The following is taken from Some Things Strange & Sinister (see end of post)
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The “Henacre Road Haunting” very briefly got
into the Press in 1990 (1 & 2).
Apparently, Kim Jye and her children had moved into the 1960s first
floor flat in
Kim Jye had reported seeing the ghost of a man wearing dark trousers, white shirt and “with an old-style bobbed haircut” on at least four occasions. But the 21 year-old was not the only witness. Christopher, 3 years-old, had a rather bad time of things in his bedroom. According to a statement buy his mother: “My little boy would not sleep in this particular bedroom for at least seven months –he said a man was coming to get me.”
The newspaper account didn’t make it quite clear whether young Christopher was stating that he’d merely seen the ghostly figure and felt it was ‘after him’ or his mother.
Whatever, Father Michael O’Regan, of Our Lady of the Rosary, was called in and he performed a blessing ceremony. By July, however, the events at the flat had driven Kim Jye and her three children to take refuge at her mother’s home, the first blessing having failed. Father O’Regan contacted Bristol City Council who took the alleged haunting seriously. Mike Griffiths, a council spokesman, told a reporter:-
“We are taking it seriously. We are taking it as a legitimate
problem, taking it on face value, bearing in mind we have a
letter from a man whose moral credence must be impeccable.”
Presumably the Jye’s were moved. The council would not discuss the matter as it concerned a tenant and they could give no information. I have not managed to track down Kim Jye and there appears to have been no further disturbances at the flat –which I am aware of.
The Parkside Hotel stands next door to the ITV West TV studios, Brislington,
The twenty-two room hotel itself dates back to 1760 and was at one time a convent for the Sisters of the Good Shepherd. In 1997 a Dutch TV crew stayed in the hotel to see whether they could film anything. As far as I can find out they never did.
But what was being seen at the hotel? According to Chris Romer of the Cheltenham Student Parapsychological Society Research Group (CSPSRG), who had been one of the investigators to look into the goings on in 1996, quite a lot was happening.
There had been reports of a ghostly nun walking across the restaurant by several witnesses. Of course, the nun ties in with the old convent which, interestingly enough, some of the witnesses had not known about.
Then there was the bar –and any number of jokes you can make out of ghosts seen in bars. Sounds had been heard and what was called a “poltergeist” had moved glasses in the bar. However, as noted in the chapter on the Ghost of All Saints Church, this was not what you could categorize as a poltergeist but rather a haunting in which objects were moved.
According to Manager Rob Green, when I talked to him in 1997; “quite a few people who work at night have seen some odd things.” Mr. Green suggested I contact the CSPSRG as they were preparing a report. It was now Chris Romer who told me of events at the hotel while his team was investigating.
A camera was set up in one particular room which had a rather bad history: apparently visitors had not stayed in it very long. A male and female investigator were left to keep the room under observation and the camera had, I was told, picked up a vertical bar of red light that appeared above the bed. There was embarrassment over the next part of the report; apparently the two observers felt “odd” and the next thing they were engaged in frantic sexual activity! More the embarrassing because, apparently, neither was “very keen” on the other.
There were also other manifestations and a report/case file did exist. However, by 1998, Mr. Romer still had not been able to find out who had this document (3-5).
In 2005 there was a report of another ghost sighting at the hotel by a staff member –this filtering through to me from a newspaper reporter. The hotel has kept its mystery tenants it seems.
But there are other little known ghosts in
Having been born and raised in the St
Werburgh’s area of the city, I and other kids liked visiting the old bomb sites
in the early 1960s and especially the “haunted houses”. We also trekked regularly to
A Roundhead figure was once seen quite regularly; he would approach people as if to say something –but then walk right through them. Had the Roundhead seen the modern day walkers –and if he had, did they suddenly vanish in front of him? I can find no record of the figure being seen after the 1980s, quite odd.
My grand dad, Bill, being “Hanham born ‘n’ bred”, told me that a serving girl whose name had been Sally, lived on a farm in the area and during the Civil War refused to tell the Roundheads where Royalists were hiding. In an attempt to escape, Sally got to the roof –it’s uncertain whether she jumped or was thrown or was simply killed there. Her ghost has always been seen on the roof though I have failed to discover which farm –if it still exists.
