A new movie is about to be released shortly, about Sarah Winchester, and the house she built and continued to build, after the death of her husband, the owner of the Winchester Repeating Arms Company.
The Winchester House (justalittered reviewed - wordpress.com)
This is one sad story.
It revolves around tragedy.
Family tragedy .
And the awful consequences of soul crushing guilt for having been involved in creating a a weapon used to kill people.
It involves a curse placed on that family by the souls of the dead that came seeking vengeance.
William and Sarah Winchester ( photo: mindshadow)
William and Sarah married at the height of the Civil War in America in 1862 and four years later, in 1866, Sarah gave birth to a daughter which she named Annie.
The child contracted an infant disease known as marasmus and only lived just over a week.
Sarah was so overcome by anguish that she retreated within her own mind and away from the public and became a recluse for many years afterwards.
(photo:digital alcohol)
It took her almost 10 years to recover and when she finally returned to public life another tragedy struck the family.
Sarah's husband, William, who was now heir to the Winchester fortune was struck down with pulmonary tuberculosis and died.
Sarah received 20 million dollars upon his death, an unimaginable sum of money for a woman to own, and was earning around $1000 a day from the Winchester Repeating Arms Company. ( Back in those days that money was not taxable - until 1913)
Sarah became one of the wealthiest women in the world.
This woman was literally loaded! (Excuse the pun)
But, as is true in all cases, wealth does not solve deep despair.
It just distracts from it.
Sarah continued to grieve the loss of both her only child and her husband until a friend suggested she go see a spiritualist who, during a seance, told her that her husband was close to her and he had a message.
Through the medium William told Sarah that there was a curse on the family. This curse had taken the life of both her baby and husband because of the rifle that had already killed so many thousands of people and would kill so many thousands more in the years to come.
The medium finished by telling Sarah that her turn would be coming soon.
The ghosts of the dead were now coming for her.
The spirits wanted their payment - they wanted the Winchester family to suffer.
Sarah was told that she needed to seek out a new life and to build a house, a house that would never be completed, for as long as Sarah kept adding to it she would stay alive. If she stopped, she would die.
(Photo: inside the magic)
Sarah found a house under construction in the Santa Clara Valley and for the next 36 years continued to add to, reconstructing and deconstructing parts of the house she would call 'home'.
By 1906 the house was 7 stories tall with over 100 rooms plus staircases that went no where, a maze of corridors and all things crazy.
But then the earthquake struck and the house was severely damaged.
This just created more opportunity for the house to continue to expand.
Workers continued to create more additions to the house until 1922 when, one night Sarah went to bed and did not wake, having died at the age of 83 sometime in the wee hours of the morning.
By the time the house was finished it was estimated that the Winchester house had around 160 rooms. It was later featured on Ripley's Believe it or Not and slowly gathered a reputation for being haunted by Sarah Winchester.
Over the years workers and staff talked about the strange going's on and also seeing Sarah's apparition haunting the myriad or rooms in the house.
I excited anticipate the movie in February starring Helen Mirren as Sarah Winchester.
It is such a weird story.
A sad and crazy woman who tried to quieten the voices in her head and sooth her despair and anguish by creating a house that has now established a life and persona of its own.
The Winchester rifle (photo: The Truth about Guns)
The house is now just as famous as the Winchester rifle and Sarah has been lost to history as a mad woman who had too much money and time and indulged herself in her imaginary world of being haunted by the thousands of spirits that were waiting to seek vengeance for their deaths at the hands of the family legacy.
Will you be watching the movie?
I sure will.
And now you know the story behind the famously haunted Winchester House.
Some information researched with the help of the prairieghosts.com website.
This is one sad story.
It revolves around tragedy.
Family tragedy .
And the awful consequences of soul crushing guilt for having been involved in creating a a weapon used to kill people.
It involves a curse placed on that family by the souls of the dead that came seeking vengeance.
William and Sarah married at the height of the Civil War in America in 1862 and four years later, in 1866, Sarah gave birth to a daughter which she named Annie.
The child contracted an infant disease known as marasmus and only lived just over a week.
Sarah was so overcome by anguish that she retreated within her own mind and away from the public and became a recluse for many years afterwards.
It took her almost 10 years to recover and when she finally returned to public life another tragedy struck the family.
Sarah's husband, William, who was now heir to the Winchester fortune was struck down with pulmonary tuberculosis and died.
Sarah received 20 million dollars upon his death, an unimaginable sum of money for a woman to own, and was earning around $1000 a day from the Winchester Repeating Arms Company. ( Back in those days that money was not taxable - until 1913)
Sarah became one of the wealthiest women in the world.
This woman was literally loaded! (Excuse the pun)
But, as is true in all cases, wealth does not solve deep despair.
It just distracts from it.
Sarah continued to grieve the loss of both her only child and her husband until a friend suggested she go see a spiritualist who, during a seance, told her that her husband was close to her and he had a message.
Through the medium William told Sarah that there was a curse on the family. This curse had taken the life of both her baby and husband because of the rifle that had already killed so many thousands of people and would kill so many thousands more in the years to come.
The medium finished by telling Sarah that her turn would be coming soon.
The ghosts of the dead were now coming for her.
The spirits wanted their payment - they wanted the Winchester family to suffer.
Sarah was told that she needed to seek out a new life and to build a house, a house that would never be completed, for as long as Sarah kept adding to it she would stay alive. If she stopped, she would die.
Sarah found a house under construction in the Santa Clara Valley and for the next 36 years continued to add to, reconstructing and deconstructing parts of the house she would call 'home'.
By 1906 the house was 7 stories tall with over 100 rooms plus staircases that went no where, a maze of corridors and all things crazy.
But then the earthquake struck and the house was severely damaged.
This just created more opportunity for the house to continue to expand.
Workers continued to create more additions to the house until 1922 when, one night Sarah went to bed and did not wake, having died at the age of 83 sometime in the wee hours of the morning.
By the time the house was finished it was estimated that the Winchester house had around 160 rooms. It was later featured on Ripley's Believe it or Not and slowly gathered a reputation for being haunted by Sarah Winchester.
Over the years workers and staff talked about the strange going's on and also seeing Sarah's apparition haunting the myriad or rooms in the house.
I excited anticipate the movie in February starring Helen Mirren as Sarah Winchester.
It is such a weird story.
A sad and crazy woman who tried to quieten the voices in her head and sooth her despair and anguish by creating a house that has now established a life and persona of its own.
The house is now just as famous as the Winchester rifle and Sarah has been lost to history as a mad woman who had too much money and time and indulged herself in her imaginary world of being haunted by the thousands of spirits that were waiting to seek vengeance for their deaths at the hands of the family legacy.
Will you be watching the movie?
I sure will.
And now you know the story behind the famously haunted Winchester House.
Some information researched with the help of the prairieghosts.com website.
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