Ghost Hunt at West Virginia Penitentiary Part 2

Part Two
Part One
Part Three
Part Four

The newly formed W.E.E. Ghosties (Winchester Entity Experts) visited Moundsville, West Virginia to take part in an all night ghost hunt at the now closed West Virginia Penitentiary. This is the second post in a four part series on our ghost hunt at West Virginia Penitentiary last weekend. Part One focused on the event of the night. This post will feature the Electronic Voice Phenomenas (EVPs) taken that night.

For those of you interested in the equipment, I used an RCA RP5030 Digital Voice Recorder. It proved to be a good little recorder first time out. Easy to use both for recording purposes as well as playback. I plan to use this recorder for more than EVPs. Years ago I recorded to cassette for writing purposes as well as preparing for speeches and practicing for presentations. I think it will come in handy for my novel revisions. Rather than post recordings that are sometimes up to twenty minutes in length, I downloaded a little Mac shareware program called MP3 Trimmer. If it works out and I plan to continue to use the program, the cost is only $10.95.

On to the EVPs. From the Sugar Shack early in the evening I uncovered two EVPs that I thought were rather interesting. In the recording titled “Riot,” Stacey asks if any ghost present was part of the prison riots. I have researched two riots/takeovers that took place at the prison, one in 1973 and one in 1986. Both resulted in the loss of at least one inmate. However, the whispered response is “No.” You will need to turn up the volume in order to hear it. The second EVP titled “Is life easy here?” received a more adamant response that can be taken as either a scream or an angry “No!” You be the judge.

The third recording titled “Charlie and Bobby (#1)” is from the hallway where we heard and witnessed the rattling window. See Part One of this series for more background information on this encounter. About 17 seconds into the recording you will hear a fellow ghost hunter address the window rattler as Charlie and Bobby which prompts the rattling. At about 24 seconds in, Polly states “You were killed in the maintenance room.” Then our first ghost hunter asks “Do you know who was killed in the maintenance room?” which causes more rattling. In “Charlie and Bobby (#2)” the rattling is much quieter when they are questioned about whether or not they ratted anyone out for the killing in the maintenance room. In “Charlie and Bobby (#3)” Charlie and Bobby feel ignored and begin to rattle loudly when the subject is changed. “Charlie and Bobby (#4)” is a rather long EVP. It starts with a noise from the maintenance room which several of us leave to hall to investigate. I hear the window rattling again and return to the hall. As I reenter the hallway there is whispering on the recording that I cannot account for. Finally, in “Charlie and Bobby (#5)” a little ghostie humor from the ghost hunters.

Up next in Part Three: the photographs.