Loading summary
Transcript10 lines
- [00:00]
Advertiser 1
This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Fiscally responsible financial geniuses, Monetary magicians. These are things that people say about drivers who switch their car insurance to Progressive and save hundreds. Visit progressive.com to see what you can save. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. Potential savings will vary. Not available in all states or situations.
- [00:25]
Advertiser 2
This episode is brought to you by blink, an Amazon company. Think you're ready for Prime Day? With up to 50% off Blink Smart Security, you will be. With crisp HD video, real time alerts and two way talk, you'll know the moment your packages arrive. Save big on Blink Smart Security starting at just $19.99 with the Blink Mini 2 plug in camera shop now at Amazon.com blink.
- [00:53]
Genevieve Mannion
Hello and welcome to My Victorian Nightmare. I'm your host, Genevieve Mannion, and I'm here to talk about mysterious deaths, morbid fascinations, disturbing stories, and otherwise spooky events from the Victorian era. Because to me there's just something especially intriguing, creepy, and oddly comforting about horror and mayhem from the 19th century. So listener discretion is advised. Hello friends and welcome to this my 49th episode. Almost 50 episodes. How exciting. I hope that you had a fantastic week. Mine was simply divine for so many reasons apart from the fact that New York slam dunk dunked the primary. So proud of my city, I finally got my invisalign shark teeth removed. I have had sharp bumps on all of my teeth for a full year. I can finally say words like murder again without the back of my tongue getting ripped up. And I've got the mouth of a Hollywood starlet. That word has been particularly difficult. Maybe one day I will release a recording of bloopers, which will just be a long string of me repeatedly not being able to properly say the word murder and cursing. You will die laughing even though it was literally 100 degrees outside. After I got them off, I went all the way to my favorite taco place and ate a taco with fancy free chompers and I almost cried. I started choking up. I had to think of the lyrics to Guns N Roses welcome to the Jungle to keep myself from crying, because there's nothing I can think of more concerning than someone eating a taco and crying. There's no way I wouldn't have ended up in someone's Instagram story with God knows what caption. So I pulled it together and I ate the very best taco of the year while looking at all of the beautiful people with their I voted stickers with the sweatiest boobs in the city. And nothing. No, nothing could have been better. Goodness gracious. I can't wait to talk to you about the things I'm going to talk to you about today. Dear listener, Today for you I will be discussing not one but two of the most haunted Victorian homes in England. I've discussed the most haunted homes in America, but we haven't crossed the pond just yet. I will be discussing the Borley Rectory as well as a little unsuspecting cottage in Essex that was once known the Cage of St. Osith. This home was the site of a medieval witch prison. I'm going to discuss a little bit about their histories and a lot about their hauntings. But first, a little Haunted Housekeeping. Thank you for your ratings on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. They mean so much to me and keep the show going. Please continue to rate the show. Thank you for your comments. I got some great ones this week. A listener on Apple Podcast Podcasts wrote that the show to them is like driving by a gorgeous or decaying Victorian home. I can't look away. Oh, that's just so lovely. Thank you for that. You can find me on Instagram @myvictorian nightmare and bluesky@victorianightmare. And if you want to support my show and listen to it ad free, you can do so by joining my Patreon. And speaking of Patreon, the Fan Coven is not ready yet. Because I have been going completely out of control, I've decided to add even more to it. For only $8.99 a month, you will receive the show ad free. You will also receive monthly witchy affirmations and meditations aligned with the celestial calendar. But that is not all. I am including an entire audiobook now on where to begin with Eclectic Witchcraft, Manifestation, Intention, Setting, or all the tools you need, all the tips and tricks and a special gift that I will be sending you in the mail. I'm also going to make the audiobook available separately. So if you don't feel like joining the coven, but you do want to know how to get started with a modern approach to the craft, you can grab that separately. And just letting you know, for the time being I am putting Dark Poetry back on hold only for a little while. I just want to make sure that I'm making the Fan Coven worthwhile for you guys. I want it to offer a lot of value, so I'm going to put my focus there and on this spooky show right here for some time.
