It started with a line in Ella Bray's book All Around The Common, first published in 1937. On page 12, she wrote that all of the houses but one around the Yarmouth Port Common were reputed to have ghosts. Thus the research started, to see what experiences people had with ghosts in Yarmouth. The following are stories relayed to us.

The Chapter House Inn has been the center of attention for ghost stories for many years. On several different occasions, paranormal societies and ghost busters have visited the Inn to survey the property and some believe that this building may well have more paranormal activity than any other house on Cape Cod!

In the main house, there is a room where some guests have reported hearing a baby cry. This is the room where at least one baby died when the home was owned by the Eldridge family. In another room, a rocking chair sometimes turns during the night to face a blank wall. That blank wall used to have a window in it, right where the rocking chair is facing. It doesn’t make any difference whether a different rocker is placed in the room.

Ghost noises have been heard in the attached carriage house. In one room, the sound of a boy crying is sometimes heard. This room was used to house stable boys and one reportedly hanged himself there. In another room some have heard the sound of horses.

A paranormal detecting team called SERT (Spirit Encounter Research Team) visited the Chapter House Inn (then the Colonial House Inn) during the spring of 2006. Some EVPs or ‘electronic voice phenomena’ were recorded. In one instance, when an audio recording device was placed in the widow’s watch, children’s voices and the sound of footsteps running up and down the stairs were clearly heard. This recording was made at approximately 1:45 AM when the building was quite silent. Later, in the same stairwell, a child’s voice can be heard whispering very close to the hand-held microphone. ‘Hello’ is the only word spoken.

The Edward Gorey House. Gorey never mentioned encountering ghosts, but did note that his cats would sometimes freeze all at once, and stare at an unseen object entering the room.

Old Yarmouth Inn has been a tavern since the 1690s. The ghost(s) who make mischief are not malicious or scary, rather they apparently possess a good sense of humor. Previous owners and employees have reported wineglasses falling and breaking from their supposedly secure rack, as well as ashtrays sliding along the bar after being stacked.

176 Old King’s Highway

This house was built by Captain Josiah Gorham. The Yarmouth Register noted, “His residence is a pretentious and substantial affair indicating that the captain was a man of means and taste.”

Gorham and his wife, Harriet Barber, had a child name Mary, one of a pair of twins, that died while when only 2 months old. The death so upset Gorham’s wife that she became mentally unbalanced.

A more recent owner noted, “It must have been a few weeks after we moved in that it happened. I was just getting into bed after a long day. My wife was sound asleep beside me, but I was still wide awake when something appeared hovering about my bed. It wasn’t something, but someone.

“It was a child. I couldn’t tell if it was a boy or a girl because of the way it was dressed. It was wearing an outfit from years ago that made the gender indistinguishable. It looked like some type of robe. Surrounding this babe was a bluish light that shone like an aura. I looked, but I couldn’t move. I felt mesmerized or else I was just paralyzed by the sight. This vision stayed above my bed for several minutes; the child just looked down at me, staring. Finally, the child left my room.

361 Old King’s Highway

“Within a couple of months, it started. My husband and I retired to our bedroom in the front of the house that at one time had been the parlor. Immediately he fell asleep while I read. Suddenly, I was aware of organ music playing in the background, gradually becoming loud enough to recognize the hymns that were being played. When I mentioned it to my husband the next day he adamantly denied hearing it, and dismissed it by saying that probably someone was playing an organ across the street. No, that was not the case; the music was coming from inside the bedroom. I knew it was real and not in my imagination.

“From that day on I was to hear it over and over again. It continued, only in that room; only at night and only I heard it. Sometimes it was so loud that I had to get up and sit in the kitchen to read my book for a while before returning to my bed and the music ceased. There would be a break for two or three nights, and then without warning the music would recommence and continue for several nights in a row. Sometimes the music was feint, but mostly very loud until I wanted to scream. It was always organ music and always hymns. The predominant piece was Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring.

“When my son was in second grade, I had an occasion to take him out of school early. I met with the school secretary and we chatted about this and that and she asked where we lived in Yarmouth. I described the location and she turned to me and said ‘doesn’t the music drive you nuts?’ I was speechless.

“It was extremely loud the day our first grandchild was born. We had been visiting, came home and finally went to bed. As usual, I picked up my book and was about to read when the music started and became so loud that I couldn’t stand it. Finally I said out loud, ‘thank you very much, I enjoyed that.’ To my amazement the music stopped!

1 Center Street

A former owner of the house when it was an inn cannot remember if she saw it first or perhaps it was a guest. It happened as the busy season for tourists was beginning to wane. A guest came downstairs and remarked about the “presence” that she felt in the rear of the house. “Do you experience this often?” she asked. No one had noticed it before, so the experience was a new one.

Not long afterwards, the innkeeper was at the foot of the back stairs. As she looked up to the upper hallway, she saw it. The apparition was a young woman dressed in a flowing white dress; the innkeeper just looked at the vision. She wasn’t frightened; as a matter of fact, she had a rather good feeling about the entire experience.

