‘My best friend is a poltergeist’
By Nicola Register.
An east London family of five gained a new member when they moved to Biggleswade – in the form of a poltergeist. Things have certainly gone bump in the night for the Osbornes since they moved into their house in Potton Road, Biggleswade. From the cold winter’s day in November 1993 when the family moved to their 60-year-old house from East London, Ken Osborne sensed something in the air. He said: “I was in the house on my own bringing the boxes in and it was as though I could sense somebody watching me. Then I could hear what sounded like someone walking across the kitchen with a walking stick. At the time I didn’t take much notice and I more or less forgot about it.”
But at Christmas he and wife Tina, 37, had more strange experiences. Father-of-three young children, Ken, 44, said: “There is one corner of our front room which is permanently cold. We have gas-fired central heating which warms the rest of the room – but it doesn’t seem to make any difference to that corner. We decided that we would put our Christmas tree in that part of the room. We were just sitting in the room one evening and all the baubles that decorated the tree started spinning really quickly for about two or three minutes. The rest of the tree didn’t even move. Not even any of the pine needles shed to the floor.”
Then, in February, Ken and Tina were sitting watching the television and relaxing. Ken has a large fishing trophy which sits on top of his television – and suddenly the lid flipped up into the air, spun a couple of times and fell back onto the trophy in exactly the right position. Other spooky experiences include: The television and video being randomly switched on and off; Ken being in the house on his own and feeling something brush past him; A pasting brush disappearing while Ken was wallpapering. Ken told the Chronicle: “I said ‘come on, give it back’ and it came flying across the room and landed back on the table.”
Although Ken and Tina were quite frightened of their mysterious house guest at first they have both become quite used to its characteristic quirks. Tina thinks it may either be her or Ken’s father, as both have died, and she believes they may have followed them to the house. According to council records the Osbornes are only the second tenants of the house which was built in 1924.
Ken said: “We’re not too bothered about having it in th ehouse at the moment because it isn’t doing any real harm. If it was going to hurt us it would have done by now. It is just a matter of accepting it. I don’t mind it at all. They say babies can sense these things. Our youngest is only two months old and he stares at the space and starts giggling. He can obviously see him. He is near enough one of the family. We just want to know who it is and what it wants, especially if it is a relative. At the moment it’s just letting us know it’s there.”
Biggleswade Chronicle, 29th April 1994.