Thirteen Georgia Ghosts and Jeffrey: Commemorative Edition

Thirteen Ghosts #3

by Kathryn Tucker Windham, Dilcy Windham Hilley (Afterword), Ben Windham (Afterword)

Petrifying the Peach State, hosts of haints have beset the state of Georgia throughout its storied history. In Thirteen Georgia Ghosts and Jeffrey, best-selling folklorist Kathryn Tucker Windham, along with her trusty spectral companion Jeffrey, introduce thirteen of Georgia’s most famous ghost stories. Windham won hearts across the nation in her regular radio broadcasts and many public appearances. The South’s most prolific raconteur of revenants, Windham, giving new meaning to the phrase “ghost-writer,” does more than tell ghost stories—she captures the true spirit of the place. Evoking Georgia’s colonial era, “The Eternal Dinner Party” explains why the sounds of an elegant dinner soirée still waft from the grove of Savannah’s Bonaventure estate. At the onset of the Revolution, the Tattnall family abandoned Bonaventure and slipped away to England. Young Josiah Tattnall eventually returned to fight in the Revolution, restored Bonaventure, and later became Georgia’s governor. One holiday eve, when the mansion was bedecked with magnolia and holly and crowded with visitors, a fire too large to control swept through the old house. Tattnall, exhibiting his cool head and impeccable manners, ordered the massive dinner table carried out to the garden where he enjoined his holiday revelers to continue their stately meal. The melancholy strains of Tattnall’s dinner guests still echo through Bonaventure’s ancient oaks on moonlight nights. In “The Ghost of Andersonville,” Windham takes visitors near the woebegone Confederate prisoner-of-war camp. A plaque there still recounts the tale of Swiss immigrant and Confederate captain Henry Wirz. Convicted—many thought wrongly—of war crimes, Wirz’s restless ghost still perambulates the highways of south Georgia. Writing for the Georgia Historical Commission, Miss Bessie Lewis quips in her preface to this beloved collection, “Who should be better able to tell of happenings long past than the ghosts of those who had a part in them?” A perennial favorite, this commemorative edition restores Thirteen Georgia Ghosts and Jeffrey to the ghastly grandeur of its original 1973 edition.

Genres: Ghost Stories, Paranormal, Childrens

149 pages, Kindle Edition

First published June 1, 1973

About the author

Kathryn Tucker Windham was an American storyteller, author, photographer, and journalist.

Windham got her first writing job at the age of 12, reviewing movies for her cousin's small town newspaper, The Thomasville Times. She earned a B.A. degree from Huntingdon College in 1939. Soon after graduating she became a reporter for the Alabama Journal. Starting in 1944 she worked for The Birmingham News. In 1946 she married Amasa Benjamin Windham with whom she had three children. In 1956 she went to work at the Selma Times-Journal where she won several Associated Press awards for her writing and photography. A collection of her photographs is on display at the Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts. She died on June 12, 2011. The 2004 documentary film, Kathryn: The Story of a Teller, directed by Norton Dill, chronicles Windham's life and varied careers.

Reviews

[Shelley Stack · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another entertaining quick read as well as a look into history.

[Catie Merchant · Rating 4 out of 5]

Love me some Kathryn Tucker Windham.

[Amber Arthur · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was the third book I read in this series, and I was a diehard fan from this point on.

I am waiting for this book to arrive in the mail, but if I remember correctly it had the strongest, most believable ghost stories of all.

My favorite was the story of Savannah, GA.

There is a museum in Windham's hometown of Selma, AL called the Kathryn Tucker Windham museum.

And if you ever get the chance to hear her speak, don't pass it up! She can also play a mean comb. Yes, she can PLAY a comb....

[Katherine P · Rating 4 out of 5]

As always a nice entertaining read by Windham. This is probably one of my least favorite collections and I think the stories are a little spookier than Mississippi or Alabama stories. Always a treat to read one of her books though.

[Tracie · Rating 5 out of 5]

This whole series was part of my childhood. I would really love have the whole set.