Have you ever sat through court proceedings? Perhaps you were the defendant? Maybe you were just a curious bystander? Did you ever see a witness on the stand answering questions? One of the lawyers shouts out "Objection!" and the judge replies with either "sustained" or "overruled". At times, the lawyers have to be allowed to have certain evidence allowed into trial via the judge, in accordance to the law. A lot of times things will be tossed out/not allowed. Other times, the judge will rule that it's okay to admit pictures, reports, etc.
Would you believe that at one time a witness gave testimony from a ghost, that was deemed inadmissible by the judge...but the jury thought "oh well"? Weird, right? Super crazy! No way that would've happened! Oh, but it did.
I'm going to take you to Greenbrier County, West Virginia. The year is 1896. It's a beautiful fall day in October, the leaves are turning colors, there's a slight chill in the air...just kidding, I truly have no idea what's the weather was like in West Virginia in October 1896. No matter the weather, Elva Zona Hester (who went by Zona) was 23 and was running errands in town when she ran into 37-year-old Erasmus Stribbling 'Trout" Shue. I have no idea why he was called "Trout". Not sure if that was his favorite fish, maybe people thought he look like one? He had recently moved to Greenbrier and was a local blacksmith. Zona and Erasmus seemed to have hit it off right away and they married a few weeks later. Zona's mother, Mary Jane, was not happy at all. Her and Zona had a very close relationship and Mary Jane did not have good feelings about "Trout".
Despite Mary Jane's objections, Zona chose to get married. Zona and "Trout" lived in a house nearby his blacksmith shop. I'm going to continue calling him "Trout" because a) I can't remember how to pronounce his actual first name and not sure how your brain's doing with it while you're reading this and b) he's a loser who deserves to be called much worse.
Even though Zona was happy to get married, their marriage would end on January 23, 1897. How did it end? I would like to say that they came to a mutual agreement and went their separate ways, but that would be too easy and the story would be way too short. And it wouldn't be a ghost story if everybody lived happily ever after, would it?
On January 23, "Trout" asked a neighbor boy, Andy Jones, to run an errand for him which consisted of going to "Trout" and Zona's house. When Andy arrived at the house, he found Zona lying dead at the bottom of her stairs. Andy ran back home to his mother and told her what he had found. Andy ran back to tell "Trout" while his mother called on the local doctor. Dr. George Knapp.
"Trout" got to the house first, Dr. Knapp arrived shortly thereafter. By the time the doctor arrived, "Trout" had already moved Zona to their bedroom and she was already dressed for burial in a dress with a high neck collar. Suspicious? One hundred percent!!! Dr. Knapp was not allowed to do a thorough examination. "Trout" got extremely upset when Dr. Knapp came close to her neck area, screaming and crying while holding her upper body in his arms. The doctor wanted to examine some bruising he noticed around her neck, but "Trout" demanded he leave. Obviously things were very very different back in those days because that would never be allowed to happen today. As the doctor was unable to fully examined her but yet had to list a cause of death, he listed it as "everlasting fate" - in today's words that means natural causes. Some reports actually stated that she died of childbirth...even though Zona was never pregnant. Ahhhh...the gossip trees of the 1800's.
At the funeral, "Trout" continued to have weird behavior. Although, I will interject here my knowledge that we never know how anyone will grieve; I completely get that. Yet in this case, I fully believe you will understand "Trout's" behavior was because of how much he had to hide. "Trout" stood next to the coffin throughout the whole funeral process. Back in those days, services were different. Many times, the family sat up for a whole night with the deceased in the room. During this process, "Trout" never left the coffin's side and never let anyone get too close to it. He also refused to let anyone remove the sheet that lay on top of his wife's head.
Eventually, somehow Zona's mother, Mary Jane, was able to take the sheet from the coffin when she noticed a strange smell. She rinsed it off in a water basin and the water turned red. Mary Jane took that as a sign that Zona was trying to tell her from the grave that she was murdered...she never actually believed that her daughter died from natural causes.
Mary Jane spent the winter after Zona's funeral services praying for Zona's spirit to visit her, and her prayers were heard. I keep praying to wake up in the morning with $1 million or more in my checking account, but no luck so far. Over four nights, Mary Jane stated that Zona's spirit, which has become known as the "Greenbrier Ghost", visited her mother. Zona told her mother that "Trout" had kept his real self hidden to the public and that he was an abusive man behind doors. Zona's spirit said that on the night she died, "Trout" had become enraged because she had not cooked any meat for their dinner. In his anger, "Trout" ended up breaking her neck. A young life taken over what was made...or not made...for dinner. What an asshole!!! Zona's spirit showed her mom how she could turn her head completely around like an owl. Mary Jane later claimed that she was wide awake during these visits and never considered them being dreams.
