The Ghost Stories of Ambrose Bierce
3.5/5
()
About this ebook
Ambrose Bierce
Ambrose Bierce was an American writer, critic and war veteran. Bierce fought for the Union Army during the American Civil War, eventually rising to the rank of brevet major before resigning from the Army following an 1866 expedition across the Great Plains. Bierce’s harrowing experiences during the Civil War, particularly those at the Battle of Shiloh, shaped a writing career that included editorials, novels, short stories and poetry. Among his most famous works are “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge,” “The Boarded Window,” “Chickamauga,” and What I Saw of Shiloh. While on a tour of Civil-War battlefields in 1913, Bierce is believed to have joined Pancho Villa’s army before disappearing in the chaos of the Mexican Revolution.
Read more from Ambrose Bierce
The Weiser Book of Horror and the Occult: Hidden Magic, Occult Truths, and the Stories That Started It All Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Famous Modern Ghost Stories Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Greatest Ghost and Horror Stories Ever Written: volume 4 (30 short stories) Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Classic American Short Story MEGAPACK ® (Volume 1): 34 of the Greatest Stories Ever Written Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Complete Short Stories of Ambrose Bierce Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge and Other Stories Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Unabridged Devil's Dictionary Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Hellbent Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAn Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Greatest Ghost and Horror Stories Ever Written: volume 1 (30 short stories) Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Devil's Dictionary Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Collected Short Stories of Ambrose Bierce Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Devil's Dictionary Illustrated Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Greatest American Short Stories: 50+ Classics of American Literature Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings50 Masterpieces of Occult & Supernatural Fiction Vol. 1 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsWrite It Right Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsTRICK OR TREAT Boxed Set: 200+ Eerie Tales from the Greatest Storytellers: Horror Classics, Mysterious Cases, Gothic Novels, Monster Tales & Supernatural Stories: Sweeney Todd, The Murders in the Rue Morgue, Frankenstein, The Vampire, Dracula, Sleepy Hollow, From Beyond… Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Devil's Dictionary: Satirical Definitions of Everyday Words Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Greatest American Short Stories (Vol. 1) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Devils Dictionary Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Related to The Ghost Stories of Ambrose Bierce
Related ebooks
The Ghost Stories of Ambrose Bierce Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Present at a Hanging and Other Ghost Stories Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Household Traitors Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Rum Runner: A Novella: Speakeasy, #2 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSkull-Face Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings50 Halloween Stories you have to read before you die (Golden Deer Classics) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThis Crowded Earth Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDracula's Guest Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Strange People, Scary People Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Box Set - The Greatest Ghost and Horror Stories Ever Written: volumes 1 to 7 (100+ authors & 200+ stories) (Halloween Stories) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsCircles of Dread Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Murders in the Rue Morgue Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsA Whisper In The Dark Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Short Stories Of Henry S Whitehead - Volume 2 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsClassic Tales of the Supernatural Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe List of 7 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsIn A Glass Darkly Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Greatest Ghost and Horror Stories Ever Written: volume 1 (30 short stories) Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Short Stories Of HP Lovecraft: "Searchers after horror haunt strange, far places." Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Ghost Stories of an Antiquary Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Valley of the Worm: The Weird Works of Robert E. Howard, Vol. 5 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsUncle Silas (Horror Classic) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Complete Works Of Ambrose Bierce Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsJohn Silence, Physician Extraordinary Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Ghosts For You
Night Side of the River Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Children on the Hill Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Hell House: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Before You Sleep: Three Horrors Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Lovecraft Country: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5House Next Door Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Linghun Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Burnt Offerings Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Kill Creek Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Second Glance: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Elementals Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Ghost Writer Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Shadows for Silence in the Forests of Hell Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Ritual: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Ghost Bride: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Lost Gods: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Drowning Kind Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Gallows Hill Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5A Sincere Warning About The Entity In Your Home Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Floating Staircase Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Library of the Dead Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Selections from Fragile Things, Volume Two: 6 Short Fictions and Wonders Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Girl from Rawblood: A Gothic Horror Story Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Her Fearful Symmetry: A Novel Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Hold My Place Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Valancourt Book of Victorian Christmas Ghost Stories Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Toll Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Collected Ghost Stories Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Haunting of Ashburn House Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Seance Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Reviews for The Ghost Stories of Ambrose Bierce
3 ratings3 reviews
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5S. T. Joshi’s Ambrose Bierce: The Devil’s Dictionary, Tales, & Memoirs is a better all-around sampler of Bierce’s many facets, but this collection is cheaper, uses Bierce’s Collected Stories as the source for the stories – important since Bierce liked to revise his work each printing, and has all of Bierce’s most famous and significant weird stories and science fiction. I would argue it’s only missing Bierce’s science fiction satires “For the Ahkoond” and “Ashes of the Beacon”. Joshi’s work includes all of Bierce’s Can Such Things Be?, primarily a collection of horror and supernatural works.It does have two things Joshi’s book lacks.First is a Bierce essay on the importance of dreams in his life, “Visions of the Night”.The second is Bleiler’s lengthy introduction. Putting aside that some have found its summary of Bierce’s life as scurrilous, I think its summary and critique of the volume’s story is valuable.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Bierce's writing is a bit uneven, but his best ghost and horror stories, such as "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge", are among the best ever written. This is a very good introduction to his work.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5While I appreciate Bierce's knack for "dropping the bomb on the reader," some of these stories became a little to predictable. Don't get me wrong; for the most part, I enjoyed this book. However, if you're a fan of his Civil War shorts, you probably won't like this. He becomes extremely wordy at times, and some of the stories don't even have a plot. Not to be negative, the stories are enjoyable overall. Look for his classic "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge" and some of his creepy ones: "The Damned Thing" and "The Middle Toe of the Right Foot."
