Virginia's most haunted places
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Virginians are more likely to encounter a haunted house than any other type of cursed location, according to an index of reader-submitted ghost sightings on the paranormal website The Shadowlands.
Why it matters: It's Halloween and you definitely don't want to end up possessed by a ghost today.
By the numbers: Of the 192 hauntings reported in Virginia between 1994 and 2022, about 69 happened inside a house, mansion or castle (we assume they mean NoVa dwellings for that last one), the data shows.
- Haunted homes were followed closely by 65 ghostly encounters in Virginia forests, swaps, hills or other creepy parts of nature.
Zoom in: Richmond has the second highest number of haunted encounters in Virginia reported to the site, per an Axios review of the terrifying stories, including for:
- ๐ง The Richmond Vampire still entombed at Hollywood Cemetery.
- ๐ป The "friendly" ghost who walks the Governor's Mansion.
- ๐งโโ๏ธ The disembodied bride one can spot on the grounds of Tuckahoe Plantation.
- ๐ฑ The Matoaca High School theater where lights shake and turn on and off and visitors feel a cold chill when they enter.
Zoom out: Williamsburg took the top spot for the most reports of Virginia cities.
- There, long-dead soldiers and circa 18th and 19th-century spirits wander the Peyton Randolph House, The Wren Building and George Wythe House (to name a few), sometimes slamming doors or appearing before strangers.
The bottom line: Ghosts are (maybe) real and we definitely don't want to see them today, or any other day.