Smyrna Museum (The Barracks) is Delaware's most family-friendly haunted site

With Halloween approaching, the Smyrna Museum (The Barracks) is the most family-friendly haunted site in HauntBound's 2026 index of Delaware's most haunted places. The index ranks 28 Delaware sites by separate published accounts and how far back they go, not by fame or search popularity.

The Barracks, a brick house built in the late 1790s by Robert Holliday, takes its name from local tradition that militia were quartered there during the War of 1812, though the state's historical marker records only the late-1700s construction and the building's Civil War role. On August 12, 1863, Delaware's first Civil War draft lottery was drawn on its front porch, when Smyrna served as the headquarters for Union troop enrollment in the state. The Duck Creek Historical Society restored the house and opened it as the Smyrna Museum in 1989.

Regional haunted-travel listings describe visitors and volunteers hearing raspy voices and unexplained sounds inside the house, small objects moving on their own and a persistent feeling of being watched, along with drifting points of light and late-night footsteps when the museum is empty. The Duck Creek Historical Society does not market the museum as haunted and runs no overnight investigations; the lore ties the reports to the soldiers connected to the building's War of 1812 and Civil War history.

Statewide, Cape Henlopen State Park (Fort Miles) in Lewes ranks #1.

"We rank by evidence, not legend: independent published accounts, documented history, and how far back the reports go. We don't claim ghosts are real, or that they aren't. We document where the reports concentrate, and we show our work," said Ben Fineman, editor of HauntBound. The ranking shows each site's documented record.

Visiting:Smyrna Museum (The Barracks), 11 South Main St., Smyrna, is open Saturdays from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m.; admission is free.

For media:The full ranking: https://hauntbound.com/most-haunted/delaware/The fact sheet, with Smyrna numbers and cleared images: https://hauntbound.com/press/fact-sheets/delaware/Venue contact: duckcreekhistoricalsociety.orgA short version follows.

HauntBound (hauntbound.com) is a family-friendly field guide to more than 6,000 documented haunted and historic places across the United States, ranked by published evidence rather than legend. No venue pays to be listed or ranked.

Media contact: Ben Fineman, Editor, HauntBound, editor@hauntbound.com

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