Keith-Hall Farm Mystery.
Malicious mischief or “Black Airt.”
For the past five weeks a number of the residents in the quiet agricultural parish of Keith-Hall have been perturbed by mysterious happenings, which to the superstitious might seem to confirm their belief in “black airt” or witchcraft. Most parishes in broad Scotland, and no doubt Keith-Hall among them, have their legends of miraculous events and of strange deeds done by witches and warlocks not only in the “witching hour of night,” but also in the broad light of day. Old, harmless women were supposed to be able to turn themselves into hares without an effort, houses were believed to be haunted by disembodied spirits, and when something went wrong in a household there were always those ready to attribute it to some person who was imagined to have supernatural power to do evil.
That was in the long past, however, and people nowadays are inclined to be sceptical of any explanation of an event that does not respond to the known laws of nature. But the incidents that have been perplexing the people of Keith-Hall for some time have made several individuals, few in number, it must be said, harbour the feeling that there may be something in the theory of “black airt” after all.
The scene of the mystery is the farm of Dykeneuk, situated some five miles by road from the burgh of Inverurie. An “Aberdeen Journal” representative yesterday afternoon visited the district, and had an interview with Mr James Innes, the tenant of Dykeneuk, and his wife, regarding what has been occurring since the month of August. Tales of the doings at Dykeneuk had reached Inverurie, but the information was rather vague, and gave the impression that something had taken place really beyond the wit of man to explain. Stones had fallen upon the farmhouses from nowhere – thrown by no one. The missiles had descended in daylight as well as darkness, and although the farm was one of open fields without hedges or hiding-places no person by whose hands the stones could have been thrown had ever been seen.
Readers of Sir Walter Scott’s “Woodstock” will recollect that in the introduction the novelist mentions that in the year 1649 a number of incidents supposed to be supernatural took place at the King’s palace of Woodstock when it was visited by the Commissioners of Parliament. Among other things stones were thrown into the rooms, some of them large, and many like common pebbles.
On the way to Dykeneuk yesterday our representative found that people were inclined to give a more prosaic explanation of the stone-throwing than witchcraft. The problem really is – “Who is doing it, and how is it done?” Driving along the road to the farm in the wind and rain the district looked extremely bleak, and an ideal scene for a mystery. At one house a considerable distance from Dykeneuk a farm-hand was met who had heard of the “ongauns,” and regarded them as mysterious, but had not been up at the farm to see things for himself.
Further along the road a man was encountered who had actually been present when stones were falling with a “clink clink” on the corrugated iron roof of one of the outhouses of Dykeneuk. What had happened baffled everybody, he said. “What is the explanation?” asked the ‘Journal’ representative. “Is it witchcraft?” “Oh, no,” he said, “somebody must be doing it, but it’s very strange all the same. Most of the stones are thrown at night, but some have fallen when it was little darker than it is now. It is not witchcraft, but there is such a thing. I know a man who was at a place where sheaves of corn and even the roof of a house walked away.”
Asked where Dykeneuk was, he pointed it out. The little group of farm-houses lie on a ridge, with two tall trees standing near them, as if on guard. It was with a somewhat uncanny feeling that one approached the place, half-fearing the sight of a figure with horns hopping up from somewhere, or the appearance of some other kind of apparition. Nothing out of the way happened, however. The dwelling-house of Dykeneuk has a garden in front with a few shrubs to the right and the two trees. To the left are the byre and other farm buildings. Behind the house are two hay-ricks, and about two hundred yards away a plantation. The nearest buildings from those belonging to the farm are two or three hundred yards distant.
From the statement made by Mr and Mrs Innes it appeared that the stone-throwing commenced about five weeks ago. One night, in the gathering dusk, while the women were in the byre, a stone suddenly struck the roof. No one could be seen outside, however. “We thought nothing about it at first,” said Mr Innes, “as we believed the stones were thrown by boys. When stones had been thrown on two or three nights, however, we did not know what to make of it.”
The stones usually fell on the roofs of the houses. A search had been made time and again during the last five weeks of the fields and outhouses, but no one could be seen. Neighbours gave their assistance by going to various points before dark, and remaining on watch, and still stones fell about the farm-buildings at intervals between darkness and nine o’clock. Not even a ghostly figure could be seen to whom Horatio’s question to the ghost in ‘Hamlet’ might be put – “What art thou that usurp’st this time of night? By Heaven I charge you, speak.”
During the past fortnight, missiles were thrown every night except Tuesday evening. The police, informed of what was happening, have visited the farm of Dykeneuk, and on one of the nights they were present, stones fell as usual. Sometimes three or four stones came in the course of an evening, and occasionally more. Fortunately no one has ever been struck.
Our representative was shown several of the stones that had been thrown. They are about the size of pebbles, but rough, not rounded. Mr Innes said they must have been thrown from a longer range than that of an ordinary catapult. “We thought,” he said, “that they might have been thrown from the plantation. We went there before it was dark and remained there. No one came to the plantation, but stones struck the roofs of the houses while we were there. It was suggested at first that someone might be ‘firing’ the stones from the trees beside the house, but we kept a watch and found no one.”
Altogether the mystery of Dykeneuk seems to be one which would tax the ingenuity of a Sherlock Holmes.
Aberdeen Press and Journal, 30th September 1915.