They call her ‘Pink Lizzie’—a name whispered by generations of Memphis locals who believe that even after the college doors closed, one student stayed behind to walk the halls of the old Brinkley school. But the real mystery lies deeper—in an elusive buried jar that once captivated an entire city.

Memphis is a town chock-full of ghost stories.  But the tale of Lizzie, the ghost of Brinkley Female College, might be the most bizarre and controversial of all.  According to legend, Lizzie wasn’t a ghost trying to frighten.  Rather, Lizzie was just looking for a living being to help right a wrong she left behind on this earth.

And Lizzie selected a young student named Clara Robertson.

Our story begins in 1871, when Clara was just thirteen years old.   Brinkley Female College had opened just a couple of years prior, advertising in local papers as the biggest college in Memphis and the “cheapest college in the world.”  For bright and mannered young girls, it offered courses in English, Latin and numerous foreign languages, along with a music program.   By all accounts, Clara fit the bill.  She was an intelligent and vibrant young girl with blond hair and vivid blue eyes.

Brinkley Female College occupied a 2-story mansion that once stood on South 5th Street. In a neighborhood of stately mansions, the college stood out with its Old South grandeur.  It sat proudly on a slight hill, protected by an iron gate, its grand, antebellum entrance consisting of six towering columns.

Clara’s father was a prominent local attorney named J.R. Robertson.  He had the means and desire to send Clara to such a prestigious school.  He likely heard the whispers about the school.  That there was some sort of curse, stemming from a bankruptcy back when the school was a private residence.  But he dismissed such tales as neighborhood gossip.  Besides, Clara would only be attending as a day student.

Lizzie’s Ghost Appears

One day, Clara was practicing piano alone in the upstairs music room when she sensed a presence.  She paused, looked up and froze.  For there before her stood an emaciated, 8-year old girl.  A moldy and tattered pink dress hung off her decaying flesh.  Her pitiful eyes stared at Clara from sunken sockets.  Her hair was long, filthy and knotted.  Clara noticed a strange, reddish stain on the front of her dress.  

She also noticed she could see right through her.

The ghost silently reached her bony hand out to Clara.  Clara screamed and ran from the room.  She jumped into bed with a sleeping student, hoping the ghostly figure would go away.  But the horrid girl floated after her into the room, her hand still outstretched.  Clara hid under the covers, tears streaming down her face, waving frantically as the ghost moved closer and closer, touching a pillow near Clara’s head.  Then she vanished without a word.

Clara told the story to her classmates, who cruelly mocked her.  She bolted home and told her father of the ghost, saying she would never return to haunted Brinkley Female College.  But her father calmed her down, telling her she was likely tired from the endless piano instruction and was just seeing things.  Or the other girls were playing tricks.  After all, she was smart enough to know there was no such thing as ghosts!

So Clara returned to school. As several days passed without a ghost sighting, she believed it really was a prank.  But one day, as she practiced in the music room with other students present, the skeletal girl materialized again.  Clara ran away screaming and found one of her teachers, Miss Jackie Boone.  Miss Boone treated her students with kindness and respect, and listened patiently to Clara before telling her: “It’s ok, just go back and ask what she wants.”

Miss Boone walked Clara back to the room and watched as she confronted the pitiful ghost she saw in front of her.  The specter pointed toward the window with her bony finger.  With a perturbed whisper the ghost said, “There’s a stump outside, 50 yards away from the house.  There’s an old jar buried there.  You must find it.”  And with that, she vanished.

Now whether Miss Boone or the other Brinkley Female College students actually saw the ghost is lost to history.  But Clara ran home again to her father, now certain this was not a prank or her wild imagination.

Mr. Robertson had heard enough.  He demanded a meeting with the headmaster, J.D. Meredith.  They both agreed they had to get to the bottom of the story.  Mr. Robertson was worried about his daughter’s well being, while Mr. Meredith was concerned with the school’s reputation.  If word got out that Brinkley Female College was haunted, Meredith knew it would be ruinous.

