One of the most renowned damned places in Connecticut is the abandoned—and allegedly cursed—village of Dudleytown. Over the years, there has allegedly been everything from suicides to demonic possessions, ghostly spirits to dreadful feelings, and all the hysterical drama in between. In short, it has…
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Headless Chickens Discovered in Courtroom Grenade Discovered in Garbage Coin Flip Decides Election Abandoned Places Cryptozoology Hauntings Legends Odd Things Weird Places Witchcraft Trials Abandoned PlacesConnecticut CuriositiesHauntingsWeird Places Dudleytown by Ray Bendici November 15, 2016 written by Ray Bendici 177 comments 5 FacebookTwitterEmail The Damned Story: One of the most renowned damned places in Connecticut is the abandoned—and allegedly cursed—village of Dudleytown.But as with many “dark” places, Dudleytown wasn’t always like that.Like much of Connecticut, settlers came to the area around what is now the quiet little town of Cornwall in the mid 18th century, and that includes the first Dudleys who came from England (via Guilford) to the Litchfield Hills in 1747. They helped create what became a thriving community, known then as Owlsbury, primarily fueled through the region’s growing iron industry. Homes were built, the land was farmed, iron was forged, the town grew and prospered, and all was well.Or so it seemed.Some attribute the demise of the town to multiple mundane factors—the depletion of the farmland, the decline of the area’s iron industry, the natural progression of younger Americans heading west to settle new lands, etc. Of course, there are others who simply believed the Dudley clan was cursed, as an inordinate number of Dudleys supposedly came to untimely ends, and that the curse extended to the village they helped found. Whatever the cause, Dudleys died off and the settlement’s population continued to dwindle until about the turn of the 20th century, when the last resident finally gave up and abandoned what was left of the town. The surrounding forest slowly swallowed up the homes and buildings, and today, the only remnants of what had been are a few crumbling foundations and empty cellars . . .Oh, and the curse of the Dudleys.The story goes that anyone who has tried to live in what had been Dudleytown has come into some terrible misfortune. Over the years, there has allegedly been everything from suicides to demonic possessions, and all the hysterical drama in between. The Warrens famously recorded a Halloween special from Dudleytown in the early 1970s, declaring it officially “demonically possessed,” which essentially opened the supernatural floodgates. Since then, it has been home to all sorts of alleged paranormal experiences, with visitors witnessing all manner of spirit and phantom as well as having unsettled feelings of dread and fear. As you might expect, the area has also drawn the attention of those enthralled with dark forces and demonic rituals, plus a healthy number of amateur ghost busters and teenagers simply searching for trouble. In short, it’s become a damnation destination.Of course, much of the mythology around the “curse” of Dudleytown have been debunked (by a Dudley descendant, no less—the Rev. Gary P. Dudley), but why would anyone let that get in the way of a good spooky story? Quite simply, there are no curses, otherworldly events or dark tragedies in the actual history of the town.Our Damned Experience: We have yet to visit Dudleytown as a group, but Kate visited back in the day—she didn’t have any unusual experiences of note, but did find a number of old foundations and a few odd bumps in the ground.If You Go: You can’t. The remains of Dudleytown are on private property owned by the Dark Entry Forest Association who vigorously discourage all visitors. It is heavily patrolled by local and state police, who will not hesitate to arrest and prosecute any trespassers. You may also like Timexpo Museum, Waterbury Connecticut State Hospital, Middletown (Asylum for the Insane) Monk Parakeets 177 comments Jesse January 23, 2009 - 1:05 am I had the pleasure of visiting Dudleytown a couple times before they really started cracking down on trespassers as heavily as they do people “loitering/trespassing” around Union Cemetery. This stepped up in intesity if memory serves after the release of the first Blair Witch Prokect film, which it has been said took a lot of cues from the Dudleytown storyline. Perhaps it was because of all the local legends and scary stories I had heard about going in “after dark,” but I only went during daylight. But I will go on record to report that even going while the sun was up was *very* creepy. One thing that has stayed with me was the utter silence. Quite literally, you can’t hear anything. On the way to the grounds, you hear the usual rustling of leaves in the wind, the chatter of woodland animals, etc. When we got there, each time we went, it was deathly silent upon setting foot