The truth will come out one way or another. No matter how hard we try, it will always reveal itself. It may take time— sometimes centuries. But in the long run, one can never hide from the truth. In the case of the Greenbrier Ghost, the world saw evidence of this. The paranormal facilitated this coming out of the fact, and it was the ghost herself who convicted her murderer.

In 1873, Elva Zona Heaster was born in Greenbrier County, West Virginia. Her early life and childhood years remain a mystery with little documented information. But we know she was pregnant in her teens and was a mother out of wedlock at age twenty-two. The fate of the child remains unknown. In 1895, Elva and her family met with the man who would eventually become her husband, Edward Stribbling Trout Shue.

Edward was a blacksmith who recently moved to Greenbrier County in search of a better life. Elva, also known as ‘Zona’, was raised in Richlands, a town in Tazewell County, Virginia. Edward was a breath of fresh air she never encountered before. He attracted her attention almost immediately. After their initial meeting, Zona frequently returned to the blacksmith shop to see him, and eventually confessed her feelings for him. Their romance was like a Harlequin whirlwind affair.

Their union, however, did not please Zona’s family. Her mother, Mary Jane Heaster, was against it. She instantly disliked Edward and said there was something strange about him. But there was little she could do, and eventually, the couple married, becoming Elva Zona Easter Shue. They began their life together in their log house. After that, things quickly fell apart.

Three months later, on January 23 1897, Edward went to the market. He sent his neighbor’s young boy, Andy Jones, to check in on his wife and see if she needed anything. Andy did as he was told and entered the Shue household. However, as Andy walked through the front door, he faced a scene that no little boy should have to.

As Andy passed through the front door, he stumbled upon the dead body of Mrs. Heaster. She was lying at the foot of the stairs, lifeless. Her body was positioned unnaturally, lying with straight legs pushed together, one arm resting across her chest, and the other positioned to her side. Her head was tilted to the side. Her eyes were open, staring up at Andy. The boy crept towards her lifeless body and whispered her name. When his quiet “Mrs. Shue?” received no response, he realized something was seriously wrong. He panicked and ran home to tell his mother. Fearing the worst, the woman called for the local doctor and coroner, Dr. George W. Knapp. It took Knapp almost an hour to get to the Shue house after receiving the call. Strangely, by the time he arrived at the house, Zona’s body was missing.

Minutes before Dr. Knapp arrived, Edward had returned home. He carried his wife’s body up the staircase to their bedroom, dressed her, and laid her body out. This was odd because, in those days, it was the lady’s job to wash and prepare a body for internment. However, Edward demanded he wanted to prepare his wife for her burial. So he dressed her in a high-necked dress with a stiff collar, placing a veil over her face.

Dr. Knapp then examined Zona’s body. He noticed slight bruising around her neck. As he went in for a closer look, Edward burst into a fit of tears, reacting almost violently, crying as he held Zona close to him, making it difficult for Dr. Knapp to perform a thorough examination. Edward then yelled at the doctor, becoming extremely agitated.

Dr. Knapp did not want to aggravate him any further. Based on Edward’s visible grief and lacking signs of foul play, Knapp concluded the cause of death to be an ‘everlasting faint’. Later, he changed the official determination to ‘childbirth’. Before her death, Zona was under treatment for ‘female trouble’, which was strange because no one knew whether she was pregnant. For whatever reason, Dr. Knapp went with childbirth, closing the case. It is possible she was trying to get pregnant and consulted with him for advice.

Dr. Knapp needed to inform Zona’s parents of her passing and arrange for her burial. Two men who were friends of Zona volunteered to go out to Meadow Fluff and inform the family. It took a while, since they lived about fifteen miles away. When they finally got to Mrs. Heaster, she seemed more angry than sad, almost expecting this news. Finally, she spoke out, saying, “The devil has killed her.”

The funeral was set the next day, on January 24 1897. Hanley Undertaking placed Elva Zona Shue in an unfinished coffin and drove her by carriage to her home. There, she laid in wake through Sunday and into the next morning as friends and family showed their respects.

