A real ghost story.
Strange tale from a Durham pit village.
A story of strange happenings, mysterious and inexplicable and fitting subject for the attention of the Psychical Research Society, comes from a Durham colliery village. A place less romantic than Shotton Colliery would be difficult to imagine. Bare, dreary, and uninviting, the village was deserted for years subsequent to the stopping of the local pit about twenty years ago. The streets of mean little houses fell into disrepair, for the workers had gone elsewhere, and the village almost passed out of existence until the reopening of the pit caused the tide of prosperity to turn, and gradually the dilapidated cottages were put into repair and inhabited.
Into one of the renovated cottages – the last but one in Chapel row – a miner named Lamb and his family moved about 16 months ago. Lamb’s cottage is like the rest, a high pitched roof at the front, permitting only one room beneath it, but at the back the cottage rises to the dignity of a two-storied dwelling. Such is the plain, unromantic dwelling which has been the scene of ghostly visitations for fifteen months – ghostly inasmuch as all amateur investigation and rational explanations have failed to account for the phenomena.
Lamb had not lived there more than a month before his rest was disturbed at night by sounds at the front door. The disturbance was not remarkable in itself, but its repetition night after night gave rise to wonder and alarm. At first the family thought the rattling of the Suffolk latch and the knocking and shaking of the door was done by some foolish practical joker who made himself scarce with remarkable celerity and security whenever his summons drew anyone to the door.
Throughout the winter the ghostly noises continued. In the worst of weather, as well as on fine nights, the door would be shaken, the latch rattled, at first gently, then roughly, and three or more knocks given to the door. No sound or voice was heard, no footsteps came or went. Watch was kept, but no human being was ever seen at the time of the disturbances. The family was in a state of nervous terror, yet for a time they feared to speak of the annoyance to their neighbours. When they did complain no one was able to elucidate the mystery, though the unknown visitor came regularly about midnight or a little later. Even in the snow time the house was not left in peace; yet in the morning Lamb could find no footmarks leading to or from his door.
No hour of the night is secure against the interruption, but from midnight to five in the morning is the time most affected. Five minutes after the “caller” had been round the other morning the knocking was heard. Another morning recently Lamb, who leaves his house half an hour earlier than his son (a young fellow just out of his teens), had just gone to work when the terror announced itself. The young man, ready to leave home for work, was too frightened to move. He is the only person who admits seeing anything at all likely to be responsible for the disturbance.
One night, coming home late, about eleven o’clock, he thought he saw a shadow glide away from the back of the cottage. He followed whatever the thing was round the corner of the row and until it crossed the top of another street – all the time keeping a discreet distance. Young Lamb did not venture to go further, and as he turned the creature he was watching turned too, for the first time, and he saw a pair of burning eyes, like living coals, glaring at him from out of the shadowy outline of a face which belonged to no one in Shotton, and the like of which young Lamb had never seen before. He fled home trembling, with the tale of how he had seen their persecutor, whom he did not recognise, but who had alarmed him terribly.
This is a plain, unvarnished statement of fact, devoid of theories. No reasonable explanation of the proceedings, either on material or supernatural grounds, has been advanced. The root of the matter, however, may disclose as remarkable a ghost story as the most romantic novelist has ever concocted.
Lincolnshire Chronicle, 3rd October 1902.
A Haunted Miner’s Family.
The “Daily Chronicle” has been telling the story of a haunted miner at Shotton. The miner and his family heard peculiar knockings in their house, which they have left for a new one. The haunted house in Chapel Row was at once occupied by a miner who declared he was not afraid of ghosts, and who alleges he has not been disturbed at nights by any unusual or inexplicable noises.
For a week the Lamb family, who did not care for the public interest manifested in their case, did not complain of being tormented in the old manner, but they have since admitted that similar noises to those which have plagued them for so long have commenced at their new dwelling. The case is rather that of a huanted man than of a haunted house.
The houses in Wesleyan Chapel Row are not built above colliery workings, and are therefore not under-propped; and various methods of trickery, while being plausible, cannot be applied to this case, which has had a course of a year and a-half.
