Abraham Lincoln is still in the White House in Washington, but he is
far from alive and well. For the President who led the United States
out of the bitter Civil War, only to be assassinated by a fanatic in April
1865, now haunts the corridors of power of a ghost. American leaders and other
celebrated visitors all claim to have seen him or felt his presence over the
last 100 years.
Sir Winston Churchill, Britain’s war time Prime Minister,
did not enjoy sleeping in Lincoln’s old bedroom, and frequently moved to
another room across the hall during the night. Queen Wilhemina of the Netherlands is said to have fainted after
answering a knock on the RoseRoom door to find Lincoln standing outside. And President
Theodore Roosevelt once said, I see Lincoln
shamble homely, with his sad, strong, deeply-furrowed face in different rooms
and halls.”
It was in 1934, during the presidency of Franklin
Roosevelt, that Lincoln
made his most dramatic appearance. Mary Eben, one of the White House staff,
entered a bedroom on the second floor to find the figure in an old fashioned
black coat sitting on the bed and pulling a pair of boots. She stared, stunned,
at the man for several seconds before he vanished.
More than 40 years earlier, another White House aide made a
public appeal to Lincoln’s
ghost to leave him alone. John Kenny was personal bodyguard to President
Benjamin Harrison between 1889 to 1893, and his nerves were frayed by footsteps
in corridors and rapping on doors which seemed to have no natural explanation.
On a visit to Baltimore, he
attended a séance, at which Lincoln
spirit was present. Kenney is said to have said, “Please don’t do it again, Mr.
Lincoln. I am guarding the life of President Harrison now, and you’ve got me so
scared I can’t do my duty.” Kenny never heard the ghost again.
Lincoln is said to step up his visits to
his old offices in times of crisis. The chief White House usher saw him several
times during World War II, and one of Theodore Roosevelt’s valets fled
shrieking from the building. President Eisenhower said he sensed Lincoln’s presence many
times. Even while Lincoln was alive in the white
house, as the 16th president of the United States, there where ghost
there. His wife confirmed spiritualist, saw her brother Alexander after he was
killed while fighting on the Confederate side in the Civil War.
Lincoln has a vision of his own death. He
told an aide shortly before his assassination that he had been woken by quiet
sobbing.
He said, “I wandered downstairs until I came to the East
Room. Before me was a catafalque with a corpse whose face was covered. Who is
dead? I demanded of the mourners. ‘The President,’ was the reply. He was killed
by an assassin.’”
Franklin Roosevelt’s death in 1945 came in chilling
circumstances, and many lay it at the door of an ancient Shawnee curse.
What is known as the Indian’s revenge started nearly 180
years ago when Shawnee
chief Tecumseh died in a pitched battle with William Harrison, then Governor of
Indiana.
In revenge, the Shawnee
placed a curse on Harrison. Medicine men told
how the Governor would become president in a year ending in zero –but would die
in office. From then on, any President elected in a year divisible by 20 would
also die before his term ended.
Harrison grandfather of Benjamin was duly
elected president in 1840 and died a month after taking office.
Abe Lincoln was elected 20 years later and was
assassinated.
The deaths of five other presidents have also been
attributed to the Shawnee
curse…
James Garfield was elected to office in 1880 and was assassinated in 1881.
William McKinley was re-elected in 1900 and was
assassinated in 1901.
Warren Harding was elected in 1920 and died of stroke in
1923.
Franklin Roosevelt was elected in 1940 and died in 1945.
John Kennedy was elected in 1960 and was assassinated in
1963.
