Another Ghost Sensation.
Brixton’s Startling Phenomena.
The London News Agency reports another London ghost sensation, Brixton being the neighbourhood of the supernatural visitation on this occasion. One of the hotels in the district is the scene of mysterious noises. The ghostly tenant has indicated his presence in the house by the frequent and violent ringing of the whole of the bells, preceded by mysterious noises from the cellar and other parts of the house, rustlings on the stairs, and the slamming of doors. These phenomena have been occurring at intervals for some time past, but the noises have lately so much increased in vehemence and frequency as to have greatly disquieted the assistants, several of whom have been frightened into leaving their situations.
St James’s Gazette, 11th September 1900.
Bell-Ringing Ghost.
Perturbed Spirit at a Brixton Hotel.
It is easy to be facetious about spirits in a public-house, and one could make quite a number of passable jokes on the matter, but none of them would settle the question which is now agitating the mind of the proprietor of a certain hotel in Fyfield-road, Brixton. He has occupied the premises only for some six months, but he has known the house for years, and during a number of those years certain phenomena have occurred within its walls which up to now have not been satisfactorily explained. Mostly they are concerned with mysterious bell-ringing, though these are not the only uncommon occurrences.
A “Chronicle” representative went over the building yesterday, and though no manifestations occurred during his visit, the circumstances were testified to by independent witnesses. The house is not an ancient one, and it has
A Blameless History.
There are no electric fittings about it, with the sole exception of a telephone-wire on the roof, the bell-hangings being of the ordinary old-fashioned wire kind. One bell, situated in a passage outside the bar, communicates with the billiard room above. There are five pulls in the room, all of which ring this bell. On numerous occasions the bell has rung when the billiard room has been empty – in the daytime, before the house was opened, late at night, after it has been closed. Careful inquiry discovered the fact that it has never been heard or seen to ring when anybody has been watching in the billiard room, but no doubt this oversight will be remedied when fuller investigation is made. Two other bells at the top of the house are
Also Guilty of Freaks.
One of them is connected with the front door, and might of course easily be pulled by anyone passing. Strangely enough, though, it still persisted in ringing when the handle was removed and the rod pushed right it. It has also rung when the outside of the house has been watched and no one was in sight. The other bell is connected with the parlour, and the wire has been broken for some time, but this has no effect on its mysterious activity. The obvious comment one would make is “rats.” However, a close search has failed to discover any indication of rats. It may also be observed that rats do not slam doors, make mysterious noises on the stairs, light the gas in the billiard room, and distribute cues that have been left in the rack overnight about the room. These are some of the troubles which the Gresham Arms is suffering from, and would be glad to receive a satisfactory explanation of. Neither the landlord nor the potman – a hard-headed, unimaginative man – believes in the supernatural theory, though they are at a loss to account for what happens. The idea of thieves may be dismissed, for nothing has been taken. Some local spiritualists have interested themselves in the matter, and an attempt is to be made through the usual channel to get into communication with the uninvited guests.
South Wales Echo, 11th September 1900.
Ghosts in a Hotel.
The strange bellringer.
The Gresham Arms Hotel, in Fyfield Road, Brixton, has a ghost mystery of the first order. For five months past the bells in the hotel have been rung by some uncanny agency, which no one has so far been able to discover. For years the Gresham Arms, or the Gresham Tavern, as it used to be known long ago, has had its ghosts. One night an apparition walked into a barmaid’s room – through the locked door, like Marley. She (the barmaid) packed her box and left next day.
Recently it has been bellringing, and also gas lighting and billiard playing. The landlord, who is a wide-awake man not given to dreaming, and the barman have gone carefully over the house at night and put out all the gas. During the night they have heard the billiard balls rolling about, and next morning they have found the billiard-room fully lighted.
Some of the bells in the house are so stiff that it difficult to ring them. Yet they have gone off ringing furiously, on their own or the ghost’s account, when no one has been near the bell-pulls, and while people have been sitting round watching.
The barman has jumped out of bed at unearthly hours and rushed down into the cellars to try and find the bellringer. He does not believe in spirits. He has found nobody and nothing. A party of four recently sat up card playing all night, and the bells went off before their eyes.A lady of the party fainted, and in the excitement the ghost disappeared – at any rate it was not seen. Still the mystery remains.
A local spiritualist being called in, said: – “Oh, yes; an uneasy spirit, of course.” So a spiritualist meeting is to be held to see what the poor ghost has to say. After he has eased his soul, says the spiritualist, he will give up billiard playing and bellringing.
