Episode 571: Lost Children of the Alleghenies

I'm Dan Taberski. In 2011, something strange began to happen at a high school in upstate New York. A mystery illness, bizarre symptoms and spreading fast. What's the answer, and what do you do if they tell you it's all in your head?

Hysterical, a new podcast from Wondery and Pineapple Street Studios, binge all episodes of Hysterical early and ad-free on Wondery. Plus. Hey Weirdos, I'm Ash and I'm Alina.

And this is morbid.

This is morbid, and today it's going to be like a strange story. oh, like a more strange than anything. Tragic but strange. I'm down for strange. I'm not super excited for tragic, but here we are on morbid.

Yeah, you know, I mean, after Fred and Rose West, I need you need a beat. We had listener tales, we had my case, which was pretty rough.

Also pretty rough. So now now strange, I'll take strange. this one's strange. There's definitely tragedy in this one.

Yeah, I mean, again, it's morbid, more it's. It's a fascinating case, for sure, and it's not. You know, this isn't going to be a super long one, but it's got a. It's got some stuff. I love that.

Do you have anything else that we should chat about before we get into it? Yeah, why don't let's chat for a second? Everybody? I love when we have like, a little down low with you guys, yeah.

It just feels wrong sometimes to go right into the case. Like, I love to just. I know it's. It's not for everybody, but it's for me, it's for me, it's for me, and I like it.

And what did Trixie and Katya say?

We're really going for it, they say, cause it's our show and not yours.

I just think it's funny that Trixie and Katya say that it is funny. I like when they say, and pose and pose, and pose and pose, I like that.

But yeah, I think we can just kind of chat for a second, don't worry, we'll get into it. Um, Katya just went back, she like, just came back on the show with Trixie, and she was like, I, um, like, discovered again how good I am at singing.

And she wrote, Like this screamo song about diarrhea running down your leg, and it's hilarious. And Trixie's face throughout the whole thing is literally just like, what, like, what? I love them so much.

I love them a lot, I love them a lot with most of my heart. Oh, that's amazing, yeah.

Love that? No, I just hear that echoing in my head. Um, yeah, we, we got to go on another ghost hunt, yeah, recently.

With our besties, our UM Ghost girls brothers Colton Coven. Thank you our ghost girls brothers Colton Coven, besties Corinne and Sabrina from two girls, one ghost. Yep.

It was so fun. You got to go listen to them. If you're not already like, what's going on? Um, but yeah, it was a blast. I love, I love investigating Haunted shit with Corinne and Sabrina, I love it so fucking much.

And Sabrina brought Payne Lindsey, who is a sweetheart, as well. And it was so fun to finally meet him in person. Because I feel like he's been like, part of our morbid journey. Like he's always been supporting in the In the Bleachers, Yeah, he's always been supportive. He's like, Yeah.

And so, and Mikey got to come, and Mikey was there. It was a whole, it was a whole gaggle of of ghoulies there, yeah.

We can't say exactly where we went, cause I think we're going to like, do something, cause we'll, don't worry, you'll find out.

Like, there's more coming, but we got to do a lot of cool shit. I did the ESTeS method and that was one of the scariest things I've ever done in my life. Ash is really good at it, cause she hears things that none of us hear, and also doesn't get as overstimulated by noise, apparently, as I do.

It got overstimulating at the end and then also in one session, cause I did it twice. And I, like, almost gave up. Because I kept feeling like I was hearing somebody say my name and I like, really panicked, going off the deep end at that point, yeah, but oh, and if you don't know what the ESTES method is?

If you're not in the know, if you're not. We didn't know what it was either until Sabrina and Corinne showed us. But you wear like noise canceling headphones, you get blindfolded, and they connect the headphones to a spirit box, which scans through like radio stations. And you say out loud what you hear. And so, like the people around, you can ask questions of the spirits in the room, and then some, and a lot of times, the things that are said answer your questions.

And it's very spooky, yeah, very scary, but it was a lot of fun. It was so much fun.

I'm telling you, if you guys can go to a haunted location and hunt some ghosties, yeah, do it, do it, man, go for it.

We're already trying to figure out where we're going to go next. Yeah, it's a lot of fun and it gets you ready, like Spooky Season is so close.

I know, and I know it's not so close, but it's so close. No, it is in my heart. it's close. I can't wait.

And it just makes me feel that way, like when I do something like that, I'm like, Oh, it's, it's a bop. I know. I feel like, don't you feel like my socks are kind of Halloween-y? Today? They are a little bit.

Or tie-dye Halloween-y, cause they're like, tie-dye orange and block orange and block orange and block um. But yeah, so that was fun. And, you know, pre-order the butcher game.

Obviously coming out September 17th, there's no tiny URL, so I can't say it there isn't. You can go to thebutchergame.com though, and it's all there.

It is that's exciting and that would be really sick of you to do. And many of you have done it. And I appreciate every single one of you. You make me smile.

And if you haven't, I'll appreciate you when you do, and you know what, I still appreciate you, but I will appreciate you even more. Buy it, it's really good.

I liked it, I mean, I'm like, totally biased, but like, I really liked it, like, genuinely loved it even.

