THE MANSION OF HEALTH In an area of Long Beach Island once known as "The Great Swamp," stood an imposing structure named the Mansion of Health. The Mansion was built in 1822, where Surf City is today located, just a year after a hurricane had destroyed the fresh water oasis for which the region was named. The Mansion was constructed near where West Seventh Street stands today. It was three stories high, and its length of 120 feet made it the largest hotel on the Jersey shore in its time. Its most impressive feature was a balcony that ran along the entire top floor that afforded a magnificent view of both the Atlantic Ocean and Barnegat Bay. For many years the Mansion flourished, isolated at its unique location. All the serenity and success of the Mansion of Health came to an end on April 18, 1854. On that day one of the worst storms in New Jersey history battered Long Beach Island. Fighting the frightening currents just offshore was the packet ship Powhattan, which was filled with over 300 newly arrived German immigrants. Captain Myers and his crew fought valiantly to keep the ship afloat in the swirling and dangerous waters, but it was all in vain. The ship was forced closer and closer to the Island by the storm. Suddenly, the Powhattan's was slammed against the shoals and a large hole was punched into the bow of the ship. There was nothing anyone could now do to save the doomed vessel. As word spread of the disaster, a small crowd of people gathered on shore, but the storm prevented any hope of rescue. Throughout the evening the Powhattan was pummeled by the huge waves and fierce winds. The ship began to break apart, and passengers, some already dead, began to be washed overboard. All the crowd on shore could do was do search among the debris and bodies for signs of life. None was found. The entire crew and all of the passengers had perished, and only fifty of the bodies had come ashore on Long Beach Island. The State of New Jersey had appointed "wreckmasters" along the Jersey Shore to deal with just such disasters. The wreckmaster's responsibility was to salvage anything of value that came ashore after a shipwreck, and to see to the proper storage of the dead until the coroner could arrange burial. The wreckmaster at Long Beach Island was the manager of the Mansion of Health, Edward Jennings, and the salvage and the deceased were piled outside the hotel. When the coroner arrived the next day, all seemed in order. However, as he examined the bodies of the dead he found one thing missing. None of the men or women had any money with them. This was most unusual. After all, when immigrants came to America, they came with everything they could carry, especially cash. It was the usual custom for passengers to wear money-belts around their waists to protect their life-savings, but the coroner could find none. Immediately, suspicion of foul play was directed at Jennings, but there was no proof that the wreckmaster had stolen any money, or even that any money existed. The bodies of the fifty men, women and children were shipped to Manahawkin and buried in pauper's graves in the Baptist graveyard. In the months that followed the suspicions concerning the missing money were forgotten, and life at the Mansion continued as before. However, when another storm ripped through the Island a few months later, a most unusual event occurred. The waves from this storm had reached near the Mansion of Health, and caused some erosion near the stump of an old cedar tree, a bygone relic of the area's freshwater past. It was there that neighbors and guests found something most unusual. In a hole, now no longer covered, where dozens of money-belts, all cut open and empty. Jennings' guilt was now a forgone conclusion to the Islanders, and he was forced to flee in disgrace to avoid prosecution. But his troubles did not end there. It is said that he was broken by his misdeeds and suffered from terrible nightmares, perhaps haunted by the spirits of those poor souls he robbed, throughout the rest of his life. He died in a barroom brawl in San Francisco. The spirits of the dead of the Powhattan were not satisfied with the death of Edward Jennings. Soon after the wreck stories began to circulate concerning strange occurrences at the Mansion of Health. Guests complained of hearing sobs during the night, catching glimpses on not quite seen figures walking on the balcony, and suffering a general sense of unrest while staying at the hotel. It did not take long for the rumors to spread, and soon the hotel was empty. Within a year, it was shuttered and closed. The "Haunted Mansion," as it became known, remained empty as America's Civil War neared. It was on a summer night in 1861, that a group of five young men decided to stay overnight in the nefarious building. After chasing each other around the balcony and enjoying themselves, as youngsters are apt to do, they bedded down on the third floor to catch the ocean breezes. Just as they began to drift off to sleep, one of the boys glanced out the window at the balcony illuminated by the full moon. What he saw there frightened him awake, and he shook his mates from his their sleep to confirm what his eyes saw, but his head would not believe. On the balcony stood a young woman holding a small child, gazing sadly out to sea. The light from the moon seemed almost to pass through her, but she was there! In a second, both mother and child disappeared. The five boys raced from the Mansion as quick as possible and headed for the mainland. From that day on, no one would dare set foot on the third floor of the cursed hotel after dark. The Mansion of Health never again opened, and it burned to the ground thirteen years later, in 1874. With the coming of the railroad a decade later, a new hotel call the Mansion House was built on the old foundations. Perhaps the spirits were still not satisfied, for it too proved unsuccessful. A few years later the hotel was moved to the ocean side of Eighth Street, where it now stands as part of Crane's Surf City Hotel. Perhaps the spectral sprits were appeased by the new site closer to the ocean, or perhaps they were assuaged when the State of New Jersey placed a monument on their unmarked graves, but the hauntings have apparently ceased, and the ghosts appear to finally rest in peace. SOURCES Down the Jersey Shore By: Russell Roberts & Rich Youmans Rutgers University Press, 1993 ---- BUY THIS BOOK! Legends of Long Beach Island By: David J. Seibold & Charles J. Adams III 1985 ---- BUY THIS BOOK! The Lure of Long Beach By: George B. Somerville Long Beach Board of Trade, 1914 ---- BUY THIS BOOK! New Jersey's Coastal Heritage By: Mark Di Ionno Rutgers University Press, 1997 ---- BUY THIS BOOK! Six Miles at Sea - A Pictorial History of Long Beach Island, NJ By: John Bailey Lloyd Down the Shore Publishing, 1990 ---- BUY THIS BOOK! SPECIAL THANKS TO The Long Beach Island Historical Association Beach Haven, NJ   BACK TO HALLOWEEN TALES - 2001