The Battle of the Mississenewa

​The Battle of the Mississenewa was one of the bloodiest fights in the War of 1812. It involved American soldiers and Indians of the Miami tribes in Northern Indiana. Many Soldiers and Natives lost their lives during the battle and the site remains as a state historical sight to this day. Every year, in October, they reenact the battle on a large scale. Though, the battle itself occurred on December 17-18, which is generally very cold and snowy by that point in Indiana. My paranormal ghost hunting group decided that we were going to do an investigation of the battlefield on the anniversary of the battle. So, we got a small group of regulars willing to brave the cold, packed up our gear, and headed out on the evening of December 17th.
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It had been snowing for the entire day and by the time we arrived at the battlefield it was basically completely covered over in a few inches. Our team had been ghost hunting for nearly 3 years, but this was the first time that the entire investigation would take place outdoors. We were all excited about being at the actual location on the anniversary and we were all bundled up in heavy winter clothing. The biggest challenge that we were going to face was dealing with the effects of the cold weather on our equipment. And we had to make sure that we paid attention to how our bodies reacted to being the cold that long and take breaks in the cars and near the campfire pits that were at the park.

On the bright side, the moon was almost completely full and was reflecting off the snow to the point in which we did not need our flashlights. That made it easier to use multiple different types of equipment such as a digital recorder, camera, and the I.R. temperature gauge. One of the first things you notice when arriving at the battlefield is the row of headstones that represents the Americans were killed during the fight. We started doing the EVP session at this location because it seems like a symbolic place and figured it would be a good location to possibly capture the voice of the spirit.

My own personal technique involves just allowing conversations to flow naturally and not to “question” the spirits. I’ve had success just speaking normally and allowing anything supernatural to interject with their own replies and comments to what we happen to be talking about. I also don’t rewind and listen to the recording at the location, as I feel as though it might cause whoever is speaking to be wary and not talk anymore. I don’t claim to be an expert when it comes to ghosts or paranormal investigations, but I do what has worked for me in the past and I stick with it.

After an EVP session at the headstone markers, we decided that we were going to go further into the forest around where the fighting would have actually taken place. It was around this point that things began to become interesting for us. My dad, who was the other regular member, happened to notice a light anomaly hovering slowly through the trees. It seemed as though it was the light of a lantern being carried through the trees, but the closer it got to us, the clearer it was that there wasn’t anyone or anything causing it to be there. There was no sound and no person carrying any kind of light, yet there was a light slowly making its way around the trees.

And if that wasn’t interesting enough, as we began to try and get a closer look at the light, I felt someone grab a hold of my bicep through my jacket. It was obviously a hand grabbing me, but there was not a single person near enough to touch me. I thought that I may have snagged my jacket on a branch, but I was not near any and could describe the sensation of feeling fingers and a thumb grip my arm. At that time, I had never been physically touched during an investigation, so it was a big surprise to have it happen in the least likely of places.

Had that been the only two odd things to happen that night, I would have considered it a successful investigation, but that was far from the only events. Not long after I was grabbed on the arm, the entire group heard a disembodied voice yell out “Stop!” as we walked further into the woods. It was the voice of a woman, and seemed to be distressed at the idea of us going any further towards where the battle took place. Again, hearing disembodied voices was not a common occurrence for us, and to have it happen while we were freezing in the middle of the night during winter was extra shocking.

Once we reached the area that was marked as seeing the most violence, we set up and hoped to see or experience more strange things. I started a fire for the group to stand around and keep warm as we waited for another sign of the unusual, and it wasn’t long before we had that experience. Off in the distance on the other side of the field, we began to see flashes of light going off spread out in a line. They would appear and vanish quickly, and appeared to be flashes of gunfire from the muskets that would have been used during the battle. There was no sound, but the pattern of the “shots” and the duration seemed to point towards them being the left-over remnants of the event replaying itself.

We couldn’t stay out there long, thanks to the harshness of the weather, but we all felt that we experienced enough that night to believe that there is still a battle going on there all these years later. We can’t say for sure whether it is like a recording of the event playing over and over, or if they are aware of what happened and where they are now. Nobody will really be able to answer that question, but sometimes it’s just nice to know that the stories are true and that there are things in this world we don’t truly understand. War can be scaring on many levels and may leave wounds that will never heal long after the fighting stops.

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