So go do that. And a lot of you have been buying The Butcher Game for the first time and reading it, which has been really fun to see. Archie's read The Butcher and the Wren look at you getting your novels confused. You were like, No, no.

The other novel you read a lot of? You have been buying The Butcher and the Wren first, and you're buying it now. And seeing it now and reading it now and telling me about it. And it's been a lot of fun to see, a lot of fun, so thank you for doing that.

And thanks for the support, I appreciate you. You fucking rock, oh my God, don't ever change.

The appreciation in this room, you know, it's, it's everywhere. I'm adjusting my mic, so sorry if you hear like thumping noises, it is what it is.

Thumping and thumping. The sun is in my hello, the sun is in my fucking eyeballs. you always end up in the sun in this room.

No matter where we put your ass, you just end up in a ray of sunshine. Because I'm just so lively and colorful. I am never in the sun and I love it, I know. But why don't we get to the get to the nitty gritty?

So today we're going to be covering the story of the lost children of the Alleghenies. I don't know this, I've heard a lot of, I've heard, like, bits and pieces of this, so much, really.

And finally, I was like, this isn't a long tale, yeah, and like, you know, like we, we have as many details as we have, cause it's from 1856, but.

Oh shit. It's a fascinating and really sad, tragic tale, okay? which has, like, somewhat of a of a no. It really doesn't have a good ending, but there's there's some good along the way, okay?

So, like I said, it's weird, it's tragic, and it's it's definitely solved, like it's not tech. This is like, not technically a crime, but it has like a very strange element to it where people thought a crime was had occurred at one point. Oh, okay.

Now it takes us way back to April 24th, 1856, which, you know, is my favorite times. I know it's so funny, cause you were telling me just that that you were doing this. And like, a couple of key details. And I. For some reason, it didn't hit me until now that it was the 1800s.

Yeah, and I should have known, because I do know you. Yeah, it's my favorite of times, and it's not my favorite of times. Because it was like, great back then, but because it wasn't great back then.

And it's really fascinating to see how everyone existed in old timey times. It's even fascinating to see how they were able to solve crimes with little to no knowledge of forensics or or science as a whole. But then they were working with nothing, just good old detective work. Now today is not one of those times where we're going to solve something with some like fancy forensic thing or anything like that.

Darn, but you'll see why. So, back in April 1856 in Spruce Hollow in the Allegheny Mountains in Pennsylvania, I want to go to there. It's made, it reminds me of Stars Hollow.

Agreed, and I really, my favorite. A quick little side track. Sorry, Oh, always. It might be one of those episodes, it's one of those days.

Speaking of Stars Hollow, it kind of made me think of, like, when they they have an episode about, like, the founding of Stars Hollow and why it was named Stars Hollow. Yeah, and it's like these two lovers, like, end up like taking shelter in a hollow. And they looked up and saw all the stars, and they were like, Stars Hollow. And it's just the cutest little thing that's gorgeous.

And I whenever I see a hollow, I always think, like, you know, spruce hollow, it's cute, but it's in the Allegheny mountains in Pennsylvania. Um, and shit was wild back then, Can I say something wild?

Sure, I feel like I didn't realize that Pennsylvania had mountains, I mean, where is Pennsylvania? It's like, Yeah, I guess that makes sense.

I was just, I was like, Can I point to it? Yeah, yeah, I don't know, I don't know why I thought that.

Yeah, it's pretty close. Yeah, it's not far at all, I don't know why.

In my head, I was like, Mountains, mountains. you're like, you're a liar. It's like, crazy, I thought, mountains.

I love that, yeah, that is pretty wild, but I love, I love you for it. Thank you, um, but honestly, shit was wild back then.

Like, literally wild, uh. The alleghenies were really dangerous to pass through and were considered the most treacherous in all of Pennsylvania. Damn. There was a lot of places in the forest where rocks changed and had formed into really large and, like, really steep gorges and ravines and inclines. Oh, that's freaky.

And due to, and there was a lot of erosion from running water, so like these things would take like sharp dips and stuff like. It was just naturally forming that way. So traversing this place was no easy task for even the most.

Skilled, skilled and equipped of people. Yeah, and in fact, a little sidetrack here, according to Explorepahistory.com. Yeah.

Charles Dickens came on through in the early 1840s, shut up a decade and a half before this happened. Yeah, and he was, uh, really unimpressed by the whole thing.

He didn't think it was that cray-cray, real unimpressed. Well, I mean, I guess a decade before it, it got worse as it went well. He, it wasn't that he thought, it wasn't like crazy, he was just like he didn't like it.

Oh, he said, he was like, I don't really like it. Um, he traveled on the Portage Railroad, which was used to traverse through these steep inclines and all that stuff to get to the other side of the mountain. Yeah, and this is what he wrote about, Oh God.

He said Occasionally, the rails are laid upon the extreme verge of the giddy precipice. He's a writer, yeah, of course. And looking down from the carriage window, the traveler gazes sheer down, without a stone or scrap of fence, between, into the mountain depths below. And then he called it all sufficiently disconcerting.

Sufficiently disconcerting is a new insult of mine. Thank you Charles Dickens. you are sufficiently disconcerting. I love that. So he was not, he wasn't into it.

