But just before midnight, strange things began to happen. The quietness of the night was broken by the "eerie, shrill cries of nearly a dozen terrified infants." It sent shivers down the spine of the veteran security guard and former deputy sheriff from Victoria. Leos said the cries indicated "pain and suffering." He couldn't locate where they were coming from at first. He finally realized the cried were coming from one of the dozen or so unmarked graves which are located near the Chapel of our Lady of Loreto.

As suddenly as the crying started, the sounds ended, only to be replaced by the singing of a woman's choir. Although he could see nothing unusual, the mysterious music sounded as if it were coming from the back wall of the old fort. Leos said the women were singing words, but he couldn't make out what they were saying, and the tune was also unfamiliar to him.

The strange singing ended in two or three minutes, but then a much more frightening even occurred. A small friar suddenly appeared ! At first, there was a vaporous form arising from the ground in front of the double door that leads into the chapel. Leos said the little friar was only about four feet tall. The robe he wore was black, tied around the waist with a rope. He was barefoot and his face was concealed with a hood.

Leos recalled having heard other people talk about the same apparition. The words of warning came back to him: "Remain perfectly still because this is an aggressive ghost." The shocked Leos just froze where he stood and watched as the priest wandered around from one corner to the other of the old church. The figure then went to each corner of the quadrangle. Leos says he thinks the hooded figure was praying in Latin.

About an hour and a half after the friar disappeared, the apparition of a woman wearing a white dress, which looked somewhat like a wedding dress, materialized in front of one of the unmarked graves that are situated in front of the chapel. It was the same grave from which Leos had heard the cries of the babies, and Leos said the woman appeared to be looking for one of the infants.

The article in the Advocate stated, "Then she turned around and looked at me. She drifted maybe a foot or two off the ground and headed towards the back wall."

Leos said the ghostly figure just floated over the wall and out of sight as she headed towards an old cemetery established in the 1700s.

Although teased by his coworkers when he told of his nocturnal adventures, Leos is convinced that what he saw was real, and not the spin-off of a bad dream. After all, he doesn't ever sleep when he is on duty! And Leos knows he isn't the only person who has reported bizarre occurrences around the old presidio.

Many residents who live near the fort have related similar stories. Although Newton Warzecha hasn't seen anything since he has become museum director, he says, "I do not know whether there are spirits there, but I could understand if there are such things, because of all the violence that has taken place there." His assistant, Luiz Cazarez-Rueda, who sometimes lives on the presidio grounds, is rather guarded with his comments when questioned about ghosts. However, the expression on his face indicated to David Tewes, who wrote the article in the Advocate, that Rueda knew more than he wanted to tell.

Dorothy Simmons, owner of the Souvenir Closet in Goliad, was watching the museum within the fort one spring day for John Collins, a former director, while he was out running some errands. As she walked through the museum and got to the third room, she heard what she called "celestial humming." A beautiful soprano voice was singing. There was nothing scary about it. She could detect the music only in that one room. When she walked out, it stopped. When she returned, it began again. Although she tried to reason it was the wind, it just wasn't enough to account for the very real sound of music which she heard. Simmons says she believes that we can experience time warps or see just a fleeting glimpse of the other side.

Then, there was the time that Irma Valencia, owner of Irma's Café in Goliad, agreed to do some volunteer work at the presidio. It was a hot, humid summer day. As Irma began to clean the furnishings and to wax the floor after the last tourist had departed, only Luiz Cazarez-Rueda, the assistant director, was still there. He had gone outside to take down the flags. As soon as he left, Valencia said, she heard organ music begin to play, accompanying the celestial humming of a woman. She said the music was just all around her, but it stopped when Casarez-Rueda came back inside. At first she thought he had been playing a portable radio, but he said, no, he didn't have a radio. Then he asked her, "So you heard it too?" Although she had been there as a volunteer many times before, Irma said she had never heard the music previously. Once was apparently enough for her, as she has stopped going out to the presidio entirely.

It seems that visitors, often complete strangers to the presidio, have reported strange happenings, also. Cazarez-Rueda said a mother and daughter visited the fort about a year ago just before closing time. The mother soon came back to the entrance and asked Cazarez-Rueda if there were historical reenactors on the property, people dressed up in period costumes to add "Atmosphere" to the place. He told her, yes, they were there sometimes on special occasions, but there was no one there on that particular day. The lady assured him she had just seen someone, a lady dressed all in black, with a black veil over her face. She was in the chapel, by the candles, and she was crying as if her heart would break. At the daughter's suggestion, the mother stepped forth to ask the lady what was wrong, to see if she could help. In that instant, the figure totally disappeared!