HauntBound archive · catalog record
Reported phenomena, as catalogued
1835 Whaling-Captain's Residence on Greenport Harbor
714 Main St, Greenport, NY 11944
Research updated May 2026
Age
All Ages
Cost
$$$
Seasonal North Fork inn rates typically run $150-300/night depending on room and time of year. Marina slips are reserved separately.
Access
Limited Access
Historic 19th-century residence and adjoining buildings; floors are noted as crooked and uneven.
Equipment
Photos OK
Est. 1835 · Whaling-Era Residence · Townsend Family Heritage · North Fork Maritime History
Greenport sits at the working end of Long Island's North Fork, a deep-water port that was central to the nineteenth-century American whaling industry. The Townsend Manor Inn is anchored to that era. In 1835, George Cogswell, a prosperous whaling captain, built a large residence on the property that now houses the inn. Cogswell lived in the house for fourteen years before, in his own words, being possessed by 'Gold Rush Fever' and decamping for California in 1849.
The building changed hands repeatedly over the next seventy-five years. The Townsend connection comes through Joseph Lawrence Townsend, a descendant of the Townsends who arrived at Salem, Massachusetts, in 1638 and moved on to Oyster Bay and East Williston on Long Island. Joseph Lawrence retired to Greenport, and after his death in 1916, his widow Lillian Cook Townsend bought the Cogswell residence in 1925. The property has carried the Townsend Manor Inn name from that purchase forward.
The inn now operates a marina, restaurant, and lodging on the waterfront. The original 1835 main building is the historic core; subsequent buildings on the property were added in the twentieth century. The inn is on Main Street, an easy walk from the village's restaurants, ferry terminal, and the Long Island Rail Road station.
Sources
The reports at the Townsend Manor Inn run modest. Guests describe tapping at the windows and scratching at the doors of their rooms. The lights, in several accounts, flicker and switch off without anyone touching them. One guest reported hearing their own name called repeatedly in the early-morning hours and feeling a push on the arm sufficient to wake them. A separate first-floor account describes a child's voice in an empty room.
The inn itself notes that the floors are crooked and the building creaks at night, and the staff and reviews are matter-of-fact about the ambient atmosphere. No paranormal investigation team has published formal findings on the property; the inn's reputation circulates through guest reviews and through North Fork ghost-tour operators rather than through television or film coverage.
The Shadowlands entry adds a clarifying note: the Townsend Manor Inn should not be confused with Raynham Hall in Oyster Bay or with the original Raynham Hall in Norfolk, England. The Townsend family has documented ties to both, but the Greenport inn is a separate property.
Stay at the 1835 main residence built by whaling captain George Cogswell, a centerpiece of Greenport's North Fork waterfront. Floors creak, doors rattle, and guests have independently reported tapping at windows, lights turning on without intervention, and a child's voice on the first floor.
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