Does ghostly widow still roam the woods and fields near Shomo Creek in the Mt. Pleasant community?

Union General Thomas J. Lucas

Last week in this space, I wrote about a recent trip that I made to Monroe County’s old Mt. Pleasant community. Many readers will know that Mt. Pleasant is located between Eliska and Chrysler in the southwestern corner of the county. Mt. Pleasant is one of the oldest settled communities in the county, and it is chock full of history.

Mt. Pleasant is also the site of the only skirmish to have been fought in Monroe County during the War Between the States. The skirmish occurred in April 1865 near Shomo Creek, and between 40 and 50 soldiers were killed there. I mentioned last week that there is a ghost story associated with this incident, and several readers contacted me saying that they wanted to hear it.

Sources say that after the skirmish, Union General Thomas J. Lucas ordered his soldiers to dig a large trench for a mass grave. The dead, which included many Confederates from local home guard units, were buried without identification, and only the disturbed earth marked the site of the trench. Among the dead was Confederate Corporal Ezekiel Watkins, the husband of Mary Watkins.

After the battle, as news of the dead traveled, family members came to the mass grave to retrieve the bodies of their loved ones for reburial in family cemeteries and church graveyards. It’s said that Mary traveled to the mass grave site many times in a vain attempt to find her dead husband. Sources say that the unclaimed bodies were eventually exhumed and buried near the fence of a local cemetery that’s still used today.

Here’s where the story takes a turn for the weird.

As time passed and winter set in, Mary was seen, wrapped in an old Rebel army overcoat, still searching the area for her husband’s body. She searched the skirmish site and among the tall weeds to see if her husband’s remains were hidden by the underbrush. Many nights, she was seen with a lantern, and at other times people found holes where the grieving widow had searched beneath the soil for her husband’s corpse.

Later, on one cold winter night, Mary was found dead, apparently having collapsed while digging another hole in search of her husband. Those who found her also found her shovel and the old lantern she was often seen carrying during her late-night searches.

Monroe County Road 1 passes through the Mt. Pleasant community. It will carry you over Shomo Creek and very close to where the deadly skirmish took place in April 1865. Many who have traveled this road over the years late at night claim to have seen the ghostly light of Mary’s lantern as she continues her eternal search for Ezekiel. Some even claim to have seen Mary herself, still wrapped in the old army overcoat that she wore to protect herself from the cold.

In the end, I’d like to hear from anyone in the reading audience with more information about this ghostly tale from the Mt. Pleasant community. Where was Mary buried? Where is the cemetery where the soldiers were buried near the fence? Let me hear from you if you know the answers to these questions or if you have any additional information about this spooky story.