like, don't. Don't waste my time.

[Alina]

This is a lot. The next night, Jenny was woken again from sleep for a third night in a row by Esther's screams. And she was screaming, wake up. I'm dying. Oh. Not wanting to cause another scene, Jenny replied, it's a nightmare. Because she's like, this is the third night. Yeah, you gotta go to sleep. But she did get up and light the oil lamp. She was like, it's a nightmare. Like, not a big deal. But as soon as the room was lit, Jenny could see her sister standing in the center of the room. And her appearance was terrifying. Her entire body was rigid and contorted, and her face was bright red and her eyes appeared to be bulging out of her head. What the fu. And she was gripping the back of a chair so hard, her fingernails left impressions in the wood. What? So Jenny again screamed for Daniel and Olive, and they burst in a minute later. And as they burst in, Daniel and Olive managed to catch a glimpse of Esther's twisted body just before she went completely white and collapsed on the Floor. Okay. Daniel helped her get back to her feet and back to bed. But she had barely laid down before she was on her feet again, screaming that she, quote, felt as though she was about to burst into pieces. Oh. Which is so fucking scary.

[Babs]

I just picture, like, ready or not.

[Alina]

Right. They helped her to bed a second time, but all three couldn't help but notice that she looked like she was swelling up. Like, right in front of them when she's saying, I'm gonna burst into pieces. And now she's swelling.

[Babs]

This is horrifying. I've never heard anything like this.

[Alina]

Daniel said to Olive, lay your hand on her. She's as hot as fire. What? Olive had barely reached out her hand when out of nowhere, the house started shaking violently, as though it had been struck by lightning. No. And they heard a loud bang come from underneath the bed. No. Then, just as suddenly as it all started, the chaos just abruptly ended and the house was quiet. And Esther's appearance returned to normal. A little pale, but normal. A little pale.

[Babs]

She didn't look great, but Lola lost a little color.

[Alina]

Yeah, she lost a little color. What? Yeah. Hello. Right now. The next day, Esther slept later than usual. She got out of bed a little past 9am Crazy, but otherwise she looked and felt normal. And it didn't seem as though there were any lingering effects to whatever had struck her the night before. Later that day, the family sat around the dinner table discussing what the happened. That because this wasn't something. Luckily, this isn't one of those stories where there's like, wow, I guess we should just move on and never talk about that. No. They sat at dinner and they were like, so what the was that last night? Like, what's going on? And they were like, what should we do about this?

[Babs]

Yeah, like, why does this keep happening?

[Alina]

But the conversation kind of just went nowhere because, like, what do you do? They all agree no one would would believe their story if they told it. And even if they did, again, what would anyone do about it?

[Babs]

Yeah. Can a home security system really call itself security if it only responds once somebody's already inside?

[Alina]

I don't know.

[Babs]

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[Howie Mandel]

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[Babs]

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[Alina]

So days passed with no other activity. But one night in mid September, Esther was getting ready for bed when she began to feel hot. Fearing again that this could be happening again, she managed to make it to the bed and wake Jenny before she felt her body go rigid and start to swell again. Oh, no. Moments later, Jenny was by her side, trying to speak softly and, like, just trying to calm her down and, like, telling her to, like, please remain calm. And she was like, hopefully this is just going to pass really quickly. Esther did as her sister suggested. So she tried to just remain still. Yeah, but because she wasn't reacting, it only seemed to make things worse. It was like her not reacting to it was making it worse. Okay, so she's laying still. And Esther and Jenny watched in amazement as the blankets and sheets started stripping themselves from the bed, landing across the room in a pile by the door, like, just flinging across the room. The experience clearly was terrifying. So both of them just start screaming because they don't know what else to do. Just before, Jenny fainted beside Esther's bed. Oh, wow. Now, as they had before, Esther and Jenny's screams brought the rest of the family running into the room. And they found Jenny collapsed and unconscious on the floor beside Esther, who was now laying unmoving and swollen on her bed.

[Babs]

What the hell is happening here?

[Alina]

They saw that the sheets and blankets were all in a heap on the floor, and this was very nice of them. Not wanting her sisters to be exposed in their underclothes, Olive grabbed the blankets and placed one on Esther and another on Jenny. But as soon as she laid them across them, the blankets flew up into the air and across the room again. They said, no comforts for you. They said, no, your underoos will be seen. Your underoos.

[Babs]

Underpants.

[Alina]

Now, after the. After the. After the underpants were exposed.

[Babs]

You're so good at that.

[Alina]

Underpants. Underpants. After they were exposed again, there was a series of loud bangs, all seeming to come from under the bed again, and all loud enough to shake the entire room. Is this man's under the bed? Jesus. Then, like before, everything came to an abrupt stop and Esther regained her composure and her appearance was once again relatively normal. Probably a little pale, you know. And Jenny regained consciousness, though she said she had a fierce headache.

[Babs]

I mean, I would think.

[Alina]

Now, Daniel Teed had no clue what was happening in his house at this point.

[Babs]

A bunch of tomfoolery, I bet he thought.

[Alina]

A chicanery. Yeah. But at the very least, he knew it was having a physical effect on Esther and had begun to affect Jenny at this point as well. So, concerned for them, he went into town the next day and spoke to Dr. Carrie, the town physician. As he'd expected, the doctor didn't believe the story at all, the doctor said, even laughed in his face about it, which I was Like, I don't know if he had to do that.

[Babs]

That's a little bit rude.

[Alina]

I don't know. Is that part of your oath? What?

[Babs]

Probably. Did they take the notes back then?

[Alina]

Probably. It's pretty old. Hippocratic oath.

[Babs]

It's fucking old.

[Alina]

But still. Dr. Karipe agreed to pay a visit to the house the next afternoon, but added that, quote, what Daniel had told him was nonsense and that he, quote, knew no such tomfoolery would occur while he was in the house.

