Latest / Crime and Horror / This trail is so evil it makes good people betray everything...even their God

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This trail is so evil it makes good people betray everything...even their God · Crime and Horror

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: One night in eighteen seventy, two best friends were out
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: in the wilds of the Canadian wilderness when they discovered
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: this gigantic gold mine. But within just a few hours
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: of this seemingly incredible discovery, something horrible happened to these
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: two men that kickstarted a chain of tragic events that
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: today we still do not fully understand. But before we
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: get into that story, if you're a fan of the strange,
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: dark and mysterious delivered in story format, then you've come
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: to the right place, because that's all we do, and
• 0:29
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• 0:38
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  Speaker 1: our weekly uploads. Okay, let's get into today's story. On
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: a spring morning in eighteen seventy, a gold prospector named
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: Frank Lemon rode his horse along the shore of the
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: North Saskatchewan River, which is a river that runs through
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: Alberta and Saskatchewan in Canada. Frank was at the back
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: of a line of about a dozen men who had
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: all been hired by a rich investor named Lafayette French.
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: He had commissioned them to search the Canadian wilderness for
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: potential gold mines, and if they found a gold mine,
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  Speaker 1: then French would bankroll a full scale mining operation and
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  Speaker 1: pull out all the gold he could, and these men
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  Speaker 1: who found it would get a cut up the profits.
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: When Frank had signed up for this job, he had
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: thought it was a great opportunity. In fact, he thought
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: it was such a big opportunity that he had convinced
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: his best friend, whose nickname was Blackjack, to come along
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: as well. But now, after weeks of searching the wilderness
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: for these mines and not finding any, all Frank really
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: wanted to do now was just go home. And so
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: as this group of men continued their ride along the shore,
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: Frank sort of zoned out and kind of stared off
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: into the forest all around him. And then at some point,
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: as he was doing this, as he was looking off
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  Speaker 1: to his right, he noticed amongst the thick trees, there
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: was this little trail, this dirt trail that kind of
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: wound off into the distance, and for some reason, Frank
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: was just immediately drawn to it, and so he pulled
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  Speaker 1: on his horse's reins and came to a stop and
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: just stared at this strange trail. Frank thought about how,
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: for all this time they've been out here searching for gold,
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: they'd basically only looked in this river and found nothing.
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: And so he thought to himself, you know, maybe the
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: gold is not in the river, but it's maybe out
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: there in the woods, and maybe this trail that he
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: was looking at might lead them to gold. And so
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: Frank turned back around to tell the rest of the
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: group about his big idea, you know, to try to
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: go down this trail here. But when he looked, he
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: saw all the men in the group except for his
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: best friend Blackjack, had continued on without him. They basically
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: hadn't even stopped when Frank had stopped. However, Frank really
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: didn't care that the group had left him, because he
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: was totally over this trip and frankly didn't want to
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: be with this group anyways, and so we just looked
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: over at Blackjack and just kind of gestured towards this
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: trail as if to say, you want to go this way,
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: and Blackjack, who was also totally over this trip, just
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: smiled and nodded like, yeah, let's go, And so the
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: two men turned their horses and began heading down this
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: thin dirt trail off into the woods. For several hours,
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: Frank and Blackjack continued on this trail deeper and deeper
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: into the forest. You get a picture of very thick
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: trees all around, and it's just this little winding dirt
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  Speaker 1: trail on the ground. They had no idea where this
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: trail was going, but there was just something so powerful
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: about this trail. It was like calling them to go.
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: But as they rode along, Frank kept getting this bad feeling,
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  Speaker 1: like he kept hearing what sounded like voices and footsteps
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  Speaker 1: right behind them on the trail, but every time he
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: turned all he saw was Blackjack. There was nobody around
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: them at all. They were deep in the forest. And
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: after a while, you know, Frank kept hearing these noises
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: and he asked Blackjack, like, hey, are you hearing that
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  Speaker 1: stuff too? And Blackjack said, yeah, I am, But he
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: too would turn around and see nothing. They were all alone,
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: and so eventually, you know, the men convinced themselves that
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: you know, what those sounds must be is the sound
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: of their party, who's discovered they have you know, left
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  Speaker 1: the group and maybe they're out there looking for them.
