Echoes Forward

As we settle into fall, it’s the perfect time to settle down for a good ghost story. Luckily, the Eastern Shore has no shortage of folklore. But the story I’d like to tell (or, rather, have others re-tell) technically belongs to our neighbors in Dorchester County.

Greenbriar Swamp sits roughly 25 miles southwest of Federalsburg, near the Blackwater area of Dorchester. There, along the Transquaking River and near the DeCoursey Bridge, generations have told the story of Big Liz – or Big Lizz, depending on the account – an enslaved woman whose ghost is said to wander the swamp carrying her own severed head. What I find interesting about this tale is that, as far as I can tell, it’s just a good old fashioned campfire tale told from generation to generation of Mid-Shore locals.

But if you’ve ever played a game of telephone, you know how this goes. Details are added, changed, or omitted, and motives and historical context turn from speculation to assumed fact. So I’m here to tell you all the ways this story has been told, and you can be the judge of what really happened.

The story begins during the Civil War, although exactly how it begins depends on who is telling it. According to paranormal researcher Mindie Burgoyne’s account in Chesapeake Ghosts, Big Liz (or rather, Lizz) was enslaved on a plantation in the region and her enslaver was believed to be a smuggler or Confederate sympathizer who was hiding Confederate money. The Eastern Shore did not see Civil War battles, Burgoyne explains, but local farms were apparently believed to have been used to hide Confederate funds. She also says that some enslaved people acted as Union informants, passing along information about Confederate activity. So in Burhoyne’s version, Big Liz was one of them, or at least was suspected to be.

The story goes that Big Liz’s enslaver assumed that she was responsible for information reaching the Union. Rather than simply confront her, he devised a plan that would both eliminate his suspected informant and protect his money. He took Big Liz into Greenbriar Swamp and instructed her to help him move and rebury his stash. Once they reached the hiding place, he told her to plant a sapling over the money so he could identify the location later. When Liz bent down to do so, he cut off her head and left her body in the swamp.

That basic story is repeated by the Edward H. Nabb Research Center at Salisbury University, which describes Big Liz as an enslaved woman and Union spy who was killed by her Confederate enslaver after he discovered that she was working for the Union. The Maryland Historical Trust likewise recognizes “DeCoursey Bridge – Legend of Big Liz” as a cultural resource associated with the murder of an enslaved woman who helped the Union. But the details begin to blur from there.

In Chesapeake Ghosts, Big Liz's enslaver returns home after killing her and is confronted by her ghost. In the 2025 Cambridge Spy retelling, things get scary as Big Liz appears in the night carrying her head, sometimes glowing blue, green or white, with eyes described as red or yellow. Different versions give her enslaver the name John Rustin and disagree over whether the weapon was a knife, machete, or sword.

Even the character of Big Liz herself changes from telling to telling. The Cambridge Spy notes that some accounts portray her as an exceptionally large and powerful woman, while others give her a much more ordinary appearance. The spelling of her name varies, too.

According to Burgoyne, strange lights began appearing around the swamp after Big Liz’s death, and she was said to emerge from the woods or mist, holding her severed head in one hand and beckoning people toward the swamp. She was supposedly offering to lead them to the Confederate treasure.

Another version, published by Pennsylvania Haunts and History, gives the supposed slave holder John Rustin a bit more background. They write that he was a Confederate fundraiser who operated a tobacco plantation near Bucktown, and that Rustin killed her with a tobacco knife after making her carry a chest of gold into the swamp. It also claims that Rustin himself died that same night after being visited by Big Liz's ghost in his bedroom.
And then there is the deal with the DeCoursey Bridge, which does really exist! I drove on it myself for research purposes (at the ripe daytime hour of 2 p.m.). The bridge crosses the Transquaking River near Greenbriar Swamp.
The Nabb Research Center describes the ritual of summoning Big Liz’s ghost as follows: park on the bridge at night, honking three times, flash the headlights, and turn off the car. According to the legend, all you have to do then is wait for Big Liz and her unfortunately detached head to appear. Chesapeake Ghosts gives a slightly different recipe: honk three times, flash the headlights twice, and then shut the car off. Another account from Maryland Haunted Houses also calls for two flashes.

In a What's Up? Media article, Dorchester County journalist Brice Stump recalled publishing his first Big Liz story in 1965. He said he learned the story through local oral history, talking with people who had heard it from previous generations. His version involved Big Liz accompanying her enslaver to bury Confederate gold before he killed her so she could not reveal its location.

So if you’re looking for a thrill, pay Big Liz a visit. I’ll take your word for whatever you see.