An Aberdeen Ghost Story.
For the past two or three days the north part of Aberdeen has been kept in a state of great excitement by a rumour that a house in Canal Road, Causewayend, has been nightly visited by a spirit “from the vasty deep,” who has disturbed the nocturnal slumbers of the household, making the night hideous, and filling the bosoms of the inmates with the utmost terror and alarm. The story soon got wind and spread with lightning rapidity, and since the beginning of the week the house has been visited every evening by excited crowds of people, numbering at times from 500 to 1000, who have with assiduity crowded the raod, some of them remaining until far into the morning, eager to catch a glimpse of the ghost, who has, however, up to the present moment stoutly declined to gratify their curiosity.
Indeed, so great and excited has the crowd become in the evening that it has been found necessary to get a posse of constables to prevent a serious breach of the peace taking place, some of the ghost gazers being inclined to storm the house in order to catch a glimpse of the denizen of spirit land at all hazards. Notwithstanding this “his ghostship” has invariably been “not at home” when these hosts of visitors have called to do him reverence.
The most wicked and absurd stories are being circulated, and, what is most strange, are given credence to by an incredible number of persons in all stages of development. Kitchenmaids and servant girls are generally the first to see wonders of this kind, and so the premonitions of the actual presence of this ghost were made to the serving maid.
It appears, however, that previous to this uproar of the ghost or ghosts, “noises” had been heard; but on a night not long since – so the story goes – when all the household were hushed in the silence of slumber, the servant girl heard an unusual treat on the stairs, and shortly afterwards a heavy body fell over the lobby table. She did not, however, venture to rise for the purpose of seeing what occasioned the disturbance, being greatly alarmed, but told her tale to the household in the morning.
It is also stated by others that on another night a visible presence glided into the kitchen and took the form of a lady in a silk dress, who approached the bed whereon lay the trembling girl, and removed the bed clothes. It is reported that this story is affirmed by the servant to be a fact, and it is further stated that a son of the occupier of the premises was also favoured with a sight of the mysterious lady. This state of matters, however, could not continue, and watchers are said to have been told off to “watch.”
These also heard strange and fearful noises, and saw untellable and extraordinary sights at midnight and during the early hours of the morning. One account runs that the “invisibles” slapped the watchers on the face, threw them about the room, and made the furniture dance and skip about, &c. Some actually declare that a ghost was seen, and a fearful sight it was. Sans head – or at least with a wonderfully small one – it appeared with the orthodox number of stripes of red paint across its throat, which is constantly pointed to with a bony finger, after the manner of Banquo’s ghost, as seen in provincial theatres. Having secured “a coign of vantage” it spoke, and in cadences more sorrowful than angry, told “an ‘orrible tale” how that its poor bones had never been inurned or laid in consecrated ground, and charged the parties addressed (names unknown) by all that was sacred to dig for its bones in a place which it particularised, and give them Christian burial, so that it might henceforth rest in peace.
Another version is that the ghost took the form of a female with a child in her arms, both of whom vanished on being exorcised by a few words of prayer. Others, adhering to the story of the luckless visitor, distinctly aver that the ghost was enveloped from top to toe in a robe of rabbit skins; and stories of persons visiting the house having their hats removed on crossing the threshold by invisible hands, and such like, are quite rife.
It is said that among the persons who visited the house were two ministers, doubtless for the purpose of comforting the troubled minds of the inmates, who were fearfully alarmed by the appearance of the “mystic lady;” but, recovering, they sent the ghost into oblivion by an apt quotation from the “Word.” Some others who “draw inferences” are positive that two men who they say were watching one night “saw the ghost” and were affrighted, because they did not stop in the house for more than an hour after entering it; but “knowing ones” tell that it was not because they saw “a spirit,” but because of the non-appearance of a more popular kind of spirit.”
The ghost, however, has evidently a most wholesome dread of the constabulary, for on Tuesday and Wednesday nights two members of the county police undertook to watch, and whether it was that the ministers mentioned had effectually exorcised the ghost, or that the “spirit” has a decided aversion to the visible representatives of the law, nothing extraordinary was either heard or seen; indeed nothing occurred worthy of notice, except that a rat ran across the floor, and no doubt turned and “glared fearfully” at the intruders.
It may be mentioned that previous to the present occupier taking possession of the house the tenement was vacant for a few years, and as there are large rag stores contiguous nothing is more probable than that the house is infested with rats. Nine tenths of the stories are not spoken to by the members of the household; the other tenth may be accounted for by a nightmare caused perhaps by the servant having taken too heavy a supper. – Dundee Courier.
Banffshire Reporter, 27th January 1871.