- [05:48]
Advertiser 3
Summer's here and Nordstrom has everything you need for your best dress season ever from beach days and weddings to weekend getaways in your everyday wardrobe. Discover stylish options under $100 from tons of your favorite brands like Mango Skims, Princess Polly and Madewell. It's easy too, with free shipping and free returns in store. Order pickup and more. Shop today in stores online@nordstrom.com or download the Nordstrom app.
- [06:17]
Genevieve Mannion
Before we make our way to the haunted houses, I have a haunted evening stroll to share with you in our weekly segment With Their Own Eyes, where I share with you the firsthand accounts of petrified Victorian ghost sightings, and this one is hauntingly mysterious. I did some more digging into this one and found some juicy details too. This comes to us from the Illustrated police news from 1882, and before I start, I just want to give a little bit of a preface here. The ghost of a young woman began appearing to the quivering townsfolk of Shropshire in 1881, following them around at night, and one of these townsfolks claimed that this ghost, when asked its name, responded and said that their name was Sarah Duckett. The article that I'm about to read is about a man who allegedly encountered this ghost after she had already been established to be named Sarah Duckett, and I'll fill in all the rest of the blanks when the article is done. It's fascinating. The article is called the Ghost of Saraducket Shropshire, and it reads the Church Stretton Copperhole's ghost story has just been revived in that neighborhood in a remarkable manner, and all the fears of the story. Superstitious people resident in the district have returned. A young man a few nights back who had laughed the loudest and ridiculed the most when the ghost story was at its height, declaring that if he had seen something resembling even his satanic majesty, much less the ghost of inoffensive Sarah Duckett, he should have something to say about it Was returning from Church Stretton when, as he relates, he perceived a woman following him at little distance. Thinking he should have company, he stayed for her to come up to him, but although she appeared to continue walking, she did not seem to gain ground. Neither could he hear the footsteps, but only the rustling of her dress. After stopping a number of times for his singular follower to overtake him, and always with the same unsuccessful result, his bravery deserted him, and he walked rapidly on towards Hope Boulder. Coming to a part of the road called the Pikes, he states that he summoned up courage to stand again, determined this time to have some conversation with this strange woman. She then glided noiselessly toward him. And within a few yards stood and slowly removed her cotton bonnet from her head, holding it towards him. He states that he saw the bonnet plainly in the strings dangling from it. The woman then passed through the hedge and vanished from sight. The young man reached home in a pitiable condition from fright. The scare appears positively greater than ever. The appearance of this alarming visitor was not confined to the young man. For an old man going along the lane leading to his cottage one night found his passage barred by the ghost and fainted outright. A youth on horseback was so scared by its presence that, putting spurs to the animal, he never drew rain until he reached the village. And I hear a lady received a more serious injury to her nervous system through imagining she saw the ghost through her parlor window. It's surprising how many people around Church Stretton solemnly shake their heads and observe that Sarah Duckett's death hasn't been clearly proved yet at all. And if it has not, it certainly seems a pity that someone cannot come forward forward to clearly prove it to satisfaction of even the most superstitious neighbor. End quote. Okay, like I said, I did some digging to find out who this woman was. Why was there confusion about how she died, if she died at all? Because the article ends with some confusing details there. I searched back in time a few years and discovered more details. It was believed that a young woman named Sarah Duckett, who disappeared from that town, was murdered and thrown down the copper hole shaft that that gentleman was walking past. In that article, it's unclear why people believed that this missing woman had actually been murdered and specifically thrown down that shaft. That appears to have been just an assumption. But when this ghost began appearing to folks in town, it caused such an uproar. And so many people experienced sightings of her that the town decided to clear the shaft, which had been filled in over the past year to search for traces of her body. No remains were found. An ominous letter was received by a tradesman working on the shaft that read, quote, you will fail to find the body of Sarah Duckett in the copper hole. Look in the cellar of the toll bar. Examine the part nearest the road in the left hand corner. Signed one who knows. End quote. Before the toll bar was searched, another letter received by a magistrate claimed that Sarah Duckett was actually