The Haunting of the Bennefield House

 Gaddistown, Georgia is a small settlement in Union County, not far from the town of Suches.  Still considered rural, it was a specifically agrarian area during the mid-twentieth century, with many farms, a church, and a combination general store and post office.

     A man named Warren Bennefield (last name changed) owned a great deal of property in and around Gaddistown, including several rental houses.  He was the proprietor of the general store, and he served as postmaster as well.  He was considered a prominent member of the community; and given his real estate holdings, his general store, and his job with the post office, he was generally wealthier (and more influential) than most of Gaddistown’s citizens.

     By all accounts, Bennefield’s wife was a beautiful woman, and he kept her in a style to which many women aspired.  He seemed to dote upon her and provide for her anything within his ability for which she asked.  Still, Mrs. Bennefield was an unsettled woman; and it seemed that her husband’s love and affections were not enough to satiate her romantic desires. Because of this, Mrs. Bennefield took a lover relatively younger than her spouse, and she would secretly meet the gentleman (under the guise of a leisurely stroll or some other innocuous excuse) at one of the Bennefields’ rental houses that was not occupied.

     At first, this arrangement worked excellently, with the adulterous couple discreetly hidden within the confines of the rental house, and Warren Bennefield tied to activities at the general store and post office.  As male pride would have it, however, Mrs. Bennefield’s young lover began to boast to his buddies of his amorous conquest; and little by little, word-of-mouth brought the story to Warren Bennefield’s ears.

     Enraged, Bennefield confronted his wife concerning her infidelity.  She easily succumbed to her husband’s wrath and admitted her lack of faithfulness to their union.  In turn, Bennefield threatened the woman until she also informed him of her next scheduled rendezvous with her love interest.  He then informed her that it would not be her who met the man at the rental house, but that he would take it upon himself to meet the lad and set him straight on the matter of the couple’s indiscretions.  He then promised her a divorce, which in those days could ruin a woman in several ways, if she attempted to warn her young lover.

     It was only Warren Bennefield’s intention to startle the young man and make firm an end to the affair by waiting for him at the rental house.  When a verbal argument began between the two men in the yard of the house, however, the younger declared his love for Mrs. Bennefield and insisted that he would not end the affair but would, instead, ensure an end to Bennefield’s marriage and take Mrs. Bennefield for his own wife.

     The verbal exchange escalated to a physical altercation, and in the midst of passion, Bennefield pulled from a leather sheath on his side a large hunting knife and slashed through his opponent’s throat, almost decapitating him.

     As no mountain jury of twelve white heterosexual men would find a peer guilty of murder for attempting to protect his marriage, and as the physical altercation and subsequent killing occurred in a moment of heated exchange, it was decided that Warren Bennefield’s actions could be deemed “justifiable homicide,” and he was acquitted of any charges.

     A few years later, my grandfather, Clifford Petty, rented, from Warren Bennefield, the house that was the scene of the murder.  Living there with my grandfather was my grandmother, my father, Paul; his siblings, Kenneth and Mary; and my grandfather’s sister Geneva Tinsley, and her son J.M.

     The house was a large two-story dwelling with a verandah that encircled the lower level, a picket fence that bordered the front yard, and a rock walkway that led to the fence’s gate.  Inside the front doors, a large hallway ran the width of the house, both upstairs and downstairs, with two rooms on either side of the hallway on both levels and a staircase ascending to the second level just inside the downstairs entrance.

     Of these rooms, my grandfather’s sister Geneva took one of the backside downstairs rooms as her bedroom.  The room was spacious and had its own door that led onto the verandah.

     After having lived in the house for a couple of weeks, the entire family was taken off guard when late one evening just after dusk, they heard footsteps coming up the rock walkway to the front gate.  The footsteps paused, and they then heard the front gate clearly squeak open, followed by a continuation of footsteps onto the veranda.

     Thinking the unexpected visitor would then knock at the front doors, everyone was surprised as the footsteps traversed the veranda to the backside of the house, and three distinct knocks sounded on the door to Geneva’s bedroom.  Cautiously, she and my grandfather approached the door and asked who was there.  After a few moments with lack of an answering voice and no further sounds of footsteps, my grandfather opened the door to find no one.

     Perplexing as this first incident was, the same scenario began to recur at regular intervals, always with no one at Geneva’s bedroom door.

     The local midwife was a woman known as Granny Wheeler, and not only did she deliver babies, but she also dealt in mountain medicine and spiritual matters.  Thus, the family decided to consult her.

     Granny Wheeler informed the family that the visitor was likely a spirit in search of someone who no longer lived in the house.  She instructed Geneva that the next time the incident occurred, she should read a particular verse from the Holy Bible and then say to the visitor, “The person you’re looking for is no longer here.”

     The family returned home with full faith in Granny Wheeler’s advice.

     A few nights later, the spectral visitor returned, knocking insistently at Geneva’s bedroom door.  In response, Geneva opened the Bible to the chapter and verse Granny Wheeler had prescribed and read it aloud.  She then said firmly, “The person you’re looking for is no longer here.”

     With that, the haunting of Warren Bennefield’s rental house was over and my father’s family was never bothered by the ghostly visitor again.

      Instead, most likely having been Mrs. Bennefield’s young lover, he continued his search elsewhere for the woman who had loved him so.

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