There is no set year of discovery for the Dybbuk Box as Jewish tails have mentioned it many times through-out various text and from various years. In 1914 a Yiddish play, The Dybbuk, embodied the tail of how the box came into existence, and horror culture has used it ever since. The famous eBay box was auctioned in 2003 which led to the widespread story we all know today surrounding this box.
Name
Dybbuk Box also spelled Dibbuk
Physical Description
The Dybbuk is said to be a disembodied malicious demon that possesses a living person’s soul to gain domain in the mortal world. The box that held the Dybbuk is an old-style wooden wine box that contained various bottles and jars of wine and trinkets.
Origin
The Dybbuk Box comes from Jewish lore and dates back to the horror story from the Holocaust. There are many tails of these “cursed boxes” through-out time, but the most famous and well-known tale came in 2003. The owner of a furniture shop in Portland Oregon, Kevin Mannis, listed the box on eBay with a fantastic horror story to go with it.
The famed story of Mannis’s box entails a 103-year-old Grandma bringing the box to America while escaping the Holocaust. When she pasted in 2001 the family sold the box among other things at a yard sale to help with the costs of laying her to rest. Mannis was very interested in the box and was instructed to never open it. Once the box was at his furniture shop strange things began to happen and even caused an employee to quit. The light bulbs would flash and shatter, strange smells, nightmares, doors slamming and moving, as well as a general dark feeling seeming to follow the box. He opened the box to investigate, he found two wheat pennies, two small locks of hair, a statue engraved with Hebrew letters, dried rosebuds, a golden wine cup, and a black cast iron candlestick holder. He gave the box to his mother who died shortly after from a stroke, then the box was giving to other Mannis’s family members who all returned it report the same paranormal experiences he had.
In 2003 the box hit eBay after Mannis couldn’t bare keeping it any longer, Jason Haxton eventually won rights to the box in 2004 with a winning bid of $280. He soon fell victim to the unnerving wrath of the box which lead him to seek help from a Jewish Rabbi to reseal the box and burying it. Haxton recovered his box for a cameo on Ghost Adventures and later went on to publish a book about his experience with the Dybbuk Box. Now many Dybbuk Boxes are flooding the eBay and Etsy markets with a wide range of prices and tales going along with their demons; however, not all of these boxes are REAL demon holding Jewish boxes many people have found fakes as they become an “in trend” item.
Have you ever wondered where the modern vampire first appeared within human history? Well, any documentation outside of ancient mythology came with historic value, from credible sources such as historian William of Newburgh. Due to his reputation as a noteworthy and careful historian, his History of English Affairs serves as one of the earliest records of vampire phenomena of the British Isles. Unfortunately, his reliance upon spoken folklore caused these chronicles to come under scrutiny and these chronicles are often considered to have vague and inaccurate content. The reliance on this folklore was due to commonplace belief in the dead returning to life as vampires, so it seemed that diminishing these beliefs would have been considered a disregard of viable information. The relish with which Willaim of Newburgh accounts for the living dead in several of his chronicles is present in his History of English Affairs, he speaks of visible ghosts or animated corpses that were believed to have returned from the grave to terrorize the living–his reports documented several stories of the undead, however, they do not attest to any blood consumption by such creatures. So were these true vampires he was documenting or were these revenants a different type of demon or spirit that was dedicated to terrorizing those who still lived? Well, they did have a few similarities with what we consider vampires.
The first report from William of Newburgh occurred in Buckinghamshire, in which a man returned from the grave and assaulted his wife for several nights; when she finally told her family about what was happening, her husband returned to terrorize her family and her neighbors as well. Only when a local clergyman wrote an absolution and placed it upon the corpse, was the body formally bound to the grave. Another report from History of English Affairs states that the body of a deceased clergyman escaped from his grave to haunt the abbey and in particular a woman from the town in which he had served in life. This woman sought out a monk who vowed to stand guard over the grave at night; when the corpse tried to escape from the grave again, the monk attacked it with an ax until it returned to its grave. When a group of monks dug up the corpse the next day, they found it sleeping in a pool of its own blood from ax wounds. They burned the corpse to ashes to prevent it from coming back again. This wasn’t the only account in which the returning corpse was burned to ashes in order to keep it from returning, as it is a common belief that vampires are exceptionally difficult to kill, but their vulnerability lies during the day while they are sleeping. As nocturnal creatures, they reportedly avoided the sunlight and then would come out at night as a means to hide their true nature. None of these reports indicated a bloodlust, but it’s still possible that these instances were missed.
Vampire lovers aren’t always aware of the vast amounts of lore that is connected to their favored creatures of the night, but the long history of the blood-sucking undead is as colorful as it is convoluted and complex. Within what can be considered the modern era, the lore attached to vampires has inspired hundreds of books, movies, and television references to these creatures and will continue to do so in times to come.
Ambrogio, the First Vampire
Photography by Kari
The very first recorded story that depicts the origin of vampires is from ancient Greek mythology, it is not as well-referenced as it should be in modern times. This story came from Delphi, a city that has existed and been inhabited since 1600 BC–the Scriptures of Delphi written by the infamous Oracle of Delphi were one of many archaeological discoveries that have emerged. These scriptures provided a solid foundation of ancient beliefs and evidence, but there are reportedly other archaeological finds that date back even further into ancient times that validate the existence of vampires. Within these scriptures is a section that has come to be known as the “Vampire Bible,” which tells the story of a man named Ambrogio, an Italian adventurer whose lifelong dream was to have his fortune told by the Oracle of Delphi.