[Babs]

I done told you.

[Alina]

Dr. Kurit arrived at the teed house the next day and examined Esther. At the time, she was showing no signs of swelling, muscle rigidity, or tremors that they talked about the previous night, but she was feeling kind of shitty, like, just unwell.

[Babs]

Well, she also hasn't been sleeping.

[Alina]

Yeah. And after looking at her over and asking a few questions, Dr. Kurit concluded Esther, quote, seemed to be suffering from nervous excitement and had evidently received a tremendous shock of some kind. Okay. It's basically what they would always say. They're like, oh, this woman's hysterical.

[Babs]

Yep, she's got the vapors.

[Alina]

She's got nervous excitement, this one.

[Babs]

She's just been doing too much.

[Alina]

The doctor had just finished delivering this diagnosis to the family when without warning, the pillow where Esther was laying came out from under her and flew across the room. And it looked like it, as if it was pulled from by someone invisible from under her. I like to think it was Esther. As soon as this doctor turned around, just launched that pillow at his head.

[Babs]

Yeah, he probably would.

[Alina]

But no sooner had they put the pillow back under Esther's head, it flew out from her a second time, leaving Dr. Karit completely stunned. The doctor jumped up from his chair, but was quickly caught off guard by the sound of loud thumps coming from somewhere in the room. Before he could say anything, the sheets and blankets that had been covering Esther then flew off and landed in a pile again. And the activity was followed by an awful sound of metallic grinding that filled the room. Everyone in the room stared at each other, like, what the is going on? Hearing this, like, metallic grinding sound, which would sound so scary in that moment, having no, like, origin. Right.

[Babs]

And just shits flying around the room.

[Alina]

Well, and then it's. And this. This is what is documented about it. Then they watched in absolute amazement as writing began to appear on the wall above Esther's head. And it said, esther Cox, you are mine to kill.

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What?

[Alina]

Yeah, exclamation point. Of course. What? What? What? Hello? So, obviously everyone freaked the out and this isn't one of those situations where everyone was like, esther Cox, you are mine to kill. Oh, no. What happened? No, they scattered everywhere. They all just went fucking running. They were like that.

[Babs]

I'd run.

[Alina]

They were checking on the children because, remember, there's children in this house. Oh, probably checking on the children, looking for any sign of who could have written those words. And they were unable to find any evidence that anyone else in the house wrote it. When they returned to Esther's bedroom, a large chunk of plaster fell from the ceiling, just missing the doctor and landing at his feet.

[Babs]

What the fuck is happening?

[Alina]

To their amazement, Esther was still asleep at this point in her bed, completely oblivious to all of it.

[Babs]

Said, I gotta catch these. These where I can get them.

[Alina]

That's. I mean, I get that girl.

[Babs]

Said, honey.

[Alina]

So the doctor returned to the house the next day to see Esther, who appeared to be completely unaffected by everything that had happened. But she was definitely more nervous than usual and would, quote, jump at any.

[Babs]

Noise because somebody said that they were gonna kill her.

[Alina]

I mean, there's that. The doctor returned several times in the weeks after this. During all which, he would witness a variety of strange things, like flying objects, loud noises heard from all over the house. Eventually, the loud thumping, thumping sounds became so loud and lasted so long, they could be heard from outside the house.

[Babs]

These poor kids were probably so scared, one reporter wrote.

[Alina]

Because this was like in newspapers, one reporter wrote, passerbys stop to listen. And the next day, the town buzzed with the story of the haunted house. What? So other people are hearing this?

[Babs]

Okay.

[Alina]

Despite all the attention Esther was getting from the people of Amherst, it seemed that no one, including Dr. Kurit, was able to explain what the fuck was happening to Esther and why.

[Babs]

Yeah.

[Alina]

In early October, Dr. Edwin Clay, the local baptist minister, visited the house and examined Esther. He couldn't find any obvious explanation for the haunting. And he concluded esther, quote, must be possessed of an extraordinary amount of electrical power.

[Babs]

Okay.

[Alina]

Nailed it.

[Babs]

He said, this bitch is the grid.

[Alina]

The grid right here. Dr. Karid agreed. He was like, absolutely. The grid. Yes, the grid. He was like, you know what? The discharge of such great electricity must be the cause of the flying objects, the loud noises and the physical symptoms.

[Babs]

And the weird writing on the wal.

[Alina]

Wall that was slow.

[Babs]

That said it was going to kill her.

[Alina]

When it came to what to do, though, they had no clue. They were just like electricity. See you later. Good luck. That was it. Now, in time, Esther and the te's house became the biggest story in Amherst. Crowds gathered outside the house, trying to gain any kind of glimpse at any of the paranormal stuff going on or hear any of the noises. Eventually, the audiences became so large that Daniel teed couldn't disperse them on his own, and he had to call the police. At the same time, Esther's physical health continued to decline. In December, she came down with diphtheria and was confined to her bed for two weeks. During this time, the activity ceased entirely. Huh. Once she was recovered, she went to visit another sister who lived in Sackville, New Brunswick, for two weeks. The entire time she was away, nothing unusual happened at the teat house. Based on that, everyone concluded, which I get, that whatever was happening, it must have been focused entirely on Esther.

[Babs]

Yeah.