On one other occasion, the owners of the inn went away on vacation in late fall or early winter. They asked a good friend to oversee the operation since it was a rather slow season for guests. While they were away the young woman appeared again at the back staircase. This was memorable for the visiting friend who recounted her startling story.

371 Old King’s Highway

“Did you ever have the feeling that someone was watching you? Not just the glance around type of reaction, but an overpowering, intense feeling that makes you react quickly to see who it is. I have.

“My husband and I purchased the home of Captain Nathaniel Taylor on 6A in Yarmouth Port. Captain Taylor commanded the schooner Yarmouth, a packet ship that sailed between Yarmouth and Boston. When the Yarmouth was sold, Captain Taylor took command of the packet Lucy Elizabeth. It was aboard the Lucy Elizabeth the Captain was injured and his life changed forever. A gunning accident aboard the ship permanently injured his arm. Captain Taylor lost command of the ship, along with his livelihood. He opened a dry goods store behind the house, but due to the onset of the Civil War and the depressed economy, he struggled to make a living. He died bankrupt at the age of 49 leaving his widow, Mercy. Nathaniel’s estate did not cover all their debts, and she was ordered to auction off her home. A prosperous and generous neighbor purchased her home at auction for $50 and resold it to Mercy the very same day. He held the mortgage which enabled Mercy to continue to live in the house and raise her two children. For the next 41 years Mercy existed on a widow’s allowance, until her death in 1908 at the age of 87.

“One night while I was in the ‘new’ kitchen, standing at the sink with my back to the room, I had the most incredible feeling that someone was watching me. I literally spun around, and there she was, looking at me. She was standing in front of the ice box which was only a few feet from where I stood. She started to raise her hand. Her face reflected the startled look of someone taken by surprise. From her dress I felt that this must be Mercy Taylor.

“She wore a pale colored cotton dress, possibly faded pink, with a pattern of small white flowers. It had a plain round collar neckline with gatherers at the waist. She wore no jewelry or any ornamentation. Her day cap came down to her ears and covered most of her dark hair. She appeared to be in her late 30s or early 40s. Then she disappeared.

The Crooked House, 188 Old Main Street, South Yarmouth

The so-called “Crooked House” burned down in 1984. According to John Sears, it was the late Ann Maxtone-Graham, a founder of the Historical Society of Old Yarmouth, who gave the house its name. "She called it the Crooked House," Sears said, "because there wasn't anything straight about it."

Sears, an 11th generation Yarmouth resident and the 6th generation of his family to reside on Old Main Street, said the Crooked House was always the talk of the town, and not just because of its unusual architecture. Everyone knew about the ghost of John Stetson and later reputed hauntings, including window shades that moved up and down by themselves and closed windows that were found open in the morning. The house, built on James Pond in the 1600s and moved to Old Main Street in the 1700s, became an infirmary for the last of the local Indigenous people who were stricken by a smallpox epidemic.

The house eventually became the home of Sears' great-great-grandfather, Barnabas Sears. Barnabas had a daughter who married John Stetson.

Laurence Barber, in his book When South Yarmouth was Quaker Village, chronicles the Dr. John Stetson story:

“Dr. Stetson and his wife lived in the old house at 188 Old Main Street, where Elizabeth’s mother had grown up. When Elizabeth died the house was sold, with the stipulation that Dr. Stetson, then aged 95, should stay there with kitchen privileges. The new owner wanted to use the building as his guest house, so he built a small cottage in back for Dr. Stetson.

“However, Stetson soon died. Several years later a guest in the main house noticed that her dogs were afraid to approach the empty cottage, and asked the maid, newly arrived from Jamaica, what the reason could be.

“The maid told her that the dogs were afraid of the man who lived in the cottage. The owner objected that the cottage was vacant. The maid insisted that a man was living there. She had seen him frequently. She even described the man, to the consternation of the owner, for the description was that of Dr. John Stetson, who had died long before the maid had ever come to Yarmouth.”

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This final story comes from the 1920 diary of Benjamin Hallet, who related his grandfather’s (also named Benjamin) experience with something paranormal in the early 1800s:

“One bright moonlit night, accompanied by a big Newfoundland dog, Benjamin left his home in Barnstable. While walking toward the packet landing he heard footsteps some distance behind him and the dog heard them too as he began to slink closer to Benjamin. He turned but could see no one behind and the footsteps ceased. He went on, the footsteps continuing as before. Suddenly something the size of and white like a sheep rushed past and crashed into a picket fence just beyond, with force enough to smash every picket on the fence. When it rushed past, Benjamin tried to set the dog on it but with a howl of terror the dog put its tail between its legs and crouched on the ground and refused to move. Benjamin ran to the fence but nothing was there and the fence was in no way injured. He insisted for the rest of his life the story was absolutely true.”

Do you have ghost stories from Yarmouth to share? Please comment and tell us!