The Haunted Outlook Inn, Newport (Former Pilgrim House Inn): The Girl at the Window

The Outlook Inn is a small bed and breakfast at 123 Spring Street, in the heart of Newport and a short walk from Thames Street and the harbor. For years it was known as the Pilgrim House Inn, and that is the name you will still find in most ghost guides. Today it has ten guest rooms, a two-bedroom suite with its own entrance, and a third-floor observation deck with views over the town.

The stories here are gentle ones. Guests have described laughter and music late at night when nobody else is awake, and a young girl seen looking down at the street from the windows of rooms that were empty at the time. In the most detailed telling she even has a name, Jessica. Rooms 8 and 11 are the two named in the accounts. For the rest of the state, see our guide to haunted hotels in Rhode Island.

The ghosts of The Outlook Inn (formerly Pilgrim House Inn)

The girl at the window

The best-known story is of a young girl seen standing at an upstairs window, staring down into Spring Street, in a room that was unoccupied at the time. HauntedPlaces lists her in Room 8 and Room 11 in particular.

HauntedHouses.com gives the fullest version. It describes a girl of about four to six in an old-fashioned gray dress, seen on the main staircase, at a third-floor corner window and once standing in the open front door on a hot summer evening. Staff call her Jessica, a name that reportedly came through a staff member who considered herself psychic. Nobody knows who she was: theories range from an epidemic to a fall from the roof deck, and none is backed by a record.

Laughter and music after midnight

Guests have also described the sound of laughter and music late at night, when the rest of the house is asleep and nobody else is up. HauntedHouses.com adds a music box heard playing in an empty room, shadows and a child’s laughter in Rooms 8 and 11, an intercom buzzing empty rooms and a laundry dryer that started by itself.

Paranormal investigators have said they photographed a face in a third-floor window, and a group made a recording in 2008 that is said to show a girl on the staircase. None of it has been published in a form anyone can check, so treat it as part of the story.

How old is the story?

Ghost listings describe the Pilgrim House as a late 18th-century building, and HauntedHouses.com dates it to 1775 and says an Irish family named Curren lived there in the 1800s. The inn’s own history is different: it says the house was built as a single-family home in the 1880s and later converted into apartments for Navy families, and hotel trade listings give 1880. We follow the inn’s account and treat the older dates as part of the legend.

The most haunted rooms and places to look

• Room 8: A second-floor room with a queen bed, an en-suite bathroom and a chair by the window; one of the two rooms named in the stories.
• Room 11: The two-bedroom suite, with a king room and a queen room each with its own bathroom, a kitchenette, a private deck and a private entrance at the back of the inn.
• Room 10: One of only two rooms that sleeps four, alongside Room 11.
• Rooms 1 to 9: Rooms for two guests; ask for one on the Spring Street side if you want to watch for the girl at the window.

History of The Outlook Inn (formerly Pilgrim House Inn)

Spring Street runs along the slope above Newport’s harbor through one of the oldest parts of town, lined with colonial and Victorian houses within a short walk of Thames Street, Trinity Church and the waterfront.

The inn says the building at 123 Spring Street began as a single-family home in the 1880s. In the 20th century, with the Navy a major presence in Newport, it was divided into apartments for Navy families, as many large Newport houses were.

It was later converted into a guesthouse, and innkeeping listings say it has taken guests since 1978. For many years it traded as the Pilgrim House Inn, under owners Barry and Debbie Fonseca at one point. That is the name used in most published ghost stories about it, and the reason this page keeps it in the title.

As the Outlook Inn it now has ten rooms and one two-bedroom suite, last renovated in 2019 according to Travel Weekly’s hotel listing. The innkeeper prepares breakfast each morning in the third-floor guest lounge, and the observation deck on the third story gives one of the better rooftop views in central Newport, out over the harbor and Narragansett Bay.

Tips for a haunted stay

• Book direct and ask for Room 8 or Room 11 by number.
• Take your evening drink up to the third-floor observation deck, then listen for the music once the house goes quiet.
• Check-in is only between 4 and 7 pm, so plan your arrival.
• Parking is off-site and first come, first served; walking or taking a taxi into town is easier in summer.
• The Hotel Viking is a few minutes’ walk away on Bellevue Avenue, if you want to see a second haunted Newport hotel.

More haunted hotels nearby

• Hotel Viking, Newport: the phantom party at the top of Bellevue Avenue
• Castle Hill Inn, Newport: the Agassiz mansion on its own peninsula
• Newport Beach Hotel and Suites, Middletown: a whole cast of ghosts across from Easton’s Beach
• Haunted hotels in Rhode Island

Sources

Facts on this page are checked against the hotel’s own website, historic records and news coverage. Ghost stories are reported as guests, staff and local historians tell them. Read how we rate haunted hotels.

• The Outlook Inn: About
• The Outlook Inn: Room 8
• The Outlook Inn: Room 11
• Travel Weekly: The Outlook Inn, Newport
• Innsite: Pilgrim House Inn, Newport
• HauntedHouses.com: Pilgrim Inn, Newport
• HauntedPlaces: Pilgrim House Inn

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