THE GOVERNOR’S MANSION
Location: The Governor’s Mansion is located on a hill at
Description: The Governor’s Mansion is a white two-story American Federal mansion. Standing at the top of a hill, the front of the house has a portico supported by four Dorian columns. The two front doors open into a grand foyer and double staircase to the upstairs. It has six bedrooms and four bathrooms. The Governor’s office is downstairs where it has a view of the garden. The grounds are patrolled by two Doberman pinschers.
Ghostly Manifestations: The White House in Washington D.C. is quite possibly
the most famous “public” haunted house in the United States, but it is by far
not the only one. Numerous buildings and structures in the nation’s capital
have been reported as domiciles for the spirits of those who have passed on to
the next world and as one continues crisscrossing the country, they would be
likely to find several more. Several of the governors of Connecticut have
noticed that with the responsibility of the state which they have taken on that
they have also accepted the unwarranted attention of a previous incumbent who
for some reason believes his term in office is not yet over with.
“I’ve worked for four governors of the state
for over twenty years.” German-born Gretchen Kraus started working in the
Governor’s Mansion in the early Sixties and eventually became the main
housekeeper. “The story of the ghost of Governor Hardwick has been passed down
for almost a hundred years since his death by the house staff. Usually things
calm down after a few days after he makes his presence known, but back in 1979,
he seemed a bit more agitated.”
Benson DuBois, who later became Junior
Governor, was the only voice of logic and reasoning for much of the strange
goings on, but even he was at a loss for words during some of the strange
shenanigans.
On November 1, 1979, then Governor James
Gatling announced he was going to start plans in building a park dedicated to
former Governor Lionel Delaney. The event must not have set well with the ghost
of Delaney as things started occurring. Things started vanishing and turning up
in odd places. The speech for the park’s inauguration vanished and turned up a
cupboard of the kitchen as a teapot from the kitchen appeared in the hallway
outside the bedroom of the Governor’s daughter, Kathryn Gatling. Inexplicable
power problems also happened as lights sometimes flickered or the household appliances
sometimes just started up under their own power. Marcy Hill, the secretary to
the Governor, typed up a speech once and handed it in to him, but it became
inexplicably replaced from a quote from Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Raven.”
“Once
upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered weak and weary, over many a quaint and
curious volume of forgotten lore…”
While a light
thunderstorm occurred outside, a portrait of Governor Delaney suddenly crashed
to the floor, damaging the picture frame and nearly ripping the picture. A
large heavy ornament on the parlor of the mansion, it weighs almost a hundred
pounds and its sudden weird collapse scared many of the people who were there
as it fell. While no one is quite positive, it is thought a vibration from the
thunder caused it to fall from its bent nail. Kraus never believed that
hypothesis.
“If that was the
case,” She insists. “Why did it wait till then to drop ? Why not at another
time when things weren’t quite so surreal ?”
As Kraus predicted,
eventually things did return to normal, but after Dubois succeeded Gatling as
Governor, he approved a budget to restore and update parts of the mansion.
Hardwick’s ghost once more became restless by walking the halls of the mansion
late at night and by eavesdropping on discussions. Several staff members
recalled a shadow that lurked in doorways and glided down corridors. A press
secretary drinking coffee in the kitchen dropped his coat over the back of a
chair, turned to the counter to get some doughnuts and then turned back to get
his coat as he found the chair now pushed to the far wall without so much of a
sound.
Kathryn Gatling
later returned to the house to lead tours of the house and grounds for
tourists. In March of 1995, she was leading a tour through the parlor as several
people looked up and noticed a man standing on the high staircase to the attic
watching them as they went through the house. They didn’t seem to mind him as
they continued on, but then there in the parlor, they saw him again. He was
identified as Roger Hardwick in a portrait dating back to 1875 !
History:
Designed and built by noted American architect in Charles Bulfinch in 1798, The
Governor’s Mansion was ready for residence in 1801. The hauntings first started
to occur in the 1880s during Governor Lionel Delaney’s tour in office and has reoccurred
with varying lengths of activity since then. Some of the recent hauntings
occurred during the two four year terms of Governor James Delaney (1979-1986) and
his successor, former junior governor Benson DuBois, who became the state’s
first black governor. Dubois served two terms himself ending in 1994.
Identity: The legend behind the ghost is that it is the ghost of former Governor Roger Hardwick who some suspect his death while in office might have had suspicious overtones. Rumor has it he was poisoned by a jealous aide, James Delaney, who wanted his job and maybe even his wife in 1879. His activity in 1979 was attributed to the fact that he was upset about a park about to be dedicated to Delaney. Rather than open an ugly investigation that could embarrass the current Delaney family, DuBois recommended to Gatling that the park be named Governor’s Park to credit all the men and their donations to the job and state. The hauntings died down after the inauguration of the park.
Comments: Benson, Episode “Ghost Story,” Hauntings loosely based on Bradmar in