During a recent ghost hunting expedition in the Wellsburg Aspen Manor Mansion in West Virginia, psychics began to feel ill when entering the basement. Members of the paranormal team wondered what could possibly be so drastically wrong. Soon equipment was brought in, and there seemed to be a concentrated area of energy around one area of wall. Upon closer inspection, the wall actually seemed like it may have been closed up separately from the rest of the wall. The team was shocked when the wall was demolished and out tumbled the bones of an unknown person who had been sawed to pieces before being walled up.
Sheriff Richard Ferguson of Brooke County has not yet confirmed that the skeleton was human, but did confirm that it had been found along with wire framed glasses and a small amount of hair. The mysterious victim had been sawed into smaller pieces, possibly so they would fit more easily in the wall when being hidden. Sheriff Ferguson added there were definitely more questions in this macabre case than answers.
The Brooke County Paranormal Society (BCPS) has done several investigations in various locations with K2 (EMF) meters, psychics, and documenting equipment such as cameras and recording devices.
Psychics remarked that they heard voices coming from the walls saying, “Help me! Help me!” and “I’m trapped in the walls!” Other evidence the group found while on that expedition include Electronic Voice Recordings in which a clicking sound can be heard repeatedly. According to the group, this clicking is similar to the clicking sound heard in many schools employing nuns who would use “clickers” to catch the attention of students and get them to calm down.
The mansion was built in the 1890’s by the son of a wealthy Steel Tycoon, Joseph Vandergrift. The mansion had been a sort of boys’ club, featuring opium, cock fights, gambling, and other forms of entertainment considered too piquant for the rest of the town to know about. No doubt when it was shut down several secrets, the bones included, were left behind. The home was later turned into a youth center before being remodeled and tailored as a bed and breakfast. At least it was about to become a bed and breakfast before this discovery, now it is officially a crime scene. The builder, Vandergrift disappeared one day leaving everything he owned behind.
One thing to note here, is since the bones had to be sent away for analysis, it seems to indicate the skull was never found, or was smashed to fragments. A human skull is easy enough to identify. So where’s the head? It was common in earlier times before forensic science became more advanced, to remove and hide the head of a murder victim to help hide the identity in the event that it was discovered. This would make it more difficult to discover a motive, and essentially make the investigation far more difficult. If this was the case with the Aspen Manor mansion, through deductive reasoning does that help the case that whoever did this may have been a visitor rather than the owner of the house? Of course this is purely speculation.
The bones were sent to the Smithsonian Museum for analysis. If it was discovered to be a human, the murder likely happened long ago making this truly the coldest of cases. Still, the Brooke County Sheriff’s department is commendably taking it very seriously. We’ll be keeping a close eye on this one and letting you know if anything further develops.