I was driving by Gettysburg the other morning at 1:00am or so and saw a very wierd site(really unimportant). It got me thinking about third hand stories I have heard about people seeing ghosts around the battlefield. I posted the Question on a PA website and was very surprised with the responses in just a 24 hour period. The stuff people have seen is amazing ranging from eerie cold air pockets on the battlefield, seeing wounded soldiers, hearing artillary birrages and other battle sounds. The best one was of a woman who took an elevator to the basement of a local hotel. When the door opened she saw a scene of an old war hospital, complete with wounded soldiers crying in pain. Wierd huh

Anyway, Have any of you heard of such things at other battlefields in the world? I bet that there is some wierdness in Hiroshima. Normandy too.

I have really tried, but I am unable to locate anything of value regarding a program I saw once on TV. It was called The Ghost Hunters, I believe, and the entire show was devoted to ghosts of the WWI battlefield Somme in Northern France.

This historian and a shrink toured the site, with the shrink constantly sensing bad karma etc, hearing young men crying in pain, pretty much alike those stories you talk about. Quite bemusing, as I don't personally believe in it, but curiosity kept me hooked.

It's not unusual I guess, that people make up such myths and stories, but they sure maintain people's admiration for those who fought with valor and died on these terrible battlefields.

As I said elsewhere, there is a part of me that can buy the argument that these are not ghosts so much as "impressions" of energy left behind from periods of great stress, emotion, commotion, etc.

A theory, but given humanity's limited understand of energy, form and matter, a useful one.

Hmm, just make sure it's not a local caretaker or sherriff trying to scare people away from a potentially juicy development site ;)

Originally posted by Rodgers
Hmm, just make sure it's not a local caretaker or sherriff trying to scare people away from a potentially juicy development site ;)

:D
Most of the Gettysburg battlefield is a National Park

Nice detective work Thelma ;)

Great reference, Rodgers. Is Scooby-Doo widely known across the Pond?

I remember a story from 30 years ago, a woman in Dieppe France heard first artillery, then the sounds of combat, ect.

All she described, and the times she heard them matched the EXACT times of the ill-fated raid made there in 1942, yet this was in the 1970s!

Several other people heard it also.

"Great reference, Rodgers. Is Scooby-Doo widely known across the Pond?"

Yes - very much so, but I suppose I should stop threadjacking as this is a good subject. Sorry everyone.

Every year around Halloween, there are several tours you can take around the Gettysburg battlefield which highlight certain specific ghost legends. Some you can even take during the middle of the night, for maximum spookiness. I've never been on one of these tours, but some of my friends have and they enjoyed it.

Once an exasperated girl friend, whom I'd dragged to see the battlefield at Mohács in southern Hungary where the Ottomans defeated the Hungarians in 1526, asked me if I expected to see the ghosts of the Hungarians and Turks come rising out of the ground to re-enact the battle for me. I thought for a moment of describing for her the value of walking a battlefield to understand local topography, weather, and to just build a mind-set for understanding the battle, but I just answered, "Yes."

If someone isn't interested in history, there is sometimes little point in describing the attraction to them.

Our relationship didn't last much longer....

I've never heard the voices of the thousands of people who burned to death in the nights of August 1944 close to where I live.

In other words, no, I don't believe in ghosts so why should I believe in any on battlefields? Sure there are stories, there are stories about other kinds of ghosts elsewhere as well. Doesn't make it true.

Lueneburger Heide? I know I can't hear or see ghosts or anything, but I don't see why I should call people who say they can liars. There's no prove that they can, but there isn't any prove that they can't either.

I've never encountered stuff like this myself, but I've heard of people who have. People in the West Sumatra highlands have stories about haunted places where separatists were tortured and killed by Suharto's army.

oh yes, Indonesian stories :) I hear them a lot too, mostly Javan stories. They have an extroardinary range of myths and stories, and exceptional personal experiences.