In anticipation of suggestions, it may be said that, so far as the hotel people can discover, there are no rats in the place.
Dundee Evening Post, 12th September 1900.
Uncanny Manifestations.
Several spiritualists and three Pressmen went round to the Gresham Arms at Brixton at Brixton on Tuesday night to try and exorcise its noisy ghosts. As they crossed the doorstep, all the bells in the house rang violently, though the wires had been cut. Arrived at a room upstairs, a professional medium among the party – Mrs Brenchley, of Finsbury Park – was put into communication with the spirits. It is a German ghost, apparently, that is making all this trouble. Its original dropped dead in the house three years ago, and “wants relief,” whatever that may mean. He even made the medium speak in German, although she disclaims any knowledge of that language. That is all the exorcising party found out, and it has proved somewhat of a failure as far as stopping the manifestations goes. Even while they were there a poker was thrown all the way downstairs by an unseen hand, and the knockings, rustlings, rattlings, ringings and thumpings are going on just exactly as before.
Bournemouth Daily Echo, 13th September 1900.
A Brixton Ghost Rings Bells and Defies Bayonets.
Many startling stories are being circulated about Brixton and the neighbourhood concerning a supernatural visitation, of which the Chesham Hotel, Fyfield-road, has been the subject. Recently the ghostly tenant has indicated his presence in the house by the frequent and violent ringing of the whole of the bells, preceded by mysterious noises from the cellar and other parts of the house, rustling on the stairs, and slamming of doors. These phenomena have been occurring at intervals for some time past, but the noises have lately much increased. Ghostly forms have been seen flitting about the house and its precincts towards dusk. One of the barmaids a month ago was so alarmed at the sight of her bedroom door slowly opening int he middle of the night despite the fact that it was locked, that she fled panic-stricken from the house, and nothing will induce her to return. The manageress of the place has also resigned. Mr Herbert Welch, the proprietor of the hotel, seen on Monday by a reporter, confirmed in every particular the curious stories which have been current. The bells still continued ringing, he stated, at the most unexpected times, although he had cut several of the wires. He could advance no theory as to the cause of the noises. He was only able in the absence of a more satisfactory explanation to preserve an open mind upon the subject.
The barman employed in the house, who is an Irishman and has recently returned from active service in South Africa, states that the whole thing is quite beyond him. He has been awakened night after night by the violent ringing of the bell communication with the bar, and is convinced of the supernatural origin of the occurrences. He had explored the cellar with a fixed bayonet, after having heard the most alarming noise of thumping and battering at dead of night, but without result, though he is certain that something has been moving about while he has been in the place. The mysterious phenomena apparently do not occur at any stated period, but take place irregularly, more frequently, however, towards the setting in of night. An investigation is, it is stated, to be made at the hotel by the Psychical Research Society.
Northwich Guardian, 15th September 1900.
Spiritualists and the Brixton “Ghost.”
The ghost at the Gresham Arms Hotel, Brixton, was, a correspondent writes, on Monday the subject of investigation by a party of spiritualists. The medium, a lady, was placed under “control” by a gentleman of the party, and informed him in German that the ringing of the bells and other phenomena were caused by the troubled spirit of a man who had dropped dead in the bar some time ago. During the evening the ghost “obliged” with some manifestations. At the entrance of the medium all the bells were set ringing violently, only ceasing at her command. This was a good start. Towards the end of the seance one of the company left the room with the landlord to investigate the mysterious opening and shutting of the door. While they were outside a small poker was observed to descend from the direction of the staircase landing, on the floor above, and the most thorough search failed to explain the incident. The medium, asked afterwards to give her opinion of the manifestations, replied, “There is a spirit alive and conscious, earth bound, and desiring relief.”
Northampton Mercury, 14th September 1900.
Brixton’s Hotel Ghost.
Weird and Mysterious Occurrence.
The Proprietor Interviewed.
“Rest, Rest, Perturbed Spirit.”
[“South London Press” Special.]
