The Knockmanowl Ghost.
(From our Correspondent).
A case which amused a crowded court very much came before, the Enniskillen Bench on Monday, the magistrates being Earl Belmore, Major Wyse R.M.; Robert Archdall (chairman), and James Coulter, Esqrs. A young girl named CAtherine Elliot, aged about seventeen, quite illiterate, for it was said in court she could neither read nor write, and when her informations were written and brought to Major Wyse he refused to sign them because she could not satisfactorily answer any of the questions that he, in his magisterial capacity, seemed it right to put to her. However, it was by the advice of her attorney that this course was taken, and proceedings under the Master and Servant Act, 1st sec., 30 and 31 Vic., were instituted.
The girl had been in the service of Alexander McClelland, of Knockmanowl, for three or four years, and had given satisfaction. In November she re-hired to serve till May for £2 5s 0d, according to her own evidence; everything went on well till about the 15th January, when the kitchen windows were broken – on one day 14 or 15 panes – altogether 17 panes between that date and the 22nd; and what struck the master as strange was they were all broken from the inside. The master and mistress were also assailed with missiles in the shape of “lumps of lime mortar” – very hard – which always struck them from behind, and which they innocently thought had come from the ceiling or the wall. The mistress at last, from the frequency of these assaults, became afraid to go into the kitchen.
Alexander McClelland deposed to the annoyance commencing on the 15th January, consisting of lumps of mortar thrown at them always from behind, and strange to say, although the girl was always in the kitchen when these assaults took place, they never suspected her of being the cause of the mischief. This old gentleman did not think it was from the ceiling, but from the wall they came. At last he was also afraid to go into the kitchen.
There were only one or two panes broken till Wednesday, when he said there were fourteen or fifteen broken, all from the inside. In cross-examination he said she had served him faithfully up to that; and he could give no reason for those attacks. He had no “difference” with her. The first or second time he was struck he said to Catherine he thought she had done it, but from that it never came into his head she was doing it, although “there was never a stroke given but when she was there.” She said to him once when he entered the kitchen – “Make you off, for I’m not safe when you’re here,” which Mr Graham, her attorney, interpreted to mean that “the spirit” would come when he was there, which provoked great laughter.
Witness went to Irvinestown, to his brother John, to consult him with reference to the annoyance, and he came to the house, and actually pulled down the ceiling, although it was so firm that he could not get it down with a stick, nor was any of the “rendering” loose, for it was tried to see if the “shooting” could have come thence. James Mitchell, a servant, deposed that he saw the ceiling knocked down by John McClelland with a hammer, but they could not discover any ghost. He saw Catherine lift some lumps and strike him on the head and back from behind, and all he said was, “There it is again.” He never looked behind. Eventually, on Sunday week, Catherine, having asked to go home for a day or two to see a cousin who was going to India, was refused; and, taking leave herself, was not permitted to resume her service, and hence the expose of the case in court.
Mr Graham, her attorney, said that rumours of her practising the “black art,” and being possessed of some Satanic influence, by which, in the opinion of simple people, she was able to turn tables and do a variety of things, had got abroad; and as her character would be seriously damaged in consequence he claimed £10 compensation, which, he thought, was little for the charges brought against her. The magistrates agreed to allow the girl 8s 6d wages, which, with 14s she had received from time to time, made 22s 6d for the three months, which was at the rate she had been hired, and discharged her from McClelland’s service. They thought the case should not have been brought into court at all.
Ulster Examiner and Northern Star, 3rd February 1875.