• 4:07
  Speaker 1: But Frank and Blackjack really had no intention of rejoining
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: the group. They kind of didn't like the group, and
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: so they said, you know what, let's just keep on going. Eventually,
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  Speaker 1: the path these two friends were on led them to
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: a stream, and so they stopped. They got off their horses,
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: they knelt down, and they scooped their canteens into the
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: water to get a drink. And as Frank did that,
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: he looked into the crystal clear water and he saw
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: nuggets of gold just sitting there in the stream. Frank
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: couldn't believe it. I mean, he's out here looking for gold,
• 4:34
  Speaker 1: but he was not expecting to find it right here
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  Speaker 1: in the middle of nowhere, despite you know, his instinct
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  Speaker 1: that maybe the gold was out here, and so he
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: just froze and he's staring at this. He can't believe it.
• 4:45
  Speaker 1: He grabs Blackjack, who hadn't seen it yet, and pulls
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  Speaker 1: them over. Blackjack looks and the two men they're like, oh,
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: my goodness, we've done it. But Frank said, look, before
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  Speaker 1: we celebrate, let's see what we're dealing with here. Let's
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  Speaker 1: go upstream here and try to find the source of
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  Speaker 1: this gold. And so the two men that got up,
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: they're super excited. They start walking along the side of
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  Speaker 1: the stream looking in the water, and as they're moving upstream,
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  Speaker 1: they're seeing all this gold in the water, and it's
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  Speaker 1: getting more and more, and eventually they reached this rock ledge.
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  Speaker 1: The water was pouring over down into the stream and
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  Speaker 1: literally in the ledge are these massive veins of gold.
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  Speaker 1: They had found a gigantic gold mine that clearly nobody
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  Speaker 1: else had tapped before. I mean, this could be worth
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  Speaker 1: not just millions of dollars, but billions of dollars. And
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  Speaker 1: so at this point the two friends began to celebrate.
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  Speaker 1: They were ecstatic. I mean, this is unbelievable. They're jumping around,
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  Speaker 1: they're hugging each other, and then at some point they
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: just kind of stopped and went silent because they realized
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: they now had a big dilemma. So the whole reason
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: Frank and Blackjack were out here in the Canadian wilderness
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: was to look for gold. But they were looking for
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  Speaker 1: gold on behalf of the rich investor Lafayette French, which
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  Speaker 1: meant they were contractually obligated to tell French if they
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  Speaker 1: found gold and so here they are. They found this
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  Speaker 1: massive gold mine, and that's what they're supposed to do
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: again based on their contract. But if they did that,
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  Speaker 1: French would get rich beyond his wildest dreams from this mine.
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: And yeah, he'd cut them a check, you know, a
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  Speaker 1: piece of the profits, but it would be like nothing
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  Speaker 1: compared to what French would get from this gold mine.
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  Speaker 1: Or and this is where the dilemma comes in. Frank
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  Speaker 1: and Blackjack could hide the facts that they had found
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  Speaker 1: this mine, and then they alone could come out here
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  Speaker 1: anytime they wanted take the gold and become rich themselves. Now, granted,
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  Speaker 1: they would have to be kind of subtle about it
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  Speaker 1: that they started showing up with barrelfuls of gold. You know, Lafayette,
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  Speaker 1: French is going to find out about it, and they're
• 6:40
  Speaker 1: going to be in trouble. But you know, there was
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  Speaker 1: a way to do it where this mine could effectively
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  Speaker 1: be theirs and they could get rich. But obviously there
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: was a lot of risk involved in that second choice,
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  Speaker 1: and so Frank and Blackjack decided that, you know what,
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  Speaker 1: this is way too big of a decision for us
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  Speaker 1: to make just on the fly right now, So let's
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: just stay here in the area. Let's camp out for
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: the night and just sleep on this and come to
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  Speaker 1: a decision tomorrow. So the two men left the stream
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  Speaker 1: and headed over to this clearing that was right nearby
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  Speaker 1: and decided that's where they would pitch their camp for
• 7:09
  Speaker 1: the night. Blackjack left to go gather firewood, and Frank
• 7:13
  Speaker 1: began to pitch their tent. And as Frank did that,
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: As he began setting up their tent, he began hearing whispers,
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  Speaker 1: kind of like the voices he was hearing as they
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  Speaker 1: were walking in on that trail, and they kept thinking
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  Speaker 1: it was maybe the group that was looking for them.