Another spectre no
longer seen, I believe since the 1970s, is “The Starving Monk”. At a time when saying Mass was illegal, priests
often visited stately homes and were hidden
in “priest hid holes” if the authorities turned up. The ghost in question was said to haunt
The monk was said to have been hidden, forgotten and to have starved to death –a not very likely tale. But for a long time the monk was seen but modern changes may not conducive to ghostly wanderings?
Another ghost that I have heard very little of
in recent years was that of Jenkins Protheroe, aka: “The Evil Dwarf
Highwayman”! Protheroe would beg for
money but if he didn’t get as much as he had expected he had a novel method of
getting more –he held up the person in question and robbed them. However, you can only get away with this
behaviour for a certain amount of time.
Protheroe was captured and tried for his crimes. In 1783, at the top of
I’m still trying
to find out whether a German Luftwaffe aircraft did crash at the old
Interestingly enough, the mid-1990s saw a rash
of ghost reports. At Mulberry
headquarters,
In 1995, another couple fled their council
home due to a ghost. Michaela Barber and
her partner, Shane, lived in a house in Leg Of Mutton Road, Wells,
One morning, at 8.00 a.m., the couple fled their home and swore never to return. Apparently, Michaela had found her five-months-old baby under his high-sided cot.
A toy TV suddenly turned itself on. Again, tenant confidentiality meant the council would not tell us where the couple were eventually moved to (8 & 9).
But we note, again, this movement of objects –and that includes the baby.
The
A woman in white had been seen many times over the years, several times outside a blocked off door which used to lead to the minstrel’s gallery. Mrs Rita Walsh had worked in the hotel kitchens since around 1977/1978 but had seen nothing odd. In December of 1982 this changed.
Mrs Walsh was working alone when she saw the infamous woman in white move toward her. Mrs Walsh told a reporter:
“When the woman approached, I tried to scream for the
night-porter, but I just couldn’t get a word out.
“The ghost told me I should not be frightened as she
would not hurt me. She was so friendly that I was
able to ask her why she wasn’t resting, and she said
she just couldn’t, then she disappeared.”
Just what do we make of this? That a ghost actually spoke to the living without a so-called “medium”. There are types of this phenomenon according to researchers.
The most common form of ghost appears to be what might be called a “Crisis Apparition”. This is usually a “vision” or disembodied voice of someone under great stress –at the point of death, for example. This vision/voice is seen or heard by someone close the person in crisis. As we know nothing really about the process of dying it is possible –possible—that there may be some kind of telepathic link between the dying and loved ones. In many cases, no doubt, these may be self-induced visions of a dying loved one by a person.
The “Collective Apparition” where more than one person sees a ghost. This can be at a séance or some other locale.
The “Haunting Ghost” is where a ghost walks
about, plays or looks out of a window, is seen seated or going through some
other mundane task. Here you could class
the Parkside Hotel nun or even the
Then we have the “Presence” where “something” is most definitely felt but nothing seen or heard. These reports may indicate some form of electro magnetic or other phenomena creating a localised effect felt by person present –such as in the “Luminous Chamber” case.
There are also the “One-Offs” –ghosts seen at a location with no spectral history known to the witness, investigators or others in the area.
“Poltergeists” (angry/noisy spirits) have been recorded since at least the 12th century. Unexplained bangs, crashes, foul smells, sudden cold spells in a house or place, inexplicable voices, objects appearing and disappearing and even levitation of of victims are “symptoms”. Here we can place the Lamb Inn, ”Coonian ghost”, the Parkside Hotel and the Leg Of Mutton Road events. Parapsychologists use the phrase Recurrent Spontaneous Psychokinesis (RSPK). ‘Demons’, ’Satan’ and even elementals have been blamed in these cases –but then so have adolescent girls/boys who are seen as the “focus” in these cases.
In the Leg Of Mutton Road affair there was no adolescent, only a baby. We are not aware of an adolescent in the All Saints Church case either.
But that leaves us with the woman in white at the Royal Clarence. Here ‘she’ knew Mrs. Watts could see her and was alarmed but placated the witness by telling her no harm would befall her! When asked why ‘she’ was not resting, the ghost responded to the question.
How –how—can a dead person’s ghost walk around knowing his/herself to be deceased and start up a brief conversation? The Royal Clarence case isn’t the first of this type of “conversation” either. It infers, rather strongly, that there is life after death and in some cases, well, hundreds of cases, something has prevented the dearly deceased from “passing on” –“finding eternal rest”.
