HISTORIC AND HAUNTED

The Newport mansion Belcourt of Newport features a screaming suit of armor, a haunted gold coronation carriage, chairs that toss people off their seats and apparitions dancing in the ballroom.

Belcourt of Newport was built by Oliver Hazard Perry Belmont, the wastrel son of financier August Belmont and grandson of Commodore Matthew Perry. (His brother August financed the Cape Cod Canal.)  Richard Morris Hunt designed the mansion according to Perry’s wish to devote the first floor to carriages and stables for his beloved horses. He modeled the 60-room house on Louis XIII’s hunting lodge at Versailles.

Belmont married Alva Belmont, the ex-wife of his best friend William K. Vanderbilt, in 1896, and she began redesigning the mansion. After the Belmont’s died, Harold and Ruth Tinney bought Belcourt in 1956 and filled it with their own collection of art and antiques. The Tinneys opened the house to the public for ghost tours and as a museum.

When the Tinneys owned Belcourt, suits of armor stood in a row at one end of the ballroom. People say they’ve heard screams from one suit of armor as the owner relives his death. A spear tip pierced his eye through a slit in the helmet.

A carved wooden statue of a monk brings a ghost of a brown-robed monk along with him. The ghost always appeared in the same room as the statue.

In 2012, the Tinneys sold Belcourt to Carolyn Rafaelian (A part of the Alex and Ani family). Inspired by Alva’s determination, Carolyn is in the process of restoring the brilliant Belcourt of Newport to all of its former glory.

* Listing information and/or photos were researched on the Internet and provided by a third-party, article or property owner's website and is deemed accurate, but not guaranteed, to the best of our knowledge.