West Virginia Penitentiary (Moundsville)
Written by Dawn Andrews VA chapter
Moundsville has a history of bloodiness! Lets talk about some of the history before I tell you about my experience that I had when I went there. The history starts back in 1866 when the prison first opened and housed over 1000’s of men at a time. The first building was the site of The North Wagon Gate, this was built with cuts of Sand stone. When the whole prison was finished and open its total cost was at $363,061. Back then, that was a lot of money to them and they used what was available. There where the North and South cell blocks which only measured 300ft by 52ft. The cell blocks were 4 tears high.
The cell where so small and they had to put 3 in each cell. The cells where only 7ft by 4ft. Now remember this, there 3 men to a cell. Can you imagine putting that many men to a cell? But, they had no options at the time so they had too. When you go there to visit and investigate you will see how truly small the cells are. I have added a picture to show you and this is one I took when I was there.
There where some big name people that had served time there. One of them being Eugene V. Debs. He served his time from April 13th to June 14th, 1919, that’s when he was transferred to a Atlanta prison. His charges was on violating the Espionage Act during the year of 1917. Another big major one was Charles Manson. He was convicted on
multiple murderer and was there for 3 days, but when he’s was denied request he went back to the prison in California. He wanted to be closer to his family, his mother was serving her own time in the Moundsville prison. (The prison denies him ever being there. But, I was told by a very good source that he was only there for 3 days and was never put on record.) This one cell has his name and dates, see above.
At Moundsville there was a total 36 homicide deaths in the prison. Some of them took place down in the “Sugar Shack!” Now when you go down to the boiler room listen because you might hear inmate R.D. Wall. And if you call out “Inmate 44670 time for work!” you can hear him say ready. He was murdered down in the boiler room by 3 other inmates with really dull homemade shivs. The reason they killed him was because he was caught “Snitching!”
Some other major things that happen at the prison was the prison break of 1979, and then the riot of 1986 (which was caused by low security and the inmates where allowed to roam freely, and the fact that some of the inmates knew how to pick locks of the cells and doors didn't help the problems.) This resulted in five officers and one kitchen work to be slammed down onto the floor by some inmates and they where stabbed in the throat and handcuffed together by their own cuffs. I would say that’s a crazy, bad way to go, do you agree?
Then there’s the “Executions.” They started out using the hanging method and the public were allowed to come and watch the hangings till June 19th, 1931, when the hangings where no longer allowed. Total
hangings were 85 men. Then in 1951 “Old Sparky” was put in the prison which is the electric chair. It was built by an inmate in Moundsville and his name was Paul Glenn. During the years of 1951 to 1965 there were only 9 men executed by Old Sparky and this was done before the state prohibited it to be ever used again as an execution tool. Old Sparky is still there to this today and you can only take photos of it.
Now that the history is done let me tell you about my investigation there. When I went in, I didn’t want to know the history and wanted to just jump right on in. At first nothing seemed to be happening. We started at the South end of the cell blocks. After we started recording, our lights started to turn off and just having full batteries too not having battery power at all. We started hearing walking above us and no was there. We came across Charles Manson’s cell and did a spirit box season. I asked if he liked the women in cell (which was just me and my mother) a voice came through and said yes. I asked if it was Charles and we got yes. We got a lot of answers from him. That video is up on The Otherside Investigators YouTube page.
But we decided to go the yard where the “Sugar Shack” is and went on down. This is where I was told a lot of the murders had happened. I started the spirit box back up and began to ask questions. One being how many died here? The answer was 10. I asked then asked how did you die? The answer was in the head. I had at that point remembered the shivs that was on display up on the main floor when you walk into the building. I asked was it by the head knocker? The answer was yes. Then it said two bodies and I felt my back burning really bad. I told my mom and she made me turn so she could look. I had scratch’s across my back and I began to feel really sick. We stopped everything and left that area, and went to the yard where the church is. I felt better once I was out of the area.
But, when you're there you will see that nothing they did was private at all. They had to shower and use the restroom in front of everyone. All the floors above the showers could look down on you and watch while you showered.
Please remember to always be kind and respectful to them there. They where humans at one time and were treated like animals. Many died due to lack of security and even by officers own hands. If you treat them with respect, they will talk and interact with you. Don’t ever poke them or make them do things to prove they are there, because they do attack others in the groups, it happen to me because someone poked at them. I am going back there to reinvestigate this fall with our hole team.
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