Bungalow’s bumps in the night.
Nervous family calls in a priest.
The house that David Price built is producing Poltergeist-style horrors for his frightened family. Over the past few years their modern bungalow in Gloucestershire seems to have taken on a will of its own in a series of mysterious incidents including: More than 40 fires starting without warning, destroying six washing machines and two cookers; Nearly 30 burst water pipes; Exploding lightbulbs and bolts unscrewing themselves; Five puppies dying in strange circumstances.
The house, built by Mr Price 13 years ago in Oakle Street, Minsterworth, has been checked by fire, electricity and water authorities who have found nothing wrong. The odd happenings have left Mr Price and his wife Ruby, both aged 49, and son Donald, 17, at their wits’ end. Mr Price even called in a priest, who gave the home a ghost-free bill of health.
The couple’s kitchen appears to be the centre of the strange phenomenon. The puppies died there for no apparent reason, and now the family do not allow animals into the room. It’s become so bad that Mrs Price now keeps her electrical appliances in her husband’s nearby workshop.
Western Daily Press, 14th March 1987.
Poltergeist terror of family hit by 40 fires.
A frightened family is blaming an evil poltergeist for a series of chilling “accidents” that are plaguing their home. David and Ruby Price have suffered more than 40 unexplained fires, with countless burst water pipes and exploding light bulbs. Five puppies have died mysteriously – all in the kitchen of the bungalow in Oakle Street, Minsterworth, Gloucestershire, that the Prices built 13 years ago.
The accidents started six years ago and have become much more frequent in the last six months. But they are not the result of a DIY disaster, stress experts say. Electricity and water board officials have given the house a clean bill of health. Now baffled firemen are investigating. “We are talking this matter extremely seriously,” said a spokesman for Gloucester fire brigade yesterday.
The Prices, both 49, and their 17-year-old son Donald are also thinking of turning to the church for help. Mr Price said yesterday: “It is quite phenomenal and very frightening. I don’t really believe in ghosts but so much has happened that I don’t know what to believe any more. We might well move out but it is not that easy because I run my business from here.”
The Reverend Ian Hazelwood, an expert on spiritual affairs, said: “Poltergeists are frequently more mischievous than anything else but their behaviour can be frightening.”
Sunday Express, 15th March 1987.
Ghostbuster priest to the rescue.
By Steve Robbins.
A church’s spiritual expert has offered to help a West family to put a stop to alarming poltergeist-style happenings at their bungalow home. David Price, his wife Ruby, both aged 49, and their son Donald, 17, are at their wits’ end. The family’s home in Oakle Street, Minsterworth, near Gloucester, has been the scen of numerous terrifying incidents in the past few years, including 40 fires and 30 burst water pipes.
Mr Price built the bungalow 13 years ago and it has been checked by fire, electricity and water authorities who have found nothing wrong. The Gloucester Diocesan Adviser on the Supernatural, the Rev Ian Hazlewood, vicar of Prestbury, near Cheltenham, said: “This sort of thing does crop up from time to time. This family should go to their local vicar initially and we will help. It could be a number of things such as a poltergeist which is mischievous but harmless, or it could be the soul of a departed one trying to attract attention.”
Other mysterious happenings include exploding light bulbs, bolts becoming unscrewed and the deaths of five puppies in strange circumstances.
Western Daily Press, 16th March 1987.
Family poltergeist terror could be radar waves.
Western Daily Press Reporter.
The poltergeist-style horrors frightening the Price family may have a more earthly explanation – radar waves. A series of unexplained mysteries have been scaring the wits out of Mr David Price, his wife Ruby, and son Donald, at their home in Oakle Street, Minsterworth, Gloucestershire, recently. More than 40 fires starting without warning, destroying six washing machines and two cookers. Nearly 30 burst water pipes. Exploding lightbulbs and bolts unscrewing themselves. Five puppies dying in strange circumstances.
The happenings baffled the fire, electricity and water authorities, but recently Forest of Dean district council’s environmental health department and Nottingham University have carried out research and believe radar could be the problem.
Mr Price, aged 49, said yesterday, “Several people have come to the conclusion that it’s connected with the Ministry of Defence radar establishment at Malvern.” He said that his house lies in the direct lines between the Malvern radar base and the Bath Navy headquarters and between top secret spy base GCHQ in Cheltenham and radar at Mitcheldean. “If you drew lines on a map between those places we are on the exact spot where they cross,” he added. He believes the waves have caused the electrical fires and the copper pipes to burst.
A spokesman for the Ministry of Defence said last night: “I have never heard of any such effects. The only danger from radar is when you are very close. It’s most unlikely but if the man feels he has a case he can put it to the MoD for consideration.”
Mr and Mrs David Price… facing poltergeist-style horrors.