He was like, Well, scary for me, not into it, don't want to do this again. I love that, I also like that. You called it a side trek.

Yeah, while everybody's trekking through, that wasn't lost on me, I love that that wasn't lost on you.

I knew you would pick that up, I got you.

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But in 1856, in these very mountains, there lived a family, a family, a small family. They inhabited a small cabin surrounded by forest, and their names were Susanna and Samuel Cox. They had, from what I could gather, three children, um, but we only hear about the two sons that went missing. Oh, no.

They had two sons and one named George, who was seven years old, seven, yeah, and Joseph, who was five years, five.

Yeah, I told you it's going to be tragic. Um, so they, you know, cute little family living in this little like, surrounded by mountains and forest, and living that kind of life together. Dad was out there hunting dinner, mom was in there cooking dinner.

It was one of those situations right now, one day in April, Samuel, Joseph and George, so the father and the two sons were all eating together. From what I gathered, I couldn't determine whether they were eating outside or they were eating inside, but it feels like they were eating a meal outside together. Because context, clues. And also it was the 1800s.

And I feel like eating outside was probably better because fresh air, less pollution was probably preferable back then. Picnic vibes, yeah.

There was no air wick plugins to cleanse rooms back then, so I'm sure it was like, let's just eat out there. Yeah, and it's mountain air, it's probably scenic as fuck.

Yeah, like, that's where you want to sit and eat now. During their meal. At some point, their dog, um, started getting riled up like something was in the woods, started barking and snarling and ran into the woods. That's scary.

And you could still hear the dog snarling, barking as he ran. So Samuel was like, Well, shit, there must be something good out there, yeah. And he was like, I should follow, like, maybe I can get fucking dinner for the rest of the week for us.

Let's go, yeah. So he grabbed his rifle and he said, Kids, I'm running into the woods after the pup and he's ran into the woods. Hopefully I come back with dinner and Mom is in the house.

So he was like, I'll be right back. I don't know what he found when he found the dog, but after he found whatever was there, like whatever the dog had gone. After he came back home and when he came back home, George and Joseph were not out there, oh, not where he had left them.

Okay, so. Sources say he was gone for less than two hours. That's still a long time. Yeah, it definitely is, but Mom was inside.

Mom was inside, so Susanna came outside and Samuel asked where the boys are, Where's George and Joseph? And Susanna immediately said I didn't see them leave. And then she was like, Wait, I thought that I thought they went with you.

Like, what do you mean? She was like, I looked out and saw none of you. I thought they you all went together. So they must've followed him, like, pretty soon after he left, so that's the thing.

It's like, so one, each parent thought they were with the other parent. This wasn't even like. This wasn't like neglect, like 1800s neglect, it was like. One of them thought, like, was just like, Oh, they're with their dad, and then the dad was like, Oh, they're with the mom. And he went inside and said, like, I'm going too.

So it's like, she, it sounds like she went right out there and then was like, Oh, like, they must've gone with their dad. I'll just finish what I'm doing in here. And she said, She when she realized they weren't out there. When she had looked out, she was like, Oh, they followed their dad. Samuel said, No, they absolutely did not follow me, and then they both started panicking.

Oh, no, now. They went searching themselves immediately. They were screaming for George and Joseph, hoping they would hear them and come running, but nothing. They saw no sign of them, they didn't even see footprints from them.

They could not figure out where they had gone, no sign the boys were anywhere. So they ran around for a long time together, searching thoroughly. And finally, Samuel was like, we got to go to the neighbors.

We got to get more people. So they went to the neighbors, told them what happened, The neighbors were fucking amazing, they all banded together.

When I was reading about this, it said, like laborers left their their work to come help, like everyone banded together. And within a day, there were more than. There were more than 200 neighbors searching like the surround, all from the surrounding community, and all the neighbors searching to help. That's on community. And I mean, like the forest was full of people just spending hours and hours searching for these boys, screaming their name, going in all different directions.

They went all through the night, searching with torches. They lit fires hoping that the boys would come towards the fires and they would light them on. Like peaks, like higher points, so that the boys would hopefully see them and come towards it. And it was like these are like experienced hunters, experienced gatherers. Like they're people who live and have grown up in these parts, so they're going for it. It's not like they're just people like like Eee trekking through the woods.

It's like, these are people that will go in the woods and they know what to do. Yeah, they were never giving up on these boys, they just kept going.

It was a such a community effort, and it snowed during all of this too. Oh God, it was really cold at night. Which did not help the search, and it also didn't help the chances of finding them alive.

No, now. This search went for days and days, evenings, back to back, and people didn't stop and they didn't give up. And there seemed to be a perimeter that they could follow near Samuel and Susanna's home. Because there was a stream that was flooded like, way over flooded, I think for most of the snow melting and stuff, and it made it very treacherous, this stream. And they, they all decided there was no way the boys could have been able to cross this river, and their family was like they wouldn't have tried to cross it.

Like, they know that that's dangerous, and they were like, if they had, they would have drowned. So then they all started looking in the stream, hoping not to find them in the stream, and they searched every bit that they could have that stream. They couldn't find them anywhere, they weren't in there.

