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| The King Plantation House at Uriah, Ala. |
For as long as I can remember, I’ve wanted to spend the
night at the King Plantation House at Uriah, Ala.
The house is a well-known
landmark in Monroe County, and I’ve ridden past it countless times on my way to
and from Atmore. Several years ago, I put an overnight stay at this historic
home on my “bucket list” and final scratched it off the list a few days ago.
The King Plantation House was built in the late 1850s in a
bend of the Alabama River at Packer’s Bend, which is in the extreme northwest
corner of Monroe County. A little over a century later, state legislator Eugene
Garrett bought the house and moved it to Uriah in 1963. Today it can be seen
just off State Highway 59 at Uriah.
My interest in this home really ramped up a couple of years
ago when the home was featured in the June 22, 2012 episode of “The Dead
Files.” During that show on the Travel Channel, a pair of paranormal investigators visited the home
and looked into claims that the house was haunted. Those investigators reported that the house was a hotbed of ghostly activity.
For the past several years, I’ve joined a handful of friends on October trips to reportedly haunted locations in our area for material for Halloween-themed
newspaper stories. Several months ago, as we began to plan this year’s trip, we
began serious discussions about how to get permission to spend the night at the
King Plantation House. As it turns out, a friend of ours, Amy Bradford, knew
the owner of the house, Anna Jean Ikner, well enough to help us get permission to
spend the night in the antebellum home.
We set a date for this past Friday night and arrived around
8 p.m. Anna Jean gave us the run of the place, and we had a blast investigating
the home for paranormal activity. (For more information about the results of
the investigation, be sure to pick up a copy of this week’s Monroe Journal and
Evergreen Courant.)
After a fun night of investigating, I turned in around 1
a.m. and quickly fell asleep in a surprisingly comfortable antique bed. I got back
up around 5:15 a.m., and our small group departed a little before 6 a.m. All in
all, it was a night I will likely never forget.
Before I close this thing out, I want to remind readers that
the King Plantation House is a private residence located on private property. Do NOT just show up there uninvited for a look around. On the
other side of the coin, the house is currently available for rent for events such as
weddings and receptions, so if you ever get a chance to visit the house, take
advantage of it.
In the end, how many of you have ever visited the King
Plantation House? How many of you have ever spent the night there? Did you
experience anything out of the ordinary? Let us know in the comments section
below.
(Special thanks to Anna Jean Inker, the Garrett family and
Amy Bradford for making this overnight trip possible.)
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