WEBVTT 00:00:00.750 --> 00:00:04.290 The Kentucky State Penitentiary sits there brooding 00:00:04.290 --> 00:00:06.929 like something straight out of your worst dreams. 00:00:07.629 --> 00:00:11.189 A dark, gothic fortress set in heavy and cold 00:00:11.189 --> 00:00:14.130 beside the murky waters of the Cumberland River. 00:00:15.150 --> 00:00:19.149 Its stone walls, weathered dark by time and trouble, 00:00:19.670 --> 00:00:22.370 seem to whisper secrets to anybody fool enough 00:00:22.370 --> 00:00:26.570 to listen. Folks say even from a distance you 00:00:26.570 --> 00:00:30.339 can feel something ain't right. Like the very 00:00:30.339 --> 00:00:33.140 air around it carries the pain and heartache 00:00:33.140 --> 00:00:36.859 of all them who've suffered within. But inside 00:00:36.859 --> 00:00:40.380 them walls, Lord Almighty, it's worse still. 00:00:41.359 --> 00:00:44.780 Guards whisper stories to each other, quiet like, 00:00:45.399 --> 00:00:47.840 about shadowy figures moving silently through 00:00:47.840 --> 00:00:51.039 empty cells, whispers creeping out of nowhere, 00:00:51.679 --> 00:00:54.420 voices of dead men mumbling their regrets deep 00:00:54.420 --> 00:00:59.469 in the night. Doors slam shut on their own. Heavy 00:00:59.469 --> 00:01:02.369 iron clangs ringing out loud enough to make your 00:01:02.369 --> 00:01:05.689 heart jump clean into your throat, though ain't 00:01:05.689 --> 00:01:09.650 nobody else around. This here's a place where 00:01:09.650 --> 00:01:13.549 men done horrible things, lived short, miserable 00:01:13.549 --> 00:01:18.170 lives and died forgotten. But some of them, well, 00:01:18.569 --> 00:01:22.230 some just ain't never left. Their souls trapped, 00:01:22.650 --> 00:01:25.650 restless and wandering, forever bound to roam 00:01:25.650 --> 00:01:28.939 this castle on the Cumberland. looking for someone 00:01:28.939 --> 00:01:33.500 to share their suffering. Welcome to Kentucky 00:01:33.500 --> 00:01:37.239 Melodies Scary Stories from Kentucky, where we 00:01:37.239 --> 00:01:40.640 spin yarns about ghostly haints, creepy hollers, 00:01:41.180 --> 00:01:43.439 and spine -chilling legends from deep in the 00:01:43.439 --> 00:01:46.819 hills. So grab a chair, dim them lights, and 00:01:46.819 --> 00:01:51.980 let's dig into something spooky. Long, for they 00:01:51.980 --> 00:01:55.200 ever thought to build that penitentiary, This 00:01:55.200 --> 00:01:57.900 land was roamed by tribes who knew it like the 00:01:57.900 --> 00:02:01.739 back of their own hands. Them native folks used 00:02:01.739 --> 00:02:05.079 the Cumberland River like a road, traveling and 00:02:05.079 --> 00:02:08.659 trading, hunting and fishing, and paying respect 00:02:08.659 --> 00:02:11.319 to spirits that lived deep in the hollers and 00:02:11.319 --> 00:02:15.759 hills. Elders spoke in whispers of ghostly guardians 00:02:15.759 --> 00:02:18.500 that walked through the thick Kentucky wilderness, 00:02:19.439 --> 00:02:22.919 ancient spirits given warnings. warnings that 00:02:22.919 --> 00:02:27.039 weren't never meant to be ignored. But when settlers 00:02:27.039 --> 00:02:30.400 came pushing westward, bringing their greed and 00:02:30.400 --> 00:02:33.860 their guns, violence seeped into every crack 00:02:33.860 --> 00:02:38.020 of this soil. Battles was fought, blood was spilled, 00:02:38.580 --> 00:02:41.939 and grief soaked into the earth, leaving an invisible 00:02:41.939 --> 00:02:46.259 mark so deep not even time could erase it. Folks 00:02:46.259 --> 00:02:49.180 round here still reckon the land was cursed long 00:02:49.180 --> 00:02:51.919 before the first stone of the penitentiary was 00:02:51.919 --> 00:02:55.879 laid. Whether them dark spirits seeped up through 00:02:55.879 --> 00:02:58.879 the ground to haunt the prison, or whether the 00:02:58.879 --> 00:03:01.800 cruelty inside them stone walls drew something 00:03:01.800 --> 00:03:04.900 wicked out of the earth itself, nobody rightly 00:03:04.900 --> 00:03:09.139 knows. But what is known, what every soul who's 00:03:09.139 --> 00:03:12.400 been near this place can tell you, is that death 00:03:12.520 --> 00:03:16.599 Misery and darkness been tied to this spot for 00:03:16.599 --> 00:03:20.680 longer and anyone cares to remember. The Kentucky 00:03:20.680 --> 00:03:24.319 State Penitentiary, what folks around these parts 00:03:24.319 --> 00:03:27.680 call the Castle on the Cumberland, opened up 00:03:27.680 --> 00:03:33.099 way back in 1886. Folks say when they built it, 00:03:33.180 --> 00:03:35.740 they carved them stones straight from the belly 00:03:35.740 --> 00:03:39.319 of the Kentucky Hills, them big slabs of gray 00:03:39.319 --> 00:03:43.430 limestone thick as a man's sins. built up like 00:03:43.430 --> 00:03:46.189 some dark medieval fortress you'd hear about 00:03:46.189 --> 00:03:49.409 in old stories from across the ocean. It weren't 00:03:49.409 --> 00:03:53.469 just a prison, it was a tomb, designed especially 00:03:53.469 --> 00:03:56.689 to keep the bad ones in and the rest of the world 00:03:56.689 --> 00:04:01.289 out. Over the years, this grim castle held men 00:04:01.289 --> 00:04:05.430 so mean, so rotten, they'd make your blood run 00:04:05.430 --> 00:04:10.129 cold. Men who'd done butchered families, robbed 00:04:10.129 --> 00:04:13.560 honest folk blind, and left a trail of misery 00:04:13.560 --> 00:04:17.160 through the hollers and hills of Kentucky. When 00:04:17.160 --> 00:04:19.959 they locked them iron gates shut behind you, 00:04:20.240 --> 00:04:23.019 weren't much hope left, just hard labor from 00:04:23.019 --> 00:04:26.660 sun up to sun down, sleeping on beds as cold 00:04:26.660 --> 00:04:29.800 and unforgiven as a mountain winter and misery 00:04:29.800 --> 00:04:34.839 so thick you could near taste it. Come 1911, 00:04:35.180 --> 00:04:38.699 Kentucky decided hanging weren't the way no more, 00:04:39.220 --> 00:04:43.149 said it was too cruel. Instead, they brung in 00:04:43.149 --> 00:04:46.689 something new and just as frightful, an electric 00:04:46.689 --> 00:04:50.269 chair right there inside the penitentiary walls. 00:04:50.870 --> 00:04:54.509 Prisoners started calling that chair Old Sparky, 00:04:54.949 --> 00:04:57.490 and it weren't long before she claimed her first 00:04:57.490 --> 00:05:01.889 soul. Poor old Jim Buckner, just a boy at 18, 00:05:02.490 --> 00:05:05.529 found guilty of killing, sat strapped to that 00:05:05.529 --> 00:05:08.120 chair, shaking and sweating, till they flipped 00:05:08.120 --> 00:05:10.759 that awful switch and sent him to meet his maker. 