So the next day, they asked Clara to wait in the hallway as they interviewed the other students.  As Clara wandered the cavernous hallways alone, the ghost suddenly materialized in front of her again.  Before Clara could scream, the ghost said, “Don’t be scared.  My name is Lizzie.  I won’t hurt you.”

As Clara stood transfixed with fear, Lizzie told her Brinkley Female College was actually her family home, obtained illegally by the school’s founders years ago.  Lizzie had returned to right the wrongs done to her family since all were now dead.  In the buried jar were home ownership papers and many unknown valuables.  If Clara could dig up the jar, she could claim ownership of the house.  But if she did not, Lizzie warned, she would curse all future owners of the property.

As the student interviews finished, a distraught Clara ran back home.  She told her father she would rather die than go back to that horrid place.  Mr. Robertson now knew his daughter was deeply disturbed, by something he could not understand.  In desperation, he asked one of his clients, a spiritual medium known as Mrs. Nourse, for help.  After hearing her story, Mrs. Nourse said there was only one option: a séance to communicate with the dead.

Spiritual Mediums Intervene with Lizzie

Mr. Robertson was highly skeptical, but agreed.  So one evening, Clara was seated across a small table from Mrs. Nourse, surrounded by her father and several interested neighbors, who normally mocked the idea of ghosts and spirits.  But as Mrs. Nourse repeatedly called out for Lizzie, they sat dumbfounded as Clara suddenly swooned and fell back in her chair.  Clara then flailed her arms violently, so much so that she had to be restrained.  

When she finally calmed, the medium put a pencil and paper in front of her.  Clara wrote furiously, page after page in strange and indistinct scrawlings.  But these scrawlings finally assumed readable form, and she began answering questions in writing. 

The spirit said her full name was Lizzie Davie.  The jar was located five feet underground, beneath the tree stump she pointed out to Clara.  And Clara was selected as the owner of its contents because she, alone, had acknowledged Lizzie.

With that, Lizzie told the medium she loved Clara but she must leave, and to awaken her with a kiss.  Mrs. Nourse did as instructed, and Clara awoke as if from a dream.  With no memory of what had transpired.

Needless to say, word spread like wildfire about the ghost of Lizzie, and potential treasure buried on the grounds of Brinkley Female College.  Local reporters breathlessly posted story after story.  What could be in that old jar? Gold? Money? Jewelry? Clara and Lizzie soon became the talk of the town.  Séances became the rage, with spiritual mediums communicating with the dead by banging tambourines, turning tables or writing on small chalkboards.  Clara herself attended some of these séances, communicating with Lizzie with a chalkboard.  

But the story of Lizzie and the glass jar spread fear as well.  Local children suffered horrible nightmares of skeletal ghosts in pink dresses reaching out to them.  Citizens were afraid to walk the poorly lit streets at night.  For those needing liquid courage, local bartenders began serving special “Ghost Cocktails” to their patrons.

Meanwhile at the school, crowds formed to watch the local men dig for the mysterious jar.  They became hundreds strong, the police struggling to hold them back.  While the headmaster Mr. Meredith hated all the attention, he knew the story would never be put to rest until the truth was discovered.  

After much digging, the men unearthed a pile of bricks and little else.  They knew they needed more guidance from Lizzie.  They sent word to Clara’s family, but she was already on her way to the dig site.  Seems Lizzie had appeared to Clara, angry that Clara herself was not digging for the jar. 

When Clara arrived, she was asked to call on Lizzie for further instruction where to dig.  Lizzie appeared, but only to Clara, reiterating she must dig for the jar herself as the contents were meant for her.  But as Clara stepped into the pit, she immediately fainted.  As she awoke, she claimed to have seen the glass jar in a vision.

Discovery of Lizzie’s Jar

Knowing Clara could not possibly dig for the jar, Mrs. Nourse was called again for a séance at the Robertson home.  The medium asked Lizzie if Clara’s father could dig on her behalf.  Lizzie agreed, but said once found, the jar could not be opened for 60 days, or the curse she warned about would occur.

