American paranormal researcher Alan Sutcliffe has been studying the so-called "Lincoln Legend" for a long time. The surname Lincoln was carried by members of an unusual family (which had nothing to do with the legendary President Lincoln). Here's what he found.
The Lincolns were strange, unfriendly people who had moved in the 1890s from somewhere in the East (possibly Massachusetts) to Neapolis, a small town in the Midwest. Father, mother, daughter and two sons were squat people with ugly fishy faces, pale yellowish skin, bulging eyes, low wide foreheads and sparse hair Two sons, Theo and Oliver, were also albinos They settled on the outskirts of Napolis in a dilapidated house …
Nobody wanted to take them for permanent work. The mother washed the neighbors' clothes, and the father and two sons earned money as porters. These alienated, unfriendly people did not like anyone in the city, and their habit of wandering the night streets, frightening people with their strange appearance, did not add to their popularity. A few years later, in 1896 or 1900, Theo Lincoln was lynched on suspicion of raping and murdering a girl from a wealthy and respected Maines family.
It may not have been Theo's fault, as he claimed, but he was seen close to the scene of the crime, and, besides, the Lincolns were too much disliked by the people of Naples. At the funeral of his son, the elder Lincoln said that the townspeople would still regret what they had done. He watched Maines and threw a slug at him, shouting "Here is your doom!" After this incident, under pressure from Maines and other townspeople, the entire Lincoln family was taken into custody.
Shortly thereafter, the father and brother of the deceased girl were killed under mysterious circumstances. Their bodies were found in a dump cut into small pieces and covered with some kind of mucus. The police investigation turned up nothing, and all the Lincolns had an ironclad alibi - they were in jail. Residents of the town began to claim that they were meeting the living Theo Lincoln on the night streets. In addition, many began to see Theo in a dream, and he threatened to brutally avenge himself. Some of those who were met by Theo's ghost subsequently became nervous or mad.
The city authorities decided to open the grave of Theo, although the local priest warned that it was not necessary to hide the grave at this hour. Despite the police ban, many people came. What was the horror of those who came when they saw footprints in the sand, leading in one direction, in the direction from the grave. The opened coffin was empty, there was only a lace handkerchief of the raped girl.
The Lincoln family was released from prison and immediately left the city, probably back to the East. Their wrecked house burned down that night, probably someone set fire to it. Since then, in Neapolis, the Lincolns have never been seen again over the next years, the town has experienced several misfortunes: tornadoes, floods, two fires, one of which almost burned down the entire city. There was even an outbreak of cholera, which claimed the lives of several dozen people. It seemed that the city was indeed cursed by the Lincolns.
This, in short, is the story of an unusual family. Sutcliffe claims to have heard about the Lincolns in the summer of 1966 from a friend of his, Raymond Frey, when they were students at the University of Virginia. Frey, on the other hand, heard the story from a doctor who was once visiting his parents in West Virginia. The elderly doctor recounted how he had been invited to see a dying patient many years ago. The patient shouted deliriously: “Lincoln! Lincoln. The next day the patient got better and the doctor asked him who he called in delirium. Then sick and told the family story
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Lincoln, stating that he himself lived in his youth in Neapolis and witnessed all the events. The patient died shortly thereafter, but the story was confirmed by his relatives. Unfortunately, Frey forgot the doctor's name. After a long search, Sutcliffe found several more descendants of the inhabitants of Neapolis, who had heard about this story from their parents. In the library of the neighboring city of Neapolis, he found a newspaper from 1900, where a small note reported the lynching of a certain Lincoln, who was accused of raping and murdering a girl.
True, there was not a word about the empty grave and the Lincoln curse. Sutcliff advertised in newspapers and on the radio seeking descendants of witnesses in Neapolis. In February 1981, Sutcliff received a letter from a certain Greta Gilmore of South Bend, Indiana. Greta reported her husband Carla. He disappeared three years ago after he decided to contact Sutcliffe after seeing his ad in the newspaper. Included in Greta's letter was a copy of Karl Gilmore's unfinished letter to Sutcliff.
In it, Gilmore reported that he was a distant relative of the Lincolns. His grandmother was a second cousin of the younger Lincolns. Gilmore inherited his grandmother's house in the South Bend area. One day he came across an old chest in the attic. There he found the papers of Theo and Oliver Lincoln. There were IOUs, pornographic pictures. In addition, Gilmore found Oliver's diary, which described the disgusting details of the life of the Lincolns. Gilmore wrote that he considered his relatives "unfortunate maniacs" He felt ashamed of them, and he burned the diary
In his diary, Oliver wrote that his parents were siblings. He described in detail Theo and Oliver's incestuous relationship with their sister, and also reported that the brothers were doing sexual experiments with stray dogs. Greta Gilmore asked Sutcliff to answer her and help her with any information in her search for her husband. Perhaps the disappearance of Karl is somehow connected with the fate of the Lincolns. Sutcliffe thought that strange disappearances, suicides, unexpected deaths often happen to people who are trying to look into the dark depths of consciousness.
About the strange story of the Lincoln family, Sutcliffe consulted with many specialists, including anthropologists, psychologists, doctors, ufologists Sally Halton M. D. believes that the Lincolns were degenerate people, just like the Jacks. The Jax case was widely discussed by doctors and psychologists at the beginning of the 20th century. Representatives of the Jax clan, who lived in Scotland for centuries, entered into incestuous relationships, which led to their complete degeneration.
Psychiatrist Ronald Jackson believes that the Lincolns most likely suffered from some kind of mental illness, perhaps a rare form of rudimentary psychosis. Sufferers of this disease become aggressive, prone to violence and change dramatically in appearance.
Biologist Jordan Russell, in a conversation with Sutcliffe, suggested that the Lincolns were mutants, practically a new species of people, obviously not viable
Ufologist Peter Lovecraft explains the strange appearance of the Lincolns by the fact that they were hybrids, descendants of humans on the one hand and aliens on the other. Lovecraft informed Sutcliffe that there is ample evidence of a spacecraft landing in the mid-19th century in the Massachusetts area. Perhaps, then, the aliens left their descendants on Earth, entering into a relationship with earthly women. All these hypotheses do not explain, however, how Theo Lincoln could get out of the grave, and the reasons for the misfortunes that fell on Neapolis.
The paranormal experts were very interested in the information obtained by Sutcliffe. After all, he relied only on verified facts, and often in the process of searching he had to check them himself. Unfortunately, people began to seriously study unusual phenomena only from the middle of the 20th century. The more valuable for future researchers is the documented evidence of such phenomena that took place a hundred years ago.
Sergey MIKHAILOV