Haunted Places in Connecticut: 14 of the Most Haunted to Visit
The White Lady of Union Cemetery, a sealed opera house with a jail in its basement, colonial inns that tell their own ghost stories and a lighthouse with a keeper called Ernie. These are Connecticut’s most haunted places, with what is history, what is legend and how you can visit.
Connecticut gave the world Ed and Lorraine Warren, and many of the state’s most famous ghost stories passed through their hands: the White Lady of Union Cemetery, the Dudleytown curse and the house behind The Haunting in Connecticut. Some of those stories hold up better than others, and several of the best-known places are now private, demolished or closed by law after dark. We have checked every place below against current sources, so you know which are open, which run tours, which take overnight guests and which you can only see from the road. The state’s oldest inns are some of its most haunted places, and Haunted Rooms runs its own overnight ghost hunts at Captain Grant’s, 1754 in Preston.
Address 109 Route 2A, Poquetanuck Village, Preston, CT 06365
Where to look The Adelaide Room and its bathroom, the main staircase, the attic, the old cemetery behind the inn, the Avery Home
Reported ghosts Mercy Adelaide Avery, two children, a girl called Deborah Adams
Visiting A working inn; book a room to stay
Ghost hunting Yes: Haunted Rooms runs ghost hunts and sleepovers here
Captain Grant’s, 1754 is a colonial house in the old village of Poquetanuck, between Mystic and the Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun casinos. It carries the name of Captain William Grant, a sea captain lost at sea, whose wife Mercy Adelaide stayed on in the house. Carol and Ted Matsumoto bought it in 1994 and opened it as an inn in 1995; the 1600s Avery Home next door adds more rooms.
The inn bills itself as Connecticut’s most haunted. Guests in the Adelaide Room describe a woman in Colonial clothes at the foot of the bed holding the hands of two children, and a shower curtain that keeps coming down. Carol Matsumoto collected the stories in The Ghosts of Captain Grant’s Inn (2017), and the inn starred in Netflix’s 28 Days Haunted. Haunted Rooms runs overnight ghost hunts here.
What investigators report
On Portals to Hell, owner Carol Matsumoto was shown using dowsing rods and crystals to communicate, and investigators focused on the Adelaide Room and the cemetery behind the inn, where a GeoPort session picked up a loud cracking sound.
Where to look Room 16, the upper-floor bedrooms, the attic, the dining room
Reported ghosts A woman called Betty in Room 16, a booted man in Room 1, past guests and staff
Visiting A working inn and restaurant; book a room or a table
Ghost hunting No ghost hunts; stay the night instead
The 1754 House is the old Curtis (Curtiss) House, regarded as Connecticut’s first inn. The building was a home in 1736 and the Curtiss family were taking in travelers by 1754. After centuries as the Curtis House Inn, and a 2014 visit from Gordon Ramsay’s Hotel Hell, the Bates-Walsh family restored it and reopened it as the 1754 House in 2020, with seven rooms in the main house and four suites in the Carriage House.
Connecticut’s tourism office calls it the most haunted place in the state. Staff have told of plates flying off tables and beds looking slept-in minutes after cleaning, and the front desk told Ramsay that a spirit named Betty was raising havoc in Room 16. Lorraine Warren is said to have named an upstairs bedroom as the main hotspot.
Haunted Rooms tip: Book a main-house room rather than a Carriage House suite, and have dinner in the tavern.
Address Sport Hill Rd (Route 59) at Stepney Rd, Easton, CT 06612
Where to look Route 59 beside the cemetery, the old eastern section by the Baptist church
Reported ghosts The White Lady, and a pair of glowing eyes called Red Eyes
Visiting Grounds open in daylight only; closed after dusk by town ordinance
Hours and season Dawn to dusk
Ghost hunting No: the cemetery is closed after dusk and police patrol it
Union Cemetery is a 5.2-acre burying ground beside the 1831 Easton Baptist Church, where Route 59 meets Stepney Road. The oldest known grave, Ebenezer Hubbell’s, dates to 1761, and the cemetery took its name after its association was incorporated in 1902. It is still used, it is badly vandalized, and it is looked after largely by volunteers.
