A Haunted House.
The town of Nelson is excited over mysterious and ghostly evidences. At a local hostelry a few weeks ago the landlord died, and this week the new tenant’s family have been disturbed by singular noises occurring upstairs when the residents were down, and vice versa.
They kept quiet on the subject till a neighbour stated he saw an apparition of the dead publican. Still, disbelief prevailed until a member of the household also saw some ghostly form recognisable as the late tenant. The mysterious noises have continued, but no explanation has been arrived at.
Naturally, since the news spread, the house has become the centre of interest, and the occupants, who cannot leave the licensed premises, have become alarmed.
Hartlepool Northern Daily Mail, 1st April 1905.
Nelson “Ghost” causes much debate at the Engineers’ Arms.
Spiritualists intend to investigate.
The Engineers’ Arms, Nelson, is at present the centre of unusual curiosity owing to the alleged appearance during the witching hours of a ghostly visitant. A few weeks ago the landlord, a Mr Robert Adams, died rather suddenly, and since then the present proprietor, Mr Cookson, and his family have had their slumbers disturbed by mysterious noises. The scare is just now causing no little sensation in the town.
A representative of the “Post,” who visited the house this morning, was told that last week, during the early hours of the morning, uncanny sounds were undoubtedly heard proceeding from the bar. They were first noticed by one of the daughters, who said she distinctly heard someone walking about and opening the door of the bar. She at once aroused Mr Cookson, who made a search of the premises, but the “ghost” had vanished. Subsequently a foundryman rushed in the Engineers’ with eyes staring and haggard face, and conveyed the information that he had actually seen th eghost of the late Mr Adams.
Another night a sound of falling planks was heard. It was just as if the house was falling to pieces said one of the daughters. She also stated that she never entered a certain room without experiencing a most uncanny sensation. The other morning she heard footsteps behind her and rushed downstairs, but there was no apparent cause for her fright. Several of the household are certainly in a state of alarm, but one little daughter takes a more materialistic view of the “spook” business and offers to escort her sisters upstairs for a penny.
The ghost story is also proving profitable to the landlord on account of the throng of interested customers who crowd the house nightly to discuss the weird business. Last night a large number of people could not find room in the inn.
Several spiritualists have asked permission to keep a midnight vigil at the house this week.
Lancashire Evening Post, 3rd April 1905.
Ghost in a Bar.
Landlord buried at Aberdeen “walks” in Lancashire.
At the Engineers’ Arms, at Nelson, in Lancashire, the ghost of Robert Adams, a former landlord, who was buried at Aberdeen, is said to have been behaving most disgracefully of late.
“He” is heard in the dead of night drinking behind the bar – one man declares that he looked through a window and saw “him” – but when the present landlord and his friends and guests descend to eject the intruder its intangible form flits upstairs to the bedrooms and disports itself there with much noise and riot.
The latest report from Nelson is that a former friend, secreted in the bar, saw Robt. Adams’s burly figure at the beer-engine, but naturally failed to seize it.
Nelson feels that something must be done. Such a ghost as this is nothing less than scandalous.
Daily Record, 4th April 1905.
Engineers’ Arms.
The license of the Engineers’ Arms, the scene of the recent “ghost scare,” was last Saturday, at the Police Court, transferred from John Heywood, an executor of the late landlord, Mr R. Adams, to Thos. Henry Cookson, who has temporarily held the license.
Burnley Gazette, 15th April 1905.
An Eagle at ‘The Engineers’.
“Do you recall,” someone asked us the other day, “the eagle which used to live in Sagar Street?” An eagle! No, we didn’t recall. But there was once a resident eagle, it turns out, at the Engineers’ Arms, and once on a day, indeed, there were rumours that its master’s ghost was in the habit of haunting the beer cellar!
Mr Fred Aldersley, of 5 Reedyford Road, Nelson, and the recently-retired licensee of the Commercial Hotel, Colne, has a few vague memories of the eagle. His family took over the “Engineers” in 1917 and he tells us that a previous landlord, an ex-police sergeant by the name of Adams, brought the eagle from a Burnley public house in 1896. The bird was vicious and was kept in a large cage on a roof in the yard of the public house. Adams used to climb up to the backyard eerie by ladder to feed the bird on a diet of rats. According to Mr Aldersley, he would pay his customers 2d. for a live rat and a penny for a dead one. Naturally feeding time usually attracted a fair crowd of sightseers, mainly children. But the bird died a short time before its master, who passed on somewhat mysteriously, Mr Aldersley seems to think, in 1904.
Nelson Leader, 23rd November 1962.