On January 23, 1897, a woman named Zona Heaster Shue was found dead in her home in Greenbrier County, West Virginia. A neighborhood boy discovered her body. No one knew for sure what had caused her death, and her husband, Erasmus “Trout” Shue, was crying and holding her head tightly. He wouldn’t let anyone touch her, even when the coroner tried to check her body.
At first, the cause of death was listed as “everlasting faint,” and then changed to childbirth, even though Zona wasn’t pregnant. The case was closed without further questions. But about a month later, something strange happened — Zona’s mother, Mary Jane, claimed that her daughter’s ghost started visiting her at night.
Mary Jane said the ghost came to her bedside and told her that her husband had killed her, just because she didn’t cook what he wanted for dinner.
Soon, people in the small town heard about the ghost story. Mary Jane was able to convince the coroner to look at Zona’s body again. This time, the coroner found injuries that matched exactly what the ghost had said. It proved that Zona had been murdered.