It is also the home of Connecticut’s best-known ghost. The White Lady, a dark-haired woman in a white nightgown or veil, is said to drift among the stones and step into the road in front of drivers on Route 59. Ed and Lorraine Warren claimed Ed filmed her, and their book Graveyard made the cemetery famous. A second legend, Red Eyes, is told about a pair of glowing eyes in the bushes.
Haunted Rooms tip: Go in daylight, stay on the paths and leave before dusk: a town ordinance closes the grounds after dark.
Address Fairfield Hills campus, Wasserman Way and Mile Hill Rd, Newtown, CT 06470
Where to look The empty brick halls behind their fences, the sealed tunnels, the campus at dusk
Reported ghosts Voices and screams, figures in white on the grounds
Visiting Roads, trails and lawns are public; empty buildings are fenced and off limits
Hours and season Campus trails open in daylight
Ghost hunting No: the empty buildings are fenced and the town patrols the grounds
Fairfield State Hospital opened in Newtown in 1933 to relieve crowding at Connecticut’s other asylums. It grew from fewer than 500 patients to more than 4,000 in the late 1960s, used hydrotherapy, insulin shock, electroshock and lobotomy, and closed on December 8, 1995. Newtown bought the campus in 2004, and in September 2024 it joined the National Register as the Fairfield Hills Campus Historic District.
Today it is a working town campus with the municipal center, a youth sports academy and NewSylum Brewing, but several empty brick halls still stand behind chain-link fences. Ghost stories here are of voices and screams and figures in white crossing the lawns. The tunnels that once carried patients, meals and, it is said, the dead were sealed in 2009.
Haunted Rooms tip: Walk the public trail loop in daylight and finish at NewSylum Brewing, in the old Stratford Hall.
Where to look The balcony, the dressing rooms, the old jail cells in the sub-basement
Reported ghosts A little boy with a ball, a man in a brown suit, a woman in white
Visiting Closed and sealed; see it from Elizabeth Street and the Derby Green
Ghost hunting No public investigations; the building is closed pending restoration
Facing the Derby Green, the Sterling Opera House opened on April 2, 1889, with a theater upstairs and Derby’s city hall, police station and jail below. Harry Houdini, Amelia Earhart, Red Skelton and John L. Sullivan all appeared here. The theater went dark in 1945, city hall moved out in 1965, and in 1968 it became the first building in Connecticut on the National Register.
It has been sealed ever since, and the stories grew in the dark: a little boy whose ball rolls across the balcony, a man in a brown suit some link to Charles Sterling, a woman in white and children’s voices. Syfy’s Ghost Hunters investigated in 2011. Derby is now paying for a study to restore it, but for now you can only see it from outside.
Haunted Rooms tip: Stand on the Green at dusk: the arched upper windows of the auditorium face you, and the old police entrance is at street level.
Where to look The family rooms upstairs, the library and the billiard room
Reported ghosts Unexplained presences told on the museum's own ghost tours
Visiting Guided house tours daily
Tours Daily guided tours; evening ghost tours each fall
Hours and season 9:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. daily, last tour 4:15 p.m.
Ghost hunting No public investigations; the museum’s ghost tours tell the stories
Samuel Clemens, Mark Twain, built this Victorian Gothic house on Farmington Avenue in 1874 to designs by Edward Tuckerman Potter, and his family lived here until 1891. He wrote some of his best-known books here. In 1896, while the family was abroad, his daughter Susy died in the house of meningitis, and they never lived here again. It opened as a museum in 1974.
The museum embraces the house’s ghostly side. It has been featured on Syfy’s Ghost Hunters and Biography’s My Ghost Story, and each fall it runs evening ghost tours about its paranormal investigations, Victorian seances and Twain’s own interest in the supernatural. The tours talk about real people, death and dying.
What investigators report
Ghost Hunters ran EVP sessions and K2 meters room by room, reporting footsteps in the dining room, a loud bang on the second-floor stairs and a possible child’s voice on audio near the nursery and Susy’s bedroom.