’’’’ Interestingly, Zona’s husband acted oddly during the wake. He showed utter devotion to his wife and was extremely protective of her body, in a manner that came across as almost psychotic. He kept close watch over her, always hovering by the open casket, not allowing anyone else to come close, not even her parents. He would let no one touch her, especially when he put a pillow on the side of her head. His behavior was notably erratic. His demeanor alternated between grieving loudly and painfully for his wife and suddenly becoming extremely energetic and delighted.

Apart from the pillow, he placed a rolled-up sheet on the other side of her head and tied a long scarf around her neck. The pillow and the sheet, he claimed tearfully, would aid his wife in her final rest and make her more comfortable. The scarf was her favorite item of clothing, and it was his farewell to her, even if it did not match the burial dress she was wearing.

That Monday, Zona’s body was taken to the local cemetery, the Soule Chapel Methodist Cemetery.  As she was moved, people noticed a strange looseness of her neck. People gossiped about theories, but there was nothing they could do because Knapp had ruled her death to be natural.

Additionally, Edward was generally well-liked and respected by the community. No one openly questioned his strange behavior. Most saw little beyond a grieving husband.

But from Zona’s mother, Mary Jane Heaster, refused to believe he wasn’t to blame. She was convinced he had something to do with her daughters’ death, though she had no proof. Before the burial, she took the sheet from her daughter’s body and handed it to her son-in-law, who refused to take it back. Confused, she took it home with her, where she noticed a strange smell on it.

Assuming that it was merely dirty or unclean, Mrs. Heaster washed it. When she dropped the sheet into the basin, the water turned red. She noticed the sheet soaked up the color like a sponge. Thus, the sheet turned red while the water became clear. No matter how hard Mrs. Heaster tried, she could not wash the red stain off the sheet. She was sure this was a clear indication that something was wrong, and that Zona’s spirit was communicating with her in a plea for help.

Mrs. Heaster began praying every night in hopes her daughter would come to her and give her a clue to prove her death was a murder. She prayed every night, and finally after four weeks, her wish was granted. It started as a bright light at first, then turned into an apparition. The room chilled and right in front of Mrs. Heaster, Zona’s ghost appeared. Finally, Zona revealed the truth.

Edward was a man possessed of a cruel nature. He was prone to abusing the people closest to him and regularly beat Zona. He often had violent fits, and on the day of her death, he flew into a rage when he thought she didn’t make any meat for dinner. In his anger, he snapped her neck. Then Zona’s ghost spun her head all the way around to demonstrate. Mrs. Heaster was frightened beyond her wits and sat on her bed screaming. She was ready to dismiss what she saw as a figment of the post-traumatic stress she’d experienced. However, for the next four days, Zona’s ghost would come back.

The subsequent visits would be different. There would be a bright light that would shine behind her eyelids, and then slowly, a mist would solidify into her dead daughter’s sunken corpse while the room became utterly cold. These appearances continued until Mrs. Heaster finally realized this was the proof she was waiting for. Now the challenge was finding someone who would believe her.

Mrs. Heaster went to the local prosecutor, John Alfred Preston, and asked him to reopen the case. Reportedly, she spent several hours with him in his study, arguing to convince him. Preston sat politely, listening to her story. Understandably, with a ghost story as her only proof, he was hesitant to reopen the case. He was sympathetic to her plight, though it seemed he might send her away. However, after contemplating the case and Mrs. Heaster’s ghost story, Preston knew there was something suspicious about Zona’s death.

He sent deputies to Dr. Knapp’s house to question him more about what he found when he examined Zona’s body. Dr. Knapp told the deputies that the examination was never complete. Edward’s “grief” interfered with the examination. Preston and the Doctor both decided a new autopsy needed to be done right away. The local newspapers picked up on the story and reported that Mary Jane Heaster wasn’t the only one that suspected murder. A few of the other locals stated that Edward was acting strange.

