A thriller writer has revealed the chilling story behind her 300-year-old Massachusetts home – and why many locals consider it haunted.
Tracy Sierra, a Colorado attorney and mother, is the author of the debut novel Nightwatching, which is based on the harrowing truths she discovers in her mysterious home.
Sierra said the house, which has been around for three centuries, was originally passed down to inherited relatives before she bought it.
She said the last owner “apparently was a real piece of work” who was not well liked by locals.
“The story goes, people finally noticed he hadn't shown up in town at all, so they came to the house, knocked and no one answered,” Sierra said in a TikTok video.
The 300-year-old Colonial-style house in Massachusetts is considered a haunted house by longtime residents who said it was abandoned for 40 years
Tracy Sierra, an attorney, mother and author, is the new owner of the mysterious house and has done some research on the house's previous owner
After digging up more information from the historical society's archives, Sierra discovered that the man was later found in the well just outside the colonial-style home.
'It was not clear whether he had jumped in there on purpose or whether he had fallen there. No one really knew what happened. It had been a long time,” Sierra said, noting the man had a drug problem.
People in town told the author that they considered the house haunted, based on how the previous owner was found and because the property remained abandoned for forty years after his peculiar death.
She said Newsweek one historical pamphlet stated that the man's death was the result of suicide, although other documents about the previous family called it an accident.
In one of her videos, Sierra showed the well the man was found in and said it has since been sealed.
She also showed the property's cemetery, where there is an unmarked headstone for the victim.
Sierra said that while it is difficult to know for sure what happened in her home, a man in his 90s was the first to approach her when she moved in and claimed she was living in a “haunted house.”
Sierra discovered that a “very wayward old man” once lived in her house and was found dead in this well. She has since sealed the well
Sierra's debut novel Nightwatching will be released in the US on February 6 and is based on her new-found truths about her 300-year-old home in New England.
“Kids dare each other to sneak into the old, abandoned house and swear they've seen the ghost of the man,” Sierra said.
The home was eventually renovated by the previous owners and Sierra admitted that she has never had to deal with supernatural experiences in the home.
'Our feeling has always been that all places have history, visible or not. And by nurturing and caring for the land and the house, by making it a home and showing respect for history, everyone is happy,” she said.
Don Allison, a ghost hunter, told Newsweek that if the previous homeowner was found dead in the well, “the haunting may or may not be at or near the well.”
Allison added that other parts of the property could raise ghostly suspicions if the former owner regularly lived in those places.
“My personal experience is that ghost attacks are harmless, although sometimes annoying,” Allison said.
The house also has a graveyard with an unmarked gravestone for the victim
Sierra said she has never had to deal with supernatural experiences in the home. “Our feeling has always been that all places have history, visible or not,” she said
Sierra shared the story of her home not only on social media, but also in a new novel.
Her thriller book Nightwatching will be released in the US on February 6 and is about a mother who hears mysterious footsteps in an old house where she stays with her young children during a snowstorm.
The mother soon begins to see the figure of a man as she is overcome with fear and tries to protect her children.
“Nightmarish, you won't be able to look away,” said New York Times bestselling author Shari Lapena in a review of the upcoming thriller.
“I wanted this story to explore the primal fears and impossible expectations that come with motherhood, as well as the ways women doubt and are doubted about themselves,” Sierra shared. The bookseller.