Visiting a haunted place by day is one thing. Investigating one after dark is another. On a Haunted Rooms ghost hunt our team takes you through a historic building with professional ghost hunting equipment, runs EVP sessions and vigils, and gives you time to explore on your own. These are the nearest ones we run.
Address Mouth of New London Harbor (offshore), New London, CT
Where to look The keeper's rooms and the roof, out in the harbor
Reported ghosts Ernie, said to be a keeper who fell or jumped from the roof
Visiting Offshore; seen from the shore and ferries. Occasional boat tours by the New London Maritime Society
Ghost hunting No public investigations
Ledge Light is the square red-brick house with a mansard roof that seems to float at the mouth of New London Harbor. It was built in 1909 on a concrete pier sunk into 28 feet of water, and in 1987 it became the last lighthouse on Long Island Sound to be automated. The New London Maritime Society now owns it, and restoration of its rusting steel beams began in 2024.
Its ghost is called Ernie. The usual story says a 1920s or 1930s keeper, told that his wife had run off with the Block Island ferry captain, fell or jumped from the roof. No record backs it up and the keeper lists show no death at the station, but the last Coast Guard crew wrote of “Ernie’s domain” in their 1987 log. Ghost Hunters found not enough evidence of a haunting.
Haunted Rooms tip: See it best from Pequot Avenue in New London or from the deck of the Block Island or Fishers Island ferry; check the Maritime Society for any boat tours.
Where to look The tap room and its fireplace, the hallways
Reported ghosts Figures in Colonial clothing, a sea captain by the fireplace
Visiting A working inn with a tap room and restaurant
Ghost hunting No ghost hunts; stay the night instead
The Griswold Inn, the Gris to locals, has stood near the Essex waterfront since 1776, when Sala Griswold opened a tavern by the wharf. It came through the British raid on Essex in 1814, it ran as a speakeasy in Prohibition, and over the years it grew to take in neighboring houses and an old schoolhouse. It is a member of Historic Hotels of America.
Connecticut’s tourism office lists it among the state’s haunted inns, with guests reporting objects falling, footsteps in empty halls and faint music. Local tellers add figures in Colonial clothes and a sea captain by the fireplace, watching for a ship. The inn itself does not make much of the stories.
Haunted Rooms tip: Have a drink in the tap room on a weeknight, when it is quiet enough to listen for the footsteps.
Where to look The cellar where Hessian prisoners were held, the upstairs rooms
Reported ghosts Elisha Benton and Jemima Barrows, a weeping girl in a bridal dress, Hessian soldiers
Visiting House museum open by appointment; closed for the 2026 season, reopening in 2027
Tickets $5 admission
Ghost hunting No public investigations
Daniel Benton settled this farm in Tolland around 1720, and six generations of Bentons lived in the full cape house. During the Revolution its cellar held Hessian and British prisoners, who carved marks into the beams. The Tolland Historical Society has run it as a museum since 1970.
Its ghost story is a sad love story. Elisha Benton, kept from marrying the younger Jemima Barrows by both families, came home from a British prison ship with smallpox and died in January 1777; Jemima, who nursed him, died a month later, and they were buried apart on the farm. A weeping young woman in a bridal dress has been reported in the house, along with lights, sounds and soldiers.
Haunted Rooms tip: Tours are by appointment: contact the Tolland Historical Society, and ask to see the Hessian carvings in the cellar.
Where to look The back wall, the iron gate, the lane through the stones
Reported ghosts A small boy by the back wall, a man with a lantern leading a horse, children's laughter, music
Visiting Small roadside cemetery; visit respectfully in daylight
Hours and season Daylight; police discourage visits after dark
Ghost hunting Not permitted after dark
Gunntown Cemetery is a small colonial burying ground on Gunntown Road in the Millville section of Naugatuck, laid out in 1790 and named for the Gunn family whose stones fill it. A fieldstone wall and an iron gate enclose old slate markers, including veterans of the Revolution, the War of 1812 and the Civil War.
There is no murder or tragic love story behind its reputation, just a long list of reported oddities: music and children’s laughter with nobody there, a man with a lantern leading a horse across the grounds, a little boy by the back wall who vanishes, and a black dog that disappears. The Warrens are said to have declared it haunted, and the state tourism office now lists it among Connecticut’s haunted cemeteries.
