Original subtitles

An idyllic new England town

Surrounded by a cursed forest.

It is well known as the dark woods.

Here darkness reigns.

You have all that evil that went on over there.

Satanic cults.

He called himself the son of satan.

You could see pentagrams painted everywhere.

We saw a group of people standing around with rifles.

All echoes of a hidden past and a centuries-old portal.

To the underworld.

I felt like I was in a horror movie.

But it wasn't. It was real.

For most of history,

New England was blanketed in forests.

But today, many of these trees have been cut down

And replaced by modern housing and urban sprawl.

However, a few remain along with their ancient powers.

I worked for the freetown police department

And I worked for the bristol county

District attorney's office.

Alan alves spent his career patrolling

The freetown state forest.

That state forest is not the same as any other forest

Anywhere that I've ever been in my life.

The hairs on your arms stand up on end, and if you notice

When you're in the woods, you don't hear birds.

You don't see deer.

It just feels very eerie here, very eerie.

It's, like, cold.

When I was a young rookie and I rode with the lieutenant,

And I saw these people in the woods.

Red robes and stuff like that around the fire

And I said "what's going on here?"

He said, "those are just hippies left over from the '60s.

Don't worry about it."

But it turned out not to be.

These groups, these people were doing some

Very heinous things in the forest.

Alan's career will take him

Deep into this fortress of darkness...

...Commonly known as the cursed forest.

Settled by the pilgrims in 1659,

Freetown is one of the oldest communities

In the united states.

Today, residents paint a serene picture of a modest village

That takes care of its own.

I grew up here in freetown, massachusetts,

Lived here pretty much all my life.

You know, it is very much a friendly country setting.

Freetown is a very small town.

A little, quaint town with not too much industry going on.

That's the way the locals seem to like it.

It's a good place to grow up.

The people are good.

We look out for each other.

But one thing sets freetown apart

From the many other idyllic villages that pepper the region.

Within the town of freetown there is a huge forest.

That's about a 10,000-acre preserve.

And it's called the freetown-fall

River state forest.

As clean and quaint and beautiful as freetown is,

Everybody who lives around here knows about the shadow

That the forest casts upon the town.

I always describe the forest as its own entity.

There's something in the forest.

It is well known as the cursed forest.

Residents commonly refer to the freetown state forest

As the cursed forest

Because it is well known as a place where terrible

And unexplainable things happen.

I believe the curse is to keep people out of the forest.

I believe the power of the curse is what's fueling

All the bad things that have gone on.

Many keep their distance at all costs.

When I was growing up my parents told me

They never wanted me to go in the forest by myself.

You definitely feel that

There might be something walking with you.

But for others the forest is a source of curiosity

That's impossible to resist.

When I was a kid, my friends and I would spend a lot of time

Out walking in the woods and exploring the swamps.

James rice grew up just steps from the woods.

But when he was 12 years old, he had an experience

That made him understand why his hometown state forest

Is believed to be cursed.

We're walking down elm street, a friend and I

And we happen to notice some footsteps.

And we thought that was unusual.

So we started following the footprints

And they disappeared into the woods.

So we followed this path for quite some ways to the woods.

And I just felt very uncomfortable.

This sort of sense of dread and a mental chill.

We could see a girl coming from the woods

And someone's chasing her or something's chasing her.

When we got there she'd had disappeared.

And I called my friend over and said, "I'm feeling

Something very strange here."

I could sense sadness or despair

Or fear sort of all combining at once.

My friend said, I don't feel anything."

I said, "well, no, come stand exactly where I'm standing."

And he said, "wow, yeah, you're right.

I don't understand it

And I've never felt this way before.

I don't feel comfortable in this particular place."

I think a part of me wondered

If maybe what I was experiencing was a call for help,

But being a 12-year-old boy I had no idea

How I could possibly help this person or this spirit.

James doesn't realize that the mysterious woman

May have been warning him of the dangers in the cursed forest.

Within months of this unexplainable encounter,

James has another more terrifying experience.

One Halloween night, we were coming back

From a little bit of trick or treating

And we saw a car that looked like an elderly couple.

We thought that they were lost, but they pulled down this road

With great deliberation

As if they knew exactly where they were going.

We built up the courage to go down there.

When we got down there just around this area

We found a burned cross...

...And some bones from some animals.

My friend said, "wow, I think that what we're seeing

Is some sort of gathering on Halloween night."

We saw a group of people standing around with rifles.

And they turned in our direction.

We weren't sure if the intention

Was just to scare us or if they had a darker intention.