alive and well and living with her husband in. And this was all just a hoax. The letter purported to be written by Sarah herself. But it was quickly determined that this letter was a fake. At this point, to add even more intrigue, the family of a woman named Sarah Duckett claimed that their daughter died the year before, but in a town a few days distance away from Shropshire, a domestic servant who bore resemblance to the woman townspeople described as their ghost. So it is possible that this ghost was that of a whole other woman who wandered far from home. Or it could have been the ghost of a woman murdered in town. Someone was clearly trying to confuse the public about where her body could be found. Or maybe it was a ghost of a whole other woman and it was nothing but a lie that the ghost claimed that her name was Sarah Duckett. Or there was no ghost and people just made up the stories. Sadly, it is not clear if they ever excavated that toll bar to see if they could find the remains of this missing woman there. Guess what? I found something so wonderful in researching haunted Victorian houses today that it has birthed a whole new segment which I cannot wait to share with you, called the Seance Room. I was desperately trying to find the sources for some of the claims about the haunted homes that I will be discussing today, which are always a little tricky to find. And I noticed a cited source called the Spiritualist. This was a newspaper that goes as far back as 1869 that I had never heard of before. And, and it's apart from the Illustrated Police News, one of the most magnificent publications I have ever found. It was a newspaper that was a record of the progress of the science and ethics of spiritualism, as they ascribed to the top of each volume. And it includes terrifying paranormal encounters between ghosts and mediums, spiritualist philosophies, information about spiritualist lectures and goings on poetry, instructions on how to be a medium yourself, etc. Etc. I almost did not finish this week's episode in time because I was simply entranced by this publication and glued to every page. And you can find this publication easily online@iapsop.com I put a link to the source in the show notes. Treat yourself. But before you do, allow me to read a brief article called the Philosophy of death in this November 19, 1869 volume. Oh, and without shark teeth in my mouth, this is heaven for me. It reads, quote, Spirits and mediums, clairvoyants and seers all agree very closely in the descriptions they give of the natural process called death. The vital forces first quit the feet and lower extremities of the body, and those who have the power of spirit vision see a luminous haze slowly forming above the head and connected with it by a shining cord. Gradually, as the vitality of the body diminishes, the cloud above assumes a distinct shape, and the spirit form of the departing individual is seen lying in a state of insensibility above the prostrate body. At last the spirit awakens to consciousness. The silver cord still connecting it with the body is severed, and the newborn spirit quits the house in company with spirit friends and relatives who awaited its arrival. The spirit friends are often seen before the life has entirely quitted the body, which is the reason why the dying so often talk of seeing departed friends around the bed. The spirit of Lord Bacon, in communication given at the circle of Judge Edmunds in New York, April 20, 1853, said, if you feel that the teachings of the spirits are beautiful, and if the views which they have presented to your mind mental eye elicit emotions of joy, how much more will you realize the ecstatic pleasure in store for you when death shall have opened the glorious realities of spirit life? Eye hath not beheld, human heart hath not conceived the truths that death will unfold. Oh, when the last pulse is fluttering, when the heart's throb is almost past, when gasping and struggling in the pangs of expiring mortality, then, then will your spirit eye behold the gates of immortality opening before you and your soul catch a glimpse of the gorgeous beauties of death. It is well for you that the lessons have made so profound an impression. They prepare your spirits to elicit from each manifestation the real object of its teachings and hasten the time when you can behold, eye to eye, face to face, the loved ones who have gone on a little while before you. There is no death. Oh, wasn't that just beautiful? Now, do I believe that the spirit of Lord Bacon said this through a medium? It doesn't matter. This reverence for the dead and peacemaking with death is just so beautiful, isn't it? Oh, wasn't that marvelous? I want that right at my funeral. We shall return to the seance room in episodes to come. Let us now make our way to the haunted houses. My main references for today are a Wikipedia article on the Borley Rectory and a fabulous article on UFOInsight.com written by Marcus Loath. These and all of my other sources can be found in the show notes. As mentioned, it is tricky sometimes to substantiate many important details about haunted houses in regard to reasons why they may be