The Hauntings of Red Ash

The Legend of The Goat Man

   The legend of the goat man has been around longer than my years on earth, in folklore, the goat man is described as an eight-foot-tall creature, half-goat half-man with glowing red eyes, cloven hooves, and horns, that roams the woodsy area. There have been reports of strange howls and shadowy figures seen on the edges of the woods, along with cars mysteriously breaking down. Legend has it that the demonic entity is the ghost of a miner that roams the land protecting it and punishes trespassers, people have experienced the entity around the cemetery or the old rail tunnels but beware the goat man only comes out on February 29, every four years. The last time it was out was in 2024, so maybe wait a few years and you might see him.

  Me, Hayden, and Athena decided it was time for us to go out to Red Ash on the one and only day the goat man appears. It was a stupid idea for the three of us, I did not know what came over us. We parked near the cemetery around three in the afternoon, not knowing the consequences, we walked up the road leading to the cemetery.

  Hayden stopped and Athena bumped into me, he looked like he had seen a ghost, we passed Red Ash Cemetery and entered Turley Cemetery. It was closed to the public, but that did not stop us from entering, we threw our bags down and set up our tents. I wanted to turn around and leave but we were already set up and ready to explore, Hayden grabbed his stuff out of our tent since he forgot his own tent.

  We played around in the cemetery for a bit before going to the creek to roam around, I almost slipped walking into the creek, but Hayden caught me, Athena, one of our other friends, grabbed onto me as we crossed the creek. Hayden crossed before me and Athena could, he ran into the woods, I tried following him, but I slipped on a branch and hit my head, I blacked out for a bit. Three hours passed, and I woke up with a bump on my head, Hayden and Athena stood outside of the tent as I lay there almost strangling myself with my own blanket, trying to get up I see a faint shadow move behind the tent. It looked like it was about five-feet-tall with the lower body of a goat and upper body of a man, I was shaken, Hayden nor Athena had a clue of what was going.

  I jumped up and collected my things and Hayden's as I saw the creature running around the cemetery, Athena grabbed her things too, we huddled together right at the entrance of the cemetery. We stepped back as we saw the eyes of the mutated creature, the more we backed out it erected from an average five-foot human being to an eight-foot mutated creature. We exited the cemetery, entering Red Ash cemetery. Hayden looked back and the Goat Man was sprinting after us, we got into the car and drove off.

  The mutation moved at the pace we were moving, so Athena hung her head out the window and watched it run after us, it caught up with us and grabbed Athena out the window, we were close to the Shoney's that cut off as you go into Red Ash, I saw Athena beating at the creature trying to pry it off, but its grip grew tighter. Athena's eyes were bulging out of her head she was still trying to hold on but she could not, before I knew it, I saw the creature crush her with all its might, her blood dripped from its grimy hands as it made a mockery of her screaming. I sobbed the entire drive back home, she was the only friend that I could trust, other than Hayden and now she is gone, like she vanished off the face of the earth.