Eventually we knew we'd have to come out from behind the rocks

And we didn't know if somebody would be

Lying in wait for us at that time.

And they weren't.

And we were able to get away safely.

James wonders if this terrifying encounter

Has anything to do with the mysterious girl

And the chilling sense of dread

He experienced a few months earlier.

Is it all evidence of a curse

That earned the dark forest its nickname,

And what was this menacing group?

These are questions that retired detective alan alves

Began asking early in his career when he was assigned

To investigate the freetown state forest.

Originally believed by other officers to be harmless hippies,

Alan soon learned that the group was far more dangerous

Than he could have ever imagined.

They would tie ribbons

That you could track.

The yellow means turn right.

You come to another ribbon that might be red.

Turn left.

Until you came to the site of the actual rituals.

And that's where we would find

Some of the evidence the ritual took place.

A large stone.

Pentagrams in the ground.

Dead animals.

There was one where we found 20 or 25 calves

Completely drained of blood.

I felt like I was in a horror movie.

But it wasn't. It was real.

In the center of freetown lies a forest

Constantly teeming with mystery and terror.

Are all the horrors people experience today

Connected to a mysterious curse from the past?

Police officer alan alves began examining

Disturbing activity

In these so-called cursed woods in the 1970s, embarking on

One of the most frightening investigations of his career.

I started doing research and I brought

Photographs of what I took, what I saw in the state forest.

Alan discovered that the pictures

That he had taken matched up with symbols

Commonly used in satanic rituals.

And I started understanding what was going on there.

There was rituals worshipping satan.

Since first stepping into the forest,

Alan felt a dark energy.

And as a young and hungry rookie, he was determined

To find out the source of the evil gripping his hometown.

He soon learned that a man named carl drew

Was at the center of the disturbing activity

Taking place in freetown forest.

I think the forest brought up the darkness in carl drew.

When carl drew's crimes were discovered,

He was brought in for questioning.

To this day, a few figures cast as dark a shadow

As this menacing cult leader.

I saw an evil.

It was like looking at the devil himself.

He called himself the son of satan.

He believed that satan will punish you

Even if he has carl drew do it.

Carl drew was a pimp.

If any called of carl drew's girls got out of line,

They would be violently punished.

It was a very active cult.

They were doing their rituals in the forest.

You have all that evil that went on over there.

Rumors of cult activity

Begin to spread through freetown

Giving the cursed forest an even more sinister reputation.

As a teenager, local resident john brightman

Started to hear the stories

But he had no idea that the area of the forest

That he and his friends often explored

Was once the site of horrific cult sacrifices.

I became aware of some of the darker things

That went on here in the freetown state forest

When I was probably about 14.

I was told a lot of bad things happened there

And that people were afraid to go into the forest.

But when john ventures into the woods on a sunny day

In 1984, he can't imagine the dark energy

He will come in contact with.

I was riding my bike with some friends.

I was riding fast. I pulled away from them.

And I needed to stop to let them catch up.

And I hear this noise.

It's almost like a branch break in the back.

I noticed this figure

About maybe 3-1/2, 4-foot-tall, child-like,

Standing there staring right at me.

You could see right through it.

His eyes were just piercing black.

Never said a word.

Never moved.

I can hear the bikes coming.

And as I turned back, it was gone.

It was the first time that anything like this

Has happened to me, and it really did shake me.

It sent chills down my bones

Because I didn't know what it was.

John's encounter with the black-eyed boy

Haunts him to this day.

I was right about where the car is

And I just happened to turn around

And right here

I saw the little boy.

The little boy just standing like this.

Just kind of looking right up at me.

The memories are spinning through my head

And I'm just kinda thinking of me

As a little boy kind of freaking out again.

It's stuck with me for so long and still to this day

That it made me draw it out.

And I decided to finally get it tattooed on me.

Over the years, john also repeatedly returned

To the site where he encountered the black-eyed boy.

On one of his visits he noticed a beaten-down shack.

The shack that used to be at this site was here

When I was a young kid.

And it was very broken down

But it was covered with graffiti and satanic symbols and signs.

Pentagrams painted everywhere.

Hearing the stories of what I grew up hearing

And thinking this was so close to home, it really startled me.

When I think about what could have happened,

It scared me.

Back in the 1970s, detective alan alves

Was once called to this very location to investigate

An ominous shack rumored to be associated

With a disturbing cult activity in the area.

I was directed to an area

Where these hunters found the bunker.

The cults are very secretive, they're very protective.

They're the ones who become very dangerous.

The horror that he is about to unearth reveals

A whole new level to the group's depravity.

