The Ghost Of Peg Alley's Point
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Peg Alley's Point is a long and narrow strip of wooded land, situated
between the main stream of Miles river and one of the navigable creeks
which flow into it. This little peninsula is about two miles long, from
fifty to three hundred yards in width and is bounded by deep water and
is overgrown with pine and thick underbrush. There is extant a tradition
to the effect that many years ago a party of Baltimore oystermen
ncamped on the point, among whom was a man named Alley, who had
abandoned his wife. The deserted woman followed up her husband, and
found him at the camp. After some conversation had passed between them,
the man induced her, upon some unknown pretext, to accompany him into a
thicket. The poor wife never came out alive. Her husband cruelly
murdered her with a club. The point of land has ever since been known by
Peg Alley's name, and her perturbed spirit has been supposed to haunt
the scene of her untimely taking off. About twelve years ago a gang of
rail-splitters were at work on the point, and one day the foreman flatly
refused to go back, declaring that queer things happened down there, and
that he had seen a ghost. Mr. Kennedy, his employer, laughed at him and
dismissed the matter from his mind. Some time after this Mr. Kennedy had
occasion to ride through the woods to look after some sheep, there being
but one road and the water on either side. As he approached the point
his horse started violently and refused to go on, regardless of whip or
spur. Glancing about for the cause of this unnatural fright, he saw a
woman rise up from a log, a few yards in advance, and stand by the
roadside, looking at him. She was very poorly clad in a faded calico
dress, and wore a limp sun-bonnet, from beneath which her thin,
jet-black hair straggled down on her shoulders; her face was thin and
sallow and her eyes black and piercing. Knowing that she had no business
there, and occupied in controlling his horse, he called to her somewhat
angrily to get out of the way, as his animal was afraid of her. Slowly
she turned and walked into the thicket, uttering not a syllable and
looking reproachfully at him as she went. With much difficulty he forced
his horse to the spot, hoping to find out who the strange intruder might
be, but the most careful search failed to reveal the trace of any one,
although there was no place of concealment and no possible way of
escape, for which, indeed, there was not sufficient time.