TextSearch

Science may\u00a0finally\u00a0unravel the\u00a0paranormal tale of the Bell\u00a0family's\u00a0haunting\u00a0that’s captured our imagination for\u00a0more than\u00a0200\u00a0years.

Bell Witch lore spins dark tale, but could science explain it all?Katie Nixon | Clarksville Leaf-ChronicleScience may finally unravel the centuries-old, paranormal tale of the Bell family haunting, a story that’s captured the imagination of area residents and Hollywood executives alike for more than 200 years. Austin Peay State University's Dr. Meagan Mann, an assistant professor of chemistry, talked about her research and subsequent theories on the Bell Witch during a Science on Tap event, held in Clarksville earlier this month.“I’m hoping that people can see this old and magical case through new and scientific eyes,” Mann said in prepared statements, ahead of an interview with The Leaf-Chronicle. Ancient and modern folklore suggests the Bell Witch poisoned the family's patriarch John Bell, something Mann’s research can explain through science. Where the research began Mann began researching the Bell Witch in 2008 and appeared in the debut of A&E’s new American documentary drama and paranormal investigative series, Cursed: The Bell Witch. The five-part show premiered in October of 2015 and was filmed on location in Adams, Tenn. She became interested in the legend shortly after moving to Robertson County, when she spotted the Bell Witch cave sign on Interstate 24's exit 11. “I didn’t know what it was, so I was curious, and that’s when I started looking into it,” Mann said, noting that one of the biggest draws to the tale is its believability. “It has some level of truth behind it which is unusual for a ghost story. We know that John Bell and his family were real people. There are records that these people lived here in this area, and so that kind of sets it apart from a lot of other legends in a way that’s kind of fun, I think.” The Bell Witch legend explainedThe story starts with John Bell, a farmer from North Carolina who moved with his family to a 320-acre, northern Robertson County farm in 1804. For more than a decade, the Bell family lived in peace, until strange events began occurring around the farm and their home in the summer of 1817. They began to see strange-looking animals and heard knocking sounds on the door and walls at night, according to legend.Other disturbing sounds included rats gnawing on bed posts, chains dragging through the home, stones dropping on the floor and gulping and choking sounds.Eventually, the family made contact with a paranormal entity who identified itself as the witch of a neighbor named Kate Batts. From then on, it was known as Kate or the Bell Witch.For the next three years, “Kate” tormented the family, none more so than John Bell and his daughter, Betsy Bell, who was pinched, scratched, stuck with pins and beaten, according to legend. Some historians say the witch's efforts were meant to keep Betsy Bell from marrying the family's neighbor Joshua Gardner and to ultimately kill John Bell – though no reason as to why had ever been provided. In December of 1820, John Bell died from poisoning. Betsy Bell broke off her engagement with Gardner the following year. Over the last century, it’s thought that “Kate” has returned twice, once in 1828 and again in 1935 – though many local residents believe she's never truly left the area and remains in Adams today. Eternal life at Union Station: Spirits of the past live on in America's best haunted hotelTennessee towns: Self-guided Tennessee road trips promise big fun from some small townsPoisoned, but with what? For Mann, one of the most fascinating aspects of the legend has to do with John Bell’s medical symptoms. “At the bottom of that story is really a poisoning... John Bell was supposedly poisoned to death,” she said. In an effort to learn more, she dove into a written account of the haunting, Our Family Trouble: The Story of the Bell Witch of Tennessee by Richard Williams Bell, John Bell’s son. “His son talked about all of these strange medical symptoms he was having, and a lot of them sounded very neurological to me, as someone who knows a bit about things like biochemistry and toxicology,” Mann said. “He would have trouble swallowing, and his tongue felt weird... he would start getting this weird twitching sensation in his face, and eventually, it grew to the point where it was kind of impacting him in other parts of his body – and if that happened to someone now, and you went to your doctor, they would send you to a neurologist." Even if John Bell's medical ailments could be explained, the fantastical events are less easily understood. “We have no way to authenticate them one way or the other,” Mann said. “Like his shoes would go flying off, and they just couldn’t be kept on his feet, and he felt like he was being smacked in the night... we can’t make heads or tails of any of that.” John Bell's final days In the book, Richard Bell goes into detail about his father's final days.“One morning, they couldn’t get him up,” Mann said, adding that family members discovered a smoky-looking vial full of a dark-colored liquid after J...