Browse:New Wood Against Spirits (Volume 1, entries 1666–1674)
New Wood Against Spirits
Volume 1, entries 1666–1674. Source context: THE DOCTORS AT WORK: REPORTS FROM LAYMEN → FOLK MEDICINE → Wood. Entries listed under this heading in the source volume.
Entries
Entry 1666
I say Clark built dis house. It wears de name Clark Hotel, an' had he of died wit displeasure an' lost it by death, an' yo' buy it an' come in an' he don't want chew to have it, dey say yo' replace some place on it wit new bo'ds - dat'll keep him away. (That will keep his spirit away.) [All interviewing was done at Clark Hotel (colored); whether within the city limits of St. Petersburg, I do not know. We passed through Memphistown (Negro settlement) to reach it - see No. 214, p.60.]
Entry 1667
I was living in an old house up on the railroad and every night there 'used to come a knocking. And if I would knock three times, it would knock three times. So I went and told my father I was going to move from up there. So he told me to get two pieces of new lumber that never was a nail in and put a piece over the front door and back door. I never heard it any more.
Entry 1669
To make it more quiet around the house they go to work and some people puts on doors to keep them from worrying them. I remember one time we had some- thing like that occur to us. They would come in and you could hear kindling PoP like they were getting their supper or something. They done that along about twelve or one o'clock. That was a farm they used to live on before the War [Civil War]. My father, he suggested that they put on new doors and new window screens and it would stop them. We did. We put them on and we didn't hear any- thing more of them. That was in King William County, Virginia, near fifty years ago [1886]. [A new door on the house confuses the spirit; he does not recognize his old home. New window screens serve the same purpose. Instead of a new door, it is sometimes repainted - see No. 1038, p.395.]
Entry 1670
Change doors and locks if spirit comes back. [Changing locks is rare.]
This is a printed editorial summary; its conditional wording and bracketed comment remain source statements.
Entry 1671
Yo' buy three bo'ds of new lumber an' nail two on de outside of yore house an' one in de house with new nails, an' dey say de ghosts will nevah come there.
Entry 1672
Put a horseshoe up ovah de do' an' that will keep 'em away - de spirit or ghost away. Or either yo' kin take new timber, a piece of new wood, an' jes' throw it up on top [of the house]. That will keep them away.
Entry 1673
If some party's dead and dey don't like you, wal, dey worry yuh. Yo' Wanta go git chew a brand-new piece of bo'd and you wanta put it in yore house; yo'll puts it on de outside of your house - got'a put fo' nails in it, one to de fo' corners. Dere's fo' corners to a bo'd. Put fo' nails in dat and throw it in de house and call dat person name and dere won't be nobody worry yuh no more.
(You throw it in the house?)
Throw it underneath the house.
(But you nail it into the house first, outside.)
Yeah, yo' nail it outside.
(Then you throw it into the house?) [This into probably intentional.]
Den yo' throw it underneat' de house and nuthin nevah worry yuh no mo'.