Haunted house
The following tales are of a house in Upper Brewery Gulch, haunted by, disembodied spirit of a murder victim. These stories are direct excerpts from the Bisbee Daily Review, this is done to so essence of the time period is retained.
Bisbee Daily Review April 11, 1906 page 5
Haunted House
Mexicans Say Spooks Visit Former Home of Murdered Man in Bisbee
Several Families Vacate Stone House
Believe The Ghost of Louis Maure Returns Nightly to Scene of Home Murdered by Mexicans with Rocks
Unearthly groans, echoing through the rooms, unseen people entering locked doors and walking about at will and strange lights from unknown causes are being heard by Mexicans who attempt to live in the four roomed stone house that was owned by Louis Maure before his brutal murder.
Situated in the upper part of Brewery Gulch, near the place of Bob McDonald, the house has been rent able only to Mexicans, no less than six families of whom taken the house, lived it a few days, and then vacated complaining that it was haunted by ghosts.
Mexicans positively assert that they hear groans at night and several times they have been awakened from sound slumber to hear measured tread on the board floor of persons who vanish into thin air the moment a lamp is lighted.
The fact that no less than six families have rented the place and quickly moved has lead some of those who have heard the stories to believe that strange natural causes are responsible for the uncanny noises or that practical jokers are busy
Owen Murphy is now owner owner of the house. For several months the possession of the house has been in the hands of Justice Murphy. Asked yesterday regarding the place being haunted, he replied that stories of the ghost have come to him. He did state that he now finds it impossible to get a Mexican family to live in the place.
Mexicans are prone to believe that the ghost of Louis Maure, who was beaten to death with rocks on Christmas Eve 1904, has returned to the place, not being able to rest in its grave because of the fact that his murders have never been found and punished.
Maure met his tragic end while returning from work in the mines about 1 o’clock in the morning. It is believed that he was killed by a gang of five Mexicans, who attempted to enter and rob the house of Bob McDonald, one of them being shot. Five of them were afterward caught, tried and sentenced to serve terms in Yuma for attempted robbery of McDonald’s home.
The most accepted theory has been that Maure met the Mexicans carrying their wounded companion and that he recognized them. Rather than permit him to live and probably be the means of bringing them to justice they brutally beat him to death with rocks. He lived a short time after the assault, but never recovered enough to name his assailants.
That Maure’s specter is roaming about the house in which he once lived is now pretty generally believed among the Mexicans of this city. Attempts to convince them that such is impossible have no effect. Those who have lived in the house cannot be induced to go near the place.
Another article exists about this house in the Bisbee Daily Review on May 1, 1906 page 8
Is Ghost Killer
Man Wants Justice Murphy to Pay him to Drive Spirits From Haunted House.
Families Now in Place Hear Nothing
Magistrate takes No stock in Theory That Spooks Return Nightly to Murdered Man’s Home in Upper Brewery.
Though he refuses to disclose the name of the brave fellow, Justice Murphy admitted yesterday that he had received at least one offer from a resident of Bisbee who agrees for a money consideration he will drive the spirits, spooks, ghosts and haunts from the haunted house in Upper Brewery Gulch, near the home of Robert McDonald.
This is the house in which Louis Maure lived before he was stopped in the canyon by a gang of drunken Mexicans while on his way home Christmas morning 1904, about 1 o’clock and his head beaten in with rocks as a result of which he died a few hours later without regaining consciousness.
Reports that the place was haunted have grown out of statements made by several Mexican families who have rented the house only to leave there in a few days with their hair standing on end, claiming that he saw strange lights and heard unearthly sounds, not unmingled with groans.
Recently Justice Murphy has rented the house to two families, each taking half. Though they have been in the building several weeks, they have heard nothing to substantiate the theory of the Mexicans that spirits of the dead return at night to walk at will and relieve the restlessness of their souls.
Justice Murphy stated Yesterday that he had refused an offer of the man who would willingly spend a night in the house and agree to either drive the spooks away or prove none ever came there. The sum he asked was too great to justify Murphy’s interfering with the pleasant occupation of any spirit that finds pleasure in coming to the house and scaring the people.
Murphy believes the spook theory deserves little consideration and that if any were ever there it was the excited imagination of the Mexican families who hurriedly left to proclaim strange things they had seen and heard.