Upon meeting this Oracle, she offered only a few cryptic phrases which translated to, “The curse. The moon. The blood will run.” Needless to say, our hero Ambrogio was disturbed by this message and spent the night pondering this message and its possible meanings. When the morning came, a sister of the Oracle, the beautiful young maiden Selene, came to care for her sister and the temple as she did every morning–upon meeting her, he decided to stay and met with her again every morning before he fell deeply in love with her. He asked for her hand in marriage and to return with him to Italy, but the god Apollo had watched this all unfold and took great disrespect that a mortal would try to take the maiden that was dedicated to him.
In a rage, Apollo cursed Ambrogio so that the sun would burn his flesh, which kept him from meeting Selene again the next morning and depart with her to his homeland. Ambrogio sought the protection of Hades, having fled to the caves, and the god of the underworld made a deal and Ambrogio had to leave his soul with Hades. Hades bestowed upon Ambrogio a magical wooden bow with eleven arrows, with which he was to hunt and kill a creature and offer it up to Artemis in order to gain her favor; once this had happened, he would have to steal her silver bow and deliver it back to Hades in order to retrieve his soul. Unfortunately for Ambrogio, he squandered the arrows killing swans and writing poetry to Selene in their blood. Realizing his plight, he stole the silver bow of Artemis anyway, but upon discovery of her missing bow, she too cursed Ambrogio, so that the touch of silver would also burn his flesh.
This new curse caused him to be unable to deliver the bow to Hades and in his grief, he fell to his knees and begged for mercy–Artemis felt pity for him and gave him one more chance. She bestowed upon Ambrogio the speed and strength of a god so that he would be as powerful a hunter as she was, as well as fangs so he may draw blood from his prey and continue to write his poetry. Newly immortal, Ambrogio was to abandon all other gods but the virgin goddess Artemis and with that pursuit of any physical love with Selene. Even though he agreed to the demands of Artemis, he wrote Selene a message that night, instructing her to meet with him on his ship. She found a coffin in the hull of the ship, with a note attached that told her to order the ship to sail and to not open the coffin until sunset–they ended up living inside of the caves of Ephesus together for many years, Ambrogio not having aged a day but Selene, still a mortal fell sick with age.
Statue of the Greek Goddess Selene
Ambrogio knew that he would not be able to spend the afterlife with Selene because Hades still possessed his soul, so he sacrificed a swan to Artemis to gain the favor of her appearance. Artemis was pleased with his loyalty and service to her, so she made him one final deal, that he may touch Selene one time in order to drink her blood. Upon drinking her blood, her mortal body would die, but she would return an immortal like himself and they would be able to spend eternity together. Selene’s spirit rose to the heavens and at the behest of Artemis became the Goddess of moonlight, where her soft light would touch Ambrogio and the children of the night who were created by him.
The Truth Behind the Legend of Dracula
In the whole of vampire lore, there are no stories that have caused more fear than Dracula; this legendary creature was invented by Bram Stoker in his 1897 novel, Dracula. His novel has inspired more horror movies, television shows, and books than any other vampire origin story–while Dracula as a character in the book is entirely fictional, Stoker actually gave him the likeness of a real historical figure who lusted after blood, who was rumored to have executed between 40,000 and 100,000 people in his famous fashion of impalement. According to legend, Vlad III allegedly feasted on the blood of the dying victims as they writhed in agony, but according to the historical references of Vlad Tepes he was regarded as a hero of his land.
Vlad Tepes, Prince of Wallachia
Son of Vlad Dracul, Vlad Tepes the Prince of Wallachia is more famously known as Vlad the Impaler–this moniker served as testimony to the brutal way in which he dealt with his enemies. Born in 1431 in what is now known as Transylvania, a central region of Romania–but according to a professor of medieval history and archaeology at the University of Florida, there is no record of Vlad Tepes ever having owned property in Transylvania. This means that while Stoker’s Dracula may be centralized in Transylvania, the historic Dracula, Vlad Tepes, didn’t have much to do with Transylvania after his birth. The supposed Castle Dracula was never inhabited by Vlad III, but has been turned into a tourist attraction due to its location and physical appearance.
The Order of the Dragon
The year of Vlad the Impaler’s birth, his father was inducted into the Order of the Dragon, an order of knights, the designation of which earned Vlad II the surname of Dracul, the old Romanian word which translated to “dragon,” this was derived from a related word, drac which translated to “devil.” Eventually, this would lead Vlad III to inherit the surname and come to be known as Drăculea, son of Dracul.
Vlad the Impaler
According to the legends that were spoken after the death of Vlad III, he got the name of the Impaler, when he was the voivode, or ruler of Wallachia. He had invited hundreds of boyars–aristocratic Romanians, who had played a pivotal role in dethroning him–to a banquet where he had them all killed and impaled upon spikes while they were still warm. The terror he reigned and the blood he spilled didn’t stop there, as he is also credited with doing the same to dozens of Saxon merchants who had allied themselves with the boyars who had stolen his throne. Another alleged bloody tale is when a group of Ottoman messengers refused to take their turbans off due to religious necessity, at which point Vlad had their turbans nailed to their skulls so they would forever remain on their hands.