haunted, exactly who those ghosts were in life, or if they are truly haunted at all. Because often all you have to go on are personal accounts and legends. And even if the sources are cited for newspaper articles about deaths supposedly connected to hauntings or even Current events regarding hauntings in the 1800s. It was the 1800s. We know our favorite Illustrated Police News made up stories all the time about murderers and tragedies. It also surely stretched the truth about hauntings. So, just as a disclaimer, I always try to do my best to substantiate claims, but it's just impossible at times in regard to today's topic, because the sources substantiating those claims are often not reliable. I won't let that stop us from having some spooky fun here, though. So let's begin with what has been described as the most haunted house in England. But I don't believe that they've trademarked that title the way the Whaley House in America trademarked themselves as being the most haunted house in America. They better get on that, because although this house is quite spooky, they have some stiff competition in the cage of Saint Osith. The Borley Rectory was built in the village of borley, Essex, in 1862. The house was built for the reverend of the Borley Church nearby. Reverend Henry Dawson Ellis Bo moved in one year after its construction. The original rectory before this one had burned down in 1841, and it's unclear if anyone died or was injured in that fire. I checked, however, when looking for who certain ghosts may be in this home, I came across a terribly sad death that happened there the very year that the house was built. This tragedy isn't mentioned in any articles about the hauntings. I just happened upon it myself. Himself a young man of 17 who was actually helping to build the home, drowned right next to it. In the Essex County Standard, August 1862. It says, quote, an inquest was held on the 31st at the White Hart in Melford before G.A. partridge, Esquire, Coroner, upon the body of John Wired, age 17 years, son, son of Mr. Wyatt, Grocer of Thurston, and in the employ of Mr. Farrow, builder of Bury, who died under the following circumstances. It appeared that the deceased, in company with Richard Matheby, a carpenter working at Borley Rectory, and other lads, had gone to bathe on the Tuesday proceeding in a river adjacent to the rectory where he was at work. The river was deep and deceased had been cautioned not to go beyond his depth. Mathebee, having swum across the river, was on the meadow on the other side when he heard someone calling out that deceased would be drowned. He immediately jumped into the water and seized hold of deceased's hair. But finding that he was being dragged in and nearly exhausted, Mathaby relinquished His hold to save himself. He subsequently again tried to save him, but in vain. Help was obtained and deceased was eventually dragged out, but life was extinct. End quote. So this is a tragic, though interesting detail to me. The new home was built to house the Reverend and his 14 children. Good gracious, that's a lot of children. There was a legend that a Benedictine monastery supposedly built in this area in the 1330s was home to a monk who had a sexual relationship with a nun from a convent nearby. Once their affair was discovered, they were both executed, the monk being beheaded and the nun being bricked into the convent walls alive. Although this has not been substantiated in any way, and I read a number of articles, specifically Catholic newspapers, that they believed this story not only to be untrue, but anti Catholic propaganda. The first paranormal events to take place at the Borley Rectory were reported by locals servants in 1863. Some claimed to hear unexplained footsteps within and around the house. At that time, in 1900, four of the reverend's daughters allegedly claimed to have seen the ghost of a nun at twilight outside the house. She was so clear that they approached her and tried to speak to her, but she vanished before their very eyes. At this, this time, a local organist who worked in the church nearby claimed to other locals that the entire Bull family were very concerned about paranormal events happening within their home. He claimed that they told him themselves that they had seen this nun on several occasions. Others claimed to see a very strange kind of apparition outside of the house as well. A ghostly phantom coach driven by two headless horsemen. This apparition was claimed to have been witnessed by several people over the next four decades. The reverend died in 1892 and his son Henry took over the parish and decided to move out of the rectory. One year later, another reverend moved in with his wife, a man named Guy Eric Smith. And to me, this is the strangest detail. Vom. Soon after moving into the house, Smith Smith's wife found a brown paper package with a skull in it. She claimed to have found it in a cupboard. Shortly afterwards, the family reported a number of paranormal incidents that scared the dickens out of them. It's just strange to me that it's just left at that. Like, did they not contact the previous owners and ask if they forgot something?