00:05:11.600 --> 00:05:16.060 After that, over 160 men took that same final 00:05:16.060 --> 00:05:19.600 journey in Old Sparky, their spirits still wandering 00:05:19.600 --> 00:05:23.199 them dark halls, restless and waiting for someone 00:05:23.199 --> 00:05:27.480 to hear their story. The prison walls ain't strangers 00:05:27.480 --> 00:05:30.939 to Kentucky's darkest souls. Folks whose names 00:05:30.939 --> 00:05:34.120 still send chills down your spine when whispered 00:05:34.120 --> 00:05:39.230 round late -night fires. Men like James Jim Howard, 00:05:39.769 --> 00:05:41.870 who was brazen enough to shoot down a sitting 00:05:41.870 --> 00:05:45.170 governor back in 1900, strutted through these 00:05:45.170 --> 00:05:49.009 halls as if he owned them, full of defiance till 00:05:49.009 --> 00:05:52.910 the day he walked free. Then there was Monty 00:05:52.910 --> 00:05:56.389 Tex Walters, mean as a rattlesnake and twice 00:05:56.389 --> 00:06:00.569 as deadly, who stirred up a bloody riot in 1922. 00:06:01.000 --> 00:06:03.699 Killing three guards before they finally shot 00:06:03.699 --> 00:06:07.860 him dead right there in his tracks You reckon 00:06:07.860 --> 00:06:11.680 you've heard of Robert Foley a monster among 00:06:11.680 --> 00:06:15.779 men Foley left behind a trail of blood so long 00:06:15.779 --> 00:06:19.540 you'd need a map to follow it six lives taken 00:06:19.540 --> 00:06:23.439 without remorse his eyes colder than winter frost 00:06:23.439 --> 00:06:27.680 and Michael st. Clair an outlaw who busted out 00:06:27.680 --> 00:06:30.800 of jail in Oklahoma and set out on a killing 00:06:30.800 --> 00:06:34.000 spree across state lines, leaving bodies in his 00:06:34.000 --> 00:06:37.500 wake as if it was just another day's work. But 00:06:37.500 --> 00:06:40.779 worst of all might have been Marco Alan Chapman, 00:06:41.160 --> 00:06:43.879 whose crimes against innocent youngins were so 00:06:43.879 --> 00:06:47.139 unspeakable, even he couldn't bear to live with 00:06:47.139 --> 00:06:51.379 the memory. He chose death willingly, preferring 00:06:51.379 --> 00:06:54.839 the final embrace of old Sparky to a lifetime 00:06:54.839 --> 00:06:59.550 haunted by his evil deeds. These men, and countless 00:06:59.550 --> 00:07:03.110 others just as vile, spent their last days staring 00:07:03.110 --> 00:07:06.649 at stone walls, waiting on death to come knocking. 00:07:07.689 --> 00:07:10.629 Some found peace in their final hours, quiet 00:07:10.629 --> 00:07:14.790 as whispers. Others raged against the end, fighting 00:07:14.790 --> 00:07:18.290 and cursing to the very last breath, their screams 00:07:18.290 --> 00:07:21.149 echoing forever through the halls of this forsaken 00:07:21.149 --> 00:07:25.629 fortress. Weren't long after them executions 00:07:25.629 --> 00:07:28.529 started that the strange things began happening, 00:07:29.209 --> 00:07:31.730 and it seems they ain't never stopped since. 00:07:32.589 --> 00:07:36.110 Long before they unplugged old Sparky in 98, 00:07:36.629 --> 00:07:39.410 guards and inmates alike knew something weren't 00:07:39.410 --> 00:07:43.529 right behind them stone walls. Folks felt cold 00:07:43.529 --> 00:07:46.550 spots so bitter it'd chill your bones even in 00:07:46.550 --> 00:07:49.990 the heat of a Kentucky summer. Whispers floating 00:07:49.990 --> 00:07:53.970 in from nowhere. Voices sounding mournful and 00:07:53.970 --> 00:07:57.629 lost. More than a few said they felt