Dante and Virgil in Hell by William Adolphe Bourguereau (1850)
Georgia-based author and artist, Mary has been a horror aficionado since the mid-2000s. Originally a hobby artist and writer, she found her niche in the horror industry in late 2019 and hasn’t looked back since. Mary’s evolution into a horror expert allowed her to express herself truly for the first time in her life. Now, she prides herself on indulging in the stuff of nightmares.
Mary also moonlights as a content creator across multiple social media platforms—breaking down horror tropes on YouTube, as well as playing horror games and broadcasting live digital art sessions on Twitch.
Robert Albert Bloch was born in Chicago, Illinois on April 5 in 1917, to two German Jews, Raphael Bloch and Stella Loeb who, despite their Jewish heritage, had the family attend a Methodist Church. When Bloch was only eight years of age, he attended a screening of Lon Chaney Sr.’s The Phantom of the Opera (1925) on his own, where he was traumatized by his first horror scene—where Chaney removes his mask to reveal the Phantom’s horrific face. According to Bloch, “it scared the hell out of [him] and [he] ran all the way home to enjoy the first of about two years of recurrent nightmares.” Like many fans of horror who see their first horror flick too young, this trauma and subsequent nighttime hauntings sparked his interest in horror. He became an avid reader at eight, reading books well above his own level of schooling, as well as experimenting with pencil sketches and watercolor art. While he very much had a love for artwork, but he was diagnosed with myopia in his youth and it deterred him from pursuing it professionally.
At the age of twelve, Robert’s father lost his job at the bank and the family moved to Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where he grew up throughout the Great Depression. During his youth, he delighted in the Golden Age of horror films that played in the picture houses, and the magazine Weird Tales, which he scrimped and saved for each month from his allowance so as to purchase a copy of this pulp magazine. Bloch’s favorite childhood short story was one of Lovecraft’s first-person narratives about an artist whose disturbing creations lead to his disappearance, entitled “Pickman’s Model,” and he would also end up doing flattering imitations of his mentor’s style later on. When Bloch was just seventeen years old he wrote to his highly regarded idol, H.P. Lovecraft, to proclaim his admiration for the writer’s short stories. It is said that he greatly preferred Lovecraft’s particular flavor of genre—cosmic or as it’s often regarded, Lovecraftian horror—over what he was being taught in his own high school English classes.
To the unending joy of Bloch, Lovecraft wrote him back and sent him copies of earlier stories he had written and asked Robert if he himself had written any weird fiction. This is when he would be admitted into The Lovecraft Circle as well as when he began writing some of his first (of many) short stories that would be published in Weird Tales. He would be the youngest member of The Lovecraft Circle, which were a group of writers who followed H.P. Lovecraft and published their short fiction in Weird Tales—a pulp horror magazine that circulated during the Great Depression.
Career
With the early influence of Lovecraft and his cosmic horror, Bloch’s earliest short stories took place in Lovecraft’s Cthulhu Mythos fictional universe. Not too long later, Bloch would begin to associate with the Milwaukee Fictioneers, a group of writer’s dedicated to pulp fiction where he began to deviate and develop his own style, instead of relying upon the Lovecraft influence. When Lovecraft died in 1937, Robert was deeply affected by the loss of his mentor, but used it as a reason to keep writing.
Despite my ghoulish reputation, I really have the heart of a small boy. I keep it in a jar on my desk.”
Robert Bloch
Novels
Bloch’s first novel to be published was The Scarf (1947) and was very reminiscent of the style he had developed when he was involved with the Lovecraft circle, but also marked the beginning the development of a style he would explore later that would be considered pulp fiction. Like most other horror writers, Bloch had a certain kind of story that inspired him—for some writers it’s urban legends, supernatural monsters, or wicked folklore; but Robert’s inspiration didn’t come from folklore so much as it did true-crime serial killers from all throughout history. Jack the Ripper, Marquis de Sade, and Lizzie Borden were amongst those whom Robert created stories based on their legacies, which included short stories such as “A Toy for Juliette” and “Lizzie Borden Took an Ax….”
When Ed Gein was arrested in his home in Plainsfield, Wisconsin for the murders of two women in 1957, authorities discovered that Gein had been stealing corpses from fresh graves of local women and then using their flesh to create furniture, silverware, and clothing. Bloch only lived about thirty-five miles away from where Gein had lived, so after the discovery of this serial so close to home, he became obsessed. The idea of his next door neighbor being a monster, but going undetected even in such a small town is what he considered his largest inspiration for Norman Bates, the anti-hero of Psycho (1959). The story of Ed Gein was sensational at the time, but what really translated Bloch’s Psycho into an instant classic both in text and Alfred Hitchcock’s adaptation for the big screen, was due to the psychological not-so-undertones of the story.
While Bloch had enjoyed some critical and commercial success before he produced Psycho, it wasn’t until the novel was published that his life changed forever. With Psycho and its instant success, he was approached by a Hollywood production company with an offer to purchase the rights to the film. He made a whopping $9,500 which through inflation would equate to $84,472 and some change.
The world of horror would be forever changed by Norman Bates, the sensitive mama’s boy, whose domineering mother corrupted him—which brought an interesting air to the 1960s as the field of psychoanalysis and the research of the Oedipus Complex which coincided with a crisis in contemporary American masculinity which followed the women’s movement of liberation. When Norman psychologically becomes his mother at the end of the novel it was representative of Freudian horror in the utmost of extreme cases. Psycho wasn’t Bloch’s only success and he continued on with his creative writing, winning awards and accolades for his talent.
