Castle Inn B&B Investigation

Location: Garden District, New Orleans, Louisiana

Date: Thursday, November 7, 2002 and Friday, November 8, 2002

Moon Phase: Half

Solar Weather: unknown

Investigators present: Hillary M., Shonda A., Robert H., Paul M.

Equipment: Olympus C-3000 digital camera, Kodak DC280 digital camera, RCA digital voice recorder, Sony digital video camera with Nightshot, Pentax PC-550 35mm camera, Extech EMF meter, Olympus 2000 Digital Voice Recorder, Sony Digital-8 Handycam, Extech IR thermometer, Sony Hi-8 Cam
Olympus C-4000 Digital Camera, Trifield EMF meter

History: This building was built in 1891, but other than that, not much is known about it. The owner, Karen, bought it in 1998 from an elderly couple who claimed to know nothing of any ghosts.
At least two ghosts are believed to visit this bed and breakfast. The first one is the ghost of a former paid servant. He has been seen on the third floor by at least one employee, and on the front porch late at night by passers-by. The second ghost is believed to be that of a little girl who died in a pond on the plantation that formerly sat on the property. The plantation lands were later divided to build the lavish houses of the Garden District. This little girl is believed to roam the area, visiting many houses, looking for her mother.
  Several guests have experienced strange occurrences in the house, and a journal is kept to document them. The experiences range from actual sightings, to feelings of being touched, to objects moving on their own. For more information on the ghostly experiences had at the Castle Inn, or if you would like to check it out for yourself, visit their website at http://www.castleinnofneworleans.com/.

Investigation: Robert arrived at the Castle Inn first, around 7p.m., and was immediately given a tour of the house, and shown to his room, #11. While on the tour, he noticed that the ceiling fan in the room next to him, room #10, was off. After the tour, he went down to get his luggage. When he got back up to the third floor, the ceiling fan in room #10 was on. Wanting to help the dust settle before we began investigating, he went into the room and turned the fan off.
  Paul and I arrived at the Castle Inn around 8 p.m. We checked in and had a look around. We were told that only a few of the rooms were occupied that night, so we pretty much had the run of the place. We then left to pick Shonda up from the airport, and get something to eat. When we got back from dinner, Shonda went up to her room (#10) to change. A few minutes later, Robert and I went into room #10, since the door was open, and Shonda was in the smaller adjoining room. Robert and I noticed that the ceiling fan was on, so we turned it off, reaching up to make sure it stopped, and left the room. A few minutes after we left, Shonda, who was still in the adjoining room, began to hear a loud ticking. She immediately thought it was odd, since she hadn't heard it before, and wondered if there was a clock in the room that she, somehow, had not noticed. She came out to the main room, and noticed that the ceiling fan was on, and the chain was hitting against the light fixture, making the ticking noise. About that time, Robert and I returned to the room. We looked at the fan, looked at each other, then asked Shonda if she had turned it back on. She stated that she didn't, and actually thought that we had turned it on the last time we were in the room, since she only heard the ticking sound after we left. We then compared notes, and realized that the fan had apparently turned itself on three times that night. We turned it off again, and it remained off for the rest of the night.
  We began our investigation at about 12:30. I set up my infrared video camera on the second floor landing, and we headed to the Marie LeVeau room for an EVP session. About ten minutes into the recording session, I felt something brush against my shoulder. I immediately thought that it was my camera strap (which was around my neck), slipping down, but when I reached up, I found that the strap was taut around my neck, and was nowhere even close to where I felt something touch me. We did get some stationary orb pictures, but nothing spectacular. At this point, I was actually beginning to think that maybe there wasn't much activity here after all. Boy, was I wrong! The night was just beginning!
At 1:20 a.m., we decided to move into another room. There is a long hallway between the Marie LeVeau room and the third floor landing. I led the way, with Shonda second and Robert pulling up the rear. As Shonda was passing through the doorway to the landing, I heard her let out a surprised "OH!" She spun around and asked Robert, who was a few steps behind her, if he had just touched her hair. We both asked what happened. She said that she very distinctively felt someone "flip her hair" as she passed through the doorway.
  Next, we decided to head to what is known to be the most haunted room, room #11. This is the room in which the employee saw the apparition of a servant standing by the window. We sat down and began our EVP session at 1:25 a.m. About two minutes later, both Shonda and I began to get pictures of moving orbs over the bed! We also took several successive pictures tracking orbs moving around the room. At 1:30, we began to hear a strange noise in the bathroom, but later determined it was only faint noises from the plumbing. We did obtain one EVP during this session.
  At 1:45, we set out some cards, carefully arranged, on the table in room #11 and moved into room #10, which actually has two rooms. Shonda sat on the large bed in the main room, I sat on the couch in the smaller room, and Robert sat on the floor between us, outside the bathroom (Paul had already retired to his room by then). Shonda started getting moving orb pictures after only a couple of minutes. At 1:59, her camera began to take pictures by itself. Her fingers were nowhere near the button, but the camera still took three consecutive pictures within about a minute, of its own volition. At 2:02, Shonda finally turned off her camera, yet the light on it continued to blink as if it were turned on. When she turned her camera back on, she tracked an orb moving around the room in several consecutive pictures. At 2:06, I got the one and only orb picture I obtained from my vantage point…a bright orb hovering in the apex of the ceiling in the small room. About two minutes later, Robert felt cold around the area of his knees. Three and a half minutes later, Shonda felt something touching her hair. This went on for about thirty seconds, till she finally asked that we turn the lights back on and end the session.
  From there, we decided to spread out in the stairway. During this time, we had Shonda's infrared video camera running in room #10, and mine running on the second floor landing. A few minutes into the session, Shonda turned to face the doorway of her room, and saw the red light on her video camera (which was facing the hallway) turn off. She went into the room to investigate, but found no reason for the camera to shut off (she had plenty of tape, and it was plugged into the wall, so batteries were not an issue). She turned the camera back on and we continued the session. During this time, we did not get any EVPs, but we did get some good pictures, including one moving orb on the second floor landing.
  By now, it was about 3 a.m., and we wanted to head down to the living room to see if there was any activity there. First, we stopped in Robert's room, and noticed that the cards on the table had been moved slightly, with the corner of one card overlapping the one next to it. We fixed the cards and went downstairs. We were getting pretty tired by this time, and had been sitting around talking for about ten minutes when we heard a loud crashing from the kitchen, which is behind a closed door, at the back of the living room. It sounded like a utensil drawer being slammed shut, with the utensils rattling inside. I immediately took a picture toward the kitchen, and got an orb in the doorway!
  We were just about ready to finally go to bed, but wanted to check out the area in front of the house first. We stood outside chatting and taking pictures for about fifteen minutes. It wasn't until later that I found I had taken a picture of an orb moving down the front steps! We didn't try an EVP session, because we didn't want to wake the neighbors. Eventually we decided that the camera flash might wake the neighbors as well, so we headed to bed for the morning.
  Before Robert went to bed, he put a battery pack snug against the bathroom door, to see if it would move during the night. This door has been reported to often swing open of it's own accord. Unfortunately, when he woke the next morning, he found that the door had not moved at all.

