Ghosts, who are spirits, not confined to the material world and to haunting just the creepy house next door; also roam the sea and wander restlessly on islands and waterfronts. Mystery Café and Boston Harbor Cruises offers a summer Ghost Cruise every Saturday night beginning June 27 through September 12, from 10/10:30 P.M. to midnight.
The cruise leaves from Long Wharf, one block from Faneuil Hall in Boston. If you use the train, take the MBTA Blue Line to Aquarium Station. Tickets are $28 each in advance, which you may order online. The July 11 cruise, currently listed as sold out, “may open,” according to the website. This cruise is not designated a family activity. Additional information is available by calling 1.800.697.2583 or visiting the website at
www.bostonghostcruise.com.
Sailing Boston Harbor in the still of the night, you will hear the long-lived tales of pirates and plunder, shipwrecks, executions and ethereal encounters from those of another time and world and those who occupied the once-bustling Massachusetts Boston Harbor.
A “professional troupe of ghouls,” made up of 18th Century sailors, fishwives and privateers (to name a few) will walk you from end to end through the legends and lore of “bloody betrayals,” Redcoats and Patriots and startling meet ups with spirits stuck in a time warp.
Mystery Café and Boston Harbor Cruises also spin Boston’s famous female ghost, The Lady in Black (a/k/a The Black Widow). Wandering George’s Island, which sits at the entrance to Boston Harbor, a specter in black robes roams aimlessly there. She is supposed to be Mrs. Andrew Lanier, who was the wife of a Confederate soldier. Her husband, imprisoned on George’s Island at Fort Warren in 1861, was accidently shot by his wife while she aided him in an attempted escape.
Mrs. Lanier was condemned to death by hanging for her dastardly deed and the death of her husband. Because she was wearing men’s clothing when she foiled the prison escape, she requested that it be acceptable to die in female attire. Someone located a black robe for Mrs. Lanier and soldiers hung her while she wore this piece of clothing. The soldiers, instructed to bury her on George’s Island in Boston Harbor, did so, but apparently, Mrs. Lanier has never been at rest. You may get a glimpse of The Lady in Black while you are on the Boston Ghost Cruise this summer.