As a child growing up in the mid-1980s,

John brightman came face-to-face with the dark side

Of the freetown forest,

When he encountered a mysterious black-eyed child

Near an ominous shack covered with satanic symbols.

It's just a few miles from town and is a site

That detective alan alves had also discovered in the 1970s

When he was investigating disturbing cult activity.

What he found there were the makings of a nightmare.

Chair had an upside-down cross on it.

And then there was all kind of baby clothes all there.

And then they had several dolls.

Some with their eyes taken out some with the heads off.

I learned that in the satanic religion sacrifices

Of newborn babies

Are the best sacrifice followed by children, followed by female.

Though it is never proven that children were sacrificed,

Eventually the cult's leader, carl drew, is arrested

For murdering one of his followers.

And the activity in the forest seems to subside.

But john's encounter with the black-eyed boy suggests

That a dark presence continues to linger.

I started learning the history of the forest

And heard about the cults and the rituals.

Who knows if the black-eyed child

Could be possibly one of the victims of this cult.

John will always wonder if the mysterious spirit

Who he encountered by the satanic shack

Is connected to carl drew's cult.

But he is not the only one to have an unexplainable encounter

With a disturbing apparition.

Friends luann joly and rené car live near the forest.

One day, a walk in the woods

Leads to a chilling confrontation.

René and I were in the forest walking through.

And I thought I saw a figure, a dark figure

Step behind a tree.

It felt like something else was there with us, a presence.

But there was no one for miles around.

I was scared. I even stepped down

And I looked around with my flashlight.

Moments later, I heard a voice say...

Carl drew.

Was this a victim or a warning to stay away?

When you hear the name carl drew,

It is like somebody poured ice water down your back.

It was very, very upsetting.

But not every eerie encounter

Can be connected to carl drew.

You have people right up to today, they're enacting

The same kind of things that the cult did.

Which came first, the chicken or the egg?

You know, in this case, was there a negative energy

Before the cult came

And that's why they even picked the forest?

The problem was that strange things in the state parks

Didn't stop with carl drew or end with carl drew.

What is the curse that lies beneath the surface

Of the forest and seems to attract

So much darkness and evil?

Travis pike grew up in freetown

And heard all of the stories.

It has quite the reputation.

Despite that reputation,

When travis was a teenager

The cult hadn't been active in years

And he and his friends enjoyed the eerie feeling they got

Exploring the freetown forest

We're all used to being out in the woods.

So when we started to come out on some of these old dirt roads

You get a sense of being completely isolated

And on top of that you always felt like

You were kind of being watched.

But one day, travis had an experience

In the cursed forest that still shakes him to his core.

It's just a group of friends in a rural town

With not much really to do.

So we would go out to have a bonfire.

I was kind of standing over the firepit

Trying to get it going and...

...One of my friends had yelled, you know,

"I think there's somebody over here."

Guys, I think there's someone over here.

Hey! Who's in there?

Hello?

Hey.

We could all see bits of something

Moving through the brush.

He was there.

We were kind of yelling, "hey, why are you following us?"

We never got any answer.

Who's back there?

It was almost taunting us to come into the woods.

- Come on, let's get out of here. - Yeah, let's go.

Everybody panicked and freaked out.

- Hurry up! - Come on!

Damn it! Come on, please?

And we turned the keys and nothing happened.

- Start the car. - I'm trying.

- Start it! - Come on!

- Go! Go! - It's not starting.

You got to be kidding me.

Come on!

Hurry!

Let's go, let's go!

And when I went to jump in the driver's side of my truck...

What is it?

I went pale and all the hair on my neck stood up.

In a forest where unexplainable encounters

Frequently occur and a dark energy

Is rumored to inspire evil,

An ominous note is enough to send travis pike

Into a fit of terror.

Jump back in the car and turn the key.

- Start it. Start the car. - Stat the car!

And again, nothing happened. Everybody's freaking out.

Hurry! Hurry.

And then the third time I turned the key...

- Yeah! - Yes! Yes!

...The car started like nothing was wrong.

And we left that dirt road sideways.

Who was the author of this threatening note

And what did it mean?

After I had that experience it kind of intrigued me.

Was it just us being anxious and scared or was there actually

Something else at work?

Travis isn't alone in feeling

That there might be a threatening presence

Lurking in the trees.

Many believe that there are dark forces in the forest.

Years after alan alves investigated

Carl drew's evil cult, disturbing things

Continue to happen in these mysterious woods.

Evil things, satanic things still went on in the forest.

People were still having rituals,

People were committing suicide,

Other people had been found dead there.

Why does everyone pick the forest?

Something's drawing them to it.