So no one wanted to believe that that would have been the outcome here, so they used it. They ended up using this stream as kind of like a natural boundary line with where they would search within. Because they were like, they didn't go over this. Yeah, now, after a few days, it was starting to dawn on everyone that these boys were not likely to be found alive. Because nights were getting freezing, right, it snowed.

Despite the great efforts, and despite the fact that they believed they couldn't have traveled that far, the morale started to wane. The exhaustion setting in, and things took a little bit of a turn. Uh-oh, see, now. People started looking at Susanna and Sam, and they said, How exactly did these two boys wander off? With both of you covering the two areas on either side of where they would have gone? Okay, which is a natural thing for people to do.

When you can't find any conclusion, you obviously you don't want this to be something that happens where everybody turns on the parents. But it's a fair enough question to ask, like, I don't want everyone to, like, come out with their pitchforks. But to question, like, they're wondering, like, can you tell me the story again? Yeah.

Kind of thing, fair enough. And after all, they said, You know, Sam Samuel was in the forest, like, wouldn't he have heard or seen them follow? At some point? Susanna was at home.

She didn't see them leave or notice their absence for such a long time. And with both of them on either side of where these children likely wandered to, like, literally covering the two ends of where they would have gone. How could they just disappear in the middle somewhere and never be found so suddenly, fingers were pointing at them. And neighbors who were so eager to help them before and offer support were now accusing them of hurting their children. And covering it up with a sob story. And we're also accusing them of trying to get money out of their neighbors for this, which I was like, Fuck, oh man.

Now they turned on them, they surrounded the cabin, they searched it high and low, They were turning everything inside out. Searching for any evidence of the boys deaths, They searched the surrounding property.

They were digging up the gardens, looking for buried bodies, so now they're just like ruining their fucking homestead. One neighbor went as far as to pull up the floorboards in their home to look for children's bodies underneath. They found nothing pulled up the floorboards.

Nothing, there was not a shred of evidence to suggest that these people did anything to hurt their children. And now they've lost their two children and their fucking home is like, destroyed. Yeah, cause that's not just like ransacked.

That's destroyed, like pulling up floorboards and digging up gardens and shit, oh, that's awful like. And it's like, Wow, they're going through this and it doesn't sound like they're a family that, like, has a lot.

I know it's like they're living in the 1800s, in the forest, in a cabin like Jesus. So that happened and things stalled for a minute. And the community, you know, and the community as well as the Cox's, really had no idea where to go next, what to do. So a local farmer named Jacob Dibert was, he lived nearby the Cox cabin.

And he was distraught at this whole situation, I mean, the whole community was. He had children of his own, he just couldn't imagine this. Like thinking how terrible it would be to lose children and have them vanish without a fucking trace. Like the Cox had dealt with, right? So he was like, it was like, really weighing on him.

Yeah, and the whole community had been talking about this involved in the searches. It was like overtaking everybody's lives, cause they just wanted to find these kids, yeah.

So on May 2nd, he said to his wife that he wished he could find them. He was like, I just wish I could come across them. And then he said, I wish I could just dream of where Joseph and George are. Wow. And that same night, he had a dream, and that dream involved him in the woods, and he was walking through this area that he didn't really recognize.

And he said, he came across a dead deer, okay, and he said, when he saw the dead deer. He saw that there was a fallen log over a stream, all right, and so he crossed that fallen log to cross the stream.

And after that log, after he got to the other side, he came across a child's shoe. Oh, no, and he said. And then he looked up and he saw Joseph and George. At the bottom, the base of a birch tree snuggled into the roots of the birch tree together. And he said it was a very specific birch tree. That apparently the top had been had been like, cut off in some odd strange way, so it was just a very like, he remembered it.

Yeah, so he woke up, shook, but attributed it to the fact that, okay. I've been heavily involved in worrying about the children, like most of the community. I was just talking about it, searching, talking about it. But how weird to say you wish you could dream something, and then you, you literally manifested that dream.

And that's so. He discussed it with his wife, Sarah. But, you know, they didn't alert the authorities or the Cox's family, cause they didn't want to send them on a wild goose chase or upset them. Don't want to sound crazy, you know, that's the thing that. And he's like, I also don't know where this is, yeah.

Like, I don't know where this area is, so I'd be like, I don't know a stream. There's tons of streams, like I all I have is the tree, yeah.

I'm Dan Taberski. In 2011, something strange began to happen at the high school in Leroy, New York. I was like, at my locker and she came up to me and she was like, stuttering, super bad. I'm like, stop around, She's like, I can't.

A mystery illness, bizarre symptoms and spreading fast, like doubling and tripling. And it's all these girls with a diagnosis. The state tried to keep on the down low. Everybody thought I was holding something back.

Well, you were holding something back intentionally. Yeah, yeah, well, yeah, now it's hysteria.

It's all in your head, it's not physical. You're, oh my gosh, you're exaggerating. Is this the largest mass hysteria since the Witches of Salem, or is it something else entirely? Something's wrong here?

Something's not right. Leroy was the new dateline, and everyone was trying to solve the murder. A new limited series from Wondery and Pineapple Street Studios. Hysterical Follow Hysterical. On the Wondery app, or wherever you get your podcasts, you can binge all episodes of Hysterical early and ad free right now by joining Wondery Plus.

