No one can say life isn’t interesting. Good or bad interesting, that’s a totally different story, but interesting nonetheless. The same can be said about the cemetery featured in today’s post: Little Mount.
Little Mount Cemetery
This is a tale that began over a month ago when we purchased a book about southern Indiana hauntings from our local Barnes & Noble because it actually included things in our new home area. Having noticed a serious lack of information about cemeteries/hauntings in this state (oh, Ohio, we love you now) and especially this area, we eagerly snapped it up. If it weren’t in the car or we had better memories, I could even tell you the name! Either way, reading through it over the course of the next couple weeks we finally came to a story about “Cemetery X” and a supposedly haunted gravestone of a Civil War soldier. The author listed several other things that she and her group believed they experienced, and after reading we were more than a little curious. Searches for “Cemetery X” quickly revealed that we were in fact correct in assuming that was a fake name. With a little, very non-descrip information, we spent over an hour searching before correctly guessing the name on a blurry photo of a gravestone in the book.
James R. Mannan
Even once we had that, it was still more searching to actually find the soldier since his name is not in the findagrave.com listings. But never fail, you’re future librarians prevailed and we stumbled upon information about James R. Mannan (whose last name, I would note, was misspelled in the only caption offering specific information). It turns out he was a private who died while at Camp Hughes, a Civil War training camp near Gosport, Indiana. He entered the service Oct. 8, 1861, and died Feb. 10, 1862, of Pneumonia, just days before the company shipped out.
But this isn’t even where the story ends! Nope. After our triumphant hour of research at 1 a.m., we were really excited to go but had class and then I was heading home to Ohio for my birthday. When I got back, we had more projects due so we finally decided to go Oct. 14. Well, something didn’t want us going because I had the most random run in with a jar of salsa at our local WalMart and cut my foot, so it pretty instantly killed any plans for the next two weeks. Finally last Thursday I was up and able enough for us to hit up this spot on our way to Indianapolis to take in the awesomeness that was RiffTrax Live: House on Haunted Hill.
It was well worth the wait too! While nothing paranormal took place (not that we were expecting anything…), it was pretty cool and out of the way. Some stones were in remarkable condition, but others were broken in half or knocked over. There was a lot of plant growth, and I can only imagine what it would look like in the summer when everything is full. Many stones had vines on them, which looked beautiful, but were a sad reminder of how little care the grounds receive.
If you’re ever in the Owen County area, I would encourage you to check it out. If you take 475 N/E out of Gosport, you’ll encounter the cemetery about two months north of the town on the west side of the road. The roads back there can be tricky to navigate, but the cemetery is obvious. There is another burial ground in the area (it seems to share a name), but the larger of the two is the one we visited. Also make sure to check out our photo page for all the photos from our trip!
January 4, 2011 at 10:48 pm
Wow! Quite something as a seeker after things spooky to find a legend apparently attached to someone with my very own name (ok my middle initial is D–my family hails from the Morgan/Owen county area so undoubtably James R and I are distantly related.) We will have to check Little Mount Cemetery out in our Spooky travels!
November 8, 2011 at 9:15 am
I am doing a project for my school and I am doing mine on Paranormal investigating. who would I need to talk to to be able to get permission to investigate this cemetery?
January 16, 2012 at 2:27 pm
According to my fellow Headstoner, in Ohio, paranormal investigatory groups contact the sheriff’s office and the township trustees (as the trustees are usually the ones who are in control of the cemetery in the first place). I recommend starting with finding out who owns the cemetery–the township, the county, etc.–and asking them for permission. Then, once you have permission, contact the sheriff’s office to make sure that they know you’re allowed to be there.
Kat Klockow’s Haunted Hoosier Halls Indiana University describes her experiences with some paranormal investigators in this cemetery. Also in her front material she describes a number of Indiana teams, including Indiana Ghost Trackers (www.indianaghosts.org), the Shadows of Indiana (www.shadowsofindiana.com), and some other groups. If you contact one of these groups, you’d be able to find out from them what their typical procedure is. Some groups do not get permission at all, and sneak into cemeteries after hours, which is something I recommend avoiding because it can lead to a lot of unnecessary trouble.
Speaking of unnecessary trouble, I also do not personally recommend getting involved in this kind of stuff. Cemeteries are cool, and exploring them and investigating their history is a fun hobby that leads to many intriguing finds. However, paranormal investigating is something else entirely. At the risk of spurring controversy, I’ll state straight up that people, once dead, do not come back to communicate with anyone, let alone random strangers late at night in cemeteries. The entities who make contact with paranormal investigators are malevolent and the realm is a dangerous one to get caught up in.
PS, I’m really sorry neither I nor my fellow ‘stoner were able to get back to you in a more timely fashion. This last year was just a tough one for working on the blog. Do keep reading!