[Alina]

That being said, while she was away in Sackville, Esther herself didn't experience any unusual phenomenon. And she said she was free from physical pain that had been inflicted on her for three months at this point. Yeah. So when Esther returned to the house after being away for a few weeks, everyone hoped the ghost or demon or whatever the fuck this thing was, the grid would have been left behind. Just in case, while she was away, Jenny and Olive relocated Esther and Jenny's bedroom to the other side of the house, hoping the new location might also aid in keeping this away. Yeah. Unfortunately, it didn't take long for them to realize that all of these hopes and all these efforts had been in vain. Because not only did it return the activity with Esther, it was stronger and more aggressive than it had ever been. Oh, shit. The first night she was back in her own bed, Esther told Jenny she could hear a voice and talking to her, and she believed it was the spirit who'd been tormenting her. The disembodied voice told Esther, quote, it had once lived on the earth, but had been dead for some years and was now only a ghost. It's kind of metal, very metal. And maybe more disturbing was the fact that according to the spirit, the house was going to be set on fire that night by another ghost who haunted the property. It went too far. So this ghost is spilling the tea.

[Babs]

Said, my guy over here, he said.

[Alina]

You know what I heard?

[Babs]

Big arsonist.

[Alina]

You know what I heard them talking about at the water cooler? Water cooler. So that's scary. So Esther and Jenny inform the rest of the household, hey, our house is going to be lit on fire by.

[Babs]

A water cooler ghost.

[Alina]

An acquaintance of the ghost that is currently haunting us. But everyone just laughed at her. Which I was like, I don't know. At this point, maybe.

[Babs]

Yeah, that's like, you've seen miraculous things happen. And now she's telling you fire is gonna happen.

[Alina]

Yeah. They're all like, no, this is crazy. It's going too far. None of them, you know, had been able to explain what they had seen or heard in the house. But they firmly believed in Dr. K and Re. Reverend Clay's explanation that it was just stored up energy and there was nothing to be scared of. That they took that as like. That's the. That's the answer Bible, according to Hubble. As they all stood together in the bedroom trying to calm Esther and Jenny, they, quote, all saw a lighted match fall from the ceiling to the bed, having come out of the air. What?

[Babs]

I'm. Okay, here's the thing. I'm gonna be honest with you. I'm trying to figure out how they could pull this off.

[Alina]

Yeah. And I can't. And they're all figure it out. These people are like. The rest of the family is, like, calling the police when people show up and stuff. Like, they don't want big crowds, like, and, like, enjoying this. But they're all saying they're seeing this.

[Babs]

Yeah.

[Alina]

Like. And Jenny luckily acted really quickly to, like, distinguish the mass. But that isn't extinguished. That's what it is.

[Babs]

Why did I say she could not tell what the fire was?

[Alina]

It says distinguish, so you were not the only one. So Jenny acted really quickly and extinguished the match just as it hit the bedclothes. Because it would have lit the whole bed on fire. Yeah. So it would have lit the house on fire. Yeah. Now, regardless of what the rest of the family believed, Esther and Jenny were convinced that the thing that tormented them was a motherfucking ghost. Also, they believed that it had its own kind of sentience and could hear and see everything that happened in the house. And if that were true, Jenny thought then it logically followed that they could potentially communicate back with it.

[Babs]

Yeah.

[Alina]

If it can see us and it's telling us things, why can't we tell it things? Yeah. So upon suggesting this very thing to Dr. Kurit, the statement was immediately followed by. By three loud knocks from the floor.

[Babs]

It said, hey, what's good?

[Alina]

It's like. It's like the spirit was like, hell, yeah, brother. In response, Dr. Kurit asked whether the spirit could hear and understand what they were saying. And the question was heard with more loud knocks. What followed was a series of questions from the family, which were answered by the spirit.

[Babs]

He said, I. I have what you need.

[Alina]

There were different kinds. They tried to get, like, a system going where it was like one knock for no, three knocks for yes kind of thing. It was able to answer various yes or no questions indicating how many rooms there were in the house and provide several other responses that supported Esther and Jenny's belief that it was more than just discharged energy. When Daniel asked whether the house was really going to be set on fire, the spirit gave three knocks, which is yes.

[Babs]

Hell yeah, brother.

[Alina]

Immediately after, the stunned family members watched as a dress flew from the closet and landed under the bed, where it just caught fire by completely unknown means.

[Babs]

Sporadically.

[Alina]

Sporadically combusted. Okay. Just all up in there.

[Babs]

Alrighty.

[Alina]

Fortunately, Daniel was able to remove the dress from the bed and extinguish those flames as well before any damage to the house was done. Now, perhaps the most like, interesting and curious aspect of the whole situation was the wild shifts in temperament from one moment to the next, because at some point, the spirit communication was calm and very even. And it came off like, kind of benevolent and helpful at times. Like it would warn the family, like when it warned the family members about the fire, or it would warn them about something else. Other times, though, it seemed to mock them all, writing cruel and profane messages on the wall or seizing Esther with. With seizures and stomach pains that lasted for days. Yeah, it feels like those two. Like that ghost was saying. Yeah, like when they. When she claimed she heard it talking to her, that there's another one. Good cop, bad cop kind of thing. Now, outside the teed house, the neighbors were beginning to arrive at their own conclusions about the haunting. Some accepted the girl's story entirely, believing the house was beset upon by ghosts. Others put the theory force that Karit and Clay seemed plausible, like. Like the electrical energy idea. Okay. But then there was another group who was very skeptical and found the whole thing completely impossible, which I get. Absolutely. They believe that rather than being tormented by ghosts, Esther was being tormented by a human being, specifically Bob McNeil.

[Babs]

Where's he at?

[Alina]

So one reporter wrote, some say that the controlling agent in these phenomena is not a spirit, but a young man who is in a distant part of the province. According to the that journalist, the individual is, quote, a person whom Esther has regarded with a strong dislike. And prior to her illness, he is said to have talked to her in such a violent and extraordinary way as to cause her much alarm and leave a vivid impression on her mind.

[Babs]

Yeah, he just talked to her, you guys. He really was.