After the extensive and prolonged vogue of the West Kensington ghost, it is but fair that the spooks should also visit London south of the Thames. And this has evidently been recognized by the unsubstantial shades themselves, who have deputed one of their number to take up his or her abode at the Gresham Hotel, Fyfield-road, Brixton, as the guest of the courteous propietor, Mr. Herbert Welch. That there may be spiritual manifestations going on around us is a thesis which modern science does not take upon itself flatly to deny, but that such manifestations should take the form of eccentric and annoying conduct in a respectable suburban hotel is really too much to believe. Sceptical, however, as we may be, the landlord and his employees insist that they – fully awake and on the alert for any trickery or practical joking – have seen apparitions, have heard and seen the bells ring without human intervention, and have seen perfect havoc in the billiard-room as the result of Mr. Welch’s visitor from the nether shades.
Now, this is all very interesting, and to those immediately concerned not a little disconcerting, if not alarming, and it is to be hoped that the Psychical Research Society, who are undertaking a systematic investigation of the affair, will be able to probe to the heart of the mystery and lay bare the reason for these uncanny phenomena. Tidings of these things having been noised abroad, a representative of the “South London Press” sought an interview with Mr. Welch, who expressed himself as frankly sceptical about the ghost, but considerably perplexed over the weird and unaccountable midnight happenings in his house.
He had occupied the premises only six months, but had lived closely contiguous thereto for over 20 years, and had never heard any talk of ghosts at the Gresham, though for years past rumour had it that the bells in the house were frequently set ringing in the night. Since his occupation, however, the ghostly manifestations had become more numerous and varied. One night an apparition appeared in the bed-room of a bar-maid – though the door and windows were fastened – and so alarmed and upset was the young lady that she left the next day. The present barmaid, Miss Nellie Bentley, does not sleep in the house – she “wasn’t going to be terrified out of her very senses by a horrid ghost,” quoth she, when interrogated upon the subject. She doubtless, being of an impressionable nature, was upset by the experiences of her predecessor, Miss Flora Steele, who had seen a white face peeping over the counter at her while counting the contents of her master’s till – as though even in spiritland the denizens waxed enthusiastic over the good red gold. Moreover, the goblin had on several occasions bumped against Miss Steele on the stairs; so apparently the spook population might benefit by a lesson in courtesy from their corporeal and mundane kith and kin who wear trousers and coats instead of winding sheets. Truly a most discourteous ghost, refusing to budge an inch when the lady desired to pass!
But the ladies of the establishment are not the only ones whose equanimity has been disturbed by the antics of the Gresham ghost. One night four intrepid sceptics sat up playing cares, when, lo! the bells were set violently ringing in their ears and swaying before their eyes. A rush was made by the quartet for the lower regions and the cellars – “darkness there, and nothing more!” The potman, too, has been prominent in the investigation. Jack Egan, a stalwart “broth of a bhoy” from the Emerald Isle, and just home from the war, where two Boer bullets went through him, went to bed one night recently, and was aroused shortly afterwards by the ringing of the bells. He took a light and ran to the billiard-room, whence strange sounds were proceeding. The cloth was lying huddled on the floor, a dozen or so cues – some of them having been in private cases, duly fastened – were lying “in most admired disorder” about the floor, and the gas was flaring. Jack was positive that he had extinguished the lights, put on the billiard-cloth, and tidied the room not an hour before. It must have been the work of the ghost. “He didn’t believe in ’em,” said Egan; “but it was a blamed nuisance, for all that.”
Now, this billiard-room is a most innocent-looking apartment on the first floor, with large windows overlooking the street. There are no cupboards, recesses, or curtains where any person could be concealed; but the apartment would seem to present some strong attraction for Mr. Welch’s mysterious and unwelcome guest. The landlord has no theory to suggest with regard to the personality of the “perturbed spirit” who “revisits thus the glimpses of the moon.” From its extraordinary penchant for bell-ringing and clattering noises, one would think it were the wraith of a wicked potman who had robbed his master, and was trying in vain to restore the ill-gotten booty, while its violence in the billard-room would give colour to the supposition that it was the spook of a billard-marker who had predeceased the final game in his last handicap, and was unable to rest until he had once more cannoned off the cush and pocketed the red.
However these things may be, it is certain that the bells at the Gresham Hotel, Brixton, are frequently set ringing after the household has retired. “You do not think it possible, Mr. Welch,” asked our representative, “for any one other than your servants to be concealed in the house without your knowing it?”
“I suppose it might be barely possible, but it is so highly improbable as to be practically impossible. Besides, had it been so, we must have found anybody who was unable to pass through solid walls, for on several of these disturbing occasions we have searched every nook and corner of the house.”
“Do you think it likely that the bell-ringing might be due to mice or rats coming into contact with the wires behind the wainscot?”
