Couple say ghost is firebug.
Ronald Atkins and his wife Ethel are certain they know the identity of the firebug who is making their life a nightmare. He’s a ghost, they say. The ghost of a man in shirt sleeves. Aged about 50. With a stern, aggressive look about him. And already, the couple claim, he has started two fires at their home in Boston Road, Hanwell, Middlesex.
Mr Atkins, 52, said: “The second time the ghost struck he set fire to the bed in our spare room. It hadn’t been used for six weeks. The police and firemen didn’t know what to put it down to. The fire started just before we went to bed. If it had broken out in the early hours we could have been roasted alive.”
Mrs Atkins, 50, said: “My heart is broken. We must get out of this house.”
Mr Atkins remembers only too well the time he was confronted by a “staring man” one morning. “I jumped out of bed, ran downstairs and checked the locks,” he recalled. “They were all secured. I’ve never been superstitious, but I was really shaken.”
That’s not all. Once, a plate flew out of the kitchen rack and smashed against a door, the couple say. And the chimes of the doorbell still ring – although they have been disconnected.
In a bid to get rid of the ghostly “firebug,” a vicar has blessed the house and sprinkled holy water in every room.
The People, 29th August 1971.