If you’re like me, you love a good ghost story in the dead of winter. The season commands all that is spooky, desolate, and lonely. Fortunately, American literature is rife with ghostly stories written by women, the Gilded Age being an era when the genre was particularly enjoyed, highly published and serialized in magazines like Harper’s, Scribner’s, and New England Magazine. Topics range from marriage, motherhood, to unruly women, but all retain an unerring sense of the otherworldly. I highly recommend curling up with these stories on a cold winter’s night.
Below is a ranking of some of the best ghost stories of the Gilded Age (and some from just slightly after it, too). If you’re a fan of the era, you’ll recognize some of the more famous names, but there are some hidden gems, too. By no means is this list exhaustive, and I encourage you to find your own favorite stories from the era, as well!
“The Lady’s Maid’s Bell” by Edith Wharton (1902)
Known for her popular novels The House of Mirth and The Age of Innocence, Edith Wharton was also a huge fan of reading and writing ghost stories. Wharton’s “The Lady Maid’s Bell” tells the story of Hartley, a maid assigned to work for a sickly woman, Mrs. Brympton, who recently lost a maid that was dear to her. Her husband, a disagreeable drunk, does nothing to better her condition, and sets the service staff on edge. During Hartley’s time in the Brympton household, she learns more about the deceased maid, Emma Saxon, as well as a possible affair between Mrs. Brympton and a bachelor neighbor, Mr. Ranford. Permeating the entire story is the presence of Emma Saxon, whose apparition stands at the ends of hallways, answers the maid’s bell, and even leads Hartley on a wild goose chase through the countryside. This story is best read on a dreary winter day,
Atmospheric and with an uncertain ending, “The Lady Maid’s Bell” keeps you thinking. You can read it here.
Edith Wharton’s best ghost stories are available here:
“Perdita” by Hildegarde Hawthorne (1897)
If you’re looking for a quick read that establishes rich scenery and mood, look no further than Hawthorne’s “Perdita.” In only a few short paragraphs, Hawthorne is able to conjure up a bewitching, if not unsettling, landscape that pervades the entire story. The granddaughter of Nathaniel Hawthorne, Hildegarde was a prolific writer of fiction, poetry, biographies, histories, and travelogues. “Perdita” follows a newlywed couple, Silvia and Jack, as they reside at Silvia’s Aunt Agnes’ home, Alfalfa Ranch. Agnes, a widow, has abandoned the ranch after the death of her daughter, instead devoting herself to charity. During their stay at Alfalfa Ranch, Silvia and Jack both see a silent, ghostly young girl that appears to them on the veranda. Intrigued, the couple then receive a visit from Aunt Agnes. Aunt Agnes’ meeting with the ghost child results in an ending that is abrupt and deftly written, highlighting the sacrifices of motherhood.
Hawthorne’s economic style shines in this piece, and you can read it here.
“Her Story” by Harriet Prescott Spofford (1872)
Harriet Prescott Spofford was published widely in her day, being not only a novelist, but also a poet and essayist. I love “Her Story” for its portrayal of unconventional womanhood, in particular, a woman who seems more like a force of nature than an actual human. “Her Story” is told from the point of view of a woman in a mental institution, who recounts the seduction of her preacher husband, Spencer, by his female ward. Throughout the story, the ward is at times bewitching and powerful; her presence and slow charming of Spencer eventually drive the unnamed narrator mad. She begins to hear voices and see specters. Our narrator, driven to extremes, confronts her husband and the other woman, but remembers nothing after, except for her time at the asylum. At the end of the story, we are told of another woman in the asylum who seems to be strangely drawn to the narrator. “Her Story” leaves you wondering exactly who this other woman is and if she has a connection to the narrator’s past.
Harriet Prescott’s stories, including the brilliant “Amber Gods,” are collected here:
“The Southwest Chamber” by Mary Wilkins Freeman (1903)
I admire Mary Wilkins Freeman’s writing for its unerring devotion to depicting the lives and relations of New England women. Her characters can be tough, and downright matter-of-fact, and that’s what makes Freeman’s ghost stories so real and tangible. I particularly love Freeman’s characterizations of the Gill sisters in this story. “The Southwest Chamber” details the events that transpire in a boarding house which belongs to the two Gill sisters, Sophia and Amanda, after their Aunt Harriet dies in one of the rooms. Sophia, not easily scared, sees no problem with placing boarders in Aunt Harriet’s old room. However, Aunt Harriet’s spirit seems to have other ideas. After terrifying tenants with phantom smells, clothing that moves as if alive, and full-on possession, Aunt Harriet manages to terrify the Gill women enough to get them out of the house for good.
You can read “The Southwest Chamber” here.
“Her Letters” by Kate Chopin (1895)
Kate Chopin’s “Her Letters” is the writer’s only story of the supernatural. A prolific short story writer, Chopin is known for her novel The Awakening. “Her Letters” is especially interesting in conversation with The Awakening, given the similar theme of spousal dishonesty and a very similar ending. Part I of “Her Letters” details a woman’s obsession with letters from her extramarital lover. Unable to destroy them herself, she decides to leave them to her husband, asking him to destroy them unopened upon her death. Part II is written shortly after the woman’s death. Despite his curiosity, the husband destroys her letter by dropping them in the river, although he begins to wonder what was in them. In Part III, Chopin describes the husband as haunted by the letters and his need to know his wife’s secret. Consumed by his incessant need to know, the husband finds himself on the very bridge where he disposed of his wife’s letters. Thinking he can hear her beckoning and hoping in death he will know the secret of her letters in death, the husband throws himself into the water below.
