A Quick Guide to the Unexplained at Vancouver’s Grant House
There are strange goings on at Grant House and other mansions along Officers Row in Vancouver. But before we get to the spooky stuff, let's get the lay of the land and reintroduce you to the most famous resident of Officers Row.
What is Officer's Row?
Officers Row is exactly what it sounds like, an area near the Vancouver Barracks that was home to soldiers and their families.
Officers Row is made up of 21 Victorian mansions that are on the National Register of Historic Places.
And as any ghost hunter can tell you, historic places are haunted.
Who Was Ulysses S. Grant?
Ulysses S. Grant was the 18th President of the United States.
Before that, he was the Commanding General who led the Union Armies to victory over the Confederacy during the American Civil War.
What is Grant's Connection to Vancouver?
When Ulysses S. Grant was a captain, he served at the Vancouver Barracks.
Grant House
Grant lived in the Quartermaster's Depot near the Columbia River - not in what is called the "Grant House," though he would have spent time inside as an officer.
The house was christened the Grant House as a tribute to this historical figure who was once posted at the Vancouver Barracks, was a war hero in his time, and historians are starting to consider him a better President than first regarded by critics.
Eatery at the Grant House
Until 2021, the historic Grant House in Vancouver was a restaurant. And it's still haunted by a ghost named Sully.
Even the restauranteurs believed in the ghost, and they should know - it liked to supervise them. Ever been bossed around by a ghost? It never ends.
Maybe that's why they closed their doors during the pandemic. Or maybe it was the pandemic.
The second floor of Grant House is allegedly boarded up. Is that to keep people out, or to keep something in?
Admiral Paul Nelson Mansion
You've heard the expression, "if these walls could talk?" Well, these walls bleed. Like in a horror movie.
The lawn is unusual as well: it perpetually dies and comes back to life. Like, a couple times a week. Does that mean it needs more fertilizer or less?
Does the Ghost of Ulysses Haunt Grant House?
Not that anyone's reported, but his home in Galena, Illinois is supposedly haunted. Maybe check there.