[Alina]

All things considered, the people of Amherst had pretty good reason to be skeptical of the whole thing. Of course, if she had just been Like a victim of the strange events happening in the house, that would be one thing. But she kind of was part of it a little bit passively at times. Like, when the entity would want to write inappropriate and vulgar shit on the wall, it would do so through Esther. Huh. So it would tell her what to write and where to write it. Okay, so she's, like, actively part of this, at least, whether she's being controlled or not.

[Babs]

So, like, when it said, like, I'm Esther is mine to kill, she's the one that wrote that.

[Alina]

That's not documented, but other times, she was.

[Babs]

Okay.

[Alina]

So in early 1879, the skeptical position was given a little more credence when, after being sedated by Dr. Kurit during a really bad episode of stomach pain, Esther, quote, fell into a cataleptic trance, during which she told all of Jenny, Daniel, and the doctor about what had happened between her and Bob McNeil. According to Esther, Bob had, quote, unsuccessfully tried to assault her, and they had a violent quarrel. Yeah. Just before he had vanished from Amherst. So after hearing this story, Olive remarked, it's Bob McNeil who's caused all this trouble. And from out of nowhere, they heard three short, sharp knocks.

[Babs]

So. Yes.

[Alina]

So it's like, what the fuck? Where's bob now? In January 1879, the noises, fires, and constant public attention finally became way too much for Daniel and all of Teed, and it was decided that it would be best for everyone if Esther moved out.

[Babs]

Oh, that's so mean. They said, we're done with all this. You gotta get the. We don't know what's going on.

[Alina]

We've had enough for your shit.

[Babs]

But truly, we really don't care.

[Alina]

Please go. Yeah. We do not. We don't want to deal with this anymore. Simply don't. So fortunately, she was quickly able to find new accommodations with a local couple.

[Babs]

Okay.

[Alina]

Named John White and his wife, Shut the in.

[Babs]

Elena Urquhart.

[Alina]

We let her in. Okay. Yeah. We gave her shelter.

[Babs]

You're kind soul.

[Alina]

Me and John White. At first, everything in Esther's new home seemed quiet and calm. Because we're great. But within two weeks, the activity started again. Okay. So, terrified by the phenomenon, John's wife, me, insisted that Esther needed to go. Oh.

[Babs]

I mean.

[Alina]

So she ended up spending most of her time living and working at the Whites restaurant in town, where the noises continued to be heard and objects continued to fly across the room. Weird. So it's like a poltergeist?

[Babs]

Yeah, very much so.

[Alina]

By the summer of 1879, the story of Esther Cox and the great Amherst mystery had spread all across Nova Scotia, thanks to curious journalists and others with, you know, an interest in the supernatural. Eventually, the story made its way to Walter Hubble, who we've cited a number of times, who spent the winter performing with an acting troupe in Halifax. And once spring had arrived, he was looking for a new set subject for a book. Now, for most of his life, Hubble had been a writer, an actor, just, you know, nothing to write home about. Had it not been for Esther's story, it's likely he wouldn't really be remembered publicly for those two tasks. Yeah. But Hubble had always had a strong interest in paranormal activity happenings. So when he read about Esther's plight, he really wanted to visit her. So he made arrangements to.

[Babs]

He said, I got to see this bitch.

[Alina]

He said, let me see what's going on right now. So he arrived in Amherst on June 11, 1879, and his first stop was the Teed house, where he was introduced to Esther. He wrote Esther was very self possessed and appeared to be in excellent health. By that time, Esther and the rest of the family had started referring to the ghosts in the house as Bob Nicholl and Maggie Fisher. Okay. Which I kind of love.

[Babs]

I do too.

[Alina]

I don't know why.

[Babs]

There's Bob and there's Maggie.

[Alina]

Yeah. At least these were the two most prominent ghosts in the house. But according to Esther, there were others. According to Esther, quote, bob and Maggie informed her it would be all right for her to share her story.

[Babs]

Okay.

[Alina]

They said it's cool you can talk to people.

[Babs]

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[Alina]

Ultimately, Hubble spent a little more than a month investigating the haunting of Esther Cox. And he admitted at first he was very skeptical of her claims. Yeah, me too. In fact, his plan was to spend enough time with Esther to gather evidence of fraud and then expose her as a hoax.

[Babs]

Oh, dang. That was what he was going to Dang, Walter.

[Alina]

I mean, he was like, I think it's fake and I'm going to expose. But Hubble said, I was willing to acknowledge that there might be a power of some kind about the girl, but of course, nothing supernatural. However, his supposed skepticism soon fell away when that evening at dinner, they were all seated around the table and they started to hear knocks. He said we could all hear even the scratching sounds of invisible human fingernails and the dull sounds produced by the hands as they rubbed the table and struck it with invisible clenched fists. Oh. So now, convinced that what he was seeing was in fact real, Hubble immediately started Booking a lecture tour for himself and asked Esther if she would be willing to join him.

[Babs]

He said, I got to spread the good word, Esther.

[Alina]

He said, let's go. And Esther was like, hell, yeah, let's go. Okay.

[Babs]

I don't know what to make of this story. Nobody really does.

[Alina]

Because by that time, she'd been asked to move out of her home and was living primarily in a small room at a restaurant.

[Babs]

No, it's truly my favorite thing that they were like, yeah, sorry. Yeah, you can't live experiencing, but like, bye.

[Alina]

John White and his wife, you know.

[Babs]

They were like, it only went so far. She got kicked out twice.

[Alina]

Yeah, she did.

[Babs]

Her own family and them.

[Alina]

She was starting to also face some hostility from the locals because they'd grown tired of all the attention that was happening around town. They just didn't want it anymore.

[Babs]

God forbid a woman. A woman get attention.

