Haunted Georgetown

12. Prospect Cottage

Washington, DC

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The house next to the ?Exorcist stairs stands on the site of Prospect Cottage, a very old structure which had a reputation for hauntings when it stood during the 19th Century. It was the home of Mrs. E.D.E.N. Southworth, a mother of two who was beaten and then abandoned by her husband in the 1850s, and took to writing novels in order to support her children. When the confederates beat back union soldiers at the Battle of Manassas, and Georgetown was widely believed to be under threat of being ransacked by southern soldiers, Ms. Southworth barricaded herself and her children in her cottage, and preyed: "There's only three of us here. How will we survive if the Confederates come?" According to Ms. Southworth, a faint voice responded, "?There are four of you here, and you'?ll be fine." She and her children survived the war and lived in the cottage for many years afterward. Subsequent owners of the cottage reported seeing the figure of Ms. Southworth in the room that had been her library. When the last of the books were removed from that room, the reports of the apparition ceased as well.