Who ya gonna call? A Pembrokeshire Haunting….

We have a new answer to that long established question “Who ya gonna call?”

Pembrokeshire County Council  it seems!

Pembrokeshire County Council to investigate ghostly events at Wintern Day Centre, Fishguard

3:04pm Wednesday 5th May 2010

Mischievous ghosts are said to be spooking staff at a Pembrokeshire day centre.

Strange activity has been experienced at the Wintern Day Centre, in Fishguard, run by Pembrokeshire County Council. The problem has got so bad staff are believed to be afraid of working there after hours.

Firstly, I can see why PCC are concerned. This is a staffing issue, and they have to take it seriously. Secondly, I’m mildly curious as to what they find!

Unexplained events include printers printing when not plugged in, keyboards turning upside down overnight, furniture being moved, items flying off walls and a haunting smell of bluebells wafting through the rooms.

OK, when a printer prints and it IS plugged in I regard that as a minor miracle. However, my issues with IT aside, that is an odd phenomena, but I can imagine a printer retaining charge after it is unplugged. There must be ways this could occur – I’m not sure by “Not plugged in” if it means not plugged in to the mains (like Cath’s hairdresser in the Cheltenham case)  or not plugged in to the pc, which would be much less mysterious I think.  I suspect many printers possess some kind of “buffer”, and after receiving a command to print can continue to do so, at some later point when powered up again. Mine does it when I turn my pc back on (or simply remember to put some paper in it) and interrupted print jobs I had forgotten about come shooting out throwing paper all over the floor.  However without more details as to the precise nature of the issue it is probably fruitless to speculate further. The problem may however be uncanny — a brief Google search for “printer working while not plugged in” provides no hits on Google.  However “haunted printer” returns 515 hits —

http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&client=firefox-a&hs=X1q&rls=org.mozilla%3Aen-GB%3Aofficial&channel=s&q=%22haunted+printer%22&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&oq=&gs_rfai=

— and i do not have time this morning to check them all to see if any are similar problems. 🙂

“keyboards turning upside down overnight” again does not sound all that mysterious to me, if by this it means that workers enter the building in the morning to find that their pc keyboards are upside down.  It seems to baffle many office workers to realise that things move overnight — because they are so used to being the sole occupants of their workspace they forget that while they are at home, or safely in bed, a team of cleaners come in and clean the office?  As they never see these people, or very rarely, they may well fail to consider the option a cleaner has simply sprayed and wiped the desk, then forgotten to flip the keyboard back properly.  I can’t prove that was what was happening here, but I would start my enquiries with the office cleaners. “Was it Henry the mild-manner Janitor? — could be!”

“furniture being moved” is something every reader of this blog must be familiar with as a recurring phenomena by now. The problem however is the frustrating lack of details — if again, it simply comes down to workers coming in in the morning and finding furniture is not where it should be, then late working staff, people using the building unofficially after close to access the net, or  most likely of all those ‘invisible’ cleaners are my prime suspects.

“items flying off walls” — interesting, but incredibly vague. I suspect the author of this piece, Anwen Humfrey would have given more details if possible — so either this happened a while ago, or the witnesses are not speaking, or its simply a very common occurrence. “Flying off” is intriguing, but “items falling off walls” may be closer to the truth – while I desperately want to know distances, trajectories etc, sadly no details are available (though I will email Anwen of course, just in case!)

More intriguing is “and a haunting smell of bluebells wafting through the rooms.” The Coates case saw me searching the house and handbag and clothing (and let’s face it I’d probably have gone for a full body cavity search if decency permitted) of a mediumistic claimant after a strong floral smell pervaded the property after she did her “clearing”.  We could all smell it, it was not a delicate scent, and I never did locate the source.  I’d be useless here though – I live near a very beautiful bluebell wood, but I can not bring to mind the smell of bluebells. Of course I could invent hundreds of reasons for a phantom smell, but just for once I’ll resist the temptation. So why bluebells?

Rumour suggests the building is haunted by the spirits of two maids who lived in the attic. It is understood the girls hanged themselves after both became pregnant. The tragedy is said to have happened when the bluebells bloomed, and the building now smells eerily of the flowers.