[Alina]

The tour began in mid June with their first stop in Moncton. Unfortunately, Esther's ghosts appeared to have come along for the ride, though, and made themselves known before the speaking event even began. The first one, they caused chairs in the auditorium to move on their own. And I guess this is, like, kind of fortunately for their. Their plight. Yeah, like, kind of sucks because they're with the. With the whole show. Yeah. This delighted some in the crowd.

[Babs]

I'd be delighted.

[Alina]

Others became annoyed, particularly once it became clear that the spirits. Spirits couldn't be controlled. So they were just, like, really up the whole thing.

[Babs]

That would make me even more excited.

[Alina]

I would love it.

[Babs]

I'd be like, oh, my God.

[Alina]

During a church service the day after the lecture, Esther was asked to leave after the service became interrupted when, according to the local press, quote, the ghosts manifested itself by knocking on the floor of the pew in front. Okay. Which, like, she can't do that. Yeah, that's.

[Babs]

How would she.

[Alina]

Like, how is she interrupting all this shit and church?

[Babs]

I'm like, damn, you know, no bounds.

[Alina]

Esther's ghosts. The diamond, I think. No. Not long after their first lecture date, the tour began falling apart. During their travels, Esther repeatedly experienced a lot of physical symptoms, like swelling, vomiting, and muscle rigidity. Ooh. Each time, she was evaluated by a doctor, and they all said, you know, more or less the same thing, that she was suffering from symptoms of over excitement. Okay. But poor health was not the only problem that was happening in each town they stopped at advanced. Word of their arrival had given the local religious organizations time to organize a protest. Even back then, they were. They were at it.

[Babs]

They were back at it.

[Alina]

And Esther and Hubble were met with strong opposition in their spiritualist message. In a letter to the editor of one paper, a Presbyterian group wrote, in the humanity, propriety, religion and decency, we earnestly protest against a proceeding so base and disgusting, testing the civil authorities ought to interfere.

[Babs]

It's like, girl, what are they supposed to do?

[Alina]

She's being home stuff. Yeah. Just informing you, saying, like, hey, she's haunted.

[Babs]

Maybe exercise her band together and exercise the.

[Alina]

You know what you can do? Just not listen to her. Just off. You could do that. The same thing that applies to social media now applies to this. Then if you don't like it, listen. Don't listen to her.

[Babs]

It's not pretty simple.

[Alina]

That hard people. Instead, they're like, no one can listen.

[Babs]

People were hate listening back then.

[Alina]

It's true. They were. Yes.

[Babs]

There's always going to be a subgroup of hate, like hate content scrollers, hate content listeners, hate protesters. You're just filled with stupid hate. Like, damn, get a life.

[Alina]

Just go do something. Get a hobby.

[Babs]

Listen, my grandpa says it all the time, get a life.

[Alina]

Get a life. Instead of spreading the hate, spread the good word. Tell people what you're doing. Let her do her thing. People will listen or they won't. And then you go, spread your good word.

[Babs]

Papa says, get a life. I say, live and let live. Exactly.

[Alina]

Now, with the lecture tour having fallen, you know, mostly apart, Hubble and his group returned with Esther to Amherst. And soon after, he informed her that he would be leaving.

[Babs]

He was like, this is a lot. He said, sorry, I have been chased out of town.

[Alina]

Yeah. Decades later, in 1879, Hubble published his account of the time he spent with Esther Cox investigating the great Amherst mystery in a book called the Great Amherst A True Narrative of the Supernatural. The book went on to become a huge success, and it honestly brought Hubble up from amateur actor, which is what he was doing before this, to an internationally recognized author and a pseudo expert on the paranormal. All right, so we got something out of it.

[Babs]

Okay, Walter.

[Alina]

Esther moved back into the teed house. Finally, they welcomed her back. They said, okay. But when the activity started up again a short time later, she was asked to leave again. Damn.

[Babs]

This bitch is getting evicted left, right and center.

[Alina]

And she went to stay with the Van Ambergs, a local family with whom she had stayed with in the past. Initially, it was pretty quiet in the house, and people even suggested Mr. Van Amber quote, possessed an influence over the ghost, similar to the alleged influence his illustrious kinsman was said to have over wild beasts. Whoa. Yeah. Okay. Mr. Van Amsburgh, he apparently was coming from a long line of people who could fucking tame wild beasts.

[Babs]

He's like a lion tamer.

[Alina]

It was pretty fun. But if Van Amberg did have any control over Esther in her spirits, it didn't last very long.

[Babs]

Aw.

[Alina]

Within a few weeks, it all started again. Pots, pans, clothes, and other valuables were thrown around the house on a near daily basis.

[Babs]

Oh, darn.

[Alina]

The tension in the house was thick. Yeah. You're ruining my shit. Yeah. And it finally came to a head a few weeks later when the ghost supposedly set fire to the Van Amber's barn.

[Babs]

That'll do it.

[Alina]

And it destroyed everything inside. It was like genuine destruction. Oh, that's sad. Furious and distraught, Mr. Van Amberg had Esther arrested and charged as, quote, an incendiary, alleging that it was she who set the barn on fire to further her hoax.

[Babs]

I mean, I do low key get.

[Alina]

Which, like, why he don't feel that way.

[Babs]

I'd probably do the same thing. Yeah.

[Alina]

According to one press account, quote, the judge and jury were non believers as far as ghosts were concerned. And Esther was found guilty and sentenced to four months in jail for arson.

[Babs]

Four months, huh?

[Alina]

It's pretty. Pretty brief. Stay for arson? I would say.

[Babs]

Light arson.

[Alina]

Light arson. Ultimately, she would only serve one month of her sentence.

[Babs]

Is she like a celeb?

[Alina]

Yeah, because it was really due in large part to the number of respectable locals who spoke out on her behalf.

[Babs]

Oh, that's nice.

