Lonely Lurker

Lonely lurker ghosts visit their final place of rest. The reason they loiter next to their own grave is unknown. Cemeteries and old graveyards are the most popular locations to find a lurker ghost. The ghost haunts the area around their gravesite. They manifest at night in strange glowing lights and greet visitors with gentle touches, laughing and giggling, practical jokes and appearing, and disappearing in front of them. The younger ghosts of children are seen skipping between the rows of tombstones or playing other games inside the cemetery. Witnesses often report seeing people locked inside cemeteries after dark but no one is ever found inside after authorities investigate.

Graveyard ghosts can be happy or sad. Witnesses have reported seeing ghosts acting joyful and others sitting alone on a tombstone weeping. Maternal female ghosts return to their children’s gravesites. These ghosts may also return to haunt because their graves were desecrated or defiled. The violation of having their gravesite dishonored can irritate a ghost. The ghost will protect their grave by scaring off potential vandals or wrongdoers. If delinquents damage the gravesite or steal something from it, the vengeful ghost can follow the troublemaker’s home and harass them until retribution has been paid or the stolen item has been returned to its rightful place.

In life, some people find graveyards to be places of peace and comfort. The irony is that graveyards can be quiet places to walk, relax and think about life. Lonely lurker ghosts return to their graves to reminisce the past, ponder the future, protect their grave and find peace with death.

Story of a Lonely Lurker

Bryan from Iowa City, Iowa, grew up hearing tales of the local Oakland Cemetery ghost, Annie Oliver, who roams the grounds of the cemetery. Bryan was interested in ghost hunting so the local cemetery seemed like a great place to visit. He and his friends went to the cemetery for a ghost hunt. The first trip to the cemetery yielded no results. After a few hours, the group went home, but decided to come back the following night to try it again.

The following night, the results were quite different. The group focused the ghost hunt on Annie Oliver’s grave. A few of the members felt an eerie feeling as if they were being watched. The camera began to malfunction. An EVP recorded a female voice saying, “This is mine.” The group experimented with different ghost-hunting methods until they had to leave the cemetery. Before leaving, Bryan picked up a small rock by Annie’s grave that could have been a piece of her tombstone. The group went home that night satisfied with their results and made more plans to return. Later that same night, Byran started to hear a voice in his bedroom. He could not make out what the voice was saying but it was definitely a voice. When he got up to leave the room, he heard something hit the floor. He turned around to see the stone had fallen off his nightstand.

When he tried to open his bedroom door to leave the room, the door was stuck – or was being held closed by an unseen force. The door had never stuck before and there was not a lock on it. He pulled the door frantically as the voice continued to speak to him and it sounded like it was getting closer. He could finally understand what the voice was saying. The voice was repeating the phrase, “This is mine.” Finally, the door popped open and the ghostly voice suddenly stopped.

Byran looked back into his room. The stone was no longer on the floor. It was back on top of his nightstand. He spent the rest of the night downstairs. The next morning he woke up early and called the rest of the ghost-hunting group. Together they returned the stone to exactly where it was taken from and apologized for taking it. Nothing else has occurred since the stone was returned to Annie’s grave.