On February 22 1897, in Nicholas schoolhouse, the autopsy proceeded next to Zona’s cemetery. School was called off for the children that say, and Zona’s body was exhumed. Finally, everyone would discover what exactly happened her. Edward complained about attending the exhumation, but deputies demanded he be present. After telling him that, Edward arbitrarily said, “I know I’ll be arrested, but they won’t be able to prove anything.”

The whole autopsy took three hours by the light of kerosene lamps. The cold weather had perfectly preserved the body, which made the examination easier for Dr. Knapp. He removed the vital organs first, then made an incision in the back of her neck to remove her brain. Upon going to the neck, they did not need to go any further.

Dr. Knapp turned to Edward and said, “We have found your wife’s neck to be broken.”

Edward dropped his head and said, “They cannot prove I did it.”

The autopsy also revealed Zona’s windpipe was smashed and her spine dislocated between the first two vertebrae. Finger marks around her neck indicated she was choked to death. This evidence confirmed what Mrs. Heaster already knew: Zona was murdered.

Until then, her encounter with Zona’s ghost was easily dismissible as something triggered by loss. However, medical evidence proved her suspicions to be correct. Mrs. Heaster could have dreamed it all up, but dreaming the details of how her daughter died was highly unlikely. In a way, Zona called to her mother to receive the justice she deserved and her mother delivered. Police arrested Edward once the autopsy was complete and sent him to the jail in Lewisburg to await trial.

Because the evidence against Edward was not even circumstantial because it was from a ghost, he pleaded not guilty. However, more details about Edward revealed interesting details from his past. His name was not Edward, but Erasmus. He was from Augusta County and married two times before Zona. The first time to Allie Estaline Cutlip, with whom he had a daughter named Gerda. She left him with their daughter after he went to jail for stealing horses. Four years later, they divorced. In their divorce papers, Alan stated that Edward beat her multiple times. Allie’s parents took in their daughter for unknown reasons.

Five years later, Edward married a woman named Lucy Tritt. After less than a year, Lucy was dead. Strangely enough, there’s no record of how she died. According to Edward, she fell and hit her head on a rock. After that, he fled town. Two years later, he met Zona.

The trial began on June 22 1897. Many people came forward to testify. Mrs. Heaster was Preston’s star witness. As an experienced attorney, Preston knew the idea of her daughter’s ghost would not give her credibility. Therefore, he limited his questions to the known facts, expertly avoiding the ghost sightings and focusing on the truth.

But Zona’s appearance to her mother instigated the entire trial. So, Shue’s lawyer attempted to discredit her during his cross-examination. He tried to prove she was a liar and a cheat. Mrs. Heaster, however, knew what she saw. She staunchly defended her belief, and despite clear badgering, she would not retract what she said. It was the defense that took up the issue of the ghost, meaning the judge could not instruct the jury to disregard the testimony. The jury had to either believe or disbelieve what was said based on their impressions.

Based on all the evidence and story of Zona’s spirit, the jury of twelve found Edward Stribbling Trout Shue guilty of Elva Zona Heaster’s murder and sentenced him to life in prison.

On July 11, a mob of fifteen to thirty men got weapons and rope and headed toward the jail to hang Edward for his crime. Sheriffs were notified about the lynch mob and took Edward to a location about a mile outside of town. The organizers of the mob were eventually charged.

Edward had to be moved to the West Virginia State Penitentiary. He stayed there for three years until an epidemic of measles, mumps, and pneumonia went through the prison. Edward got sick and died on March 13 of 1900. There is no record of where he was buried.

For the rest of her life, Mrs. Heaster never recanted the story of her daughter’s ghost. She received her justice. Mrs. Heaster never claimed to see Zona’s ghost again. Whether or not the ghost appeared to her, it seems something extraordinary happened.

The State could not dismiss this. So a historical marker made of stone was erected near the cemetery where Zona is buried.

It reads:

Interred in the nearby cemetery is Zona Heaster Shue. Her death in 1897 was presumed natural until her spirit appeared to her mother to describe how her husband Edward killed her. An autopsy on the exhumed body verified the apparition’s account. Edward, found guilty of murder, was sentenced to state prison. Only known case in which testimony from a ghost helped convict a murderer.