Broadstairs Ghost Story.
A circumstantial story of mysterious midnight sounds and happenings in a house in the centre of Broadstairs has aroused intense curiosity among residents there, according to the special correspondent of the “Daily Mail.” Testimony on the subject is borne by three people – by the tenant himself, who has fled from the house; by a local jeweller of repute; and by a local journalist.
“Almost immediately after my arrival here,” said the tenant,” the manifestations commenced, terrifying my wife into a nervous illness and shaking my nerve. Occurring at midnight, upon about two nights out of six, they have followed a regular route. From the basement, where in one place the boards have a hollow ring, as though there were a well or some chasm underneath, we have heard a measured, heavy footstep mounting to the top of the house. Then, after a brief interval, there has been quite a pandemonium of sounds. Doors have opened and shut. One in the hall, although bolted, has been flung wide open. There have been clashing sounds and noises of screams, and deep, heavy breathing in the passages. Not once have we seen anything,” he continued, “but there has been a sickening sensation, as of some unearthly presence. The house has become quite untenable.”
Belfast Telegraph, 24th October 1908.
Broadstairs Ghost.
A family driven from their home.
A ghost – or what is believed to be a ghost – has taken possession of a house at the seaside resort of Broadstairs, Kent, and made matters generally unpleasant for the occupier. Six months ago, it is alleged, the visitant first gave signs of its presence. The hall door opened mysteriously at night-time, although it had been previously locked; footsteps were heard in the passage and on the stairs, a human body appeared to be pulled from the stairs to the basement, and from below there came the sound of a struggle.
Doors bang mysteriously at times, it is stated, and furniture is thrown about. Nothing in questionable shape has really been seen, although on one occasion, at nine o’clock at night, when alone in the house, the occupier imagined that he saw a figure in black in the hall. In view of the other strange manifestations he did not stop to parley, but left the building.
A favourite walk of the ghost is from the bottom to the top of the house, and the occupier had a door placed at the top of the lowest stairs, with a bolt attached. But the door has been found open after being bolted. The sound of the bolt being rattled backwards and forwards has also been heard. When the family retired for the night, after bolting and locking the front door, the occupier has come downstairs to find it open.
The family no longer sleep on the premises, and the ghost walks the passages undisturbed, although lately he must have been rather inconvenienced by investigators who have stayed in the house at night, hoping to solve the mystery. One of these bears out the family story of ghostly noises, including the opening of doors, the faints screams of a woman in the distance, and a sound like the rustling of a lady’s silk dress as she walks.
Daily News (London), 26th October 1908.
Peeps into the past – 50 years ago.
There is a haunted house in Broadstairs. Terrifying happenings are alleged to take place at night at the premises of Mr G.H. Hutton-Preston, Belmont terrace, High-street. Mr Preston said, “It sometimes sounds as though someone is pulling a body through the hall and footsteps come from the basement and go to the top of the house.” They have heard the crash as of furniture being thrown down the stairs and the rustling of a lady’s skirt. Mr Preston has tried unsuccessfully to photograph the ghost.
East Kent Times and Mail, 29th October 1958.
A Broadstairs “Ghost” Laid.
A ghost story from Broadstairs has been effectually disposed of a by a special correspondent of the “Daily Mail.” It was alleged that the visitant first gave signs of its presence six months ago [follows on as above until ‘to find it open’].
The “Daily Mail’s” correspondent writes as follows:-
Broadstairs, Sunday night. After two midnight vigils in the haunted house here, I am led to the conclusion that natural causes account for nearly all the ghost-like sounds – footsteps, cries and heavy thuds – which were described in these columns on Saturday, and to an eager discussion of which practically the whole neighbourhood has devoted its week-end.
My night watches began at 10 p.m., and were continued until 3 a.m. My companion was the local journalist previously referred to in “The Daily Mail.” Our precautions against human agency were these:
1. Every door in the house was locked, and the key removed. 2. Each window fastening was carefully tested. 3. Such a network of threads was stretched from door to door, and across each stairway and landing, that it would have been impossible for a human being to move about without leaving a trace of his presence.
Not once during our silent watch – in which the house was plunged into complete darkness – was a thread broken or a door or window tampered with. The sounds which we actually heard, and what seem to be reasonable explanations of them, I have tabulated below:
1. Curiously muffled noises, apparently coming from the lower part of the house, as though someone was shuffling about on bare boards or moving a heavy bundle or case; also an occasional metallic rattle, quite distinct, such as might be made by the violent shaking of a door handle.
2. Dull, echoing thuds, apparently proceeding from somewhere about the house, but extremely difficult to locate, varied by a series of brief, staccato sounds, coming from the staircases and startlingly like rapid footfalls. Both these phenomena were, at first, apparently inexplicable and very disquieting.
3. (a) Queer rustlings and faint movements about the passages; (b) faint, shrill sounds, which might be said to resemble human cries; (c) a fitful, puzzling light and shadow in the rear of the basesment.
Explanation. 1. From an adjacent stable, probably owing to the existence of some forgotten underground passage, the uneasy movements of the horses’ feet and the rattling of their manger chains are – when once the sound is located and understood – heard in the basement with astonishing ease.
2. Daylight inspection of the basement, where the frames of many of the doorways are awry, and a consultation with a local architect, established the fact that the foundations have sunk, or are sinking. When called upon to bear unequal burdens, strained joists and timbers may make unaccountable noises in the dead of night.
3 (a) Could be ascribed safely to rats, mice, or wind; (b) actually traced to the erratic creaking of a metal signboard; (c) the faint reflection of a street lamp some distance away, and the movement of a tree.
While we were lying rolled up in our rugs on the basement floor just after midnight this morning some local practical jokers – whose excited whispering we could hear quite well – managed by removing a metal flap to thrust a live cat through a small ventilator near the ceiling. The unfortunate animal fell with a thud to the floor; then, dazzled by a beam of light from my electric torch, it was easily secured. The ghostly gleam of white light had the effect of sending off the humorists in a rare fright.
Some hollow-sounding boards in one part of the basement had been said to mask a well or cavern. To determine this point I had several of them taken up yesterday afternoon. Nothing was below but a foundation of chalk and concrete.
Whitstable Times and Herne Bay Herald, 31st October 1908.