Battery Park Hotel (Battery Park Apartments)
Built in 1924 by Edwin Wiley Grove, this Beaux-Arts high-rise was the scene of one of Asheville's most notorious crimes. On July 16, 1936, New York University student Helen Clevenger, visiting with her uncle, was found shot and beaten to death in her room, killed by a .32-caliber bullet. Hotel night janitor Martin Moore, a young Black man, was arrested, signed a confession he later said was beaten out of him, and was executed in the gas chamber that December, a case long shadowed by doubts about his guilt and now examined in a 2021 book. The hotel later became senior apartments, but its haunted reputation persists. Residents and staff report that around the mid-July anniversary of the murder, the window of Helen's old room glows with an eerie red light, and an elevator is said to run on its own at night. The story is a staple of Asheville ghost tours.
📍 1 Battle Square, Asheville, NC 28801, Asheville, NC · Get directions