The freetown state forest appears to be a force field

Like no other.

Something deep in these woods

Has an immense power to bring out evil.

It's interesting with route 24,

People call it massachusetts's deadliest highway.

It goes right through the forest,

And it's very narrow.

Manny famalore has been a paramedic in freetown

For almost 20 years.

He knows the horror stories well.

A lot of people say that there's

Really negative energy in this area.

I believe that there must be something in this area

Because with the stories consistent,

There has got to be something

That keeps them the way that they are.

In his job, manny has seen trends that suggest

All the chatter about the cursed forest

Is more than just speculation.

He has seen an unusually high number of car accidents

On route 24, the highway

That runs directly through the freetown state forest.

In 2009, there was over 650 accidents.

On route 24 in freetown, this was the scene

Shortly after 4:30 this evening.

The victim is 53-year-old...

In 2017, there was over 500 accidents.

Massachusetts state police have confirmed

That one person died at the scene.

A lot of these accidents have fatalities

And these are very, very violent accidents

And people can't explain why there's so many on this highway.

There's deaths everywhere, but there's a consistency

In the deaths and in the suicides in the area.

And it really makes you wonder,

Is there something that's drawing that negative energy?

Manny has a theory that the forest's history

May provide an important clue.

People say that the area is cursed.

So could it be because the area was built parallel

To an old indian trail?

But it's just one of those mysteries.

Those who know the history of the region

Are certain that the experiences of the native americans here

Have contributed to the forest's dark energy.

Long before the cult activity

And other modern murders,

The native american wampanoag people

Faced horrors in these cursed woods

That nearly led to their annihilation.

The wampanoag people came up from the south as the ice

Retreated, as the bays were formed.

We've been here about 12,000 years.

Hartman deetz is a member

Of the mashpee wampanoag tribe.

The freetown state forest in particular

Is an area where wampanoag people have

Had ongoing presence.

One place in the forest that has always been

Especially significant to the wampanoag people

Is the hockomock swamp.

Now separated by modern architecture,

The hockomock swamp was considered

Part of the freetown state forest,

Wetlands to be respected and feared.

The wampanoags felt that this swamp held

A lot of negative energy.

That it was basically a gateway to their version of hades.

In fact, the name hockomock swamp loosely translated

From algonquin means "dark place" or "place of the devil."

A local author, andrew lake, has researched

The wampanoag's troubled history with the swamp.

From the time that the pilgrims landed in plymouth

The wampanoags would tell the settlers not

To venture too far in the swamp

Because they may never come back.

This was considered to be a very spooky place

Of superstition and supernatural beings.

Despite these warnings, tensions between

The wampanoags and the european settlers arose, and a bloody war

Was fought for control of the lands

Surrounding the hockomock swamp.

King philip's war, as it's known, is the war

That was fought in the 1670s

Between the wampanoag people and the english.

There's conflicts over land transactions which are happening

Very constantly and big chunks of land

Are being transferred from native hands

To foreigner hands.

And ultimately people fought back and forth and whole towns

And whole villages were destroyed on both sides.

The king philip's war was actually bloodier

Than our own civil war, american civil war, per capita.

It was a very horrible, horrible war where both sides

Did very horrible things to one another.

Some believe that the brutality of the war

Was due to its proximity to the hockomock swamp

With all its mystical powers.

The idea that the forest was cursed began to take shape.

Because even the warfare

Was almost horrific and supernatural.

I mean, there were crimes committed on both sides

To women and children that were just absolutely unspeakable.

And a lot of people believe

That it was supernatural forces within the area

That may have actually influenced the wampanoag

And the plymouth colony to be so violent towards one another.

Like the spirits reminding residents of the cult

And other modern evil, there is unexplainable activity

That harks back to the king philip's war.

There have been the stories of drumbeats.

That happens at all the locations

That seem to be key to the king philip's war.

We've heard the stories and we were out there.

We heard drumming, we heard 15 beats in intervals of three.

Boom boom boom. Boom boom boom.

It was pretty dramatic.

And it wasn't anybody messing with us.

You hear the drumming.

It's kind of an eerie feeling that,

"hey, there's something out there

That wants to play this for you."

Mysterious encounters with spirits

And vicious criminal activity

In the freetown state forest

Follow in a long tradition of violence and blood

That has been spilled for centuries.

It could be argued that the hockomock swamp

And freetown seem to be the real centers

For the spirit activity because of their connection to the war.

The dark history trickled down the evil

That could be responsible for the king philip's war

May be the reason why you have such dark crimes

Such as the satanic activity.

To this day people still report very strange

And unsettling things around this area.

