Haunted Heartland

The story of Celeste McVoy Holden can be found in the book Haunted Heartland by Beth Scott and Michael Norman (pp. 232—234).

The Other Side
In St. Louis, Mrs. Pearl Curran wrote entire novels and sonnets while a spirit named Patience Worth guided her hand. Mrs. Curran claimed to know nothing of how the writing came to take place and, indeed, was shown to be ignorant of many of the names, places and events included in the poetry and stories. More recently, a British woman, who had never studied musical composition in her life, claimed that long-dead composers, including Beethoven, were using her to write symphonies. She would sit before blank sheets of music notepaper, her hand flying across the pages, jotting down musical phrases. When played, the pieces sounded much like the music of the composer with whose spirit the woman said she was communicating.

But there are even more bizarre incidents of what has been called automatic writing, including one in Michigan in the early 1960's in which a spirit message probably saved a woman and her infant daughter from the murderous intentions of her berserk, estranged husband.

The city of Pentwater lies north of Grand Rapids on the rocky shore of Lake Michigan. It comes to life each summer as hundreds of families from Detroit, Chicago, and other large, industrial cities of the Middle West trek northward to the sunny beaches and clear air of the lakeshore. Near Pentwater lived Celeste McVoy Holden, recently separated from her husband, in an isolated residence of many rooms and several wings, typical of the bygone era when summer homes were as grand as permanent residences. Aside from a chauffeur and a maid who lived in Pentwater and came to the house during the day, Mrs. Holden and her four-month-old daughter lived alone in the rambling mansion.

The summer after she separated from her husband, Mrs. Holden invited one of her closest friends, a well-known artist, Mrs. Buell Mullen, to spend a few weeks at the Pentwater house. Mrs. Mullen, famous for her etchings and paintings on stainless steel, lived in New York City and exhibited her work in galleries from Brazil to Detroit. President Eisenhower once commissioned her to etch his likeness as a gift to a military regiment.

Mrs. Mullen agreed to come and arranged with her husband to meet her later at the house. He had some business to finish before he could get away.

Shortly after her arrival, alone in her room, Mrs. Mullen sat down at the desk to write a letter. She wanted to give her husband the rather complicated directions to the Holden house. Suddenly, her hand was jerked away from the paper, as if it had been grabbed by some unseen intruder. She fought unsuccessfully for control. Then, she watcher her hand, as if it belonged to someone else, move across the paper writing without any conscious effort on her part. The handwriting was different from her own and the words: "Beware! Beware! Beware!" made no sense to her. Beware of what? Then her hand scrawled the word "Jack" across the stationery.

Buell Mullen ran to Celeste Holden's room, told her what had happened and showed her the paper. Mrs. Holden blanched. "Jack," she said, her voice trembling, "is my former husband's name." His violent temperament was part of the reason they had separated. Were the women being warned that he might do them harm?

Hoping to find the source of the mysterious message, Celeste and Buell searched the house for an Ouija board. When they found none, they went to Pentwater to buy one. Back home, they sat the board across their knees, with their hands resting on the teardrop-shaped marker.

When Mrs. Holden asked what was going to happen, the words spelled out in response terrified them: "Murder, you and your child." Then: "Prepare!"

But how? She had no weapon. Celeste telephoned her chauffeur and, without revealing the cause of her concern, asked if he could come to the house at a moment's notice in case of trouble. He said he could.

As it was getting late, Celeste and Buell locked each door and window, picked up the sleeping baby and retreated to the most secure wing. Here they piled furniture against the doors, blocked the windows and — waited. Unable to sleep, they played cards through the long night, stopping and listening hard each time they heard the slightest sound. Eventually morning came and nothing had happened.

The women felt silly to have taken seriously such an absurd notion as spirit communication. Until two days later. A friend named John Malloy phoned to ask Celeste if she had seen Jack. The startled woman said no, she assumed he was in the city.

Then Malloy told her that two nights before he had seen Jack in Pentwater. Jack had staggered into a party at nearby Harbor Point, drunk, waving a gun and boasting to the stunned gathering that he was going to kill his wife and baby. Malloy had wrestled the gun away and calmed Jack down. Holden had left the party about three o'clock in the morning. Malloy assured Celeste that was the last they had seen of him.

Celeste thanked Malloy and put down the phone. Had Jack left town at three a.m. as Malloy had said? Or had he left the party and come to kill them as he had sworn to do? Perhaps they would never know whether the action they took to barricade themselves into the most inaccessible part of the house had saved their lives. And all because of a most timely warning from — the other side.