UNC Shows State's Unsolved Mysteries

Many of them involve factual events and people, while some are pure fiction. This is the focus of the "North Carolina Mysteries, Myths and Legends" exhibition in Wilson Library, running until Jan. 19.

"Very rarely do you get a topic like this where you can pull all parts of North Carolina together," said Neil Fulghum, keeper of the N.C. Collection Gallery in Wilson Library.

One of the most circulated stories overheard from campus tour guides involves Wilson Library and the Bell Tower. The top of the Bell Tower, funded by John Motley Morehead, can be seen above the dome of the library, named in honor of Louis Round Wilson.

The legend says there were ill feelings between Morehead and Wilson. Morehead had the tower built tall enough so that when looked at from in front of the library, the tower's conical peak appears to sit like a dunce cap on the library's dome, which represents Wilson's bald head.

Fulghum said the story has no grounds because the library was named in honor of Wilson in 1956, 25 years after the completion of the Bell Tower.

"I don't know whether there was an actual disagreement between Morehead and Wilson, but this story has been circulated and alluded to for half a century," he said.

Another common campus legend goes back to 1833 and involves a duel between a student at UNC, Peter Dromgoole, and a jealous suitor. The story tells of a midnight duel between Dromgoole and his rival for a local girl's affection in front of a large rock, which today sits outside the entrance of Gimghoul Castle, about one-half mile from campus.

Today there are dark reddish stains on the stone, which is said to be the tombstone of Dromgoole. The legend also tells of the ghosts of Dromgoole and his girlfriend, which can be seen walking hand in hand during a full moon.

Fulghum said the story was made up to explain the disappearance of Dromgoole, who was from Virginia and left Chapel Hill suddenly in 1833.

"Dromgoole left Chapel Hill in a huff because he did badly on an exam, but he was seen in Virginia before he disappeared," Fulghum said.

In an old article of "The White and Blue" was born yet another legend -- of buried Confederate gold at UNC. According to the story, in the final days of the Civil War gold coins disappeared from the Capitol in Raleigh and were brought to Chapel Hill and buried.

This story, which ran in 1989, was based on a detailed journal by J. Fraser Allenby and a transcribed lost manuscript by Hamilton G. Dowd.

Fulghum said the story also has no truth to it."Just because something is in print or on a computer does not make it a fact," he said.

A mystery told near the Outer Banks of North Carolina is about a five-masted schooner, the Carroll A. Deering, which washed up along Diamond Shoals off of Cape Hatteras in 1921. When the rescue boat reached the stranded ship, no crew was found on board -- only three kittens.

There are many speculations about what happened to the crew of the ship. A rich documentary collection including FBI and investigators' reports tried to explain the mysterious disappearance of the 11 people on board.

UNC Professor Bland Simpson, director of the creative writing program, wrote a book about the mystery of the Deering. He said he decided to explore it more in depth because he grew up hearing the story.

"It's one of ours -- I've heard it all of my life," he said.

"It's an unresolved mystery, which means you can turn it all different ways and find things about it but never find the heart of it."

Tiffianna Honsinger, a volunteer at Wilson Library, said the myths and legends at the exhibit remain popular because people still want to explain what actually happened.

"I think that the unknown is fascinating to everybody," she said. "It fills a basic human need to explain the unexplained, kind of like gossip."

The Features Editor can be reached at features@unc.edu.