ghostly 00:07:57.629 --> 00:08:00.490 hands grabbing at their clothes, pulling and 00:08:00.490 --> 00:08:03.370 pinching, like something from the dark trying 00:08:03.370 --> 00:08:08.269 desperately to make itself known. That execution 00:08:08.269 --> 00:08:11.629 chamber. Lord help you if you ever step foot 00:08:11.629 --> 00:08:15.250 in there alone. Folks swear they can still hear 00:08:15.250 --> 00:08:18.050 the buzzing and crackling of electricity from 00:08:18.050 --> 00:08:21.170 Old Sparky. as if she ain't never done claiming 00:08:21.170 --> 00:08:24.730 her share of souls. Others who've lingered too 00:08:24.730 --> 00:08:27.449 long near that awful room have heard screams, 00:08:27.769 --> 00:08:31.589 muffled and far off at first, but rising louder 00:08:31.589 --> 00:08:34.929 until they're filling your ears. Screams of men 00:08:34.929 --> 00:08:38.029 who died decades ago but ain't yet been laid 00:08:38.029 --> 00:08:42.129 to rest. Death row ain't no better, neither. 00:08:43.090 --> 00:08:45.590 Prisoners locked down, tied in their cells, talk 00:08:45.590 --> 00:08:48.190 about shadowy figures standing over their beds 00:08:48.190 --> 00:08:51.659 at night, watching them while they sleep, breathing 00:08:51.659 --> 00:08:55.360 cold air down their necks. Some have woke up 00:08:55.360 --> 00:08:59.000 hollering, finding scratches deep as a wildcat's 00:08:59.000 --> 00:09:02.700 claws carved into their skin, marks left by things 00:09:02.700 --> 00:09:06.940 you can't rightly see. But there's a spot worse 00:09:06.940 --> 00:09:11.080 than any other, the third floor. Even the meanest, 00:09:11.279 --> 00:09:13.659 toughest guards in the penitentiary avoid it 00:09:13.659 --> 00:09:17.889 best they can. Patrol it alone. Ain't hardly 00:09:17.889 --> 00:09:21.470 no one brave enough to do it. Them that try feel 00:09:21.470 --> 00:09:24.850 a weight pressing down on them, like some wicked 00:09:24.850 --> 00:09:28.570 thing just watching, waiting for the right moment. 00:09:29.269 --> 00:09:32.309 It's said the third floor holds the darkest secrets, 00:09:33.029 --> 00:09:35.370 secrets that have driven grown men to leave their 00:09:35.370 --> 00:09:39.070 jobs, swearing never again to set foot in that 00:09:39.070 --> 00:09:43.250 place of endless pain. Even with all the horrors 00:09:43.250 --> 00:09:46.490 it's seen, Kentucky State Penitentiary still 00:09:46.490 --> 00:09:50.090 stands, mighty and dreadful as ever, housing 00:09:50.090 --> 00:09:52.929 the meanest, most dangerous fellers in the state. 00:09:53.690 --> 00:09:57.730 Ain't no comfort to be found here and them hauntings. 00:09:58.049 --> 00:10:01.610 They ain't never slowed down, neither. Every 00:10:01.610 --> 00:10:04.950 now and again, folks brave enough to call themselves 00:10:04.950 --> 00:10:08.129 paranormal investigators manage to talk their 00:10:08.129 --> 00:10:12.179 way inside. When they come, They bring along 00:10:12.179 --> 00:10:14.960 fancy gadgets to prove what everybody already 00:10:14.960 --> 00:10:19.039 knows deep in their bones. That place is plumb 00:10:19.039 --> 00:10:22.799 full of restless spirits. They've caught voices 00:10:22.799 --> 00:10:26.059 whispering through their contraptions. Voices 00:10:26.059 --> 00:10:28.200 saying things that'll send a shiver straight 00:10:28.200 --> 00:10:32.720 