 |
The
Hatchet
Lady |
North of
Abilene, there's a small town named Stamford. Near
that community,
there's a brushy, overgrown park on Farm to
Market
Road 1226 about five miles south of the town, which
is known
as Buie Park. The old park harbors two well-known
ghosts
of the area, and the legendary spirits are known as the
Hatchet
Lady and May's Mother. Whether they haunt the wooded
park area
simultaneously, or whether they take turns, I'm not
certain.
But according to an article by Kathy Sanders that ran
in the
Abilene Reporter News on October 30, 1985, they are
well known
around Stamford. The Hatchet Lady's story is, years
ago, when
the park was still a well-kept beautiful spot, a young
woman from
Stamford was engaged to be married. Shortly before
the wedding
was to take place, her fiance took her out to Buie
Park, and
there in that remote setting he broke the news to her
that he
really didn't want to get married after all. The young
woman was
shocked... hurt... crushed by this disclosure. In her
disstraught
state she refused to accept her fiance's decision, and
in a moment
of unreasonable rage and heartbreak she killed him
with a
hatchet. (No one has been able to explain how a young
woman,
supposedly out for a tryst, could have so conveniently
been supplied
with such a deadly weapon!) Anyhow, the story
goes that,
hatchet in hand, the spirit of the young woman still
returns
to stalk the park, preying on amorous couples. I guess she
figures
if she couldn't be happy, why should anyone else be?
She is
a vindictive spirit, apparently.