- [24:42]
Advertiser 2
Hey, it's Ryan Reynolds here from Mint Mobile. Now, I was looking for fun ways to tell you that Mint's offer of unlimited Premium Wireless for $15 a month is back. So I thought it would be fun if we made $15 bills, but it turns out that's very illegal. So there goes my big idea for the commercial. Give it a try@mintmobile.com Switch upfront payment.
- [25:04]
Genevieve Mannion
Of $45 for 3 month plan equivalent to $15 per month required new customer offer for first 3 months only.
- [25:08]
Advertiser 3
Speed slow after 35 gigabytes of network's busy taxes and fees extra see mintmobile.com.
- [25:12]
Genevieve Mannion
The Smith family claimed to hear sounds of servant bells ringing all on their own and despite being being disconnected on coming home in the evenings, lights would be seen coming through the windows from the inside, but upon entering no candles or lamps would be lit. They also heard footsteps around the house. Smith's wife was another one of those folks who claimed to see the Headless Horseman carriage at night, which is horrifying. This is the spookiest detail to me. Like what happened to those men and horses? Were they attacked on the road and were they on their way to the home as it was when they were killed to pick up a resident? Or even spookier, is there a headless person inside the carriage coming to the home over and over again? I think about this stuff all day long. The Smiths were so creeped out that they asked to be put in touch with none other than the Society for Psychical Research. I spoke about them only two episodes ago on the Willington Milhouse episode. I had never heard of them until researching that house. Just in case you're not familiar, they were a non profit organization in the UK that released a monthly journal who still exist by the way, since their inception in 1882. They currently describe themselves as the first society to conduct organized scholarly research into human experiences that challenge contemporary scientific models. I mentioned two episodes that their originally stated purpose was to examine without prejudice or prepossession and in scientific spirit those faculties of man, real or supposed, which appear to be inexplicable on any generally recognized Hypothesis. Fabulous. In 1829 the Daily Mirror sent a reporter who wrote a series of articles on the house detailing the alleged paranormal activity. The paper also arranged for a paranormal researcher named Harry Price to come and visit the house. He himself was a member of the Society for Psychical Research and was known for debunking certain mediums claims about their abilities to contact the dead. He also endorsed a number of mediums abilities as well. He exposed William Hope, famous spirit photographer for creating hoax double exposed photography. I put put some of those wonderful photos on the Instagram and Blue sky by the way. He exposed this man and many other mediums and tricksters of the spiritualist community and was respected for the most part by scientific communities for doing so. However, when he came to the Borley rectory, which he claimed did in fact exhibit unexplainable phenomena, his work there was questionable and disputed by other experts. When he arrived, strange, different kinds of experiences than the ones the Smith family reported started happening and mysteriously stopped as soon as he left. For example, stones were thrown, a vase was thrown across a room, as well as other objects. Smith's wife believed Price to be a fraud, faking different kinds of paranormal activity because he didn't experience any himself and probably just didn't want to leave the home without a story. She maintained that she did experience very strange paranormal things in the house, just not what occurred when he was there. The Smiths moved out only two years after moving in, and by this time the home had quite a reputation. The parish had difficulty finding tenants to move in. A cousin of the Bull family, Lionel Algernon Foyster, another Reverend Reverend, decided to move into the house, and quickly. His family claimed to experience some very frightening events, Much like Joseph Proctor in the Willington Mill House. Rev. Foyster kept a diary over the course of five years documenting the paranormal activity in the house. These experiences included bells ringing, windows shattering, stones and bottles being thrown, and even his adopted daughter being locked in a room that had no key. There, writings on the walls, including one ominously saying, marianne, please help me get out. Marianne was the name of Reverend Foyster's wife. She claimed to have been thrown off a bed. And twice Foyster tried to perform an exorcism, but was attacked with flying objects when trying. Now, this family had some questionable reliability. In fact, paranormal researchers that visited the house all agreed that it wasn't ghosts causing disturbances, at least for these folks. They believed that it was Mrs. Fer, who, after denying it, admitted that she was having an affair with a man who was lodging in the house and used paranormal explanations to cover it up, like she and her husband laying in bed. Did I just hear footsteps? I'm gonna go check those out. Be back in 45 minutes. Honey, if you hear any moaning or banging, it's. It's ghosts. Go back to