The Passing of My Grandmother

From: Tony Middleton (Sightalign@aol.com)
Story type: Ghost
Location: Long County Ga.
Source: Form Submission

It was late in 1922. My grandmother, Kate Deen Middleton, was pregnant, and the onset of labor signaled the hour of delivery was near. Like most poor people of her day, the birth would be at the home. When her ninth child was born earlier that year, the doctor had warned that her life would be at risk if she continued bearing children. The doctor was now in attendance because it was already known that the delivery would be difficult, and family had gathered from all over to witness either a birth, or a death.

All through the long afternoon and well into the evening the doctor struggled to save them. Late into the night the first of twins was born. Shortly thereafter the second was born.

But all was not well. The gathering of cousins and siblings, along with my grandfather, had all lingered on the front porch in order to be present when news came. The outlook was grim. One of the babies had died. The other was not expected to live. Indeed, the second twin died in the wee hours of the following morning.

As the people quietly stood on the porch, and in the shadows of the front yard, everyone was astounded to see my grandmother open the front door and step silently onto the porch. Her expression was mournful in the dim lantern light as she surveyed the assemblage about her. No one spoke or moved.

All who witnessed it later said that not a word was spoken. Soundlessly, my grandmother turned and stepped off of the porch and walked out into the darkness.

I am sure that mouths hung open in amazement as a moment later the exhausted doctor stepped out on to the porch and wearily announced that, despite his best efforts, Kate had gone to meet her maker. She and her twins would be buried together in a wooden coffin. Nearly everyone who was there that day has long perished. But as a child I met and spoke to several of those people who all swore that it happened just that way on a cool fall night in the woods of a south Georgia county called Long in 1922.