Stone-throwing spirits at Kingston.
From our special reporter.
Kingston-on-Thames, Tuesday night.
A paragraph in yesterday’s Daily Telegraph set forth that for a week past numbers of shop windows had been smashed at Hampton Wick by stones thrown by unseen agency, and that the police had been unable to detect the culprits. Also that at Kingston, on the opposite side of the Thames, and about a quarter of a mile off, the premises of Mr Penhey, an oil and colour merchant, had been damaged in the same way.
A startling case of stone-throwing by spirits recently defied all the acuteness of the Royal Irish Constabulary at Cookstown, in the north of Ireland, as recorded in the Daily Telegraph and the Belfast Daily News; another example perplexed the police of Pekham a short time further back, and a large number of similar cases were once collected and published by Mr William Howitt; consequently I visited Hampton Wick and Kingston today to inquire into the circumstances already mentioned.
At Hampton Wick I found several shops with smashed windows, and was informed that the stone-throwing had been going on for nearly a fortnight, but ceased last Saturday. It usually began after dark, except upon one occasion, and I saw that all the windows smashed were within a radius whence stones might have been thrown by a human arm from a single fixed point. Although the police were hit by the stones, and saw the windows smashed, they detected nobody; still, as it was clear that the damage might have been done either by the spirits or by evil disposed persons, and as there was no preponderance of evidence either on the one side or the other, I did not attempt to hastily unravel the mystery, but came on to Kingston.
Mr Penhey has a flourishing business here in the Market Place; he is intelligent and courteous, has a taste for art, and is not at all pleased with the circumstances which have brought him and his premises into such undesired notoriety that sometimes several hundreds of persons congregate outside his door, and that when I arrived I found two policemen on guard. The popular idea here is that his house is thronged with affable ghosts, who every night float him about his bed-room, and the street boys venture to perpetrate a pun upon his name, and a hoax upon their kindred, by sending in their more innocent companions to ask – not for pigeon’s milk – but for “A Penny Ghost.”
If Mr Penhey tells the truth the incredulous listeners grin at him, so he says as little on the subject as possible. The following, he informed me, are the actual facts of the case: – “I have lived in this house for five years, and have never witnessed anything abnormal. About six weeks ago builders began, under my instructions, to excavate under the rear of these premises in order to enlarge them, when several skeletons were dug up, as well as a quantity of loose human bones, also a few coins several centuries old. the house appears to be built upon the site of an ancient graveyard.
Last Tuesday pieces of mortar and stones began to fall in the shop, usually in the evening in bright gaslight, but on examining the ceiling no mortar was found to be dislodged. Afterwards, in the presence of witnesses, stones fell in some of the upper rooms of the house while the windows were closed, and the investigators standing by the doors.
One night Mr Turner, the jeweller, with my apprentice Mr MArtin, and myself, searched the house. A piece of brick fell upon the landing of the second floor while no windows were open. It felt warm when I picked it up.
Search was then made at the top of the house, and as I stooped down in one of the small rooms to look under the bed, which was the only large piece of furniture in it, a stone fell on the floor near my head. I said to the two standing near the door, ‘You threw that!’ but they protested that they had not done so. Exaggerated rumours about these facts have spread all over the neighbourhood, and hundreds of people have congregated before my shop in the expectation of witnessing something awaful.
I cannot account for the facts. I know nothing about Spiritualism, and have always treated it with levity. The only conclusion I can come to is that these things are done to annoy me by some person or persons unknown, in order to injure my business. Up to the present time I have been unable to discover their true cause. I have never seen any intelligence connected with this stone-throwing, or heard any noises about the house at night except those caused by mice. The stones ceased to fall last Saturday, as at Hampton Wick.”
To-night I proposed that we should sit together in subdued light, in the excavated portion of the premises, in which during the afternoon I saw a piece of mortar fall vertically from under the clean deal boarding of some stairs; Mr Penhey heard the noise as the mortar struck the ground, but did not see the descent. By the screened light of a candle we sat in the haunted region for half an hour, in company with Mr Turner, but nothing took place, though one would have thought that the ghosts had every chance. We twice heard a noise like a piece of mortar falling in the shop aboove, and Mr Turner afterwards picked up a piece on the floor day. Those in the shop, in which there was much hustle, had not heard anything fall.
I rather fancy that the excavations have little or nothign to do with the phenomena, but that mediumship has been developed in the apprentice, or Mr Penhey, or somebody in the house, without their either knowing or desiring it; the argument against this is that the disturbances do not appear to follow them into other houses.
In past times such disturbances haave sometimes been found to accompany particular persons, who were cruelly persecuted in consequence; but in these days the spirit of fair investigation is rife, so that in Cookstown the only persecution Mr Allen suffered was at the hands of undeveloped spirits, who sometimes cut the dresses of members of the family to shreds while they were upon their backs.
Spiritualist, 17th September 1875.
The poor Spiritualists, who have already had so much to suffer, have sustained another serious blow. A short time ago the startling discovery was made that a resident of the spirit world was giving public manifestations at Hampton Wick, his particular mission on earth being to break windows. The Spiritualist newspaper took up the matter with considerable earnestness, and published a special article on “Stone-throwing spirits,” and local Spiritualists bestowed considerable attention upon the destructive ghost. About a dozen detectives were engaged to unravel the mystery, the value of property destroyed making matters very serious, and their failure caused the Spiritualists to be triumphant. But the “ghost” has now been found, and he is discovered to be none other than an errand boy who has carried on the sport with enough cleverness to escape previous detection. For one month, at least, whilst the lad is in gaol, the people of Hampton Wick will not be troubled by ghosts, and the believers in visitations from the spirit world will have to look elsewhere for confirmation of their theories.
Birmingham Mail, 28th September 1875.