The Legend of Franklin Connecticut’s Bloody Apple Tree

The Legend of the Bloody Apple Tree

A legend is a tale that has been passed down, often by many generations, and is told as if it’s true even though it’s unauthenticated. Such is the case with the legend of the bloody apple tree. It’s reportedly been shared for more than two centuries.

Story has it that in 1759, a traveling peddler was passing through late at night in Franklin, Connecticut. He sought refuge for the night at the farmhouse of Micah Rood.

Micah Rood was a man with a quick temper. His father fought and died in the French and Indian War, causing him to despise the French.

The peddler spoke in an accent, and it wasn’t long before Rood began to suspect that the traveler was French. Since the war was still raging, Rood couldn’t stand by with a French man in his house. So, Rood took action. He murdered the traveler and buried his body beneath an apple tree.

When apple season came around, the tree bloomed a deep red. Inside, the apples were specked with a blood-red color. Townspeople began to say that Rood’s bloody apple tree may connect him to the murder of the traveler. Despite the suspicions, Rood was never tried for the murder, and he lived out his life as a free man.

In another version of the tale, the townspeople learn the traveler is missing because a letter arrives from the man’s friends, wondering if they know anything about his disappearance. The letter tells them that the peddler is German, not French. Micah feels so terrible about his mistake he hangs himself from the same apple tree, thus causing the tree to be cursed by all the blood spilled there. For generations, the tree goes on to have specks of blood in its apples.

The Real Story of the Micah Rood and the Bloody Apple Tree

In Stephen Gencarella’s book, Spooky Trails and Tall Tales Connecticut: Hiking the States Legends, Hauntings, and History, Gencarella shares that Micah’s father was one of the first settlers in Franklin. The real Micah Rood lived between 1683-1728.

An early account of the legend, written in 1839, states that Micah committed a murder and was executed. He was then buried in the nearby town of Lisbon. An apple tree grows from his grave and produces apples with blood-red specks inside them.

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Historical records indicate that the Rood family was indeed involved in a scandalous crime, but it wasn’t directly tied to Micah. Micah’s father, Thomas, was convicted of incest with his daughter Sarah and was executed in 1672. George, the son of Sarah and her father Thomas, moved to Lisbon and died in 1744.

There’s the connection with Lisbon again. Perhaps the legend drew from all the Rood family men, merging them into a single monster.

The color of the apples from the tree could have been the cause of a mutation. Or it could have been a “Mike apple,” an apple variety common in the nineteenth and early twentieth century.

Whatever the case, the legend and the dark truth of the Rood family spurred a story that has intrigued people for years. Even though the family’s apple trees are long gone, some believe the earth is cursed to produce bloody apples where these men lie.