10 Haunted Places In Jacksonville
Photograph courtesy of David Gano
It has captured the imaginations of Jaxons for decades. Abandoned for 54 years, unsubstantiated claims range from a cannibal principal who ate students to a 1960s furnace explosion that killed several people.
While it's doubtful that longtime principal "Miss Annie" Lytle Housh ate her students, the school's architect, Rutledge Holmes, did kill himself with a .32-caliber pistol in 1929. Reported to have been heavily drinking for a while, according to Reclaiming Jacksonville, his suicide note read:
"Do not notify any one. I have some pains in the region of my heart. Should I die I would like to be wrapped in one of my camping blankets and buried under some pretty trees in the country in an unmarked grave. Take what I have in Quincy for the trouble. R. Holmes."
Whatever one believes, it's hard to deny that the Annie Lytle is a creepy place.
Click HERE for more interior images of Annie Lytle Elementary School.
Ambassador Hotel
Photograph courtesy of Nomeus
The first upscale apartments in downtown Jacksonville, the Ambassador Hotel originally opened in 1924 as 310 West Church Street Apartments. In 1944, it was converted into a hotel. Its Senator George Smathers suite was the room that Smathers slept in on May 2, 1950, the night he defeated Senator Claude Pepper for nomination to the United States Senate. However, by the time the 1980's crack epidemic came, the Ambassador and its seedy Downtowner Lounge had become a dilapidated den of wickedness with rooms being rented for $15/day to transients. It's been 15 years since it was shut down and closed for good by code enforcement. Let's just hope that whenever someone reopens its doors, they won't have an Amityville horror situation on their hands.
Click HERE for more interior images of the abandoned Ambassador Hotel.
Bostwick Building
Built shortly after the Great Fire of 1901, the former Guaranty Trust and Savings Bank is one of downtown's most recognizable vacant historic buildings. Currently slated to become downtown's newest steakhouse, in 1925, the bank's head cashier Thomas R. Hendricks committed suicide inside of the building.
Click HERE for more interior images of the Bostwick Building.
Brick Church Cemetery
This place has poltergeist written all over it. During the Civil War, it was the site of a brick church just outside of Jacksonville, where a small battle took place.
A small command under Lieutenant Strange of the Third Florida had been ordered to capture federal guards, if possible, without bloodshed. In the tension, there was almost instant confusion over the demands being shouted back and forth and when the Federals fired into the Confederate ranks, the little incident turned into a small but raging general battle. Several Southrons were injured in that first volley, and though they only had half the numbers of the Confederates, the federals were behind walls and trees, and tombstones, in the church yard, well-positioned to repel attacks. In the ensuing general engagement, Lieutenant Strange was mortally wounded somewhere close to the church. There were no accurate counts of the dead or wounded, and if other battlefields are any indicator, many of those bodies lay alongside the abandoned roads of a war torn city, until animals and time had removed the last traces.
In addition to the battle, a small cemetery existed behind the church. In typical developer friendly Jacksonville fashion, a warehouse development was allowed approval to build right on top of the 19th century cemetery. Today, thousands of cars drive right pass this site near Myrtle Avenue and Church Street every day. The warehouse appears to be long vacant. We wouldn't be surprised if someone's little girl starts conversing with the television set and hollers, "They're Here!"
Click HERE for more information about Jacksonville's lost cemetery.
Camp Milton
Camp Milton has been recognized as the “last remaining unrecognized and unprotected Civil War battle site in the state of Florida.”
Camp Milton, named after Florida's Governor John Milton, was among the most significant fortifications built in Florida by Confederate authorities during the Civil War. Located west of McGirts Creek, Camp Milton became the eastern Florida military headquarters for the Confederate States of America (CSA), housing 6,000 infantry, 1,500 calvary, and 430 field pieces.
While it was no Gettysburg or Antietam, it was the site of a three-day skirmish between the Confederates and 400 Union troops. The Union forces quickly captured the line. A site where many souls were lost is probably a place where you shouldn't hang out alone at night.
Click HERE for more images of Camp Milton.
Captain W.J. King Residence
This Mayport house was occupied by Captain William Joseph King in the late 19th century. It's been the site of so many freaky things that in 1968, parapsychology researchers from Duke University examined the residence. Their report concluded that some sort of "presence" exists within the house.
Witnesses say a rocking chair moves on its own, the very chair where some say King’s aunt was killed by pitchfork by a jealous ex-boyfriend. High heels have been heard walking in the unoccupied attic, and another ghost called Little Butler is said to open doors for visitors. A spirit maid is said to throw her weight around in the kitchen, and a ghostly bride is said to reside here as well. She is rumored to have died in a car crash outside the house on her wedding day. A 1999 book called Jetty Man by Bill Reynolds tells of the hauntings.
Source: https://www.hauntedplaces.org/item/king-house/
The Carling
Today, the Carling is a restored luxury apartment building in the heart of the Northbank and a testament to downtown's revitalization. On the night of December 29, 1963, while filled with visitors in town for the Gator Bowl, the building became a 13-story tower of terror. Then known as the Roosevelt Hotel, a fire broke out resulting in the deaths of 21 guests and Jacksonville Fire Department Chief James Romedy.
Click HERE to see a brief video from 1963 of the Roosevelt Hotel fire that claimed 21 souls.
Ford Motor Company Assembly Plant
The Jacksonville Ford assembly plant is one of 1,000 buildings designed by Albert Kahn for Ford. The building was one of 16 satellite plants constructed after Kahn's one-story, steel-framed model was perfected with Ford's Rouge River complex in Detroit. Completed in 1924, the plant employed as many as 800 workers churning out 200 Model A cars each day. It remained operational until 1932 and subsequently was used as a parts warehouse until 1968.
While we haven't heard about any paranormal activity happening at the site, it is the type of place where bodies can easily disappear and that a guy like John "The Jigsaw Killer" Kramer would have a field day.
Click HERE for more images inside the Ford Motor Company Assembly Plant.
Moncrief Cemetery District
This just might be the most disturbed place in Jacksonville. There are four prominent cemeteries near the intersection of Moncrief Road and 45th Street, that were established for African-Americans during the Jim Crow era. Most of these burial grounds were maintained by the Memorial Cemetery Association. The association was created by Jacksonville's first black millionaire, Abraham Lincoln Lewis. Already in decline, when Abraham Lincoln Lewis's Afro-American Life Insurance Company ceased operations in 1990, no entity was left to maintain them. Today, these cemeteries contain broken vaults and exposed caskets in a landscape where mother nature is naturally reclaiming what had been a well maintained final resting place for many early 20th century African-American Jaxsons.
Click HERE for more images and information on Mt. Olive Cemetary.
Old St. Luke's Hospital and the Florida Casket Factory
Completed in 1878, this hospital building played a prominent role in caring for Jacksonville's citizens stricken by the yellow fever epidemic in 1888, the typhoid epidemic ten years later, and the Great Fire of 1901. In 1885, St. Luke's established the first modern nursing school in Florida. In 1914, the hospital moved to a larger complex in Springfield. In succeeding years, the old building served as a coffin factory and a warehouse, before standing vacant for several years. According to Hauntedplaces.org, rumor has it that witnesses claim ghostly patients and nurses are occasionally seen walking down its halls.
Click HERE for more images and information on Old St. Luke's Hospital.
Article by Ennis Davis, AICP. Contact Ennis at edavis@moderncities.com