Photographs from History that Will Haunt Your Dreams

8. This Sad Clown Was Putting Out a Fire

Circuses have a reputation nowadays for being inhumane, for making a spectacle out of people who do not fit in, and for using animals in ways that deprive them of their fundamental rights. However, they have also been notoriously unsafe, as epitomized by a fire at a Ringling Brothers Circus in Hartford, Connecticut, in 1944. This picture is of “Weary Willie,” a clown persona created by Emmett Kelly, who performed for a crowd of 6000 people when the circus tent caught on fire. He rushed to begin helping people escape and then helped put out the fire. Yet 168 people still lost their lives that day.

7. A Haunting Shadow from the Hiroshima Bombing

When the atomic bomb fell on Hiroshima, Japan, on August 6, 1945, the explosion literally vaporized so many people within seconds that there is no accurate count of how many people perished. The blast’s radiation caused imprints on the surfaces where people were vaporized, leaving thousands upon thousands of “death shadows” on the city. This picture looks like something spilled on a porch. However, it is all that remains of someone vaporized by the explosion, and we have no idea who the person was.

6. This World War I Soldier Had a Haunting Form of PTSD

The original term for PTSD was “shell shock.” It referred to soldiers returning home after World War I who had severe mental distress due to their experiences in the trenches. The fighting was so brutal that it literally broke down the minds of the soldiers and altered them forever. While the soldier in this picture appears to be smiling, he was one of 80,000 British soldiers from World War I who developed PTSD because of atrocities that no human should ever experience. The unnatural look on his face leads one to easily believe that the man was not happy; instead, he suffered.

5. A Haunting Message

The “Lipstick Killer” was a woman named Frances Brown who, upon claiming her second victim, wrote this chilling message on the wall in lipstick. Detectives who found the victim’s body also found a bloody thumbprint on the doorknob, and the newspapers went to town on the message the perpetrator had left behind. Brown claimed one more person before being apprehended, a fate that she wanted if she really believed the writing on the wall. The assumption was that the guilty party was male, but it turns out the perpetrator was a 32-year-old woman.

4. A Haunting Photo of a Woman Tied to a Tree

Do you remember watching cartoons with a damsel in distress tied to the railroad tracks? In the comics, she was always there so that the hero could save the day. But this woman? We really don’t know why or when they took this picture or what it is even about. Perhaps the woman was just engaging in some good-natured horseplay in this historical photo. Alternatively, maybe someone had tied her to a tree with more sinister intentions and decided to take a macabre picture of her legitimately crying out for help. We certainly hope the reason is the former.

3. Another Victorian Ghost Haunting the Photo

This picture is of Lord Combermere, allegedly taken four days after he passed from a blood clot. During his funeral service, which took place four miles away from his study, Sybell Corbet took this long-exposure photograph, which shows the ghost of Lord Combermere sitting in his chair. Is this another picture of a ghost caught on film? Not likely. We know that Victorians were the first to experiment with cameras. Plus, they were fascinated with ghosts and loved to tinker with photographs to make it appear that a spirit was present.

2. This Scary Photo Is From Chernobyl

You may know that Chernobyl was the site of an epic nuclear disaster that was so severe that the rest of the world began to question the use of atomic energy seriously. This picture is of the “elephant’s foot” formed beneath the core that melted down in the nuclear plant. It is a mixture of sand, concrete, and sealing material that melts together with nuclear waste. Today, the elephant’s foot only radiates about 10 percent of the radiation emitted when the disaster first happened, but that is still enough to cause severe radiation poisoning.

Read Too: 16 Disastrous Facts About The Chernobyl Disaster.

1. This Haunting Guy Looks Like the Ultimate Slasher

This photo looks like it came straight out of a horror film, but it is from real life. Decades after Jack the Ripper terrorized London, Edward Paisnel dressed in a woman’s wig and mask and terrorized the inhabitants of England’s Island of Jersey. During the day, he helped his wife run an orphanage, but at night, he allegedly prayed to Satan and committed unspeakable acts. When they caught him, he was convicted of 13 crimes and received a prison sentence of 30 years. Imagine the horror his wife must have felt.