The Bell Witch was always a favorite
legend growing up here in
Tennessee. (
Adams, TN, where all the fun took place, is about 70 miles from my childhood home.)
Elementary school teachers tended to assign her as a report topic, and naturally
Kate (the name the witch allegedly claimed) came up at
camp fires and such. However, until happening across the
Bloody Mary node (trying to figure out what I was drinking Thursday night) and reading a similar
urban legend, I'd completely forgotten about our version, endlessly repeated on
playgrounds. With some small variation, the instructions for summoning the Bell Witch went like this:
1. Go into a room with no windows and a mirror. (usually a bathroom)
2. Turn out the lights. (or fail to turn them on, as appropriate)
3. Whirl in a circle three times, repeating, "Bell Witch" each time.
4. Turn on the lights... check out the three new scratches that would supposedly appear on your face.
5. Think up a good story to tell your parents about the origins of the scratches.
While I knew several girls who claimed this worked (usually, incidentally, cat owners), it certainly never did so for me! (Admittedly, not being a big fan of getting scratched, I never tried much.) In
playground popular opinion, this was due to
faulty instructions and/or some failure to follow them properly.
Also vaguely related to the Bell Witch - near the former Bell family farm, there's a
Bell Witch Cave. Some people claim the
poltergeist went to it when she left the
Bells. A few eerie incidents are still reported from time to time... but whether or not it's really
haunted, it's open to tourists. Directions for getting there can be found at http://www.prairieghosts.com/b-cave.html.