The Bell Witch of Adams, Tennessee
In the early 1800’s several families traveled to the large plains of Tennessee to build new homes and farms. Soon one family was haunted by a terrifying spirit that became known as The Bell Witch. But, where did the legend come from, and what parts actually happened?
The Bell home before it was torn down in the early 20th century
Part 1 - The Legend of The Bell Witch
“I fear not the dark itself, but what may lurk within it.”
— Unknown
The 1800s were a time of great expansion for the United States and a time for opportunistic families to purchase land to try their hand at farming. Often, several families traveled together in order to brave the dangers of the terrain.
In 1804 the Bell and Batts families were both one of these opportunists and traveled together with others to the new lands of Tennessee, little did they know their fates would be intertwined for the rest of time.
The Batts and The Bells
The Batts were very early on affected by the harsh environment of the 1800s. The patriarch of the family, Frederick Batts, fell ill several years into arriving to the new farm and was left unable to do much work.
While the matriarch of the family, Catherine, who often went by Kate, was left to take on many of the responsibilities of the farm. As this was unusual for the time, those who didn’t know Frederick saw Kate as a tough and mysterious woman. Rumors began to spread questioning whether Kate was practicing witchcraft in the dark recesses of her home in order to complete the farm work on her own.
Despite Kate’s hard work, with Frederick’s illness and his inability to assist with tending the farm, it was decided they would sell off pieces of their land. One of the first takers was their neighbors and fellow travelers, the Bell family.
The Bells consisted of Lucy Bell and her husband John Bell along with their six children. Unlike the Batts, the Bells were respected and mainly well-liked in the nearby town. John Bell had a reputation for creating successful farms prior to moving to Tennessee and their new farm was looking to be the same.
The respect he garnered allowed him to become a prominent member of the local Red River Baptist Church.
A Rivalry Emerges
Hearing the Batts family was interested in selling off portions of their land, John Bell jumped at the opportunity. But he also knew of the Batts' financial situation and took advantage by offering Kate Batts a substantially lower price than what was being asked.
With no other option, the Batts family took the offer but the transaction brought about a newfound hatred from Kate Batts toward the Bell family, specifically John Bell. A short time later, in 1817, John Bell also purchased a young slave girl from another farmer, Benjamin Batts, who happened to be the brother of Kate Batts.
Although the sale was complete, John Bell stated he would return in a few days to pick up the girl. Upon his return, Benjamin Batts felt the girl was worth more than the price Bell paid and wanted to resell her. The two negotiated and in the end, John Bell sold the girl back to Benjamin Batts for a much larger price than what he originally paid.
After hearing the events, Kate felt that John Bell had once again taken advantage of her family and urged Benjamin to do something about it. Benjamin Batts took action and filed a lawsuit against Bell. While the church felt Bell was justified in his actions and defended him, the courts disagreed.
John Bell was found guilty of usury, the act of charging excessive interest. With this guilty conviction spreading throughout the towns, the Red River Baptist Church decided to distance itself from John and went the extra length of excommunicating him. Some say the act of being shunned by the church opened up the family to evil.
Evil Comes Knocking
In the fall of 1817 while out tending to his land, John Bell and his son, Drew, began to hear the sound of a strange growling. The two ventured further into the corn fields and spotted an animal that John Bell would later describe as having the body of a large dog and the head of a rabbit.
The sudden appearance of the animal frightened the two and triggered John Bell to fire several shots at the creature. Believing to have struck and killed it, the two Bells cautiously approached where they believe the animal fell but, to their shock, found no evidence of it.
Though nothing else out of the ordinary happened that day, that night was the first night the family reported the sounds of knocking coming from somewhere outside of their log cabin. With each passing day, the knocking became louder and more forceful.
On several nights, when the knocking was too much to take, John Bell rushed outside to catch the culprit but every time there would be nothing in the vicinity or any evidence of someone or something banging on the cabin. Little did the family know this was just the beginning of their terrors that would soon become an everyday occurrence.
