The Mystery of the Coffin Beneath Chateaugay Lake
As Originally Told in the Steamboat Dispatch
Chapter II: The Curse of the Cattail Flats
Well now, dear readers, gather ’round as I spin you a yarn that’ll curl your hair and chill your bones. Picture it: Chateaugay Lake, a shimmering expanse cloaked in the whispers of the past. In the summer of ’76, secrets brewed beneath the tranquil surface, and none knew this better than ol’ Jack Clifford—the man some dared to call the Shatagee Woods Admiral of the Steamboat Pirate Syndicate! Folks whispered that his control stretched beyond the shoreline and deep into the cattail flats, where a foggy morning could swallow a whole boat without a trace.
It all started when a pair of adventurous divers stumbled upon a cement-filled coffin at the bottom of Chateaugay Lake, a sight that rattled the very foundations of our quiet town! Rumors swirled like smoke from a campfire, and one voice rose above the rest: that of Johqu Bogart, the resident storyteller with a knack for the eerie and strange. As he spun tales of mischief and darker dealings, folks leaned in, hearts racing, eager to uncover what lurked in the depths of our beloved lake.
Join us as we delve into the tangled web of intrigue, betrayal, and the haunting echoes of those who dared to tread where few have returned!
The discovery of the cement-filled coffin in Chateaugay Lake had sent a shiver through the quiet little Adirondack community, but it was far from the only secret buried in the wild depths. A tangled web of intrigue and vice stretched back across the decades, to the very founding of Camp Jack, that mysterious estate where Evelyn Nesbit and Jack Clifford had once made merry—too merry, as some whispered—and perhaps darker forces had come to stay.
As the waters lapped against the swampy shoreline, there was talk among the few who dared speak of it: that coffin wasn’t meant to be found!
The tale took a turn down the well-worn trails of the region’s sordid past—led by a certain Johqu Bogart, an ancient codger known for his fiery recounting of old campfire stories, his voice twisted through a malfunctioning vocoder, ringing out with a metallic squawk. His retellings drew the curious and the daring, the ones who wanted more than just trout and tranquility from the lake. They wanted the secrets. And Johqu had plenty.
“Summer of ’76,” his voice rattled out one autumn night, as the campfire flickered and twisted in the shadows of the towering pines, “it was a pair of ol’ divers what first laid eyes on it. Thought they had seen an old stump. Then, they tapped it—cement. Found it right there, just off Camp Jack.”
The crowd leaned in closer.
“Ol’ Jack Clifford,” Johqu continued, his words warped, “he had his hands in some rough dealings, but it was never just the wild parties and the Brazen Serpent Wendigo Whisky. Nah, there was somethin’ darker goin’ on…”
There had been stories of fights breaking out at Camp Jack—gunfire, shattered bottles, and one summer evening in 1915 when a guest hadn’t made it back to shore. “Accident,” they’d said. “Hunting mishap,” claimed others. But there were whispers about a missing sportsman who had more enemies than friends.
Cassius Bellows, the formidable owner of Deer Spring Lodge and a friend of Clifford’s, had his own role to play. Bellows wasn’t a simple host catering to the “sportsmen” from New York and Boston who flocked to the Adirondacks for their fix of wilderness and “Brazen Serpent”. Bellows had seen too much. His lodge, hidden away in the folds of the Chateaugay forests, was more than just a retreat—it was a hub for the elite, the rich men from the cities who sought not only the thrill of the hunt, but the thrill of the unknown.
It was said that one night, in the fall of 1915, a secret syndicate had gathered at Deer Spring Lodge. Among them were steamboat captains, bootleggers, and men with darker trades—connected through whispered deals made on the decks of Bellows’ launches and motorized boats that prowled the lake. At the head of this syndicate? None other than Clifford himself!
The night of the infamous gathering had started innocently enough. The men, their voices thick with the drawl of the city, had been discussing the expansion of their business. But the mood changed when an unexpected visitor arrived—one of Clifford’s old rivals, a man named Sullivan, who had an axe to grind over debts long unpaid and scores unsettled.
No one knows exactly what happened next. Some say Bellows and his younger cousin Millard Bellows, known for building the finest boats on the lake, had been present. Others claimed they’d heard a gunshot in the woods near the lodge that night.
Sullivan was never seen again. His disappearance was chalked up to “the wildness of the land,” but Bellows’ lodge guests knew better.
The coffin in the lake? Johqu grinned a toothless smile as the flames licked higher. “It weren’t just a piece of cement, no sir. It was sealed up good and proper by them steamboat men. They weighted it down, dropped it in the lake, and counted on the swamp to keep it hidden.”
But why there, in the shadow of Camp Jack?
That had been Bellows’ idea, Johqu said. The syndicate feared that Sullivan’s spirit would linger.
They believed the cursed man would haunt the very waters they had sailed upon. And so, at the suggestion of one of Bellows’ more superstitious friends, they laid Sullivan to rest in the depths—cement-bound—off the shore of Camp Jack, where the spirits of Jack Clifford’s wild guests and their intoxicated, reckless actions could keep him company.
The years passed, the party-goers vanished, but the coffin remained. In the 1970s, when two divers stumbled across it while searching for the rumored old “Cattail Flats” treasure from the steamboat days, they had inadvertently uncovered the last remaining link to a night of horror long forgotten by the living—but not by the dead.
As Johqu’s tale ended, the fire crackled and the crowd around him sat silent, haunted by what they had heard. The rugged shores of Chateaugay Lake seemed suddenly less peaceful, the wilderness less inviting. Who knew what else lay hidden in those murky waters?
In the distance, across the lake, the outline of Camp Jack could just be seen—a dark silhouette against the rising moon, with shadows dancing on its shore like specters from a long-forgotten past.
The next chapter loomed.
What mysteries of Chateaugay Lake haunt you?