October – a month where the air turns colder, the light more golden, the trees glowing and fiery – spooky season begins, and the veil between this world and the next seems just a bit thinner. My thoughts turn to ghost stories and local Hudson Valley folklore.
~ Anne Charlotte Photography

Every October, this little stretch along the Hudson where I live comes alive with the Legend of Sleepy Hollow – Washington Irving’s spooky tale of a ghostly Headless Horseman from the American Revolutionary War, haunting the area around the Old Dutch Church and its burial grounds in the village of Sleepy Hollow.

There was a contagion in the very air that blew from that haunted region; it breathed forth an atmosphere of dreams and fancies infecting all the land.
~ Washington Irving

Last fall, I decided to wander the Old Dutch Church burial grounds and visit the site where the original bridge once stood over the Pocantico River – where the Headless Horseman’s victim, Ichabod Crane, took his last fateful ride – and write a post about it.

First published in 1820, Washington Irving’s The Legend of Sleepy Hollow was inspired by local folklore and tales he heard while spending time in the Tarrytown and Sleepy Hollow area as a teenager. The folklore told of a Hessian soldier whose head was blown off by a cannon during the Revolutionary War. It was said that the headless soldier haunted the woods along the Pocantico River near the Old Dutch Church burial grounds, riding through the darkness in search of his lost head… and perhaps a bit of revenge.

Certain it is, the place still continues under the sway of some witching power, that holds a spell over the minds of the good people, causing them to walk in a continual reverie. They are given to all kinds of marvellous beliefs, are subject to trances and visions, and frequently see strange sights, and hear music and voices in the air.
~ Washington Irving

The Legend of Sleepy Hollow culminates in the telling of Ichabod Crane’s harrowing ride home on his old horse, Gunpowder, as he is pursued and hunted by the Headless Horseman along the banks of the Pocantico River, which winds its way toward the Hudson. No one really knows what happened to Ichabod Crane that chilly autumn night… but he was never seen or heard from again.

In the dark shadow of the grove, on the margin of the brook, he beheld something huge, misshapen, black, and towering. It stirred not, but seemed gathered up in the gloom, like some gigantic monster ready to spring upon the traveller.
~ Washington Irving

On cold, quiet, moonlit October nights, some say that if you listen closely, you can still hear hoofbeats echoing in the distance through the woods along the Pocantico River.

If you would like to read a more in-depth post about The Legend of Sleepy Hollow and Washington Irving, visit my original post, October – A Time for Ghost Stories.

You can also visit my Stories pages for other posts and photos.