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Nell Cropsey's ghost still waits for her suitor

By Mike Conley | The McDowell News

Published: November 19, 2008

In 1898, a merchant from up North named William Cropsey took up residence in a house along the banks of the Pasquotank River in Elizabeth City. He brought with him his family, which consisted of his wife and several pretty daughters. One of them was Ella Maud Cropsey, who went by the nickname Nell. The beautiful girl had light brown hair and piercing blue eyes. Naturally, Nell Cropsey attracted many young men in Elizabeth City. It was expected that she would soon get married and start raising a family.
Nell had a steady boyfriend named Jim Wilcox and they went together for three years. But has time went on, Jim did not propose marriage to Nell and the young couple began to have their disagreements about their future together.
On the evening of Nov. 20, 1901, another young man named Roy Crawford arrived at the Cropsey home to call on Nell's sister Ollie. He was there at the same time that Jim came to visit Nell. Jim and Nell were the first to go to the front porch and say their goodbyes. Ollie and Roy went out next to the front porch and saw neither Jim nor Nell. She assumed Jim had left and her sister had gone upstairs to the bedroom that the two girls shared. But when Ollie went back to her room, Nell was not there, according to the book "Amazing North Carolina" by T. Jensen Lacey.
Ollie went straight to bed, probably thinking her sister would join her soon. When she awoke some time later, Nell had still not come home. She reported Nell missing to the rest of her family, who quickly started a massive search for the missing 19-year-old girl. She had apparently vanished without a trace on the night of Nov. 20, 1901.
For weeks, the search continued as the entire community desperately looked for Nell. Then on Christmas Eve, William Cropsey received an anonymous letter postmarked from Utica, N.Y. The writer stated that after Jim Wilcox left Nell that night, she had heard the family's dog barking and walked out into the yard to investigate. She saw a man trying to steal her father's pig and threatened to turn him in. The man then hit Nell on the head with a stick, carried her to a boat, and rowed off with a dead or unconscious Nell.
The writer of the mysterious letter also drew a diagram and marked with an X the spot where Nell's body could be found. For some reason, the police paid little attention to this cryptic letter. One of the weird things about it was that the letter was postmarked in New York, which is where the Cropsey family came from originally.
Thirty-seven days after she vanished, the corpse of Nell Cropsey was finally found floating in the cold waters of the Pasquotank River. Her body was carried back to the family home and an autopsy was performed there. It showed that she had been killed by head trauma.
Jim Wilcox, her boyfriend, was the prime suspect. He stated that he and Nell had a serious argument on the night of Nov. 20, apparently about his failure to propose marriage. He stated he had broken off their relationship and left her weeping on the front porch. He steadfastly denied having anything to do with her killing. Nevertheless, Jim was jailed under suspicion of murder. At one point, a lynch mob came to jail so they could drag Jim off and hang him. William Cropsey himself managed to disperse the mob, according to a Web site.
Jim was finally tried for murder in 1902 and found guilty. He was sentenced to death by hanging. However, a mistrial was declared and he got another trial. He was again convicted but this time he was sent off to prison where he remained until pardoned by the governor of North Carolina in 1920.
Some believe that he was innocent of the crime, just as he maintained. One theory holds that Nell's father was the real murderer.
After his release, Jim Wilcox lived as a recluse and several years later committed suicide with a shotgun. Ollie's old boyfriend Roy Crawford also took his own life.
Today, the Cropsey family home still stands in Elizabeth City but it is not open to the public. It is said that the beautiful ghost of young Nell Cropsey can be seen in one of the windows, still waiting for her suitor.

Contact Mike Conley at 652-3313, ext. 3422 or e-mail nconley@mcdowellnews.com.