Dudley Road

Dudley Road is a scary urban legend about a road in Billerca, Massachussetts that is said to be haunted by the ghosts of dead nuns.

According to one legend, there was a convent on Dudley Road many years ago. When teenage girls in the area became pregnant, their embarrassed parents would send them away to the convent. After they gave birth, their babies were taken away from them and put up for adoption. The girls were then forced to become nuns. They say that three of these girls couldn’t stand it anymore. One night, they escaped from the convent and hung themselves from a nearby tree. Their bodies were buried in the graveyard across the road and three black crosses were erected over their graves. Soon afterwards, the convent was closed down and it became a nunnery.

According to another legend, there was an insane asylum near the nunnery. One night, a crazed man escaped from the asylum and he broke into the nunnery. The man murdered several of the nuns, slitting their throats from ear to ear with a knife. Three nuns managed to escape, but the man chased them down and hung them from the tree.

There is a third legend that claims the nuns were hanged for practicing witchcraft. A house was later built on the spot where the nuns were hanged, but it had to be abandoned months later because it sank into the earth. They say the house is still there today. So far, it has sunk into the ground up to the 2nd floor windows and every year, it sinks a little more.

Whatever actually happened on Dudley Road, the ghosts of the dead nuns are believed to haunt the area. Local people say they hear wild screaming coming from the woods, while others say they see ghostly nuns drifting across the road with chains around their feet. Most people who visit Dudley Road report feeling the strange sensation that they are being watched. Some even claim they have been followed home by these spirits.