I’m pretty sure this romantic tale has grown up recently (perhaps from a psychic claimants utterances) in response to the smell, not vice versa. I could of course be totally wrong, I usually am. I would love to know if there is any written record, or indeed older resident of the area, who can recall hearing the story in the past. “Wronged pregnant maidservants” are a staple of Victorian scandal and modern psychic’s claims, but whenever I hear of a “ruined” girl and these tragedies, I am reminded of Thomas Hardy’s wonderful poem The Ruined Maid. Do have a look, it’s not what you might expect from Hardy! 🙂

One source who has been researching the building, said: “It’s quite true, it’s a very scary situation, staff are not willing to work there at night at all. “It’s worse now than ever. Over the years when they used to light fires there, they would go out with a bang for no reason. It must be especially frightening for someone new starting work there.”

An anonymous source? Presumably someone connected with the workplace, but OK,  they tell us a couple of very interesting facts. I don’t know if the fires are gas, coal or electric, so I can’t speculate in that — but I’d get a fire safety officer round, or a GasSafe plumber, or an electrician as appropriate.  However this has been going on for years at a low level?  Yet only recently have the other phenomena started based on this – but I am speculating beyond the facts, and would need t know much more before I could be confident in that assertion, it’s just a possibility based on what I infer from this…

Shaun Sable, of paranormal investigation team Pembrokeshire Beyond, said: “It would be quite exciting to go down there and see what’s happening.” The Western Telegraph understands that Pembrokeshire County Council is investigating, and despite calls for an exorcist, is looking for other explanations before considering that course of action.A Pembrokeshire County Council spokesman said: “Members of staff at the centre have reported some strange activity and unusual noises. Although there have been no further reports in the past month, the council has arranged for the building to be inspected in order to reassure the staff working there.”

It’s interesting the phenomena apparently ceased quite quickly. Again I wish I knew more…

Anyway part 2 to follow.

cj x

Cheshire Poltergeist in Picture Pose?

Poltergeists are like buses — You wait ages for them, then they all turn up at once; or so it would seem. Well of course I have not been waiting ages — this blog is only a couple of weeks old, and already we have looked at Cork (last week) and York (earlier today). I am slightly annoyed with the paranormal-powers-that-be that they have no provided another case, published just two hours ago in a Cheshire newspaper.  Any of my readers in the Stockport area?

OK, I will try and give this one the love and attention it deserves, but a chap can only comment on so many cases in once day! It seems ironic I signed off my last piece on the York poltergeist just an hour or two ago saying people ask “where are the poltergeists today?” and stating that the answer was no one was looking — well I think this proves my point. I shall certainly send a message to the SPR Spontaneous Cases Committee drawing attention to this blog, and then they can proceed as they see fit with each of these cases. Becky and I would love to follow them up — but I simply do not have the money to do so (Indeed I  simply do not have any money at all, as readers of my personal blog will appreciate!).

Ghostbusters called in to pub after party pic terror

March 31, 2010

A landlady has called in a team of ghostbusters after things went bump in the night at her pub.

The ghostly happenings came to a head when Janice Wright held her 45th birthday party at the Stock Dove in Romiley.

An unidentified figure appeared in photos taken at the bash, held on Saturday, March 20.

Now she has called in paranormal researchers Club Zero Ghost Group to investigate.

Mrs Wright said: “I could not believe it when I saw the pictures – it is really freaky. We seem to have a resident ghost. We have heard whistling, screaming and crying and been tapped on the shoulder. My 19-year-old son Philip moved out of his bedroom after the furniture moved.”

So immediately this one is different: the emphasis is very clearly on a traditional “ghost” interpretation, and the landlady has chosen to call in a local group (never heard of Club Zero Ghost Group but nice website,  but will have to get in touch with them, I’m friends with a bewildering number of paranormal groups!), but in this case the ghost appears to have been photographed. Best take this  bit at a time…

An unidentified figure appeared in photos taken at the bash, held on Saturday, March 20.

Sadly the photo is not reproduced anywhere in the article, which is a puzzling oversight. One wonders if the mystery guest might just be a gatecrasher? I’d be curious to see it, but obviously with photos with extra people in them like this the usual explanation is that someone else was present, and simply not identifiable by the photographer afterwards. I must say I have seen photos of me in which I am unrecognisable to me! I will make some enquiries, but I am really unsure what to say about this until I have actually seen the images.  However Mrs Wright is unnerved by the photo – but could that be because of the other phenomena?

We seem to have a resident ghost. We have heard whistling, screaming and crying and been tapped on the shoulder. My 19-year-old son Philip moved out of his bedroom after the furniture moved.”

