The Real Life Haunting by Annabelle the Rag Doll

Three films have featured Annabelle the demonic doll, but how much is fact and how much is fiction?

Annabelle in the Occult Museum — Photo free to use

If you are a fan of horror films, you have likely watched one of the Annabelle films. Annabelle is a doll possessed by a demon that enters people’s lives to burn down their houses and haunt their loved ones. Some may not know that Annabelle is based on a true story. You can even visit the Annabelle doll in the Occult Museum in Connecticut.

In 1970, a mother went into a thrift shop and purchased a Raggedy Ann Doll for her twenty-eight-year-old daughter, a nursing student. Her daughter collected dolls, so this seemed like the perfect gift. Her daughter, Donna, loved the doll and took her back to the apartment she shared with her flatmate, Angie.

The doll that moves

She would sit the doll on the sofa or sideboard and go to work; that was when the strange occurrences started. Soon, the girls realised that when they returned from work, the doll had moved. They would leave the doll in one room to find her in another. Was it their mind playing tricks on them?

It seemed not, as soon scraps of parchment were found around the flat with the words ‘help us’ or ‘help me’ written in crayon. The girls said that this was strange as the apartment had no crayons or parchment.

Annabelle Higgins

One evening, when the girls returned home, they discovered that the doll had blood spots on her hands. This was when they contacted a psychic medium. The medium examined the doll and stated it was possessed by a little girl who played on the apartment’s land. The girl was six years old when she died and was named Annabelle Higgins. Annabelle would speak to the girls through the medium and state that she wanted to stay, which they agreed to.

One of two things can be summarised from this; the first was that the medium was a fake and had investigated the land the house stood on, found a report on Annabelle’s terrible accident and used it with the worried nurses. The other, if you believe in possession of objects, is that the nurses had just granted the spirit permission to live in their house, a dangerous thing.

Annabelle Attacks

Regardless, the girls stated that the paranormal activity increased in the flat. Angie had a fiancee, Lou, who was a regular visitor to the flat. On one occasion, he states that he woke in a state of sleep paralysis, and the Annabelle doll moved up his body, strangling him into unconsciousness. He woke the following day, convinced the encounter had not been a dream.

On another occasion, Lou was around the house studying maps when he heard a noise coming from Donna’s bedroom. He approached the room and felt a presence behind him. He noticed that Annabelle was then on the floor in front of him. He stated that he felt a sharp pain in his chest and observed bleeding from seven scratches along his chest. The scratches would completely vanish two days later.

Donna and Angie decided to consult their local priest, who made some calls and arranged a meeting with paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren. Both had been made famous through the Amityville House and the investigations they had carried out there.

The Occult Museum

The Warrens investigated the doll and stated that it was possessed by a demon, not a little girl. The demon had lied to the psychic to gain the girls’ trust. The Warrens agreed to take the doll away from the flat for the safety of the occupants. Driving away from the apartment, the couple said they felt the doll meant to harm them, so they avoided busy roads and drove home along back roads. Whilst driving, the brakes on the car would fail several times. Ed Warren took action and doused the doll in holy water. The brakes returned, and the rest of the journey was uneventful.

Once within the museum, Annabelle was placed in a glass cabinet with a clear sign warning people not to open the cabinet. However, Annabelle was not finished with her reign of terror; several visitors to the museum reported bad luck after going near the doll. One young man eager to impress his girlfriend went as far as banging on the glass and taunting the doll. He would die on the way home from the museum in a motorbike crash, his bike losing control and hitting a tree. His girlfriend would be seriously injured and require extensive medical treatment to survive. She reports they were laughing about the doll when they crashed.

The Warrens were so concerned about the doll’s presence that they would bless the case every week with holy water, right up to their death. On their death, their daughter and her husband, Tony Spera, took over the museum, following the same routine.

Is it dangerous? Yes. Is it the most dangerous object in this museum? — Tony Spera

Fact or Fiction

The Warrens and their family have told much of Annabelle's story. Unfortunately, little evidence exists of the daughter and her flatmate, which has led many to discredit the story. It was, however, a story that excited James Wan when he started making it into his trilogy in 2014. Although the mother and daughter only appear briefly initially, the film has veins of the true story.

Whether you believe it or not, I would still think twice about mocking the Raggedy Ann Doll housed in a glass cabinet in the Occult Museum.