Things that go bump in the market.
The things that go bump in the night are getting cheeky… they are getting up to their tricks in broad daylight. And with hair-raising results. For two months, the ghosts and poltergeists – claimed to haunt Kensington Market, London – have been having a rest. Then yesterday, as stallholder Patsy Dorsett went to take a wig from its stand, a shelf mysteriously heaved up and six wigs started flying and dancing in the air. Just as they were settling themselves in a tangled mess on the floor, a long, slinky black wig neatly toppled off its stand.
Now Mr Rudi Rampersad, manager of the market, has decided it is time for action. He plans to contact a ghost-investigating team to see if they can exorcise his unwanted tenants.
Daily Mirror, 27th August 1968.
Things that go bump in a market.
By Nigel Joiner.
Footsteps on the stairs and nobody there… a telephone dialling on its own accord… a shelf “jumping” with no one near it. These are among the odd happenings reported at Kensington Market in Kensington High Street recently. The latest incident was last week, when 24-year-old Patsy Dorsett, who runs a wig boutique stall at the market, was looking at a shelf of wigs. “As I was looking, the shelf suddenly jumped up about three inches,” said Patsy, who lives in Elsham Road, Kensington.
“All the wigs toppled on to the floor. I was furious. I thought next-door had banged the wall and upset the shelf, but when I went next door they said nobody had been near the wall.” Next she went downstairs to see if anyone had been hammering near the ceiling – but again drew a blank. “I don’t believe in ghosts. I’m sure there must be an explanation for this,” Patsy said this week.
Other odd happenings are also reported by the manager of the market, Mr Rudy Rampersad, and his wife, Betty. The first occurrence was about two months ago when Mrs Rampersad heard footsteps in the building late one night when it was deserted. “It sounded like a girl’s footsteps, a girl wearing high heel shoes. When I went out, there was nobody about,” she said.
Said her husband: “We nearly had a row over that. She thought at first I was bringing a girl into the building. Mrs Rampersad said she has also seen a “girl with long fair hair” and an “old woman sitting in a rocking chair” at the building late at night. “I was very scared when I saw these things,” she said.
Her husband was slightly sceptical about the ghosts – until he heard a telephone being dialled in the building late one night. “I went up to the telephone and saw the dial moving of its own accord,” he said. “That gave me a chill. I later telephoned the Post Office and asked if it was possible for a telephone dial to move by itself, and they said it was impossible.”
Shortly after this, Mr Rampersad and his wife burnt some incense near the telephone. Said Mr Rampersad: “We said some prayers and since then it has been quiet. That is, until we heard this week about the shelf of wigs moving.”
The Society for Psychical Research in Adam and Eve Mews, Kensington, which investigates strange occurrences, told the “Post” that in June, 1930, a case was reported to the Society of “footsteps and whispering noises” being heard in a flat in St Alban’s Mansions which is near the market. There were also reports of “misty” figures being seen. Mr G.W. Lambert, of the Psychical Research Society, said that very often underground streams – and there are several in the Kensington area – accounted for noises like footsteps being heard. People often “saw” apparitions because these were strongly suggested by the noises. Streams could also cause vibrations in buildings, he said.
The shelf of wigs at a stall in the Kensington Market which “jumped”, tipping a row of be-wigged model heads on the floor. Patsy Dorsett is seen re-arranging one of the wigs after the “happening.”
Mr Ranpersad and his wife – and the telephone which, says Mr Ranpersad, “dialled” itself.
Kensington Post, 6th September 1968.