Mysterious Affair at Wigan.
A Supposed Ghost.
The inhabitants of that portion of Pemberton known as Robin Lane Ends have had their feelings shockingly upset during the last two days by the supposed visit of some supernatural being. The ghost- for ghost it has been christened, though up to the present it has been absolutely invisible – has been performing some mysterious pranks in one of the houses.
The house at which the performances are enacted is one of a row of ordinary cottages situated in Soho-street, a thoroughfare which joins the main street between Wigan and Pemberton, at right angles. Nothing distinguishes the house from the rest except a small hole ina pane of the front window. The hole will hardly allow the easy passage of a man’s fist; but it is mainly at this aperture that the unknown being performs his pranks. But since no human eye has seen the performer, it would doubtless be wiser to call in the neuter gender and style the performer “it.”
“It” began its work on Sunday, when the heads of the family chanced to be away from home. First, the ghost sent forth a huge shower of something like sand, which went against the face of a girl, who was stunned and temporarily blinded. A violent shaking of the window followed.
The neighbours were alarmed at the occurrence; they came first in twos and threes, then in scores, and the house rapidly filled. The street in front of the house became blocked with a surging crowd of information-seeking humanity. Despite all these hundreds of eyes the performances of the invisible one went on. The windows rattled, the walls shook, and through the aperture in the window pane, coal the size of chestnuts, and sometimes as big as a man’s fist, rolled in abundance. Everyone saw the coal come; but not one saw by what it was sent.
With the advance of the night the house and its approaches lessened their population. The father and the mother returned, and still the work of the ghost went on. Watch was set in and out. Nothing, however, could be seen which would account for the sending of the coal lumps, which became more and more frequent. Tired with watching, and wondering at the ghostly performances, the family went to bed. The next morning they examined the heap of coal which had come from no one knew where. In bulk it had increased none, nor had it lessened by one lump.
Lancashire Evening Post, 1st March 1892.
Preston: Wednesday, Mar. 2, 1892.
An Up-To-Date Ghost at Wigan.
Things are evidently moving fast in the spirit world. Wigan being the centre of a coal district, and the country being just now disturbed by a coal crisis, the ghosts of Wigan have evidently deemed it necessary to keep abreast of the times, and “manifest” in coals. A profound feeling of thanks is due to them for their thoughtful consideration; and if the coal strike really comes to pass, we may most rightly and properly hope that these ghostly producers of good household coals, “the size of chestnuts and sometimes as big as a man’s fist,” will increase and multiply and replenish the cellars.
The story is an excellent one. A certain house in Wigan has – according to the report of our own correspondent – been rented, or at all events, visited by a ghostly entity known seemingly as “It.” “It,” with a creditable modesty, has chosen a humble cottage dwelling for an abode, and the simple means of a broken window pane for the revelation of its eccentric disgust with things in general, and passers-by in particular.
The first “materialisation” was that of “something like sand,” which “It,” with ill-breeding characteristic of a neuter gender, “sent forth against the face of a girl;” and then the window was rattled with something of the mischievous delight which a boy feels when he has made a pot-shot from a safe ambuscade. The girl, however, seems to have spread the news afar, and the neighbours were soon agape with wondering curiosity; they “came first in twos and threes, then in scores, and the house rapidly filled; and the street in front of the house became blocked with a surging crowd.”
In the presence of all these witnesses, we are assured the manifestations continued, and the “coals rolled through the hole in the window in abundance.” “It” must be a good-natured sort of a wraith, and withal a hard-working one. The work of coal distribution went on all night, while the family, who were the rightful and fleshly tenants of the house, treated the matter with philosophic indifference worthy of Wigan traditions, and took no heed of the growing heap of Goblin coal, but just went to bed and slept over it.
It is clearly a case for the Society of Psychical Research; and Mr. W.T. Stead, in his new quest for Spooks, has not come across an eccentric coal-heaver’s sprite which, like “It,” delivers coals gratuitously at a time of crisis in the coal trade, but prefers to shoot them nut by nut through a hole in a window pane. There must be a sad lack of labour-saving appliances in the coalyards of Netherdom; but even these may come after a time; and certainly the Wigan Spook is a decided advance on anything yet offered in this line by Theosophists or other dealers in the uncanny.
An “It” that can deliver heaps of good serviceable coal at nothing a ton is a distinct improvement upon Mahatmas, who can get no farther than a few immaterial words on materialised paper. If we had to choose between the cults, we should decide, without doubt, for the practical “It,” and range ourselves on his side.
At the same time we should not advise those whose coal cellars are empty to break a window pane as a sort of complimentary invitation to this nitrogenous spook. There are enough pranks played in the ordinary coal trade already.
Lancashire Evening Post, 2nd March 1892.
The Supposed Ghost at Wigan.
A Constable Comes.
The minds of the ghost-frightened residents of Robin Lane-ends, or at all events the majority of them, have been set at rest. The coal-throwing already described having recommenced, the occupants of the house which was thus troubled called in a police constable. Like all who had been before him, he could detect no one, nor anything throwing the coal; but being a persevering officer he commenced a search. Right under the window containing the broken pane whence the coal, &c., was supposed to come, he espied a hole in the house floor, of about the same size as the window pane. At this he waited and watched, but nothing emerged. At last he went back to his duty in the streets.
Other eyes took his place and directed themselves upon the newly-discovered hole in the house floor. After some anxious watching they had their reward, for up popped a lump of coal, similar in size and quality to the lumps that had come before. The constable was recalled. The latest mysteriously sent lump of coal was shown to him. He was convinced it was from a coal bed a little below the surface, and had been hurled up by a draught of coal gas from the mines. He told the afflicted household his belief concerning the mysterious pranks – a belief which there and then took root and set them to rest.
Lancashire Evening Post, 2nd March 1892.