On Halloween, it seems appropriate to look at the legend of the Gray Man of Pawley’s Island, South Carolina, a benevolent ghost said to warn residents of coming severe storms and hurricanes. Those who heed his warnings are said to survive the storms while their homes and property remain undamaged.
The story, with several variations, is said to date from 1822. Its origin is alleged to be of a young man going to visit his fiance, who dies after falling into quicksand on Pawley’s Island. His ghost is said to continue to walk the beaches of the island, providing warnings of foul weather — a ghostly freelance meteorologist, of sorts.
While the legend has a long oral tradition, the story of the Gray Man appeared in writing for the first time in 1956 in a book of ghost stories by Julian Stevenson Bolick. The story got national attention just after Hurricane Hugo in 1989 when Pawley’s Island residents Jim and Clara Moore were interviewed on the television show Unsolved Mysteries. They told their story about seeing the man on the beach and how he disappeared when they waved. Their house was spared in the storm while the homes of their neighbors were heavily damaged.
The last reported sighting was just before Hurricane Florence hit in 2018. A Youtube video purports to show a shadowy figure on a dock during the hurricane