The Ghost of the Old Catholic Cemetery

by Allan Pinkerton

It would be a surprise to the general public if the records of all my offices could be thrown open for inspection, so that it might be observed what a wide range has been covered in investigations which I have been called upon to undertake—the mysteries to unravel, or crimes to prevent or unearth. It must not be supposed that the services of my agencies are wholly devoted to criminal matters. Some of the most important legal contests of the times have been decided in accordance with the irresistible array of evidence which a small army of my men have quietly, keenly, and patiently secured; while the operation of immense business interests, like banking, insurance, and railway matters, have often been interrupted by seemingly inextricable confusion and complexity, which threatened great loss, until my services were asked; and by my thorough and complete system, through which almost general and instant communication and information can be secured, I have been enabled to bring order out of chaos, and prevent what might have otherwise resulted in commercial ruin to my patrons. As the individual detective’s notice must be brought to everything great and small upon any investigation he may be conducting, so is it true that the principal of a large system of detective agencies must be so situated that he may consider and receive every possible variety of business—always expecting that which is disreputable—and then have means at his command to carry each case, may it be great or insignificant, to a successful issue.

In the pursuit of these cases there is frequently both tragedy and pathos; they are always full of deep and fascinating interest to myself and my operatives, and quite frequently they bring to the surface all phases of ridiculous humor, which I frequently enjoy to the greatest possible degree.

In the summer of 1857 there was located, along the shore of Lake Michigan, within the limits of the city of Chicago, a high, narrow, sandy strip of land, then occupied as a cemetary, known as the “Old Catholic Burying Ground,” or the “Old French Cemetery,” from the fact that within it reposed the remains of hundreds who had died in the Catholic faith, as well as large numbers of the early French settlers and their half-breed progeny.

Quaint inscriptions and devices were there seen, and everywhere upon the great cenotaph or monument, or upon the most modest of graves, the cross, in every manner of design, somber with black paint or bright with fanciful colors, or still white in chiseled marble, could be found.

The old cemetery has since been removed; and where once stood, in silence and mournfulness, the city of the dead, now are seen splendid mansions of the rich, with magnificent gardens and conservatories, or, in that portion which has been absorbed by Chicago’s beautiful Lincoln Park, handsome drives, fine fountains, exquisite lawn or copse; and over all the old-time somberness has come an air of opulence, beauty, and healthful diversion. Scarcely could a greater change anywhere be noted than from the former solemnity and desolation to the present elegance and artistic winsomeness.

In the time of which I write Chicago was much younger than now. Twenty years have made the then little city the present great metropolis. All the great enterprises which now distinguish the city were then in their infancy. Particularly were all institutions of learning having a hard struggle to creep along; and the medical schools, then just started, were put to every possible shift for the funds necessary to an existence; and there being often no legal provision for securing “subjects” for dissections, the few students pursuing their course of study were compelled to secure these essential aids to their work by grave-robbery, that greatest and most horrible desecration imaginable.

The old French cemetery being situated less than a mile and a half from the river—which then as now was called nearly the geographical center of the city—the temptation to steal newly-buried bodies from so convenient a locality proved irresistible, and the city was soon startled by a succession of grave-robberies which excited general indignation and alarm. Coupled with this indignity to the dead and the friends of the dead, some malicious persons had entered the cemetery and wantonly desecrated graves from which subjects had not been taken.

Some held that this had been caused through religious ill-feeling, others that it was the result of pure mischief on the part of such persons as had been concerned in other impudent and graceless grave-robberies; but the result of it all was that so much public wrangling and excitement occurred that a committee of prominent gentlemen, including some of the city officials, called upon me, and desired me to take such measures as would cause a cessation of the outrages, and bring to punishment whoever might be found to have been the perpetrators of the same.

While such was the result of the operation, it is only my purpose here to relate a single incident of the many interesting ones which transpired, and one which, while it illustrates the ridiculous length of absurdity to which an inherent superstition and a hearty fear will lead their possessor, I can never recall without almost uncontrollable laughter.

