Have you ever had a gut feeling that something terrible was going to happen? Have you ever gotten a feeling that something bad was going to happen to you? You’ve heard of gut instinct and that you should always listen to it. A man woke up one day and had a gut feeling that he was going to die. This is that man’s story.
Francis Leavy was a kindhearted man who worked as a firefighter during the 1920s. He was loved by many and disliked by few. He was always smiling and willing to help anyone. On April 18, 1924, his peers saw a change in his personality and got worried. Leavy wasn’t smiling; he was grumpy and upset. His peers wanted to know what was wrong with him and how they could make him feel better. Leavy was washing a window at the Chicago Fire Department when his co-workers asked him what was wrong. He replied by saying he had an eerie feeling, the feeling that he was going to meet his demise that day. Right when he said that the bell rang out signaling, there was a fire somewhere that needed to be taken care of.
All of the firefighters got on their gear and left, racing towards the fire. The fire was in a multi-level building. When they got there, Leavy and the other firefighters assessed how many people might be on the top floors and how they could help them. The firefighters were confident that everyone would be rescued but the fire had other plans. The flames claimed the bottom layer of the building, and the roof caved in. The walls caved in and pinned people in their path under the rubble. Leavy was one of the ones pinned under the burning rubble.
Francis Leavy died that day, making his premonition come true. While all of the firefighters that lived were trying to process the death of their colleagues, something strange happened. They were sitting at the firehouse the next day, remembering their fallen men when something odd appeared on a window. It was the window that Leavy had been washing the previous day before the call. A handprint that looked distinctly looked like Leavy’s handprint. People were shocked and confused.
A fireman tried to wash the window to get the handprint off. The handprint remained on the window no matter what cleaning products or chemicals were used to try to get it off. For years, the handprint remained on the window, and the mystery surrounding it never was solved. The only way they were able to get the handprint off was by a newspaper boy who accidentally threw a newspaper into the window shattering it in 1944.
Websites I used for research: https://listverse.com/2015/02/25/10-strange-mysteries-from-around-the-world-that-are-still-unsolved/ https://coolinterestingstuff.com/the-strange-story-of-francis-leavys-handprint
Katie's Murders and Mysteries 