Mary Jane took these visits as an "ah ha!" moment. Me personally...I would've pissed the bed! Mary Jane...clean and dry because she is not a scaredy-cat like me...told this story to an attorney in Lewisburg, John A. Preston. She asked that Zona's body be examined properly. Mr. Preston looked into things and decided to "take on the case". He confirmed that a full exam had never been done. What wonderful deductions, Sherlock!
Mr. Preston also found out that "Trout" had been married before...twice. His first wife died after suffering a broken neck when she fell from a haystack. Hmmmmm..... His second wife died while helping him build or fix a chimney. Supposedly a brick fell and hit her in the head and she died from the hit. Double hmmmmm...
Mr. Preston and a doctor got permission to exhume Zona's body after a few weeks. The doctor did a full autopsy, although "Trout" sat in the room the whole time. Again...welcome to how things happened in the 1800's! Three days later, on March 9, the doctor concluded that Zona was murdered, finding that "...the windpipe smashed. On the throat were the marks of fingers indicated she had been choken [sic]."
After the autopsy results came out, Sheriff Hill Nickell arrested "Trout" and he went to trial on June 22, 1897. No other suspects were mentioned.
At trial, Mary Jane testified, talking about her visits from Zona's spirit. Mr. Preston never mentioned Mary Jane experiencing ghostly visits, he called them "dreams". The defense tried to make Mary Jane and her "dreams" sound completely foolish, but they failed. Her testimony was so compelling, that the whole transcript was printed in its entirety in the Greenbrier Independent on July 1st, 1897.
Below is a copy of part of the transcript:
Answer: I prayed to the Lord that she might come back and tell me what had happened; and I prayed that she might come herself and tell on him.
Question: Do you think that you actually saw her in flesh and blood?
Answer: Yes, sir, I do. I told them the very dress that she was killed in, and when she went to leave me she turned her head completely around and looked at me like she wanted me to know all about it. And the very next time she came back to me she told me all about it. The first time she came, she seemed that she did not want to tell me as much about it as she did afterwards. The last night she was there she told me that she did everything she could do, and I am satisfied that she did do all that, too.
Question: Now, Mrs. Heaster, don’t you know that these visions, as you term them or describe them, were nothing more or less than four dreams founded upon your distress?
Answer: No, I don’t know it. The Lord sent her to me to tell it. I was the only friend that she knew she could tell and put any confidence in; I was the nearest one to her. He gave me a ring that he pretended she wanted me to have; but I don’t know what dead woman he might have taken it off of. I wanted her own ring and he would not let me have it.
Question: Mrs. Heaster, are you positively sure that these are not four dreams?
Answer: Yes, sir. It was not a dream. I don’t dream when I am wide awake, to be sure; and I know I saw her right there with me.
As many of us know, a jury needs to find a defendant innocent or guilty of the charges brought up against them based on the evidence produced/allowed at the trial. The testimony about Zona's ghost was ruled inadmissible. The jury deliberated for an hour and found him guilty. Obviously, I can't interview the jury to ask how they decided on the guilty verdict...unless I use a Ouija board, maybe...but it is said that they kept the "ghost visits" in their head during their deliberation.
No matter what, the guilty verdict was put through and "Trout" was sentenced to life in prison. Many townspeople didn't think that was good enough and that "Trout" didn't deserve to live that long. On July 11, vigilantes tried to get to "Trout" at the local jail, but he had already been transported to the state prison in Moundsville.
"Trout" died on March 13, 1900, in the West Virginia State Penitentiary of unknown causes. He ended up being buried in an unmarked grave in the local cemetery.
The state of West Virginia has erected a state historical marker near the cemetery in which Zona Shue is buried. It reads:
Interred in nearby cemetery is Zona Heaster Shue. Her death in 1897 was presumed natural until her spirit appeared to her mother to describe how she was killed by her husband Edward. Autopsy on the exhumed body verified the apparition's account. Edward, found guilty of murder, was sentenced to the state prison. Only known case in which testimony from a ghost helped convict a murderer.
Did Zona's spirit actually appear to her mother? I have no idea. Did a jury find her husband guilty partly based on the "testimony of a ghost"? It seems like that may have happened. Do I have someone that I will appear to if my husband ever murders me to help catch and convict him? ONE HUNDRED PERCENT!!!
Stay safe in life...and make sure you have that person you can appear to after your death if you need help.
-- Audre
Photo by: bing.com/images
Sources:
wikipedia.org
allthatsinteresting.com
astonishinglegends.com
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