Screaaming girls visit ‘haunt’ house.
Youngsters crowd round the window, others peer in… all trying to see the ghost.
Policemen sealed off a “haunted house” yesterday… because the couple who lived there have fled from a GHOST. But they couldn’t stop the throngs of young people who descended on Mansefield Street, Partick, Glasgow, when word of the ghost leaked out. The street became No. 1 attraction for week-enders. First came the children. Then the teenagers. Hundreds of them stood outside the house chanting: “We want the Ghost.”
But staying as far AWAY as possible were Mr and Mrs Lachlan Hanlon, who have sworn that they will never return to the flat they called home for two years. The Hanlons left their room and kitchen at No. 23 in a 4 a.m. dash with their friends, Mr and Mrs Tom Kearney, after a week of terror. They say they felt as though invisible fingers were prodding them. Then came mysterious knocking sounds from the bedroom. Today the Hanlons will look for a new home.
Yesterday, in daylight, the house had no fears for the crowds who visited the street. And they were disappointed to find the house locked up, with boards on the windows. As darkness fell there were hysterical screams from young girls as boy-friends shouted “Spook”.
Said Mrs Catherine Dyhall, who lives at No. . 27: “It has been pandemonium all day. I’d rather have a ghost in my own house than stand another day like this.”
Spooknote- The last time a “ghost” appeared in Scotland was in December last year, when 11-year-old Virginia Campbell, of Sauchie, Clackmannanshire, was said to be haunted by a poltergeist.
Daily Record, 7th August 1961.
The Haunted Hanlons ‘Won’t Go Back’.
Mr Lachlan Hanlon, the 31-year old Glasgow man who, with his wife and three-month-old daughter, fled from their room-and-kitchen home in Partick because they believe it is haunted, sat in his mother’s home in Priesthill today still certain that he is not going back to Mansfield Street. Showing the strain of a sleepless night, Mr Hanlon said he would have a rest then look for another house.
A doctor had to be called today to give the family a sedative after the strain of the weekend they spent in the Partick house -when coal rose out of a bucket, they were pushed by invisible fingers, and a “ghost” appeared beside the child’s bed.
Mr Hanlon said that ever since he moved into the house at 23 Mansfield Street, Partick, two years ago, he had always felt a “creepiness” about the place. “A lot of people think this might be a glorified publicity stunt,” he said. “They can sneer about the haunted Hanlons, but let them mcome through what we have and they will realise it is no joke.” Mr Hanlon’s wife Mary (28), a former beauty queen, said that the last week in the house was a “week of terror.” Mr Hanlon’s mother, Mrs G. Hanlon, said: “I know what they are saying is true. Every time I entered their house I found it terribly cold, although they had big fires on. It always felt ‘creepy’ to me.”
Meanwhile, in Mansfield Street neighbours are talking about the haunted house. Children peer through the keyhole in the hope of seeing the coal in the bucket rising and dropping back piece by piece. Mr Hanlon claims this happened early on Saturday. It was then Mrs Thomas Kerney, a family friend from Manchester, holidaying with the Hanlons, saw a figure like a very tall man with bushy hair leaning over the children’s bed.
Edinburgh Evening News, 7th August 1961.
Tired-eyed and sleepy after a night in Glasgow’s “Ghost House,” 59-year-old Mr George Hanlon stayed off his work to-day. His 31-year-old son, Lachlan had been chased from the house by probing fingers, jumping lumps of coal, mysteriously banging doors, and the ghost of a bushy-haired man.
The two Hanlons decided to do a “swop” of houses for the night. While young Mr Hanlon, his wife Mary and their two children stayed in his parents’ house in one of the city’s housing schemes, the elderly couple spent last night in the “ghost house” of Mansfield Street. “We had more trouble with children and noisy onlookers than with ghosts,” Mr Hanlon told an Evening Express reporter to-day.
Last night a local minister the Rev. Maxwell Magee, had gone into the kitchen of the two-apartment house along with Mr and Mrs Hanlon, sen., and said a few prayers.
Meanwhile, Lachlan Hanlon thinks that the ghost from Mansfield Street has moved with him and his family to the other side of the city. His wife Mary, a former beauty queen, said: “There seems to be the same ghostly atmosphere.”
Tonight, Mr and Mrs Hanlon sen., intend to stick it out again in the “ghost house.”