Haunted Rooms tip: Visit in daylight and park with care: Gunntown Road is narrow and fast, and police discourage after-dark visits.
Where to look Chapman Falls and the potholes in the rock beside it
Reported ghosts The Devil fiddling above the falls, dark figures in the woods
Visiting Free state park with trails, camping and the falls
Hours and season 8 a.m. to sunset
Ghost hunting No: the park closes at sunset
Devil’s Hopyard is a state park of about 1,000 acres on the Eightmile River, bought by the state in 1919. Its centerpiece is Chapman Falls, which drops more than 60 feet down steps of Scotland schist and once powered Beebe’s Mills. Beside the falls the water has drilled smooth round potholes into the rock.
Settlers had a better explanation for those holes. The Devil, the story goes, sat on a boulder above the falls playing his fiddle, got his tail wet and burned the holes with his hooves as he stormed off. The park’s own history admits nobody knows where the name came from: a hop grower called Dibble is the usual guess. Modern visitors add tales of dark figures and voices in the woods.
Haunted Rooms tip: Walk the short path to the falls viewpoint and look for the potholes on the ledges; the trail is easy and the park is open until sunset.
In 1796 a breakaway religious group led by Elijah Andrus settled this hollow on the Blackledge River. So many settlers were named Gay that the village took the name. Its wool mill and later a paper mill kept it going until fires and hard times emptied it; the last mill burned in 1879. A descendant gave the land to the state in 1943, on condition that the name and the graveyard survive.
What is left are mill foundations, cellar holes and a small graveyard beside the trail, and two grim legends no court ever settled: a peddler whose skeleton turned up in a charcoal pit, and a blacksmith’s apprentice said to have been killed by his master for coming in late. Ghost hunters like it, and the state tourism office lists it as a haunted site.
Haunted Rooms tip: From the main lot it is about a ten-minute walk to the burned mill; the graveyard is on the right before the white trailhead.
Where to look The second-floor hallways of the main house, the grounds behind it, the basement tunnels
Reported ghosts A calm woman in white known as Francis
Visiting A working country inn; book a room to stay
Ghost hunting No ghost hunts; stay the night instead
The Blackberry River Inn is the Moseley House-Farm, a colonial house begun in 1763 in the Litchfield Hills and listed on the National Register in 1984. It was a working farm until 1939, was remodeled in the 1920s by architect Alfredo S.G. Taylor and has been an inn since about 1939, under its current owners since 1993, with suites in the main house and rooms in the Carriage House.
Connecticut’s tourism office describes a peaceful Lady in White, said to be named Francis, often seen on the second floor; guests and staff say they feel calm around her. Tunnels in the basement are said locally to be linked to the Underground Railroad, a tradition that has not been documented.
Haunted Rooms tip: Book a Main House room to sleep in the 1763 building rather than the Carriage House.
Where to look The docks and marina, guest rooms, wedding photos
Reported ghosts A see-through woman in white, sometimes called a phantom bride
Visiting A working resort and marina; book a room to stay
Ghost hunting No ghost hunts; stay the night instead
Saybrook Point Resort & Marina sits where the Connecticut River meets Long Island Sound, a waterfront resort with a spa, marina and a busy wedding calendar. The main building is modern, but the point itself has been settled since the 1630s.
Its ghost story is a wedding one. A woman in a see-through white gown has been reported near the dock, and a phantom bride is said to turn up in wedding photographs. Guests have also described a presence sitting on the bed. Nobody knows who she is; a local legend says she was buried alive nearby. This is a light, romantic haunting rather than a famous one.
Haunted Rooms tip: Walk the dock after dark and book a water-view room.
These places appear in older lists of haunted spots. We keep them here so you know the facts before you go, but you cannot (or should not) visit them.
Dudleytown, Cornwall
The abandoned hill settlement in the Dark Entry Forest is private land, closed to the public, and trespassers have been arrested. Historians have taken the Dudley curse apart. Read the real story in our Dudleytown guide.
