Stories

The Ghosts of VMI

Virginia Military Institute is a spooky place.  Every Cadet and every former Cadet has a story.  I have mine.

Ghostly Sentinels knock on doors and pull covers off sleeping cadets, rousing them for guard duty.

Cadets report seeing General Stonewall Jackson in the Old Barracks Courtyard and Parade Ground.

The statue, Virginia Mourning Her Dead, standing guard over the graves of six cadets killed at the battle of New Market, is said to moan and weep with tears running down her face.

A pale disembodied face named The Yellow Peril haunts the middle stoops on the front side of Old Barracks, sneaking up on Cadets and screaming.

Entering Jackson Memorial Hall at midnight, touching the Mural, reciting the names of the ten Cadets killed at New Market, and then walking out down the center aisle, Cadets say, produces moans, cries, and voices from the Mural.  No one turns around.  I have never seen or heard this, though, admittedly, I have never been in JM Hall at midnight.

Summers are the worst.

Summer school students occupy only a few rooms.  Work crews refurbished and cleaned the rest.  Racks, shine boxes, and stereo cabinets are on the stoops.  Desks and chairs are in Wall Lockers.  Only the dim Fourth Stoop lights illuminate the three Barracks at night, casting strange shadows that seem to move.  The place is old.  Strange sounds echo off the walls, impossible to pinpoint.

It is the perfect environment for Ghosts.

Claudius

In 2010, VMI exhumed the remains of Claudius Crozet, a former engineer in the French army, Virginia state engineer, and the first president of the VMI Board of Visitors.  His iron casket had a glass viewing plate above his face.  Sadly, there is a hole in the case from the 1942 exhumation and movement from Shockhoe Cemetery.  This hole let moisture inside the case so Claudius decomposed.  Only his clothes remain.  The casket rested in Kilborne Hall over the summer until summer construction ended.

Kady was working at the museum and called me to come to have a look.  I  went down to Kilborne as fast as I could go.  It was so cool.  I called the Commandant and Deputy Commandant.  The Commandant was like me, enthralled with the event.  The Deputy was spooked and left the room.

I had Barracks supervisor duties that night.  During my shift, I made plans to prank The Deputy when he had duty the next night.  While sleeping during my shift, all the guidon poles stacked in the corner of my office crashed to the floor.  They had been there all summer.  I could never figure out why they fell, but I had suspicions.

Good prank, Claudius!

Moving Furniture

One summer evening, two Summer Students, rising Seniors, came by my office, reporting furniture moving above their Old Barracks room.  No one was supposed to be in any of the second, third, or fourth stoop rooms in that barracks during the summer.  I investigated, thinking some students had found an unlocked party room.  I checked the rooms directly above and all rooms left and right, on every stoop.  Nothing seemed out of place, and all room doors were secure.

I told the Cadets to let me know if it happened again. 

They were back in less than an hour.  This time, I took them with me to investigate; still nothing.

We returned to their room.  I sat with them, listening, while we hatched a plan.

If we heard it again, one of them would run out into the courtyard with my Maglight to watch the stoops, another would run up the stairs next to Daniels/Lisa Arch, while I ran up the stairs in Sally Port.  We planned to work from the stairs to the room above theirs.  If needed, we would proceed to the third and then to the fourth until we caught the culprits.

Sure enough, we soon heard a wooden desk chair scraping across the ceiling above our heads.  We were out of the room and on the Second Stoop in seconds; there was no way for anyone to elude us.

We never found anyone or any explanation.  The sounds stopped that night.

Mr. Porter

During the building of Third Barracks, a workman named Bobby Porter fell to his death on the back side of the construction.  Just before Cadets would occupy it for the first time, I took my family touring.  I walked them all over the building, pointing out the similarities and differences to the older barracks.

Looking out of the fourth stoop windows, I pointed out the height and told them about Mister Porter.

Finishing my tour, I walked everyone down the back stairs, past the new Latrines, turning right to exit the new arch.  As we passed each room, from New Sally Port to Third Barracks Arch, the doors slammed violently shut, one after the other, just as we passed them.

For a final cleaning, all room doors and windows were open.  It was a moderately windy day.  The concaved front of VMI Barracks is famous for scooping up and channeling the wind, so the doors slamming could have been that, but I knew what it was.

I told my family, I think Bobby wants us out of his Barracks.

The Scary Cadet

VMI makes no secret about how physical it is, billing itself as the Toughest School in the Nation.  Sadly, they sometimes lose a Rat during training, a rare occurrence.  One Fall, a young man collapsed during a run because of an undiagnosed pre-existing medical condition.  Nothing the medics or doctors did would have saved his life.

He lived in Third Barracks.

The following year, during the night that Rats meet the Rat Disciplinary Committee, a member of the Cadre noticed a Rat who looked pale and was staring across the courtyard at the other side of Third Barracks.  Approaching the Rat, he asked if he was OK.  The Rat said, That Cadet is staring at me and I’m scared.

The Cadreman looked where the Rat pointed and saw nothing.   When asked to describe the Cadet, he said he had no legs and was floating above the stoop.  Then, he described the young man who had died the year before.

Is VMI haunted?  I will let you decide.  All I know is that I do not challenge the Mural in JM Hall or go inside the Barracks alone at night.