250th Celebration Fact is a Legend of the Headless Horseman of Lauderdale
Celebrating Botetourt’s 250th Anniversary with a legend not based all on facts except the events it surrounds! Ghost stories abound even in Botetourt County. As I was a child, my father repeated to me the Headless Horseman of Lauderdale every Halloween and I never pass that glorious farm near Buchanan that I do not think of it.
Based only on the imagination and as an archetype of a Headless Horseman made famous by “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” by Washingon Irving, to the best of my recollection, here it is.
When General Hunter attacked Buchanan during his infamous raid on the Valley of Virginia including Buchanan. He then rode over to Lynchburg in June of 1864. Hunter had a stout force of Union Calvary marauding the countryside. This ghostly legend has it that during the skirmishes involving the Confederates and the Union Calvaries, there resulted in one of the Union soldiers losing his head on or about the junction of Wheatland Road and Lee Highway north.
His body was removed by his contingent but never was the head found. It is said, though I have never verified it, that the farmer found the head and buried it somewhere near his cornfields between what is I-81 and Lee Highway.
Our story begins on a windy night when the moon was full and peeking out from darkened clouds. The time was back in the early 1930s my Dad, Grandfather Clifford Thomas and my Uncle Bill had been to Lithia to coon hunt with a friend. It was around 3 a.m. this account is according to them. “The witching hour,” my grandfather said in his deep baritone voice. As they drove along in the family Packard… suddenly Coon dogs howled in the back seat, my Dad and Uncle jumped to the window and my grandfather stopped the car!
All three swore to me, they saw the soldier, sabre held high racing along the creek bottom headed toward Lauderdale in search of his head! They watched until he vanished into thin air. They were wide awake when they reached home and swore not to tell my grandmother and Aunts so as not to scare them. I was the first female in the family to hear their ghostly experience.
I was both chilled and thrilled and slept with my light on for several nights! And so goes the legend in my heart forever!
Now that my breathing has returned to normal. Have you seen any Botetourt Ghosts? Let us know! Happy Halloween!
There are many more ghost stories and our Fincastle Library staff has a great short video of some of them on You Tube. Click here. https://www.youtube.com/watch?reload=9&v=Ev8U3H-8oMc&feature=share
Story and photo by Cathy Benson