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: He began hearing those voices again. It was kind of
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: all around him in the trees, but every time he looked,
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: there was no one there. Now Frank convinced himself that
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: maybe these whispers were actually Blackjack, because he had gone
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  Speaker 1: off to get firewood and maybe it was him. But
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: at one point when Frank heard these whispers, he looked
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  Speaker 1: in the direction of the whispers, there was no one there,
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  Speaker 1: and he realized Blackjack was at the same time on
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  Speaker 1: the opposite side of the clearing. It could not have
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  Speaker 1: been him, and so Frank couldn't help. But feel really unsettled.
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  Speaker 1: It was like there was somebody or something here watching
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: them or listening to them, but he just couldn't tell
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  Speaker 1: who or what it was. But Frank told himself to
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: shake it off, you know, don't worry about that instead,
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: just focus on getting the camp set up. We recently
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: launched our newest podcast at Ballin Studios called Redacted Declassified
• 8:15
  Speaker 1: Mysteries with Luplamana, and so far, you guys are loving
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: it so much so that I am now happy to
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: announce that we've created an official YouTube channel for the
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: show Redacted. So now you can enjoy listening to and
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: watching this show in a beautiful new animated format. And
• 8:31
  Speaker 1: if you love binging things like I do, well you're
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: in luck because we just dropped the first three episodes
• 8:38
  Speaker 1: of this new animated series and from here on out,
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: every Tuesday, you'll get a brand new upload on this channel.
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: To give you a sense of the stories and the
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: artwork that you'll see on this brand new Redacted YouTube channel,
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: here's a look at a clip from episode one, and
• 8:52
  Speaker 1: keep in mind what you'll see in this clip is
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: reflective of how all the episodes will be on this channel.
• 9:00
  Speaker 2: Ten thirty five pm. On January third, nineteen sixty one,
• 9:04
  Speaker 2: a physicist named Ed Valario pulled up to a secret
• 9:06
  Speaker 2: nuclear test site in the Idaho desert. Ed had received
• 9:11
  Speaker 2: an emergency call about an explosion at the nuclear reactor
• 9:14
  Speaker 2: known as sl IE. No one had been able to
• 9:17
  Speaker 2: contact the three men who were working that night. Valario
• 9:20
  Speaker 2: waved at his partner, who was waiting for him in
• 9:22
  Speaker 2: front of the reactor building. The two men grabbed their
• 9:25
  Speaker 2: gas masks and rushed inside. They hurried up three flights
• 9:30
  Speaker 2: of winding stairs that led toward the reactor's control room,
• 9:33
  Speaker 2: past pipes and motors and condensers, towards the cramp nerve
• 9:37
  Speaker 2: center that controlled the reactor. The building was completely silent
• 9:41
  Speaker 2: save for the frantic static from their Geiger counters. Valario
• 9:45
  Speaker 2: glanced down and saw the needle pointing to maximum radiation levels.
