These Are The Creepiest, Most Haunted Places In NJ

NEW JERSEY — Haunted houses around the neighborhood are great Halloween fun for impressionable children, but New Jersey residents seeking an authentic scare might want to check out The Devil's Tree.

That’s according to Thrillist, a travel and entertainment media outlet that recently released its list of the 50 (one for each state) most haunted, scariest places in America.

A handful of other media outlets have also compiled a list of creepy, haunted places in New Jersey, showing there’s no shortage of places to get the daylights scared out of you.

Of The Devil's Tree, the Thrillist editors said:

"Out of context, the tree’s silhouette alone is enough to inspire nightmares: a warped, half-dead oak looming in the middle of a lonely field, with dozens of ax marks lining its trunk. Then, there’s the gruesome history."

This gnarled tree sits at 181 Mountain Road in Basking Ridge near the Bridgewater border, and local stories abound about why it's said to be haunted.

Rumors — or some say truths — surrounding the tree date as far back as the 1920s, when a group of KKK members was rumored to hold cross burnings and hangings off the limbs of the tree.

The so-called "gateway to hell" has dozens of ax marks around its trunk, and some say that anyone who tries to harm the tree will experience "swift and violent retribution" from a malevolent spirit.

"Naturally, it has become a tradition for ballsy teens across the Garden State to pee on its trunk," the Thrillist editors added. "But do so at your own risk—you might just lose your life (or your manhood) to the tree's sinister curse."

Meanwhile, Business Insider names the Pine Barrens as the most haunted place in New Jersey.

This region spans seven counties and "contains ghost towns galore" that were abandoned when coal mining took off in nearby Pennsylvania, the publication noted. Urban legend also sets the Pine Barrens as the home of the infamous "Jersey Devil," usually described as a kangaroo-like creature with horns and bat-like wings.

HGTV also says the Pine Barrens region is the most haunted in New Jersey, going a bit deeper into the legend.

The Jersey Devil is "said to be the cursed 13th child of a woman known as Mother Leeds," the site wrote:

"According to legend, the baby boy transformed dramatically just after he was born, sprouting leathery wings, horns and a forked tail. He killed the midwife before flying into the chimney and disappearing into the pines."

HGTV noted that there have been many reported sightings of the Jersey Devil over the years in the Pine Barrens.

Last on our list is Forbes, which picked Port Monmouth's historic Spy House as the spookiest spot in the Garden State.

Officially known as the Whitlock-Seabrook-Wilson Home, this house has stood at 119 Port Monmouth Road for 300 years. Rumors abound about who came in and out of the Spy House when it was still a small cabin back in the 1700s, including pirates and British soldiers secretly being eavesdropped upon by their militiaman barkeep (hence the name).

"Reports of mysterious weeping, the apparition of a lady in white and a sea captain stand as a testament to the house’s eerie past," Forbes wrote.