There is an awful lot of phenomena packed in to that short sentence. What is interesting is the differences to what we saw reported at York and Cork.  “Whistling, screaming, crying”… The whistling sets an icy tingle down my spine, not least because the motif is used in William Hope Hodgson’s supernatural fiction,  but because whistling has been a feature of a number of cases. Screaming and crying? One wonders when this will resolve in to voices — and if a voice does emerge, I really want to know more. I am not going to speculate further here on this simply because I am making predictions about what would happen and the nature of the voice if that did occur — I’m hoping for something more like the Rougham Poltergeist in Suffolk in the 1980’s than the questionable voices of Enfield.

Janice Wright (c) Stockport News 2010

I’m Always Touched by Your Presence, Dear…

Now Becky is about to do a major study (well she has started) for her Ph.D on apparitional experiences, funded by the SPR and supervised by Dr Ian Hume at Coventry University. Before she began Becky and I conducted a piece of research we call the Accidental Census of Hallucinations, which we hope to publish an article based upon in the Journal of the Society for Psychical Research.  Drawing on the work of the SPR in the 1880’s and 1890’s and Dr Donald West’s fascinating studies later, the details are not important here but we closely analysed (using a methodology called Grounded Theory) sixty accounts of unusual experiences. (I’m sure we will write much more on this topic in the future, so I’m passing quickly over it here.)

In that sample 21.3% reported a tactile hallucination, that is a  feeling of being touched, as Ian did. 53.8% of those who did reported other phenomena: in 46.2% it was the sole experience reported.  In 69.2% of those who claimed tactile hallucinations it only happened once: the remainder had multiple experiences of this sort.  In only one case  it is  an ongoing experience, that happens semi-regularly. There was nothing unusual about the gender or age of the people having the experience compared with other anomalous experiences (such as say seeing apparitions) – two thirds of those reporting the experience were female. 32% of the reports mention specifically being touched on the shoulder.

So what does this tell us? Actually, not much, apart from the fact one can have the distinct impression of being touched with out any other “ghostly” experiences. I therefore make the following suggestion: the sense of being touched may be a relatively common physiological or neurological phenomenon – a somatosensory hallucination. In fact it may be about as common as hearing someone call your name, but there not being anyone there. Now the account is not clear how many times this has happened, or to whom, but if it has only happened once or twice then it may just be a coincidence of a trivial but not uncommon experience, and maybe then suggestion.

The problem with my hypothesis is that in about half the cases Becky and I found the experience of being touched was linked to other phenomena. While my idea is that these cases are recalled precisely BECAUSE of the other phenomena, I am not convinced that can necessarily account for such a high correlation. I have tried a little experiment on Facebook, and asked

If you read this can you answer yes or NO (and I do want negative replies) as a comment, please! I’m trying to do a really quick rough and ready straw poll. The question is “have you in the last month had the feeling of being touched by an invisible person?” Don’t worry it does not mean you are mad or ill – I’m just …curious about this fairly common experience…

I received over a day 37 responses: 12 positive.  I think this strongly supports my hypothesis the experience is extremely common, but under normal circumstances simply ignored and forgotten?

The Usual…

Moving on we get to the really interesting (to me) bit —

“My 19-year-old son Philip moved out of his bedroom after the furniture moved.”

Bedrooms again, furniture moving again (these poltergeists should get in to the Removals business: might need someone to drive the truck though!) Are we seeing a pattern yet folks? Now of course it could just be that everyone from York to Stockport to Cork reports similar experiences because actually they are all drawing on the same films, TV, or popular culture motifs. Yet somehow, I find this unlikely — the experiences seem (to me anyway) rather trivial compared with the ones you see on the TV.

The Stock Dove - cliick for the pub website

Wayne from the Bury St Edmund’s research group messaged me earlier and said he was wondering when we would see another Enfield poltergeist but you know what? I suspect that any of these cases could be as big, if the SPR got hold of them and sent Guy Lyon Playfair and Mary Rose Barrington  or Tom Ruffles or whoever over.  Enfield just got a blaze of press attention (did the story break in the August “silly season” when news is slow  by any chance?), and has had much discussion, writing and books on it. Most of these little cases I am chronicling here strike me as having very bit as much interest — but I doubt in 20 years time people will be referencing them…

There is another curious parallel with the Cork case – the timings —

Janice reopened the pub with her business partner last August after it had been closed for 11 months.

Now thinking back to Cork, the family moved in last August, after the house had been empty for a while. I can not see any reason to think this is more than coincidence, but I think we should watch out just in case any patterns emerge, and we can find hypotheses we can test.  As I said in the Cork case, one would expect people to mistake ordinary noises and house settling, pipes etc,  for something weird in the first weeks after moving in. Here as in Cork the family had settled in for maybe eight months.

