History & local legend
A cellar across the Chambersburg Pike from Mary Thompson’s house figures in one of Mark Nesbitt’s Seminary Ridge ghost stories. During the Battle of Gettysburg in July 1863, the Thompson property was associated with Confederate commander Robert E. Lee’s headquarters. In Nesbitt’s tale, soldiers clearing the surrounding ground placed bodies in a cool stone room beneath a barn across the street.
One soldier had been mistaken for dead. Trapped beneath the other bodies, he remained alive for several days before someone found him, but died soon after his rescue.
A house later stood on the barn’s foundation. According to the story, a couple living there heard violent blasts from the cellar and called a priest to cleanse the building. The disturbances stopped. Writing about the account again in 2019, Nesbitt said a former occupant had told him the priest’s mark—a cross inside a circle—could still be seen on the cellar door.
Sources
- Mark Nesbitt, 13 Hidden, Haunted Hotspots, recollection of his Ghosts of Gettysburg III account and personal conversation with an occupant
- Gettysburg Daily, named James Thompson house photograph and the location where Brady's studio photographed the three prisoners
- American Battlefield Trust, the two historic Thompson houses on opposite sides of the pike
- Library of Congress, three prisoners photographed at Gettysburg in July 1863