My plan of operations was as follows:

I detailed eight men from my force, under the charge of Timothy Webster, one of the most faithful men ever in my service—who, it will be remembered, was executed at Richmond as a Federal spy during the late civil war. These were stationed that every entrance to the cemetery should be guarded, as well as all the new-made graves thoroughly watched. As no word could be spoken lest it might frighten away any culprit before he could be captured, I found it absolutely necessary to devise some simple, though silent and effective means of communication. To effect this I decided upon using several sets of heavy chalk-lines, such as are generally used by carpenters in laying out work. The ends of each line were attached to small stakes driven into the ground about three feet apart. The operatives’ station was between these stakes; and, in order that every man should be forced to not only remain at his post, but remain continually awake and vigilant, I required the line to be gently pulled three times, beginning with a certain post, and extending rapidly, according to a pre-arranged plan, and the same signal repeated after a lapse of about one minute, in reverse order. This was the general signal that everything was as it should be, and nothing new had transpired. This was repeated every fifteen minutes, so that by no possibility could any dereliction of duty pass undetected.

Aside from this, the system of signals comprised means of communicating the presence of any outside party, at whatever point the intruder should make his appearance, and such other necessary information as would lead to a silent, swift, and certain capture of any person who might, for any cause whatever, enter the cemetery.

I had detailed men for this work whom I felt I could rely upon. Simple as it may seem to one who has never had such an experience, remaining all night in a grave yard, with every nerve and faculty on the constant qui vive of expectation, is not soon pleasant work as it may be supposed; and though the novelty of the affair, coupled with all manner of outlandish jokes upon the situation, kept up an interest which lasted a few nights, I began to notice signs among a few of my men indicating that the solemnity and dread of the situation were taking place of its original romance.

Coupled with this, there were among these eight, as there always are among any like body of men the world over, a few who, like myself, began to notice these indications of weakness on the part of the more susceptible among them. These braver fellows immediately commenced, with solemn tones and long faces, to relate hobgoblin tales of ghosts and materialized spirits which came from their silent resting places for unearthly strolls among them. Although I put a stop to this as much as possible, what had already been done had had its desired effect, and a few of the watchers showed well-defined evidences of genuine fear, and to such an extent that I was finally compelled to relieve some men, and fill their places with others.

Among the cemetery detail was one young fellow named O’Grady, a genuine son of the Emerald Isle, who had come to me almost direct from Ireland, and who, though he had been in my service but a few months, had shown native traits such as gave promise of improvement and advancement. He was the very life and soul of the detective rooms, and the wonderful tales he related of himself, his ready wit, his true bravery in all places wherever he had been previously used, and his quick generosity toward his fellows, had given him an exalted place among them.

I saw that O’Grady was weakening.

He tried hard not to show it. He endeavored to look bright and spirited, but it was all up-hill work. He began to get thin on this grave-yard duty. It was very reflective work. From eight to ten hours utterly alone, and surrounded by everything which could fill one’s mind with fear and dread, had its effect. His natural superstition suddenly developed into an abnormal and unnatural dread, which to the ignorant fellow seemed to become almost overwhelming. Had he not been such a hero in his own eyes, I am certain that I could not but have relented; but, under the circumstances, I confess that I heartily enjoyed his forlorn appearance as he dejectedly left the Agency to take up his all-night’s vigil, which undoubtedly soon became a genuine terror to him.

Having carried the matter so far, the spirit of innocent mischief and practical joking, which has always been strong within me, as many of my personal friends long ago discovered, prompted me still further.

I determined to play ghost for one night, show O’Grady a genuine goblin, and put his often-told tales of personal bravery to a practical test.

Accordingly, giving out at the Agency that I should be absent at a neighboring town for the night, before sun-down I secured a private conveyance which took me to a point along the lake shore, about a mile beyond the old Catholic Cemetery; and then, before the time for the detail to go on duty came, disguised all that was necessary to prevent recognition by any chance stroller, I hastily returned to the cemetery through the heavy copse of scrub-oak and willow that then lined the shore at that point, and, entering the place unobserved just as the twilight began to gather heavily, secreted myself within a heavy clump of arbor vitæ ornamenting a family lot, not over twenty feet from the point where I had previously learned that O’Grady was stationed each night.

I had no time to spare, for I had thus hardly become one of the cemetery watchers before, one by one, and all in stealth, the men began coming in from every direction, but so secretly and carefully that they might have been mistaken, by one not informed of their purpose, for ghosts or grave-robbers themselves, while Timothy Webster noiselessly sped from point to point, stretching the line which held the men silently to their work.

I could have touched the fellow as he passed me. In fact, an almost irresistible desire seized me to play Puck as he sped by, and trip him among the damp, dark weeds.