So his wife agreed that it was, you know, likely from all the stress of the searching, talking about it, saying he wanted to find them. To her. She was like, you know what it sounds like, you just kind of manifested that idea because you really want to, yeah.

But that next night, same dream, same exact dream. And he even attributed that one because he was not a superstitious guy. This is not a woo guy who's sitting there. Being like, this is a message from beyond, like, you know what I mean? But still, same dream, two nights in a row.

Two nights that's never happened to me. So he's sitting there and he talks to his wife and his wife is like, I don't know. Like, that's kind of strange. And he's like, Yeah, you know, but I talked to you about it today and yesterday.

Same exact dream, bro. Maybe my mind is just really thinking about how strange it is, so it's kind of just giving me the same things. Puzzled together, Sure, so he was like, You know what?

So he goes to sleep on the third night, same fucking dream, a third night in a row. Stop it. And that's when he said, Nah, this is something. He was like, something is different here.

Yeah, so he ended up calling his brother-in-law Harrison, and he told him, and I think his last name was Wysong okay, and he told him the situation. And suddenly, he, Harrison and his and Jacob's wife Sarah, who are brother and sister.

Okay, they suddenly realized together, this place that Jacob was describing, Wait, that's actually really familiar to us, cause all of a sudden they were both like, Wait a second. I know that birch tree, and they said it was a place near our childhood home, about five to seven miles away from here.

It's a very specific birch tree near a stream. Stop it. And they were like, the top is cut off, right? So Jacob and Harrison were like, we gotta go.

We gotta go to this place just to get it out of my mind, at least, like, we gotta go. So Harrison was like, I think I know where it is, I can bring you there. So they go, they see a dead deer.

No, they see a fallen log across the stream, and Jacob is like, Fuck off, are you kidding me? And I bet that's what he said. They go across the stream.

They cross it, they see a child's shoe, everything, and when they see the child's shoe, they look up and see that same birch tree with the top cut off and at the base of it, huddled together in the roots, were George and Joseph. No, and unfortunately, they had passed away.

It had been more than I think. It had been like 13 days since they had gone missing, and you said it was like, so cold at night. They're five and seven, like they don't know how to survive in the woods. Yeah, it was definitely so.

Oh my god, yeah, now. According to a website I found called catbirdlife..com Catbird Life, it looked like the younger boy had died. First because it appeared his brother had placed his own hat down for his brother to lay on as a makeshift pillow.

And they were like, huddled together. Oh, that's gut-wrenching. Oh my God. Now. Word was sent back to the Cox family immediately, like they sent Harrison.

Harrison went to get Samuel, and Jacob stood and protected the boy's bodies himself until the family arrived. Oh my God, absolutely devastated. And they said, When Samuel came, he just fell onto his boys, weeping, of course.

I can't imagine, no, and you just in the, you know, he's sitting there thinking, like, How did this happen? yeah, how did this happen?

And nobody. How did they? How did this happen? Like, what? Yeah? And when they were examined, it appeared very much so that George and Joseph Cox had passed away due to exposure to the elements like hypothermia. Which is horrifying in its own right.

Yeah, they were literally found huddled together under in the roots of the tree. And do you? How far were they from their own home? They were? They were, like, not that far, but I think they were in like a they were far for little boys like, that's for sure.

And I think they just got turned around. They just didn't know where they were. They had crossed over that stream when they didn't think they would. Oh, they did, but it was that fallen log.

And I was like, no one saw the fallen log. Yeah, like, what the fuck? I don't know if it was at a different end of the stream, where they just didn't cover as much or what. And you're just like, like, no one heard them in the woods.

That's what I so, so. They must have wandered outside of where the searchers had obviously set up the boundaries. Yeah, they all believe that the boys could not have gone across the screen to the stream, so they didn't search there. Which, again, like you said, no one heard, like, not one person went across the stream or even had thoughts to go across the stream. And like, I know you set up that boundary, but the boys didn't see the fires or anything like that.

That's the thing. Where were they? While everyone was searching, there were thousands of people at one point searching. And even just the fact that, like, they went into the woods alone.

Like, it sounds like, maybe they were just following. They were like, Well, maybe we should go see what dad found. Yeah, I think that's what people say that, like, maybe they saw how excited their dad was. Like running into the woods to go after the dog. But I'm like, but then that would lead me to believe they followed directly after him, right?

And at that point, they would not, that wouldn't have happened, they would at least come across. But maybe they did just get turned around really quickly and just started traveling in the complete opposite direction of where their dad was. Or did they just wander out after? Like, you know, like, they saw him go in and they were like, Oh, and then they talked it through and decided to go in after. You know, I think it must've been later then. I also think of the ages and I'm like seven and five, like I have eight year olds and a four year old, yeah.

So pretty similar. But I'm also like, we don't live in the 1800s, in the woods, on a mountain, in a cabin. Well, who knows how often they went in the woods? Even? well, these kids were very, they grew up in the woods.

They were outdoorsy. Cause when I first read this, I looked at it through my like 2024 bias of sitting there. Being like my girls would never wander into the woods at that age. Like, they'd be like, fuck, no, like, they just like, I'm not going in there.

