When the Lord Spared Louisa

Downtown Louisa, Ky
Source: City of Louisa

This month I celebrated my 43rd birthday. In the 4+ decades that I've been alive on this earth, I have witnessed so many "end of the world" predictions...literally too many to count. In fact, I think it was twice just in 2025 that I managed to survive the Rapture! And of course, the Y2K panic is still as fresh in my mind today as it was twenty-six years ago. 

As we all waited out the end of 1999, waiting for the ball to drop (followed by the planes to start falling from the sky, computers to crash, and everything resetting itself to 1900), we were all wondering just what our fate would be. I thought New Year's Eve 2025 would be a fun time to share another, much older prediction of destruction, going all the way back to the summer of 1920. 

The awesome Facebook page, Historic Wayne County WV, recently shared this newspaper article from the Wayne County News, dated June 17, 1920. 

On a warm, Tuesday morning in June, a "holy roller preacher" had predicted that Louisa, Kentucky would be destroyed by a fire a Biblical proportions. This unnamed preacher persuaded his followers to cross over the Big Sandy River into West Virginia and take refuge in the hills overlooking Fort Gay. There, they could safely observe the town of Louisa and all of its sinners go up in smoke. 

But, like so many predictions of this type, this one failed to materialize and the people of Louisa and surrounding areas were spared. I honestly don't know enough about the history of the area to even make an educated guess as to why Louisa, Kentucky was slated for destruction, while the towns all around it, including those across the river in West Virginia, were totally safe. 

So, speaking of predictions....what predictions do YOU have for 2026? Please share them in the comments below or find me on social media and let me know! 

Wayne County News
17 June 1920

David Morgan's Vision

Source: WV History on View

I absolutely love when a little supernatural lore makes its way into mainstream history! One such example can be found in the Marion County community of Rivesville. Along US 19 there is a unique historical marker, dedicated to an early pioneer in the region that is today West Virginia, David Morgan.  

David Morgan, known as The Great Indian Fighter, was the son of Colonel Morgan ap Morgan and brother to Zackquill Morgan, who founded Morgantown, WV. Born in 1721, David was a surveyor with George Washington in 1746 when the Fairfax Stone was laid, and fought in the French and Indian War.

In the late 1770's, David and his family had retired to the Prickett's Fort area near Fairmont. And, that's where legend and history collide.  It is said that in April of 1779, David Morgan, just shy of his 58th birthday, had taken ill.  As he lay in his sick bed, he had a feverish dream that two of his children had been attacked and were scalped and bleeding.  David awoke from this strange dream to find that his children had in fact, wandered away from the security of the cabin in search of a lost cow. He jumped from his sick bed, and yelled for his children to hurry back up the path to the home.

The children had just made it back when two Indians appeared from out of the woods and attacked.  David, though ill, managed to fight off and even kill one of the Indians. However, as he was fleeing, the other Indian threw a tomahawk directly at David's head.  David's life was spared as the quick-thinking frontiersman threw his hand up to shield himself, severing at least one finger in the process.

1995 David Morgan portrait by Kelley Ward

Prophetic dreams (also known as Veridical Dreams) are not uncommon among the superstitious Appalachian Mountain folk, and I know that certainly in my family, dreams foretelling the future were taken pretty seriously.  In the wild frontier that would become the state of West Virginia, sometimes that intuition and/or divine intervention...whichever you want to call it...was all that stood between you and death. 

David Morgan's prophetic vision may have saved his life as well as those of his children, and it certainly makes for a wonderful bit of folklore.  Unfortunately, some scholars don't believe this sick-bed vision ever actually happened.  Nevertheless, visitors to Rivesville near where the incident occurred, have been treated to this wonderful informational sign.  The sign is part of the West Virginia Highways Historical Markers Program, which was initiated in 1937.  Based on the photograph above, found at the WV History on View website, it looks like this sign was one of the originals placed in the 1930's and 1940's.  And, at least as recently as 2011, the sign still appears to be standing, as seen here in this Waymarking entry. 

