The Pursuit of the Bell Witch

The Bell Witch is one of America’s most famous hauntings.

Originating near Adams, Tennessee, the story has inspired poems, books, novels, films, and countless retellings over the past two centuries.

One of the earliest non-biographical treatments was a poem titled The Trials of Betsy Bell, written by an unknown author and published in Nashville, Tennessee, in 1906. Much more recently, the story inspired the 2005 film An American Haunting, which offered a very modern, although shallow and stereotypical, interpretation of the events.

Somewhere between those two extremes lies an enormous body of folklore, testimony, family history, speculation, and unanswered questions.

The facts behind the Bell Witch are not nearly as neatly packaged as the versions found in books and movies.

And that is where the story becomes interesting.

Where the Bell Witch Haunting Happened

The Bell family home stood on the south bank of the Red River, approximately one mile from Adams Station and around 40 miles north of Nashville, Tennessee.

The house no longer exists.

After Lucy Bell’s death, the structure was dismantled and its materials were repurposed elsewhere.

Today, there is no Bell farmhouse to walk through and examine.

What remains is the story.

And reconstructing that story presents problems for skeptics and believers alike.

The Problem With the Bell Witch

The Bell Witch story has been told so many times that separating the original accounts from later interpretations can be difficult.

Movies simplify it.

Books reinterpret it.

Folklore adds details.

Skeptics attempt to explain it.

Believers attempt to identify whatever supposedly haunted the family.

Looking backward through the available evidence, however, reveals at least one haunting possibility that appears to have received surprisingly little consideration since the earliest book about the case was published.

Before examining that possibility, it is necessary to understand the Bell family, the haunting, and the historical record surrounding them.

The Earliest Bell Witch Book

The mysterious events surrounding the Bell family did not receive widespread media attention until M. V. Ingram, a Clarksville newspaper editor, published his book about the haunting in 1894.

Even then, the book circulated primarily within the region, and relatively few copies were distributed.

The history behind Ingram’s work, however, went back much further.

In 1846, Richard Williams Bell, the brother of Elizabeth “Betsy” Bell, wrote his own account of the family’s experiences.

Twenty-six years had passed since the death of John Bell.

Richard titled his manuscript Our Family Trouble.

He did not immediately publish it.

Instead, the manuscript was hidden away.

An Accusation Against Betsy Bell

Richard apparently wrote Our Family Trouble in response to a newspaper article produced by one of the investigators of the Bell Witch case.

That investigator’s account was published in 1849, although the work itself has since been lost.

What survives is the allegation it supposedly contained.

Unable to devise another explanation for the phenomena, the investigator concluded that Betsy Bell had perpetrated the entire hoax.

The accusation went much further than simply blaming Betsy for mysterious noises or practical jokes.

According to the theory, Betsy had terrorized her own family and ultimately murdered her father.

Richard Bell was furious.

He believed his sister’s name needed to be cleared.

What Betsy Lost

Whatever actually caused the disturbances, Betsy had already lost considerably because of them.

She lost her betrothed.

She lost her father.

She lost her peace of mind.

According to the surviving account, Betsy remained so affected by her experiences that she was unable to sleep alone in a bed for the remainder of her life, even after the Bell Witch had disappeared.

Richard’s manuscript therefore served not simply as a history of the haunting.

It was also a defense of his sister.

The Manuscript Remains Hidden

Richard Bell died several years after completing Our Family Trouble.

The manuscript passed to his son, James Allen Bell.

James also kept it hidden.

He did not grant M. V. Ingram permission to publish the manuscript until he was elderly, long after the original members of the Bell family had died.

Ingram then incorporated Richard Bell’s account into his own substantial collection of personal testimony and documentation.

The result was published under an enormous title:

An Authenticated History of the Famous Bell Witch: The Wonder of the 19th Century, and Unexplained Phenomenon of the Christian Era. The Mysterious Talking Goblin that Terrorized the West End of Robertson County, Tormenting John Bell to His Death. The Story of Betsy Bell, Her Lover, and the Haunting Sphinx.

The agent, printer, and binder was William P. Titus.

Fortunately, later generations found considerably easier ways of referring to the various Bell Witch books.

The White Book and the Red Book

The original edition had a white cover.

Copies eventually became extremely difficult to locate.

Even the Tennessee State Archives lost the copy it once possessed, and copies also disappeared from Tennessee libraries.

In 1961, Ingram’s book was reprinted with a red cover.

That edition became commonly known as the Red Book.

The reprint helped preserve an account that might otherwise have become extraordinarily difficult for later researchers to access.

The Black Book

Another important Bell Witch volume came from within the Bell family itself.

Dr. Charles Bailey Bell, John Bell’s great-grandson, wrote another account of the haunting.

His book was first published in 1934.

Because of its cover, it became known as the Black Book.

The Red Book and Black Book became two of the principal works through which later generations encountered the Bell Witch story.

But the books also helped preserve some of the questions and controversies surrounding the haunting.

Was Kate Batts the Bell Witch?

Ingram’s account lightly implicated the Bell family’s neighbor Kate Batts in the haunting.

Her name would eventually become so closely associated with the story that the mysterious entity itself became widely identified as “Kate.”

The situation was not quite that simple.

The Batts and Bell families remained on speaking terms.

Kate Batts herself was reportedly furious when the spirit claimed an association with her.

Nevertheless, the connection endured.

Eventually, Kate Batts became one of the most recognizable figures in Bell Witch folklore.

Andrew Jackson and the Bell Witch

Ingram’s account also included one of the most famous episodes in the entire legend.

According to the story, Andrew Jackson visited the Bell farm and personally encountered the mysterious entity.

The Jackson episode became another enduring part of Bell Witch lore and helped transform what began as a local Tennessee haunting into a much larger American legend.

Was There Ever Really a Witch?

Despite the name, there was never an actual witch involved in the traditional sense, at least as far as is known.

Many people suspected that human forces were responsible for at least some of the phenomena.

Others who accepted the supernatural aspects of the story interpreted the entity as a poltergeist or demon.

During the nineteenth century, it was commonly described as a goblin.

None of those labels solves the problem.

Calling it a demon assumes one explanation.

Calling it a poltergeist assumes another.

Calling it a witch creates still another image that may have little to do with what witnesses actually described.

For simplicity, throughout this series the mysterious presence will simply be called a spirit.

The Pursuit of the Bell Witch

The Bell Witch has survived for more than two centuries because there has never been a completely satisfactory explanation for what supposedly happened to the Bell family.

Was it folklore?

A hoax?

A poltergeist?

A malicious spirit?

Were human beings responsible for some of the phenomena?

Were later writers responsible for embellishing events that originally had much simpler explanations?

Or did something genuinely inexplicable occur along the Red River outside Adams, Tennessee?

The surviving accounts contain contradictions, rumors, extraordinary claims, and questions that may never be answered.

But they also contain something worth pursuing.

Behind the movies, novels, tourist stories, and two centuries of embellishment was a real family whose experiences became one of the most enduring supernatural legends in American history.

To understand what the Bell Witch might have been, the best place to begin is with the people who lived through it.

The Bell family.

About the Author

Laura Wright

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