The Haunting at the Bell Farm
Several days after the knocking began, the children started to complain of scratching sounds coming from their beds. Invisible fighting dogs were heard outside the homes at all hours of the night. And, the sounds of furniture being moved and thrown about echoed in the night yet, when a family member checked the rooms, nothing would be out of place.
At first, while the sounds were disturbing, no one seemed to be in any real danger but as time went on, whatever malicious spirit was causing the trouble grew in strength.
The children were targeted and began experiencing more tangible events. At night as they slept, their pillows, blankets, and covers were violently pulled from them. The children would awaken finding their belongings thrown across the room with no explanation.
And then the whispers began.
One of the children, in particular, Elizabeth (Betsy) Bell, became the target of whatever entity was haunting them. One night Betsy Bell’s dream suddenly ended with a powerful slap to her face.
She woke terrified but as she made her attempt to move, she found her hair tied to the bedpost. Before she could reach to untie herself, an invisible entity slapped Betsy again and again.
Her screams woke the rest of the family and they rushed into her room to find her laying there with hand-sized welts on her face. This was just the start of the physical hauntings the family would start to experience.
A Violet and Loving Witch
Word spread to the nearby town of a spirit haunting the Bell family and with that, came a constant stream of visitors, either to disprove the tales or to see it themselves. During one of these visits, a man asked aloud, “Who or what are you?” to the spirit.
For the first time, the spirit spoke in a clear voice and demanded to be called the “old kate batts’ witch”. From that point forward the witch would willingly answer questions but only when called Kate.
Other times she would sing hymns, quote scripture, and taunt the family. But one family member she loved was the matriarch Lucy Bell, describing her as the perfect woman and mother. On the opposite end of the spectrum, The Bell Witch despised John Bell and threatened several times to take his life.
A Famous Visitor
As the tale of the bell witch continued to spread across multiple towns, more and more visitors came by hoping to witness the events. One man by the name of William Porter, who stayed for the night, claimed the witch climbed into bed with him.
Thinking quickly he tied her up in the sheets and attempted to throw her into the fireplace hoping to rid the Bells of the spirit. It was then the sheets became too heavy to move and he was overtaken by a pungent putrid smell.
According to legends one visitor who came by to visit the Bells was none other than president Andrew Jackson in 1819, years prior to becoming president. On hearing about the hauntings troubling the Bell family and having led some of the older Bell children into battle, Andrew Jackson took it upon himself to visit the home and hopefully help.
For the journey, Jackson traveled with a few men, one of which was a self-proclaimed witch tamer. Upon reaching the outskirts of the farm, the wagon the group was riding in became so heavy that horses could not pull it. It is here that Andrew Jackson was said to have proclaimed “by the eternal, that must be the bell witch!”
The proclamation drew a response from a female voice who laughed and allowed them to proceed but threatened to see them later that night. Within 24 hours Andrew Jackson and the rest of his men had fled the farm.
It is rumored that after experiencing a large amount of paranormal activity including one of his men being thrown out of the home, Andrew Jackson announced “I’d rather face the whole British Army than face the bell witch again.”
The Death of John Bell
As the years of the hauntings went on, the health of the Bell’s patriarch slowly began to deteriorate. John Bell experienced sudden episodes of choking and the inability to swallow or speak. On December 19, 1820. John Bell did not wake from his sleep.
As he appeared to be in a coma, his family rushed to his medicine cabinet but found it empty except for a mysterious vial with a foul liquid. To test it, one of the Bell boys gave a few drops of the liquid to the family cat causing it to drop dead instantly.
Moments after the cat died a loud cackling was heard and the bell witch announced, “I gave ol’ jack a big dose of that last night which fixed him!”
The very next day John Bell passed away at the age of 70.
It’s said after his death the hauntings ceased for a time, except for his funeral where the bell witch was heard laughing and singing drinking songs.
A year later the witch reappeared when Betsy Bell was set to marry Joshua Gardner, a long-time fiance of hers. The witch appeared constantly to taunt and harass the two and warned Betsy of marrying Joshua. This was enough for Betsy to call off the engagement. She would go on to marry a man named Richard Powell several years later.
