HAUNTED HUMÅTAK

 

MARSHES BY HUMÅTAK RIVER

Around midnight on Tuesday, November 18, 1980, going into Wednesday, Marine Corporal Steven R. Thompson was beaten and left for dead by three, young Humåtak men after a night of drinking and bickering.

All four men, and some others, had been drinking outside one of the men's homes. When Thompson entered the home without asking, a resident of the home felt disrespected. Some people say that Thompson was making advances on a lady in the house. Heated verbal exchanges ensued between Thompson and some of the men. Someone suggested they beat up Thompson to teach him a lesson.

They invited him to walk the sandy shore of Humåtak Bay, but the men felt it was too open and visible so they lead Thompson to the overgrown bushes and bamboo grove by the river near the Mayor's Office. There they beat him so bad that the back of his head was lacerated. Then they left him in the thick vegetation for the night.

The next morning, Wednesday, they checked on him. Thompson was alive and moaning, but the three men left him alone one more time, too afraid to tell anyone. 

A whole day passed and now it was Thursday. Two Humåtak men were taking advantage of the bright moon light that night and went to the area to hunt for crabs. They found a human body, instead. There was no ID on the man, but when word circulated around the island that a dead Caucasian was found, someone from the Marines told civilian authorities that a Marine had been missing for two days. Eventually authorities concluded that the dead body was Thompson's.

"THE BAMBOO"

WHERE THOMPSON'S BODY WAS FOUND

It didn't take a murder for Humåtak people to feel uneasy about the river banks in Humåtak. To this day, people in Humåtak call it "the Bamboo," even though the Mayor's staff cut down the bamboo long ago. The sound of wind blowing through the bamboo, and the creaking of the long stalks of bamboo, gave the area an eerie feel.

A woman in her 60s told me, "Growing up, my parents always told me not to play in that area. They never said exactly why. Just that it's a bad area. So hardly any kids played there. It always was a lonely place."

She also said that there used to be a wood and tin-roof house nearby, which is now long gone, which everyone considered scary. There was a family living there, with two children, but they rarely went outside the house. Even the two children stayed indoors. This cast a creepy shadow over the house, which was already in the area of the spooky bamboo marshland. Kids, especially, felt weird passing by the house.

About the only story I heard from Humåtak people about "the Bamboo" is that voices will be heard, but there is no one there. Most people are not sure what language was being spoken; the voices were heard but the words were not clear.