Today we discuss another story attributed to Phillip Babb (1) of the Isles of Shoals. This one centers on his ghost haunting Appledore Island. It was known as Hog Island in his day, but the name was changed for obvious reasons. Once again, I’ll be fact checking as we go. The story goes like this:
Approximately seven miles from the shores of Kittery, Maine and ten miles from downtown Portsmouth, New Hampshire lie a group of sparsely inhabited, and little-known islands – The Isles of Shoals. These islands are rich in the folklore of early American settlers.
The largest of the islands was known as Hog. The attraction to this island was a freshwater spring on the south shore which attracted the first settlers. This was the population center of the Shoals until 1680 when forty of the resident families migrated to Star Island, south of Hog [They actually moved for tax purposes as the islands are split between two different states].
But in 1661, the entire archipelago had been named Appledore after the village of Appledore near Portsmouth on the southern shore of England. [False: The name has only been used for the Island, not the collection that is known as the Isles of Shoals]. After the influx to Star, the preferred name of Appledore was restored, and has remained so until this day. Appledore is owned by Star Island Corporation. They lease it to Cornell University and the University of New Hampshire who conduct formal undergraduate and post graduate marine science programs under the name of the Shoals Marine Laboratory.
Appledore did have its day, however. There were piers, tennis courts, cottages, studios and even the Appledore Hotel, built in 1847 by Thomas Laighton, the father of the authoress, Celia Thaxter. And there is Babb’s Cove, named for one Philip Babb who flourished early in island history. He died in 1671, and his ghost still walks the island! I have heard, though I cannot attest to the fact, that the ghost of Philip has been referred to the Ghost Research Society for investigation.
There is a superstition among the islanders that Philip Babb, or some evil-minded descendant of his haunts Appledore. No timid soul can be induced to walk alone after dark over a certain shingly beach on the island, at the top of a cove bearing Babb’s name – for it is there that his uneasy spirit is often seen.
He is supposed to have been so desperately wicked when alive that there is no rest for him in his grave [Harsh]. His dress is a coarse, striped butcher’s frock, with a leather belt, to which is attached a sheath containing a ghostly knife, sharp and glittering. It is his delight to brandish it in the face of terrified humanity.
One Shoaler was perfectly certain that he and Babb had met, and he shuddered with real horror, recalling the meeting. His tale was originally penned by Celia Thaxter in 1873 and has undergone more than one nemesis. The following is my rendition of the tale, which is based on Miss Thaxter’s. (Since I wrote the story to use with my seventh graders, the vocabulary reflects that which I wished my students to learn–and some of the more sophisticated words were added by them. Third person was changed to first person to enhance use in a campfire setting.) And now, meet my family ghost, then adopt your own family ghost!
“It was after sunset, and I was coming round the corner of a workshop, when I saw a wild and dreadful figure advancing toward me. My first thought was that someone wished to make me the victim of a practical joke. I called out something to the effect that I was not afraid, but the thing came nearer and nearer showing me his ghastly face and hollow eyes. His expression was fiendish as he extracted a knife from its belt and flourished it in my face. I fled to my house and entered breathlessly, calling against the person who had tried to frighten me.
To my alarm, I found him sitting at my supper table and eating my victuals! At this sight, my senses left me, and I was overtaken by a faint. When I awoke, Babb started to laugh — at first a chuckle. Then it became louder, and louder until the rafters began to shake, and I–I began to quake. Then, in an eye blink, he vanished, leaving me more firmly convinced than ever of his ghostly presence.
A short span of time passed, and this one warm, summer night found me sitting on my broad piazza at sunset, searching for a cool sea breeze. The wind was calm–barely a waft in the still atmosphere. The sea murmured but little. Birds twittered softly welcoming their time of rest.
As I glanced northward toward Babb’s Cove, I saw a figure slowly crossing the shingle to the path which led to my house. After watching it a moment, I called out to it, but there was no reply. Again, I called. Still no answer. The darkish figure glided slowly closer and closer to my being. Suddenly, I realized that I was hearing no steps on the loose shingle that was wont to give back every footfall. I slowly descended the steps of the piazza and sauntered toward the stranger.
In the twilight I could see the face and immediately recognized the butcher’s frock and leather belt of Babb. But I was not prepared for the devilish expression of malice in that hollow face, and I was chilled to the marrow at the sight!
The white stripes in the frock gleamed like phosphorescent light, as did his awful eyes. I called out aloud, “Who are you? What do you want?” He but continued his advance towards me, when suddenly the shape grew indistinct, first thick and cloudy, then thin, and finally dissolving quite away. And I, much amazed and totally in a daze, returned to my house perplexed and thoroughly dissatisfied that the meeting had ended without a personal encounter as to the purpose of his presence in my surroundings.
Since that re-encounter, I have seen him not, though I still feel his presence in my midst. Like the Ghost and Mrs. Muir, I feel him in a storm, when the wind bursts open a window, and the wild rain pours in. I sense him when my candles flicker. I sense him when my electricity goes out, and the lights of those around me remain alight. I sense his presence when my little dog suddenly becomes alert, looking at one particular spot in the room. I sense his presence as the clock ticks, ticks, ticks ushering in the twilight–when the ghost of my ancestor begins his haunt.”
I have been to Appledore. I have walked in the obliterated footsteps of this butcher of hogs by profession. The whole Babb family is buried in the valley of Appledore where houses stand, and where once a bowling alley stood and all of the balls rolled over the bones of all of the Babbs! [False: The Cemetery is from a much later time and was not paved over for a bowling alley. It is believed that the Shoalers spent the winters on the mainland, a practice that is still honored today.]
Perhaps that is why Philip haunts. Since the last equinoctial gale blew the building down, quiet has returned to their earth, and perhaps he may now rest more peacefully without the din of the play arena.
Philip Babb is just one of the resident ghost population on Appledore and probably the one who has received the most notoriety, though on Star Island there is, in windy weather, the most extraordinary combination of sounds, as if two bluff old fellows were swearing at each other, gruffly, harshly, continually, with a perseverance worthy of a better cause. Really, it is a most disagreeable racket!
By Dubh Sidhe.
Many thanks to Mr. Laurence Bussey of the Isles of Shoals Historical and Research Association for his critique and approval of this article.
While it is impossible to verify this story, history has scores of people who have claimed to encounter Phillip along the beach and throughout the Island. Know also that Dubh Sidhe is a concept, not a person. It’s a pen name.
However, locals still know his name and retell stories carried down through the generations. During the 2011 Babb Family Association Reunion we went to the Isles of Shoals and the captain of the ferry that took us out there started telling tales of Phillip Babb over the P A, without even knowing we were on board.
Phillip would have been celebrating his 421st birthday this year and it is just now that we can tell his story properly.