St. James Episcopal Cemetery

A marble statue of a woman cradling two infants marks the grave of Mary Meinert, who died of tuberculosis in 1898 at age 34, leaving behind newborn twins who died shortly after. Marietta teenagers have dared each other for decades to run thirteen laps around the monument asking about her babies, and visitors report hearing a woman weeping and a child calling "Mommy" near the grave.

If you run around the statue thirteen times and ask "Oh Mary, oh Mary, what happened to your babies?" she will start crying. Or so Marietta high schoolers have been telling each other for decades.

The statue is a marble woman cradling two infants, and it marks the grave of Marion "Mary" Meinert in St. James Episcopal Cemetery. The legend says Mary died in childbirth, that the statue weeps tears of blood on Halloween, that you can hear a baby crying near the grave at night, and that the stone infants change positions when nobody is looking.

None of that is true. Here's what actually happened.

Mary Meinert was born October 25, 1863 and died on May 21, 1898, at age 34, from a lung ailment, almost certainly tuberculosis. Her obituary in the Marietta Journal on May 26 described her as "one who did more charitable work in visiting the poor and sick ministering unto their need." She left behind a husband and six children, including newborn twin girls who were just four weeks old. The twins died shortly after their mother. The monument near the original cemetery gates commemorates all three of them.

St. James Episcopal Cemetery was established in 1849, with the first burial in 1850. It sits on about an acre and a quarter of land in Marietta, and the grave count includes roughly 3,000 Confederate soldiers. A staggering number for a small-town cemetery. Civil War artist Alfred Waud, famous for his battlefield sketches in Harper's Weekly, is buried here too.

The Mary Meinert legend is the main draw for ghost hunters and curious teenagers. The thirteen-laps ritual has variants: some versions say three laps on Halloween while asking "Mary, Mary, how did your children die?" But the experience people describe is the same. The sound of a woman weeping near the grave. A child's voice calling "Mommy." Equipment failures. Ghost hunters in 2005 reported two camera batteries dying simultaneously during an investigation, along with footsteps despite being alone in the cemetery.

The cemetery has been listed as one of the world's most haunted, which is a big claim for a quiet churchyard in suburban Marietta. But there's something about the Meinert grave that gets under people's skin in a way that bigger, flashier haunted sites don't. Maybe it's the statue, the way the marble woman holds those babies, the expression on her face. Maybe it's knowing the real story: a young mother, beloved in her community, who didn't survive long enough to raise her children.

St. James Episcopal Cemetery is still an active burial ground maintained by St. James Episcopal Church. Open to visitors during daylight hours. The Meinert grave is easy to find, near the front gates. And whatever you do, count your laps. Marietta kids say thirteen is the number. They also say you'll know if you miscounted.