Ghost Tales of DC: the Phantom Cyclist

As Halloween approaches, I thought we'd spend a little time sharing some of the haunted happenings of the Nation's Capital. In keeping with DC Like a Locals goals, we're going to depart from the standard Demon Cat of the Capitol and Abe Lincoln at the White House tales that seem to be the standard diet of ghost stories around here. We're going to branch out a little and share a little about our lesser known neighborhood ghosts we've found researching our Ghost Tours. A few of these are on the various tours; most were simply just great tales where the ghost was discourteous enough to not haunt a site close to our route. As they are too good to go untold, we'll share them with you here.

We're always looking for new scary stories of DC, so if you have any, please share them with us at comments@dclikealocal.com.

For the first of our ghostly tales, we'll take up a story from The Hill is Home, written by my good friend and ghost tour partner, Robert Pohl: The Phantom Cyclist.

It was a late night in 1892. A Washington Post reporter was taking the street car down B Street (Now Independence Ave) past the Capitol. The street car turned north onto 1^st St. SW and was proceeding towards the Garfield Statue when the gripman threw on the brakes and brought the car to a shuddering halt. “Quick, John, I’ve run over a bicyclist sure this time!” cried the gripman, and he and the conductor disappeared under the front of the car, where the bicycle and its rider were presumed to have ended up.

There was, however, nothing to see. The two trainmen searched under the rest of the car, and came up empty. Finally, certain that no one had been struck, they continued on their way.

The Post reporter smelled a story and asked the gripman for more details as they continued up 1^st and turned onto Pennsylvania Avenue for the long run to Georgetown. “Strange.” said the gripman “I would take my oath that I run down a cyclist then. I saw him plain as day come darting at full speed down Capitol Hill, and I caught him just as he left the shadow of the bushes.”

As they continued the trip, the reporter drew out the gripman some more. “This is the fourth time I have been taken this way, and each time it has happened at that same spot., where the Capitol Hill driveway emerges into First street, near the circle. […] I am haunted by a cyclist, and if you like I’ll tell you why I, more than all the other gripmen, should be thus cursed.”

Detail of map from 1892 showing street car tracks. Red dots are track of bicyclist, red lines are the path of the street car before the 'crash,' green line after.

It turned out that the gripman, while operating one of the horse cars-which were DC’s public transportation option before cable-drawn street cars became the norm-had had a bicyclist ride into the front of his carriage, separating it from the horses which were pulling it. The cyclist had been run over by the carriage and died shortly thereafter. And now his ghost was exacting revenge on the driver by repeatedly appearing to come to the same end. The only difference was that the original cyclist had been riding a penny-farthing bicycle (with his legs draped over the handle bars, no less) and his ghost had chosen a more modern conveyance.

Presumably with the retirement of the gripman, so too has the ghost retired. There have been no further incidents of ghostly cyclists careening down Capitol Hill.

The Phantom Cyclist