Third Time's A Charm at Powhatan

Location: Powhatan Courthouse and Jail; Powhatan State Park, AR

Date: September 7, 2012

On a dark and very stormy Friday night, all six members of our team headed up to Powhatan Courthouse for a third investigation. On previous trips we had experienced various types of activity from EVPs in the jail to something turning a flashlight on and off in the courtroom and even activating the voices for one of the museum’s many displays. With plenty of energy in the air from the night’s storms, we hoped to experience similar activity and maybe uncover some of the mysteries surrounding the reported deaths in the area, including a man who hung himself after trying to kill his wife and a woman who died after killing her infant.

Things in the courthouse were fairly slow on this trip. While on previous trips we had very good luck communicating with someone using flashlights, that trick didn’t seem to interest the spirits this time. We did have a couple of interesting results there, however. Early on in the night, Mitch was taking pictures in the courtroom but didn’t seem to be getting any interesting results. My mom commented that whatever was in the room should step in front of the camera so Mitch could see it. In his next couple of photos after that, strange white streaks were very apparent. These were not shaped like typical orbs, but more like something caught in motion.

The moving orbs caught in the courtroom.

Towards the end of our investigation, my parents were in the courtroom and my dad was jokingly acting out a court seen, doing voices for a judge and defendant. At some point during his scenario, our audio recorder picked up four quick taps in the background that sounded like a gavel hitting judge’s bench.

While the courtroom wasn’t very active throughout the night, the jail proved a little more interesting. When my dad, Mitch, and Samantha first went down to the jail, the K2 meter indicated there were high energy levels present. This energy seemed to follow Samantha around for a few minutes and then dissipated. After a few minutes, Mitch and Samantha returned to the courthouse and I took their place in the jail with my dad. We spent about an hour sitting on the floor of the jail attempting to communicate with someone using the K2 meter and a flashlight. On several occasions both pieces of equipment were activated, but we could not get any solid responses to our questions. What was most interesting about these occurrences is that we had two audio recorders going at the time, one lying on the floor a few feet from the K2 and flashlight and one across the room on a bench. Whenever enough energy approached us to turn on the flashlight or register on the K2, strong electrical interference can be heard on the nearest audio recorder, but the never happened to the recorder that was across the room from us.

Orbs in the jail.

We had two other interesting audio pieces from the jail as well. One EVP was caught only seconds after I entered the jail. While my dad was telling me that he felt like something had just briefly touched his hand, across the room the audio recorder Mitch had left on a bench picked up the name “Emily” in a very plain, but whispered tone. Although we cannot trace this name directly to any of the suspected spirits at the park, one of the park employees told us that the wife of the hanged man had been named Mary E. Mosby. 

The second EVP we caught in the jail was less direct. Throughout the night my dad tried to get responses by singing or whistling. Towards the end of the night he gave  one last attempt at whistling a song but lost his breath and let the tune die off. After he stopped whistling, very faintly the audio recorder picked up two short whistles from another unknown source.

Even though the weather was nasty and activity seemed pretty slow compared to our first two visits at Powhatan, this trip proved worthwhile in the end. The historic courthouse and jail once again provided us with some intriguing evidence and left us hoping to return again someday to try to find out more about Miss Emily.

Hayley.

Below is a short video of the flashlight coming on in the jail, followed by our EVPs from the night.