  The next night, around 8:15 p.m., Robert had to run an errand, so Paul and I retired to our room to take a nap in preparation for another night of investigating. Shonda turned out the lights and curled up on the couch in room #11 to do the same. She was just drifting off to sleep when she heard rather loud footsteps between the bed and the wall. Then the footsteps began moving toward her. She quickly sat up, looked in the direction that the steps were coming from (but saw nothing) and said "stop it!". The noises abruptly ended.
  At around 10p.m., we were sitting in Room #11 chatting. Robert had to run into the city, and Paul, who was lying on the bed, had to go back to the Marie LeVeau room to get something, leaving Shonda and I alone in the room. About five minutes after they left, Shonda and I were in the middle of a conversation when I saw something move out of the corner of my eye. I turned to look at the bed, and saw a pillow flip long end over long end right off the bed! The pillow turned almost a full 360 degrees in the process. Shonda and I just stared, with our mouths hanging open, not quite believing what we just saw. We then got up and tried to position the pillows to see if we could purposely make them flip in the same manner, but were unable.
  When Robert and Paul returned, we told them about the pillow episode. They tried to recreate the situation, but were also unable. We then sat down in room #11 for an EVP session. We did get a few orbs, but the room did not seem nearly as active as the night before. At about 11:20 p.m., we decided to go down to the living room.
  When we reached the living room, we found another couple of ghosthunters, so we asked if we could join them. They told us they had heard some loud noises in the kitchen before we came downstairs, and we told them about the noise we had heard the night before. About twenty minutes later, as we were sitting around talking, we heard the loud crashing noise similar to what we heard the previous night. We took this as a good sign, so Robert set up his video camera in the enclosed porch area, and we all sat down for an EVP session. The three of us spent some time tracking a couple of orbs moving around the room. Almost four minutes into the recording, both Shonda's and Robert's camera's started giving them problems. As they were stating this, I got the faint voice of a little girl on the recording. Being that there were only three grown men, and three grown women anywhere in the vicinity, the little girl's voice jumped out at me.
  At 11:47, Robert moved into the unfinished bedroom and bathroom off the living room. He called Shonda into the room to ask her if she felt uncomfortable. Immediately upon entering the bathroom, he got the overwhelming feeling that something did not want him in there. When Shonda walked back into the bedroom from the bathroom, she took a picture and got a moving orb over the bed. We remained downstairs for about another twenty minutes, before retiring. Since we had stayed up most of the night the night before, we ready for a good night's sleep.

Conclusion: I think I can speak for the whole group when I say that this is definitely one of the most active places we have ever investigated. We experienced inanimate objects moving by themselves, a fan repeatedly being turned on after we turned it off, strange touches, several strange noises, eerie feelings, and cameras turning off by themselves. We obtained almost forty pictures of moving orbs and at least one EVP. We still have several hours of video to review. I believe that there may be more than two spirits here, but of course, we have no way to know for sure. If there are only two entities, then they are extremely active. If you are looking for a charming place to stay in New Orleans, and would love to have a ghostly experience or two, then this is definitely the place for you.
  Although room #11 is rumored to be the most active, we found room #10 to be even more so. We also found quite a bit of activity downstairs in the living room and kitchen, as well as the area outside in front of the building. Several people have reported seeing apparitions in the stairway and hallways, but I can't help but wonder if this is due to the many suits of armor tucked into the corners there. I know that they gave me a bit of a scare several times.
  For all you ghosthunters out there, the owner and manager of the Inn will welcome you. They were extremely hospitable, and look forward to having their hauntings documented. If you do decide to visit the lovely Castle Inn B&B in the Garden District of New Orleans, tell them PRSNA sent you. And try to stay up as late as you can…you're sure to get a show!

We would like to thank the owner and management of the Castle Inn for their incredible hospitality!

Submitted by Hillary Murdoch