Legend has it that right about the time Betty Davis of Tallahassee started to investigate paranormal goings-on in nearby Monticello, a young bride-to-be found a lovely, like-new antique wedding dress in the front window of a consignment store there. This was before 2003, when ABC News designated the place "the South's most-haunted small town."
Made by hand by a Tallahassee dressmaker with fabrics and notions from New York City, the dress had been brought to the store by a distant relative of its former owner. He'd found it in an attic, wrapped in a 90-year-old newspaper. When the young woman fastened the dress around her neck, she felt a sharp, painful pinprick, but she thought its inner facing had just become stiff with age, and didn't give it another thought. But then she brought the dress to another shop for alteration. The second the seamstress touched scissors to the dress, the young woman felt unseen hands wrap around her neck and choke her until she nearly lost consciousness.
She later found out the dress had belonged to Priscilla Deloren, who died of grief — or by her own hand; nobody really knows — after her husband-to-be left her at the altar in 1920. All involved thought it best to burn the dress, lest it find its way to another unsuspecting bride-to-be, and legend has it that a bloodcurdling scream came out of nowhere as the garment went up in flames.
This story of "The Jilted Bride" is included in "Haunted Monticello, Florida," a new collection of ghost stories published this summer by The History Press' Haunted America Series. The compendium of well-researched, historically accurate spooky tales also includes one about Dr. Palmer, whose house is thought to be the most haunted building in Monticello. Palmer sold a malaria remedy known only as 666 and operated a mortuary out of an upstairs bedroom, which is host to a bloodstain that has been covered periodically over the years with paint and other walls, only to reappear at will.
Davis, who wrote "Haunted Monticello" with Cairo, Ga.-based psychic Christine McVicker, owns and has operated the nonprofit Historic Monticello Ghost Tour since 2001. She told Dr. Palmer's story to her increasingly creeped-out tour group on a sultry summer night as they stood in front of the Palmer house. They stared at a garden statue that reportedly turns itself around on its own accord and smelled eerie candle smoke that came out of nowhere as they peered at the upstairs window for a glimpse of Palmer's ghost.
"One in every three buildings in Monticello is either haunted or has experienced a haunting," she said, detailing experiences she'd had as a paranormal investigator, spending the night inside each one. She stood in front of the Palmer House, listening for emissions from visitors' smart phones equipped with apps that reportedly pick up ghostly electromagnetic frequencies. She pointed behind her at the house, where she'd recently spent the night with members of the Big Bend Ghost Trackers.
"People ask us if we get scared spending the night inside these houses. Along with my flashlights, my EMF meters and all my other handy-dandy ghost tools, I always pack up an extra pair of underwear," she joked. "At this particular house, I thought I was going to have to fight the rest of them for my extra pair of underwear."
During October — when she and other tour operators don Victorian gowns to make things extra spooky for Halloween — Davis gives 50 percent of her proceeds back to the town of Monticello. She has books and T-shirts for sale at every tour. To schedule a ghost tour or get more information on ghost hunting workshops, visit www.bigbendghosttrackers.com.
By Kim MacQueen
The Tallahassee Democrat
