King’s Tavern has existed in its current form since 1789, when Richard King bought the building only two decades after it was first constructed. Shortly after, he hired a 16-year-old girl named Madeline to be a server, and he had an affair with her. When Mrs. King found out about her husband’s infidelities, she had the young girl killed. The story is sometimes dismissed as fiction, but how else can you explain the three mummified bodies discovered in the main room’s chimney/fireplace in the 1930s?
Perhaps they were victims of the Harpe brothers, America’s first serial killers, who often drank at the tavern and supposedly killed between 39 and 50 people — possibly including some at the tavern itself! These events may have sparked the hauntings, which are responsible for shadowy forms, heat emitting from the fireplace when no flame was lit, mysterious footprints appearing inside, randomly slamming doors (sometimes when Madeline is mentioned), crying baby noises, and countless other mysterious happenings.
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