Tragedy in Dogtown

Tragedy in Dogtown

The events that have taken place in Dogtown have left its woods with a terrible stigma, and although having fears based on these unfortunate events make sense, it is unfair for these horrendous acts to leave a permanent taint on Dogtown's beautiful lands. It is not the place that inspired these acts, but the people. Their deaths should not be sensationalized, but recognized for what they are, and brought to light rather than kept in the dark for people to use their stories to encourage others to stay away from the woods.

Abraham Wharfe

According to Geni.com, Abraham Wharfe was born in Gloucester on July 17th, 1738 and grew up to become a successful sheep farmer in Dogtown. He married a woman by the name of Mary Allen at the age of 24. They had children, however the number of children is unknown. What is known is that the same year Abraham decided to end his own life by crawling under a rock and slitting his throat. He was one of the last residents of Dogtown, and his suicide came as a shock to many of his friends. The cellar hole to his home is still marked in Dogtown by the number 24.


Being a well-liked member of the community as well as one of the last people to live in Dogtown, Wharfe's suicide adds to the belief that the woods are haunted, his ghost being one of them. It was not the place that tempted him to make this decision though; it was his own personal troubles that he felt could not be remedied. The setting cannot prompt a person to make such a crucial decision. This is the kind of thing that only people can inspire someone to do.

Anne Natti
The murder of Anne Natti was vile, horrendous, and so unwelcome that it shook the entire city of Gloucester when it occurred in Dogtown on June 24th, 1984. She was a teacher who lived on the edge of Dogtown with her new husband and their dog. Dogtown had been a sanctuary for her and her family. They often took long walks through the woods to visit friends and enjoy the fresh woodland air. The day her life had been taken was similar to all of the other walks she had taken in the past, until it reached its tragic end.

Peter Hodgkins, a man who frequently visited the Dogtown area while riding motorbikes, was responsible for her murder. He had admitted to having previously assaulted his girlfriend, but claimed that the murder was an act of impulse. He stated that it had not been thought out, and something inside him gave him the desire to brutally take her life.

This shows evidence of a severe mental disorder; people do not casually take strolls through Dogtown and become overwhelmed with the desire to murder. Again, here is an unfortunate (to say the least) example of people characterizing a place unfairly based on a heinous event that had occurred there. My aim is not to act as though these deaths did not occur or to pretend that they are not serious or tell people that they should not mourn; rather, my goal is to convince people to look at the place for what it is and not let it be defined by the few lives who happened to end unfairly. Stones in Dogtown are engraved with either numbers of words, such as the stone marked "Anne's Path" to pay respect to Mrs. Natti, and these are important lives to remember. My point is that the place does not encourage the events that occur there, and Dogtown did not inspire Mr. Wharfe to take his own life or Peter Hodgkins to take Anne's. These were acts performed by people suffering from something within themselves, and it is sad that these acts have turned such a beautiful and peaceful place into a haunted, blood-thirsty mystery in the minds of so many.




The information above was gathered from:


"Abraham Wharfe." Geni. Geni.com, 2015. Web. 09 June 2015.
        <http://www.geni.com/people/Abraham-
         Wharfe/6000000021168216868>.


East, Elyssa. Dogtown: Death and Enchantment in a New England
       Ghost Town. New York: Free, 2009. Print.


"HODGKINS, COMMONWEALTH Vs., 401 Mass.  

       871." MassCases.com. Commonwealth of Massachusetts, n.d. Web. 09 June 2015.