A Short Message From the Author

A word about plagiarism—plagiarism is the

intentional copying of another person’s work and

misrepresenting it as your own. I have been both

plagiarized and accused of plagiarism during my

years of writing. But I have never intentionally copied

anyone else’s writing and misrepresented it as my

own. I always cite my sources.

As I was researching the Hartford Castle, I

discovered that Troy Taylor had lifted his account in

Haunted Illinois almost word for word from an article

in the Lewis & Clark Journal. It would have been so

easy to simply quote or cite the article, but instead

Taylor chose to misrepresent the work as his own,

changing a few words here and there hoping that no

one would ever notice.

Well, I noticed, and time and time again I have

seen that same kind of nonsense repeated throughout

the business of ghost lore publishing. Why on earth

none of these writers would simply give credit to the

people who came before them, I will never

understand. Does doing so diminish your own

reputation? Hardly.

Please, stop the madness! You are grown

adults and should know better. Stop the copy-and-

paste jobs. We would all be better off in the long run if

we simply acknowledged each other’s work. g

Your Letters

I just have to say your stuff is really great. I

first saw your videos on youtube then went on your

site and have been siting at my computer for hours

now just reading haha best of luck!

—Your friend, Sean

I grew up near Cuba Rd, and when I was in 7th

grade (1977) a friend of mine found a dead body while

riding her horse down Cuba Rd. strangled with piano

wire. I didn't realize it's become such a "ghost hunter"

location. There's a secret graveyard in the area, but I

won't say where because it will get over run.

—Youtube user “xandxigns”

If you are a fan of the Legends and Lore of Illinois, we want to

hear from you! Please e-mail your letters to:

thefallen2@gmail.com.

http://www.myspace.com/legendsandloreofillinois

Contents From the Author 1 Your Letters 1 A Quick and Dirty Guide 2 The Fallen Investigate 3 Book Review 6 Ghostly Games 7 Trivia 7

Page 1

An old gazebo sits in the overgrown woods.

A Quick and Dirty Guide to

Hartford Castle

“Hartford Castle” is the colloquial name for a

mansion that formerly stood on a tract of land just

outside of Hartford, Illinois, across the river from St.

Louis. The mansion’s actual name was Lakeview, but

few besides the original owner referred to it as such.

The original owner was a French immigrant named

Benjamin Biszant, who built the imposing home for his

bride, an Englishwoman whose name has apparently

been lost to history.

Sparing no expense (which was certainly an

impressive dollar amount in 1897), Biszant

surrounded Lakeview with sprawling gardens,

statuary, romantic gazebos, and, finally, a moat to

keep out trespassers. According to Louie Haines, a

neighbor who recalled helping to dig the moat with

his father, the Frenchman stocked it with goldfish that

interbred with local crappie, producing what he

described as “unusual looking fish” (Lewis & Clark

Journal 25 March 1973).

Eventually, Biszant’s wife died and, perhaps,

the pain was too much for him to remain at Lakeview.

He sold the mansion and moved west. A number of

owners and tenants occupied the mansion until 1923

when a husband and wife from nearby Wood River

purchased the property. They lived there until 1964,

when the wife became a widow and decided to move

to less lonely surroundings.

During that time, according to Bill Matheus of

the Lewis & Clark Journal, local residents treated the

property as if it were their own. Visitors frequently

roamed the grounds and even invited themselves

inside the mansion for tours! The mansion

deteriorated during the late 1960s, and in 1971 and

1972 vandals ran wild.

“Unknown persons… ripped mantels from the

walls, crushed chandeliers, pulled supports from

staircases, and took small sized telephone poles and

used them to ram holes in the many rooms of the once

beautiful ‘castle,’” Matheus wrote. The building was

officially condemned, and a few months later, in 1973,

it burnt to the ground.

At least one ghost story came out of Lakeview

during the time of its original ownership. According

to the Lewis & Clark Journal, the story started when a

burglar entered the mansion and was scared away by

the clinking of bamboo window curtains. Benjamin

Biszant himself claimed that was how the rumors of a

ghost began. Troy Taylor, in what seems to be his

only original contribution to the legend, asserted that

the ghost of the Frenchman’s wife has been seen on the

property (Haunted Illinois (2004), pg. 121-122).

