A Co. Tyrone Ghost Story.
A curious story from Newtownsaville (10 miles from Omagh) is to the effect that bricks mysteriously fell down a farmer’s chimney. Despite two re-buildings, the bricks continued to fall, although no loose places could be found. The bricks were heaped in a pile, but however many were added the pile did not increase. The bricks ceased tumbling on Tuesday.
Irish Independent, 4th October 1918.
A Really Active Ghost.
Weird Tale of Damage at a Country House.
Here is a chance for the lady who is advertising in the English papers her readiness to rid houses of ghosts.
A Dublin correspondent says the district of Newtownsaville, about ten miles from Omagh, is in a state of ferment through strange happenings in the house of a Protestant family. The trouble began last September, when bricks began to fall down the chimney and ornaments were broken without visible agency. After a visit of the parish priest the uncanny happenings ceased for a time. In the past few weeks, however, they have been renewed and every article of earthenware in the kitchen is smashed, the windows are broken, and clothing is torn in a peculiar way.
Sacks containing oats and other produce have been torn and the contents scattered about. The chimney-stack has been practically removed.
Nearly all the damage is done in daylight. The local Protestant clergyman was a spectator of some ofthe incidents. He was sitting on a chair in the kitchen reading his Prayer-book when a brick which had fallen down the chimney “disappeared” and one of the windows was broken.
A dresser in the kitchen is totally devoid of delf with the exception of a few half-broken vessels. The hands were removed from a clock of an antiquated type. After being replaced they disappeared.
Hundreds are daily visiting the scene.
Weekly Dispatch (London), 13th April 1919.
A ghost story! That’s too good to be missed.
The people of Drogheda, who will remember the cock-and-bull story of the haunted house near Boyne Bridge, must have some lively remembrances of the collapse of the ‘Haunted House Story’. However, the story of the ‘Haunted House by the Boyne’ fades into insignificance compared with the story of the alleged haunted house in County Tyrone. It has made good copy for some local scribes, and has enjoyed such world-wide circulation that it is worth while recapitulating. Of course, like every ghost story, the cat comes out of the bag at the eleventh hour. But thus the story goes:-
‘The clergyman (Rev Mr Stothers, BA) was sitting on a chair near the dresser, and one of the bricks that had some time previously fallen from the chimney was lying on the floor in front of him. While Mr Stothers was reading his prayer book there was a crash of glass, portion of one of the panes remaining in the window fell down in bits, and the brick that lay on the floor had disappeared.’
The scene was the kitchen of a little two-roomed thatched cottage at Tullynafoyle, near Newtownsaville, County Tyrone. For some time past the humble dwelling has been the locale of remarkable happenings, for which a supernatural explanation has been readily provided by the neighbours. The occupants are a Protestant family named Allen, and the Protestant clergyman was there to investigate the occurrences when the incident of the vanishing brick occurred as detailed above.
The first time that any uncanny incident occurred to disturb the even tenor of the Allen family life was in September last. On that occasion, however, the manifestations ceased after a visit to the house by the Parish Priest, Rev Father McMeel, and there was no further trouble until about a fortnight ago.
This second visitation totally eclipsed the first one in persistence and destructiveness. The interior of the dwelling, particularly the kitchen, is a veritable wreck; practically every article of earthenware is smashed; the panes in the windows have been broken, and various articles of clothing are peculiarly torn. Bags containing oats also have been seriously tampered with.
The greater portion of the frontage of the chimney, which is constructed of brick, is open almost to the top, the bricks according to the occupants’ story, having mysteriously fallen out one by one within the past fortnight. Many of them, striking the floor, are said to have rebounded and made the windows or the delph on the dresser their targets.
Mr Allen detailed the damage to a representative of the Ulster Herald who visited the scene, and, showing a handful of large pebbles, said – ‘Often when standing on the floor here these stones were thrown through the window, and the peculiar thing about it is that no matter who was on the floor they were never hit, but some articles of glass or delph suffered. While in bed at night we have never been disturbed; this disturbance takes place in daylight and before bedtime.’
A dresser in the kitchen is totally denuded of delph except for the presence of some vessels half broken. ‘I have scarcely a delph article in the house that is safe,’ said Mrs Allen plaintively, ‘but,’ she continued, ‘if we have not to leave the place entirely we will be all right. Every shelf on that dresser,’ she added, ‘was filled with delph, but all have been smashed within this past fortnight.’
Husband and wife tell of a rather peculiar discovery. On getting out of bed one morning last week after a peaceful night a quantity of delph, including plates, cups and saucers, which for safety had been stored away in a press in the kitchen was found neatly arranged in rows on the kitchen floor and undamaged, but portion of the press was slightly broken.
The sequel of the whole story is epitomised in a couple of lines in the daily Press of Tuesday, wherein it is stated that the ‘boy’ in question has been the cause of all the disturbance and the cause of all the misgivings. It is now authoritatively stated that the cause of all the trouble was a boy, who now admits that –
‘On Saturday night a number of neighbouring men (whom he named) came here, and they decided on sitting up with us for some time. They remained until it was late in the night, and my wife prepared tea for them; they were sitting at the table when a brick – and we did not know where it came from – dashed on a plate on the table. The brick split in two and the plate was undamaged. Immediately afterwards the lamp, which was lighted without a globe, was struck by something and the light put out.’
‘The lamp,’ he added ‘came in for further attention on Sunday night, when the bottom of the oil bowl of it was broken by a brick.’
A hammer, a hatchet, and the sling of a plough disappeared mysteriously from the house, and were subsequently found on three different occasions in a lane near the cottage. An old clock of an antiquated type that served as a timepiece in the cottage for many years has been, according to the story, mysteriously destroyed. This was practically the only article in the bedroom that was touched in any peculiar manner.
One morning it was discovered that the hands of the clock were missing. They were again affixed to the timepiece by Mr Allen, but on the following morning the hands and weights were found to have been removed, and subsequently the dial was found smashed, although at no time did the occupants hear any noise in the way of a breakage.
The police have visited the place repeatedly, and a police sergeant from Ballygawley, according to Mr Allen, had a decidedly strange – if not sensational – experience at the disturbed cottage on the occasion of his visit last week. In the occupant’s own words, “the sergeant was sitting on a chair at the kitchen table, having placed one of the fallen bricks on the table beside him. A plate on the dresser was suddenly smashed, and the brick that the sergeant had placed on the table was missing in a twinkle.”
Drogheda Argus and Leinster Journal, 19th April 1919.
also reported as Newtownsville in the Donegal Independent.