Twin Lights' Lovers
In Highlands, New Jersey, there is a place called Twin Lights Lighthouse. This turn-of-the-century lighthouse houses dual lighthouse towers. This beautiful lighthouse sits above the town and shine brightly to bring sailors and boaters home safely. As a child, I used to love to visit this lighthouse and learn about not only the history of the lighthouse but also the town around us. This lighthouse was a fond memory of mine when I was a little girl and visited the lighthouse with the Girl Scouts. I always looked forward to coming to the lighthouse and hearing all the stories of the tower and the town around us. During certain times of the year, the guides and historians would also tell ghost stories related to the tower and town. This story is just one of those many stories of our town that had everything in it, from ghosts to lost love and betrayal. Although this is another story about the lighthouse, to me, this is a story of true love.
*******************************************************************************
As the story goes, a pair of young lovers had their fate tied to this lighthouse. The eldest daughter of the lighthouse keeper fell in love with a fisherman who lived in the town that sat below the tower. After a time of courting, the fisherman asked for her hand in marriage, and the Father would not allow the union. The Father thought the young man was beneath his daughter's social standing and sent her fisherman away. The daughter had tried to escape with her love, and her Father found her and brought her home. After she returned home, he locked her in her room at the base of the second tower. The daughter lived in her prison with the hope her Father would relent and let her have her love come back into her life. However, she did not know that her Father had arranged for her fisherman to work at sea aboard a fishing ship along the Atlantic coast.
Unaware that her lost love had been sent to sea, the daughter patiently awaited his return. After a few months, the daughter received a post from the ship's Captain. In his letter, he explained her beloved had moved up the ranks and had wanted to come home to try to speak with her Father one last time as his standing had greatly improved. However, one night during a bad storm, her love was swept overboard and was presumed deceased. The daughter took the news and grieved the loss of her love, and she blamed her Father for the loss of his life and no longer spoke to him. For a long time, the daughter had hoped the news was wrong, and she would climb to the top of the second tower and keep watch in the hope her love would return to her.
Weeks turned into months, and months turned into a year. Soon the daughter fell ill, and her parents called for the local doctor fearing it was pneumonia. The doctor came and examined the daughter and stated it was not pneumonia. He was perplexed as she was very ill, and after conferring with other doctors, they came to believe she was dying of a broken heart. A week later, after taking to her bed, unable to do anything, the daughter passed away at the base of Tower 2 from what many believe was a broken heart.
The mother was distraught over losing her daughter and blamed the lighthouse keeper. The Father also blamed himself and swore he would never interfere with any of his children's lives again. The Father spent many hours in her room and one day opened her desk and found the letter from the ship's Captain that her beloved had been on. The Captain had told her of many talks with her fisherman and still held out hope for a reunion and his love for her. He had written that at the last port, her beloved had purchased her a ring that he had hoped to use as a wedding ring for her upon his return. The Father reached into the envelope, and it held an engraved wedding band.
On cold and stormy nights, if you're lucky enough to live near the towers, you might see the silhouette of a woman in the windows of the lighthouse tower two, keeping watch for her love to come home. When you visit and sit where her old bedroom sat, you may hear the daughter crying for her fisherman. I hope the two young lovers found each other in the afterlife.
** I searched and could not find a family that could have been from the history of the Twin Light Towers. So is this just a ghost story, or did it happen? Before I moved away from Highlands, I thought as a child that I did see the silhouette of a woman in the tower.**
Comments
Post a Comment