Family haunted by ghostly goings-on.
Strange things are happening in the Hawes household, things that have no reasonable explanation… uncanny happenings that are disrupting house and home. Weird goings-on over the past two years have got steadily worse, until now 26-year-old Mrs Jean Hawes can’t even get a babysitter in for her children – they’re too frightened. Stories of mysteriously opening doors, things being moved when no-one is in th ehouse, a frightened little boy and an Alsatian dog called Ross who bristles visibly every time he comes in th ehouse are some of the facts of life at 33 Westmark, part of Lynn’s new Fairstead Estate.
Coming to Lynn from Harlow about two years ago, Jean and her husband David exchanged houses with an elderly woman and her son. Things started going wrong some two months later. Driving home from shopping one day with neighbour Mrs Freda Manning, Jean remarked on seeing a figure at her front bedroom window. She gave a perfect description of the old woman had lived there. Although Freda had known the woman for several years, Jean had never met her. There was no-one in the house.
But it was Freda herself, who lives next door but one, who reported the first phenomenon in the house. Talking of the time when Jean was still expecting her daughter Emma, now 16 months old, she explained: “I was in the house one day, doing a bit of housework for Jean while she was out. I had a strong feeling of being watched, and felt very cold. Coming downstairs, I felt as if there was someone right behind me.”
Nothing more happened, until a fortnight later, when the respective couples had been out for the evening. Jean was putting her son to bed when she experienced the same thing. “From then on, different things seemed to happen,” said Jean. “There was a time before we had the stairs carpeted when I was convinced someone was walking on them. Another time, after we had friends in for the evening, I was carrying cups and saucers out to the kitchen, when the cups just seemed to be carried from my hands. They broke on the floor.”
Jean’s three-year-old son David plays a large part in the story. His room has always been the front bedroom upstairs, until he started waking up, tearful, and saying “I can see a man.” As an experiment, Jean and her husband David moved the little boy into their room, and all was quiet. Their son has just finished a week in hospital with chest trouble. In the time he was away, the room has been re-decorated – but nothing has changed, David still wakes up crying.
Eight months ago, Jean Hawes found an old ring behind her bedroom door, with the initials D.H.W. inscribed. There seemed no explanation.
Two weeks ago, she had another unusual find, a battered, broken little crucifix under a bottle of perfume on her dressing table. The Hawes family had had no visitors that Jean could link with the crucifix, and had to put the incident down on the ever increasing list of mysteries.
The same day that she found the crucifix, Jean was upstairs in the house with Mrs Manning, when she saw the bathroom door open. “Not only did the door open, but the shower curtain was left swinging about,” said Jean.
Last Friday morning, Jean and Freda Manning got locked in! With a heavy bunch of keys, and a standard lock on the back door, they couldn’t believe it. They had only been in th ehouse for five minutes, leaving the keys in the door, when they found they couldn’t get out. A neighbour, Mrs Maureen Ward, came to the rescue and unlocked the door.
“I really don’t know what to make of it all,” said Jean, “because there doesn’t seem to be anything you can put your finger on. If it was just me involved, I would think it was my imagination.” But as well as Freda Manning, Jean’s next-door neighbour Mrs Joyce Hardy, has heard things. Only a week ago, when all three were in Joyce’s house, there was a series of thuds on the connecting wall. Worried about Emma, asleep upstairs, Jean rushed to her house, but there was no-one and nothing to be seen.
One person who makes his feelings obvious is the Hawes’ Alsatian, a three-year-old dog trained for security work. “He won’t settle for a moment when he is in th ehouse,” said Jean. “His hair stands up all down his back and he rushes around like a mad thing.”
So what now… Jean admits to not knowing what to do next. For there’s the problem of the babysitters for one thing. Ever since th elast one thought she heard the hoover being turned on downstairs and her coat was moved from the bed on to a chair in the bedroom, Jean’s been hard put to find anyone willing to sit with David and Emma.
Jean’s husband, a tyre fitter, used to laugh at her tales. Ever since he saw an image in his own living room, the shape of a person, he takes things a little more seriously. “I must say, I’m getting pretty frightened by some of the things that are happening now,” Jean admits,” but I really don’t know what there is to be done.”
Jean Hawes and her son David pictured in the bedroom where the little boy is so unhappy. Behind is the window where she believes she saw a figure. Standing left is neighbour Freda Manning.
Lynn Advertiser, 15th February 1974.
Fire wife blames ‘electric ghost’.
“Ghostly” occurrences at a house are believed to have led to a fire which had left a family homeless. The family pets could have been killed – but for the bravery of a teenaged neighbour who broke into the home to rescue them. Fire swept through the first floor of a council house yesterday at 9 Silver Green on Lyn’s Fairstead Estate, seconds after Mrs Linda Poll left to take her two-year-old daughter to school. Mrs Poll said she could hardly believe what had happened. “It all happened so quickly,” she said later.
The fire destroyed all the bedrooms on the first floor and caused hundreds of pounds worth of damage. Mrs Poll, who was yesterday staying with friends until West Norfolk Council can find her and her family accommodation, complained of strange electrical problems. On the morning of the fire she said she had noticed her cooker plates had mysteriously been turned on and her cooker timer was buzzing even though she had not set it. And over the last month, she told the Lynn News, she had noticed her hair dryer and food blender were smelling when she used them and lights, which were turned off, would suddenly turn themselves on.
Mrs Poll said she had noticed a strange noise coming from the fuse box and had notified Eastern Electricity to send someone round to inspect the wiring. Just before Mrs Poll left her house before the fire she said she had noticed a smokey smell but rhought it was the grill which she had just used. Her neighbour, Mrs Sheila Walker of 36 Eastfields, noticed smoke billowing from her upstairs window and called Mrs Poll back.
Mrs Walker’s son, Spencer (16) ran across to the house and kicked down the front door to let the dog out. He then shut the doors upstairs and rescued the pet budgie.
Mr Robert Poll, who is a self-employed bricklayer left the house just after 7 am and their son Jonathan (9) had left for school. The two other children live away from home.
Lynn fire station officer, Paddy Barrett, said the fire was believed to have been caused by an electrical fault but they were still investigating.
Mrs Walker said that she has also experienced similar electrical problems to Mrs Poll.
Story: Kay Jones.
Lynn Advertiser, 23rd April 1985.