We walk past the Thomas Rose House on Church Street each day on my Charleston Footprints Walking Tour, and I tell the story about the man who supposedly haunts it with his ghost. He was doctor who had moved to Charleston from New England after the American Revolution, and was living in a room there when the building was a boarding house, and was known for whistling as he walked the streets. He was involved in a duel in October, 1786, in which he was mortally wounded and carried back to the house where he died of infection weeks later, and legend says his whistling can still be heard. The copy on the plaque outside the house was taken from a 1950’s newspaper article in which the writer incorrectly wrote the doctor’s name as Joseph Ladd Brown, when in fact, his name was Joseph Brown Ladd, and perhaps Dr. Ladd is still whistling to get someone’s attention to change the wording on the plaque. Tourists hear quite a few ghost stories in the streets of Charleston, and this one is perhaps the most intriguing. <img.src=”Charleston Ghosts” alt=”The Whistling Doctor”