[Alina]

She did have some people in her corner.

[Babs]

They said no, it really was ghosts.

[Alina]

After she was released, she found work as a live in maid for Arthur Davison, the local clerk of the court. But as always, things started to go wrong almost immediately in the Davison house. Knives, forks, sewing needles, knitting needles, all manner of dangerous objects. This time, not just pots and pans. They flew around the house with, like, pretty regular frequency at this point, including one incident when a large fork struck Davison in the back of the head. Oh, fuck. Oh. Like the previous accommodations, her time with the Davisons came to an end after his barn caught fire and was completely destroyed. What now if she's still setting fires to prove this whole thing? That's bold.

[Babs]

That's almost what makes me feel like it's real, though, because it's like, why would she do that again? More time in jail.

[Alina]

But then again, she did get out after only a month. So it's like she looks around and she's like, well, people will band together to get me out.

[Babs]

And at least for her jail Was like a steady living, like.

[Alina]

Yeah. Situation for months. She had someone. Somewhere to stay.

[Babs]

Yeah.

[Alina]

Two hots in a cot, you know?

[Babs]

Two hots.

[Alina]

Jesus Christ. It's true.

[Babs]

You're not wrong.

[Alina]

For. For Esther. It's true. Now, after being kicked out of the Davison house after, you know, the barn set fire, Esther spent two months bouncing around from one home to another, never staying more than a few days. In early 1880, she suffered another attack of physical symptoms that required Dr. Karit to sedate her with morphine. And she remained unconscious for several days before coming to and resuming her normal state.

[Babs]

A lot of morphine.

[Alina]

Now, this latest attack on her health and well being proved to be the last. Oh, no. After a brief period of depression, she was resolved to reclaim her life. She was like, I cannot do this anymore. And she was like, I'm just moving on. I'm moving forward. I'm gonna try to put this behind me and try to see if that will work. And within a few. A short time, she started seeing a man from town. Oh. After a brief courtship, they married and they had one child. And it's unclear how or why the first marriage came to an end, because it did. But Esther would go on to marry a second time and have another child before leaving Amherst for good and relocating to Brockton, Massachusetts.

[Babs]

Shut the up. Shut the up. That's like when it happened in the menu. And they were like, yeah, she's from Brockton. I was like, what?

[Alina]

Like, what the.

[Babs]

Esther out here in Brockton.

[Alina]

The most random town.

[Babs]

Truly the most random town. What is Brockton known?

[Alina]

Is it City of Champions?

[Babs]

City of Champions. Yeah.

[Alina]

Like, that's. I. If you had said, like, Palmer, you know, Amherst.

[Babs]

Well, anything, like.

[Alina]

Because it's like, that's like a Western Malden, Marlboro, like. Yeah. Adams, Everett, Dorchester, Worcester. If you had said any of these towns, I'd be like, wow, that's weird.

[Babs]

Rocked it. The are you doing in Brock.

[Alina]

Brockton? Like, I'm not saying. I'm just like, it's just so random.

[Babs]

No, that's literally. It's just a random place.

[Alina]

So random. So crazy. It was like the menu moment for me as soon as I read it, I was like, what?

[Babs]

It's like you just hear, like, glass shatter.

[Alina]

Yeah.

[Babs]

What the weirdo in Brockton.

[Alina]

Yeah. Now, by that time, whatever had been haunting Esther Cox appeared to have left her. There's no further reports of supernatural phenomena after she got married.

[Babs]

That makes no sense to me.

[Alina]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Babs]

Years and years and barn fires a plenty and Then she's just like, yeah, I want to get married and have some kids.

[Alina]

And I know. She's like, it's weird. It just went away.

[Babs]

She, like, stopped swelling too.

[Alina]

Yeah, she stopped all of it, I guess. Which, like, that's weird, cuz she was swelling up and I don't. This.

[Babs]

I don't know what to make of this.

[Alina]

I don't need. Now. Little is known about her life after she left Amherst.

[Babs]

Little is known about her time in.

[Alina]

Brockton other than the documentation of her death on November 8th, 1912 at age 52. What the. She'll do. 52? Yeah. I mean, it is the 1800s.

[Babs]

Yeah. But still.

[Alina]

Now, the story of Esther Cox and the great Amherst mystery had captured the imagination and attention of people everywhere, all over the world since it began. Wow. And it obviously inspired a lot of theories about where this all came from. Some, like Walter Hubble, believed that she was genuinely haunted. And others believe the entire saga was a hoax perpetrated by one person. Person.

[Babs]

I feel like I'm not in either camp.

[Alina]

I know it's a hard one to sit in. It is. Dr. Walter Prince wrote in 1919 in an article for the Journal of the American Society of Psychical Research, the Amherst mystery we are informed on. The best authority is no mystery at all, except to persons who refrain from using their powers of observation and reason. So they're like, it's really not a mystery unless you just choose not to see what's happening. Okay. He said the only mystery is that. That so many persons who should have known better are deceived.

[Babs]

But like, how is she creating knocking in the. In the front pew when she was not there?

[Alina]

Those are the kind of things. And also it's like.

[Babs]

And how did she make things fly?

[Alina]

That's like the knives and forks and shit. Like, no one was saying, I saw her throw these things. Like they were just flying around.

[Babs]

I mean, I guess they're like Criss angel mind freak vibes.

[Alina]

Like maybe Criss angel mind freak. Maybe she figured out it. That's the tweet period.

[Babs]

Yeah.

[Alina]

Like, that's it.

[Babs]

But you know what? Like, he can. He can do, like, illusions and maybe illusionists are definitely.

[Alina]

Yeah. Like, maybe she's one of the great illusionists of our time.

[Babs]

You know, maybe she's Esther girl.

