The Haunted Winchester Mansion, San Jose, California

Oct 15

On 525 South Winchester Blvd in San Jose California stands a Queen Anne-style Victorian mansion with a history as dark as its hidden rooms. Its story, like the walls within, will lead you down long passages, up staircases to nowhere, and through doors that open to nothing.

Step into the home alone and you might find yourself in a maze where others have been lost, where doors slam on their own, and floorboards creak under the spirits of the dead. Venture too far in and you’ll find yourself in a séance room where the home's original owner was said to commune with the dead.

Where she would make plans to build more pieces of her maze to confuse the spirits of those wanting revenge for the deaths her family business had caused.

Or… so the myths go.

Today we’re looking at the Winchester Mansion in San Jose, California. We’ll look at the life of Sarah Winchester, the myths that plagued her, and the Winchester mansion, and finally, we’ll try to piece together the true story of what really happened within those walls.

PART 1 - The Foundation

“In this world there are two tragedies. One is not getting what one wants, and the other is getting it. The last is much the worst.”

Oscar Wilde

Sarah Lockwood Pardee was born in 1839 in New Haven, Connecticut. She was the Daughter of a seemingly loving and happy family who were progressive to the changing landscape of the 1800s in the United States. Including a growth in spiritualism that began in the late 1840s.

Her father, Leonard Pardee, worked hard as a woodworker to provide, in his time, he grew his wealth substantially. Enough to enable him to afford a live-in domestic servant, private music lessons for the children as well as a French tutor.

This upbringing allowed Sarah to become an intelligent, well-rounded student. She could speak four languages and was proficient in musical composition, mathematics, and sciences leading her to be admitted to the “Young Ladies Collegiate Institute” at Yale College.

Her beauty and intelligence would earn her the nickname, the “Belle of New Haven”. Despite this, unlike her sisters, Sarah was a private person, engaging in less of the social requirements that may have been expected in upper-class society.

But, of course, the progressiveness of the mid-19th century had its limitations. Sarah was expected to marry and settle down; her parents pushing her to marry another within the same social class.

The Winchesters

Enter their neighbors, the Winchesters. The patriarch, Oliver Winchester, at the time was the co-owner of the Winchester-Davies Shirt Manufactory making a fine living for his family. But Oliver was a businessman and upon discovering the financially failing Volcanic Repeating Arms Company, he and other stockholders took it over, renaming it the New Haven Arms Company in 1857.

During this time, his son William Winchester worked closely with him in all his endeavors and was in line as the heir to any fortunes. Seeing as he was just two years older than Sarah and with the social status of both families, it made it easy for the Pardees to accept William as a potential husband to Sarah.

The two married on September 30th, 1862. Over the next few years, the families would experience great financial fortunes but pay terrible personal prices.

Attempts at Legacy

In 1860 The New Haven Arms company would produce the highly successful Henry Rifle, selling over 12 thousand in the span of 6 years. This enabled Oliver Winchester to reorganize the New Haven Arms company in his image, renaming it the Winchester Repeating Arms Company with the first Winchester rifle produced in 1866 securing the legacy of the Winchester name.

But the price had been steep, in 1863 Oliver Winchester’s daughter and sister to William, Annie Dye would lose her two-year-old son Charles to illness. Several months later, on January 16, 1864, Annie would pass away while giving birth to another son. And just 19 days later, her newest son would also tragically pass away.

Two years later in 1866, there was cause for joy, William and Sarah Winchester announced they were expecting a child. On June 15th, 1866, Annie Pardee Winchester was born, named after William's late sister.

With Annie’s birth and the Winchester Repeating Arms Company in full swing, the future seemed bright but the celebration was short-lived. Annie had been born with a digestive disorder known as marasmus preventing her from metabolizing protein, and just 6 weeks later on July 25th, 1866 Annie Pardee Winchester would pass away.

Over the next 14 years, both the Pardee and Winchester family would continue living in close proximity and enjoy the benefits of the Winchester fortune but misfortune was never too far behind.