So Mr. Robertson returned to Brinkley Female College with a small crew.  Within an hour, he finally unearthed a large, moldy jar, about 12 inches tall.  He could see several bags and a faded, brown envelope through the murky glass.   As he climbed from the pit, the crowd excitedly screamed for him to open the jar.  But Mr. Robertson had seen enough to know Lizzie was not one to be trifled with.  He stuck that jar under his coat and swiftly headed home.

Now the Robertson family had a new problem.  Public interest in the jar was at a fever pitch.  Mr. Robertson knew he just had to wait 60 days before cracking it open.  First he had to hide it – but where?  He chose the only place he knew someone wouldn’t want to search: the family outhouse!  He tied a rope tightly around that jar and hung it under one of the seats.  Even Clara was kept in the dark where the jar was.

To satisfy the public, Mr. Robertson announced a public opening of the jar in 60 days time at the Greenlaw Opera House.  Admission would be one dollar per person, with proceeds split between the Robertson family and a local orphanage.  

But the event never occurred.  A few days prior, newspapers reported a brutal attack at the Robertson home.  During a get together with friends, Mr. Robertson had heard a noise outside and went to investigate.  Worried when he didn’t return, his friends found him in the yard beaten and bloodied.  He told them four armed men had pounced on him, threatening his life if he didn’t reveal the location of the jar.  He reluctantly pointed toward the outhouse.  

Now feeling duped, some local reporters called the whole story an elaborate hoax.  With dripping sarcasm, they demanded one of the many spiritual mediums – now all the rage in Memphis – prove themselves by holding a special séance to identify the perpetrators.  But the thieves were never identified.  And the mysterious jar was never seen again.

Curse of Lizzie’s Ghost

Worried that his integrity was in question, J.R. Robertson wrote a book on the entire incident.  Signed affidavits were provided by prominent Memphis citizens and police officers with firsthand knowledge of the events.  Around that time, friends of the Davie family came forward, claiming to have seen Lizzie in her coffin.  She had been buried in her favorite pink dress – with strawberry stains on the front. 

Shortly thereafter, it was said Clara took part in one last séance to speak to Lizzie.  Lizzie told her the jar indeed contained gold, diamonds and thousands of dollars worth of coins.

But Lizzie was not done haunting Brinkley Female College.  Many believe the curse of the treasure jar came to pass.  Stained by its reputation as a haunted school, Brinkley Female College closed its doors shortly after the incident.  It was converted into apartments, but tenants were hard to come by, too scared of the building’s haunted past.  Over decades, it decayed into a crumbling tenement building for the railroad.  In the 1970s, a paper manufacturer finally tore it down to build a warehouse.  Today, the once grand street is yet another faceless industrial sector.

Although the house was gone, Lizzie was said to have remained.  Workers for the paper manufacturer reported strange noises and sudden temperature drops in the warehouse.  Papers would mysteriously fly off the shelves.  Perhaps Lizzie was still angry and refused to leave.

Clara and her family faded into obscurity, as Memphis turned its attention to other matters.  The story of haunted Brinkley Female College was largely lost to time.  But somewhere out there might be that mysterious glass jar.  So next time you’re at an antique store in the area, look for a dirty glass jar about 12 inches tall and 10 inches wide.  If you see some strange faded papers and small envelopes inside, open it!

On second thought, maybe you shouldn’t….

-THE END-

Story Credits

Adapted from folklore and produced by Craig Dominey

Audio production by Henry Howard

Storyteller: Cathy Kaemmerlen

Piano improvisations by Carole Mitchell

Sources

Historic Memphis – “Brinkley Female College…and it’s Famous Ghost Story.”

Windham, Katherine Tucker, “Memphis Great Jar Mystery, ” from Thirteen Tennessee Ghosts and Jeffrey.