With Halloween lurking just around the corner, it seems only appropriate that we should rummage through some of Arlington’s own “X-Files” and blow the dust off of an incident alleged to have happened at Arlington Hall, a girls finishing school turned intelligence post that was profiled in a previous Our Back Pages. Though anecdotal in nature, this recollection from an anonymous military policeman has much more detail than is the norm and is a fascinating story.
One evening, while on patrol, the policeman overheard various discussions on his police radio about a number of odd occurrences in a certain building. In fact, the building was one in which the policeman himself had previously heard strange noises while on duty. During the course of the evening, MPs assigned to the first floor desk in the building were hearing footsteps from the floor above. The footsteps had the characteristics of a person walking on a hard, wooden floor, and then stepping onto a carpeted, softer surface. After a supervisor was summoned to the scene, this activity was heard again, causing the supervisor and additional personnel to investigate the second floor, to no avail. At the same time, a second patrol which was en route to the scene, noticed what appeared to be a female figure clad in a floral print dress who repeatedly entered and exited an upstairs ladies bathroom, pausing to regard her reflection in front of a mirror. After observing this behavior, the patrol notified the MPs at the downstairs service desk, who again investigated the area in which this activity is alleged to have taken place, with a similar lack of results.
One would think that all of this is mysterious enough, but, it was later learned that the building in which this incident occurred was rumored to have been haunted by the ghost of a young woman from the time when Arlington Hall was a girls finishing school. Supposedly, after becoming pregnant by a stable hand, the young woman took her life out of fear of the embarrassment and shame that it would have brought to her family.
What about you?
Do you have a spooky tale to tell? Tell us about any hauntings or mysterious occurrences that you have encountered in Arlington.
Arlington Hall Station was purchased by the US State Department in the early 1990s and in 1993 became the George Schultz Foreign Service Institute. I have done a lot of research on the relationship of the FSI to its previous incarnations. The funny thing is that there are still employees working at the Arlington Hall building which still refer to "Mary The Ghost". And this is 2011!
I worked at AHS in the early 80's and yes the ghost is named Mary – I believe the dorm rooms were located on the third floor and there use to be a phone booth at the end of the hall where they found her body.
I work at the FSI, and out of personal preference, I have spent many quiet days in the old building. This building is now known as E building. On many occasions I have seen shadow figures, heard footsteps, felt cold drafts where there shouldn’t be. However recently I walked in the back door on the ground floor and felt as if I had walked through a spider’s web, but found none of it on me.