Proprietary House: The Third Investigation

Date: May 26, 2010

Location: Proprietary House, Perth Amboy, NJ

Investigators: Jeff Huber, Greg Caggiano, Brett Bodner, Andrew Rodriguez

Report:

This was our first trip back to the house for an investigation since Jeff and I founded Franklin and Heard Paranormal, named after the two famous people associated with the house. It also happened to be the most active night there I have personally experienced, and Jeff said it was high up on his list as well. For Brett and Andrew, it was their first time.

It was mentioned several times to them to not get too excited, because there is always the chance that you will see absolutely nothing, which occurred the last time Jeff and I were there. For the first hour of our three hour venture, there really was not much going on.

Jeff was giving another tour upstairs to two curious onlookers who were passing by the house as we were entering. On top of that, his niece and her friend were also there. With so many people in the house to start off, most noises we heard could be dismissed easily, except for a few.

While sitting in the tea room, famous for blue beams of light that randomly glow outward from the walls, and also the sight of a British soldier who walks through a wall, because of a supposed tunnel that used to be located there during the revolution, we heard noises on a tape recorder that Brett brought along. These noises, which sounded mostly like a thud, followed by shuffling, could not have been causes by the three of us, because we made sure to sit perfectly still.

We asked several questions into the recorder, hoping to catch words in return, but several times we were met with just noises.

When the tour and Jeff’s niece and friend left, it was now the four of us alone in the house. With everything very quiet, we made our way upstairs.

There is a certain window in the dining room that if you look through the glass, you will feel drunk and unbalanced, because a man that died in that very corner was a drunk when he was alive. Without knowing this, Andrew experienced it while standing near the window.

For the next two hours, we would call names, including a few, “God save King George!” and were met with silence. It seemed as soon as we were about to call it a night, that the craziest moments I have ever experienced in a house happened.

With the four of us standing in the foyer, between the dining room and another room used for conferences, we heard a loud thud in the dining room, which was where we placed the tape recorder minutes before. But when we went to listen to it, no noise could be heard. The dining room was now freezing at this point, which is funny because the foyer was muggy and hot.

After that event, Brett and Andrew’s flashlights began to go haywire, flickering on and off randomly, this being after Brett just put two new batteries in his right before we left. We then made our way back into the foyer, and challenged the ghost of a little boy to show himself.

This boy, who always appears in blue, and is named Alex, was supposedly thrown out of a window and killed there in the 1800′s, but no one has ever confirmed that. Whether or not that is how he died, it is sure that he did in fact die in the house.

So anyway, we promised the little boy that we would play around with him, because we know he is a prankster. He often likes to ride the elevator, and play around with visitors. When I called out to the little boy, in the doorway of a room adjacent to the foyer, I saw a small shadow peer out from behind the wall, as if he was seeing who was there. Within ten seconds, we were all hit with chills.

We walked to where I saw the shadow, and Brett pulled a battery out of his flashlight, promising to roll it to the boy so he could play with us and roll it back. It was then when Brett dropped the battery, and just as he was bending over to pick it up, he felt a little tug on the side of his shirt. Clearly startled, he jumped around and looked at us, and none of us were within five feet of him. He told us what happened, that it was like a “playful” tug.

After the rolling the battery around on the floor, it was to no avail, or so it seemed. After a few good rolls, it would stop dead in the same spot of the floor twice, and one spot in the same area, it just continued on, hitting the wall.

When we walked over to that area, I flicked on the light switch, and the bulb blew out. We were going to remain in darkness.

All of us headed down the hallway to take a look up the stairs. Because of how the winding staircase was built, you can see right up to the fifth floor. I yelled, “Is there anyone up there?” and within five seconds, shadows started moving like crazy on the walls by the stairs, and once again, all of us felt chills down our spines. My left arm then went numb, and I had a headache that didn’t go away for hours. Jeff would feel the same.

We then went into the conference room where Jeff told us more stories about the house. After about twenty minutes, Brett, Andrew, and I went back to the dining room. As we were setting up the tape recorder, all of us stopped and looked at each other at the same time. Eerily, we all said exactly the same word: “Tobacco!”

Clear as day we smelt pipe tobacco where we were standing, not even faint, but a distinct odor, causing Andrew to cough. It smelled like after you have a pipe going and you put it out, the smell that is left over on the burnt remains. After about thirty seconds it disappeared, but reappeared two more times in the next few minutes.

The dining room was now back to a normal temperature, and the presence we felt for the previous twenty minutes was gone.

Our night was over.

Greg Caggiano and Jeff Huber are the founders of Franklin and Heard Paranormal.

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