Loss of a Family

After losing her father in 1869, in May of 1880, Sarah Winchester’s mother passed away. Seven months later in December, Oliver Winchester would die leaving the business solely to William. And in March 1881, just four months later, William Winchester succumbed to tuberculosis.

Sarah Winchester, seemingly overnight, would become one of the richest individuals in the world while her personal foundation crumbled. She inherited $20 million dollars equal to over half a billion in today’s money as well as a 50% holding in the Winchester Repeating Arms Company and a daily income of one thousand dollars equal to over 26 thousand dollars in today’s money.

With the speed at which she became a multi-millionaire, the reclusive Sarah Winchester was thrust into the public eye and when the public couldn’t see, the myths would begin to spread.

PART 2 - The Myths

“All houses in which men have lived and suffered and died are haunted houses.”

Mary Roberts Rinehart, from The Red Lamp

Five years after the series of devastating deaths, in 1886, Sarah Winchester left her home in New Haven and purchased a 40-acre plot of land in San Jose, California which included an eight-room cottage.

She then hired between 13 and 16 carpenters and numerous construction workers to begin work creating a mansion based on her design.

As word spread people began to wonder why Sarah went all the way to San Jose to build her home. But since Sarah had grown even more reclusive no one outside of the workers in the home ever spoke to or even saw her.

Rumors began to spread of Sarah Winchester’s interest in spiritualism, it was thought she had visited a well-known medium in Boston who after some time was able to channel the spirit of William Winchester.

William warned his widowed wife of the vengeful spirits looking for revenge. They sought vengeance for the deaths the Winchester rifles had caused all the years past. She was cursed and had to escape west to begin constructing a home in an effort to confuse the spirits.

She was told the construction would have to continue day and night at all hours and if she ever stopped the spirits would take her as they had taken her daughter and husband before.

Escaping Revenge

For the next 20 years, she did just that. The 8-room cottage had become a sprawling seven-story mansion, every day Sarah would give the construction workers new plans on what to build, crudely drawn on whatever paper she could find.

The plans often contradicted what the previous day’s work had accomplished. The new plans would create rooms within rooms, hallways with dead ends, and doors that open to walls. Windows were seemingly added randomly, sometimes looking out from one room into another, and sometimes placed into the floors.

The stories say this was all purposely done. It was said the construction workers would witness Sarah in her séance room daily communing with the spirits on what the plans for construction should look like. The goal was to build a labyrinth where the vengeful spirits wouldn’t be able to find her.

Other stories said Sarah would perform nightly seances at midnight, ringing the bell when the seances began and again when they ended at 2 am. She would wear all black, covering her face in a veil at all hours, as well as sleeping in different rooms every night in further attempts to confuse the spirits that sought her out.

Sarah was thought to have been driven mad by her fear and past trauma. Many saw her as an insane woman doing what she could to keep ghosts away from her while staying hidden from the public.

A Day Off

One story says after 20 years of construction, Sarah Winchester believed she was now safe and had the workers take the day off. That day was the day of one of the deadliest earthquakes to ever hit the US. The 1906 San Francisco earthquake estimated at a 7.9 magnitude killed up to 3 thousand people, destroying over 80% of the city.

The quake would topple the top 3 floors of the Winchester mansion trapping Sarah in one of the rooms until workers were able to dig her out. After this construction restarted immediately.

Final Pause

The next time Sarah let the construction pause for a day was September 5th, 1922. This would be the day Sarah Winchester succumbed to heart failure and died in her sleep.

In the end, the one hundred and sixty room mansion would stand at four stories tall encompassing twenty-four thousand square feet containing over two thousand doors, ten thousand windows, 47 stairways and fireplaces, 17 chimneys, 13 bathrooms, 6 kitchens, and 52 skylights.

Sarah Winchester’s will made no mention of the mansion and despite the size, appraisers felt the mansion was worthless due to its design and damage sustained from the 1906 earthquake. It was eventually leased and sold to John and Mayme Brown who would begin conducting tours of the house in 1923.

