An Absent Love, An Angry Spouse, And A Murder

Just eight miles north of Decatur, Nebraska, lays a hill overlooking the Missouri River (located on an Omaha Indian Reservation). There lays a pile of dirt approximately 45 feet high which marks the burial site of several Omaha Chiefs, including Chief Blackbird. The Chief was buried in the year 1800 and in a way of sitting upright on his horse. The hill itself is said to be haunted but not by Chief Blackbird himself, but a young lady who was murdered.

The legend has it that in the 19th century a young couple had fallen in love back east in the 1840's and planned to get married after the young man returned from his studies aboard. But he did not return as planned. The young lady waited for his return for 5 years but assumed he had passed on. She met and married another man and moved west with him to live on blackbird hill.

The poor young man was headed back to his fiancee, when his ship wrecked and he was stranded. It took the determined young man 5 years to get back to the US. When he returned he learned she had thought he had passed and that she had married another man and moved west. His love for her was so strong that he set out to find her and attempt to convince her new husband to withdraw the marriage so he could be with her.

He headed out to California with a wagon train, but was not able to find her, so he decided to head back to his family back east. His travels lead him down the Missouri River which would lead him to the bottom of Blackbird Hill. He seen and followed a small path up the hill to the top where a small cottage house sat, and inside was the young woman he had been searching for. The two were reunited, and she confessed the love she still had for him and that her marriage was based on security, not love. He explained what had happened on the ship he was aboard, and how he came home to find her married to another man, and of his travels to find her. She promised the young man that she would leave her husband. Fate had brought them back together again.

They said temporary goodbyes, and the young man went and hid in the bushes until the husband returned home later in the day. When the husband returned, she explained her absent love and how fate had brought them back together and asked to be relieved of the marriage. The Husband did not want her to leave him and begged her to stay, when she refused he got angry and attacked her with a hunting knife, screaming in pain she fell to the ground. He dropped the knife and picked her bleeding body up. He ran to the cliffs edge with his still-living wife in his arms and jumped down into the river where both of them drowned. The fiance ran, and made it to the cliff in time to see the husband jump to the river with her in his arms, and to hear her last scream. Her scream was left heavily in the air. (Back in those days the river's course ran further west than it does now, The hill stuck out over the river.) He was devastated that he just watched his fiance be murdered.

Having nothing to live for anymore, the young man began to wander the hill, After some undetermined time a group of hunting Omaha Indians came across the young man unable to speak, starving and barely clothed, while his feet were bare and bleeding. The Indians took pity on him, and carried him back to their village and cared for him physically until he was healthy enough to travel, as his broken heart would never heal.

The hill appears to have never healed from the horror that had taken place their. The Blackbird Hill Legend says the path from the cabin to the hill where the murder/suicide took place is still bare today. It is said on October 17th of every year the woman's screams can be heard on top of the hill. Dozens of people have claimed to of heard the woman's last screams. Groups of people have gathered together on top the hill to hear her screams.

The passed years have changed the geography of the land, the river no longer reaches the base of the hill, and the hilltop is not as high. Blackbird hill is now on private property,(Omaha Indian Reservation) which means visitors can no longer visit the burial sites, or the hill unless you are granted permission. There is a nearby scenic overlook by the river you can visit. If you do visit the nearby scenic overlook at the right time on October 17th, you may be able to hear her screams for yourself. Her soul is clearly not able to rest at peace.

Thank you for reading! I will be posting more stories similar to this one, they will be the stories behind legends, and haunted places. Please share these with your friends and families who love to read about haunted places, and/or stories behind them.