• 9:50
  Speaker 2: He'd never seen levels that high before. When Valario opened
• 9:54
  Speaker 2: the control room door, his heart skipped a beat. The
• 9:58
  Speaker 2: scene inside was total devastation. Twisted metal scattered across the floor,
• 10:04
  Speaker 2: clouds of steam hovering above the shattered control board, pools
• 10:08
  Speaker 2: of blood and water everywhere. Two bodies lay on the floor,
• 10:13
  Speaker 2: bodies so badly mutilated it was impossible to tell who
• 10:16
  Speaker 2: they were, but where he wondered was the third man.
• 10:21
  Speaker 2: Then something above him caught his attention, something on the ceiling,
• 10:26
  Speaker 2: something that would haunt him for the rest of his life.
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: Head on over to the official redacted YouTube channel today.
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: The handle is at redacted Mysteries. Make sure you go
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: over there and subscribe so you don't miss any uploads.
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: I will also put a link to the channel in
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: the description below. Wonder Plus subscribers can also watch Redacted
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: on the wond reapp Okay, back to the stories. A
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: few hours later, Frank and Blackjack were sitting on a
• 10:58
  Speaker 1: log in front of the campfire, eating rash, talking about
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: what they were going to do with the gold. At
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: some point, Frank said what he was really thinking about
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: this whole situation. He told Blackjack, Look, I think we'd
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: be so stupid to tell Lafayette French. Why should we
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: take a small payday one time when we can basically
• 11:15
  Speaker 1: have an endless supply of wealth for the rest of
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: our lives. But when Frank looked over at Blackjack to
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: see what his reaction was to this pitch, he could
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: see right away that Blackjack disagreed. Blackjack was kind of
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: looking down, and he kind of turned to Frank and
• 11:28
  Speaker 1: was like, look, it's morally wrong to lie here. I
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: would rather be poor and honest than rich and morally bankrupt.
• 11:35
  Speaker 1: And so what it started as a civil discussion from
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: this point on really escalated and just became a full
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: blown yelling fight, with both men absolutely refusing to budge
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: on their stance about what to do with this gold.
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: And eventually, when the two men were standing up and
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: just screaming in each other's faces, Blackjack finally just threw
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: his hands up and said, you know what, enough, and
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: he turned around and stormed over to the tent and
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: disappeared inside. For a minute. Frank stood there stewing by
• 12:01
  Speaker 1: the fire, just completely furious that Blackjack didn't see it
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: the way he saw it. But eventually Frank kind of
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: calmed down and thought, you know what, I need to
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: go to bed too. Obviously we are not near a decision.
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: We need to sleep on this. And so, even though
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: Frank was still upset, he walked over to the tent too,
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: didn't say a word to Blackjack. He just climbed inside,
• 12:20
  Speaker 1: got into his sleeping bag, and tried to go to sleep.
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: But after laying there for a while. When Frank had
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: not fallen asleep and his friend Blackjack had he was
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: snoring and passed out. Frank just could not help feeling
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: enraged again at his friend, like, how can you not
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: see this opportunity here? Why in the world would you
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: tell Lafayette French that's so stupid? And so Frank just
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: laid there restlessly, tossing and turning, listening to the sound
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: of Blackjack's snoring and getting so mad at him. And
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: as he did, you know, Frank went from you know,
• 12:50
  Speaker 1: I need to convince Blackjack in the morning that we
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: need to keep the gold for ourselves to I need
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: to stop Blackjack from telling anyone he is an obstacle.
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: He's not a friend, He's a problem. And as he
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: thought about this, these dark thought loops were going through
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: his head. Frank just became consumed with rage. It was
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: like he couldn't control what he was doing. And in
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: that moment, Frank found himself getting up, walking out of
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: the tent and grabbing an axe, And before he could
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: even think about it, he had walked back into the tent,
• 13:21
  Speaker 1: raised the axe, and driven it into Blackjack's skull, killing him. Instantly.
