Queer House at Canterbury.
Police investigate weird occurrences.
Strange and uncanny occurrences have been reported as taking place at a house in Northgate, Canterbury, of which a Mrs Bentley is the tenant and where rooms are occupied by a family named Douglass, and where the husband is an engine winder employed at Chislet Colliery. Complaints having been made to the authorities of supernatural bangings on walls, and other strange happenings, two City police-constables were posted at the house in the hope that they might solve a mystery that has naturally caused some local discussion. The constables appear to have had some weird experiences, but left the house without achieving their object.
It seems that while one officer stood in the entrance passage there was a loud thump on a partition behind his head, although the room behind was unoccupied. Then the other officer, while interviewing Mrs Douglass, was struck on the face by a flying piece of coal, and when he was in the act of picking it up he was struck by a second piece. The officers thoroughly examined the walls and even took up floor-boards, but were unable to discover anything to account for the banging. During the investigation the first constable was struck by a thimble, which flew from a dresser and rolled slowly down his leg. When the police left the house they did so to the accompaniment of further wall bangings.
This is not the whole story! Other things besides flying articles have taken place and it is reported that on one occasion an old lady was mysteriously lifted from a chair and set on her feet.
The Douglass family formerly resided at Fordwich, near Canterbury, and it is related that similar strange things happened while they lived there.
Tuesday Express (Kentish Express mid-weekly), 22nd July 1930.
Mysterious Rappings in a House.
Psychic Society says it has solution.
From our own correspondent.
Canterbury, Tuesday.
Mysterious rappings in a miner’s house in the Northgate area of Canterbury have led to an investigation by the Canterbury Society for Psychical Study. Members declare they have located the disturbance, and will deal with it as occasion demands. Many rumours about the happenings in the house – some not without humour – are current in the city. One states that a man, once delivering coal at the house, went to pick up the empty bag, and found that all the coal had jumped back into it.
Daily Herald, 23rd July 1930.
Eerie happenings at Canterbury.
“Uncanny noises” in a Northgate house.
Do I sleep? Do I dream? / Or are spirits about? / Are thing what they seem. / Or are they open to doubt?
These lines of “Truthful James,” slightly adapted, very well express the feelings of a special representative of the “Kent Messenger” who inquired this week into weird noises and manifestations which are said to have occurred at 122, Northgate Street, Canterbury. Credibility and scepticism appear to hold about equal sway in the minds of those associated with the matter, but it must be said that while the believers include people who claim to have actually heard and witnessed the happenings, the doubters do not.
Quivering chairs, it is stated, have forced sitters to rise; pieces of coal have leapt about and struck people; loud bangs have been heard coming from empty rooms; and a thimble, it is asserted, has sprung from a dresser and struck a constable, who, with another, had been summoned to the house.
The disturbances seem to have been centred in rooms occupied by Mr Douglass, an engine winder at Chislet Colliery, his wife, and their young son, a quiet studious schoolboy of fifteen. The tenant of the premises is an elderly widow, Mrs Bentley. It was late on Thursday night when the police were called in to investigate, and the arm of the law appears to have laid the “ghost,” for the “Kent Messenger” representative was told on Tuesday afternoon that nothing of the same nature had since been reported.
Neither Mr Douglass or his wife were accessible, the former being at his work in the colliery, and all that could be elicited in a call at the house was a curt and somewhat surprising denial from a young woman who came forward. “There has been nothing heard here,” she declared emphatically. A neighbour, however, was more communicative, and gave the “Kent Messenger” representative a graphic account of her own experiences on Thursday night.
“It was most uncanny,” she said, “We were having supper about twenty minutes past ten when Mrs Douglass came and fetched me and my son. She was terrified, and I and my daughter and son went in there. I heard the noises, and saw chairs quivering.” The speaker described the noises as “terrific,” and said the quivering of the chairs forced her daughter and another young woman to their feet. “The noises seemed to come from the floor,” she said. “We were told they had started before ten o’clock, and did not finish until after twelve. The police did not go until after then. The noises seemed to be in the corner of the room, near the partition. The house has no cellar, and a policeman pulled up a floor board in the passage to see if he could discover anything.”
Asked if she saw a policeman hit by a piece of coal, the speaker said she was in another room when that occurred. “I was too scared at the finish to step there,” she added. Much discussion has been aroused in the neighbourhood, and there were many interested people outside the house on Monday, apparently hopeful of further manifestations. An investigation has been made by members of the Canterbury Society for Psychical Study.
Mrs Bentley has occupied the house for thirteen years, and Mr and Mrs Douglass have lodged there for the past two years, but no mysterious disturbances have been reported before. When the Douglass family formerly lived at Fordwich, however, similar weird happenings are said to have occurred there.
Maidstone Telegraph, 26th July 1930.
Canterbury Ghosts
Some traditions of an old-world city.
By J.F. Ellis.
In a London newspaper recently reference was made to some weird happenings in a Canterbury house. Two policemen were sent to this house – which is in Northgate Street, and in which rooms are occupied by a family named Douglas – in the hope that they might be able to solve a mystery that has aroused considerable discussion.
Complaints had been made to the authorities of super-natural bangings on walls. While one officer stood in the entrance passage there was a loud thump on a partition behind his head, although the room behind was unoccupied. While interviewing Mrs Douglas, the other constable was struck on the face by a flying piece of coal, and when in the act of picking it up, was struck by a second piece.
The officers thoroughly examined the walls and even took up floor boards, but were unable to discover anything to account for the bangings. During the investigation the first constable was struck by a thimble, which flew from a dresser and rolled slowly down his leg.
The police left the house to the accompaniment of further bangings on the walls. Other weird occurrences, apart from flying articles, are stated to have been experienced, including that in which an old lady was mysteriously lifted from her chair and set on her feet.
The husband is an engine winder, employed at Chislet Colliery, near Canterbury.
This is of peculiar interest not only to those who are students of psychological phenomena, or believers in spirit manifestations, but to one who has lived long in our premier Cathedral City it repeats an oft told story so common as to excite little interest to those whohave dwelt there for any length of time. Canon Barham, Tom Ingoldby, was well acquainted with the ghostly traditions of Canterbury, and the surrounding district, and satirised them in his amusing lays and legends, “The Story of Nell Cook: a legend of the Dark Entry,” a now almost forgotten effort of his pen, is too rich not to be quoted in this place, and we must beg the editor’s indulgence to quote a few stanzas for the benefit of our readers: [not related to poltergeists at all].
Chichester Observer, 6th August 1930.