Today, the Hartford Castle is nothing more

than a hole in the ground, surrounded by concrete

debris and a shallow moat. All of the gilded

ornaments are long gone, and the beautiful gardens

are no more. Soon, all that will remain are the

memories of this once legendary spot. g

Page 2

Ruins of the former mansion litter the 35 acre property.

A concrete pillar lays discarded.

The Fallen

Investigation File 023

Leaves crunched beneath the feet of The Fallen

as they trudged through the dense woods, while the

rush of cars from the nearby highway partially

obscured the sound of their movement. At long last,

the quartet emerged into a clearing where the

underbrush disappeared. Casey the Coydog panted

excitedly and sniffed the ground.

Mike, Greg, Aurelia, and Emmer stood and

faced what looked like a nondescript swamp, but

what, in reality, was a wide moat that ringed an island

that could only be seen from the air. Somewhere on

that island were the ruins of an old mansion.

“It’s too bad Davin isn’t here to see this,”

Emmer said, “and maybe that girl Emily too, I guess.”

“No it isn’t,” Greg shot back. “That—“

“That’s enough,” Mike said, interrupting his

friend. “We have more important things to worry

about right now, like how we’re going to get across

this moat.”

“Isn’t there a way around?” Emmer asked.

Mike scanned the area. For as far as his eyes

could see, the water hugged the trunks of the trees. In

some places, downed branches seemed to offer a ford,

but it was doubtful whether any would hold a

person’s weight.

Casey the Coydog barked and began to trot

along the shoreline away from The Fallen and toward

the sounds of traffic.

“Where’s she going?” Greg wondered aloud.

“Stupid mutt,” Mike grumbled. “She’s going

to get hit by a car is what’s going to happen.”

“Forget about it,” Emmer said. “How are we

going to get across all this water?”

“We could build a bridge,” Greg suggested.

“Look at all these branches lying around. Mike,

remember when we got stuck out in those woods and

built a shelter out of whatever we could find? This is

pretty much the same.”

“We don’t have time for that,” Mike snapped.

“This whole place is low ground—and flooded. It

would take hours to get across. Crowley’s ass!”

“Oh, for Pete’s sake,” Aurelia sighed. She

shoved past Mike and Emmer and trudged straight

into the water. Her boots sunk into the mud at the

bottom of the moat, but the water was not deep

enough to poor over the calf-high rim of her footwear.

“That’s fine for you,” Emmer laughed, “but

what about us?” Mike, Greg, and Emmer were all

wearing hiking shoes.

Greg shrugged. “For once I agree with Aura,”

he said. “It’s the easiest way.” Without skipping a

beat, he joined Aurelia in the moat and made his way

to the dry land a few yards away.

Exchanging glances, Mike and Emmer

cautiously

Page 3

A former pool or pond—long exposed to the elements.

cautiously entered the freezing water.

After a few minutes, the four found themselves

on the opposite shore, feet soaked, but otherwise in

one piece.

“Since I’m probably going to get pneumonia,

explain to me what was so damn important about

coming here, and it better not have anything to do

with imaginary beings, drunk high school kids, or this

stupid portal obsession of yours,” Emmer spat.

“Man, Emmer is really being a wet blanket,”

Greg quipped, but the group ignored him.

Mike rolled his eyes. “It does have to do with

the astral portal,” he said. “We know a guy from

France built this mansion, right? Supposedly for his

English bride, who apparently never had a name?

That is suspicious in and of itself, but why did he

build the mansion right here? And where did his vast

fortune come from? Why did he leave suddenly?”

“Maybe he was just a really private guy,”

Emmer said. “He left because his wife died and he got

lonely. Why is everything a conspiracy with you?”

“Because sometimes it is a conspiracy,” Mike

countered. “And in this case, I’m convinced that this

guy came here from Europe looking for the astral gate.

And I think he actually found it. And I think it’s

nearby and he hid its location somewhere on this

property. I think he tried to open the gate and it

destroyed his life—cursing this property in the

process.”

“Why do we want to find this thing again?”

Greg interjected.

Emmer ignored him. “What evidence do you

have

have to back up this nonsense?” he demanded.

“I’ll know it when I see it,” Mike said.

Emmer threw up his hands, but joined the

group as they trekked toward the center of the triangle

of land that made up the grounds of the former

mansion. Suddenly, the quartet heard barking coming

from somewhere off to their right. They broke into a

run, dodging branches and underbrush, until they

caught a glimpse of a group of five adults dressed in

white suits standing off in the distance near an old,

crumbling gazebo.

