The Bailey House Museum, located in Brownville Nebraska, was the former home of Captain Benson M. Bailey. It was probably built shortly after the Civil War and was originally located on the banks of the Missouri River. Shifting shorelines persuaded Captain Bailey to relocate the structure further inland, and the location he chose is where the house still stands today. Captain Bailey was a Union officer during the Civil War. He tragically lost his first wife and an infant daughter in 1860, leaving him a widower with three young children. The captain remarried after the war and relocated his new family from Tennessee to Nebraska, which is when the Bailey house was built. The Bailey house remained in the family until Captain and Mrs. Bailey’s untimely deaths. After a series of ownership changes it was purchased by the Brownville Historical Society, who restored the home to its original glory and turned it into a museum full of artifacts and relics from the past.
Two Unsolved Murders
As the legend goes, Captain Bailey and his wife may have picked an unfortunate location for their new home. As it turns out, when they moved from the riverfront to Main Street, they gained a neighbor who would become their undoing. Although the stories have never been proven, it is said that this jealous neighbor murdered Mrs. Bailey in 1880 by poisoning her meal. Perhaps because Captain Bailey’s attention was not swayed after his wife’s death, the captain himself met the same fate three years later. Nobody was ever charged with the murders, and the case remains a mystery.
The Ghost of Captain Bailey
There’s nothing that fuels a ghost story more than an untimely murder, and the Captain Bailey House is no exception. Guests report seeing full bodied apparitions of the man walking about the home as if he still owned it. It is said that he likes to turn the lights on and off, and neighbors have reported hearing piano music coming from the home while there was no one in residence. Captain Bailey’s spirit is also known to open and close the doors whenever he feels like it. One door in particular is known to be slammed open and shut with extra vigor. This is the door where Captain Bailey’s body was found, sitting on the floor with his back against it.
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