In the cursed forest, a spot known

As the assonet ledge has been the unfortunate site

Of many suicides.

Could this have something to do with its proximity

To the hockomock swamp?

The first time I went up there,

I felt an enormous feeling to jump.

And I backed away from it.

It was really a strong feeling

And then I tried to get back

And it was a strange feeling that I was gonna fall.

And I got further and further back.

And I've never walked to that ledge ever since.

Once a bunch of us friends were at the assonet ledge.

I'm afraid of heights, would not go near the edge.

And I felt this weird feeling come over me.

And my friends saw me start walking

To the edge of the ledge.

They thought I was gonna jump.

And I don't remember any of it.

One local legend says that during

The king philip's war, a number of wampanoag warriors

Leapt to their deaths from the assonet ledge

To avoid being killed by the colonists.

Might this be the reason people feel

That they are being lured towards the edge?

Haunted by their own experiences at the assonet ledge

And throughout the forest, john, alan, and andrew

Decide to see if they can connect

With the source of the curse.

We've always been told don't go there at night

And a lot of people will purposely stay out of there

And I'm nervous about being there at night right now

Because of what could be going on

Or what could happen.

You know, a lot of people have gone into the woods

And some haven't come out.

What is the evil that's in here

That draws the people to come here and interact

And cause the trouble that they cause

And the problems that they bring here?

I mean, to have that much crime,

I mean, and satanic stuff all concentrated

In one area like that.

It is a place I find strange. This is no doubt about it.

Let's face it, the native americans

In this area always felt that the swamps

Were special places places, places to fortify.

But this place right here, the hockomock,

This is a place of darkness, a place of evil.

The indians always known, it's always been.

It could show itself.

Andrew, john, and alan are about to venture

Into the heart of the hockomock swamp.

They have all been impacted by the cursed woods

And are uniting in a mission to confront the source of the evil

Head on.

It is a crazy, crazy place, that's for sure.

I don't know. It might be my imagination

But it does feel heavy back here.

Yes, very, very heavy back here.

It is very, very quiet. Very quiet.

My experience has been, you know, human activity

Doesn't shut tree frogs up. Those things are awful quiet.

Do you feel cold?

It does -- it does feel like the temperature's dropped.

It does.

And being summertime, almost the first week of July,

It should not be this cold but it has dropped.

As the group moves deeper into the swamp,

They begin to feel that they are not alone.

The hell was that?

What the hell was that?

I heard some movement over there.

Yeah, you did too. Right? Yeah.

You definitely heard that, like, a little splash.

I did. Yeah.

Hey, andrew? Yes.

Come here and take a look at this.

Straight ahead, where my light is.

We're being watched right now.

The dark energy emanating from the hockomock swamp

Is believed by many to be the root of the evil

Pervading the freetown state forest.

Something was reflecting back, looking back us.

You mean like eyes? Yeah, like eyes, yes.

John, alan, and andrew are venturing deeper

Into the notorious hockomock swamp.

They are experiencing the dark energy

That usually keeps people away

And believe that a mysterious presence is following them.

You know, the indians would warn the settlers,

You know, don't go too far into it

And you don't get lured into it.

Are we allowing our own fascination,

Our own interests, our own curiosity

To have us walk further and further into this?

And that's what I'm getting afraid of.

As they get closer to the heart of the swamp,

The forest's dark energy becomes too much.

I can't. I'm feeling very uncomfortable over here.

Yeah. Yeah. You know, you were saying earlier,

Maybe we could find, you know, the evil that's in here.

I don't know, maybe if we go a little further

We're going to and I don't know if that's such a good idea.

Not what we want to find. Yeah.

No, I agree.

The group stops in their tracks.

They are not comfortable traveling any deeper

Into the dark swamplands.

Just the heaviness of it.

It was uncomfortable.

It made me very nervous

And anxious to actually get out of there.

Yeah, no, I'm glad you said it

'cause I was keeping it to myself,

I didn't want to, you know. Yep.

You guys ready to get out of here?

From the ancient powers of the hockomock swamp,

To the bloodshed during the king philip's war,

To murders, suicides, accidents,

Cult sacrifices, and mysterious encounters with lost souls,

The freetown state forest

Has more than earned its reputation

As a cursed forest.

And many freetown locals believe

That their state park is destined to be cursed forever.

I was definitely skeptical growing up

But the more time I spend out here

The more I feel that there's definitely something not right.

I think freetown state park will always be remembered

As an odd and strange place.

Everybody around the area knows about it.

Freetown will always be haunted by its dark history.

There will always be something that is attaching to this town.