Springwood Cemetery

Greenville's oldest municipal cemetery is haunted by Fannie Heldmann, a twenty-five-year-old who drowned herself in the Reedy River in 1889 rather than marry the business partner her father chose. A white mist appears near the guardian angel statue her father erected, and a 2009 paranormal investigation turned up an unexplained voice whispering a name that matched a nearby grave.

In 1889, twenty-five-year-old Fannie Heldmann slipped out of her bedroom, walked down to what is now Falls Park, and drowned herself in the Reedy River. Her father, George Heldmann, a wealthy German saddle maker in Greenville, had arranged for her to marry one of his business associates. Fannie chose the river instead.

The newspapers said she "suddenly became insane" while making wedding arrangements. George erected a tall guardian angel statue over the family plot at Springwood Cemetery, a few blocks from the river where his daughter died. Visitors have been reporting a white mist near that angel ever since. A young woman in Victorian clothing has been spotted walking among the older graves at twilight, and people describe sudden temperature drops and the feeling of being followed along the winding paths near the Heldmann plot.

Springwood is South Carolina's oldest municipal cemetery, and its history runs deeper than the Heldmann legend. The first burial happened in July 1812, when Elizabeth Blackburn Williams, the mother-in-law of prominent early Greenvillian Chancellor Waddy Thompson, was laid to rest in what was then a family garden. Francis McLeod opened the land for public burial in 1829 and eventually deeded a portion to the growing city of Greenville. Today the cemetery covers eighteen and a half acres and holds more than 10,000 burials, with an estimated 2,600 additional unmarked graves scattered throughout the grounds.

Eighty unknown Confederate soldiers are buried near the entrance, men who died of wounds or disease after being moved to one of the two Greenville buildings used as hospitals during the Civil War. The cemetery's layout was designed by landscape architect Gottfried L. Norman, inspired by the rural cemetery movement that started in 1831. The entrance gate, made of Indiana limestone and designed by local architect James Lawrence, was completed in 1914. Greenville has a long list of prominent citizens in the ground here: Governor Martin F. Ansel, Congressman John Jackson McSwain, and textile magnate Charles E. Daniel among them.

The Ghost PRO investigation team conducted an overnight session on September 5, 2009. They covered about half the cemetery with video, photography, and EVP equipment. The photographs and video captured what the team described as orb phenomena, though they acknowledged that outdoor conditions, humidity, and passing headlights made definitive conclusions impossible. The more interesting moment came from a psychic on the team named Catherine, who reported hearing a male voice whisper "John... John" near a large tree. The team searched the area and found no matching name on any visible grave. The next morning, when they returned to collect equipment, they found the marker for John F. Johnson, 1879 to 1960, right in the spot they'd been standing. Seven investigators had walked past it in the dark without noticing. The team reported plans to return and investigate the other half of the grounds.

Springwood sits in the heart of downtown Greenville, less than a quarter mile from Main Street. It doubles as a park, which was actually the original intent. Rural cemetery design was meant to give cities green space before public parks existed. People picnicked here. They strolled the paths. The Upcountry History Museum runs evening tours led by guide Debbie Spear, covering the symbolism of Victorian grave markers, from pall-draped columns to lambs representing children who died young.

But Fannie Heldmann is the one people come looking for. The angel her father built for her stands tall enough to spot from several rows away. Whether the white mist is real or a trick of Greenville's humid evenings, the story of a young woman who would rather die than marry a man she didn't choose tends to linger in a place like this.