Salem Ghost Tour

If you thought Salem, Massachusetts was just famous for witches, think again! In the bewitching downtown you can hunt for not only witches, but ghosts as well!

Voted the #1 thing to do in Salem in 2009 by NBC’s Official Best Tour of Massachusetts, the Salem Night Tours conduct 75-minute tours into the supernatural world of our historic New England city. Guided by a licensed tour guide, you will journey through cemeteries, former sites of the 1692 witchcraft trials, and famous locations of folklore and legend. The use of flash photography is highly encouraged as many visitors have had spirits appear in their pictures. As a resident of Salem for the past three years, my favorite thing about the Salem Night Tours was that they offered information I had never learned before!

For example, next to the Dunkin Donuts on the corner of Washington Street and Norman Street, lies the Joshua Ward House, one of the most haunted houses in America. The house was originally owned by George Corwin, a former High Sheriff of Essex County, Massachusetts during the 1600s. He was a belligerent man who earned the nickname ‘The Strangler’ because many accused witches died at his hands. Giles Corey, the well-known victim who was eventually pressed to death, was the last to suffer under Corwin’s hands. Corwin passed away at the age of thirty, but at Corey’s sentence, which you get to see on the tour, he cursed Corwin and all the Sheriffs of Essex County.   Because many people had ill feelings towards Corwin, he was buried in his house until it was rebuilt in 1784, the foundation of the original house is all that remains. After the house was completed, George Washington actually stayed there during a visit to Salem. This is why Washington Street is named Washington Street.

But it was in the 1980s when Carlson Realty made the house its headquarters, that people started discovering its haunted happenings. Doors would shut on their own, objects move, lights turned on and off by themselves, and burglar alarms would continually go off. The grizzliest paranormal activity that has occurred there has been the apparition of two women. One of them is an old lady sitting by the fire and the other is younger women who stalks the upstairs.

These women are believed to be two of the women Corwin brutally murdered. In the 1990s, a man named Dale Lewinski captured them while trying to take a picture of the Carlson Realty staff.

The Joshua Ward House wasn’t the only place I enjoyed visiting, I also liked the Gardner Pingree House, which is the house the American board game, Clue, was based on.

On the outside, Gardner Pingree is an idyllic Georgian house, but its skeletons would shock you! But don’t worry, I didn’t ruin everything for you! The greatest thing about the Salem Night Tours is that no two tours are the same!

Salem Ghost Tour 
127 Essex Street 
Salem, Massachusetts 01970 
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