You can read Chopin’s dreary tale here.
“Secret Chambers” by Mrs. Wilson Woodrow (1909)
Fans of Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca, rejoice! Mrs. Wilson Woodrow’s 1909 story “Secret Chambers” is a fraction of the length of Rebecca and tells a similar story. In it, a passionate artist, Arnold, and his new wife, Sylvia, return to his mansion where the deceased first wife’s presence dominates all. Mystery surrounds her death, and a deeply devoted housekeeper describes the dead woman, Adele, as beautiful, charismatic, harsh, and possessive. The longer Sylvia stays in the house, the more she seems to lose her own identity to the dead Adele, suddenly becoming jealous of her husband’s devotion to his art. In a fit of rage, Sylvia attempts to destroy her husband’s artwork and then herself, not knowing she is reenacting the exact last minutes of Adele’s own life. Mrs. Wilson Woodrow effectively uses uncertain and blending identities that border on possession to illuminate the anxieties of the second wife, a common trope in this genre and era.
“Luella Miller” by Mary Wilkins Freeman (1902)
If you like Spofford’s idea of unearthly, enchanting women, look no further than “Luella Miller,” whose titular character consumes people in different ways. “Luella Miller” is partially told by a woman named Lydia Anderson, who knew Luella during her lifetime. Lydia recounts that Luella was pretty and charming, yet frail, a beauty atypical for her New England town. However, the townspeople that came into contact with Luella didn’t seem to last very long. Several men and women fall to Luella’s influence, all of them working themselves to the bone to provide for her before eventually withering away and dying. Lydia, unable to continue watching as neighbors die for the useless Luella, confronts Luella about her behavior, which shocks her. Not long after, Luella begins to waste away in the same fashion as her victims, unable to care for herself. The night Luella dies, Lydia Anderson swears she sees the spirits of Luella’s victims helping her out of the house, before they all disappear.
You can read “Luella Miller” here.
And here’s a collection of all of Freeman’s ghost (and otherwise weird) fiction:
“The Giant Wistaria” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1891)
Although not her most famous story, I love Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s “The Giant Wistaria” for a couple of reasons: Gilman’s attention to an eerie and lush landscape, an ambitious shift in time in the narrative, and an ending that is shocking. “The Giant Wistaria” begins in the 1700s (the titular plant is only a young vine at this point), as a man and his wife contemplate returning to England after their daughter has become pregnant and born a child out of wedlock. The husband, enraged, has kept the baby from his daughter, and has plans to marry her off to a cousin, threatening to keep her in the house forever if she refuses. The story then flashes forward to the late 1800s. A couple has rented a house for the summer with a giant wisteria vine that grows across the front of it. The couple invite their friends to spend the summer with them, remarking on the possibility of the house being haunted. After their first night in the house, the group remarks upon strange feelings in the night, some of them having even seen the ghost of a woman in the house, crouching in the cellar. They decide to investigate the cellar, and what they find is entirely unsettling.
Read Gilman’s “The Giant Wistaria” here.
“From the Loom of the Dead” by Elia Peattie (1898)
Elia Peattie was not only a fiction writer, but also a journalist and critic. “From the Loom of the Dead,” like many of Peattie’s other short stories, depicts frontier life. This story in particular has a folklore-flare, as the main ghost story is told by an ancient Icelandic seer and storyteller, Urda Bjarnason. Urda’s tale is of John and Loa, two siblings who lose their mother at a young age and find it hard to adjust. Things get worse for the siblings when their father remarries. Their stepmother is cruel, and refuses to buy enough food for them or to make them new clothes. The children freeze and starve, begging their stepmother to take care of them as their mother once did. She simply laughs, telling them their mother is someplace where she can no longer help them. That night, the stepmother wakes out of a dead sleep to see the ghost of the children’s mother, weaving cloth. The ghost wraps her in this cloth, which the stepmother finds repellant and loathsome. In the morning, she tries to present the cloth to the children, but it disappears, and she spends the day in bed entirely drained. When the ghost returns for the second night in a row, the woman resolves to properly feed and clothe the children, and lives in fear of the ghost returning.
You can read Peattie’s story here.
“The Yellow Wall-Paper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1892)
“The Yellow Wall-Paper” isn’t just Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s most famous story. It’s also an incredibly salient piece about what happens when women aren’t allowed a right to their own bodies. It’s difficult to ignore this story, given its popularity and Gilman’s undeniable ability to ratchet up an unhinged mood. Written as a scathing critique of Dr. S. Weir Mitchell’s controversial rest-cure, “The Yellow Wall-Paper” is from the point of view of a new mother prescribed the rest-cure for her post-partum depression. Kept in a room with a disgusting, florid wallpaper, she slowly begins to lose her mind, imagining she can see a woman trapped in the wall-paper. Her husband infantilizes and condescends to her during this whole process, which leaves Gilman’s readers with an incredibly iconic ending scene that sticks with you long after the story ends.
Gilman is of a class all her own; each time I read this story I find something new and am amazed by Gilman’s prose. You can read the story here.
And you can find both “The Yellow Wallpaper” and “The Giant Wistaria” in the Penguin collection of Gilman’s stories:
Related:
Check out the great collection of Victorian Christmas ghost stories by Valancourt:
The Wimbourne Book of Victorian Ghost Stories –comes in several inexpensive volumes in paperback and Kindle:
Dara Downey’s great book on women’s ghost stories:
Shelby Carr is a Ph.D. student in English at Lehigh University, where she studies 19th century American literature and Gothic literature. You can follow her on Twitter @CarrShelb.
