Showing posts with label Radnor PA. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Radnor PA. Show all posts

Monday, September 13, 2010

Ghost of General Anthony Wayne

During the Revolutionary War, General "Mad"Anthony Wayne commanded troops under the leadership of George Washington.  He commanded the 4th Pennsylvania Regiment at the battles Brandywine, Paoli, and Germantown.  

 General "Mad" Anthony Wayne

 Former estate of General "Mad" Anthony Wayne in Paoli, Pa


He later led the Continental forces at the Battle of Monmouth.  Followed later in the war by the Battles of Stoney Point and Green Spring.  Stoney Point was his most successful campaign of the Revolutionary War.  After serving as a statesman, General Wayne was later called back into service to lead forces during the Indian Wars at Fort Recovery and the Battle of Fallen Timbers.

Statue honoring General Anthony Wayne at Valley Forge, PA

Wayne died in 1796 while returning to Pennsylvania from a western military post.  He was buried at Fort Presque Isle which later became Erie, Pennsylvania. There was a blockhouse named after him which is still standing today.  

Marker at the site of Fort Presque Isle which contained the Wayne Blockhouse

His family wished to have his remains moved to the family plot in in Radnor, Pennsylvania which is located near Philadelphia,  not far from Wayne's home in Paoli, PA.  His son, Colonel Issac Wayne traveled to Presque Isle to retrieve his father's remains.  However, Issac was traveling with a small horse drawn rickety two wheeled cart.  In order to make transport easier, they boiled the flesh from the bones and placed it back into the grave.  The bones were then loaded onto the cart for transport back to Philadelphia.  The box containing General Wayne's remains kept falling off of the cart.  It was discovered upon arrival in Radnor that many of the General's bones were missing.  Rather than backtracking and retrieving the missing bones along the trail back to Presque Isle which follows what is now mostly Route 322,  what was left of his bones was buried in the family plot at St. Davids Episcopal Church.


General Anthony Wayne's second grave site in Radnor, PA



It is said that every year on General Wayne's Birthday which also happens to be New Year's Day, he rises from his grave and can be seen riding across the state of Pennsylvania back to his original grave in search of his bones.  

Sunday, October 11, 2009

Cabrini College - Radnor, PA

The  Missionary Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus established a charter for Cabrini College in 1957.  Named after the founder of their religious order,  Saint Frances Xavier Cabrini.  The grounds were formerly an estate owned by John Dorrance. His daughter Mary, fell in love with the stable boy. The Dorrances did not permit their daughter to see the stable boy any longer who hung himself in Grace Hall, which used to be a stable. Out of sorrow, Mr. Dorrance’s daughter killed herself by jumping off of the balcony of the mansion.  It is said that she was carrying the unborn child of the stable boy.  Both were buried in what was then the peach orchard.

Cabrini College - The stables
Cabrini College - The stables


Occasionally the apparition of Mary is now often seen wondering the grounds wearing a blue dress.  She is most often seen near Woodcrest Hall which is where the peach orchard used to be.  In the winter time when there is snow on the ground, foot prints have been found in the snow that suddenly end near the mansion. 

Woodcrest Hall at Cabrini College is the area which most hauntings are said to occur
Woodcrest Hall at Cabrini College is the area which most hauntings are said to occur


Some say the rope which the stable boy used to kill himself still hangs from the rafters.  They say it has been seen to be swinging back and forth when there is no wind to make it move.