Thriller Writer Shares 'Disturbing' Real Story About Her 300-Year-Old Home

A New England writer told Newsweek and her social media followers the chilling tale behind her 300-year-old house's mysterious well.

Tracy Sierra, the thriller author behind the novel Nightwatching, told her followers on TikTok the spooky truth behind her house and the unsettling well discovered years back.

Sierra said the home was built roughly 300 years ago and stayed within the family until a few decades before she purchased it.

"The last guy to inherit the home was apparently a real piece of work," Sierra said in her video.

The "really crotchety old man" was not well-liked in town, according to what she found in historical society records, which she said indicated he might have substance issues.

"The story goes that folks finally kind of noticed that he hadn't been showing up in town at all, so they came to the house, knocked and no one answered," Sierra said.

They finally found the man, but it was nowhere inside the house. Instead, his dead body was located in the well.

"It was not clear if he jumped in there on purpose [or] if he fell in there," Sierra said. "No one really knew what happened. It had been quite a while."

Today, the well remains on the property, but it no longer supplies drinking water.

Sierra went on to say that for a long period of time, townspeople considered the home haunted because of the way the former owner was found and what a difficult person he was. After he died, the house remained abandoned for 40 years, adding to the lore surrounding the home.

Sierra told Newsweek she found out about the well's sordid history from the previous homeowner's research. A historical pamphlet mentioned the death and attributed it to suicide, while other records around the family called it an accident.

"So who is to say what happened?" Sierra told Newsweek, adding that an older man in his 90s in her town first alerted her she lived in a "haunted house" from his childhood memories.

"Kids would dare each other to sneak into the old, abandoned house, swearing they saw the man's ghost," Sierra said.

The prior family that purchased the home slowly restored it over a decade, and Sierra says to this day, she's never had a supernatural experience in it.

"Our feeling has always been that all places have history, visible or not. And by tending to and caring for the land and the home, by making it a home and showing respect for the history, everyone is happy," Sierra said.

Nearby the home, there's a graveyard that includes the man who fell into the well, marked by an unmarked fieldstone.

What Makes A Haunted House

While Sierra might not have experienced a haunting as a result of the man's untimely death at her current home, many people do report strange occurrences in a place plagued with trauma or death.

"If a previous owner was found dead in the well, hauntings may or may not take place at or near the well," ghost hunter Don Allison told Newsweek. "They could be focused on the spot where the owner died, or throughout the property in places the deceased frequented."

Allison said those who suspect a haunting should look out for unexplained cold spots or even the sound of footsteps and voices. Sometimes, residents note a smell of perfume or tobacco smoke, signaling a former resident is still perusing the grounds.

And of course, like in many horror movies, some haunted residents say they'll actually see and hear doors opening and closing alongside electronics turning on and off.

"In more active hauntings objects may actually move on their own," Allison said. "Sometimes entities are seen with the naked eye. They can appear as solid as a real person or semi-transparent and can appear and or vanish in an instant."

Allison added that sometimes investigating a house and looking for paranormal activity will ramp up haunting activity, so sometimes choosing to coexist peacefully with a home's energy is the best course of action.

"In my personal experience hauntings are harmless, although at times annoying," Allison said.