in the actual grounds wherein you find the hollows, cellars and foundations. With the recent upswing in paranormal popularity, from ghost tours in New Orleans to all the shows on various cable networks, I think the Dark Entry Association is really missing out on a potential “oddity/curiosity cash cow” for the Cornwall area. I’ll also back up the “vigorous discouraging” attitude of the locals… it’s surreal. I’m sure it’s just out of frustration of cleaning up after trespassers and whatnot, but it really plays into the entire Dudleytown mythos… that temptation of the unattainable. Stacy March 2, 2009 - 10:21 pm Last year me and my boyfriend went to dudleytown in mid November (08). We entered through Dark Entry Road, which didn’t have a street sign but we were able to figure it out through directions, pictures and a good hunch. We noticed the sign but of course ignored it anyway. As soon as we left the car our phones lost service. We walked until we came across what looked like stone basements. I tried using my phone the entire walk and sometimes it would ring 2 or 3 times and then go to a strange static. I thought nothing of it though, we were in the middle of the woods! The only scary thing we saw was a white tailed deer. Birds were chirping, it seemed like any other hike in the woods. We couldn’t leave well enough alone though and both took a rock from as close to the “foundations” as we could get. A little disappointed we made our way back to the car with our rocks. Once we actually sat in the car, service returned to our phones. We drove away with our rocks in tow and after leaving Cornwall center we witnessed (what I thought) was a funny but strange accident involving vehicles in front of us which could have easily included myself had I not been paying attention. I dropped him off home (he forgot his rock in my back seat) and I put my rock on my front porch and went in to watch some TV. I tried to turn my volume down via remote but it wouldn’t work. I pounded the keys a few times and suddenly the the volume started lowering.. but I wasn’t touching the remote. It was stranger because the volume decreased in single increments.. 10-9-8-7… down to mute. The problem with that is either manually or by remote the volume only ever changed in increments of 2.. I was freaked out enough that the next day I through the rock on my porch in the woods and forgot about it. It was easy to forget about too seeing as though my car was breaking down daily, weekly if I was lucky. After cleaning it out, preparing for yet another trip to the shop, I found the rock. I gave it back to my boyfriend and he put it under his bed. Later that night we fooling around taking pictures and in almost all of them “orbs” can be seen, unexplained smoke. One in particular, half of my face is covered in a haze… This is the point where I started to see a relation between “odd” things happening and these rocks we took. Strange things seemed to follow them. I am by no means a superstitious person and frankly don’t believe the myths surrounding dudleytown, much of the reason why I took those rocks, to “challenge” whatever all the hype was about. We put the rock in the car the next day, with intentions to dispose of it. It was forgotten again for a few days but remembered once my car starting acting up again. We were leaving a friends place when we finally decided to toss it and left it in the parking lot on a grassy area in front of her apt. Less than 2 weeks later her house was raided and she was in jail. Of course, had they been law abiding citizens a raid would have never took place, it just seemed ironic that it happen so soon after we left the rock. They had been living there for over a year with no problems. Listen, I’m not saying that anything that happened in that month was paranormal, supernatural or whatever else. What I am saying is that enough strange, uncanny things took place that I began to almost fear a ROCK. I noticed a distinct pattern between where they were placed and negative things that took place there. My fears almost seem confirmed since discarding the rocks last year I’ve had no car problems, no “hazy” photos and no self adjusting volume. Of course, there were smaller coincidences that are forgotten or not worth mentioning but all in all both of our families think we meddled with something we shouldn’t have and honestly, I do too. Sometimes there are just too many “coincidences” for it to be a coincidence. Michael Carroll March 18, 2009 - 5:48 pm I am the founder of the group NEST (New England Spiritual Team) and am extremely interested in getting permission from this group to go to Dudleyville. Does anyone have the contact info for this group so I can try to go there? Or does anyone know anyone else who I can talk to to go there with permission? Thanks in advance. mike September 2, 2014 - 2:16 am go up the other side ofgo up the other side of mountain , just right of original dudley town just before dark/noone