Right, but these are boys, too, like little boys in the 1800s, who are taught everything about the woods. And then I'm sitting there thinking, Well, and you know what, maybe maybe kids in other parts of the United States.

Would do the same thing. Would who are raised in the woods and hunting and gathering and fishing and doing all that stuff, like, maybe they would wander into the woods. I can't, I just can't base it on my own. I initially went to base it on mine and I was like, that's silly to base it on your own.

But I see what I mean, I see why you would, cause. I was just trying to figure out, like, why did they wander? And then I'm like, Ah, it kind of it makes sense, it makes sense that they would.

And I think they just got turned around, that's what it does sound like. They saw something cool, they both ran after it to go look, and then they realized I don't know where we are.

Like, we went off the path kind of thing. So it's still strange that no one. I'm like, did they hear people calling to them? Yeah, people went out immediately, right?

Their own parents did, all the neighbors, the whole community screaming their names, nobody heard them, they didn't hear anybody like, where? But again, that's the weird part.

But I mean, I guess, are the woods dense? That's exactly what I was saying, I was like, Okay, maybe the they are dense. So it's like, maybe it's one of those things where it just we don't realize how the sound gets like, muffled in that place.

Like, you think they're going to hear it, but it's like, if it's a canopy of trees, it's going to keep that sound. It's like Okigahara forests, it stifles all the sounds. Forests are fucking scary they are.

They're fucking terrifying they are. And also you're like, and then like the fires being lit and stuff, I'm like, then I wonder. I'm like, did they try to get to those fires and they couldn't get to them? Like, it just breaks your heart.

But then the fact that they weren't very far from. I don't know. I don't know exactly how far they were, but I don't think they were as far as they thought they were. But obviously the initial thought is, how the fuck did this guy know where these boys are? Oh, did people? Yeah, cause it's they. They're not like, they're not like. You manifested a dream, bro.

It's crazy, I will say. At first, everybody was kind of like, what, like, I don't know which I feel like.

I want that I might have the same reaction, yeah, like, you're at least going to be like, wait a second. And once. It became clear, though, that they had died of exposure.

Yeah, that it was kind of one of those things where it's like, you can't argue that he did something, I mean, he. They died of exposure. It's not like there's any foul play here, right?

He wouldn't, just this random farmer, who's a father himself, wasn't going to lead these boys into the middle of the woods. And just to be like, Bye like that doesn't seem like normal, no? And so now it's kind of hard to argue. Anything but a prophetic dream.

But it's just he saw it, he wanted to see it, and he saw it three nights in a row, three nights in a row. And to see the dead deer, the fallen log, the child shoe, and then the birch tree.

Every time, and that is the exact state, and it's there's a plaque up. I mean, this is like, real, this isn't like folklore, it's like, this happened.

And in fact, the reward money was given to Jacob and Harrison, the brother-in-law and the farmer, because they found the boys. I mean, yeah, and they immediately gave it back to Samuel and Susanna. Are you kidding me? They said they wanted to help pay for the gravestone for the boys.

So they didn't take a cent. So they're like, good ass people, like that's the thing, like he literally, like you were saying like this is like, like a pretty like, normal community. Like they could have used that money.

That's the thing that, like, they are good dudes who just wanted this family to be able to pay for. To bury their children, which the boys were buried in a casket together. So they have one gravestone. Fucking ruined me, dude now. In 1906, the community came together again and they raised money. Enough money for a few years later to have a completely like a rectum monument in for the boys honor.

Wow, and it's an. It's placed right now in the exact site where Joseph and George was found were found. Oh wow, like the exact spot where the tree was. Oh, that's so haunting.

I know, but like, it's really awesome. But they did that, yeah, and they and they all raised money to do it.

Like, the community came together. Oh, that poor family. And on the monument is the story of the boys tragic disappearance and deaths, and there's also a photo of Jacob Dibert. Oh, wow.

Like, that's like a like a little sassy photo of him and his Sunday best, you know? But imagine you're just like hiking and you see that and read that story, and you're like, this is where they found two little babies.

Like that, the heaviness of that site. If any of you have been there, like, tell me about it. Because I'm like, I can't imagine how heavy that would be. No, and people can travel there today. It's a place to see and there's always, like toys and flowers and such that people leave for the boys.

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But now there's also a structure built around the monument, like a like a roof, and it has like a chain link fence around it. Yeah, because humans, um, are literally garbage, and they have vandalized it before, literally what is wrong with people?

Like, and in fact, you gotta be real fucked up to vandalize a monument where two, seven, a seven and a five year old were found dead. Yeah, like, do some inner work. It does make you sit there and be like, Well, it's you see the two separate sides of humanity. In this story, you see Jacob Dibert and the whole community coming together, being like, let's give them the reward money.

And then you see piece of shit humans from 2000, and, you know, whatever, vandalizing the memorial that those people worked so hard to erect. Yeah, we love humans like we haven't done a whole lot of growing here.

We're going, it seems like we're going backwards. It sure does. In fact, the sign leading to the monument says Lost Children Memorial. It's a sign that says that it is literally riddled with bullet holes, that sign.

What? yeah, assholes, just shooting at the sign like, do better people.