Pretty soon O’Grady came to his station, groaning and muttering.

As soon as the dark came down upon the old cemetery I left my hiding-place and got in line with the tell-tale string.

O’Grady was busy saying his prayers, and of course did not hear me rustling about in the long grass.

My first impulse was to grab a cross from some old-time grave, and toss it, over the stones, in upon him; but by some great effort I suppressed this, and soon found myself sitting in a hollow between two mounds, with my hand upon the line.

“One, two, three!”—jerk, jerk, jerk, went the line: the first signal was being given.

My hand touched the line as lightly and yet as knowingly as the telegraph operator’s fingers touch his well-known instrument; but I made no sign of my presence.

O’Grady answered the signal loyally; but scarcely was his duty done in this respect before he began a sort of low, crooning wail, half like a mother’s lullaby, half like a “keen” at a wake.

“Why did I lave ye, ye green ould sod? Why did I lave ye, ye dear old bogs? Why did I lave ye, ye blue-eyed swateheart” Feule I am that I came to the divil’s ould boy, Phinkerton! Feule I am that I sit here by the blissed crosses av the dead, waitin’ for the ghouls to rob! Och, murther! Happy I’ll be if the whole blissed place is tuk away!”

“One, two, three!”—jerk, jerk, jerk, came the signal again, while O’Grady answered, as I could feel, with an impatient response.

After this, for a time, the brave Irish guardsman weaved back and forth upon the grave where he was sitting; when suddenly, to my horror, he lighted his pipe and began smoking.

I knew the man had become desperate in his loneliness, and had arrived at a point of feeling where he was utterly regardless of the success of the operation; and if I had felt sure of this when he recklessly lighted his dudheen, I could not but realize it to my sorrow when, in the glow of his roaring pipe, I could see that he followed his solace of tobacco by a more substantial quieter of superstition and fear from a black bottle, which the bold O’Grady had conveniently set, after each passage to his lips, upon the base of the monument above the grave where he was sitting.

I was indignant, and yet interested. I felt lie dragging the brave O’Grady from his comfortable quarters to give him a good drubbing for his utter carelessness of the interests of the operation, and I am certain that in my then state of mind I would have done so if my desire to nearly scare the life out of him had not been uppermost.

Outside of the fussing and wailing of the O’Grady, there were no other but unpleasant surroundings in the old Catholic Cemetery. Now and then the ghostly hoot of the owl sounded weirdly from the surrounding treetops. From the low copses beyond came the mournful cry of the whip-poor-will. And down along the silvery beach of the shore, which gleamed and darkened as the new moon appeared, or was obscured for a time behind the darkening clouds, floated up and over the dreary place the sad and ghostly beating of the waves upon the beach.

It was a lonesome place, and it began to occur to me that I would not care to pass many nights in such a manner myself; but, under the circumstances, I saw that Mr. O’Grady had fixed himself about as comfortably as it well could be done. Every time the signal was given, Mr. O’Grady would respond, when he would immediately recollect that his good bottle stood idle beside him. After a little he seemed to become so lonesome and dejected that he began a sort of conversation, in a low tone, with himself, in which he compelled the bottle, by proxy, to join, all after the following fashion:

“An’ it’s a big feule ye are, O’Grady. If it were not for meself that’s thakin’ pity on yez, ye’d be dead enthirely.”

“Ah, faith!” Mr. O’Grady would reply, with a sigh, “thrue for ye, thrue for ye! If I ever get out of this divel’s own schrape, ould Phinkerton’ll never get me in the loikes again!”

“So ye say! so ye say, O’Grady; but yer always and foriver resolvin’, and ye come to nothin’ in the ind!”

“Don't be worryin’ and accusin me, me dear boy. This schrape wid the graves will be me last. By the rock of Cashel! phat's that?”

This last exclamation from Mr. O’Grady, which was in a tone of great alarm, was caused by my displacing a small foot-stone, which fell from the elevation of the graded mound with a sharp crash upon the graveled walk below.

I had got my sheet well adjusted, and had intended moving upon the scared Irishman at one rush; but his terribly frightened manner and the unfortunate falling of the footstone caused me to change my plan and decide to bring on the climax in a gradual accumulation of horrors. So I gave a well-defined moan, and watched for the results.

