When it comes to spooky travel destinations, graveyards supposedly haunted by vampires rank near the top of the list. From the Rocky Mountains to the historic streets of Glasgow, each site carries its own chilling tale of blood‑sucking specters and desperate townsfolk trying to keep the undead at bay.
Why These Graveyards Supposedly Attract Vampires
Folklore, disease, and a dash of imagination have turned ordinary burial grounds into hotbeds of vampire lore. Whether it’s a misplaced stake, a cursed crypt, or a tree that seems to bleed, the stories we’ll explore below prove that the line between history and horror is often just a few inches of earth.
10 Lafayette Municipal Cemetery Lafayette, Colorado
Some headstones seem magnetically drawn to legend. In Colorado’s Lafayette Municipal Cemetery, a modest stone bearing the name Theodore “Fodor” Glava—an immigrant laborer who died of influenza at 43—has sparked a vampire saga. According to local lore, Glava was a tall, thin Transylvanian with dark hair and unnaturally long fingernails. When townspeople caught wind of his supposed nocturnal habits, they drove a wooden spike into his heart, allegedly killing the vampire and birthing a solitary tree that still rises over his grave.
Today, curious teens and paranormal investigators still wander the cemetery, hoping to catch a glimpse of the lingering legend.
9 Resurrection Cemetery Justice, Illinois
Just south of Chicago, Resurrection Cemetery is famous for the phantom hitchhiker known as Resurrection Mary. But the ghostly activity doesn’t stop at a girl in a party dress—nightly scratching sounds echo from a hidden grave, leading some investigators to label the culprit an unnamed vampire clawing its way to the surface after sunset.
8 Southern Necropolis Glasgow, Scotland
The Gorbals district’s Southern Necropolis holds over a quarter‑million tombs, including notable figures like Sir Thomas Lipton. In September 1954, police officer Alex Deeprose responded to a frantic call: dozens of children patrolling the grounds with knives and wooden stakes, hunting a two‑meter‑tall vampire with metal teeth who allegedly ate two local boys. Though no murders were ever confirmed, the children’s nightly patrols sparked a brief panic and even forged an unlikely alliance between Christians, teachers, and Scottish communists, who blamed American horror media for the frenzy.
7 The Erie Cemetery Erie, Pennsylvania
When a town shares its name with a great lake, eerie stories tend to follow. Erie Cemetery houses the so‑called Vampire’s Crypt—a towering mausoleum of interlocking V‑shaped slabs. Legend claims the crypt exudes an oppressive, unnatural vibe. One daring teen scaled its walls on a dare, only to be terrified by a specter and later die in a freak accident. Another tale tells of a widow besieged by a pack of feral dogs guarding the crypt. Rumors also suggest the crypt and a nearby Witches’ Circle have hosted pagan rites that might have resurrected the vampire, echoing the plot of Dracula A.D. 1972.
6 St. Mary’s Churchyard Tarrant Gunville, Dorset
During the height of vampire superstition, suicide victims were often suspected of becoming undead. In Dorset’s St. Mary’s Churchyard, workers unearthed the corpse of “Old Doggett,” later identified as William Doggett, a steward who’d tried to profit from his employer’s estate. To prevent his return, they tied a yellow silk ribbon around his legs. Yet folklore insists his ghost still roams the nearby Eastbury House, waiting for a headless coach driver, and that his blood‑stained visage haunts the churchyard itself.
5 Dellwood Cemetery Manchester, Vermont
Captain Isaac Burton, a celebrated war hero turned deacon, faced a tragic series of tuberculosis deaths. After his first wife, Rachel Harris, succumbed, Burton married Hulda Powell, who also died of consumption. Convinced a vampire was draining his family, Burton and Judge John S. Pettibone exhumed Rachel’s body, removed her heart, liver, and lungs, burned the organs, and mixed the ashes with water—then drank the concoction. The public spectacle drew crowds from across Vermont, all eager to witness the vampire’s destruction. Today, Burton and his fourth wife rest in Dellwood Cemetery, while Rachel’s lost grave continues to intrigue ghost hunters.
4 Santa Paula Cemetery Guadalajara, Mexico
El Panteón de Belén, better known as Santa Paula Cemetery, is famed for a vampire tree. Legend says a vampire once terrorized Guadalajara, first preying on animals, then infants. Citizens formed a vigilante squad, drove a stake through the creature’s heart, and buried the body beneath massive concrete slabs. Over time, a mysterious tree cracked the slabs, growing from the staked heart. Folklore warns that cutting a limb from this tree will cause blood to appear, and if the tree ever lifts the coffin, the vampire will rise and hunt the living once more.
3 Culmen Kaldus, Poland
“Culmen,” the Latin name for a medieval burial ground in Kaldus, Poland, dates back to the 10th century. Archaeologists led by Prof. Wojciech Chudziak uncovered 14 skeletons from the 11th‑century layers that had been decapitated, crushed, and buried on their sides—clear evidence of anti‑vampire rites. At the time, Christianity had not fully permeated the region, allowing such superstitions to flourish. The remains of a man and a woman, both showing disease‑related trauma, illustrate how seriously medieval Poles took the threat of the undead.
2 Dummerston Center Cemetery Dummerston, Vermont
In 1859, Henry David Thoreau documented New Englanders blaming tuberculosis on vampires. Their remedy: exhume suspected bodies, remove vital organs, burn them, and mix the ashes with water for a curative drink. Lieutenant Spaulding, whose children died of consumption, followed this practice. He dug up a child’s grave, burned the heart, lungs, and stomach, and fed the mixture to a sick daughter—who recovered. Though Spaulding and his wife rest in unmarked graves, two of their children lie in Dummerston Center Cemetery, where visitors still hope to glimpse a vampire ghost.
1 Hollywood Cemetery Richmond, Virginia
William Wortham Pool, an unremarkable bookkeeper from Mississippi, was interred in Richmond’s Hollywood Cemetery in 1913. The legend of the Richmond Vampire began after the Church Hill Tunnel collapse in 1925, which killed several workers. Superstitious locals claimed the disaster awakened a blood‑soaked creature that fled the tunnel and vanished into Pool’s crypt. An alternate tale names Benjamin Mosby, a mutilated tunnel worker, who allegedly ran into the cemetery before dying. Though the stories lack concrete evidence, they have cemented Hollywood Cemetery’s reputation as one of America’s most intriguing vampire sites.