Death
Bloch was seventy-seven when he passed away on September 23, 1994—he had long battled with cancer and it finally took him at his home in Los Angeles. Before he passed, however, he wrote what was considered an unauthorized autobiography, which was titled Once Around the Bloch (1993) and while he didn’t speak of his illness, it was clear that it was written with the realization that he was not long for this world.
Georgia-based author and artist, Mary has been a horror aficionado since the mid-2000s. Originally a hobby artist and writer, she found her niche in the horror industry in late 2019 and hasn’t looked back since. Mary’s evolution into a horror expert allowed her to express herself truly for the first time in her life. Now, she prides herself on indulging in the stuff of nightmares.
Mary also moonlights as a content creator across multiple social media platforms—breaking down horror tropes on YouTube, as well as playing horror games and broadcasting live digital art sessions on Twitch.
Born of the eerie and enigmatic nature of the sea, ghost ships have been objects of fascination for centuries. Many of the stories behind phantom vessels have historical evidence, explanations—or at least theories—of how they came to be abandoned and what happened to their crew. The legend of the ghost ship Jenny and how it came to be the Ship of Icy remains shrouded in mystery centuries after it was discovered.
“May 4, 1823. No food for 71 days. I am the only one left alive.” – Was the captain’s last entry in the ghost ship Jenny’s log book. Jenny was an 1800’s English schooner that became frozen in ice crossing the Drake Passage in 1823.
Ghost Ships: A Common Thread
Image courtesy of Wikipedia
One of the earliest substantiated claims of a phantom vessel is one that ran aground on Easton’s Beach in Rhode Island, between 1750 and 1760. The SV Sea Bird is well-known through a fictional account, but historical records also exist.
Another well-researched and factually interesting instance was the disappearance of Sir John Franklin—a British Royal Navy Officer and Arctic explorer who, after serving the crown in wars against Napoleonic France and the United States led an ill-fated expedition in search of the Northwest Passage in 1845 (Ray 2023). Countless stories are associated with Franklin’s vanished expedition. Two centuries later his disappearance is just as fascinating and inexplicable now as it was at the time (Schuster 2)
Karl T. Andree a German geographer and publicist, is well-known for linking the story of Franklin and the ghost ship Jenny. As the editor of the Globus, he purportedly brought the two stories together first. In his excitement of the first edition of his geographical journal, he wanted to create interest. His enthusiasm stirred from introducing the general public to the exciting side of geography (Schuster 2).
Watch the Ghost Ship Jenny on Puzzle Box Horror’s YouTube channel
Jenny of the Isle of Wight
Ghost ships are clearly not an impossible concept. The events that surround the ghost ship, Jenny, however, are most unusual and highly unsettling. Bohemia, boasts a narrative that is simultaneously more believable and different than popularly cited sources. Regardless of these differences, the story remains an eerie example of the destructive capacity of Mother Nature.
The ghost ship Jenny was, allegedly, an English schooner that hailed from the Isle of Wight. She would come to be the subject of a legend that remains unproven to this day. The Jenny left its home port on the Isle of Wight, and made a successful journey all the way to the port of Callao, Peru—the main port just outside of Lima. With one-half of their journey completed, the crew of the Jenny would have to sail their vessel through the treacherous waters of the Drake Passage once again. The Jenny’s return trip would end in the Drake Passage—but what caused the ship’s voyage to end so abruptly?
The Drake Passage: The Roughest Seas in the World
The Drake Passage has the roughest seas known in the world. This is largely due to the fact that the Pacific, Atlantic, and Southern Oceans all converge into this one passage. With no landmasses to create resistance, the winds can reach incredible speeds. All of this adds up to rocky waters that only the most robust of vessels can withstand. Throughout maritime history, the Drake Passage has claimed more than 800 ships and with them, the lives of approximately 20,000 sailors. (Andrews, 2015)
The Story of the Ghost Ship Jenny
Little to nothing is known about what Jenny and her crew endured during their travels. Countless versions of their story have been published and since speculated upon. It is believed that Jenny began her journey in England. She left her home port on the Isle of Wight approximately a year before the last entry in her logbook. The intended voyage and where Jenny ended up is vaguely mentioned. However, it is known through each rendition of her story that she navigated the Drake Passage. Her last port of call was Callao, Peru—the de facto port of the city of Lima.
From Peru, Jenny traveled back through the Drake Passage but this is where her journey, as we know it, ended abruptly. It would be quite some time before the fate of Jenny and her crew would be discovered and no evidence of her expedition has been uncovered outside of the stories of her rediscovery. Regardless, any theories surrounding her disappearance would be pure speculation.
Did the Ghost Ship Jenny really exist?
Upon further research, neither the ghost ship Jenny, the whaling vessel Hope nor Captain Brighton could be found among any official documentation of Andree’s sources for the 1862 edition of Globus (Schuster 2). The story that appeared in Globus in 1862 was, however, traced back to the original publication which had been anonymously printed in Bohemia on February 14, 1841. In fact, the story had not only been printed in Bohemia but at least nine other magazines and newspapers within the same year. The only significant difference that could be cited was the year Brighton was said to have found the ghost ship Jenny, but whether it was 1839 or 1840 really made no difference to the readers.
It is assumed that since none of the publications cite a source for their information, the initial journalist likely believed the information was authentic and happened upon it from an oral source since no documentation of an English source has ever been discovered (Schuster 3).