“Damn it, I thought we got rid of those guys!”

Mike exclaimed. In fact, the sharply-dressed Bible-

beaters hadn’t been seen in months.

“What are they doing here?” Emmer asked

rhetorically. “Shouldn’t they be in Haiti converting

the dark and swarthy heathens or something?”

“I know what they’re doing here,” Mike said.

“They’re here for the same reason we are. I told you

there was something to this!”

“Just because several people believe a delusion,

doesn’t make it any less delusional,” his friend shot

back.

As they closed the distance between them, The

Fallen saw that Casey the Coydog had somehow

circumvented the moat. Her mangy coat was bone

dry, and she barked and growled at the dapper

interlopers.

“Looks like you got here just in time!” the

middle-aged, brown haired woman at the center of the

group laughed as The Fallen came within ten yards.

Page 4

KISS fans have also visited the ruins...

More concrete debris.

She scrutinized them, noticing that they were soaking

wet from the knee down. “What happened to you?

Didn’t you know there’s a path from the highway to

right where we’re standing?”

“Shut up!” Aurelia growled. “What are you

doing here?”

The woman laughed again. “Hypocrites! You

claim the right to go wherever you want, but you

won’t extend that same right to us?”

“We’re not assholes,” Mike retorted. “What

have you found?”

“What do you mean?” the woman asked,

feigning innocence. “There’s something here to find?”

“You know what I’m talking about,” Mike

snapped.

The brown haired lady waved her hand and a

balding, rotund man pushed a crumbling, stained

book into her fingers. His hand bore a ring with a six-

pointed star embossed on its surface. “Oh, you mean

this?” she teased. “The journal that contains the

directions to the astral gate, how to open it, and the

ultimate secret to unlocking the world for our divine

mission?”

“Yeah, that,” Greg said.

“Give it to us!” Aurelia screamed and

brandished her fists threateningly.

As the middle aged woman shook her head,

two of the men behind her pulled small pistols out of

their pockets and pointed them at The Fallen. “I

assure you that unlike those idiot Devil-worshippers,

these guns are quite real,” the woman said. “I detest

violence, of course, but even Yahweh was vengeful

when He felt it necessary.”

For a moment, Aurelia looked as though she

was ready to test the fundamentalist’s resolve, but

Mike firmly took her by the arm and began backing

away. “We never pick fights we can’t win,” Mike

whispered. “Trust me, it’s better this way.”

“If you only realized how ridiculous all of you

look,” Emmer interjected with a quick chuckle. “Don’t

even get me started.”

The Bible-beaters threw him an angry glance,

but slowly withdrew down the overgrown path,

journal in hand.

Aurelia waited until they were out of sight

before she swore and struck at the air, while Greg

whistled for Casey the Coydog and embraced her

whe.

when she trotted over by his side.

“Good dog,” he whispered. “You did your

best.” He then turned and addressed the group.

“Well, that’s that, isn’t it? All this work for nothing.

Congratulations.”

Mike rolled his eyes. “Not quite,” he said.

“I’m not a complete moron. I thought there was a

chance that they would get here before we did,

especially since they seem to be working with those

Satanists somehow.”

“That still doesn’t make any sense to me,” Greg

said. “Why would they help each other? They have

exactly the opposite agenda.”

“It’s too bad neither heaven nor hell actually

exist,” Emmer interrupted.

“Whatever,” Mike snapped. “The important

thing now is that we stop them from opening that

gate. Luckily for us, I think I figured out where it is

without even looking at the Frenchman’s journal. But

we have to act quickly.”

To be continued…

Page 5

A narrow sidewalk or foundation rings the former

location of the mansion itself.

Book Review How have apparitions of the dead appeared in

Western culture over the centuries? How has that

appearance changed? Why has that appearance

changed? These were the questions Ronald C.

Finucane tackled in his book Ghosts: Appearances of the

Dead and Cultural Formation, and the answers he found

may surprise you.

Most academics would probably dismiss a

study like this, since the supernatural is not a “serious

subject,” or at least, not one to be taken seriously. But

as Finucane explained, “Even though ghosts or

apparitions may exist only in the minds of their

percipients, the fact of that existence is a social and

historical reality: the phenomena represent man’s

inner universe just as his art and poetry do (1).”

