The Restless Skeleton of the Borrego Badlands

Photo via gotoborregosprings.com

Whisper in my ear that there is a U.S. State Park which has long been haunted by an enormous lantern-bearing skeleton, and, naturally, all I can do in response is hop up and down like an over-caffeinated kangaroo and shriek, “Blog post, here we come!” 

Southern California’s Borrego Badlands are ideal surroundings for bizarre folklore.  It’s a 20 mile wide, 15 mile long section of the enormous Anza-Borrego Desert State Park.  Although the area was under the sea in ancient times, today it is a mass of arid, desolate arroyos reminiscent of photos of the Martian landscape.  Having visited the place myself, I can attest that it has its charm, albeit of a stark, almost eerie fashion.

Our ghostly legend began with a prospector known as “Charley Arizona.”  Some time in the 1880s, Charley was traveling from Yuma, Arizona to San Diego.  One night, he camped near the appropriately named Superstition Mountain, about four miles southeast of Borrego.  He was awakened by the sound of his burros getting very agitated about something, and he went to see what was troubling them.  Some two hundred yards away, Charley saw a light like a lantern shining through the darkness.  Surrounding that light was a huge skeleton, about eight feet tall, staggering seemingly aimlessly through the desert.  Charley could "hear his bones a-rattlin!"  A few minutes later, the creature climbed a ridge and disappeared from view.

Two years later, two other prospectors camped in the same general area.  During the night, they were alarmed to see a flickering light going by in the distance.  One of the men insisted it was a tall skeleton carrying a lantern.  A few months later, the men were in Vallecito, California, when another prospector told them of having seen “a wandering stack of bones” in the badlands, carrying a light.  Like Charley, he thought the skeleton was just wandering around pointlessly.

Once talk of this peripatetic skeleton began circulating, more sightings emerged, some of them more reliable than others.  Two men went into the badlands, determined to see the strange being for themselves.  After three nights of hunting it down, they were not disappointed.  They chased after the skeleton as it wandered in the general direction of Fish Mountain.  In his 1940 book of Southwest folklore, “Golden Mirages,” Philip A. Bailey quoted one of the men as saying, “it would gallop up a hill with remarkable energy and then stop and putter around, walking in circles as though undecided what to do.  Then it would stalk majestically down the hill and across the plain, only to end up in some canyon busily tramping around.”  One of the men shot at the strange being, which didn't seem to trouble it in the least.  The men trailed after the skeleton for some three miles before it disappeared from view.  Other visitors to the badlands reported seeing a strange moving glow in the distance, without seeing the skeleton itself.

As for the interesting question of why Borrego was home to a giant wandering skeleton, most prospectors believed it was the spirit of a man who had died searching for the elusive Phantom Mine.  (Bailey commented, “The mine is known to exist, and its exact location is common knowledge, but for some inexplicable reason no one can find it.”)  Others theorized the apparition was of one Thomas “Pegleg” Smith, discoverer of a now-lost gold mine.  A mysterious ball of light has often been seen in the vicinity of Squaw Peak, but opinions vary about whether or not it’s connected to our well-lit bones.

In any case, I now have a strong urge to pack my bags and head back to those badlands for a spot of skeleton-hunting.  Who’s with me?