There are theories that suggest that the ghost ship Jenny story is actually an Antarctic retelling of the Octavius which had not only happened on the opposite side of the globe, but almost an entire century prior (Schuster 3). It’s curious, but true that many renditions of the legend include details identical to those of the Octavius. The cargo ship turned ghost ship allegedly vanished off the coast of Greenland in 1761. The story tells us of its miraculous discovery fifteen years later. The crew froze in their agonizing final moments. The Captain, pen still in hand, froze at his desk.
The Ship in the Ice
In an effort to consolidate the details into one manageable story, we have taken the multitude of sources we found and created our own version of the story, just as the storytellers of our past might have done.
That was the story. Question the manner of telling
But be sure at least of ice and pain and silence.
Of Time? Well, there one can never be certain —
For you a thing to be measured, perhaps — for me, a searching,
And for seven alone on a frozen ship? I wonder.
However it was, is beyond our chance of knowing.
— from The Ship of Ice by Rosemary Dobson.
September 22, 1839
Captain Brighton of the whaling ship the Hope, entered into his logbook the sighting of a whale. When their chase drew them close to the ice barrier, they lost sight of the whale. In an effort to find the safety of calm seas, Brighton and his crew found themselves in the middle of a chain of icebergs. Around nine in the evening, a storm was upon them, despite the situation Brighton was more annoyed than afraid since they had chanced into a basin of calm waters. He alerted his crew to remain awake so that they might catch a favorable midnight breeze and navigate out of the basin. If they didn’t turn back, then they risked becoming stuck in the ice for the entire winter.
As the midnight winds hit…
They brought with them a flurry of snow and thunderous cracks that left the crew filled with dread. Brighton knew this sound was an indication that the icebergs surrounding them were breaking apart and his fears were confirmed when tremendous shock waves rocked the Hope from all sides. Escaping the basin proved to be impossible, as did finding a safe place to pass the rest of the night. Anxiety persisted amongst the crew, but they managed to stay afloat through the night. Morning light brought a calm over the crew when they saw their ship had taken no significant damage. An astonished crew noted that the mountainous bergs that had closed them in the day before now lay shattered around them. The icy waters that surrounded them bore a resemblance to a desert archipelago.
Around midday…
The sailor at the watch in the masthead cried out that he had spotted a ship at sea. Persistent icebergs blocked Brighton’s line of sight for a time, but when the hull came into view he stood aghast. The sails faced in strange directions and the ship’s rigging was wholly miserable. They watched as the vessel sailed feebly under the persuasion of the wind before it finally came to rest upon an iceberg. Captain Brighton, along with a few of his men boarded their ship’s jolly boat and quickly rowed over to the derelict vessel which had so piqued their curiosity. A more intimate view of the ship revealed a slew of impacts against the ice that the hull had withstood.
From their vantage point in the jolly boat, they could see no one on the deck. A blanket of snow that reached an incredible height covered the ship’s deck. Still, Brighton called out to the ship several times and received no answer. Just as they were about to make their way up to the deck, an open gate caught Brighton’s attention. Twilight permitted him to see the silhouette of a man sitting in a chair at a desk. He could just make out writing instruments and an open book in front of him. Brighton and his men hesitated no longer. Once on deck, they shoveled away the high blanket of snow that covered the trapdoor to the cabin.
Consumed with anxiety…
The men descended into the depths of the ship. Together they headed to where Captain Brighton had seen the man sitting. They trembled in anticipation as they came face to face with the stranger, who sat unresponsive in front of them. Brighton took a few steps closer to him and observed that the man was dead. Upon closer inspection, he noted something disturbing. A thin greenish mold covered the man’s forehead and cheeks. What was worse, was that it clouded the man’s eyes as well. The ship’s logbook lay open in front of him. It was open to the last entry and a quill lay aside the dead man’s hand. The man had succumbed to the elements shortly after penning the final log.
“January 17, 1823. Today it is seventy-one days that our ship has been trapped in the ice. All our efforts were in vain — last night the fire was extinguished, and all our captain’s efforts to light it again failed — this morning his wife died of hunger and cold, as did five of the sailors from the crew. No more hope!”
Next, the men…
Ventured into the Captain’s quarters, wherein they found the corpse of a woman on the bed. Her features remarkably preserved by the cold, she still held the appearance of life. However, her torment-twisted limbs told the story of the pain and suffering she had endured in her last hours. They next searched the crew’s quarters at the front of the ship. There they found several sailors lying dead in their hammocks. Even the dog lay frozen to death under the stairs in the corner. Out of all the things the men found in their search, food, and fuel were not among them.
Little by little Brighton’s men lost their mettle. Their fears and superstitions prevented Brighton from investigating the ship as thoroughly as he would have liked. Saddened by what they had discovered, Brighton took the ship’s logbook. Noted in the logbook was the ship’s last port of call—Callao, Peru. On the cover of the logbook, Brighton saw the name Jenny of the Isle of Wight. Brighton resolved to return the logbook to the ship’s owner. When he returned to his ship, he did so with renewed conviction. Any ship which ventured too far into these inhospitable waters faced incalculable dangers.
Fact or Fiction: The Jenny’s Mystery Persists
Outside of the legend, there are very few references of the Jenny in fictional works. Both of the works we found through our research were published within the last century. Rosemary Dobson wrote the poem “The Ship of Ice” in 1948. Her poem won her the Sydney Morning Herald award for poetry that same year. In her poem, she mentions that the discovery of the ghost ship Jenny happened in 1860. She cited the information she pulled from the anonymous report The Drift of Jenny, 1823-1840. She cited an English translation of the story from the Globus in 1862.
