Remembering the Greenbrier Ghost
By Nancy Richmond
Now that the most mystical season of the year is upon us, I thought it would be appropriate to reminisce about one of Greenbrier County’s most supernatural events, which has been told in almost every country in the world, and which has been the inspiration for numerous books, plays and magazine articles.
The tale of the Greenbrier Ghost began when a young farm girl, Zona Heaster, met and married Edward ‘Trout’ Shue in Greenbrier County, WV, on October 20, 1896. Shue had a bad reputation and had spent time in prison. He had been married twice before. His first wife ran away from him and the second died under strange circumstances. The failed marriages did not seem to bother Shue, and he often bragged to his friends that he intended to have seven wives before he died. Zona, who was only 21, tried hard to please her new husband, but the marriage was not a happy one. Zona and Shue rented an old farmhouse at the edge of the Livesay’s Mill township and the new bride kept house while her husband worked at the local blacksmith shop.
On the 23rd of January, just 4 months after their wedding, a neighbor boy found Zona Heaster Shue lying dead in the family room of the old farmhouse. Shue was alerted and ran home, where he carried his wife upstairs. He washed off her body and attired it in a high collared dress that concealed her entire neck. When Dr. George Knapp (who was also the town coroner) arrived, Shue would not allow him to examine his wife’s body, so the physician diagnosed her as having died of childbirth, although there is no record she was pregnant at the time. Shue sat up with the body all night, and would not allow anyone else near it. Zona was buried in the cemetery at the Soule Chapel Church on January 25, 1897.
After Zona’s burial, her mother Mary would wait until her husband was asleep and then go into Zona’s old room and lie down on the bed, so she could mourn in private and ask God to let Zona be at peace. One night, Mary saw a glow in the corner of the room where there was no possible source of light. Suddenly, Zona stepped out of the light and walked to the bed. Mary was horrified, but Zona looked just as she had before her death, so Mary asked her how she had died. Zona replied that she had been ill the day of her death and had only prepared a cold lunch for her husband when he walked home from the blacksmith shop at noon. He became enraged and choked her. Zona said she had not died from illness or a fall, but that her husband had crushed the bones in her neck, killing her. The ghost then turned her head completely around in order to demonstrate her injury, and then walked back into the light while still staring at her mother.
Mary Heaster went to the Greenbrier County Prosecuting Attorney, John Alfred Preston, and told him she believed her daughter had been murdered. He found the woman’s story so compelling that he talked to Dr. Knapp, who admitted Shue would not let him examine Zona’s body. The prosecutor then ordered the body to be exhumed and autopsied. The procedure was performed at the Nickell Schoolhouse by Dr. George Knapp, Dr. Leancy Rupert and Dr. Lorenzo Houston McClung. The autopsy proved that everything Mary Heaster had told the Prosecutor was true. Greenbrier County Constable Shaver then arrested Shue, who shouted, “You can’t prove that I did it.”
Edward Trout Shue was indicted for murder, and his trial was held at the Greenbrier County Courthouse in June of 1897. Judge J.M. McWhorter presided. Mary Heaster was called as a witness for the prosecution. She told the court about her daughter Zona’s ghostly visit and how that the autopsy done on her daughter showed she had been choked to death. On the last day of June, the jury found Shue guilty of murder in the first degree and ordered him to be sent to prison, where he remained until his death on March 13, 1900. Zona’s ghost never returned.
The official West Virginia Historical ‘Greenbrier Ghost’ Marker, which was erected in 1979 on Highway 60, states: “Interred in {the} nearby cemetery is Zona Heaster Shue. Her death on January 23, 1897 was presumed natural until her spirit appeared to her mother and described how she was killed by her husband Edward. Autopsy on the exhumed body verified the apparition’s account. Edward, found guilty of murder, was sentenced to the state prison. Only known case in which testimony from {a} ghost helped convict a murderer.”
The last sentence on the historical marker refers to the fact that Zona’s mother Mary Heaster was allowed to enter her daughter’s ghostly statements as evidence at Shue’s murder trial. This is perhaps the most remarkable part of the story (other than the ghost herself) because Mary’s remarks were not objected to by either the defense lawyer or the prosecution lawyer. Consequently, Zona’s statement to her mother was not declared inadmissable by the judge, making it the only court case in US history where a ghost’s testimony in court helped to convict the suspect in a murder trial.