around and just wildlife,Beautiful,stay a few hours as i did doing a cable install and come down dark dirt road slow! good luck!!! shane March 21, 2009 - 1:31 pm the dark forest entry will not let any one into dudley town they dont care the reason .. i went there with my girlfriend last year it was not at all weird there were no orbs nothing but a realy old lady who called the cops and the cop who gave us a ticket i have pics if anyoe would like to see htem let me know [email protected] Brian Liotta June 20, 2009 - 10:02 pm I went camping there several times in the 70’s and I will say that we did not sleep. I will agree with Jesse above and state the absolute silence and the absence of any creatures that usually habitat wooded areas was a little unnerving. When we used to camp, I was eighteen and all I heard that the place was supposed to be haunted. When I read a book that chronicled the history of Dudleytown, I only went back a few times during the day because I wouldn’t go there at night anymore. One of the times I went back during, I found a dead horse in one of the foundations. It was covered with branches. It hadn’t even decomposed yet. Somebody dumped a dead horse down in the foundation less than 48 hours prior. I can add some details to this, but I don’t think anybody would believe me. Sky Guy July 3, 2009 - 10:45 am Brian, could you elaborate? i know you said no one would believe you, but i’d still like to know the details. respond on here and i’ll leave give you my email adress Candace August 21, 2009 - 4:08 pm I went to Dudleytown years ago with 3 friends. We walked all over the place, saw the remainders of the foundations but absolutely nothing paranormal. The woods was like any other woods (birds, deer, etc.) and we took tons of pics just to be sure we looked at every angle of this story. The pictures held nothing out of the ordinary. As much as I am a skeptic in these matters, I’d still be the first to plow my friends over in a flat-out run if I heard or saw anything out of the ordinary! Nothing to report about this one and if you look into it’s factual history, there is not much truth in all the legend behind it either. Sorry to disappoint….. Brian Liotta October 18, 2009 - 5:47 pm Sky Guy, I apologize, I haven’t been on the site for awhile, but I know other people (friends at the time) who can attest to the dead horse and our camping trips. Unfortunately, I haven’t seen any of them in 25 years, but a friend of mine brought proof to a gathering that the horse was there. It was something out of The Twilight Zone. I will not post what happened on this website without permission from the owners of the site. Steve(damnedct) October 19, 2009 - 12:21 am Go ahead Brian, we just monitor language. Steve Jon October 29, 2009 - 11:29 pm I went there in 1997 with three friends. It was late March and it got dark fairly early still. We went up the trail from Dark Entry road around 3 pm. By time we got to the top it was around 4 or so and just starting to get dark. We realized if it was getting dark at the top of the mountain it would surly be dark earlier in the valley where we parked the car. On the way down the trail, it was just about completely dark a third of the way down, we picked up a few branches to use as walking sticks and checking for ice in front of us. LOL, of course we didn’t have a flashlight that was part of the fun of it. We went there with the intention to see if anything was going to happen. Yes, we saw the foundations and walked all over the place. There were 4 of us so we were able to cover a lot of ground by splitting up. On the way down it was interesting to hear something in the distance. As we got closer we saw a fire, it turns out a group of college kids from Uconn were spending the night there as an experiment. They were quite spooked by us since we just appeared out of the dark. They couldn’t believe we had the balls to walk all around there in the dark without at least a flashlight. Like I said, we were looking for something to happen. Nothing did. The only thing I can say that was unexplainable was the fact that the car we came in had electric door locks and they always worked perfectly. Always! When we finally got back to the car around 8 or so the door locks wouldn’t work. Only the key was able to make the locks operate. When we left Dark Entry road wel pulled over about 300 feet southbound on route 7 to check the locks again. Just to keep it the same we all got out of the car locked the doors and then tried to open them as usual. Interestingly enough, they worked again and Always did from that point on until the car was sold many years later. I could never explain that, but I guess in hind sight, something strange did happen there. I was told to never take anything home from there. Im not a complete believer, but I would heed the warning. Its too bad a bunch of idiots ruined it for everyone after the Blair witch project came out. Damn bastard kids vandalized the place