• 13:27
  Speaker 1: A few minutes later, Frank was outside, sitting by the campfire,
• 13:31
  Speaker 1: looking at his bloody hands, wondering what just happened. How
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: could he have just done what he did? That was
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: his best friend? What had come over him? It was
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: like Frank was a different person. He couldn't understand. But
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: as Frank was sitting there grappling with what he had
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: just done, a twig suddenly snapped over in the direction
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: of the tent, and instantly Frank looked over, like, who's
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: over there? What's going on? And as he looked in
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: the direction of the tent, he began to hear this low,
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: guttural moaning. It almost sounded like a dying animal. He
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: thought for a second, like, wait a minute, is Blackjack
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: not actually dead? Is that him making that noise? But
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: at the same time, Frank's thinking, that's not possible. I
• 14:08
  Speaker 1: practically split Blackcheck's head in half with that axe. He
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: can't be making that sound. But before Frank could even
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: begin to process what he was hearing, this sound, this
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: moaning sound got louder, and it got closer to Frank,
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: like it was moving in his direction. But there's nobody here,
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: and so Frank is horrified, and then right as the
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: sound is practically on top of him, he began hearing
• 14:31
  Speaker 1: those whispers, those voices he had been hearing in the
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: woods on the way out here, except this time the
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: voices were clear. They were talking to Frank, and they
• 14:39
  Speaker 1: were saying, you're gonna be tortured for what you did
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: to Blackjack. And then just as soon as these voices began,
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: suddenly they stopped, the moaning stopped, and the entire forest
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: just went deadly silent, and Frank is just stuck there,
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: staring in the tent, wondering what's happening. And then the
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: silence was broken by this unbelievably loud, high pitched, blood
• 14:58
  Speaker 1: curdling human scream coming from the tent. And it was
• 15:01
  Speaker 1: at that point that Frank just got up and sprinted
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: to his horse and began riding away away from the gold,
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: his friend's body, everything. He didn't care. He needed to
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: get out of there as soon as possible. But the
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: second he began blindly galloping through the forest away from
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: this area, he began hearing whispers and heavy footsteps right
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: behind him, as if they were following him out of
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: the forest. But Frank was so scared, he didn't even
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: dare turn around to look. He just rode as fast
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: as he possibly could. Hours later, Frank suddenly emerged from
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: the dark forest, and just by absolute happenstance, he arrived
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: right in the town that he and the other gold
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: prospectors had passed through on their way out into the woods.
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: And the moment Frank left the tree line and actually
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: entered into this town, the whispering and the footsteps, which
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: had basically chased him all the way to this point,
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: they stopped. Suddenly Frank was all alone. Now by this point,
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: Frank had convinced himself that everything he had heard in
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: the woods, the voice telling him he was going to
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: be tortured for what he did done, you know, the
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: heavy footsteps, the whispering, the screaming, the moaning, all of it,
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: everything that had caused him to flee, was actually the
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: ghost of Blackjack. That after he had killed his friend,
• 16:11
  Speaker 1: his friend's spirit had immediately risen and sought revenge on Frank.
• 16:15
  Speaker 1: That's what was happening. And this horrified Frank so much
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: that he didn't care at all about the gold anymore.
• 16:21
  Speaker 1: He just wanted to get out of the spiritual danger.
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: He thought he was in and so as he rode
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: into this village, all he looked for was a church.
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: And when he found the church, he went to the
• 16:31
  Speaker 1: front steps and he sat there waiting for the priest.
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: At dawn, the priest finally arrived at the church and
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: found Frank sitting there looking horrible, and Frank instantly stood up,
• 16:41
  Speaker 1: rushed over to the priest and began begging him to
• 16:44
  Speaker 1: save him from Blackjack's ghost. Now, at first, as the
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: priest listened to Frank tell his story about this ghost,
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: he just thought that Frank was crazy. But once he
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: got Frank to slow down and sort of go over
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: the details step by step, the priest realized that perhaps
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: was some truth to this story. It sounded like it
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: was probably true that Frank really did find a gold
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: mine with his friend named Blackjack, and at some point
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: the discovery of this gold mine prompted Frank to murder Blackjack.
