Halloween is still seven weeks away, but if you’re looking for a book to put you in the Halloween mood, I recommend that you check out a great new book called “Haunted Alabama Black Belt” by David Higdon and Brett Talley. Released on Aug. 20 by The History Press, this 128-page book is full of creepy stories from Alabama’s “Black Belt” region, including Conecuh County.
“Haunted Alabama Black Belt” is divided into three parts. The first section discusses haunted sites in the Eastern Black Belt, including places in Barbour, Bullock, Dale, Macon, Pike, Russell and Tallapoosa counties. The second section tells of creepy places in the Central Black Belt, including locations in Butler, Conecuh, Crenshaw, Dallas, Lowndes, Monroe, Montgomery and Perry counties. The third section discusses spooky locales in the Western Black Belt, including spots in Choctaw, Greene, Hale, Marengo, Pickens, Sumter, Washington and Wilcox counties.
Readers of The Courant will be especially interested and entertained by the tales in the book having to do with places in Conecuh County. Those places include the Old Carter Hospital in Repton and the Old Castleberry Bank Building. The authors also discuss the origin of the name of Murder Creek and how it relates to Conecuh County’s early history.
Other locations in the vicinity of Conecuh County that are also described in the book include the Consolation Church in Butler County, the Rikard’s Mill Historical Park near Beatrice, the Old Monroe County Courthouse in Monroeville, the McConnico Cemetery at Perdue Hill, the Claiborne Masonic Lodge, the Monroe County Library in Monroeville and the L&N Train Tunnel at Tunnel Springs.
Higdon and Talley present tales of these locations in an entertaining fashion and the book appears to have been well researched. This should come as no surprise given the qualifications of the two authors. Higdon, a veteran of the war in Iraq, is the founder and lead investigator of the Tuscaloosa Paranormal Research Group. Talley, an attorney with degrees from Alabama and Harvard Law School, is the author of “That Which Should Not Be,” which was a Bram Stoker Award nominee in the category of Superior Achievement in a First Novel. Last year, Higdon and Talley teamed up for another outstanding book called “Haunted Tuscaloosa,” which I also highly recommend.
When it comes to books about supernatural happenings and haunted locations in the state of Alabama, I’d rank “Haunted Alabama Black Belt” and “Haunted Tuscaloosa” among the best. Others that I would recommend include “Of Foxfire and Phantom Soldiers” by George Singleton, “13 Alabama Ghosts and Jeffery” by Kathryn Tucker Windham, “Ghosts and Goosebumps: Ghost Stories, Tall Tales and Superstitions from Alabama” by Jack Solomon and Olivia Solomon and “Forgotten Tales of Alabama” by Kelly Kazek.
In the end, if you’d like a copy of “Haunted Alabama Black Belt” for yourself, it’s not hard to find. Copies are available at all major Alabama bookstores, and you can also buy it online through Amazon and Barnes & Noble. If you like a good ghost story, you won’t be disappointed by the tales contained between the covers of this book.
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