Camden Courier-Post – April 10, 1925
“Black Bird Pounced on My Head and I was Breathless,’ She Says After Tour of ‘Doc’ Hyghcock’s Former Domain
By M. IRENE FROST, Society Editor of The Courier
Touching in the highlights of my tour of the “Voodoo” house the thing that impressed me most, perhaps, was the black bird, which pounced on my head and fanned my face with its wings just as I entered the tunnel of utter darkness.
After a breathless retreat to the wall on the other side of the tunnel, I straightened myself and resolved to continue, no matter what worse thing happened – if anything more distracting could happen.
By the time my guide had explained the mechanism of the fowl and told me that he had pulled one of the innumerable ropes overhead to cause the crow’s action, I was almost myself again.
I was now on the lookout for most anything. Holding tight to the guide’s coat tail, I had weird visions getting lost. I had, I probably could never get out myself or maybe it would close in on me – the more I thought the more the ape-like face of the constructor haunted me.
I decided to start conversation along other lines, but Mr. Guide was so full of explanation, opportunity did not present itself.
We wound in and out, climbing through narrow doors and over foot-high fences. Doing this with a bent back- in fact sometimes we had to crawl- was quite weakening.
Shortly we came to a widening of the passage. In it was an old automobile seat. In front of that was a stove and down near the floor was a large clock. This I concluded must be the “torture chamber.” Very appropriate, indeed, for I was by this time beginning to place myself in the position of some of the poor women who may have met their fate there.
It seemed the guide lingered there longer than necessary and I began to feel i was going to faint.
I never had fainted before but that did not mean I never would.
He guide insisted on telling me wild tales of what probably had happened here until I began t think he was connected in some way with the voodoo man and I believe I could justly sympathize with a person who thinks he is losing his mind.
Finally he moved on and daylight peeped through the crude ceiling at the end of the passage we climbed a ladder which brought us into the back yard.
Now to see the house, I was feeling miserable, but without letting myself think about it, I started. This was not quite so bad as the underground part. The hallways were light, but the rooms built three-in-one were of course dark.
Beds not made, everything dirty- I wondered what his wife could have done with her spare time, but then when one considered how her husband kept the place “messed-up” with his preserved herbs, he could hardly lay a great deal of the blame on her.
We went from one house to another through several secret entrances, once climbing through the roof of a closet in one, down into another in the other house. Incidentally chairs did not seem necessary at all. The only chairs seemed to be placed in the store.
The end finally came. I felt as though it were also mine. However, my imagination is still doing “overtime.”
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