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: But despite the fact that this man Frank had just
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: openly confessed to a murder, the priest could only focus
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: on the gold, the gold that apparently Frank had found
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: out in the forest. It was like this intense feeling
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: had come over the priest. This darkness that just made
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: him suddenly so greedy. He had never felt this way
• 17:35
  Speaker 1: before in his life, but it was like he was
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: laser focused on finding a way to claim that wealth
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: that was just out there right now. And so, against
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: all his better judgment, the priest turns to Frank and says,
• 17:46
  Speaker 1: you know what, we'll help you, but for right now,
• 17:48
  Speaker 1: you need to get out of town. Get out of here,
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: don't come back. We'll go out, we'll find Blackjack, we'll
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: give him a proper burial, and that will protect you
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: from his ghost. And so Frank was so thankful to
• 17:58
  Speaker 1: the priest and he took off, not realizing that the
• 18:01
  Speaker 1: priest did not care at all about Frank. At this point,
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: all the priest cared about was getting Frank out of
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: the picture so that that gold mine out in the
• 18:08
  Speaker 1: woods could be his. The next day, the priest asked
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: his friend, an outdoorsman named John McDougall, to head off
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: into the wilderness to try to find Frank in Blackjack's campsite.
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: And so that's what John did, and after a few
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: hours of looking, he found the campsite, and sure enough,
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: he found Blackjack's dead body still inside of the tent.
• 18:27
  Speaker 1: With the axe lodged in his head, and right away, John,
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: the ever loyal friend to the priest, began doing what
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: the priest told him to do, which was to bury
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: Blackjack to cover up the murder, because the priest and
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: John were planning to claim this gold mine for themselves,
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: and they couldn't have this murder getting out to the
• 18:44
  Speaker 1: public because then officials would come out and investigate the scene,
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: and then they would find the gold mine. They couldn't
• 18:50
  Speaker 1: have that. And so John began digging a grave for Blackjack,
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: and as he did, he began hearing whispers all around
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: him in the trees. Remember, he's all alone out there,
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: and so he began looking around, trying to figure out
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: who's out here. Did somebody follow him? But there was
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: no one. John did his best to keep trying to
• 19:07
  Speaker 1: dig as quickly as he could, but these whispers, these
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: awful voices, they just kept getting louder and louder and
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: more pronounced and closer to him, eventually to the point
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: where John was spooked. I mean, John was this avid
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: outdoorsman who routinely spent time by himself out in the wild,
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: but here he was feeling very unsettled by these voices.
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: But despite his fear, John did what he was told
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: and dug the grave as fast as he could, grabbed
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: Blackcheck's body, threw him inside. He covered him up, and
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: he put a couple of big stones on top of
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: the grave site to kind of make a makeshift tombstone.
• 19:40
  Speaker 1: And then afterwards, again, despite feeling totally unsettled out here,
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: John did the next part of the plan, which was
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: to go look for gold. Go to the stream, find
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: the gold these guys were talking about. But as John
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: is down by the water looking for gold, he began
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: hearing more and more of those voices all around him.
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: He kept spinning around, but nobody was there. And then
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: finally this awful, high pitched laughter cut through the trees.
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: He whipped around. There was nobody there, but it was
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: so terrifying that John just abandoned the search for gold
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: and just hopped back on his horse and fled out
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: of there. But within a couple of days, John and
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: the priest had convinced themselves that those weird noises and
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: that laughter that John had heard out there was just
• 20:21
  Speaker 1: some bird, that it was all in John's head. He
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: was spooked for no reason, when in reality it was
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: just that incredible pull of that gold being out there
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: waiting to be claimed. It was like John and the priest,
• 20:32
  Speaker 1: they just they couldn't not go looking for it. And
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: so John decided to go back out into the woods,
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: except this time he did not go alone. He brought
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: a group of men with him. And so this group,
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: led by John, retraced Frankken Blackjack's steps down that skinny
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: trail all the way to their campsite, and when they
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: got there, John just froze. He could not believe what
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: he was seeing. The rocks that were sitting on the
• 20:54
  Speaker 1: grave where John had just buried Blackjack were gone, these
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: huge rocks just missing. And also the tent, the bloodied
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: tent where Blackjack had been murdered, had also been cleared.