Hauntings

Today the home is owned by Winchester Investments LLC, representing the descendants of John and Mayme Brown. Tours are conducted on a regular basis and the home has been opened to paranormal investigators.

Both investigators and visitors throughout the years have claimed to experience paranormal activity. Hearing disembodied voices, feeling cold spots, and feeling hands pushing or nudging them.

Others claim to have heard footsteps coming from the 3rd floor where the servants used to live, as well as apparitions including one that bore a resemblance to Sarah Winchester.

The myths of her tormented life and of her attempts to escape the spirits that haunted her have led to a mansion that itself exudes fear onto its visitors. But the true story paints her in a different light.

PART 3 - The True Story

“Houses are not haunted, and regardless of the architecture with which we surround ourselves, our ghosts stay with us until we ourselves are ghosts.”

Dean Koontz

Sarah Winchester was always a private person, choosing to stay close with her family, away from outsiders. With the losses she suffered in quick succession, it’s no wonder why she would stay away from the public eye.

After inheriting her riches, Sarah was hands-off in the family business, some theorize she felt guilt for having money that was obtained from weapons and death. While that might not be true, what is true is she wanted a change of scenery.

Sarah did move to San Jose but in 1884 and not alone, it was actually with her sisters and brother-in-law. Even buying them a farmhouse in Los Altos, California.

While it is possible she saw a medium prior to moving to San Jose as spiritualism was still popular in the United States, the idea that she was told to constantly build or else face death was a made-up story in the February 24th, 1895 issue of the San Francisco Chronicle.

Rumors

In the article, the reporter writes, “The sound of the hammer is never hushed… the reason for it is in Mrs. Winchester’s belief that when the house is entirely finished she will die.”

This story was picked up by other news media and reprinted and retold. Somewhere along the way stories of ghosts seeking revenge were added for flavor possibly because of Sarah’s alleged interest in spiritualism.

The stories of her also keeping workers on the clock 24 hours a day, year-round was also a fabrication. Letters she wrote to her sisters show she often had workers take time off for various reasons for example if it was too hot in the summer.

Some theorize her interest in remodeling was a passion she could now fulfill with her seemingly endless supply of money. She used no architects and her designs were her own, changing with her interests and with whatever she felt like building at the time.

The oddities of empty hallways and doors opening to walls may have just been mistakes as she created designs without the use of a blueprint or even referencing what was in the surrounding rooms.

The 1906 earthquake added to the erratic-looking interior since she decided to remove the top three floors that were damaged from the earthquake instead of rebuilding them. This contributed to the stairs that led nowhere among other seemingly odd choices.

Giving Back

It was also thought Sarah kept workers employed throughout the year as a way to share her wealth. She paid workers three times the average rate and even purchased homes for their families while they worked on her home.

She often gave to charity anonymously and prior to moving to San Jose gave one million dollars to fund the building and operation of a hospital devoted to helping those suffering from tuberculosis.

Sarah Winchester herself had long struggled with debilitating arthritis, something that along with her preference for privacy kept her out of the public eye fueling more rumors and tales from those that wanted to know more.

Those that did know her or worked with her refute the idea she was guilt-ridden, insane, or performing daily and nightly seances. They tell of an intelligent level headed philanthropist who continued to build her home as a hobby.

Haunted?

The mansion itself is an architectural marvel or nightmare depending on how you see it. It was ahead of its time with three elevators, indoor plumbing, hot water, and forced air heating among other advancements of its time. The décor within changes without warning from room to room dependent on whatever Sarah Winchester felt like displaying at the time.

The constant changing and design oddities contribute to a creepy uncanny feeling adding to the idea of the mansion being haunted. And with so many visitors claiming to see and hear things, is it possible the home is actually haunted?

That’s a mystery for you to decide or experience but the myths surrounding the history of the mansion and Sarah Winchester herself should finally be laid to rest.

But if you really want to get the whole story, the book, “Captive of the Labyrinth: Sarah L. Winchester, Heiress to the Rifle Fortune” by Mary Jo Ignoffo is an excellent resource and read that I highly recommend.