In 2018, Michael Wilkinson published a short story, entitled “The Drift of the Jenny”. It was a dramatic rendition of the story from the article found in the Globus in 1862. He included elaborate details and perspectives that otherwise would have been unknown. The retelling of this story by new authors truly inspires creative minds to keep old legends alive.
The truth behind the ghost ship Jenny continues to elude us, but our sources remain. The legends as they appeared in both Bohemia and Globus have been included below in their English translations. We hope that you, the reader, will conduct your own investigation. Ascertain the details for yourself and draw your own conclusions. This centuries-old mystery may simply be the evolution of a sailor’s yarn into an urban legend or, this seemingly tall tale may have been birthed from true events. New and substantial developments are unlikely to be found. That doesn’t mean that a dilapidated ghost ship Jenny and her crew aren’t still sailing the haunted inhospitable Antarctic waters.
The Original Tales, Translated
The following article appeared in Bohemia, ein unterhaltungsblatt on February 14, 1841. It is the earliest printed source of the legend for the ghost ship Jenny.
What follows is a direct translation of the story as it was printed in the Bohemia magazine in 1841:
The Ship in the Ice.
A true story.
The ship the Hope, Captain Brighton, equipped for whale fishing beyond Cape Horn in the calm sea, found itself in the middle of a chain of icebergs on September 22nd, 1839, at 9 o’clock in the evening, just as stormy tides were setting in, which formed a wide bay, so to speak. Not half an hour from his ship the captain noticed another long line of ice cliffs of wonderful height and completely covered with snow. All space through which the eye could pass was filled with enormous masses of ice, which showed that the ocean was closed in this direction.
Captain Brighton, however, found his situation more difficult than dangerous, for there was complete calm in the large basin. He was not afraid of being thrown against one of those ice rocks that lay motionless. He therefore limited himself to the exact vigilance that his position required of him; the whole crew remained awake on deck to catch the breeze which usually rises after midnight; in this case, he wanted to turn the ship around immediately because if he had ventured any further he would have to fear being surrounded by ice for the entire winter.
At midnight…
A strong wind arose and brought a flurry of snow. A thunder-like crack, a terrible roar, filled the crew with terror. It was a sign that the ice was moving. The Hope received tremendous shocks from the floating ice masses; it was impossible to find a safe place. The night passed with anxiety difficult to describe. In the morning the storm calmed down and the crew was pleased to see that the ship had not suffered any significant damage. The sailors were astonished to see that the icy mountains that had been so tightly closed yesterday had been shattered, and the entire sea had taken on the appearance of a desert archipelago.
Towards midday, the watch in the masthead shouted: “A ship at sea! At first, some icebergs floating between this ship and the Hope prevented the captain from seeing more than the mastheads, but soon the hull came into view, and Brighton was amazed by the strange direction of the sails and the miserable appearance of the ship the rigging was astonishing. The vessel sailed fleetingly before the wind for a distance of a few cable lengths and finally hit an iceberg.
Soon the crew…
Of the Hope noticed that the strange ship was abandoned. But Captain Brighton let out a boat. He boarded it with a few sailors and quickly rowed over to the ship whose appearance had so excited his curiosity. As he got closer, he saw the ship’s hull, as it were, gnawed by time or by countless impacts against the ice. No one was on the deck, which was covered in snow to an incredible height.
Brighton called the strange ship several times, but there was no answer. He was just about to climb up when an open gate caught his attention. Through the window panes, he saw a man sitting on a chair in front of a table on which there was a kind of register, writing utensils, and pens. The twilight in this room prevented the captain from seeing more.
Brighton and the sailors…
With him did not hesitate to climb the deck. Here they first had to shovel away the high blanket of snow that covered the trapdoor of the cabin. Here they descended with a mixed feeling of anticipation and secret horror. First, they went to the room where the captain had seen the man sitting. When they entered they couldn’t help but tremble. The unknown sat there, didn’t move, and didn’t return the greeting of his guests. The man took a few steps closer to him and saw that he was without life. A thin, greenish mold covered his forehead and cheeks and clouded his eyes. He was a man about thirty years old. A feather lay next to his hand on the table, and the ship’s book was open in front of him.
The last passage in this journal read as follows:
“17. January 1839. Today it is seventy-one days that our ship has been trapped between the ice. All our efforts were in vain — last night the fire was extinguished, and all our captain’s efforts to light it again failed — this morning his wife died of hunger and cold, as did five of the sailors from the crew. No more hope!”
Captain Brighton and his sailors were forced to leave the horrible place after such a sight. When they entered the main façade, the first thing they noticed was the body of a woman on a bed. Her features had retained all the freshness of life, only her limbs, through their twisting, indicated the terrible torments under which the poor thing had died. At her side was sitting on the floorboards a lifeless young man, holding a steel in his right hand and a flint in his left, next to him was a can of tinder.
From here…
The captain went to the front of the ship to the crew’s quarters; several sailors lay dead in their hammocks. A dog was found frozen to death under the stairs in a corner. There was no food or fuel anywhere.