[Alina]

Mind freak. Esther Cox. Mind freak. I mean, is what works. Honestly, should be titled mind freak.

[Babs]

I mean, it had to like that. Like that people learned that somewhere.

[Alina]

Yeah, I mean, we. Look, we just said people were already doing the. Don't you Know, instead of me just not listening to something I don't like, I'm gonna try to make everybody not listen to something I don't like back then. Yeah, they were definitely doing mind freak back then.

[Babs]

Exactly. They were everything we're doing now. Mind freak, you know, twerking, all of those things. They were different.

[Alina]

They were throwing ass.

[Babs]

But, yeah, I don't know. I believe in hauntings, like, 150%, but I've been to a lot of haunted locations at this point, and nothing ever gets thrown. Like, I've never seen anything thrown, and I desperately want to.

[Alina]

Yeah, I would love to see something.

[Babs]

Like, I've never seen the extreme sides that people talk about, and that does.

[Alina]

Make you question it. Makes me think of it of, like, going back to, like, the energy kind of thing of it. All that, like, stored energy, especially, like, traumatic energy or negative energy. I fully believe that. I'm like, does that. Can that cause things like that? But again, like you just said, I've never seen it happen.

[Babs]

I've never experienced it, like. And we've been in some places where.

[Alina]

I mean, in our house growing up. I remember me and my brother were downstairs, and we heard a crash. Yeah. And when we ran up to it, and his room was wildly haunted. It was my room first. And then I was like, that, you can have this.

[Babs]

He took it, actually, you know what?

[Alina]

And that. It was a. It was a framed picture that didn't just fall down on the wall. It had.

[Babs]

It, like, flew across the room.

[Alina]

It, like, went across the room and was leaning against the other side of the room. So I will say I didn't see it with my own eyes, but I heard it when I.

[Babs]

You. Like, before I moved into Ma and Papa's house, and I used to, like, just stay for, like, the week or, like, some, like, time. I would sleep in that room from time to time. And do you remember the night that a box just slid across the floor out of nowhere and I. I woke the entire house up because I screamed loud. So I have seen things move.

[Alina]

So.

[Babs]

Yeah, I've just like. Well, yeah, I mean, I can literally still see that in my head.

[Alina]

That was crazy. Yeah. So, I mean, I guess. Yeah. You know what I mean? It's not as egregious as knives and forks flying through the air and, like, pots and pans and shit.

[Babs]

Yeah.

[Alina]

But it's something.

[Babs]

Yeah.

[Alina]

I don't know. Yeah.

[Babs]

It's very unknown to me, but Dr.

[Alina]

Walter Prince and many others in the field of paranormal research flatly rejected Hubble's account of this supposedly true haunting. They were asserting that their steadfast belief was merely, you know, this was just a disingenuous marketing strategy to sell more books. That's what they were asserting. I'm not saying that. Author Lori Glenn Norris, whose 2012 book Haunted Girls tells a more detailed story of Cox's life. Onic title. Right. Haunted Girl. And it's Girl. Sorry, I shouldn't have said girls. It's girl.

[Babs]

There are many haunted Girls.

[Alina]

We are two of them. There's only one. I said girls accidentally. But it tells a more detailed story of Cox's life life and agrees with that sentiment that something else was going on. According to Glenn Norris, the haunting most likely started out as a prank by a young woman who was desperate for attention. But everything quickly spiraled out of control. After her mother's death, her father's remarriage, and being shipped off to live with her sister, her life probably felt like it was kind of falling apart. Yeah. Very out of control. Add to that the assault and the death threats from McNeil, and it's very likely that Esther was in a mental health crisis and needed help.

[Babs]

But then flip that on its head. Like you just said, there are energies that feed off of negative experiences, and I would assume that would have been a very negative experience for her.

[Alina]

Yeah.

[Babs]

And she was living with trauma.

[Alina]

Yeah.

[Babs]

So it's like maybe something was feeding off of that.

[Alina]

I can see her doing it for attention and then it's spiraling out of control during a mental health crisis. Or I can see that side.

[Babs]

Yeah, I agree with you.

[Alina]

But Glenn Norris said instead of helping her, the people who should have helped her, quote, turned her personal crisis into a public sensation. More than a century later. Her story has inspired countless books, plays, even an annual festival in Amherst known as Estherfest.

[Babs]

There's an Estherfest, and I've never gone. I spent plenty of time in Amherst.

[Alina]

The draw of the story is the fact that it's still one of the nation's great unsolved mysteries, while others use it as an opportunity to share their own ghost stories.

[Babs]

When are we going to Estherfest?

[Alina]

Amherst Mayor David Crogan said, I just like that it puts a spotlight on the town. I mean, it's a ghost story that apparently is one of the most well documented supernatural events that have ever been.

[Babs]

Yeah.

[Alina]

Although she appreciates that people are continuing to tell Esther's story, Laurie Glendorris her appreciation of the festival and celebration of Cox comes with a warning. She said, I appreciate that we're still Telling the story. But she warned. Hopefully people will take into consideration that there was more to her than the 15 months and how this type of thing can be so harmful to people. She said, I'm not sure if Esther really ever recovered from it.

[Babs]

Oh.

[Alina]

Which, like, she also doesn't know that because we don't have any documentation of how she was after she got married. Interesting thing.

[Babs]

Kind of sounds like she did recover from it because she went on to have. Have two marriages and two children.

[Alina]

That's the thing. And then lived a life again. So it's like. And I lived a life in Brockton, Massachusetts.

[Babs]

I think she recovered from it.

[Alina]

So it's like. I appreciate, though, that she's saying, you.

[Babs]

Know, like, that there's more to her.

[Alina]

Than 15 months that there really could have been a mental health crisis here happening. That was. But we don't know that. That's the thing. Like, we don't know that. Yeah. She was not documented to have mental health.

