In June of 2025, we traveled to Frederick, Maryland, and one of the stops that we had to make was the old Frederick Court House. We visited the old Frederick Court House not only because of its rich history, but also because it has been the subject of several haunted claims.

When we got there, we saw that the building was closed for the weekend, but an event was being set up while we filmed outside. We filmed and moved on to the next location because even the participants didn't know what was going to happen.

Frederick, Maryland, is often called one of the most haunted towns in the state, and at the center of many of those stories stands the red brick City Hall on North Court Street. By day it is a working municipal building and a handsome example of nineteenth-century architecture. By night, according to locals and ghost tour guides, it becomes something else entirely, a place where centuries of trials, protests, and punishments seem to echo in the dark courtyard and along the dim hallways.

Long before the current structure rose here, this patch of ground was already a stage for high drama. In 1765, angry citizens gathered on this site to protest the British Stamp Act, burning effigies of royal officials in defiance of what they saw as unfair taxation. That act of rebellious theater happened years before the Boston Tea Party, and many like to say that the sparks of revolution still linger in the air around City Hall, giving the place a restless, charged feeling after dark.

The land soon became the heart of county justice. An early courthouse and jail stood here in the mid-1700s, where colonial magistrates heard cases ranging from petty theft to capital crimes. It is not hard to imagine the anxiety of defendants waiting for verdicts or the quiet grief of families learning that a loved one had been condemned. Modern storytellers sometimes connect today's unexplained footsteps and disembodied whispers to those early days, as if the people who once staked their futures on this square never truly left.

In 1785, a more substantial Georgian courthouse replaced the earlier building, symbolizing Frederick's growing importance. That solid structure seemed destined to last, but in 1861 a fire ripped through the courthouse and destroyed it. The cause was never fully explained, and the timing on the eve of the Civil War has fed later rumors. In local lore, that fire is sometimes described as the moment when the site's energy shifted from merely historic to truly haunted.

Out of the ashes rose the building known today as City Hall. Construction on the new courthouse began in 1862 and finished in 1864, giving Frederick a stately Italianate structure with a central pavilion and cupola, pressed brick walls, and decorative detailing. It stood not only as a symbol of law and order but also as a statement that Frederick had survived the upheaval of war and fire. Yet some residents say the spirits tied to the old courthouse simply moved into the new one, wandering the corridors of this fresh building as if it were just another chapter in their unfinished story.

During the Civil War years and long afterward, the courthouse saw its share of tense moments. Frederick sat at a crossroads of armies and loyalties, with soldiers and refugees moving through town and court cases reflecting a society under strain. Modern visitors sometimes report seeing what looks like a man in nineteenth-century attire standing near the front steps or in the second-floor windows, only for the figure to vanish when they look again. Guides often frame these sightings as echoes of wartime officials or onlookers whose concerns were never fully resolved.

By the early twentieth century, the courthouse had settled into its role as the center of county justice. In 1922, it hosted one of Frederick’s most notorious legal moments, the trial and sentencing of William Stultz for the murder of a city police officer. He would later be executed for the crime, and this case is sometimes tied to lingering sadness and heavy energy felt by people who walk through the square. Some say the memory of those grim proceedings still clings to the site.

When a new county courthouse opened nearby in the early 1980s, the old building transitioned from courthouse to City Hall. The change in function did not erase its past. Instead, it layered municipal offices and public meetings on top of centuries of trials, political protests, and public spectacles. Staff members and visitors sometimes talk about the strange contrast between modern offices and a building whose walls once witnessed life-or-death decisions.

Haunted tales today often focus on apparitions said to appear near the front entrance and in the park-like space out front. Some ghost tour narratives mention three ghostly men occasionally seen together, lingering on the steps or just inside the lobby as if locked in a quiet, eternal argument. People describe them as solid one moment and transparent the next, fading away when someone gets too close. Whether these figures are thought to be judges, lawyers, or condemned men varies from storyteller to storyteller.

Other stories tie directly back to the 1765 Stamp Act protest. Visitors walking past the historic marker sometimes report catching a glimpse of movement out of the corner of their eye, shadows shaped like men in colonial clothing gathered as if around an invisible fire. Some say they hear faint murmurs or a low rumble of voices when no one else is nearby, adding to the belief that the patriots who once burned effigies on this ground may still linger.

Inside the building, the ghost stories become more intimate. There are accounts of footsteps pacing along empty hallways when most of the staff have gone home, or the soft creak of doors opening and closing on their own. A few people working late in City Hall report hearing what sounds like the rustle of heavy fabric just behind them, only to find no one there. These sounds are often attributed to long-dead judges or clerks still tending to unfinished business.

Some tales focus on the buildings' lower levels and older staircases, places where the stone and brick feel close and the air seems heavier. Visitors on ghost tours say they feel unexplained cold spots there, even on warm evenings. Others report a sense of being watched from the landing between floors. These uneasy feelings are often linked to prisoners who once passed through the building, climbing those same steps toward verdicts that changed their lives.

Given Fredericks' Civil War connections, it is no surprise that soldier spirits appear in the legends as well. The area around City Hall has seen troops march, wounded men carried through the streets, and heated debates over loyalty. Some modern observers claim to see fleeting shapes in worn uniforms near the fountain or along the edge of the square, especially during reenactment weekends or around local battle anniversaries.

Today, City Hall is a regular stop on multiple ghost tours that wind through Frederick's historic district. These tours highlight the city's past in terms of war, executions, and restless spirits, presenting City Hall as a landmark rich with eerie stories. Its brick facade often appears in ghost tour ads lit dramatically, as if the building itself is part of the supernatural tale.

Participants on these tours sometimes leave with stories of their own. Some say their photos of City Hall show cloudy streaks, odd mists, or glowing shapes that were not visible when they took the picture. Others describe feeling a sudden sadness while standing in front of the building or an urge to look over their shoulder as they walk across the brick path. Even those who do not experience anything unusual say the history alone makes the building feel alive with echoes.

Skeptics argue that City Hall is precisely the kind of place where someone might expect to feel spooked. The architecture is old, the stories are dramatic, and the setting encourages imagination. Drafty hallways can create cold spots, settling beams can mimic footsteps, and reflections in old windows can look like mysterious figures. For many, that is explanation enough.

Believers, however, see these recurring reports as patterns rather than coincidences. They point to the emotional residue left behind by rebellions, fires, wartime unrest, executions, and decades of legal decisions. To them, the apparitions on the steps, the footsteps in empty corridors, and the lingering sense of being watched are signs that the past is still very much present.

In the end, the haunting history of Frederick City Hall is deeply tied to the history of Frederick itself. The building stands where revolutionaries once protested the crown, where fires reshaped the skyline, where wartime tensions simmered, and where justice shaped the lives of countless citizens. By day it remains a functioning center of local government. By night it becomes a place where the past feels unusually close, close enough that some visitors swear they can feel it just over their shoulder.