“I believe we are fairly free from those vermin,” replied Mr. Welch; “but even were it as you suggest, mice and rats could not light the gas in my billiard-room.” Here was a floorer.
“Quite so. I take it that your man, Jack Egan, is not given to hallucinations or gifted with a fertile imagination?”
“Ah, you doubt the story of the gas evidently. Well, I can only say that I am firmly convinced that Egan turned out the gas and tidied the room, and that the lights were rekindled and the havoc I have described was wrought. As I have said, I am not a believer in ghosts, according to the popular conception of such beings, but that mysterious occurrences for which I am utterly unable to account have been and are going on there is no loophole for even the shadow of a doubt.”
“I understand that the Psychical Research Society are going to take up the case?”
“I shall be perfectly willing for them to do so, or for any small body of responsible gentlemen to visit my house and make every possible investigation, and if they can exorcise the spectre I shall be exceedingly glad.”
After some further desultory chat upon ghosts in general and the Gresham Hotel ghost as a type, our representative took his departure, reflecting as he went upon the assurance which one Hamlet gave to his friend Horatio to the effect that there were more things in heaven and earth than were dreamed of in the latter’s philosophy, to which category of esoteric phenomena we must now add the hitherto unexpected species of bell-ringing spooks and billiard-playing ghosts.
Several spiritualists and three Pressmen went round to the Gresham Hotel, at Brixton, on Tuesday night to try to exorcise its noisy ghosts. As they crossed the doorstep all the bells in the house rang violently, though the wires had been cut. Arrived at a room upstairs, a professional medium among the party (Mrs. Brenchley, of Finsbury Park) was put into communication with the spirits. It is a German ghost, apparently, that is making all this trouble. Its original dropped dead in the house three years ago, and wants “relief” – whatever that may mean. He even made the medium speak in German, although she disclaims any knowledge of that language. That is all the exorcising party found out, and it has proved somewhat of a failure so far as stopping the manifestations goes. Even while they were there a poker was thrown all the way downstairs by an unseen hand and the knockings, rustlings, rattlings, ringings, and thumpings are going on just exactly as before.
“Black and White” writes to the “Daily Express”: “Referring to your paragraph on ghosts at the Gresham Hotel, Fyfield-road, Brixton, I can vouch, as a former manager of this hotel, for the ringing of the bells at various odd times, but I always put it down to their being of the old wire-pull pattern. I have been in other houses that had these bells, and have experienced the same result. I may add that while I was there two barmaids that were there at separate times would not sleep in a certain room of the house owing, they said, to the doors opening, though locked, in the middle of the night. There were always strange noises in teh house, but as there was a great deal of wood in the construction, there is nothing extraordinary about this.”
South London Press, 15th September 1900.
The story about the haunted hotel at Brixton has come rather late for the silly season; but it will do to stir up excitement in the popular southern suburb. Considerable ingenuity has been already exercised in locating the premises and in forming an opinion as to their inhabitants. The subject is not being treated with that reverence due to ghostly visitations. There are several hotels in Brixton between the famous house on the hill, for so many years conducted by Peall, the spot stroke champion, and the White Horse towards Kennington, where the celebrated Brixton jackdaw holds seances.
I reside in the neighbourhood; but I cannot ascertain what house has suddenly become haunted. This I do know, which may have some bearing on the phenomenon of ringing bells. During the heat wave early in the summer the electric bells at my house started ringing on their own account at a particular time in the afternoon. It was most irritating, and not a little alarming. No one had touched them, and yet ring they would. I went to the front door and manipulated the “push.” It was burning hot, and this circumstance gave me a thought. The heat of the sun concentrated on the metal around the “push” has set up expansion and contact, and of course the bells rang wildly. That was the simple explanation of what at first appeared like a mystery.
Brighton Gazette, 13th September 1900.
A Haunted Hotel.
The Brixton Ghost.
Spiritualists on its track.
A tentative attempt to exorcise the “ghost” which is said to inhabit the Gresham Arms Hotel, Brixton, and which has indicated its presence by the violent ringing of the bells in the house and other alarming signs, was made the other night, when a party of spiritualists, with whom were three Pressmen, held a seance at the hotel. The party was accompanied by a professional medium – Mrs Brenchley, of Finchley Park – and the investigation was conducted in a room on the second floor of the house.
