Danvers State Hospital Site

Nicknamed "Hell House on the Hill," this psychiatric hospital opened in 1878 and became known as the birthplace of the prefrontal lobotomy. Judge John Hathorne of the Salem witch trials once lived on this land. H.P. Lovecraft based Arkham Asylum on Danvers.

The land where Danvers State Hospital once loomed has been steeped in darkness since the 17th century. Hathorne Hill received its name from William Hathorne, a notorious magistrate who obtained it in a 1637 land grant and built a mansion there. His son, Judge John Hathorne, likely lived in that house—the same Judge Hathorne who presided over the Salem Witch Trials in 1692, sending innocent people to their deaths without ever expressing remorse. When Massachusetts purchased the property in the 1870s to build a psychiatric hospital, they erected it directly atop ground already soaked in suffering.

The State Lunatic Hospital at Danvers opened in 1878, designed by Boston architect Nathaniel Jeremiah Bradlee according to the Kirkbride Plan—a then-progressive philosophy that believed beautiful settings and compassionate treatment could cure mental illness. The Gothic-style structure of locally sourced red brick stretched 1,100 feet long and encompassed 313,000 square feet, earning the nickname "the castle on the hill." The original design accommodated 500 patients with space for up to 1,000.

That humane vision quickly became a nightmare. By 1900, the hospital had already treated over 9,500 patients despite its limited capacity. By the 1930s and 1940s, more than 2,000 patients were crammed into a facility meant for a quarter that number. Patients walked the hallways naked, lived in their own filth, and were held in basements when the wards overflowed. The hospital became known as "Hell House on the Hill" as administrators turned to brutal measures to maintain control—straitjackets, shock therapy, and most infamously, the prefrontal lobotomy.

Neurology experts called Danvers State Hospital the "birthplace of the prefrontal lobotomy." Dr. Walter Jackson Freeman II pioneered the procedure here, drilling into patients' skulls to sever brain nerves. The operations left victims emotionally numb, wandering aimlessly through the halls, staring blankly at walls. In 1939 alone, 278 people died at the facility. No one knows the total death count, but at least 10% of all patients are believed to have perished there.

The hospital finally closed in 1992, but the hauntings had already begun. During its operation, an administrator's daughter named Jeralyn Levasseur lived on the grounds with her family. She recalled playing in the attic with her siblings until they encountered the spirit of an elderly woman scowling at them from a darkened corner. The attic became off-limits after that, but the scowling spirit continued to visit Jeralyn at night, slowly pulling the covers straight off her bed as she lay paralyzed with fear.

After closure, Danvers became a magnet for paranormal investigators and urban explorers. More than 120 trespassers were arrested between 2000 and 2007 trying to encounter the ghostly patients. Those who gained access reported hearing disembodied voices, wails, and patients pleading for help and attention. Apparitions of former patients drifted through the corridors. Ghost hunters claimed to see Thomas Kirkbride's ghost floating through the underground tunnels. The building's atmosphere was so unsettling that David Caruso, who filmed the 2001 horror movie "Session 9" there, described it as "a place you never got comfortable in. You can really feel the pain of the people that went through Danvers."

H.P. Lovecraft drew inspiration from Danvers for his fictional Arkham Sanitarium in "The Thing on the Doorstep" and "Pickman's Model." That creation later inspired DC Comics' Arkham Asylum in the Batman universe. The real asylum proved as horrifying as any fiction.

In 2007, despite the building's listing on the National Register of Historic Places, AvalonBay demolished most of the original structure and converted the site into the Bradlee Danvers apartment complex. Shortly after residents moved in, a fire destroyed four of the new buildings. Today, only the brick shell of the administration building remains. But the dead were not so easily removed. Two cemeteries with 770 graves still occupy the grounds, their headstones marked only with anonymous numbers instead of names—a final indignity for those who suffered lobotomies, shock therapy, and neglect. Residents of the apartments report hearing moans and screams at night, and visitors to the cemeteries encounter apparitions of those who died in one of America's most infamous institutions.