Mr. O’Grady listened for a moment, as if hoping that he had been deceived; but I could see in the faint light, to which my eyes had become accustomed, that he was trembling violently. He applied his bottle to his lips, and its mouth rattled against his teeth as he did so.

Another prolonged and blood-curdling moan came from the cluster of arbor vitæ. This caused Mr. O’Grady to industriously begin crossing himself, and at the same time mutter some prayers as rapidly as his half-drunken lips could dole them out.

I saw that this should not be too far prolonged, for the poor coward might give the danger signal, which would at once bring a half-dozen stalwart fellows upon us; and so, while in his abject fear he was pleading with all the saints in the calendar for protection, I suddenly rose in my ghostly attire and in a moment was upon him, waving my arms and gesticulating very savagely for any sort of ghost that was ever manufactured but never uttering a word.

“Holy mother of Moses!” yelled O’Grady, springing wildly into the air, and turning a complete back somersaut over the base of an uncompleted monument while I sprang after him.

“Murther! Help! Murther!” howled O’ Grady, recovering and bounding like a deer over four graves at a leap; while I could see, as I flew after him, that my operatives were hastening to the rescue.

I could not help but know that grave consequences might follow my unusual action; but a wild, boyish, and uncontrollable desire to pursue the flying O’Grady suddenly possessed me, and for the first time overcame all other motives.

And so away we went together!

Mounds, headstones, clumps of evergreens, newly-dug graves, wheelbarrows, and grave-diggers’ litters were cleared as though we two were fox-hounds at a chase. Some sort of instinct for safety seemed to direct the wild O’Grady toward the western boundary of the cemetery; and away he went howling and yelling at every jump, but increasing his speed at every terrified glimpse of the relentless ghost behind him.

Over the fence he went at a bound, cursing and praying at every gasp. I was younger then a score of years, hardy and agile, and I now saw a two-fold reason for keeping pretty well upon the heels of O’Grady. My operatives were in full pursuit, and “Halt, halt, halt!” was heard on every side; and so, making a running jump of it, although my ghostly toggery impeded me somewhat, I managed to get over the fence with quite as much grace and agility as the wild Irishman in advance. It was well that I did so, for at that moment I could see the flash of several pistols lighting the sky behind, and instantly after heard the whispering of several bullets within dangerous proximity to my person. Over the fence scrambled my men in hot pursuit, but swift on the wings of terror and fear sped the horrified O’Grady; and never for an instant relinquishing what were certainly unusual exertions on my own part, I sped on wildly after him.

We soon outdistanced my operatives so much that I could see, as I ran, that they were compelled to give up the chase and return defeated; but the witless O’Grady and his vengeful ghosts swept on and on. That part of the city, then containing but a few scattered residences, was soon passed, and O’Grady and the ghost continued the trial of speed out across the open prairie, still to the northwest. This was traversed in the most remarkable time ever made, O’Grady still yelling and cursing and praying, but the ghost, ever silent and relentless, not far behind; when suddenly we came to the north branch of the Chicago River, then hardly more than a creek, into which, with a wild cry of despair, the Irishman plunged, swimming and scrambling to the other side just as I had reached the shore, where I gave another spurt to his speed by an unearthly yell, which seemed to send the man on still faster, if it could be possible; and the last I heard of O’Grady he was tearing and bounding through the hazel brush like a mad bull beyond.

So far as I know, O’Grady is still running.

He has never been heard of by me or any of my many employees. Though I advertised for him repeatedly, no answer ever came; and if any one of my readers, whose eyes may chance to fall upon this sketch, can prove that he is the veritable O’Grady, he can have the small amount of salary still standing to his credit on my books, which has so far been wholly unclaimed.

After a hearty laugh on the shore of the North Branch, I cast my ghostly attire upon the prairie, and, utterly tired and exhausted, plodding back, through the darkness, to the city, taking lodgings at an out-of-the-way hotel for the balance of the night, and was ready for business as usual at my office in the morning.

Never were there seven more perplexed men than those who reported the mystery of the night previous at the Old Catholic Cemetery.

O’Grady was gone—that was certain. His cries for help had been heard. His wild flight, pursued by a veritable ghost, which could be vouched for by those who had attempted its capture, was related. There, at the mound of the uncompleted monument, were found a nearly empty whiskey-bottle and a still smoldering pipe. But this was all that was known by the honest fellows, or will be known, until this sketch is given to the public, of the Ghost of the Old Catholic Cemetery.