Janice Wright seems to take a very level headed view of the phenomena —

She said: “I think we must have disturbed the ghost. I have been told stories by some of the customers about how a girl came for a stay here when it was a coach house and was murdered, and it is thought she is moving things in my son’s room as that is where it happened. I can’t wait for Club Zero to come in to see what they can find out.”

So once again a dead guy – or in this case a dead gal – is to blame? Was the Stock Dove ever a coaching inn? I have no idea, but if I saw the building I could probably make a good guess. No for the story to make sense the murder must have been discovered, and most murders leave written records, so perhaps some local historian will be able to confirm the truth of this one.  It sounds like folklore to me, or people inventing explanations, but I wonder — I have been wrong on this before, most notably on the Old Bell, Dursley Case. I will keep an open mind for now.

The rest of the article simply deals with the impending visit of Club Zero –

Club Zero Ghost Group was founded in Stockport by Chris Andrews in 2003. It will visit the pub in April. Carole Webster, 56, the club’s events manager, said: “We are looking forward to going in to do an investigation. We will take along our equipment including EMS, an infrared system and a video camera. We will then put together a report and a DVD. There will also be a medium present.” For more information see clubzero.co.uk .

I assume EMF meter is intended by EMS, but I could be wrong – this look like a journalistic typo, and I wonder if a DVD is standard for ghost groups now. Seems sensible to keep a record fo the investigation anyway. Well I will do some digging and see what I find out, but for now I’ll call it a day.

cj x

Welcome to Polterwotsit!

OK, let’s start with the obvious question – what exactly is  a “polterwotsit”???

The answer is of course, “no one knows!”

Disappointed? Well, polterwotsits for the purposes of this blog are what other people call ghosts, spirits, poltergeists, hauntings, spooks, or even if you happen to be a fan of the parapsychological literature “Recurrent Spontaneous Psychokinesis” – or RSPK for short. The problem with all those terms is they have too many associations, too many theories implied, and let’s face it they quite possibly tell us no more than the my term  “polterwotsit”.

And that is what makes them so interesting! In our world there are few mysteries where the intelligent layperson can make a contribution, and most cutting edge research seems to be done by post-doctoral specialists in white coats. We have just such experts in the form of parapsychologists, but this is one field where we can all make a difference, and our research may actually help solve one of the last great mysteries.

Who is the blog for?

It is aimed at the general public, but there will be no dumbing down here! Hopefully the content will be clearly written, simple and understandable but perhaps at times challenging.  It will be of particular interest if you

* have a true “ghost” or “poltergeist” experience to share, and want to talk to people with an interest in such things!

* You think you are being haunted and want advice or pointing in the right direction

* You have an interest in parapsychology with an interest in “spontaneous cases” (as opposed to experimental or laboratory work) – ghosts, hauntings, poltergeists in particular.

* You are actively involved in ghost research, ghost hunting, or paranormal investigation.

* You like to critically examine such things

or

* You just love a good ghost story!

Who Ya Gonna Call?

If you have a comment on any story just sign in and leave a comment. All comments are moderated to prevent amusing spam, so  hopefully you won’t see thousands of offers for a larger manhood or exciting real estate in some swampland.

If however you want to write a piece for us, or you have a case to report, or a ghost story to share, don’t just comment. Instead in the first instance email CJ and we will get right back to you.

We love comments and emails, so please don’t be shy.

How You Can Help!

Over the next few weeks we will be adding a lot of content to the blog: essays on theories of hauntings, poltergeists, reviews, web coverage, news items, etc, etc. We are always interested in hearing from you. If you see something on the web or local press about ghosts or hauntings,  drop CJ a line. ( If you can’t get that link to work the address is chrisjensenromer@hotmail.com ). Again, if you have a true ghost story you wish to share with the world, do write. I can’t promise we will publish everything, simply because we are very busy, and following up all the email we get as it is takes time, but we will write back!

So, Seriously, Why Polterwotsit?

A long time ago, CJ met a young lady who had a most odd experience. He talked to her about poltergeists, and she in her reply was not exactly sure of the spelling – geist or giest? – so she wrote “polterwotsits”. Today she is CJ’s girlfriend, and doing her Ph.D in parapsychology. Reminds me of the old joke – “I could not spell parapsychologist and now I iz one”! So “polterwotsit” became a running joke, and still makes me smile today.

Anyway welcome to polterwotsit, and hope to hear from you soon!

cj x