A remarkable incident occurred as the medium entered the house, the whole of the bells, the wires of which have been cut, ringing furiously for some minutes. Later, the medium having been placed ‘under control’, conducted a conversation in German with a gentleman of the party, and informed him that the disturbances were caused by the troubled spirit of a man who had dropped dead in the house three years ago. She also made other statements while in the “trance” with reference to previous occurrences in the house, such as an accident to a child, the death of a former landlady, and the family affairs of the present landlord.
Another curious occurrence took place previous to the medium recovering consciousness. An amateur spiritualist, a member of the party, left the room in compnay with the landlord on account of the mysterious opening and shutting of the doors. Two or three minutes later a small poker was thrown from the top of the staircase leading to the uppermost floor, and the most diligent investigation failed to explain the incident.
Asked afterwards as to her opinion of the cause of the various phenomena, the medium replied, “I have been unconscious – my intelligence only has been acting. But there is a spirit – alive and conscious. There is a man in this house, who dropped dead, and he wishes for relief. I do not speak German.”
Meanwhile the ringing of the bells, the thumpings, batterings, and rustlings, and the opening and slamming of doors goes on with undiminished vigour, and the Irish barman, a returned invalid from the war, parades the house with a huge revolver.
Northern Echo, 14th September 1900.
Science and Health.
By Dr. Andrew Wilson, F.R.S.E.
The Latest in “Ghosts”.
My readers will doubtless have been reading about the ghosts or spirits which have been disturbing the peace and felicity of life in a Brixton hotel. Crude jokers of course have been telling us that spirits are appropriately found in a public house, but there is a section of mankind which will always take such assertions, as those made in the newspapers regarding the Gresham Arms at Brixton, as being serious in the extreme. For one thing, it cannot be at all unprofitable that a hotel should have the reputation of being haunted. Common curiosity will impel a rush of customers whose discussion regarding the spirits require to be frequently wetted. If I were the landlord of such a hotel I should boom the “spirits” for all they were worth. “Psychology on the premises” would be an attractive heading to the bill of fare. “Spirit demonstration every evening the ghosts permitting, etc,” might also serve to attract custom. I do hope the landlord of the Gresham Arms for his own sake is up to date in this matter. His purse will benefit if he can run the spirit show with persistence and tact.
“Spirits” and their Species.
What we have learned about the Brixton “spirits” is, first, that they are of course invisible, and that the term “ghosts” (which last I take to imply ocular manifestations of alleged disembodied souls) is therefore inapplicable to the disturbers of the peace at the Gresham Arms. Has it every struck my readers that the fine, frisky, old-fashioned “ghost” of the Christmas numbers, clad in a winding sheet, has been improved upon very much of late years. We have evolved with the “spirit” stage of superstition. It is no longer necessary to see your ghosts. You feel them touch you, you hear them ring bells and pull furniture about, and lift tables and do other feats of strength that I am morally certain the originals of the “spirits” could never have performed in the flesh.
What strikes one about the whole “spiritualistic” humbug is the very material nature of the disembodied souls. Delicate and ethereal beings could not ring bells and lift tables, and so we are told that these acts result from the “materialisation” of the spirits: so that we are left to face another monstrous piece of charlatanism, namely, the idea that “spirits” can remain as “spirits” or become material bodies at will. Is there in short any limit to this folly, this crudeness, this trifling with nonsense in the matter of spiritualism? And the Brixton case is but the last incident in a long record which shows that the wish to explain curious strange happenings by superstition instead of appealing to common sense is apparently strongly inherent in the human mind.
The Brixton Case.
The Brixton incident may be very briefly told. It is alleged that at the Gresham Arms bells are violently rung even though the wires thereof have been cut. Sounds of things falling are said to have been heard, and I read of a poker having been thrown downstairs by an unseen hand. A professional female “medium” was called in (I am writing this shortly after the event) and she is said to have conversed in German with the spirit which has perturbed the house. The spirit it is alleged is that of a German who dropped dead three years ago in the house. It is said to “want rihlf,” whatever that may mean, and why the spirit has waited for three years before manifesting its presence is, of course, another little puzzle added to the difficulties of the case – that is on the spiritualistic theory.