sleep. The Voysters moved out of the house in 1837, and Harry Price himself rented the home for a full year. He recruited 48 other paranormal investigators to come to the house, mostly students who spent time there to monitor activity and report anything that they saw or experienced. One of the recruited investigators, a young lady named Helen Glanville, performed A woman Ouija Board seance and Price reported that she contacted two spirits. The first was a young nun who identified herself as Marie Lair, who claimed through the spirit board to have left her religious order and traveled to England to marry a member of the Walgrade family. She said she was murdered in a home that existed on the site before the Borley Rector was built and her body could be located where the cellar now stood or that it was thrown down a well. That's unclear. The medium investigator also said that the writings on the wall experienced by the Foyster family were hers. Specifically, the writing of Marianne please help me get out was her appealing to Mrs. Foyster to dig her body out and bury it in a Christian burial. The second spirit identified himself as Sonnex and Amours. He claimed that he would set fire to the house at 9 o' clock that evening and also said that when the house was burned down, the bones of a murdered person would be revealed. The home did not burn down that night, but it did burn down one year later after Harry Price had since moved out. In February of 1839, the new owner, a man named Captain W.H. gregson, was unpacking boxes and accidentally knocked over an oil lamp. The house was never connected to electricity and was still being lit by gas lamps. The captain got out alive, thank goodness. But a neighbor claimed to have seen the figure of a ghostly nun in the upstairs window during the fire. When Harry Price learned of the fire, it was he who interviewed this woman who who he admitted charged him for her story. A few weeks after the fire, Price paid to conduct a dig of the house's burnt ruins to see if there were any bones beneath the cellar and claimed to have found two bones believed to belong to a young woman by him. The bones were buried in Liston churchyard with a Christian burial ceremony. However, the local parish of Border poorly refused to allow the ceremony to take place in its churchyard because the bones were not substantiated to have belonged to a woman. And some people actually believed that they were fakes. So to me I actually do believe that something, something existed here. So many families had very strange paranormal sounding experiences which was researched by organizations like the Society for Psychical Research. And it is important to note most of their findings were that a large number of claims about the hauntings were simply untrue. They could easily be explained away by everything from confessions by the very owners like Marian Voyster who admitted that she lied about paranormal experiences. By the construction of that house being very drafty with strange acoustics There are even conflicting accounts about whether it was just a lie that the children of the Bull family ever mentioned a ghostly nun at all to that organist who spread the story. But I am drawn to the Smith family, the couple who were so creeped out that they reached out to the Society for Psychical Research themselves, hoping to get a proper investigation. They were the ones who saw the headless horsemen, heard footsteps and saw lights in their windows. They didn't seem to have anything to gain in asking that their house be investigated. To me, and they left within two years. There just doesn't seem to be any reason why this reverend and his wife would make these things up. So I personally believe that there is certainly some fluff here, some tall tale, but some details that, if indeed the folks weren't misquoted in newspapers, at least lead me to believe that they themselves believed they were experiencing something paranormal, especially because such a tragic death occurred just as the house was being built I am the world's biggest advocate for therapy, so I am delighted to introduce you to RULA Affordable Telehealth Therapy. I've mentioned on the show how I've struggled with mental health, especially in my 20s. I felt like nothing but a shell and didn't even consider that this was a mental health issue that could actually be treated. I ended up in the hospital and met a therapist who set me on the path to healing. I really wish RULA existed back then, although I was able to find therapists to help me. The process was so stressful and sessions were so expensive and no therapists accepted my insurance. Rula's mission is to make high quality mental health care easy and affordable. They accept most major health insurance plans and the average copay is only $15 per session. Their over 15,000 providers are also carefully vetted and chosen for their experience. Your journey begins with a few questions about what is important to you so that they can can connect you with a therapist that matches your preferences and you can often find an appointment as soon as the very next day. Thousands have already trusted RULA to support them on their journey toward improved mental health and overall well being. Head on over to rula.com victorian to get started today. After you