This letter was found in the barn in the spring of 2018.

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These cold fall nights warn of a history of darkness that has haunted the hills of Ashe County for hundreds of years. Many believe it is an ancient evil that traveled from Ireland with the descendants of Jack The Smith, better known as Stingy Jack, who is widely known to have cheated Satan numerous times.  What is not known are the details of the contract that he would eventually make with Lucifer for admittance into the demon domain as one of the Seven Princes of Hell. It is long suspected that his descendants were the anchors for the demon minions that conceivably tormented the area.   Long-time locals suggest that this is a fiction and question why ghastly occurrences continued after all of Jack's lineage was expelled from the region.  Local historians contend that the land is cursed and that the malodorous darkness that lurks deep in the hills existed long before Irish settlers migrated to the valley. 

This unseen evil was first recorded by the early Cherokee people who chose to call this area home.  Many young Cherokee girls vanished over the years.  The family and sometimes the entire tribe were always found ghastly and grotesquely murdered not long after the disappearance of a young girl.  Many believed it was a rogue group of Catawba(kuh-taa-buh) combatants looking to capitalize on fear in order to push the Cherokee from the territory.  The few Cherokee warriors who escaped these massacres throughout the centuries always disputed this belief and spoke of an ancient evil that they could only express with the inscribed letters NOXLETUM.  This was never accepted or understood by the Cherokee people and was always dismissed as a warrior whose spirit had gone mad.  Today we know these letters to be two Latin words which are “Nox” or darkness and “Letum” which is death.  Over time the bloodshed become known as the dark death. 

  There are also countless stories about the mad henchmen who live deep in the dark wooded graveyard hollers just off of a road you probably traveled called Idlewild.  It is said the henchmens' fervor for murder intensifies as the October Blood Moon draws closer.  For many small farming communities the October Harvest Moon is cause for celebration and festivity.  In this county it is cause for terror, and this is why you can hear local churches ringing the steeple bell in October close to the witching hour as a desperate warning to all those wandering the hills late at night.  There are those who say there were no henchmen and that one only needs to see  the correlation between the disappearance of a young girl not long before the slaying of her family and the stories told by the Cherokee people. 

A more revealing and recent account is that of Peggy Tory.  She had long been suspected of witchcraft, and it was whispered by many that she was the daughter of a slaughtered family years earlier.  It was rumored that her soul had been consumed by the evil that infects these hills.  A lost hunter passing by claimed to have witnessed her uttering the words, “pitch it here demon” as hay began to fill the holes that appeared to be shallow graves outside her shack.  Many whispered that she could take the form of owls and cats so that she might uncover those who claimed she was practicing necromancy.   
 
  Soon you may consider visiting the Daray family where young Grace is intent on joining the All Hallows Eve festivities at a nearby farm. Grace's parents Dolores and Hartley have noticed distressing and mysterious occurrences around their farm.  They are concerned with Grace's developing need for isolation and bizarre behavior.   I warn you not to venture into these October nights knowing the evil that lurks in the hills.  Hopefully the dark history you now know will furnish you with the sense to stay home. 

 -Jaspen Gulp 12th:Oct. 1845 Local Historian