1859 Ashton Villa

Galveston's first grand Broadway mansion, built in 1859, the Ashton Villa served as a Confederate hospital during the Civil War and later as home to the eccentric Bettie Brown until she died here in 1920.

A caretaker in the carriage house woke to piano music drifting from the Gold Room. He grabbed a flashlight and went to investigate, expecting an intruder. Instead he found the faint image of a woman in 19th-century dress seated at the piano. She and the music faded together.

That was Bettie Brown. She has been here since 1920.

Ashton Villa, built in 1859 by hardware magnate James Moreau Brown, was the first of Galveston's great Broadway mansions. The three-story brick and cast-iron house was one of the few to survive the Great Storm of 1900, which killed 6,000 people. During that hurricane, the Browns opened the front door and let floodwaters rush straight through the house and out the back — preventing the structure from being pushed off its foundation. One of the youngest Brown daughters sat on the staircase as water rose to the 10th step.

The mansion's ghost is Miss Bettie Ashton Brown, James's golden-haired daughter. Born in 1855, Bettie grew into a woman who scandalized proper Galveston society. She traveled alone to Morocco, Jerusalem, Egypt, China, and India. She smoked in public. At one party she appeared with kittens riding on the train of her dress. When James died in 1895, he left Ashton Villa to her. She lived there until her death in 1920.

Ashton Villa is sometimes called "the most haunted building in America," largely because of Bettie. She has been seen in the Gold Room, at the top of the staircase, and at the piano. One tour guide saw a blonde on the second-floor landing, wearing turquoise and holding an intricately detailed fan — one of Bettie's prized possessions.

Foundation staff point to something stranger: Bettie's souvenir box from the Middle East, which locks and unlocks on its own. No living person has a key. Staff also find impressions on her bed, as if someone had just been sitting there.