Captain Brighton was prevented by the superstitious fear of his sailors, from searching the extinct ship with as much detail as he would have liked. Meanwhile, he took with him the ship’s book, in which was recorded the entire route the ship had taken since it had sailed from Lima. In front of the diary was the name of the ship, Jenny of the Isle of Wight. At last Captain Brighton returned to his board, deeply saddened by the sad spectacle he had just seen, and by his examination convinced anew of the incalculable dangers to which all ships are exposed if they venture too far into the inhospitable Arctic Ocean.
The following article appeared in Globus, Illustrated Magazine for Countries and Ethnography. It was also a self-proclaimed Chronicle of Travel and Geographical Newspaper. This version of the story wasn’t printed until sometime in 1862. This article remains the most cited source of this legend.
What follows is a direct translation of the story as it was printed in the Globus in 1862:
A Ship in the Ice of the Southern Polar Sea.
Mac Clintock’s report on the trip to find Sir John Franklin is read with keen evaluation and not without emotion. At Victoria Point, on the northwest coast of King Williams Island, where Bad Bay lies, the first written record of the missing sailors was recovered; It was dated May 28, 1847, and at that time everything was fine. But there was a postscript in the margins, according to which the ships Erebus and Terror were abandoned on April 22, 1848, having been encased in ice since September 12, 1846. Franklin had already died on June 11, 1847, and the total death toll already amounted to 9 officers and 15 men from the remaining crew. On April 26th the survivors wanted to escape to Bad’s Fish River.
On May 30, 1859, Mac Clintock found a large boat on the west coast of King Williams Island, not far from Cape Crozier (latitude 69° 8′ north, longitude 100° 8′ west), at a point where the coast bends to the east his companion Hobson had been examined a few days earlier. It was 28 feet long, flat-built, and carefully prepared for travel on the large fishing stream, and consisted of a very strong sleigh. In this boat lay two human skeletons; One had been chased home by wolves, and the other was still covered in clothes and belts. Beside these unfortunates were five rifles, and on the side were two double-barreled shotguns, each of which had a barrel loaded.
Next to various…
Autochthon* books was a copy of the eulogist from Wakefield. Mac Clintock also found an astonishing array of clothing, nails, files, all sorts of implements, some tea, forty cans of chocolate, some tobacco and firebolt. The Eskimos had already told us that many white men had fallen on the way to the great Fish River; A skeleton partially covered in snow had been found at Cape Herschel. An old Eskimo woman hunted: “They fell down and died while they were running.”
Mac Clintock’s report reminded us of a funny one we once read about a dead ship in the southern Arctic Ocean.
It must be a terrible fate to be surrounded by icebergs in the gray polar cold, to be pinned down and to be wiped out by cold, hunger, terror, and doubt, and to say to yourself that you have disappeared without a trace.
In September 1840, the whaler Hope, Captain Brighton, cruised beyond Cape Horn in the southern Arctic Ocean. One September evening the wind drove him to ice fields and mountains, which formed a wide road. About half a nautical mile away, an indistinguishable chain of high, snow-covered Spitsbergen** was visible; Everything was covered in ice and in that direction, the ocean was visibly closed. In the wide basin, however, the sea was rough and the Hope was in no danger of strolling towards the ice coast; Nor were there any icebergs floating around, as they all formed one continuous body of water. However, the captain was always vigilant and the crew was ready to take advantage of the first favorable wind, which usually blows around midnight in September.
If you explore…
This ice base for a long time, a terrible event could occur that the icebergs become mobile, fold together, and wedge the whaler until mild bitterness sets in or for eternity.
The wind really picked up at midnight and at the same time, there was a heavy snowstorm. Soon afterwards a thunder-like sound rang out and the terrible crash of the icebergs filled the crew with fear and horror. The previously rigid masses of ice began to move. The floes also began to drift rapidly and collide against the ship, and Brighton barely had any hope of finding a way out of the billowing ice labyrinth.
The terrible night passed away amidst people who didn’t give in to gossip. The storm subsided as day appeared and was considerably busy. The ice masses, which in the evening had formed an impassable, mountainous mainland, now dissolved into countless floating islands and formed, as it were, a mobile archipelago.
A ship in sight! About midday the sailor on duty called Go from the masthead. The captain, who was on deck, could only see the tops of the masts because of the icebergs between the Hope and the indicated ship, but he soon noticed the strange condition of the rigging. The ship drifted downwind against an iceberg and then came to a standstill.
There was now…
There was now no longer any doubt that the team had deserted. The captain put a boat out to sea and went to the wreck. It soon became apparent how much it had suffered. There was heavy snow on the deck and not a living creature was to be found; There was no answer to repeated calls. Brighton docked and boarded with three sailors. Not a soul moved. When he entered the cabin, what did he see? A man sat on a chair in front of a table on which a logbook lay. Everyone’s hair stood on end because the man remained motionless and the greeting that was called out to him remained unanswered. The man was a dead corpse; He still had a pen in his hand and the last word in the logbook read:
“January 17, 1823. Today is our seventy-first day since we were surrounded by the ice. Despite all our efforts, the fire went out yesterday. His wife is sick today died of hunger and cold; no more hope!”
That’s how it was in the helmsman’s cabin. In the captain’s room, the corpse of a woman lay on the bed; Her face still bore almost all the expressions of life, and only the cramped appearance pulled together limbs suggested the battle she had fought with death. A man sat next to her; On the ground next to him lay firesteel, stone, and a lighter filled with burned canvas. Several sailors were found frozen to death in the hammocks, a dead dog lay in front of the stairs and there was no trace of food anywhere.