David Morgan passed away on May 19, 1813.  He is buried in a private cemetery in Marion County. The Morgan Family was instrumental in shaping the history of what would become the great state of West Virginia, and thanks to a dire warning that came to him in a dream, David Morgan and two of his children were able to survive long enough to see some major changes come to the area. 

Further Reading:

The Earliest Printed Version of David Morgan and the Two Indians, by Jack B. Moore (1962)

Nostradamus and the 2012 Presidential Election

A few days ago I made a trip to the local Goodwill to check out the books.  As a collector of paranormal literature, I tend to go ahead and buy ANYTHING that even remotely applies to the paranormal that I find there.  For less than a dollar, I see it as a good investment in my personal library, lol.  Anyway, on this trip, I picked up a 1985 book by Erika Cheetham, called The Further Prophecies of Nostradamus:  1985 and Beyond.  It's a follow-up to an earlier work by the same author.

The first section of the book is sort of a combination of the author's own background and how she got involved in decoding Nostradamus, as well as a short history on Nostradamus himself.  I read through this part, and basically lost interest.  However, before I stuck the book on the shelf and totally forgot about it, I flipped through some of the "prophesy pages."  I know I was working on little sleep, but one passage in particular jumped out at me and immediately my brain went into that "what if" mode...

Here's the original quatrain:

De l'Orient viendra la coeur Punique
Facher Hadrie et les hoirs Romulides
Accompagne de la classe Libyque
Temples Mellites et proches isles vuides.

And here's the author's transcription into English:

From the [Middle?] East will come the African heart to trouble Hadrie and the heirs of Romulus.  Accompanied by the Libyan fleet, the temples of Malta and nearby islands shall be deserted.

Not only does the author translate the quatrains, but she also makes a stab at interpreting them, and while not much is said about this particular one, it was theorized in context with some other quatrains to mean that WW III would probably start around 1986 in the middle east, with Qaddafi being a major player.

Of course, I was 3 years old in 1986, so I looked at this quatrain with the perspective of the 21st century, and since the election JUST happened, is still fresh and relevant in my overworked brain.  Immediately, my AP English classes kicked in and I wanted to extrapolate the passage, despite the fact that Nostradamus not only wrote in his own "code" of sorts, but also, his words have been loosely translated and interpreted, opening his meaning up to all sorts of different perspectives.  Still, this is what I think it means...

I think that the African heart is Barack Obama.  Obviously, he is African American, and his father hails from Kenya.  Although he's not "middle eastern," there are people who will bet their first born child that he is a Muslim...which so many in this country just automatically associate with the Middle East.  The heirs of Romulus in this case is Romney.  An heir of Romulus would be someone from Rome, or someone Rome-born, which can be expressed grammatically as Rome ne (masculine) or Rome nee (feminine).  Rome-ne can be loosely interpreted as Romney.  I won't get too much into the second part of the quatrain, but the major issues going on with the U.S. Ambassador to Libya, and one can easily read enough into this information to make it relevant.

On the other hand, one can read into this information and find arguments to make it fit a variety of scenarios.  When I told my sister about my "revelations," she automatically threw back a rebuttal that I was experiencing the Barnum Effect, lol.  The Barnum Effect is properly known as the Forer Effect, named for Bertram Forer, who studied the effect in 1948 through a series of personality tests given to his students.  The name Barnum Effect comes from the circus man's "something for everyone" slogan.

The Barnum Effect, or Forer Effect basically states that individuals will attribute very broad generalizations about character to their own individual characteristics, and is why an individual can read ANY sign's horoscope and find things in there that apply specifically to them, lol.  However, in psychology usage...and to an extent, "paranormal" usage, this term really does apply to things like personal characteristics and experiences, and even though I read into what I thought was relevant with this quatrain, it wasn't about ME, lol.  Therefore, I prefer the term apophenia, which I think may or may not be more accurate within this usage.  Apophenia, which will be discussed more in a later post, is basically seeing meaning where there is no meaning.  Technically, this definition used in general context doesn't really fit either, but its a great explanation for the 3:33 and 11:11 phenomena, lol. 

Looking for more Nostradamus Prophecy?  Check out my article on the Gangnam Style Apocalypse!