A former manager of the hotel contributes a very common sense view of the matter. He heard the ringing of bells and set down the circumstances to the fact that the bells being of the old wire-pull kind, it was not unlikely that now and then wires would stick, and on their release, cause the bells to sound. In other houses where he was employed, a like result was noticed. Then barmaids alleged that their locked bedroom doors opened in the middle of the night. This is not the first time we have heard of people thinking a lock was secure when it was the reverse; and finally we are told the house has a deal of wood in its construction, and that the cracking of the wood gives rise to noises of unnatural kind. If people choose to interpret these noises as made by a disturbed Teutonic spirit, they are very welcome to their belief.
The Probable Explanation.
My view of the matter is that somebody is having what the schoolboys call “a nice little lark” at the Gresham Arms. If anybody will take the trouble to read up the accounts of many alleged ghostly visitations in the past, he will find ample material for possessing an opinion similar to my own. Let him peruse Mr Andrew Lang’s book for example, entitled “Cock Lane and Common Sense,” and read therein of the marvellous trickery and deception which kept all London in wonder, and he will cease to feel surprised that every now and then some discovered nature takes to itslef the taste and duty of making people believe in spirit manifestation.
Only the other day I read of a haunted house, in which noises were heard, bells rung, chairs broken, and bedclothes tossed and tumbled about. A case in fact analogous to that at Brixton. The “ghost” was discovered in time to be a young girl of a hysterical (I should say mischievous) type, who delighted in seeing older (I won’t say wiser) people perplexed by her ingenious cantrips. It is somewhat surprising to find so many cases of this kind, to be the out come of fraud and trickery – at least, it has been so in the past. One feature of such cases is also the frequency with which young girls figure as disturbers of the peace. This alone is a curious fact, but I suppose it is to be accounted for on the ground that the morbid cunning of hysteria, is often more than equal to the deception of the ordinary mortal. Be that as it may, I should feel inclined (although I am not a person given to betting), to take very long odds in favour of the Brixton disturbances being the direct outcome of mischief on the part of somebody who knows the house. Failing this, and allowing for exaggeration on the accounts of this case, I should fall back on the wire and bell theory, but I would add that it is exactly a house of this kind which lends itself to be made the scene of mischievous frauds. The modern spirit does not like electrical apparatus, as as far as I have heard, does not tamper with electric or pneumatic bells.
Cardiff Times, 22nd September 1900.
Brixton Ghost’s Tricks.
A Seance held to find the ghost.
A contributor to the current number of Light, the organ of the psychologists, evidently anxious, like the fat boy in Pickwick, to make all people’s flesh creep, rakes up the ashes of the Brixton ghost.
That ghost, as was described recently, has been performing during the past six months at the sedate hostelry known as the Gresham Hotel, its chief indulgences being bell-ringing at all hours of the day and night, midnight billiards, and unauthorised interference with the gas lights in the house.
A week or two ago a seance was held, and the ghost on that occasion dropped a hammer or something of the kind down a flight of stairs. It must have been the ghost, for nobody but a ghost would be guilty of such facetious conduct while Spiritualists were holding a solemn investigation under the same roof. The Light contributor clinches the matter by saying: “This affair, which has unfortunately got into the papers too early, is undoubtedly the work of some supernormal agency.” “A seance,” says the correspondent, “was held by Mrs Brinckley, who gave her services. There were only two Spiritualists in a circle of nine. The conditions were naturally most difficult for any medium. However, Mrs Brinckley was soon ‘influenced,’ and made much ado about one who had dropped down dead in the house. A man died in the bar singing ‘Those bells shall not ring out’ some few months ago. This fact was absolutely unknown to the medium, who was a stranger to us and the district. In the various rooms into which we followed the medium deaths were described, and she pointed out one particular window through which, she said, a coffin had been lowered. This was all subsequently verified.”
But the ghost refuses to come out of his lair, and the actual causes of the phenomena have still to be discovered, which is a distinct victory for that very elusive ghost.
Sunderland Daily Echo and Shipping Gazette, 27th September 1900.
Science Jottings.
By Dr. Andrew Wilson.
I have been waiting patiently, very patiently indeed, for some further revelations and explanations regarding the “Brixton” ghost. In that busy suburb of London exists a hostel called “The Gresham Arms.” This inn was the scene of the visitations in question, and I am only sorry for the sake of all concerned that the sensation should have fizzled out in such an ignominious fashion. But the incident will serve its own purpose as a text for a few comments on “ghosts” in modern life. Brixton is not the only locality that has been favoured with visitations. Readers of this column may recollect my comments on the case of the haunted house described at first as “B—,” and then identified as Ballechin House, N.B., a domicile belonging to the Marquis of Bute, who has fathered a volume dealing with the manifestations said to have occurred on his property. The Ballechin mystery also fizzled out, I understand, after a religious service had been held by way of laying the “spirits.”
