That ghost will have to leave, decides Sarah.
Pensioner Mrs Sarah Mayor’s lodger is almost always the perfect gentleman. He always keeps himself to himself and never leaves the house untidy. In fact, he had only one bad habit. He would insist on clattering about the house in the middle of the night. And because of that Sarah, aged 82, has decided that he must find himself a new home. She has called in the local vicar, the Rev Robert Griffiths, to evict him. After all, he is the best person to deal with a resident poltergeist.
At her century-old terraced home in Lancaster Road, Hindley, near Wigan, widow Sarah said: “He makes a terrible din. He starts off by knocking on the bedroom door next to mine and goes on until the noise fills all the house, and then finishes off with a tattoo on the front door. I wouldn’t mind if he could be a bit quieter about it, but I can’t sleep a wink until all the noise has died down. And it’s always at 2.30 am right on the dot.”
She added: “Perhaps if I were younger I’d have looked for a new house, but I’m too old to move. He’s the one who’ll have a go. I hope Mr Griffiths can help.” Mr Griffiths said yesterday: “For an old lady of Mrs Mayor’s years, living with one of these things in the house can probably be rather disconcerting, particularly if it’s an exceptionally noisy one. I’m not expert on exorcism, but I intend to call on her to see what I can do.”
Manchester Evening News, 28th October 1969.
Haunted happenings.
Noises in the Hindley night.
It was one of Wigan’s noisiest ghosts. It banged about and made the most terrible noises, especially in the night. The reign of the spirit lasted for many years at No 14 Lancaster Road, Hindley, and I have spoken to three families who lived there and experienced the ghostly presence. I first wrote about odd noises at No 14 in the late 60’s when the end terraced house next to an entry was occupied by pensioner Mrs Sarah Mayor. She told me in the late 1960’s: “It makes a terrible din. I asked a local vicar to come and investigate. But he came up with nothing at all. The ghost’s still here.”
Sarah, who died before she could move house, believed the noisy presence was connected with a woman who had once lived in a small self-contained annexe at the rear of the house and who had died in mysterious circumstances. She said “This usually happens in the night. The knocking starts at around 2.30 and within minutes the noise fills the whole house. I don’t get a wink of sleep until he’s finished banging about.”
The next tenants were a newly married couple, Mr and Mrs Frank Brookfield. They heard the noises several times, but attached no importance to them. And it wasn’t long before they moved to a bigger house.
The last people to occupy Hindley’s haunted house were husband and wife Ronnie and Doreen Hatton. Said Ronnie: “We knew of the ghostly reputation before we moved in. And we hadn’t been installed long before the night noises started – like the sound of a whip cracking. It woke me time out of number. But my wife never heard it. Eventually, we moved to our present house in Sussex Close and blow me if I didn’t wake up and hear the same noises. It seemed the ghost had followed us. One night after hearing the noise, I woke my wife. And for the first time she heard the noise too. She was amazed. And after that the ghostly noise disappeared.”
Hindley resident Mrs Eva Carrington of Bridgewater Street said: “I never heard the noises but just went as cold as the grave when I went into that house. There was something very odd happening there. I sensed it.”
No. 14 Lancaster Road was demolished about 10 years ago.
Wigan Observer and District Advertiser, 25th May 1989.