Oct. 29th 2014
In
December 2003, we were contacted by a family who had moved into a North
Birmingham property in March of the same year. We were told that they
had been experiencing numerous strange occurrences around the property,
including the sound of heavy footsteps walking across their upstairs
landing - from one end to the other. In mid-December the footsteps had
manifested so loudly, they were convinced that there was a genuine,
living person in the house with them. They were of the opinion that -
the longer they stayed in the property - the louder and more pronounced
the activity would get.....
The reported activity didn't begin as
soon as they moved in, but seemed to coincide with their beginning to
decorate the upstairs portion of the house. They were told that the
previous tenant had not decorated in the 10 months that she had remained
in the property and neither had the tenant before that. The house had
supposedly contained a number of families over the years.
The
stairs had also been heard to creak, as if someone were walking down
them, along with sighs, whispers and the sound of someone calling the
name of the father of the family. There were bumps and bangs and sounds
of objects moving about the property...... but they had never actually
been able to catch such things actually 'in the process' of being
moved!? Clothes and other items were moved from room to room.
The daughter had apparently felt her hand being stroked during the
night when occupying the front bedroom and their son had actually
refused to sleep in the same room because he said there was a man in
there who was always watching him....... This 'man' had been seen in
other parts of the house by the lad too.... particularly standing
outside the bathroom and, sometimes, floating up at ceiling height!
When pressed for a description of the figure, the boy had said he had
brown hair, a 'horrible blue shirt' (the lads words) and black trousers.
On waking each morning, the family would always discover that their bathroom window had been opened in the night!
Activity seems to have definitely been stronger in the upper portion of
the house - involving most of the rooms on the 1st floor, save for the
rear bedroom. The effect had become so pronounced that visitors were
asked - without any form of prompting - to walk around and say which
parts of the building they felt strongly about? Apparently, all came up
with the same answer - the landing! During a holiday, a relative was
asked to keep a check on the house and they reported having gone
upstairs and had a distinct feeling that someone was walking behind them
throughout the visit. The feeling had been so strong, they were -
afterwards - dubious about ever going upstairs again.
Having
spoken to a local medium about a completely different matter, the
psychic referred to the property in question and voiced the opinion that
there was more than one spirit there and they were something to do with
other tenants from the history of the house. She said that they were
trying to gain the attention of the current occupants!? She had
specifically mentioned the spirit of a man in her appraisal of the
situation.
At the point of contacting us, the family were already
on a housing list for an exchange of properties and we were told they
were hopeful of a fairly quick move.
Just over 2 years later, we
placed (as we frequently did back then) an advert in the Tamworth press,
asking for people to contact us with their ghost stories. One
afternoon, in response, I received a phone call from the woman who had
previously written to me about the above case.
In her opinion,
the activity appeared to have potentially 'moved to their new property
with them' - a scenario that we're all aware of from other instances, of
course. To add to the situation, the 'new' property that they'd moved
to 'also' had a reputation for being haunted...... along with a number
of other properties in their street, it seems!? Before they moved in,
the next door neighbour had apparently called the police out twice
because they said they'd heard people running around in the empty,
adjoining property! Since they had moved in, the neighbours had also
come round to complain of the TV being on 'full blast' all day long.....
They knocked the door to find no one in the house, as the entire
family were out all day and the TV wasn't actually on!?
Around
the time that they had phoned us, they had started noticing some form of
'smoke-like' form on the landing of the house. On first seeing it,
they believed that they may have had a fire of some kind, but then the
effect was seen to 'drift' and vanish in a nearby room! The young
daughter had also seen a 'foggy' effect on the stairs outside her
bedroom.
Objects had been found to have vanished around the
property - tea towels and the like - and a particular perfume was
detected around the same time every night. It was suggested to them
that the previous owner of the house - an elderly woman - had regularly
'washed herself down' at that point in the day!?
People in other
properties had also reported peculiar things happening. Speaking to an
elderly neighbour, they were told that he had been followed by the
figure of a 'miner-like character' along the street one night.
The village had been a heavily mined area right up until the 60's and
there were rumours of a pit disaster in the area at some point?