sign up, they'll ask you where you heard about them. Please support my show and tell them that I sent you. Go to rula.com victorian and take the first step towards better mental health. Today. You deserve quality care from someone who cares. Okay, let's talk about the Cage of Saint Osith, a sweet little cottage in Essex whose bones were built in the 1500s as a prison, but was converted into a lovely cottage in the 19th century, although the original in main apparently never left. And if you would follow me up to the door of this sweet little cottage in Essex, I want to show you something. It's actually not the 1800s we've come to. It's the early 1970s. I don't tend to travel outside the 19th century. I don't think I've ever taken you anywhere else. But tonight I am making a special exception. And I haven't brought us any drinks or snacks because we are not staying long. It's 1972, it's 10pm and luckily for us, nobody locked their doors in the 70s in this town. So we are just going to go ahead and let ourselves in. Wow. Dig the witch prison tangerine shag carpet. That is astounding. Okay, follow me. We're going to pop a crouch or a kneel realistically behind this plaid tobacco infused couch. The room is lit by a single dusty lamp in the corner. They must have forgot to turn off the record player. Oh, check out this ashtray. It's one of those thick glasses. Murder weapons. Same color as the carpet. So chic. Okay, the family is home. A mother and father are upstairs getting ready for bed. And their son is upstairs too. Okay, shh. Someone is coming down the stairs. It's a young boy, maybe 12, 13. That's him. Slamming himself against the walls of the stairwell every step he's taking. Something is very wrong with this boy. Okay, get down under the couch. You can still see him. He just sat down on the carpet. He's got a matchbook in his hand. Okay, get ready to run. Okay. He just lit the match and threw it on the carpet that he's sitting on. Okay, take my hand. We're getting out of here. Okay, you can see through the window. The mother just ran down and saw what's happening. She's running back up. The father is now coming down and. And he's blasting the room with a fire extinguisher. Okay, okay. Walk with me back over the street. It's okay for now. This boy was allegedly possessed. At least this was what the locals claimed. And he was trying to set the place on fire. They all moved quickly after this event, by the way. This situation was the account of a woman who herself moved into the house for a short while. A woman named Nicole Curtley. She had heard that this had happened years earlier and still moved in. Regardless, a little history about this home and the village where it stands the village of Saint Osuth was named after the granddaughter of the last pagan king king of England, a woman who lived in the seventh century. So this home exists in a very old village. Local legend claims that Danish invaders beheaded this woman. But being a woman of strong Catholic faith who wanted to be a nun in life, she carried her own head to a nunnery. The town has a colorful history, but it's known best for its history of witch trials, specifically the trials of 13 women, two of which were hanged. I often speak of witchcraft and witches on my show. I identify as one myself. And before I discuss that particular history, it's important to note that many of the people executed for witchcraft in this time and in this town were not witches at all. As we currently understand witchcraft. They were simply healers, midwives, practitioners of folk spirituality, difficult women, difficult men, or people falsely accused by forced confessions. And I just want to be sure we make that distinction. This home is not haunted by wickedy witches. These women were just people. Although one was a midwife who also may have practiced pagan healing practices. And her name was was Ursula Kemp. She was accused of using witchcraft for evil purposes, even though she was also known in town as a healer. She was accused of causing deaths of women and children in the village with black magic. And when she was arrested and forced into a confession, she was forced to name other witches as well. Her own children were coerced into confessions of their mother's witchcraft and as well. And one child claimed that she heard her mother murmur something at a woman who died hours later. And even her 8 year old son claimed that his mother kept spirits in the house who she would offer cake and beer to. But we all know how easy it is to coerce children into making confessions, especially when they're scared. These poor children. Ursula was found guilty and brought to what was then known as the cage. From there she was taken to Clemsford and hanged. This building remained as a prison for hundreds of Years later, until 1908 and in the 1800s it had been rebricked. Although the original structure was simply built upon, in the 1970s, two bedrooms were added and the cell where Ursula and many unfortunate souls were kept was converted into a living room. Tenants would come and go and come and go, many of which claiming bizarre and terrifying events took place there. And a number of them broke their leases because they were too scared to stay. In 2010, a woman named Vanessa Mitchell bought the property. And allegedly