The haunting of Esther Cox is still a mystery in Amherst

In the late summer of 1878, a sleepy Nova Scotia town found itself in the middle of a mystery. 

Unexplained banging sounds rang from a home on Princess Street, buildings combusted into flames and a disturbing message was scratched above a young woman's bed: "Esther Cox, You Are Mine to Kill."

If you're from Amherst, this ghost story needs no introduction. 

Newspapers from as far away as New York documented the troubling events — later dubbed the Great Amherst Mystery by American actor Walter Hubbell who sought to profit from Cox's story.

The 18-year-old's haunting continues to inspire books and podcasts about the paranormal, and there's even a town festival in her honour. Esther Fest returned to Amherst this week after a pandemic hiatus.

But this lighthearted community festival, complete with a street party and scavenger hunt, is built on a history that's far more disturbing than ghosts or spirits, says author Laurie Glenn Norris.

"It can be very pertinent to today because a young person, a young girl, [is] looking for help and people don't really know what to do with her," said Glenn Norris, who co-wrote Haunted Girl: Esther Cox and the Great Amherst Mystery.

Possession, poltergeist or haunted house?

Most versions of the story begin with Cox and a man named Bob MacNeill taking an evening carriage ride into the Tantramar Marsh.

Some say she was held up at gunpoint by MacNeill or sexually assaulted. MacNeill left town the next day. 

Not long after that, strange things started happening. A box of fabric moved by itself from under Cox's bed and flew into the air. One night, the young woman started convulsing and her body swelled up.

Soon, journalists, doctors and religious leaders were gathering in her bedroom to witness the phenomenon for themselves, leading the Chignecto Post to jubilantly proclaim that, "this town has its mystery at last."

"It's like, was she possessed or were they poltergeists or was it a haunted house? All of the big movies that you can think of, whether it's [The] Amityville Horror or Poltergeist or the Entity, it's got elements of all of them in one story," said playwright Charlie Rhindress, who was born in Amherst and has been fascinated with Cox's story since elementary school.

His very first play, written in 1991, was called Guilty! The Story of the Great Amherst Mystery. He was the one who first approached the town in 2017 and suggested more should be done to highlight this history.

"For many years we didn't do a lot with the story," he said. "I've said if we were Americans, there would have been a movie about this and probably a TV series. There'd probably be a museum. The whole town would be built up around this story."

Thousands expected at Esther Fest

All these years later, Rhindress is still eager to solve the mystery.

"I find it hard to believe that so many people could have sworn that they witnessed things if there was nothing going on. But then it's also hard to believe that these things actually happened," he said. 

Amherst Mayor David Kogon has had his own encounter with ghost stories, which he said are big in his town.

"The third floor of our house was an apartment that we let a friend rent, and she told us that she saw the same ghosts repeatedly," he said.

While Esther Fest is in many ways built around the Esther Cox story, Kogon said it's taken on a life of its own. He's expecting thousands of people to take part in the festivities that run until Halloween.

"I just like that it puts a spotlight on the town," he said. "I mean, it's a ghost story that apparently is one of the most well-documented supernatural events that have ever been."

I'm not sure if Esther really ever recovered from it.- Laurie Glenn Norris, author

Glenn Norris said she's glad the festival is keeping Cox's name alive, but she worries the young woman's true story is getting lost. 

She believes the eerie events of 1878 likely started as a prank by Cox who wanted some agency in her life, but then it spiralled out of control.

At the time, Cox's mother had died and her father had left town, and she was living with her sister's family acting as the maid.

"Hopefully people will take into consideration that there was more to her than the 15 months and how this type of a thing, how this type of a public thing, can be so harmful to people," she said. "I'm not sure if Esther really ever recovered from it."

From personal crisis to public sensation

Even though Cox was never directly interviewed, people reported that she believed spirits were trying to possess her. She also feared MacNeill was going to kill her.

All of it, according to Glenn Norris, sounds like someone who had experienced trauma and was in the midst of a mental health crisis.

But instead of helping her, she writes in Haunted Girl that people profited from Cox and "turned her personal crisis into a public sensation."

Cox ended up spending time in jail for arson and eventually left Amherst for Massachusetts where she died at age 53. 

"It's funny that people want it to be a ghost story," Glenn Norris said.

"For them, the idea of a ghost is more interesting than the idea of this young girl trying to figure out her life through using ghosts."