This I simply find impossible to accept for so many reasons. Billions of people have lived and died on this planet and “Heaven” must be suffering some severe over-crowding! There takes place one disaster after another adding thousands upon thousands more souls to the ‘population’ –and what of dead animals - the highly intelligent dolphins? Is it just humans who go into an “after life”?
Scientifically, I cannot accept that. So what is going on? The truth is that I will keep on investigating and, one day, hopefully I can have a ‘conversation’ with something like the woman in white!
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A4 FormatB&WPaperback358 pagesHeavily illustrated£20.00
After more than 40 years as an investigator and more than fifty as a naturalist,the author has opened some of the many files he has accumulated dealing with such things as..
The Terrifying Events At The Lamb Inn, The Ghosts Of All Saints Church, Dead Aquatic Creatures of Canvey Island, captured bigfoot like creatures in India -all exclusively presented for the first time and with new added research previously unseen.
PLUS a vastly expanded section on Spring-heeled Jack! Photographs, maps, line drawings and up-dated to make 358 pages looking at Things truly Strange and Sinister.
Cryptozoologist,Ghost Hunter,Ufologist or Fortean:this book has something for everyone -including the just plain inquisitive!
ContentsForeword by Travis L. Whitehurst
Introduction de occultis non judicat ecclesia
The Bristol Rocking Horse
The Terrifying Events At The Lamb Inn
The Coonian Ghost
The Ghosts Of All Saints Church
His Luminous Chamber
The Late Reverend Dr. Blomberg
And More Ghost Stories
The Thomas B. Cumpston Case
The Chupacabra
The Strange Case Of The Gotherington Gargoyle
What’s Tall,Hairy And Vanishes?
Mystery Beasts Of Ireland
The Creature Of The Dump
The Strange Creature Of Repton Woods
The Bizarre Legends,Crimes And Truth About Spring Heeled Jack
The Black Beast Of Darmstadt
The Nameless Thing Of Berkley Square
The Terrifying Case Of The U.S. Naval Transport
The Case Of The Ghost Lear Jet
Ghost Planes,Crashes And Dead Aquatic Creatures
The Mitchison Loch Ness Monster Video
From The Deep Below To The Air Above –USOs
Aerial Encounters Over Austria
A Crashed UFO In 1790?
Angel Hair
Quimper-Corentin:Where “Thunder Fell”
Strange Aliens From Space
The Llandrillo ‘Saucer’ And Other Crash Retrievals
Transient Lunar Phenomena,Alien Structures And Moon Vegetation
Whiddon Down-Saint-Jean-du-Guard:Impossible Correlations?
The Venezuelan HorrorA Final Word.
After more than 40 years as an investigator and more than fifty as a naturalist,the author has opened some of the many files he has accumulated dealing with such things as..
ContentsForeword by Travis L. Whitehurst
Introduction de occultis non judicat ecclesia
The Bristol Rocking Horse
The Terrifying Events At The Lamb Inn
The Coonian Ghost
The Ghosts Of All Saints Church
His Luminous Chamber
The Late Reverend Dr. Blomberg
And More Ghost Stories
The Thomas B. Cumpston Case
The Chupacabra
The Strange Case Of The Gotherington Gargoyle
What’s Tall,Hairy And Vanishes?
Mystery Beasts Of Ireland
The Creature Of The Dump
The Strange Creature Of Repton Woods
The Bizarre Legends,Crimes And Truth About Spring Heeled Jack
The Black Beast Of Darmstadt
The Nameless Thing Of Berkley Square
The Terrifying Case Of The U.S. Naval Transport
The Case Of The Ghost Lear Jet
Ghost Planes,Crashes And Dead Aquatic Creatures
The Mitchison Loch Ness Monster Video
From The Deep Below To The Air Above –USOs
Aerial Encounters Over Austria
A Crashed UFO In 1790?
Angel Hair
Quimper-Corentin:Where “Thunder Fell”
Strange Aliens From Space
The Llandrillo ‘Saucer’ And Other Crash Retrievals
Transient Lunar Phenomena,Alien Structures And Moon Vegetation
Whiddon Down-Saint-Jean-du-Guard:Impossible Correlations?
The Venezuelan HorrorA Final Word.
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