‘Holy ghost’ helps out canon at St Mark’s.
Clergy admit: We’ve got it maid!
by Sarah Holmes.
Cambridge.
Three generations of vicars say they have lived with the ghost of a helpful maid in a city house. Over a 30-year-period, residents at St Mark’s vicarage, in Barton Road, say they have experienced strange phenomena, including objects being moved, doors opened and the central heating being turned on and off.
Canon Bill Loveless, who moved in to the house at the end of 1967, was the first to hear things going bump in the night, and current resident Canon Christine Farrington is still noticing unusual activity. Loud crashing sounds and the noise of objects being moved around in the attic were commonplace during the 20 years Canon Loveless and his family lived there. His wife, Betty, says she saw a figure of a young girl at the foot of her bed. Canon Loveless, who has retired and lives in Swaffham Bulbeck, said: “The vicarage used to be much bigger and was divided in half about the time we moved in. I believe the ghost is a young servant maid who is in some way not at rest.” But the Canon said there was no feeling of malevolence about the mysterious spirit. “There was no feeling of evil and it was not in any way threatening,” he added.
Before moving in, the next occupant, Canon Philip Spence, knew nothing of the activity the Loveless family witnessed. The Spence family, who now lives in Peterborough, said the most mystifying event was when a set of doilies were taken out of a drawer and placed under the glass of a 1930s bedroom furniture set. His wife Monica Spence said: “She was always doing helpful things and we did not feel frightened at all.”
The three clergy are to speak about the unexplained events at the vicarage in an episode of the Anglia programme Signs and Wonders called The Afterlife, on Sunday at 2pm.
Cambridge Daily News, 27th November 1997.