The Haunting in Connecticut house, Southington
The former Hallahan Funeral Home on Meriden Avenue, where the Snedeker family said they were haunted from 1986 to 1988, is a private family home, and police have asked sightseers to stay away. See our Haunting in Connecticut guide.
Norwich State Hospital, Preston
The asylum closed in 1996, and almost all of its buildings have been demolished in a long cleanup for the planned Preston Riverwalk. The site is closed. See our Norwich State Hospital guide.
Remington Arms, Bridgeport
Bridgeport began demolishing the old munitions works in April 2023; only the 1909 shot tower survives, fenced for future reuse. See our Remington Arms guide.
Yankee Pedlar Inn, Torrington
The 1891 hotel behind the film The Innkeepers, with Alice Conley’s Room 353, closed in December 2015. Its renovation stalled and the building is gutted. Stay at the Blackberry River Inn in Norfolk instead.
Lighthouse Inn, New London
The 1902 Guthrie mansion with its legend of a bride on the stairs closed after a two-alarm fire in May 2022 and takes no guests. Captain Grant’s, 1754 is about 20 minutes away.
Changed from our older guide: Dudleytown and the Haunting in Connecticut house are private, Norwich State Hospital and the Remington Arms factory have been demolished, and the Yankee Pedlar Inn closed in 2015, so all five moved to the off-limits list with the facts. We corrected Dudleytown’s curse story, which historians have shown is mostly invented, and we note that the Sterling Opera House is sealed and can only be seen from outside. New in this update: haunted hotels count as haunted places, so Captain Grant’s, the Griswold Inn, the Blackberry River Inn and Saybrook Point now have cards alongside the 1754 House; and we added the Mark Twain House, New London Ledge Light, Gay City State Park and the Daniel Benton Homestead, plus a full guide to the Sterling Opera House.
Visited one of these places? Tell us what happened
We collect first-hand accounts from visitors and add the best ones to our guides, with your first name and the date of your visit. We read every story before it’s published.
Union Cemetery in Easton, home of the White Lady, is the most famous. Captain Grant’s, 1754 in Preston bills itself as the state’s most haunted inn, and the state tourism office has called the 1754 House in Woodbury the most haunted place in Connecticut.
Where can I go ghost hunting in Connecticut?
Haunted Rooms runs overnight ghost hunts at Captain Grant’s, 1754 in Preston, where you investigate the inn after dark and sleep in one of its rooms. Most other famous sites, including Union Cemetery, Fairfield Hills and the state parks, close at dusk and do not allow investigations.
Can you visit Union Cemetery at night?
No. A town ordinance closes Union Cemetery after dusk and police patrol it. Visit in daylight, stay on the paths and be careful of the many broken stones.
Can you visit Dudleytown?
No. Dudleytown is private land owned by Dark Entry Forest, Inc. and is closed to the public. Trespassers have been arrested, and the curse story does not survive a look at the records.
Is the Haunting in Connecticut house real?
The house in Southington is real and was once a funeral home, and the Snedeker family did describe a haunting there in the late 1980s. The book’s author later said Ed Warren told him to make the story up, and later owners report nothing unusual. It is a private home.
Can you stay overnight in a haunted place in Connecticut?
Yes. Captain Grant’s, 1754, the 1754 House in Woodbury, the Griswold Inn in Essex, the Blackberry River Inn in Norfolk and Saybrook Point all take guests. See our guide to haunted hotels in Connecticut.
Sources and how we research
Every place in this guide is checked against its official website, historic register listings and news coverage, and we confirm whether it is open, closed, private or gone before we list it. Ghost stories are reported as staff, visitors and local historians tell them; we say so where records contradict a story. Each place shows how many independent sources we checked it against; our own Haunted Rooms pages are not counted.
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About the authors
The Haunted Rooms Team runs public ghost hunts and overnight investigations at historic venues across the United States. We research every place in our guides using official sites, historic registers, local archives and news coverage, and we report ghost stories as the stories they are. We review each guide regularly so you are not sent to a place that has closed, changed hands or banned visitors. Spotted something out of date? Let us know.