Western Daily Press, 8th July 1987.
Ghost of a smile at the MoD!
A haunted house of horrors gave up its secret yesterday when David and Ruby Price finally managed to lay the ghost. For the past five years there have been bumps in the night, 90 burst water pipes, 40 fires, hundreds of exploding lightbulbs and numerous pets dropping dead. Engineer David, 49, of Oakle Street, Minsterworth, Glos, now believes he has irrefutable evidence – provided by scientists – that the ghost is… the Ministry of Defence. He claimed it shows his house is on the exact cross-over point of radar pulses between four MoD bases.
Daily Express, 9th July 1987.
NASA boffins probe into poltergeist blazes.
By Steve Robbins.
A top space scientist has been investigating mystery fires at two West homes. Former NASA defence consultant Dr David Baker and other top scientists believe the Poltergeist-style horrors which frightened a family at Minsterworth near Gloucester, and a series of unexplained fires at a house in West Street, Somerton, Somerset, could be caused by secret Government defence experiments.
David and Ruby Price and their son Donald have been baffled by the spate of 40 fires which started without warning, destroying six washing machines at their home in Oakle Street, Minsterworth.
Mr Nigel Pattemore, who lives with his father Frank at Iberson, West Street, Somerton, has been arrested by police about a series of bizarre electrical faults at his home. Machine operator Nigel, aged 35, was questioned for seven and a half hours and released without charge last month and is now fighting to clear his name.
The new theories for the mysterious happenings at the two houses will be featured on The Cook Report on ITV at 8.30 p.m tonight. Three international defence and electronics experts will say on the programme that the families’ problems may have been caused by microwave radiation designed to combat low-flying Soviet aircraft or by experiments designed to simulate the electromagnetic pulse produced in a nuclear explosion. Government departments declined to be interviewed for the programme.
Western Daily Press, 5th August 1987.
MoD denies fire claims.
The Ministry of Defence last night denied any top secret military link with a series of bizarre fires at two West homes. A spokesman dismissed suggestions that Government establishments in the West had been conducting anti-Soviet radar tests, which could have caused fires and exploding electrical appliances. Three international experts claimed this would explain electrical surges at Frank Pattemore’s home in West Street, Somerton, while other tests, to simulate electro-magnetic pulses from a nuclear explosion, could explain 40 fires at David and Ruby Price’s home in Oakle Street, Minsterworth. Mr Pattemore’s son Nigel, who was arrested and questioned by police about the electrical surges at his father’s house, has now been told that he does not have to answer his bail.
Western Daily Press, 6th August 1987.
‘Radiation’ fire claims denied.
Claims that microwave radiation from GCHQ in Cheltenham have caused more than 40 fires at a Gloucestershire home were denied today. A spokesman for GCHQ dismissed suggestions that secret radar work could be to blame following an investigation by TV detective Roger Cook screened last night. He was joined by top physicists at the house belonging to David and Ruby Price, Oakle-street, Churcham, where there have also been 28 water pipe bursts in five years. The family dog is too afraid to enter the house which has suffered dozens of fires.
Mr David Price said today: “I thought they did a good job on the programme and hopefully it will make the Government come forward a bit more and look into the matter. I don’t think there can be any other explanation,” he said.
But the GCHQ spokesman said: “There is nothing we are doing here that is likely to create the manifestations they were talking about. We have looked at the problem sympathetically but we know it is not us.”
Gloucestershire Echo, 6th August 1987.
MoD denies fire claims.
The Ministry of Defence last night denied any top secret military link with a series of bizarre fires at two West homes. A spokesman dismissed suggestions that Government establishments in the West had been conducting anti-Soviet radar tests, which could have caused fires and exploding electrical appliances.
Three international experts claimed this would explain electrical surges at Frank Pattemore’s home in West Street, Somerton, while other tests, to simulate electro-magnetic pulses from a nuclear explosion, could explain 40 fires at David and Ruby Price’s home in Oakle Street, Minsterworth.
Mr Pattemore’s son Nigel, who was arrested and questioned by police about the electrical surges at his father’s house, has now been told that he does not have to answer his bail.
Western Daily Press, 6th August 1987.
Cook Report: Close Encounters. https://youtu.be/S6vGbEu_Cyc
RC: Glastonbury Tor: an ancient site of magic and mystery. A fitting place perhaps to begin a bizarre latter day mystery tale. The villains of the peace in this strange story are not immediately obvious – but the victims certainly are. First on the list, a few hours up the road from here are the Price family, who are convinced there’s something very nasty in the air. We’re at Churcham, just outside Gloucester.
Mrs P: It’s been like a horrible nightmare.
Mr P: I think at the last count we’ve had 53 fires up to date.