down your spine. Please like help me and warnings 00:10:32.720 --> 00:10:37.340 like get out. Sounding desperate and angry. Floating 00:10:37.340 --> 00:10:40.759 through air that's thick with sorrow. Others, 00:10:40.759 --> 00:10:44.279 using those strange infrared cameras, swear they've 00:10:44.279 --> 00:10:47.000 seen shadowy shapes moving slow and deliberate 00:10:47.000 --> 00:10:50.019 through empty hallways, shapes that ain't got 00:10:50.019 --> 00:10:53.340 no right being there, dark figures wandering 00:10:53.340 --> 00:10:56.100 with no explanation and disappearing as quick 00:10:56.100 --> 00:10:59.960 as a blink, guards and prisoners alike, tough 00:10:59.960 --> 00:11:02.860 men who ain't supposed to fear nothing, tell 00:11:02.860 --> 00:11:06.379 tales of being shoved by invisible hands, scratched 00:11:06.379 --> 00:11:09.840 by claws they can't see, and whispered to by 00:11:09.840 --> 00:11:13.600 voices that don't belong to nobody living. But 00:11:13.600 --> 00:11:16.639 the worst story in recent years comes from back 00:11:16.639 --> 00:11:21.740 in 2017. A guard making his rounds late one night 00:11:21.740 --> 00:11:24.059 saw what he reckoned was a prisoner standing 00:11:24.059 --> 00:11:27.419 stock still at the far end of the hallway, staring 00:11:27.419 --> 00:11:31.179 straight at him. When he hollered out, asking 00:11:31.179 --> 00:11:34.779 what the inmate was doing, that figure just melted 00:11:34.779 --> 00:11:38.490 away into thin air. leaving nothing but silence 00:11:38.490 --> 00:11:42.350 and fear behind. After he gathered himself and 00:11:42.350 --> 00:11:45.269 checked the cells, weren't nobody there at all. 00:11:45.850 --> 00:11:50.029 Just empty space, silence, and something dark 00:11:50.029 --> 00:11:54.190 watching from the shadows. Now, don't go getting 00:11:54.190 --> 00:11:57.570 ideas about strolling inside that place like 00:11:57.570 --> 00:12:00.250 it's some sort of haunted attraction you'd find 00:12:00.250 --> 00:12:04.059 down the road. Unlike them old prisons elsewhere 00:12:04.059 --> 00:12:07.179 that's been opened up for curious folk and thrill 00:12:07.179 --> 00:12:10.840 seekers, the Kentucky State Penitentiary ain't 00:12:10.840 --> 00:12:13.740 never stopped being a place of punishment, and 00:12:13.740 --> 00:12:16.240 them gates stay locked tight as a preacher's 00:12:16.240 --> 00:12:20.980 fist on Sunday. Ain't no tours, ain't no souvenirs, 00:12:21.360 --> 00:12:23.600 and ain't nobody getting in unless they wear 00:12:23.600 --> 00:12:27.399 a badge, got shackles around their ankles, or 00:12:27.399 --> 00:12:29.799 somehow sweet talk their way into looking for 00:12:29.799 --> 00:12:34.679 ghosts. But if you're mighty curious, if you're 00:12:34.679 --> 00:12:37.779 brave enough or foolish enough, you can make 00:12:37.779 --> 00:12:40.299 your way to Eddyville and get yourself a good 00:12:40.299 --> 00:12:44.840 look from the outside. Just standing there, gazing 00:12:44.840 --> 00:12:47.820 at the towering gray walls that look blacker 00:12:47.820 --> 00:12:50.899 than coal in the moonlight, you might feel a 00:12:50.899 --> 00:12:53.700 chill slide right down your spine. It's like 00:12:53.700 --> 00:12:56.740 the place itself is staring back at you, watching, 00:12:57.480 --> 00:13:00.629 knowing every secret you got. And if