as soon as she moved in, all hell broke loose. After living there for three years, she reached out To a paranormal investigator, a man named John Fraser, Asking him to investigate her home. She could stay only the three years until she couldn't take it anymore. She decided to rent it out, which is mean. I really hope she warned the tenants first. And no one who rented it would stay very long. These are the experiences that she claimed to have when she lived in the house. She claimed doorknobs would rattle as if invisible hands were turning them. Objects on shelves would move around. She heard tappings everywhere, and blood spots would randomly appear in the hallway. She claimed to see apparitions of people in full daylight. And the spirits in the house were strong enough to pull her hair and even punch her in the back. One visitor in the home even claimed that someone or something, something invisible, grabbed them and tried to throw them down the stairs one day while Nicole Curtly was unpacking. She was actually the best friend of Vanessa Mitchell. She moved in with her. When she was unpacking, Vanessa boiled a kettle to make them some tea, and she claimed that she heard footsteps behind her. She turned around, expecting to see her friend. But when she turned, she saw a black fog drift across the room through the door. She didn't tell her friend at the time. She decided to keep that to herself. But both of them together would experience more unsettling things. The house would remain cold even in the summer. Strange odors would appear out of nowhere. They would pick up the scent of pipe smoke. Now, to be fair, a home that was originally built to be a prison in the 1500s and covered in brick might remain cool in the summer. Old place have old smells. And those 1970s tobacco odors may have stuck around, but some of the other experiences are not so easily explained away. They would see tiny bright lights floating around the house. And one night, both Vanessa and Nicole were awakened by an incredibly large crash in the living room. They both ran out of their bedrooms and down the stairs to see what happened happened. But nothing seemed to actually happen at all. However, they both felt an overwhelming sense of dread. This exact thing happened to my mother once in a house we lived in. She said that it sounded like a large piece of furniture in the dining room that held all of our plates smashed to the ground. She ran down the stairs to see what the hell happened. I. I was probably 8 or 9 when this happened. I remember her asking me if I heard the sound of a train crash in the dining room. I was asleep in the living room, but I didn't hear anything at all. I've mentioned my mom's ability to hear supernatural things on episodes before. I believed her then and I believed her now. The women were getting so scared that they invited the local vicar to come to the house and bless it, and he agreed. He went from room to room and outside the house they all walked together. When they came back into the house, all of the water taps had turned themselves on. The vicar himself admits to this happening and feeling something not right in their home. There are so many more examples of creepy stuff happening in this house, but to me, the creepiest of all was that Vanessa began sleepwalking. She never had before in her life, and every night she would awake standing in the dark in the same spot, the place where a previous tenant had hanged himself. She claimed that she would awake to hearing voices saying, kill yourself. I mentioned that Vanessa had a paranormal investigator come to the house, a man named John Frazier. He brought with him another investigator, a woman named Rosie O' Carroll. While walking through the house, Ms. O' Carroll began to feel her legs burning. She looked and found searing red marks on her legs. She went to a doctor who confirmed that they were burn marks. John Frazier, who did not experience anything himself, however, along with his assistant, concluded that there was credible evidence that the home was haunted. He didn't just investigate the house, he interviewed past tenants and his conclusion was that the home was inhabited by many spirits. In 2020, Vanessa sold the house and it appears that it now belongs to a gal named Amy who has a spooky YouTube channel called Amy's Crypt. I don't see any videos about the cage yet, but it looks like she plans to restore it on her Facebook page. Very exciting to think that we might get more updates on the property and its hauntings in the future. If you enjoyed this podcast and would like to hear more, please please rate the show on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Share it with your spooky friends and family. Let me know what you think of it in the comments and if you would like to listen ad free, join the Patreon. Be kind to yourselves and I will see you in your nightmares.
- [49:38]
Advertiser 1
This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Do you ever find yourself playing the budgeting game? Well, with the name your price tool from Progressive, you can find options that fit your budget and potentially lower your bills. Try it@progressive.com progressive casualty insurance company and affiliates price and coverage match limited by state law. Not available in all states.