Button Eyes and a Locked Case: The Annabelle Doll in Monroe

Reviewed by Josh N · Updated October 3, 2026 · How we verify

The Annabelle doll is not the carved, cracked porcelain face that stares out of movie posters. It is a Raggedy Ann: soft body, yarn hair, button eyes, stitched mouth, the sort of thing sold by the thousand. What separates it from every other Raggedy Ann is a claim made in the 1970s by paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren, who said the doll was demonically possessed and locked it inside a display box at their Occult Museum in Monroe, Connecticut. Academics and science writers have dismissed those claims as myth and folklore. Both of those sentences are true at once, and that tension is the whole story.

Quick Facts on the Annabelle Doll

• What it is: a Raggedy Ann doll, claimed to be haunted.
• Where it went: the Warrens’ Occult Museum in Monroe, Connecticut, after being given to them in the 1970s.
• Who gave it up: a 28-year-old student nurse named Donna, from Hartford, Connecticut.
• Status of the museum: closed in 2019 over zoning violations.
• Current custody: comedian Matt Rife, confirmed in August 2025 as buyer of the Monroe house and collection.
• Verified paranormal evidence: none. The record consists of the Warrens’ own accounts.

Donna, the Student Nurse, and the Medium Who Named the Doll

The account that every later retelling rests on comes from the Warrens themselves. They said the doll was given to them in the 1970s by Donna, a 28-year-old student nurse from Hartford, who claimed the doll could move by itself and showed malicious, frightening behavior. Before the Warrens were involved, according to their version, a psychic medium told Donna and her roommate that the doll had been taken over by the spirit of a dead seven-year-old girl named Annabelle. That is where the name comes from. Popular retellings have since attached a surname and a backstory to the girl, but no documentary record of such a child has ever been produced.

The Warrens rejected the medium’s reading. Their conclusion was that the entity attached to the doll was not a dead child at all but something demonic, and that it had used a sympathetic story to get a foothold. They took the doll away and placed it in a display box at their Occult Museum in Monroe. That is the moment a family toy became an exhibit.

The Claims That Grew Around the Case

Over the years the Warrens publicized a widening set of claims about what the doll had done. The most repeated are that it inflicted “psychic slashes” that drew blood from victims, that it caused a priest who insulted it to run his car into a tree, and that it stabbed a homicide detective, forcing him into early retirement.

It is worth being precise about the status of those stories. None of them is supported by an independent report, a police record, a medical record, or a named witness outside the Warrens’ own circle. They are claims made in interviews, lectures, and books. Science writer Sharon A. Hill put the problem bluntly when discussing the supernatural claims Ed Warren made about Annabelle: “We have nothing but Ed’s word for this, and also for the history and origins of the objects in the museum.”

From The Demonologist to the Conjuring Universe

The doll reached a wide audience through print first. Gerald Brittle’s 1980 book The Demonologist featured the story, written, Brittle has said, under an exclusive deal with Lorraine Warren. In 2009, Tony DeRosa-Grund’s Evergreen Media Group made a series of deals with the Warrens for rights to exploit their stories. In 2014, Warner Bros.’ New Line Cinema claimed rights to the Annabelle story in connection with chapters from The Demonologist, which the studio said were acquired from Mrs. Warren and/or Spera and Graymalkin Media.

On screen, the character was deliberately redesigned. Producers did not use the Raggedy Ann likeness, partly over potential trademark issues and partly to make the doll more unsettling for a horror film. The result has been described as a terrifying porcelain doll, disfigured and immediately menacing. It first appears in James Wan’s The Conjuring (2013), then anchors Annabelle (2014), Annabelle: Creation (2017), and Annabelle Comes Home (2019), with further appearances in The Conjuring 2 (2016), The Curse of La Llorona (2019), The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It (2021), and The Conjuring: Last Rites (2025). The doll has even turned up in superhero films, including Aquaman (2018), Shazam! (2019), and Shazam! Fury of the Gods. Anyone arriving at the real doll expecting the movie face will be disappointed.

Why Skeptics Call Annabelle a Modern Legend

Skeptical investigators and science writers treat the Annabelle story as a modern legend and point to the absence of corroborating evidence. Joseph Laycock, an assistant professor of religious studies at Texas State University, notes that most skeptics have dismissed the Warrens’ museum as “full of off-the-shelf Halloween junk, dolls and toys, books you could buy at any bookstore.”

Laycock’s more interesting argument is about where the idea came from. He calls the legend a case study in the relationship between pop culture and paranormal folklore, and suggests the demonic doll trope later popularized by Child’s Play, Dolly Dearest, and The Conjuring likely grew out of earlier legends around Robert the Doll, and out of a Twilight Zone episode broadcast five years before the Warrens’ story: “Living Doll,” in which the mother is named Annabelle. His reading is that possessed dolls let modern demonologists locate supernatural evil in the most banal and domestic of places.

Hill has made a related point about the Warrens’ reputation generally, arguing that many of the myths and legends surrounding them have seemingly been of their own doing, and that audiences struggle to separate the Warrens from their Hollywood portrayal. Her verdict on the object itself is deflating: like the real-life Ed Warren, the real-life Annabelle is far less impressive.

The 2025 “Disappearance” and Devils on the Run

The most recent chapter is a marketing story rather than a paranormal one. In 2025, online reports claimed the doll had vanished. The Warrens’ estate promoted those reports as part of a viral campaign for a traveling exhibition called Devils on the Run, which showcased items from the Occult Museum. Tony Spera, director of the New England Society for Psychic Research, stated plainly: “The doll was never missing. We had taken the doll on a brief tour to several locations, so paranormal enthusiasts could witness the real Annabelle.”

The tour also carries a genuine tragedy. In July 2025, Devils on the Run organizer and host Dan Rivera, who had been a lead promoter and produced videos of the doll on TikTok, died unexpectedly in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. His death was immediately folded into the curse narrative online. Nothing in the record supports that reading, and a sudden death deserves better than being used as a plot point.

Can You See the Annabelle Doll in Monroe?

Not at a walk-up museum. The Occult Museum closed in 2019 due to zoning violations, and it has not reopened to general public visits. The Monroe property is a private residence, and there is nothing at the address for a casual visitor to see; treat it as someone’s home, because it is.

Custody changed in August 2025, when it was confirmed that comedian Matt Rife had purchased the Warrens’ home and Occult Museum in Monroe. The purchase included becoming legal guardian of the entire collection, the Annabelle doll included, for at least the next five years. The realistic way to see the doll in person is through sanctioned touring events of the kind Devils on the Run offered, which appear at booked venues rather than in Connecticut. Check announcements from the collection’s current handlers before planning any trip around it.

Sources

• Is 'Annabelle' Based on a True Story? All About the Real-Life Doll That Inspired the Haunted Tale
• The true story behind the CT doll at center of ‘Annabelle’ film series
• Tellers of Eerie Tales: 'Ghostbusters' Speak at Rutgers
• Warner Bros. Facing $900 Million Lawsuit Over ‘The Conjuring’ Franchise
• Annabelle Comes Home Has A Sly Reference To The Real Doll
• Wikipedia: Annabelle (doll)

Ghost Tours Nearby

Haunted History Walking Tour of Providence★ 4.9 (152)from $30Providence Ghost Tours: Phantoms, Poltergeists, & Pestilence★ 4.4 (77)from $26Haunted Boat Tours in Providence★ 4.5 (50)from $45

Affiliate links: BeyondHaunted may earn a commission, at no extra cost to you.