you listen 00:13:00.629 --> 00:13:03.850 close, you might just swear you hear something 00:13:03.850 --> 00:13:07.090 calling from beyond them cold stones, something 00:13:07.090 --> 00:13:09.789 dark and restless, waiting for you to come a 00:13:09.789 --> 00:13:14.509 little closer. The Kentucky State Penitentiary 00:13:14.509 --> 00:13:18.429 ain't just some ordinary jail. It's a bone -chilling, 00:13:18.889 --> 00:13:21.990 heartbreaking graveyard of souls, a place where 00:13:21.990 --> 00:13:25.350 pain and death hang heavy as fog and the hollers. 00:13:26.029 --> 00:13:29.070 Folks say some of the wickedest men who ever 00:13:29.070 --> 00:13:31.850 walked the earth spent their last miserable breaths 00:13:31.850 --> 00:13:35.870 inside them walls, living and dying, forgotten 00:13:35.870 --> 00:13:40.070 by the world outside. Or so folks reckon. Because 00:13:40.070 --> 00:13:42.950 if you find yourself standing outside them stone 00:13:42.950 --> 00:13:46.090 walls on a still Kentucky night, you might catch 00:13:46.090 --> 00:13:49.110 something drifting on the wind. Something that 00:13:49.110 --> 00:13:51.710 sounds mighty like the last scream of a desperate 00:13:51.710 --> 00:13:55.230 prisoner, echoing from somewhere deep inside. 00:13:55.600 --> 00:13:59.440 It's a scream that don't never die, a spirit 00:13:59.440 --> 00:14:02.779 trapped forever, walking the halls of that forsaken 00:14:02.779 --> 00:14:07.159 fortress. And friend, if you do hear that scream, 00:14:07.659 --> 00:14:10.679 best you don't look behind you. Cuz something, 00:14:11.220 --> 00:14:13.419 something dark and restless, something waiting 00:14:13.419 --> 00:14:16.700 all these years, might just be watching you, 00:14:17.019 --> 00:14:21.039 waiting for you to turn around. Now, y 'all reckon 00:14:21.039 --> 00:14:23.860 this place is truly haunted by them restless 00:14:23.860 --> 00:14:27.460 souls? Or is it just folks imagining things on 00:14:27.460 --> 00:14:30.759 account of all that history? Has anybody out 00:14:30.759 --> 00:14:33.759 there ever felt something real strange or spooky 00:14:33.759 --> 00:14:37.480 -like when passing by Eddyville? If and you got 00:14:37.480 --> 00:14:40.700 kinfolk who've worked behind them walls, or maybe 00:14:40.700 --> 00:14:44.039 spent a spell there yourself, what kind of tales 00:14:44.039 --> 00:14:47.460 have they told? Do y 'all think places that've 00:14:47.460 --> 00:14:49.960 seen that kind of suffering can ever find peace? 00:14:50.440 --> 00:14:53.580 Or are they bound forever to them dark memories? 00:14:54.490 --> 00:14:59.250 Come on now, don't be shy. Pull up a seat, pour 00:14:59.250 --> 00:15:02.009 you some coffee, and share your thoughts down 00:15:02.009 --> 00:15:04.870 yonder in them comments. I want to hear what 00:15:04.870 --> 00:15:08.289 you think. If tonight's tale chilled you to the 00:15:08.289 --> 00:15:11.610 bone, remember, this ain't the only dark holler 00:15:11.610 --> 00:15:14.629 we'll be wandering through. Hit that subscribe 00:15:14.629 --> 00:15:17.929 button and come on back to Kentucky Melody. Where 00:15:17.929 --> 00:15:21.909 shadows got secrets, the hills whisper, and every 00:15:21.909 --> 00:15:25.230 road leads somewhere you might not wanna go alone. 00:15:25.610 --> 00:15:29.929 Cuz in Kentucky, friend, something's always watching.