Mrs P: I think the fires have been the worst, but the flooding is just as bad because you’ll go out and you come back and you’ll find your home flooded right through.
RC: In five frightening years, six washing machines, three television sets, two cookers and numerous small appliances have burst into flames. The family have also endured 53 fires and 73 floods.
Mr P: [pointing at pipes] These one inch compression fittings you see here, they unscrew, they come completely undone, and the joint blows apart. Light bulbs flung(?) out, ceiling roses catching on fire, we’ve lost two or three beds complete due to the electric blankets. During the time we’ve been experiencing these problems, we’ve had the problem with the animals. On lots of occasions we’ve had young pups sort of six to eight weeks old, they’ve more or less died instantly. [shot of dog looking out sorrowfully from under a chair].
RC: The Price’s home is close to an 11500 volt transformer. So could the damage have been caused by unexpected power surges? The Midlands Electricity Board claimed it wasn’t their fault.
Ralph Brain, Midlands Electricity Board: Although we’ve done extensive tests and inspections on the network, we’ve found nothing irregular with his supply.
RC: Nevertheless, photographs of the damage to the house and to appliances show that something or someone was at fault. Suspicion then fell on the Prices themselves.
Mr P in the loft: Well this is where one of the worst fires took place. I managed to get the fire out and under control and rang for the fire brigade, and they came with some police and forensic evidence experts. [shot of the family looking miserable round a table]. Immediately then they more or less accused us of doing it ourselves.
RC: So what did you think to that?
Mr P: Well not a lot, because we knew darn well it just wasn’t so, we knew perfectly well it wasn’t, and we knew that for a long long time.
RC: The suspicion was based on a report from Capenhurst, the Electricity Council’s research centre. The MEB had sent them just three pieces of charred wire. The question, had they charred from the inside, suggesting an electrical fault? No, said Capenhurst, they’d charred from the outside.
Mrs P: Seeing as I was the one who generally found it, or it happened when I was in the house, I’ve been pointed at very hardly. I’ve been very upset about it. But I can tell you I haven’t done it, and neither has my son or husband.
RC: Throughout the worst of their troubles, the family have only really had one supporter – local environmental health officer Jason Gillard.
JG: Some of the effects do take some believing, in the nicest way possible, it’s usually said, and very easily said, ‘oh it’s all self-inflicted.’ But I can’t come up with any sensible motivation for that. Let’s quickly explore that if we may. They’re a self employed family. If Mr Price and his son don’t do the work, they don’t come up with the money [shot of farm machinery outside a big shed]. Businesses are in a hard enough time at the moment without having to come up here and cope with fires and floods and all the rest of it.
RC: Mr Price by now was developing a theory of his own. He wrote to the fire brigade: “We remain convinced that the problems have been caused by some form of experimental work – possibly military – and that someone, somewhere is aware of this but not prepared, or allowed, to admit it.” David Price, an agricultural engineer [shot of Mr P and son on traction engine], essentially a low-tech person, found himself forced to consider a high-tech explanation to his predicament. He began to keep a graph of fires and floods at his home, which eventually recorded as many as ten incidents a day. But not every day.
Mr P: It never happened on week-ends, on Bank Holidays, or ever at night. It was always after about 11 o’clock in the morning, and once 4 o’clock in the afternoon was over, you felt reasonably sure that nothing was going to happen again that day.
RC: The council’s environmental health officer Jason Gillard supported the family’s view that outside forces were at work.
JG: I came into the house, I listened to the problems that had beset the Price family at that point in time, and it occurred to me then that most of them seemed to lie in a corridor running end to end of the house, just slightly diagonally of the ridge line. By standing in that corridor end-to-end, one immediately sees the aerial assembly on the hillside, some miles off, it’s true. If you then, as I did, draw a line through the bungalow and keep on going, it ends up in a certain installation in Cheltenham.
RC: He means GCHQ, the high security government communications centre a few miles away.
JG: Now, I contacted them. I started with radar establishment at Malvern [shot of the Royal Signals and Radar Establishment], because I thought really they would be more able to explain it perhaps. More likely to.
RC: The establishments involved, including British Telecom who run the microwave station near the Prices’ home, all said it was nothing to do with them, and refused to be interviewed. So, in an effort to solve their problems, the Prices agreed to have a variety of experts look around.
.An Expert: …the rotating of lightbulbs – now we have rotating type phenomena of some sort. By stretching one’s imagination to the very very limits, one could possibly conceive of some very high frequency effect… [shot of Mr P looking tired and non-plussed].
RC: Meanwhile, out in the garden talking to Mrs Price, Dr Sue Blackburn [actually Blackmore], a parapsychologist with an interest in poltergeists.
SB: Possibly there might be psychic phenomena going on here but from what I’ve seen today I very much doubt it.
