There are places on this earth where people disappear… And places where history refuses to stay buried.Tonight, on The Haunting Truth, we journey into the Great Dismal Swamp — a place of true crime, survival, violence, and supernatural terror — where the line between history and haunting dissolves into fog.

Listener discretion advised. This episode contains discussions of historical violence, murder, enslavement, death, and supernatural folklore that may be disturbing to some listeners.

Sources:

National Park Service (NPS) — Great Dismal Swamp National Wildlife Refuge

U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service — Great Dismal Swamp Refuge Archives

Daniel O. Sayers, A Desolate Place for a Defiant People: The Archaeology of Maroons, Indigenous Americans, and Enslaved Laborers in the Great Dismal Swamp

WPA Slave Narratives (1930s) — North Carolina & Virginia Collections

Library of Congress — Born in Slavery: Slave Narratives

North Carolina State Archives: Missing persons reports (19th–early 20th centuries), Canal laborer death records, Coroner inquests involving swamp recoveries

·Virginia State Archives: Lumber camp accident reports, Prohibition-era criminal activity and moonshining records, Unsolved deaths tied to swamp regions

Norfolk Virginian-Pilot (1800s–1900s)

The Daily Advance (Elizabeth City, NC)

Local Oral Histories: Camden County, NC, Gates County, NC, Suffolk & Chesapeake, VA

Algonquian Tribal Oral Traditions

John V. Dennis, Legends of the Great Dismal Swamp

The Mysteries of the Great Dismal Swamp – North Carolina Ghosts

Loren Coleman, Mysterious America

Local Hunter & Ranger Anecdotal accounts

Edmund S. Morgan, American Slavery, American Freedom

Alan Taylor, American Colonies

Environmental Trauma Theory

Facebook: Jenn Woo Thehauntingtruth

Instagram: the_haunting_seeker

Email: hauntingtruth@outlook.com

Join us tonight as we discuss a case from Camden NJ that sits at the crossroads of true crime, literary myth, and the uncomfortable truth about how real girls disappear behind fictional ones.

This is the story of Sally Horner, the child whose kidnapping and captivity would echo through American culture long after her death… and whose name was nearly erased by the fame of the novel she never lived to read.

Sources & Reference Material:

Films:

1. Lolita (1962) — Directed by Stanley Kubrick

2. Lolita (1997) — Directed by Adrian Lyne

3. Poison Ivy (1992)- starring Drew Barrymore

4. The Crush (1994) - starring Alicia Silverstone

5. American Beauty (1999)- starring Kevin Spacey and Mena Suvari

Books:

1. Lolita (1955) — written by Vladimir Nabokov

2. The Real Lolita (2018)- written by Sarah Weinman

3. My Dark Vanessa (2020)- written by Kate Elizabeth Russell

Contact Info:

Facebook: Jenn Woo Thehauntingtruth

Instagram: the_haunting_seeker

Email: hauntingtruth@outlook.com

Join us as we discuss something we thought only happened in the past. But no- it is still happening today, as we can see in a recent case in Philadelphia.

This episode discusses grave desecration, human remains, and disturbing historical practices involving the dead. This is for entertainment purposes only and since this is an ongoing investigation, the charges are alleged until conviction.

Sources & Reference Material:

• The Philadelphia Inquirer — early 2000s reporting on the Jonathan Gerlach investigation

• Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas records

• Pennsylvania criminal statutes on cemetery desecration

• Homepage | Friends of Mount Moriah Cemetery

• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o7FSKw5S-qg&msockid=f3e745deff9611f0a6281ba931a5dfb0

• Jonathan Gerlach case: Court docs reveal accused grave robber's months-long plot to steal human remains in Pa. - 6abc Philadelphia

• Bing Videos- Everyday New Chapter Podcast

• Bing Videos-Lauren the Mortician Podcast

• Michael Sappol, A Traffic of Dead Bodies: Anatomy and Embodied Social Identity in Nineteenth-Century America

• Thomas W. Laqueur, The Work of the Dead: A Cultural History of Mortal Remains

• University of Pennsylvania Archives — history of medical anatomy programs

• Smithsonian National Museum of American History — “Resurrectionists and Medical Education”

• Pennsylvania Anatomy Act of 1883

• Philadelphia Cemetery History Project

• Forensic psychology research on necrophilic fixation and post-mortem objectification

• Academic studies on cultural memory and death practices

Contact Info: Facebook: Jenn Woo Thehauntingtruth

Instagram: the_haunting_seeker

Email: hauntingtruth@outlook.com