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From: slt55@cc.usu.edu
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.ghost-stories
Subject: POLTERCAMP Story: Repost
Date: 7 Nov 97 08:49:48 MDT
After much arm twisting (you can let go now, Kevin), I have finally been convinced to write up the story of "Poltercamp". The writer/editor in me wanted to present this is in "story" form, and maybe I will some day. But since it is a true account, I hope the stark relaying of facts will suffice. I guess it is probably a good idea to write the facts down, since over the years events tend to get fuzzy and things that were certain seem less so. In this case, I don't think that will ever happen. Everything that I am about to record about that night high on Diamond Peak is true, and there is no way I will forget it. Though the events may not seem particulary terrifying to those who weren't there, they are disturbing and not readily explainable. This is what happened.
In the summer of 1987, my parents and I went camping in southwestern Wyoming with my brother Dirk and his family. Towing a tent trailer behind our car, we drove up a fairly rough dirt road till we were close to the summit of the mountain. The road was isolated as we drove up it, and what few camp sites that existed off the road were deserted. We arrived at the last camp site, which was where the road ended, without having seen another soul.
It was late afternoon when we arrived. The campsite was fairly heavily wooded, with aspens and pines intermingled. I remember feeling strange as we set up the campsite, kind of an eerie tense feeling, like a storm was coming. There wasn't a cloud in the sky, however. I remember that clearly because, as night came on, I decided to pass on the crowded trailer and sleep outside and look at the stars. My brother Dirk decided to do the same.
As we winded down for bed, my brother and I began discussing how eerie this place felt. It soon occurred to us that we hadn't heard a single bird or other animal since we had arrived. (Dirk had heard something when we first got there, having discovered a rickety forest service outhouse and decided to use it. In the middle of the "event" something in the pit began thrashing around, prompting Dirk to cut off mid-stream and dash out in case it was a skunk). Besides that one event, however, there had been absolute silence. Even now, as we lay and watched the stars, the only sound was the faint crackling of the fire.
Around 1 am, I began to hear a strange rushing sound. Sort of like an ocean wave coming in from far way. It grew louder as it came closer, and soon it was obvious that it was a gust of wind rustling through the trees. Just before it hit, Dirk and I felt the temperature around us plummet, turning a mild summer night into a biting cold. Then the wind exploded through our camp.
Exploded is the only word to describe the way this gust hit. It was intense, almost gale force. But the oddest thing about it was the way it blew things around. A folding chair was sent spinning off, when another sitting next to it didn't even move. Glasses and utensils flew off the picnic table, while paper plates and napkins didn't even rustle. And it was loud, making a rushing sound like a train roaring past.
This lasted for about 10 seconds, though I thought it would never end, and then it receded as it continued on past us to the north. My brother and I looked at each other in disbelief. "What the hell was that?" I said, and before he could answer, we heard the rushing build again. And the gust came back, only this time, it was coming south, back the direction it had just went, as though it had reversed course. Again the cold temperature hit us, right before the gust exploded into our camp and repeated it's strange behavior of knocking only certain items around. We listened as it receded again to the south.
Then we could hear it circling, and it came through again from the west, repeating the same behavior as before. Then, it once again reversed course and came at us from the east. Then it was gone.
Needless to say, Dirk and I were both wide awake by this time. We kept looking around us, waiting for the obnoxious wind to come back. Suddenly, we heard a scream, the kind a young girl makes (both of us have heard a mountain lion scream, and this wasn't it). It was off in the distance to the east, the same direction the wind had last gone. We both got up, grabbed a flashlight and walked a ways into the forest, yelling "hello? Who's there?" There was no answer.
After a couple of minutes we went back to our sleeping bags and lay back down. A few minutes later, we both heard the faint sounds of someone crying. It also sounded like a young girl. We got up and yelled again, but there was no answer. We even ventured a little ways from the camp, but the crying never seemed to get any closer. Finally we lay back down again, and about an hour after it had started, the crying stopped.
It wasn't until the light of a false dawn began to creep on the horizon that I was able to convince myself to sleep. And my dreams weren't much better. I woke up with the lasting image of a girl in a old frontier style dress sitting in front of cabin on a huge log. She was crying, and the cabin door was hanging partially off of the door frame.
When I got up, Dirk and I decided to go out and see if we could find another camp and find out if someone had been hurt. We headed east, and as we came over a rise about two hundred yards from our camp, I felt my heart skip a beat. At the base of the rise was the foundation of a ruined cabin, and the crumbled remains of large log lay in front of it, exactly as it had been in my dream.
We went back to camp, noticing again the lack of any sounds of wildlife. We decided not to stay another night after all and left that same morning. And while there may be some explanation for all this, I don't plan on camping there again.
If you'd like to e-mail comments or questions (both are welcome), please send them to either me at: cmurcray@awwa.org Or my brother at: kmurcray@du.edu
Happy Halloween!!
Copyright 1997 by Colin Murcray. All rights reserved.
This and other true ghost stories may be found at:
http://www.du.edu/~kmurcray/ghost.htm
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