Another Expert: When it comes down to it, you’re into the James Bond field, to imagine that there would be some external cause.
RC: Dr Frank Barnaby could be a latter-day ‘Q’ – a former Aldermaston Scientist, professor of physics, and the director of the Swedish government’s peace institute, he’s a specialist in advanced military weapons systems.
Mr P talking to RC: The electricity board has got chart recorders and records and graphs showing the voltage coming into the property.
RC: Will they show you those?
Mr P: No they will not show them to us, but they do know if there’s any problem with the incoming supply.
Dr FB Weapons Expert: A small number of the many things that have happened here in this house could have been caused by deliberate action by someone in the house.
RC: But most of them in your view certainly couldn’t have.
FB: Most of them could not.
RC: What do you think the probable cause was then?
FB: Well on first sight, the obvious thing that springs to mind is a large voltage, a pulse of high voltage, two or three thousand volts say, going up the electrical line into the house. But on the other hand, some of the explanations must relate to the house itself being irradiated by a large external source of radiation. Now there are several possibilities there. It could be very high intensity radar, for example, military radar, or it could be a large intense beam of microwaves.
RC: And would energy of this magnitude be military or commercial?
FB: Almost certainly military. And that theory fits in well with the obsessional secrecy of the electricity board in this matter. There is absolutely no reason why they should keep secret about their explanation of the events, and obviously they must have an explanation – unless it were a question of military security.
RC: So, he says that advanced military radar is a real possibility. However, are the Prices telling the truth? Enter the polygraph lie detector. How accurate is it?
Charles Jones, Polygraph operator: I feel that from my standpoint, I’m a good 98-99% – I can’t say 100 because there’s always the possibility of human error.
RC: And it’s good enough, in this country for example, to be used for positive vetting in the security services?
CJ: Yessir, it is.
[ominous music from A Clockwork Orange as Master P is attached (in his farm overalls) to the lie detector machine]
CJ: Now here’s the standard form, I want you to look at this. Your name will go in there. The date goes up here. [shot of Master P’s very oily hand as CJ rattles off something he’s clearly said a thousand times] … without duress, voluntarily and without coercion or promise or reward of immunity… do you understand that? [shot of the graph being drawn] Do you know who has caused any of the damage reported in this house? [shot of Mr P’s hand]
Mrs P: No.
CJ: Now have you deliberately caused any of the damage in this house?
Mrs P: No. [shot of Mrs P also wired up while A Clockwork Orange plays]
CJ: Have you reported any false claims to anyone?
Mrs P: No.
RC: So Charles, having interviewed these three people and tested them, what conclusions have you reached?
CJ: Well it’s my opinion based on the tests that I’ve conducted that they were telling the truth to the questions that I asked them.
RC: So you’re satisfied that none of these three people has had anything to do with damaging this house in the way that’s been reported?
CJ: That is correct.
==
RC: The Prices weren’t alone. The happenings in their house attracted a fair amount of publicity. And that publicity prompted a letter from a family in Somerset.
[continued on this page: https://poltergeistreports.blogspot.com/2023/04/somerton-somerset-1987-and-before-and.html ]
Psychic brings peace to poltergeist bungalow.
By Beverley Hawes.
A couple whose home has been plagued by unexplained disasters believe they may have at last solved the mystery. A psychic has discovered that their bungalow was built on a burial ground created in horrific circumstances similar to those in the film Poltergeist. Since the psychic’s visit a month ago, the family has put up a memorial cross in the garden and the trouble has stopped.
David and Ruby Price have been baffled by the mysteries at their home in Oakle Street, Churcham, Gloucestershire. Scores of fires have broken out, washing machines and a cooker have been destroyed and pipes have burst countless times. Light bulbs have exploded, windows have shattered and bolts unscrewed themselves.
An army of experts has beaten a path to their door to try to explain what is happening. Fire brigade experts, electricity and water officials and Forest of Dean district council environmental health officers have all been stumped. Nottingham University experts thought radar could be the possible cause, linked with GCHQ at Cheltenham and the Malvern radar base.
But now London-based psychic healer Selena Hart has visited and believes she has found the chilling answer to the nightmare bungalow. She maintains that a mound in the garden hides the remains of monks and nuns who were burned to death in the 10th century. Miss Hart said: “I looked for every rational explanation and there was not one. I questioned the Price family very carefully and soon realised it was nothing to do with them. It was the spirits of the perpetrators of the act who needed to be freed. I went around the rooms saying my prayers and telling the spirits they can go, that there is no reason to stay.” Miss Hart also told the family to put up a small memorial cross in the garden which they did. Mrs Price said: “We hope the whole thing has now resolved itself. We do hope it is all over.”
Western Daily Press, 10th May 1991.