The Foley House Inn

Charm certainly abides at the quaint little bed & breakfast known as the Foley House Inn on Savannah's Chippewa Square. But something else seems to be in residence as well; something that has lingered for nearly 130 years.

As Savannah's oldest inn, the Foley House served as a boarding house in the late 1800's. The inn keeper was a woman named Mrs. Foley, a widow who took in boarders in order to make ends meet. Mrs. Foley was a kind and gracious woman, but a prudent woman as well. She was said to have been very concerned with checking references for those who sought to rent her rooms.

As legend has it, a fellow came calling on Mrs. Foley one afternoon to inquire about renting a room. He was something of a smooth talker and was able to convince the shrewd widow into renting to him even though he possessed no references. Against her better judgment she let him in.

As the story goes, one evening Mrs. Foley was in her bedchamber when this less-than-gentlemanly man burst through the door intent on doing her harm. Unfortunately for him, he had underestimated this old cookie. She jumped up and quickly grabbed the heavy silver candlestick from her nightstand and bashed him over the head with it, killing him. Mrs. Foley kept this a secret. Until her death bed that is.

While lying on her death bed she proceeded to tell the tale of a man that she had killed one night in self defense, a man whose body she had sealed up between the very walls of her boardinghouse. No one of course believed her. Especially not since she was dying of dementia. They simply thought she was a crazy old woman telling stories. Until...nearly a hundred years later, when the inn was going through renovations, workers discovered something quite gruesome indeed. The skeletal remains of a man were found literally inside the wall.

Today guests at the Foley House Inn experience the gracious hospitality that has been this inn's trademark for nearly a century and a half. But they experience other things as well. Guests in certain rooms will feel a passing gust of wind coming through their guestroom door, as if someone were rushing into the room. An added perk for this inn is that they allow small pets. These pets, however, seem to behave strangely in the Foley House Inn; staring intently at the wall and growling at the end of an empty corridor. In the late afternoons the figure of a man dressed in black and wearing a top hat has been seen in the garden.

A stay at the Foley House Inn, with all of its 19th century charm, is sure to please the most discriminating of travelers. In fact, some travelers seem to have never checked out.