Beginning in the Classical Era of Greece and

Rome and ending in the twentieth century, Finucane

carefully dissected the cultural phenomenon of ghosts.

Not surprisingly, he found that ghosts have changed

over the millennia. Their appearance, their purpose,

and their mode of communication with the living have

all undergone important transformations.

For instance, in ancient Greece, the spirits of

the dead were seen as passive and fleeting. Only in

the Classical Era did they emerge from the

underworld to torment the living. In the later Middle

Ages, ghosts were everywhere—walking among the

living like any other member of society. The danse

macabre portrayed death as a daily companion and the

ultimate social equalizer. In the early modern world,

ghosts appeared as disembodied limbs to interfere in

the daily life of their living relatives. And, finally, in

our time, they have taken on a more vaporous and

indifferent quality.

Contrary to an earlier period, the author noted

that in the Victorian era ghosts seemed to have no

purpose whatsoever. “Most Victorian ghosts were

perceived as having nothing to say about buried

treasure, murders, revenge, legacies, and most

participants evidently felt no need to provide a

resolution to this puzzle,” he wrote (212).

One point with which I find myself in

disagreement is the author’s contention that ghosts

haven’t changed very much since Victorian times. He

insisted that contemporary ghosts are also

purposeless, remote, and usually of anonymous

origins. Nothing could be further from the truth, in

my opinion.

Crisis apparitions, in which family members

are seen shortly before or after their deaths, are among

the most common ghost sightings today. Further-

more, ghosts are often said to return to “ease the

anxiety of a loved one” or to remind the viewers of a

tragic incident. Those two examples might be

different from a ghost pointing out buried treasure,

but they are purposes none the less.

The idea that the appearance of the dead is tied

to human cultural experience is an important one. For

instance, it just might answer the question of why

ghosts wear clothes, or why ghosts used to be

burdened by chains but are no longer. Most

importantly, it suggests that ghosts are more a part of

the human experience than we generally assume.

Ghosts have been with us since the most

ancient of times, and cultural archeology shows us

that they are an fundamental part of our inner world.

Ronald C. Finucane, a professor of medieval history at

Oakland University in Rochester, Minnesota, has

written a wonderful book that I think everyone

interested in ghosts should read. g

R.C.

Finucane,

Ghosts:

Appearances

of the Dead &

Cultural

Transformati

on. Non-

Fiction.

ISBN-10: 1-

57392-068-1.

(Amherst:

Prometheus

Books,

1996.)

Page 6

Ghostly Games

This section is designed to put fun back into the

paranormal. Most of these ideas will have nothing to do

with poking around with an EMF detector and thinking

you’ve detected a ghost when you’re really just standing

under a power line.

Game #11: Cabinet of Curiosity

Ingredients

3-5 friends.

1 stop watch.

1 fake skull.

A cluttered closet.

Instructions

Before the game starts, players should make

sure that the closet is cluttered but not so much that it

makes movement impossible. Also, remove any

potentially hazardous items.

One player should hide the skull somewhere in

the closet (within view—the game should be difficult

but not impossible). Make sure that the other players

do not see where the skull was placed.

Taking turns, each player is allowed 1 minute

to find the skull with the closet door closed. The

player who finds the skull gets to hide the skull in the

next round.

Play continues until everyone has found the

skull at least once. Good luck! g

Trivia

Tough questions will be asked in this section. It is up to

you to uncover the clues and determine the solutions.

Sometimes you will find the answers buried in the current

issue; other times you will need to go to the location itself.

The answers to this month’s questions will be posted in next

month’s issue.

1. In what year did the Hartford Castle burn

down?

2. The original owner of the mansion came from

which European country?

3. What was the proper name given to the

Hartford Castle?

4. Off of which road can the property be

accessed?

5. When seen from the air, what shape (roughly)

is the moat surrounding the property?

6. In what year was the Hartford Castle built?

7. According to Trent Brandon’s Book of Ghosts,

what type of ghost would the original owner’s

bride be?

Go out and explore, and good luck!

Answers to last month’s questions:

1. 10 Miles. 2. Hugh Bowles. 3. A White Oak. 4. A Platt Map.

5. 200 E. 6. Abraham Lincoln. 7. Two.

Page 7

Part of the fabled moat.

The ruins of the bridge over the moat.