and lit fires. Now NO ONE can go there unless you are named in the land trust. You would just have to park far away and risk it by walking miles through the woods. Im sure you could get away with it. Just dont go alone. It is VERY remote and if you fall and get hurt you could be in trouble. Cell phones barely work in that area. When I went there cell phones werent even in option in that neck of the woods. Its nice to say at least Ive been there and did it. In the dark:). Kalani Lopa February 4, 2010 - 12:50 am I will be bringing my son to Dudley Town each time that he doesn’t behave. Vanessa August 16, 2015 - 2:48 pm Directions please Im trying to go there today please can someone help me find this place. Thank u Billy Earl February 4, 2010 - 1:28 pm I grew up near by and visited Dudleytown many times as a kid . We used to go bottle digging around the cellar holes. I never experienced anything “paranormal” but will confirm the creepy silence there.I have hiked/backpacked all over and never found a wooded area quite like it.Occasionally the lone deer or Chickadee, but mostly dead silent ,devoid of life. The Appalachian Trail used to run near by but was re-routed decades ago..At the base of Dudleytown mountain ,near the old trail,is Baldwin Cave. You have to shimmy down a long tube that leads to a large room formed by glacial boulders.Probably the coolest cave in CT. Back in the 70’s,the local Cornwall kids used to have keg parties in Dudleytown and its legend used to draw devil worshipers and wackos performing animal sacrifices. The local,very wealthy,residents got fed up and closed the whole area down.Who can blame them.I wouldnt want those kind of people hanging around my neighborhood. The locals are constantly watching for tresspassers and you will definately get in trouble with the cops should you try to explore. kayla June 16, 2010 - 11:27 am dose anybody know the directions to get up there like how to get up there past dark entry road david mitchell June 28, 2010 - 2:08 am I enjoy snooping the web and reading stories about the area. The fact seems in late years the land owner Dark Entry Forest Association does not want any stranger on their land and no excuses. Actually they own 800-900 acres and NOT the whole area. They think they own everything. I’ve asked…o…only locals (not knowing who I even was) can get permission and other excuses… Oddly nobody even knows what the ‘association’ is about. At town hall I suggested it was THEM that were into odd things like satanic stuff. They without saying so possibly agreed with me. All the secrets ?? !!! I have seen strange stuff up there and don’t think anybody has been hanging around but ‘them’. (it’s an easy walk or wander from the end of Bald Mountain Road) I’ve had bad luck up there but it could just be my imagination. It is so much work to get there now somebody is so tired they can imagine anything. Good News is now the Mohawk Trail is supposedly all off their property now. The problem is they think they own everything and call the police every time they see somebody. Town roads are ‘town roads’ ?? My interest is Baldwin Cave. Can somebody help me ?? Even with Cornwall Town Hall it is a mystery. Dark Entry Forest Association says it’s not on their property. (via telephone conversation) Otherwise excuse my bad-mouthing Dark Entry. I don’t really care because their treatment of me has been terrible so why say nice things ? hey..they own their property but treatment of others ? Then they think the town is supposed to worship them. Baldwin Cave ?? Any help ? I am zz4——–at——–coltsfoot.org John July 1, 2010 - 2:35 pm I was there about 20 yrs ago. I also experienced the silence that a couple other posters spoke of. No birds chirped, no squirrels moved about…nothing. Also of interest were the flies. As I stepped into the foundations of the old homes i noticed a preponderance of flies. As I stepped out the flies stayed inside the foundation area. As we all know swarms of flies indicated the presence of evil…… Anything behind all that….who knows? Interesting and fun anyway. Gary July 15, 2010 - 6:05 pm Went to Dudleytown via the Mohawk Trail in Dec. of 2006 or ’07. The one wierd thing is that the gps went crazy when we got near to the trail at the top of the road. The gps’ (we were looking for a geocache) arrow would spin crazily and change the distance whenever we faced the site but returned to normal just from turning around and facing the other direction. Since this is controlled by satellite I found it very odd. No ghosts, friend took a piece of foundation and he remains one of the luckiest people ever. The Mohawk trail goes through D-Town and does not belong to the DEFA but you aren’t allowed to step off the path even a bit it seems. Further, we were somewhat interrogated after we parked the car down at the bottom of the road near the river. We still went but the guy who questioned us apparently headed … truncated (121,373 more characters in archive)