Old taverns, especially in New England often have residual energy impressed within its walls
The Duxbury restaurant is said to be haunted by three friendly ghosts
Patriot Ledger Newspaper, Quincy, MA Oct 2020
DUXBURY — The Sun Tavern, a cozy haunt on a quiet stretch of road in Duxbury isn’t just known for its steaks, lamb or calamari, it’s also home to some supernatural guests.
The restaurant, operated out of a colonial-era home, is said to be home to at least three spirits, Lysander Walker, a recluse who shot himself in the sitting room on Oct. 3, 1928, and Mary and Elizabeth Williamson, two little girls who died of scarlet fever in the house in the 1700s, according to the Tavern’s current owner, Gary James.
A Boston Herald article from 1928, uncharitably dubbing him the “Last Duxbury Hermit,” details how Walker was found dead by an 11-year-old-girl who lived across the street, according to the book “Stopping Places: Along Duxbury Roads” by Margery MacMillan. Walker had apparently been distraught over the death of his wife and took his own life.
A few years after Walker’s death, in the early ’30s, the home became a restaurant.
James, who took over the restaurant in 2017 from Larry and Carol Friedman, said he has had at least one encounter that may have been Walker.
“I was standing out back behind the restaurant with Larry talking and I see this shadow approaching us and then take off,” James said. “I thought it was somebody trying to break into cars.”
James said he and Friedman looked around for someone to no avail, Friedman chalked it up to a visit by Walker, whose death certificate hangs in the restaurant.
James said as recently as a few weeks ago a server thought she saw a man sitting at one of the restaurant’s tables, but the restaurant was closed, and other staff said there was no one there.
Larry Friedman, who still owns the property and previously owned the restaurant in two different stints, said he’s had quite a few creepy encounters.
He said when he was first taking the restaurant over in 1996, the basement was flooded. In order to get the electricity in the building working again, he had to rid the basement of water.
In the process of drying out the basement, Friedman said he was down there in waders, using a generator to operate temporary lights and a sump pump to suck the water out, with his wife and brother-in-law just outside.
“All of a sudden, the light goes off, generator stops, water stops. And I’m yelling up through the window...Not a word. I don’t hear a word out of them,” Larry Friedman said. “Suddenly I feel these arms around me. To this day, I tell this story, it wigs me out.”
Friedman said he couldn’t see anything when the lights went out. He said the lights came on moments later and he started yelling to his brother-in-law who swore the generator never stopped.
Friedman said he had always been resistant to different paranormal investigators or groups coming in not wanting to upset the spirits, but in his second stint owning the restaurant starting in 2009, he was finally convinced to let a few people in who while there made an audio recording.
Friedman said the girls seem to mostly haunt the upstairs where they apparently died. The bathrooms and an office now occupy the second floor of the building.“They went down to the basement, and the basement is a trip in itself. It’s an old basement, it’s an old stone wall. Most of the staff won’t go down there,” Larry Friedman said. “But they did a recording down there, and they heard a very young girl’s voice saying, ‘Larry’s coming. Larry’s coming,’ which is mind-blowing. And then, a man’s voice, an older voice saying, ‘Get out.’ I’m guessing that was Lysander.”
Even the most skeptical staff seem to find themselves believing in spirits after working there.
James and Friedman each separately told a story about a choking diner who seemed to get a helping hand from an apparition that happened three or four years ago.
“One busy Saturday my bartender starts screaming. ‘Larry! Larry!’... I run up to the bar and there’s a man choking,” Larry Friedman said. “I was just about to give him the Heimlich Maneuver, when he spit out his food. ... He turns around to me and says, ‘Thank you.’ I said, ‘I didn’t even get to touch you.’ He turns to the woman next to him and says, ‘Thank you.’ And she said, ‘No one touched you.’ He said, ‘Someone hit me on my back.’”
The restaurant has had several names over the years, but the spirits seem to be a constant.
Selden Tearse whose mother Peyton Wells and late-father David Wells owned the restaurant from 1964 to 1973 said her father used to tell stories of spirits there. Tearse said her father would blow the candles out at night and leave them in one part of the restaurant only to find that they had moved the next morning. During the Wells’ tenure owning the restaurant, the alarm went off one night, and police came to investigate. Hearing footsteps, the police went in, guns drawn, but found no one, according to MacMillan’s book.
But, never the diner should worry, Friedman said it appears that despite, the spookiness, these seem to be friendly ghosts.“You know, I was not a believer when I first bought the restaurant. I’d heard stories. I really didn’t believe any of them, so I completely put it out of my mind,” Friedman said. “I think Lysander Walker and the two girls are very friendly. I know they’re happy the building’s occupied and things are going on.”
Joe Difazio can be reached at jdifazio@patriotledger.com
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