Mid-Lothian Journal, 24th October 1902.
The Durham Ghost
A Psychical Researcher on the Affair.
The obvious thing, in the case of a new ghost story, like that at Durham, says the London “Daily Chronicle,” is to submit it to somebody trained in psychic inquiry. Mr E. Westlake, F.G.S., who is secretary of the experimental committee of the Psychical Research Society, was good enough to discuss the “Durham ghost” with one of our representatives. He spoke as follows:-
“The case does not strike me as a strong one, but still I should regard it as probably worth investigation. To say more, before making local inquiry would be to prejudice it which is the last thing an inquirer ought to do. Intermittent sounds, even when loud, are always very difficult to locate. The apparition is the least evidential of all, as, though doubtless convincing to the seer, one cannot a priori allow it much weight in view of the circumstances which led up to it. The seer was probably already firmly convinced that the ongoings were due to some mysterious causes, which would suggest an apparition. Trickery within or without the house is, according to my experience, the most probable explanation.
“I once made a careful note of unmistakable knocks which I heard late at night on my own front door when there was certainly no one there, and the matter might have remained obscure had I not found in the darkness a thread of black cotton extending from the knocker to the corner of a street opposite. At Shotton the people seem to have felt too much terror to make them, I should say, sufficiently careful observers. Again, the sounds being heard mostly in the stillness of the night is suggestive of a normal cause. Possibly concussions in the colliery might shake the door, or be interpreted as doing so. But it is really quite useless to offer conjectures at a distance. Great patience on the spot is needed to get to the bottom of these reports, and to separate out the genuine psychic element which may possibly underlie them, and which, if it could prove a ghost, would be, to my mind, the most valuable knowledge in the world.”
It was remarked to Mr Westlake that if Shotton was like some other mining districts, there was, probably, a good deal of under-pinning of the ground with props. This might mean from time to time a movement of the surface which would account for the ghostly disturbances. Mr Westlake thought that this point, like others which would suggest themselves on the spot, would be worth bearing in mind. He mentioned that, of the various ghost cases he had investigated personally, only one could not be explained, in some measure at all events, by normal conditions. Supposing a case to be worth looking into at all, the first thing was to ascertain if there was a common sense solution to it, and that was the first demand here.
Should the Psychical Research Society think it worth while to pursue the “Durham ghost,” the results of the inquiry will no doubt be awaited with interest.
The story of the ghostly proceedings at Shotton Colliery, so graphically written up in a London contemporary, turns out, says our Seaham Harbour correspondent, on inquiries being made, to be nothing more than a silly hoax or rumour. If there is anything resembling what has been described, it is looked upon by those of the inhabitants who have interested themselves in the matter to be the work of some practical joker. There is nothing supernatural about the affair, and the majority of the residents knew nothing about the alleged ghostly visits until they read the report in the local papers.
Sunderland Daily Echo and Shipping Gazette, 30th September 1902.
Shields Daily Gazette, 29th September 1902.
Shotton Ghost Story.
Further Developments.
The London Daily Chronicle says: –
Since we published our Special Correspondent’s account of the Shotton ghost story, the narrative has gone the rounds of the papers, and has been discussed without any satisfactory explanation being arrived at. An important development of the case has taken place during the last few days.
A fortnight ago the miner who has been troubled for eighteen months by inexplicable noises which disturbed him and his family at night, moved out of the house which had gained the reputation of being haunted, and took up his residence at an isolated cottage near the colliery offices. His late residence was at once occupied by a miner who declared he was not afraid of ghosts, and who alleges he has not been disturbed at nights by any unusual or inexplicable noises.
For a week the first family, who did not care for the public interest manifested in their case, did not complain of being tormented in the old manner, but they have since admitted that similar noises to those which have plagued them for so long have commenced at their new dwelling. The case is rather that of a haunted man than of a haunted house.
Our correspondent writes that none of the explanations offered by strangers are tenable. The houses in the row are not built above colliery workings, and are therefore not under-propped, and the various methods of trickery adduced, while being plausible, cannot be applied to this case, which has had a course of a year and a half.
Shields Daily Gazette, 18th October 1902.