What is wrong with people? Do fucking better? It's like you're just like wasting your own shit, and it's like, ruin something. Did that do something for you?

Did it do something for you to shoot at a sign that says Lost children's memorial? You should go to therapy. Did you go home after that and talk to another human being who didn't know that? You had just done that? Like, What the fuck is wrong with you? That's wild.

That's truly wild. That's really like just barbaric behavior. I'm like, you got to get it together, yeah, or like, chain yourself up and away from society.

That's a good plan. Nobody really wants you there. Yeah, it's just like, that's so gross to me, I don't understand people who do that shit.

No, now, in the area where the boys were found and where the memorial sits, people report a lot of strange feelings. Oh, I believe it very heavy. There, people say they hear kids like giggling and they'll hear kids talking.

They'll hear kids like, running around. at least, you hear them like, happy, Yeah, I hope they're just playing together in the woods, yeah.

Like, you know, and people will like, see if it snows, they'll see like footprints of little kids around the memorial. Shut up. Yeah, oh, that's some Blair Witch type shit. Oh yeah, I'm sure.

Now also, interestingly enough, a bluegrass song was written about this story, called Jacob's Dream. Oh cool, and it was written by John Pennell Pennell. I think it is, and Julie Lee, and it was performed by Alison Krauss. About this tragedy, wow.

It's a gut-wrenching song, to be honest. Sure, the chorus is written from the boys perspectives. And I can't, please don't. Yeah, I'm not even going to read them, cause I'll cry.

Yeah, I can't. You can look it up, though. But Julie Lee, one of the writers, said of the song I am distantly related to Jacob Dibert on my mother's side by marriage. Oh shit. So all my relatives up in this small area of Bedford County, Pennsylvania, in the Allegheny Mountains, know this true story.

Everyone in that area knows the story of the lost Cox children, or the lost Children of the Alleghenies. The lost children of the Alleghenies is such a haunting statement, haunting, haunting title. It really is. I can see why you were like, I need to know everything.

Yeah, it just like I was like, I need to know about this and I'll give you like, cause I know. I was like, Oh, this song. And it's really sad. And I'm not going to tell you anything about it. I'll give you a little bit of it.

So, um, so the story, the song, basically, like, tells the story, and then the chorus is where they get to, like the children's perspective. Are you going to sing that to me? and the chorus says, I'm going to give you the last chorus? Cause it's when they were found, okay?

Cause the other ones are like, when they're saying, like, why can't you hear our cries? I'm going to do a self-soothing exercise. While you do this, it says, Oh, mommy and daddy, look past the tears, you cry.

We're both up in heaven now. God is by our side. As you lay us down to rest in the presence of the Lord. Know that we will meet you here at Heaven's door. Oh my God, isn't that just like gut-wrenching?

My body just went.

That's it's, that's just like, Oh.

Cause they're babies, like those are babies. I have chills everywhere, scared little babies.

It's just like, Oh, but I? The song is like, a, really, it's a. It's just like a retelling of what happened kind of thing. It's not like a, you know, it's not like a really upsetting song in any other way. Like they, I think they did a proper tribute to it, yeah, and that's a that's a perfect way to say a tribute.

Now the last little strange thing that I was like, huh, yeah, now I'm like, Jacob Divert, are you? are you like a wizard? Like, what is going on? So there is a story from 1887 that talks about a woman named Sydney Griffith, who left Portage, which is in the same area. And was walking home waiting to be picked up by her horse and buggy.

Loves it. And I think it was like her brother was coming to pick her up in the horse and buggy. Yeah, she was wandering a bit. She kind of, like, lost where she was on the trail and she got lost in the cedar swamps.

Oh God, she was gone, vanished, without a trace. They could not find her. for two full days. They searched, no one could find her.

Same kind of thing. No sign of her whatsoever. And they were like, How the fuck did she wander off like that? What happened? So they were thinking, foul play.

Someone kidnapped her right, and on the second night she was missing. A man had a fucking dream.

Dreamed about where to find her, and dreamed about where to find her alive. What this man was Isaac Divert, Jacob Divert's son? What? yeah?

I was like, Jake, you're like, what the what the fuck? He led a rescue team to the area and she was found alive and rescued. Can you imagine, like, obviously, he grew up his whole life hearing his story, his father's story, and then to have the exact same motherfucking powers.

Yep, do you believe in magic? what the fuck? yeah, Oh my God.

Yep, dude, that's nuts. I've read that last part and I was like, shut the front door, that's on some familial Warlock shit.

That's the thing that's really cool. And people burned witches, look what witches and warlocks are capable of you, stupid fucks.

Look at them doing it, I mean, they'd burned people that weren't even witches. Yeah, exactly, but like, it's like people like this, who would like him saying? I found them because I dreamed three nights in a row of where they were. Was pretty ballsy to the wallsy of him, to be quite honest. I mean, he had no other thing to say.

He was like, I don't know how else I would have stumbled upon them. I'm going to be honest and look at that guy, just being honest, he's like, I dreamed about it, yeah.

And here they are like, and he was also like Jacob was like, devastated to find them, like, he was like I didn't, and then like for a little while, he was like, I. I. When I said I wanted to find them, like, I wanted to find them alive for their parents. Like he didn't want to manifest them being dead and finding them somewhere, you know, like, so he was like, devastated to find them.