Book preview
The Ghost Stories of Ambrose Bierce - Ambrose Bierce
The Ghost Stories of Ambrose Bierce
by Ambrose Bierce
SMK Books
Copyright © 2013 by SMK Books
All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever.
SMK Books eBook edition June 2013
Manufactured in the United States of America
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
ISBN 978-1627552165
Table of Contents
The Ways of Ghosts
Present at a Hanging
A Cold Greeting
A Wireless Message
An Arrest
A Man with Two Lives
Three and One are One
A Baffled Ambuscade
Two Military Executions
The Isle of Pines
A Fruitless Assignment
A Vine on a House
At Old Man Eckert’s
The Spook House
The Other Lodgers
The Thing at Nolan
The Difficulty of Crossing a Field
An Unfinished Race
Charles Ashmore’s Trail
Science to the Front
The Middle toe of the Right Foot
The Damned Thing
The Ways of Ghosts
My peculiar relation to the writer of the following narratives is such that I must ask the reader to overlook the absence of explanation as to how they came into my possession. Withal, my knowledge of him is so meager that I should rather not undertake to say if he were himself persuaded of the truth of what he relates; certainly such inquiries as I have thought it worth while to set about have not in every instance tended to confirmation of the statements made. Yet his style, for the most part devoid alike of artifice and art, almost baldly simple and direct, seems hardly compatible with the disingenuousness of a merely literary intention; one would call it the manner of one more concerned for the fruits of research than for the flowers of expression. In transcribing his notes and fortifying their claim to attention by giving them something of an orderly arrangement, I have conscientiously refrained from embellishing them with such small ornaments of diction as I may have felt myself able to bestow, which would not only have been impertinent, even if pleasing, but would have given me a somewhat closer relation to the work than I should care to have and to avow. - A. B.
Present at a Hanging
An old man named Daniel Baker, living near Lebanon, Iowa, was suspected by his neighbors of having murdered a peddler who had obtained permission to pass the night at his house. This was in 1853, when peddling was more common in the Western country than it is now, and was attended with considerable danger. The peddler with his pack traversed the country by all manner of lonely roads, and was compelled to rely upon the country people for hospitality. This brought him into relation with queer characters, some of whom were not altogether scrupulous in their methods of making a living, murder being an acceptable means to that end. It occasionally occurred that a peddler with diminished pack and swollen purse would be traced to the lonely dwelling of some rough character and never could be traced beyond. This was so in the case of old man Baker,
as he was always called. (Such names are given in the western settlements
only to elderly persons who are not esteemed; to the general disrepute of social unworth is affixed the special reproach of age.) A peddler came to his house and none went away - that is all that anybody knew.
Seven years later the Rev. Mr. Cummings, a Baptist minister well known in that part of the country, was driving by Baker’s farm one night. It was not very dark: there was a bit of moon somewhere above the light veil of mist that lay along the earth. Mr. Cummings, who was at all times a cheerful person, was whistling a tune, which he would occasionally interrupt to speak a word of friendly encouragement to his horse. As he came to a little bridge across a dry ravine he saw the figure of a man standing upon it, clearly outlined against the gray background of a misty forest. The man had something strapped on his back and carried a heavy stick - obviously an itinerant peddler. His attitude had in it a suggestion of abstraction, like that of a sleepwalker. Mr. Cummings reined in his horse when he arrived in front of him, gave him a pleasant salutation and invited him to a seat in the vehicle - if you are going my way,
he added. The man raised his head, looked him full in the face, but neither answered nor made any further movement. The minister, with good-natured persistence, repeated his invitation. At this the man threw his right hand forward from his side and pointed downward as he stood on the extreme edge of the bridge. Mr. Cummings looked past him, over into the ravine, saw nothing unusual and withdrew his eyes to address the man again. He had disappeared. The horse, which all this time had been uncommonly restless, gave at the same moment a snort of terror and started to run away. Before he had regained control of the animal the minister was at the crest of the hill a hundred yards along. He looked back and saw the figure again, at the same place and in the same attitude as when he had first observed it. Then for the first time he was conscious of a sense of the supernatural and drove home as rapidly as his willing horse would go.
On arriving at home he related his adventure to his family, and early the next morning, accompanied by two neighbors, John White Corwell and Abner Raiser, returned to the spot. They found the body of old man Baker hanging by the neck from one of the beams of the bridge, immediately beneath the spot where the apparition had stood. A thick coating of dust, slightly dampened by the mist, covered the floor of the bridge, but the only footprints were those of Mr. Cummings’ horse.
In taking down the body the men disturbed the loose, friable earth of the slope below it, disclosing human bones already nearly uncovered by the action of water and frost. They were identified as those of the lost peddler. At the double inquest the coroner’s jury found that Daniel Baker died by his own hand while suffering from temporary insanity, and that Samuel Morritz was murdered by some person or persons to the jury unknown.
A Cold Greeting
This is a story told by the late Benson Foley of San Francisco:
"In the summer of 1881 I met a man named James H. Conway, a resident of Franklin, Tennessee. He was visiting San Francisco for his health, deluded man, and brought me a note of introduction from Mr. Lawrence Barting. I had known Barting as a captain in the Federal army during the civil war. At its close he had settled in Franklin, and in time became, I had reason to think, somewhat prominent as a lawyer. Barting had always seemed to me an honorable and truthful man, and the warm friendship which he expressed in his