The Fear and…
Superstition of the sailors did not allow further investigation, but Captain Brighton took the logbook with him to give to the shipowners. The ship was the Jenny and was based on the Isle of Wight; It had last been in the port of Callao near Lima and had lain in the Antarctic ice for a full seventeen years. Captain Brighton returned happily to Europe with the Hope.
*/ôˈtäkTH(ə)n, ôˈtäkˌTHän/ noun. an original or indigenous inhabitant of a place.
Jeans, Peter D. “The Schooner Jenny.” Seafaring Lore & Legend: A Miscellany of Maritime Myth, Superstition, Fable, and Fact, International Marine, Camden, ME, 2004, pp. 272–273.
Schuster, Frank M. “In search of the origin of an Antarctic ghost ship: The legend of the Jenny re-evaluated.” Polar Record, 58(e13), 2022, pp. 1-9.
Georgia-based author and artist, Mary has been a horror aficionado since the mid-2000s. Originally a hobby artist and writer, she found her niche in the horror industry in late 2019 and hasn’t looked back since. Mary’s evolution into a horror expert allowed her to express herself truly for the first time in her life. Now, she prides herself on indulging in the stuff of nightmares.
Mary also moonlights as a content creator across multiple social media platforms—breaking down horror tropes on YouTube, as well as playing horror games and broadcasting live digital art sessions on Twitch.
Within the paranormal community, there are always going to be skeptics, but some of those skeptics actually err on the side of disbelievers—this is a good thing, it’s always better to have a healthy level of doubt in order to pursue evidence without any bias. There have been numerous theories to explain the paranormal phenomena that affect certain people, including but not limited to the natural phenomenon of sleep paralysis, sleep deprivation, drug use, temporal lobe epilepsy, and a psychotic state. This explanation states that ghosts are simply the result of hallucinations or illusions that are produced by the brain when it’s not in a fully alert state. So, what does this mean for the whopping 45% of Americans who believe in ghosts and other supernatural beings?
Evidence Collection in Paranormal Investigation
Something that is considered part of a range of scientific data collection and regularly used among those who are seeking to find evidence of the existence of ghosts, is the EVP, or electronic voice phenomena. EVPs utilize audio recordings to capture ambient sounds during an investigation, then are later reviewed for messages from the beyond. The general consensus is that these audio recordings can register sounds that are inaudible to the human ear, with the understanding that any voices or brief sounds being captured would be ghostly in nature. To believers, EVP recordings seem like incontrovertible evidence of communications from beyond. The problem with this is that, given the opportunity for bias, the content of a recording can be highly suggestive. Without any suggestion from peers, research shows that people cannot agree to what they hear in “conclusive” EVP recordings. This brings down the ability to rely upon recordings as evidence since there can be no clear consensus upon what it is really evidence of aside from pareidolia—the tendency to perceive human characteristics in meaningless perceptual patterns. Combining the illusory quality of EVPs, as well as the misuse of other scientific equipment to investigate ghosts, it’s not difficult to see how scientists can easily debunk any evidence that has been provided by amateur and professional paranormal investigators alike.
Photography by LuckyLouie
Considering all of the scientific data to back the assertion that ghosts don’t exist, there are substantial numbers of people who still believe in them worldwide. The beginning of televised paranormal investigations has broadened that number significantly and opened up the ability to talk about paranormal subjects without too much blowback from skeptics. There are, however, tendencies to overdramatize events and investigations by some televised paranormal investigative teams—such people seem to be more oriented in the publicity and making events more fantastical than they truly are, which ends up leading to more skepticism instead of belief in the tangible evidence. What does this mean for the believability factor of investigative teams that are supposedly attempting to gather evidence while staying unbiased in the end result? It really means that any factual evidence that may be provided to give any credibility to the existence of ghosts or spirits. Unfortunately, some shows that continue to air are clearly for entertainment purposes only, such as Ghost Adventures, where any evidence being collected is presented with positive bias in favor of those who collected it. The problem with these shows is that they present themselves as true investigative paranormal teams but go to lengths to overdramatize everything they do. This is not to say that they don’t have their own basic value as entertainment alone, they just don’t possess merit as a source of proof when their evidence is bias-skewed EVP recordings.
Photography by Kevin Wolf
So, if ghosts aren’t real, then why do ghost stories seem so common? Well—there are justifiable explanations for ghost stories, whether or not you believe in ghosts it’s pretty much the same answer. Ghost stories exist because people have always needed the ability to relate their real-life experiences. Whether the reports of ghosts have been a result of scientifically explained phenomena, or they’re actual occurrences, these experiences can be incredibly emotional. Were the original tellers of the tale communicating their experiences due to an incredibly heart-warming reunion with their beloved late spouse, or was it a frightening confrontation with a ghostly predator? These are stories that people ache to tell others as if to get a weight off of their chest, or to stop feeling so alone in their experiences. Human connection drives ghost stories and it doesn’t hurt that they’re an amazing source of entertainment.
Georgia-based author and artist, Mary has been a horror aficionado since the mid-2000s. Originally a hobby artist and writer, she found her niche in the horror industry in late 2019 and hasn’t looked back since. Mary’s evolution into a horror expert allowed her to express herself truly for the first time in her life. Now, she prides herself on indulging in the stuff of nightmares.
Mary also moonlights as a content creator across multiple social media platforms—breaking down horror tropes on YouTube, as well as playing horror games and broadcasting live digital art sessions on Twitch.
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