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The Phantom Chaise
By Thomas D'Agostino
FATE :: October 2004
New England is abundant with ghosts and legends of strange accounts that have helped shape the character of our landscape: vampires, pirates, lost treasures, witches, and restless spirits forever doomed to play out a role that led to their untimely demise.
This account concerns one of the latter.
Many people in the region have related stories of a phantom chaise drawn by the largest black horse ever seen even to this day and always followed by an unexpected storm. At the reins, one unfortunate Peter Rugg is destined to eternally wander the countryside looking for home.
Some scholars suggest that Rugg’s ghostly chaise is a Halloween story made up by William Austin from 1824 to 1826 to scare the timid, while more affirm that Austin’s accounts are based on actual proof of the ghost’s existence through accounts taken long before his version and long afterwards as well—proof found in other writings, accounts, and a famous rock that is but a short drive from my home.
Who was Peter Rugg? Or should I say, who is Peter Rugg? Some say the first question is correct. There are, however, many New Englanders who will swear that the latter question is more appropriate. They have encountered the glowing carriage led by an unearthly roman-nosed bay furiously racing along the roads with the drenched spirit of Peter Rugg at the reins and his ghostly daughter clutching his coat sleeve in timeless fear.
The story begins in 1770 when Peter Rugg, a wealthy cattle and horse merchant harnessed his light carriage with his favorite horse, a great roman-nosed bay, for a small business trip to Concord, Massachusetts.
It was a pleasant day, so he let his ten-year-old daughter, Jenny, accompany him on his journey. As they rode away from their Middle Street home in Boston down the cobblestone road, friendly neighbors had no idea it would be the last time they would see Peter Rugg. Alive at least.
The trip out was uneventful. On the way home, however, they were overtaken by a terrible thunderstorm forcing them to take temporary refuge at a friend’s home in West Cambridge. Tom Cutter served Peter Rugg a dram of hot-spiced rum while his daughter shivered from the wet by the fire. The fierce storm did not let up, yet Rugg was determined to get home that night despite the insistence of his friend that he wait out the rain.
The stubborn Rugg exclaimed an oath that he would see home that night by God or the devil or he would never see home again. Truer words were never spoken in all of West Cambridge.
Rugg’s chaise never made it home. Authorities, along with friends and neighbors, searched for months, yet no trace of the wagon or its occupants was ever found.
During the spring of the next year Rugg’s former neighbors on Middle Street were wakened from their sleep by the clopping of hooves on the cobblestone road. Thomas Felt peered out the window into the mist and saw a phosphorescent chaise with the shades of Rugg and his daughter coming down the street. The apparition gave him such a scare that he quickly locked the windows and drew the shade. Soon reports of the phantom chaise were coming in from all parts of the region ...
Read the rest of this article in the October 2004 issue of FATE
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