PART 2 - Other Versions of the Legend
“I believe in ghosts, but we create them. We haunt ourselves.”
— Laurie Anderson
The story of the Bell Witch has had many variations in the past, mainly due to the story being told mostly orally until the late 1800s.
The first book, or full account, of the events that transpired on the Bell Farm, came about in the book Authenticated History of the Bell Witch by Martin Ingram. The book was based on and included the first-hand account of Richard Bell, one of John Bell’s children.
"Authenticated"
While the version I wrote above is a condensed version of the most prominent version and appears in Martin’s book, there are a few variations out there. Some retellings of the story have Kate Batts being a widow who was at one point engaged to John Bell but after he broke up with her, she swore revenge.
Another retelling has Kate Batts dying after the sale of the farm and placing a curse on John Bell. Her rage caused her spirit to return as a vengeful witch who brought along other spirits, sometimes up to 5, to haunt the Bells. In reality, the real Kate Batts lived a long life, well past John Bell’s death.
Other retellings omit Kate Batts completely from the story and, based on some historical documents, those versions are closer to what really happened as there are no records of her and John Bell interacting. Even the sale of land to the Bells from the Batt’s never actually happened.
So what can we say for sure actually happened?
Part 3 - Separating Fact from Fiction
“Believe nothing you hear, and only one half that you see.”
— Edgar Allan Poe
The most likely theory in my opinion is most, if not all, of the story, was made up by Martin Ingram. While the people may have existed and records do show the death of John Bell, there is no record or document linking him or his family to a ‘Kate Batts’.
Martin Ingram’s Source
The only account comes from Martin Ingram’s book which, despite using Richard Bell’s diary as his first-hand account, it turns out Richard was born in 1811 making him 6 years old at the time the haunting began and 10 by the time his father died. Richard also didn’t write the events into his diary until 30 years later.
Martin Ingram’s book which was published 70 years after the supposed events, used the 30-year-old memories of someone trying to remember what happened when they were a 10-year-old child. On top of this. Martin Ingram was a newspaper writer during a time when newspapers were for entertainment as much as news, so embellishment was not out of the question.
The involvement of Kate Batts and her family in the lives of the Bells vary widely based on who is telling the story. While records show that the excommunication of John Bell from the church due to a dispute with Benjamin Batts is historically accurate, the excommunication occurred in 1818 well after the spirit supposedly began showing up.
Andrew Jackson
Another major event of the legend that can be disproven is Andrew Jackson’s involvement. It was said that after the events, Andrew Jackson refused to ever speak about what happened that night. But if the story is true then others spread the word.
In 1828, Andrew Jackson faced President John Quincy Adams in a vicious and ruthless Presidential Election. It was an election that included personal attacks targeting Jackson’s marriage which he would later claim caused the death of his wife.
Andrew Jackson was widely known as a man with a tough exterior and a short temper. If the story of him being outmatched and frightened by a ghost actually happened in 1819, it would have definitely been used by the Adams campaign to attack Jackson in 1828. On top of this, there is no surviving document, letter, or journal by Andrew Jackson or anyone else that details an encounter with the Bell Witch.
John Bell’s Death
But what about John Bell’s death? There is no record or document attributing his death to the witch or anything supernatural. While it’s not known what killed John Bell, it has been suspected to have been caused by a neurological disease. As it was 1820, many neurological diseases that can affect a 70-year-old man were not widely understood.
The vial that supposedly killed John Bell and the cat was said to have been thrown into the fireplace where it exploded into a blue flame shooting up into the chimney. This means there is no physical evidence and this part of the legend comes from Martin Ingram’s book, which again, comes from Richard Batt’s hardly credible memories.
Today there are many books, movies, documentaries, songs, plays, and tourist attractions based on the story and adapted from the story of the Bell Witch. Unsurprisingly every adaptation changes the story a bit to fit the vision of the creator.
This causes new supposedly haunted events like the Bell Witch Cave to spur up out of nothing but then again, maybe the entire Bell Witch legend was also spurred out of nothing.
Other Sources
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