Edisto Island: Buried Alive

The South has many dark tales of hauntings. For years it has been stated the following tale is true. 

In the mid 19^th century Edisto Island located an hour south of Charleston, South Carolina was dotted with cotton plantations. It was said this island produced the best cotton in the South.

Unfortunately, the island also was a breeding ground for what at the time was one of the most feared diseases in America, Diphtheria. This disease was particularly deadly because most of its victims were children. 

Edisto Island is mostly wetlands and its dense, hot, muggy weather in combination with stagnant water helped spread this disease.

One wealthy cotton planter and his family, a wife, daughter, and son lived near the northern coast on the island. There was a breeze in this area, but his daughter one summer became ill. 

The slaves that cared for her panicked for her symptoms, a sore throat, and a high fever meant one thing to them-Diphtheria.

Over the next several days the father watched, helplessly as his daughter’s condition worsened. 

Diphtheria is an insidious disease that causes a person’s throat to swell—known as bull neck—it literally kills its victims by strangulation. Feeling helpless, the planter watched his daughter slowly die from suffocation.

On the island when a person died, it was imperative they were buried right away for the heat sped up the decomposition of the body. 

An important note in this story is the family waited several days for a close family relative to arrive before placing the daughter’s body in the family crypt. 

The stench from bodies during this period was so unbearable that people took “nosegays” with them to funerals, not to honor the deceased but instead to help them bear the smell.

Because of the delay, the father could not find anyone to help with his daughter's body, so he carried her body himself to the family crypt. 

The family was so grief-stricken they did not take note of the fact that the young girl’s body appeared as fresh as it was while she was alive. The planter placed her on a slab within the crypt and shut and locked the door.  

Ten years passed and the son, now a young man, went off with his regiment to fight in the Civil War. His parents were very proud, but tragically like so many other soldiers, he was sent back to them in a pine box. 

The family once again gathered at the crypt to say farewell to their son. But as they opened the crypt door, another nightmare awaited them.

To their horror the family found the bones of their daughter on the floor near the door. The bones of her fingers were shattered and frayed. The father discovered deep scratch marks on the door. 

Finally, remembering the state of his daughter’s body as he placed her on the slab, he now understood she was still alive, but he had sealed her fate when he locked the crypt door.

It appeared she had woken out of an apparent coma and crawled across the floor in the dark tomb attracted by the only light—which passed through the door’s keyhole. She had dug small holes in the door in her attempts to get out. 

People came forward and mentioned they had heard screams the day after the girl was placed in the crypt, but since they seemed a far way off, they ignored them.

Even today the crypt
has no door. 

This story doesn’t end here for several days after the family placed the son’s coffin in the crypt, the door, which had once more been locked, was discovered open ajar. Not thinking anything about it the family re-locked it. 

But the door was found standing open a few days later. This time the family sealed the door tightly. Within a few days, the door was wide open again. 

A friend of the family was enlisted to help seal and lock the door permanently; afterward, he assured the family that the door would now remain closed.

But the family was told a week later that the door was off its hinges and lying on the ground. At this point, the family had the door embedded into the floor of the crypt and then they had the remains of their family members buried.

This crypt is still near the woods behind the Edisto Presbyterian Church, which was established in the 1830s. Recent witnesses state that the scratch marks are still on the embedded door.