Harper Family

The year was 1970, seven years after the death of Mrs. Hudson, when the first family moved into the old Hudson home. It was the beginning of summer and a man by the name of Philip Harper bought the house for his wife and thirteen-year-old son. They had a small family, but Philip felt the need to expand the home. There was an abundance of land, so he thought he should build extra rooms for his wife and son.

Bad idea.

The noise and disturbance is thought to have provoked the ghost of Mrs. Hudson. While exploring the attic of the house one day, I found a journal in a box full of old, dusty books. The journal was written by Denny Harper, the son. I learned exactly what happened the summer of '70. Written below, Denny Harper tells his story through journal entries.

June 3rd

"We just moved into our new home, and Dad has already started renovating. He's building a new office, a sun room, and most importantly a library. I can hardly wait for him to complete it! My favorite thing to do, next to writing, is reading. The house should be finished by the end of the month, but for now I'm going to go explore the new house and all the land."

June 15th

They've almost finished building my library. I love our new home, but this addition will top it all off. Lately I've been fishing and swimming in the lake and exploring the land on my bicycle. I'd rather spend my days outside because I've had a strange feeling inside the house lately. I feel as if someone is watching me all the time. Maybe I'm just paranoid being in a new place. Our last house was in a big neighborhood, and this house is very secluded.

July 2nd

As I was trying to fall asleep last night, I couldn't help but feel that someone was watching me again. When I was lying in my bed, I could feel a breeze rushing past me when my eyes were closed. No windows were open, and I couldn't figure out what it was. It was too dark to see anything, and I was scared to even walk across the room to turn on the lights. Tonight I'm going to keep my flashlight close. Hopefully I can figure out what's going on.

July 3rd

Last night I went to bed rather early. I made sure to bring my flashlight like I planned. Again, like the night before, I felt something moving around me. I turned my flashlight on, and I witnessed a lady dressed in a nightgown seemingly floating continuously back and forth between my room and down the hallway. Why was she gliding so gracefully? And how did she get in our home?

"Mother!" I shrieked. She ran into my room and asked, "What is it, darling? Are you alright?" When I pointed to the woman, Mother's face became so pale that I thought she might faint. The woman was in a gown, and now her face was more visible which revealed a bloody, gunshot-wounded head. She looked very angry and turned towards us when she shouted, "Leave immediately! Get out of my house!

Her house? We've been living here for a month now. That's when I made the connection. She was a ghost! Dad heard all the commotion and started to make his way to my bedroom. When he was walking down the hallway, the ghost knocked him over and screamed, "Look what you did. You ruined everything. Leave my house before I kill you!"

Mom and I rushed over to help him. The ghost had seemingly disappeared for the moment, but we didn't waste any more time being there.

July 4th

This is the last time I'll ever be in this house. I'm packing my stuff up, but we won't be here long. We stayed in a motel last night, and we're leaving in a couple of hours. We're going to stay with Grandma until we find a new home. Mom and Dad won't talk about anything that happened. I wonder if they noticed anything before like I did, but when I mention anything I get in trouble. I'm glad we got out of there before something worse happened.

Present Day

Denny must've left his journal here on his final day. I wonder if that was on purpose or by accident. I've been able to figure out which rooms of the house were added on. The original house has an older framework and older trimmings, so the new rooms look slightly different. From what I can tell so far, I think the ghost haunts people in the original rooms. Denny's room, the only bedroom connected to the hallway, was where the first haunting took place. I live in Denny's old room, so that explains my experience. She must dislike the additions for some reason, and it seems to me that it's because she thinks the house is still owned by her. It's time to dig deeper and get stories from the other families.

Bibliography: W. Henderson, Notes on the Folk-Lore of the Northern Counties of England and the Borders, p. 336

Story Source: Sacred Texts

Author's Note: In the original story a family moves into a haunted home. When the father decides to add on to the home, it angers the ghost in the house. He begins to haunt the family in different ways and eventually they realize it's because of the house addition. The goal is to "lay the ghost" in order for it to stop haunting them. It takes many men to make this possible and in the end the ghost is taken care of and never haunts them again. In my story, I chose to not get rid of the ghost, Mrs, Hudson, because the next few stories will involve her. This is only the beginning of the adventures of the first family to move in since Mrs. Hudson's death. In the original, it doesn't say how many children there are, but in my version there is only one son. I also wrote from the perspective of the son, Denny, through journal entries that he wrote about his experience in the home. I chose to write from his perspective because it's a firsthand account and it makes the story seem more credible. Towards the end, I wrote from the original narrator's perspective to reveal what she has discovered from the journal entries.

Ghost of Mrs. Hudson

Source: Maxpixel