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: There was no trace of it anywhere. It was like
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: the campsite had never existed. And this made no sense
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: to John because he knows this is a totally isolated
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: part of the wilderness, Like nobody comes through here. Who
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: in their right mind would just happened to pass by
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: and randomly grab all these rocks and the tent covered
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: in blood and take it out here? It made no sense,
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: like who could have done this Now, until this point,
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: John really had convinced himself that everything he'd experienced the
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: time before was in his head. It was just a
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: bird or you know, it was just normal forest sounds.
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: And he also liked the priest, had convinced himself that
• 21:40
  Speaker 1: Frank's original story about Blackjack's ghost chasing him out of
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: the forest with just the ramblings of a crazy guilty man,
• 21:48
  Speaker 1: a murderer's guilty conscience, had created that story. But now
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: as John was surveying the scene in front of him,
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: he couldn't help but think, maybe this place is haunted.
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: And so once again John just turned and fled. He
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: and the men they got out of there as fast
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: as they could. And when John got back to town,
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: instead of going to the priest, he just went right
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: to the bar and just started drinking. And he kept
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: on drinking until he died of alcohol poisoning just a
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: couple of days later. And John's death started a chain
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: of unexplained catastrophes all connected to this gold. First, the priest,
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: after discovering what happened to John, didn't really spend any
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: time grieving the loss of his friend. Instead, the priest
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: just saddled up and headed out into the woods to
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: find the gold himself. However, he found the trail that
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: led out to the campsite and to the gold had
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: been destroyed in a forest fire. Then Lafayette French, the
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: rich investor who had bankrolled the original expedition, he heard
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: about the mine and decided he would go find it. However,
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: the guide that he hired to take him there literally
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: died on the way into the forest. By this point,
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: French had heard all the stories about how you know,
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: Blackjack's ghost was out in this forest haunting the area,
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: preventing people from finding the gold. But French ignored all
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: those stories. Just like with Frank and the priest and John.
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: It was like that gold had an unbreakable hold on him.
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: And so for thirty years French kept going out into
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: that forest searching for that gold mine, and eventually he
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: found it, or at least that's what he said in
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: the last letter he wrote back home. But we'll never
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: actually know for sure, because after sending that letter, on
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: that same day, Lafayette's cabin burned down and he died
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: without telling anybody the location of the mine. And so
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: with French's death, that sort of solidified the rumors that
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: the haunting was real, and people began to believe that
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: there was only one thing that could explain this almost
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: magnetic pull the gold had on so many people, and
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: also all the terrible fates that befell everybody who tried
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: to go look for it, and that was that the
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: gold mine was cursed. And today people still believed that
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: that Blackjack's ghost is out there in the forest preventing
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: people from finding out the goal. But whatever the truth is,
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: whether the curse is real or not, to this day,
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: no one has ever been able to successfully find the
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: gold again and live to tell about it. Are you
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: the type of person who has binged basically all of
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: my YouTube videos and every week you anxiously wait a
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: new upload. If so, thank you, But also you're in
• 24:23
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• 24:26
  Speaker 1: a separate podcast, the Mister Ballin Podcast, that has literally
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: hundreds of stories that are not on YouTube that you
• 24:33
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• 24:37
  Speaker 1: podcast platforms again, it's just called the Mister Ballin Podcast,
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: and on Mondays, on that podcast we upload exclusive new
• 24:45
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• 24:48
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• 24:52
  Speaker 1: your favorite videos on YouTube and put those on the podcast.
• 24:56
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• 24:59
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• 25:02
  Speaker 1: episodes one month ahead of Apple and Spotify and all
• 25:06
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• 25:09
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• 25:12
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• 25:14
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• 25:17
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• 25:20
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• 25:23
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