A 'perfect storm' for the paranormal: touring America's most haunted town

Thousands of people died at Gettysburg – and they’re still here, ghost buffs say. A thriving cottage industry offers visitors the creeps

Stroll Gettysburg’s darkened streets on any autumn evening and you’ll see guides in period costume leading packs of uneasy tourists from one macabre site to the next, lanterns held aloft. Approximately 10,000 lives were lost here, and 30,000 more people wounded, in the three-day 1863 battle to which the Pennsylvania town lends its name. Depending on who you ask, not all those casualties have left.

Considered one of the most haunted places in the country, if not the world, Gettysburg has nurtured an appropriately robust ghost-tour industry. According to Destination Gettysburg, a tourism bureau, there are 10 ghost-tour and paranormal investigation companies operating in the town, which boasts a population of 7,700. For many visitors, the sober project of commemorating the dead by day at the Gettysburg national military park is followed by a lighthearted, if more viscerally frightening, escape at night.

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from The Guardian https://ift.tt/2OeMxBG