And everybody that was there said he protected those boys bodies until the parents came. That's incredible, like, stood over them, guarding them. That's a straight up hero, yeah.

And it's like, That's fucking crazy though, and imagine that's your dad, that's your dad, imagine your dad did that, and then you do that.

And then you do that, and it's kind of like, beautiful, too. That like, first of all, he was ever able to do it, but then that that woman was found alive. Yeah. And his dad, like, always felt sad that he hadn't found those kids alive, that he wanted to find them alive.

And it's like, Oh, it just it. it got me. that's bonkers, bro. It just got me like this story. First of all, it's tragic. It's just so sad to think of these two little boys.

And it also, like, kind of taught me not to look at a situation in this timeframe, kind of thing and through my own lens. Cause my initial first reaction was trying to figure out how these boys got lost, and I was like, No. Why does a seven-year-old and a five-year-old run into the woods? That's wild behavior.

But I'm like, No, that was normal behavior for these boys, like, I'm sure this was not a thing that they were worried about. And you just have to think, like you were saying earlier, like, region to region is so different. Absolutely back then, in the region, in the place that they were living, they're living on like a mountain.

You know what I mean, like in the forest, that's all they know. It's not like they're just walking down the road, It's like they're in the middle of a forest. They want to go anywhere.

Or they're going through a forest. So these boys were probably very confident, and the parents were probably pretty confident. I'm also like, what did the dad find in the forest? I know I'm like, did you find? He had thought that maybe the dog had, like, found like a. It could have been like, you know, some kind of fox or a squirrel or something that they could eat, I suppose.

But what's going on in that forest, I don't know. He didn't seem upset about what he found in the forest, like, he didn't come out and be like, Oh my God, I found a mythical beast. What if he didn't find anything, though?

And yeah, we don't know. Maybe I know what was the dog freaking out about, that's what I mean.

Yeah, cause it's just like there was no foul play here, so it's like, or no foul play that they found here. Yeah, so it's like, we also have to look at it as it's the middle of the forest in Pennsylvania in 1856..

So I'm like, did they not know that there was foul play? did they miss something? I hope not, and that's not me being like, somebody killed those kids, no.

Like, I think they genuinely, I think unfortunately and very tragically, died of exposure. I really do. I think it was hypothermia. What a strange story, though, but the story just I know it's like a shorter one and just kind of strange. But it felt like one that I was like, I just got to talk to you guys about this.

Well, and every now and then, people like a shorter episode to, like, just ponder a strange story. This is for your drive home, you're welcome, you know? Hopefully you pulled in your driveway. Go hug somebody that you love.

Eat a good dinner inside, yeah, or outside, if you prefer, just don't go running into the forest and then be a good neighbor.

Yeah, and don't pull up people's floorboards, cause that's absolutely insane. Yeah, insane.

That's insane, Madison, that's insane, Madison. And I guess there's like a lot of reports where, like, the neighbor who pulled up the floorboards is named as like. I think Charlie Ross, but from what I've read, don't go after Charlie Ross hundreds of years later. Because I don't think I think he was mistakenly identified as being the guy who did it.

Oh, who, like, pulled up the floorboards, how shitty is that? But I just wanted to throw that out there in case you come across that.

I think it's a case of mistaken identity. So don't send your bad vibes his way. Don't besmirch Charlie Ross just yet, you know, yeah.

We don't know, yeah, we don't know about him. Things got lost through the great vines of centuries. It's been a little while.

You know that it does happen, but just in case you come across that, just like, take it with a grain of salt. Yeah, for old Charlie Ross, you know?

Damn, yeah, it's a crazy story, it's a sad story. Poor Samuel and Susanna.

Poor everyone in this just breaks my damn heart. I know it really does, but yeah.

Well, that's the story of the lost children of the Alleghenies, Joseph and George Cox. There's a spooky, strange story for you. Yeah, we hope you keep listening, and we hope you keep it weird and do keep it so weird that you have prophetic dreams. Because that's fucking baller.

That is Baller Go Jacob, generational prophetic dreams.

Excuse me.

Elena's being weird. If you like Morbid. You can listen early and ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. Prime members can listen ad-free on Amazon Music. Before you go, tell us about yourself by filling out a short survey at Wondery.com Slash survey.

She struck him with her motor vehicle, she had been under the influence, and then she left him there. In January 2022, local woman Karen Reed was implicated in the mysterious death of her boyfriend, Boston Police Officer John O'Keefe. It was alleged that after an innocent night out for drinks with friends, Karen and John got into a lover's quarrel en route to the next location. What happens next depends on who you ask.

Was it a crime of passion? If you believe the prosecution, it's because the evidence was so compelling. This was clearly an intentional act. And his cause of death was blunt force trauma with hypothermia or a corrupt police coverup?

If you believe the defense theory, however, this was all a coverup to prevent one of their own from going down. Everyone had an opinion and after the 10 week trial, the jury could not come to a unanimous decision to end in a mistrial. It's just a confirmation of just how complicated this case is. Law and Crime presents the most in-depth analysis to date of the sensational case in Karen.

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