Forest Hill Cemetery, Madison, WI
I was in Madison, Wisconsin to research the graveyard in April of 2013. I also visited Rome Corners Intermediate, Prairie View Elementary and Netherwood Knoll Elementary schools in Oregon, Wisconsin while I was there. Thank you so much Chris Antonuzzo and Mark Lee for your kindness and extra help!
When Madison, Wisconsin began to grow and flourish during and the Civil War, local village cemetery, Orton Park proved too small to accommodate all of the people dying to get in. So local politicians bought a 140 acre plot of park-like land and created the Forest Hill Cemetery in 1857. Some say the cemetery is ripe with ghostly activity.
Why would such a peaceful final resting place be haunted? There are several possible reasons, according to local paranormal investigators. First, many of the bodies buried at Forest Hill were moved from smaller neighborhood graveyards to their new resting place, without their permission. Many of their identities were lost in the transfer. Consider these three possible examples:
· Norwegian (Unknown – March 16, 1860. Unmarked. A three-foot tall dwarf, died “while in liquor.”
· Colburn, Lydia (February 27, 1764 - March 10, 1852), unmarked. Lydia was a native of Ingersol, Canada West, and attended the Congregational Church. Her date of birth is the oldest in Forest Hill.
·
Klines, Hans (1828 - February 8, 1858), unmarked. Klines, a German, died in jail while confined for stealing timber.
A large boulder was installed by the Women’s Relief Corp in 1891 as a memorial to the unknown dead. But it didn’t quiet the ghostly energy. In fact, it gave the restless spirits a focal point, according to local experts.
A second possible reason for paranormal activity is the fact that 140 Confederate soldiers who died as prisoners of war at Madison’s Camp Randall are buried at Forest Hill – not far from the bodies of 240 Union soldiers. Could it the Civil War soldiers object to being buried so close to their enemies?
Third possible cause for ghostly activity, the highest point of the Forest Hill Cemetery was allegedly once a sacred burial ground for Wisconsin’s Native Americans. Noble warriors were said to be laid to rest in a goose-shaped mound on the southeast side of the cemetery.
Factor in decades of more traditional deaths from old age, car wrecks, disease, natural disasters and even brutal winter weather, and haunting doesn’t seem so a far-fetched. But when I toured the massive graveyard, admiring all the old, worn grave markers, and the unmarked graves alike, I didn’t experience even a flicker of paranormal activity.
Guess the ghosts weren’t restless the day I came to call.
I was in Madison, Wisconsin to research the graveyard in April of 2013. I also visited Rome Corners Intermediate, Prairie View Elementary and Netherwood Knoll Elementary schools in Oregon, Wisconsin while I was there. Thank you so much Chris Antonuzzo and Mark Lee for your kindness and extra help!
When Madison, Wisconsin began to grow and flourish during and the Civil War, local village cemetery, Orton Park proved too small to accommodate all of the people dying to get in. So local politicians bought a 140 acre plot of park-like land and created the Forest Hill Cemetery in 1857. Some say the cemetery is ripe with ghostly activity.
Why would such a peaceful final resting place be haunted? There are several possible reasons, according to local paranormal investigators. First, many of the bodies buried at Forest Hill were moved from smaller neighborhood graveyards to their new resting place, without their permission. Many of their identities were lost in the transfer. Consider these three possible examples:
· Norwegian (Unknown – March 16, 1860. Unmarked. A three-foot tall dwarf, died “while in liquor.”
· Colburn, Lydia (February 27, 1764 - March 10, 1852), unmarked. Lydia was a native of Ingersol, Canada West, and attended the Congregational Church. Her date of birth is the oldest in Forest Hill.
·
Klines, Hans (1828 - February 8, 1858), unmarked. Klines, a German, died in jail while confined for stealing timber.
A large boulder was installed by the Women’s Relief Corp in 1891 as a memorial to the unknown dead. But it didn’t quiet the ghostly energy. In fact, it gave the restless spirits a focal point, according to local experts.
A second possible reason for paranormal activity is the fact that 140 Confederate soldiers who died as prisoners of war at Madison’s Camp Randall are buried at Forest Hill – not far from the bodies of 240 Union soldiers. Could it the Civil War soldiers object to being buried so close to their enemies?
Third possible cause for ghostly activity, the highest point of the Forest Hill Cemetery was allegedly once a sacred burial ground for Wisconsin’s Native Americans. Noble warriors were said to be laid to rest in a goose-shaped mound on the southeast side of the cemetery.
Factor in decades of more traditional deaths from old age, car wrecks, disease, natural disasters and even brutal winter weather, and haunting doesn’t seem so a far-fetched. But when I toured the massive graveyard, admiring all the old, worn grave markers, and the unmarked graves alike, I didn’t experience even a flicker of paranormal activity.
Guess the ghosts weren’t restless the day I came to call.