KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- The Rev. Henry David Jardine came to Kansas City in 1879, a young priest eager to serve his flock. But Jardine soon became the focus of one of the biggest church scandals the city had known. Six years later, he died mysteriously, a chain welded around his waist and a bottle of chloroform at his side. Though Jardine has been dead more than 100 years, some think he never left St. Mary's Episcopal Church. His ghost is still there, they say, searching for something.
The Rev. Bruce Rahtjen turned from the front of the marble altar and motioned toward a painted-glass window on the second floor. "A number of parishioners have said that when they're in here at night by themselves, they feel some kind of presence," Rahtjen said quietly as the afternoon sunlight cast an eerie glow on the visitors below. "And they invariably point to that window. I know this sounds bizarre, but I've felt it, too."
Eyewitness accounts
Other members of St. Mary's Episcopal Church say they've not only felt it, they've seen it. "I used to cook down there on Mondays for the Tuesday food pantry," Annamarie Manzo said. "Around 9:30, I started hearing funny noises. I went into the main sanctuary, and there was this strong incense smell all over the place." The church burns incense during its Sunday high Mass. "And then I swear I saw something white floating around. Like a cloud," Manzo said. "I live in an 88-year-old house, and I'm used to old-house things. But this was something different."
Ten years ago Keith Gottschall stopped by St. Mary's late one night to visit a friend who was arranging altar decorations. "When I pulled into the parking lot, I noticed a figure moving past the window on the second floor of the church, which is kept locked," said Gottschall, who has been a church member a dozen years. "It looked like a man, but it moved quickly, like it wasn't walking but floating." Gottschall went inside, figuring his friend had brought along another friend, Billy. "Where's Billy?" Gottschall asked. "What do you mean? No one's here but me," his friend said. Gottschall climbed the back staircase and found the door locked at the top.
A shady past
In 1879, Henry David Jardine came to town to become the church's rector. Before long, the priest was being criticized for his zeal to create a parish that accepted rituals unpopular in a conservative church. In an effort to oust Jardine, influential members of the community in 1884 brought charges against him, accusing him of immoral behavior. Then it was learned that, as a youth, Jardine had broken into his brother-in-law's store and stolen a large amount of goods. He served two years in a New York prison.
In 1885 an ecclesiastical court found Jardine guilty of improper conduct toward a girl, indecent conduct toward women who had gone to his confessional and using narcotics. The narcotics charge arose from the fact that Jardine was addicted to chloroform, which he used to alleviate a nervous affliction. Jardine appealed his removal as rector and made a personal plea to the bishop in St. Louis. On Jan. 5, 1886, he visited the St. Louis church of his old friend, the Rev. George C. Betts, and then spent the next four days working on getting reinstated.
Jardine's efforts failed. And on the morning of Jan. 10, Betts entered the sacristy where Jardine had been sleeping and found his friend dead.
Mysterious death
Covering his face was a small handkerchief. By his side, a bottle of chloroform. Those preparing Jardine's body for burial made another bizarre discovery: A chain had been welded around the priest's waist, rusted as if it had been worn a long time. Chain marks were embedded in his flesh.Many assumed that Jardine had been wearing the chain as penance for his youthful crimes. Others said the priest wore the chain to keep from levitating at the altar, which he was rumored to have done on occasion. Some thought Jardine's death was a suicide. Those who saw him as a martyr said it was accidental. But psychic and self-proclaimed "ghostbuster" Maurice Schwalm of Kansas City said he thought Jardine was murdered by one of his enemies.
Much of Jardine's colorful story is recounted in a 1949 best-selling novel, The Chain, by Paul Wellman of Kansas City. Records show that Jardine's body was buried in Forest Hills Cemetery in Kansas City. Along with his body was a box of personal belongings, including the chain. Schwalm, whose own book, Mo-Kan Ghosts, is to be released in the spring, said he thought Jardine -- or at least his chain -- might have been secretly buried in the basement of St. Mary's, under the painted-glass window of St. Alban, a British martyr.
A ghostly presence?
The narrow, twisting staircase at the rear of the church was made for a good ghost story. Barely wide enough for one person, the wooden stairs creak with each step. Above, the vaulted ceilings and Gothic-style brick arches keep the area cool and shadowy. "Some people say they get part way up these stairs and feel a cold draft," Rahtjen said on a recent tour. He pointed to a window halfway up the steps. "I say that's the culprit."
Schwalm isn't so sure. He had brought along a gauss meter, which measures magnetic field strength. The presence of ghosts, Schwalm contends, increases the strength of magnetic fields. The monitor was quiet as Schwalm started up the stairs. But halfway up he paused. The meter was buzzing like an electric razor. The meter was quiet throughout the rest of the church, except for spots under the St. Alban's window and on the right side of the altar, where it became extremely active. The altar, which was installed in 1888, was dedicated to Jardine.
Schwalm, who has been a member of the church almost 50 years, became interested in the "haunting" after several conversations with the Rev. Edwin Merrill, a former St. Mary's rector. "He told me he frequently heard bumps and knocks and creaks around the altar and also frequently heard steps like somebody was coming up the back stairs to where he (Merrill) lived," Schwalm said. "He assumed all this was connected with Father Jardine." Schwalm wasn't convinced, he said, until he took photographs of the altar one afternoon.
Seeing is believing
When the photos were developed, Schwalm said, he saw objects that he hadn't seen through the lens: a sheetlike monk carrying a candle and a skull-like profile that he said was identifiable as one of Jardine's old enemies. Schwalm said he turned up other oddities. The rector reported cold spots on the back stairs. An alarm service reported tower doors open in the middle of the night. An organ repairman said his dog tracked an invisible object across the room.
Then one afternoon in 1977, Schwalm said, "I saw Jardine. He was smiling, wearing the robes of a monk. But instead of a rope around his waist, he wore his chain. He was levitating slightly, and he had an aura of light around his entire body." Schwalm said he hadn't seen the apparition since.
Why may Jardine be "haunting" the church? "Because he thinks his record was never made clear," Schwalm said.
