Haiti Ghost House

If you’re really into doing some ghost hunting or if ghostly spirits don’t bother you then right in the heart of Little Haiti in Miami, Florida you’ll find Villa Paul. This is a neo-Classical mansion built in 1920 with a special Cuban flair. The mansion has ten rooms, two baths, 18 ft. tall ceilings, hand-painted floor tiles and Tuscan columns. It was built with Cuban-exported yellow bricks and white stucco.

Villa Paula was built for the first Cuban Consulate Senior Don Domingo Milors and his wife Paula. The couple lived in the mansion when tragedy struck and Paula died from complications due to a leg amputation. Afterwards Muriel Reardon too residence and lived there for more than 30 years. Many owners came and went and the mansion became a residence for senior citizens.

The mansion was left deserted and fell into disrepair by 1974. At this time a man named Cliff bought the mansion and restored it. He soon discovered that he was not living alone.

Manifestations

What happens when you realize that you’re living with spirits is that you hear a steady knocking on the front door but once you open it there is no one there yet, you cannot be sure the spirit has not already entered your home.

Then there was the spirit who really hated cats and Cliff has three of them. Cats have the ability to see spirits unfortunately these cats couldn’t save themselves from a slamming iron gate. The previous owner Muriel who had passed on really hated cats.

It was known that Paula preferred to keep the bedroom door shut so that there would be no draft while she played the piano. So now Cliff discovered that his bedroom door would shut by itself whenever he left it open.

The aroma of strong Cuban coffee would come from the kitchen and the fragrant smell of roses from the dining room even when the season for roses was long past.

One shadowy figure was seen but disappeared before it could be seen fully. Another figure was seen in the hallway by the bedrooms. This was a Cuban woman, her hair in a bun. She floated down the hallway in a full-length gown. The woman had only one leg and then just as suddenly she disappeared into thin air.

In the backyard the clicking of high heels could be heard on the stone path.

A ghostly inhabitant threw a fit one day. There was a loud noise in the kitchen and dishes and silverware were thrown all over the place. A front porch chandelier loosened from its socket and crashed to the ground.

Psychic Research

A seance was held in 1976 by a spiritualist minister.

During this session it was revealed that the mansion held the spirits of Paula and four other entities.

Even though Paula was too shy to tell them who she really was she did say she loved to grind Columbian coffee, enjoyed playing the music from “Carmen” on the piano and love to have roses in the mansion.

The other entities were a thin man in a top hat, a heavy-set woman in a red dress, a crying woman who was sad that she had lost a medal in the garden and another unhappy young woman who was seeking the burial place of her illegitimate baby. The baby must have been buried somewhere on the ground of Villa Paula.

Following another seance in 1979 some of the disturbances quieted down and Cliff sold the mansion. In the 1980s the new residents were treated to a full program with poltergeist activity and sightings of Paula. Once again cats were trapped and killed by the iron gate.

By 1989 The Miami Herald had named Villa Paula the most haunted house in the city. In the early 1990s the mansion became a doctor’s medical office. This was good news for the ghostly residents who now could freely roam about in the evening

hours.