The Brixton story reminds one of that of the “Cock Lane Ghost,” which Mr Andrew Lang has treated of with his accustomed acumen. Its facts are few and simple – in a way. The story began with the assertion that bells were rung in the Gresham Arms, in the absence of obvious material agency. Then the billiard-room was believed to be haunted. Billiard-cues were found lying on the floor, contrary to the practice of every well-ordered billiard-room, and billiard-balls were heard to click, presumably because “spirits” were playing a little game at pool, perchance, or perhaps the ordinary “fifty.”
A poker is alleged to have been flung downstairs in a mysterious manner, though nobody seems to have cross-examined the housemaid on this accident; and barmaids were said to complain that locked bed-room doors opened of their own sweet will.
Finally, it was asserted that a German person had died suddenly in the billiard-room, and a lady medium being professionally called in, it is alleged, conversed with the Teutonic shade in its own tongue, whereof she is said to be entirely innocent. The German spirit, it was ascertained in this official way, was “seeking relief” – from what, or out of what, was not stated.
This is an unvarnished account of what one “read in the papers.” I eagerly awaited for further details. As I have remarked, they have not come to hand. Nothing more has been heard of the German spirit or the medium; not a word has been said about bells ringing or billiard-balls clicking through unseen agencies, and the Brixton mystery has therefore died a natural death. But sundry cold-water douches to the spirit hypothesis were administered during the progress of the story by people who knew the premises.
One writer, a former manager of the hostel, knew it as an old building, provided with the old wired bells, which are apt to stick occasionally and to be suddenly released. An indefatigable reporter was shown a hole near the bar through which the bell-wires passed, and through which anybody given to practical joking could easily have manipulated the bells, and so we have heard no more of this mystery at the inn. As in most other cases of the kind, I should be inclined to say the whole story was one fifth reality and four-fifths exaggeration. The reality, in its turn, may likely have been represented by a bell ringing suddenly through the sticking and sudden release of its wire.
Now I say this incident should be highly instructive to everybody who is interested in the analysis of so-called “ghost” and “spirit” recitals, for it is a type of most of the marvellous tales to which we are treated from time to time in the way of records of mystical experiences. Our capacity for descrying the marvellous and mystical far exceeds that which we exhibit of endeavouring to probe any matter of the Brixton kind to the bottom, and we do not even take the trouble to read records of similar cases and of the explanations they have received. The “Cock Lane Ghost” is a case in point, and there are dozens of others which might be cited with the view of showing that the only wonder regarding incidents like the Brixton one is that sensible people should imagine for one moment that any supernormal agency is needed to produce effects which even the clumsiest of practical jokers could readily achieve.
In a large number of similar instances we find a simple record of trickery played by one or more persons on their neighbours. I know not how the proclivity is evolved, but the spirit of mystifying people is one which is abundantly present in cases of hysteria, and especially in those which concern the female sex. In a very large proportion of cases, the disturber of the peace has been found to be a hysterical girl, who, prompted by the spirit of mischief, or whatever we may term her aberrant tendancy, has set a houshold by the ears, produced noises (said to be of supernatural origin), thrown about articles of furniture, and otherwise evolved all the antics of the haunted house. I see a close resemblance in such a case as that of the Brixton hostel to the instances where a practical jokist, or a hysterical person, imbued with all the cunning of that state, has been “having a little lark,” as the schoolboys put it.
What occurs to one also is the thought that the old-fashioned ghost clad in the cerements of the grave, and the spectre of the Alonzo and Imogene type have quite died out. It is not “ghosts” but “spirits” that are the objects of regard to-day; “spirits” that levitate chairs and tables, that rap out replies to questions, and that generally conduct themselves as very material things indeed. If ever Mr W S Gilbert rewrites “The Sorcerer,” he will have to make John Wellington Wells deal not in ghosts but in “spirits.” He may still retain the popular “penny curse” (much in demand on Saturday nights by the lower orders), and even the love-philtre may remain as, perhaps, the modern tonic. But the “ghost” will have to go. The fine old full-flavoured spectre who came free of charge is as dead as the Dodo. Our modern “spirits” charge a guinea a head (through the mediums) for being called from the vasty deep.
Illustrated London News, 6th October 1900.