We lived in Charles Town, WV. Charles was one of George Washington's brothers. He had donated the land for the town and had an old mansion there. Their brother Sam also had a house in Charles Town. Supposedly, Sam was the last male descendant of the Washington line that had produced a male. Not sure that name still continues from that family.

Anyhow, the Washingtons were all over the area. It's near Harpers Ferry, where the Shenandoah and Potomac rivers converge and head on down to Washington DC.

We lived in a house that had once been part of a plantation and was originally built in the 1850's. In the 1970's a large addition was made to the house. My family had numerous issues dealing with apparitions.

One of the members of our stake presidency was visiting us there one day and my wife was telling him of these experiences. She has subsequently retired as a geriatric nurse and can tell extensive stories of seeing spirits when people are approaching death. Anyhow, after she told him some stories, he told her one that has been a bit difficult to process.

He said he was living likewise in a period house from a bit farther back than ours in that area near Winchester, VA. He said he was coming down the staircase from his children's bedrooms when up the stairs came a spirit and began to engage with him. He said his countenance was calming and he was surprised that he wasn't freaking out, but then he told him that he needed to stand their firmly that an evil spirit was coming his way and if he wanted to protect his children, then he'd need to stand there on the stairwell and use his priesthood, if need be, to keep this spirit from ascending those stairs. The spirit then vanished and this brother was terrified, but stood there and sure enough a spirit arrived that was dark and threatened him, but he rejected him via the priesthood and he vanished.

As I stood there hearing this story, I was doing my best to not soil my clothes. If this hadn't been a respected member of the stake presidency, I might not have believed the story, but I had no reason to doubt his account, but to this day (this was in the mid 90's) that story totally freaks me out.