Ghost tried to strip me!
A sexy poltergeist tried to strip a pretty West Belfast woman while she slept in the bedroom of a haunted house, it was claimed this week. Attractive Rose Hamill woke up in terror and felt an invisible hand tug at her close fitting silk pyjamas. The ghostly sexual assault happened at the house of her widowed mother Cathleen Phillips who fled her home – dubbed Ireland’s most haunted house – after several uncanny and frightening occurrences.
Rose Hamill spoke for the first time about her bizarre night of terror when she awoke and found that she was unable to move. She told Sunday World she felt a ghostly hand pull at her night clothes. In her desperation, drenched with a cold sweat, Rose whispered a brief prayer – “Holy Mary Mother of God protect me” – and the unseen presence went away.
Within days of this eerie incident a gang of youths threatened to burn down the house where Mrs Phillips lived after they claimed to have seen ghostly figures at a downstairs window. But the mob were held back by friends of the elderly Cathleen Philips whose haunted home is overshadowed by a giant peace wall. Mrs Philips told Sunday World that a priest had visited her recently and claimed that the strange and chilling noises they heard in the night were the malicious work of a poltergeist.
The ailing pensioner’s trouble began at the end of May when she and her married daughters, who took turns to stay with their widowed mother, began to hear bumps in the night and the sinister sound of someone walking through their home. At first they didn’t take much notice and say they made light of events by saying it was the ghost of their dead father come back to look after the family.
But the bumps got louder, according to another daughter Geraldine Falloon, who claimed that she and her other married sisters Ann McCoubery and Cathleen Calms felt a chilling sensation sweep over their bodies and the air became icy-cold. Ann McCoubery says that a six year old child had wept bitterly because she said a “strange man” would not allow her to leave an upstairs bedroom.
Shortly before Mrs Philips fled her home she awoke one morning to find that all of the religious statues in her home had been knocked down. When the sisters did decide to confront the presence they claimed that the knocking and strange happenings got worse. Ann McCoubery said that since their mother fled from the Springhill Avenue home the family are now afraid to return. “We are all frightened to go back because we believe that there is an unseen presence there,” she said.
When three of the sisters returned to near the house with Sunday World they appeared very disturbed and were visibly shaking. They refused to go in the house.
Sunday World (Dublin), 22nd July 1990.