TV Shock for Hatton man.
A Glasgow man living in the North-east received a shock when the house where he was born in Partick appeared on television – with the newly-acquired reputation of being haunted. Mr Robert McNeil (49), Auquharney House, Hatton, was visiting the Conservative Club, Aberdeen, when the picture of his old home, 23 Mansfield Street, Partick – a house deserted this week by its present occupants because of supposed “ghosts” – came on the screen.
Mr McNeill was born at No. 23 in 1912, and he left the district when still an infant. He doesn’t remember anything about the house or recall any strange stories connected with it. But does he belive in ghosts? When I spoke to Mr McNeill in the lounge of his Hatton home to-day, he gave me an emphatic “No.” He waved a hand vaguely at the walls of his own imposing-looking house, set in the grounds of his mink farm. “All old buildings have creaks and moans, groans and…” With a loud click, the French window in the corner of the room swung open unaided!
“See what I mean?” said Mr McNeill, with a smile. “And THAT’S no ghost – its happening all the time. Something wrong with the catch: it opens by itself even when we lock it” he explained. I was not convinced. “I did have a strange experience when I was a child,” he added, as he closed the window, “though not when we were living at Mansfield Street. We had an old rocking-chair at home – every house had them in those days. I was alone in the house one day, sitting in the chair and singing to myself as I rocked. I stopped singing, and clap, clap, clap… someone, something applauded me,” he said, laughing. “I was pretty scared at the time – dived straight out of that chair. Of course,” he added, “there was some explanation for it. Old houses have thick walls, but I expect someone next door heard me singing and clapped.”
Maybe, Mr McNeil, but were you trying to prove something to me – or to yourself? Mr McNeil, who started his mink farm in 1947 and moved to Hatton nine years ago, remains an unbeliever: his wife is a little less convinced. Opening French windows would cause anyone to ask: “Is there a poltergeist in the house?”
Aberdeen Evening Express, 8th August 1961.
Couple spend night in “haunted” house.
There were animated scenes in a Glasgow street last night when a couple prepared to sleep in a “haunted” house. During the evening a clergyman called at the house which is believed to have ghosts and said a prayer in the kitchen. The house at 23 Mansfield Street, Partick, is the home of 31-year-old Mr Lachlan Hanlon, his wife Mary, and their two children. They fled from it at the weekend, along with a family of friends holidaying with them.
Last night the parents of Mr Hanlon decided to stay all night in the supposedly haunted house while the young couple and their children crossed the city to live in their home in the Priesthill district. The house is on the ground floor and has a main door. All round the doorway and windows children have scribbled in chalk, “This is the haunted house.” Hundreds of children gathered and played in the street while Mr George Hanlon and his wife unpacked and prepared to spend the night.
Fifty-nine-year-old Mr Hanlon, whose son has spoken of lumps of coal which jumped from buckets, of probing fingers, of mysteriously slamming doors, told a reporter, “My wife, Annie, and I have decided to stay here tonight and see what happens.” Mr Hanlon, sen., a labourer, had taken his working overalls with him. “I’ll get up at the usual time in the morning and go out to my work at the normal time,” he said.
The Rev. Maxwell Magne told a reporter that he accompanied the couple into the house, bu the did not wish to discuss the matter further.
All during the day house-hungry families in Glasgow were queuing up at the factor’s office asking for the keys of the beautifully-decorated little house in Mansfield Street. First in the queue was the blonde young mother of an 18-month-old baby, Mrs Cathie Falconer. She and her husband live in the area, and she says that she would much rather stay in the two-apartment house than in her own single apartment, as she doesn’t believe in ghosts.
Dundee Courier, 8th August 1961.
Haunted Hanlons Go Back.
The Hanlon family – chased out of their home by a ghost – were back in residence last night. Back with them too, apparently was a ghost. Mrs Mary Hanlon, mother of two, said: “We are still very much aware of a presence… I can’t explain it. I’m desperate to get away form this place.
The family have stayed with relatives for the past fortnight, ever since a “week of terror” at their home at 23 Mansfield Street, Partick, Glasgow. They claimed they were prodded by invisible hands, heard weird noises, felt the room suddenly turn ice-cold, and saw a coal bucket rise from the scuttle.
Daily Record, 21st August 1961.