Berkeley Castle West Virginia: History and Reported Hauntings

Reviewed by Josh N · Updated August 27, 2026 · How we verify

Berkeley Castle West Virginia sits on a hill above the spa town of Berkeley Springs, a Gilded Age fantasy in stone that has been drawing curious travelers for well over a century. Officially it is the Samuel Taylor Suit Cottage, sometimes listed as Berkeley Springs Castle. It was begun in 1885 as a private retreat for a wealthy Washington, D.C. colonel who died before the work was done, and it has carried a reputation for ghostly activity ever since. That reputation rests on stories told by visitors and paranormal enthusiasts, not on anything that has been documented or proven.

Quick Facts

• Also known as: Samuel Taylor Suit Cottage, Berkeley Castle, Berkeley Springs Castle
• Location: On a hill above Berkeley Springs, West Virginia
• Built: Construction began in 1885 for Colonel Samuel Taylor Suit of Washington, D.C.
• Completed: Early 1890s, after Suit’s death in 1888, for his widow Rosa Pelham Suit and their three children
• Size: Fifteen rooms, including a ballroom measuring 50 feet by 40 feet
• Design credited to: Washington architect Alfred B. Mullett, with detailed design and construction supervision by Snowden Ashford
• Status: Privately owned. Not a public museum or ghost tour attraction

The History of Berkeley Castle

The castle-like house was built for Colonel Samuel Taylor Suit of Washington, D.C., who wanted a personal retreat near the fashionable mineral springs resort town of Berkeley Springs. Work began in 1885. Suit died in 1888, before the house was finished.

The building was completed in the early 1890s for his young widow, Rosa Pelham Suit, and the couple’s three children. Suit had first met Rosa at Berkeley Springs, which gives the place a certain romantic symmetry that later storytellers have leaned on heavily. One detail worth knowing for anyone touring the exterior: the work carried out after 1888 is of noticeably inferior quality to what came before, a visible seam between the colonel’s ambitions and what his estate actually delivered.

Rosa Suit entertained lavishly at the house until her money ran out. The property was sold in 1913. Atlas Obscura has summed the period up simply as a wealthy widow living the high life in a Gilded Age country house, and that is close to the heart of the real story here. The castle was never a medieval fortress or a site of documented tragedy. It was an expensive vacation home that outlived the fortune behind it.

The Architecture

The fifteen-room interior includes a ballroom 50 feet wide and 40 feet long, which is a substantial room for a private retreat and a reminder of what the house was built to do. The design is attributed to Washington architect Alfred B. Mullett, who is alleged to have sketched a rough plan on a tablecloth at the Berkeley Springs Hotel. That anecdote is repeated often and should be treated as tradition rather than confirmed fact.

The design may have drawn on elements of Berkeley Castle in Gloucestershire, in the United Kingdom. Detailed design work and construction supervision were carried out by Snowden Ashford, who apprenticed under Mullett, is credited as an architect in his own right, and designed Washington’s Eastern Market.

Popular retellings of the castle add flourishes such as Italian marble fireplaces, French tapestries, and cutting-edge Victorian conveniences. Those details are part of the story as it is commonly told locally rather than facts established by the documentary record, and visitors should treat them accordingly.

Ownership Since 2020

Anyone researching a visit needs to know about the property’s recent history, because it has changed what the castle is. In February 2020 the property was purchased for $1.4 million by the VDARE Foundation, a tax-exempt affiliate of the anti-immigration organization VDARE, which publishes writings by white nationalists. The source of the money is unknown. The purchase was met with resistance from residents and leaders in Berkeley Springs.

VDARE founder and editor Peter Brimelow said at the time, “We absolutely will not be having rallies, marches or demonstrations. We’ve never been involved in anything like that, and we never will be,” adding, “We just want to be quiet, good neighbors. The only public events we’re anticipating right now are the local charitable functions that we understand the castle has traditionally hosted. We hope to have some private meetings and functions, but don’t have plans for any public VDARE events.”

New York Attorney General Letitia James later alleged that VDARE had violated New York law by misusing non-profit resources while residing on the castle grounds since March 2020. In March 2024 a New York state judge found the VDARE Foundation in civil contempt for failing to turn over evidence related to the investigation, and ordered a fine of $250 per day until it complied with a subpoena issued in 2022. In July 2024 it was announced that VDARE would be suspending operations, with Brimelow resigning as president of the foundation. A spokesperson for the attorney general’s office said the website’s closure would not affect the investigation.

Reported Phenomena

There is no evidence that Berkeley Castle is haunted. What exists is a body of reported experiences from visitors, former guests, and paranormal enthusiasts, collected and repeated over the years. Nothing in the property’s documented history records a death inside the building or any event that would explain the stories.

The accounts most often attached to the castle include:

• A woman in a white dress, said to vanish when anyone approaches her
• A figure in armor described as appearing atop one of the towers before disappearing
• Shadowy or indistinct figures seen inside the house
• Unexplained noises with no identified source
• A general sense that Colonel Suit himself lingers in the building he did not live to see finished

These are reported experiences, not verified events. The knight in armor is worth noting as a folklore detail rather than a historical one: the house was a Victorian retreat built in the 1880s, and there were never knights here. That kind of story tends to attach itself to buildings that look the part, and Berkeley Castle looks the part from every angle.

Visiting Berkeley Castle

Berkeley Castle is privately owned and is not operated as a museum, a historic house tour, or a paranormal investigation site. There are no documented public ghost tours, and there is no legal public access to the interior. Given the ownership history since 2020 and the ongoing legal questions surrounding the property, the situation on the ground can change and should be checked before anyone makes the trip specifically to see it.

What remains straightforward is the setting. The castle stands on a hill above Berkeley Springs, a town whose mineral springs drew the visitors who made a house like this possible in the first place. Berkeley Springs itself is a walkable historic spa town, and the castle can be appreciated from a distance as part of that landscape. Treat the property as someone’s private land, stay off the grounds, and do not attempt to enter the building.

Sources

• National Park Service
• US Census Bureau
• fohbc.com
• heraldmailmedia.com
• Atlas Obscura
• Wikipedia: Samuel Taylor Suit Cottage

Address: 276 Cacapon Road