[Babs]

That's a theory.

[Alina]

Crises or anything like that.

[Babs]

Right.

[Alina]

That's a theory. It's a very good theory.

[Babs]

Yeah.

[Alina]

There's also the very valid. If you are into supernatural theory that something was going on here. There's also another theory that this McNeil guy was tormenting her.

[Babs]

Yeah.

[Alina]

Because that's like a real theory.

[Babs]

I kind of wonder.

[Alina]

He was, like, stalking and tormenting her.

[Babs]

I actually kind of wondered that. Especially when, like, the match fell from the attic.

[Alina]

Yeah. It's like that could have been. And it could be a combo platter.

[Babs]

Because also he.

[Alina]

Many different things.

[Babs]

He just disappeared.

[Alina]

Appeared. Yeah. Nobody knew where he went.

[Babs]

So it's like.

[Alina]

And he was.

[Babs]

You just live in the. I mean, we've covered stories before where people have lived in the walls and.

[Alina]

He was known to be a dick face. And it's like. And it's not like they had simply safe back then where they would tell if he was in the attic. Like, they know. Yeah. There's nothing. He could have climbed in an attic very easily and just lived there. And it's like this guy was skinning cats alive. Like, he would say that he was, but that's. It's the truth. Like, he was a straight up monstrous human being. This would not be out of the realm of possibility. He tried to assault her or did assault her. It sounds like. And it's like it's not out of the realm of possibility that this McNeil guy made it his fucking business to torment her afterwards. Like, you don't know. And even if he started to. And then it turned into something else because he had literally driven her to a mental health crisis. Yep. Where she was just continuing it because she believed she was still in it.

[Babs]

Yeah. And not even realizing that she was continuing it.

[Alina]

Or it's a fucking demon. Could be. I mean, it's all. What do we know? Here's the thing. What does anybody.

[Babs]

That's it. We said it in the abduction episode. There's just so much out there that we don't know about.

[Alina]

We don't know. It could be any of these things. I'm willing to believe any three of them. They all make sense.

[Babs]

Maybe it's a combo of all.

[Alina]

I think it's a combo of all of them. I don't know.

[Babs]

That's a crazy story, though.

[Alina]

Yeah.

[Babs]

I've said it 50 million times. But I really don't know what to make of that.

[Alina]

It. That's the thing. A lot of these things, when we talk about them like the poltergeists are haunting. Usually at the end. I feel I'm in one camp or the other one. One way or another.

[Babs]

Yeah.

[Alina]

This one. I feel conflicted.

[Babs]

I do too.

[Alina]

And it's. I don't believe it was just a straight up haunting. No. No. I don't think it's just clear cut haunting. I think there was other elements involved. Yeah.

[Babs]

I feel like.

[Alina]

I think that could be part of it.

[Babs]

I think there's absolutely an element of haunting. And I think the McNeil thing, it's like. Like he assaulted her and then he just like left. Is not that believable to me.

[Alina]

Yeah. I feel like something like we never heard about him again.

[Babs]

I feel like he played a deeper role.

[Alina]

Yeah. Than people realize. I think so too.

[Babs]

What an interesting story.

[Alina]

Yeah.

[Babs]

And I'm really trying to go to Esther Fest.

[Alina]

That's the. We gotta go to Esther Fest.

[Babs]

And I'll remember that there's more to.

[Alina]

Her than 15 months while I'm at Estherfest. Hell. Yeah. So I found it. So. And remember, this is Amherst, Nova Scotia. Oh, yeah.

[Babs]

So I've actually asterisk. I've never been there. I thought we were talking because I was like, I don't think you've spent a lot of time in it. You're like, I'm not positive. But something tells me also that makes it even more random that she made her way to Bronx.

[Alina]

That's why it's crazy.

[Babs]

I thought you meant like Amherst, like Western Mass.

[Alina]

Yeah. So Esther Fest is. Apparently, this is, according to the website, is a celebration of the paranormal and horror that takes Place in Amherst each October. Inspired by Esther Cox and her story. So it's happening right now.

[Babs]

I'm still trying to go. Yeah, Nova Scotia seems dope.

[Alina]

Yeah, it seems like it's a fun. The Great Amherst Street Party is part of it.

[Babs]

Yeah, I'd like to go to there.

[Alina]

This looks like fun. The gram The Great Amherst Street Party takes place on the 18th of October. Live music. This is live music with second toe.

[Babs]

Which I think is a little piggy.

[Alina]

Bouncy castles. I mean, benders, face painting, horse and wagon ride.

[Babs]

Horse wagon ride.

[Alina]

Like this is.

[Babs]

What was the last thing you said?

[Alina]

A petting zoo. A petting zoo and so much more.

[Babs]

It says, I think we ought to book tickets. That looks like fun.

[Alina]

Yeah, it does.

[Babs]

It looks like a busk.

[Alina]

It does. It looks like a. Like a Berkshire bust. It really does.

[Babs]

I am obsessed and I think maybe go next year.

[Alina]

So if you're in Amherst or if you're in Nova Scotia at all, go. Like our friend Jordan from Nighttime podcast, go.

[Babs]

Oh my God, Jordan. Go to escrow us everything because it looks cool. Go oot and tell us we're the worst. All our Canadian listeners said bye.

[Alina]

They said you all right, guys?

[Babs]

Well, that was a good story. A Lionel.

[Alina]

It was a fun one. We hope you keep listening and we hope you keep it weird.

[Babs]

But not so weird that you don't go party your ass off at Esther Fest and make things fly, baby.

[Alina]

Esther Festival. Yes. Esther Fester. Esther Cox. Mind freak.

[Babs (Ad Segment)]

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[Babs]

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[Alina]

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