Sailor is flown home to catch ghost.
A sailor’s wife is troubled by a ghost – so the Navy has flown her husband home from Malta to see about it. The ghost has been worrying Mrs Dorothy Hampson, 29, and her four children in the top-floor flat of a Georgian house at Wyndham place, Plymouth. She feels safer now that her husband, Leading Seaman William Hampson, 28, of the aircraft carrier Eagle, is home.
Mrs Hampson first complained of the ghost in June, when she heard voices calling “Betty”. She felt hands on her shoulder and a tugging at her dress. Father N.H. Hanson, assistant curate at nearby St Peter’s Church, blessed the house, and the ghostly activities died down. Now Mrs Hampson claims to have seen the ghost – “a black and white phantom” – crouching behind a chair. Leading Seaman Hampson said yesterday there was “a strange atmosphere” in the two upstairs rooms of the flat, which his family no longer used. There had been strange noises, not only at night, as if someone was walking heavily across the ceiling. Two of their children, Tony, 5 and Dorothy, 7, had been “bumped in the back” by an unseen hand when they were alone in their rooms.
Father Hanson said yesterday: “There is not the slightest doubt that Mrs Hampson was genuinely distressed by these disturbances. I know that at least one family left the house because of these noises. I have made inquiries but cannot find any historical fact that could account for ghosts – if one admits their existence. But, since Mrs Hampson first complained, several people have told me the house is haunted.”
Mrs Hampson said she “dreaded” the time when her husband has to rejoin his ship next month. The Admiralty said last night that Leading Seaman Hampson was granted leave because his wife had housing difficulties.
Daily Mirror, 26th August 1955.
Navy sends a sailor home to beat a phantom. Plymouth, Thursday. From Betty Crisp.
Bill Hampson is the first man to get compassionate leave from the Royal Navy to lay a ghost. And tonight the bearded leading-seaman confessed he had failed. But his 29-year-old wife Dorothy is more than ever convinced that a hairy-armed phantom visits their flat above a Plymouth shop, calling to her and the three children. She has seen and heard it since 28-year-old Bill was flown home from the aircraft carrier Eagle in the Mediterranean because of her illness through worry. “It was like the flash of an explosion with a man’s figure in the centre,” she told me, her grey eyes wide with remembered horror. “The arms were crossed and I could see thick hairs on them, but the head and shoulders were missing. I screamed and turned away. When I dared peep again it had gone. Bill and a friend were with me in the living-room but were looking towards me and saw nothing. I have heard a voice calling ‘Betty’ as though in anguish, and felt unseen hands tugging my skirt and touching my shoulder. It terrifies me.”
She and her children, aged seven, five and two, have lived in the flat for a year. Her husband is trying to find a new home for them before rejoining his ship next month. “I haven’t seen the ghost,” he said, “but I’ve experienced a sensation of death-like cold or sultry closeness and it’s nothing to do with the weather.
Bill Hampson at home last night.
Daily Herald, 26th August 1955.
Wraith made wife scream, says seaman.
The Royal Navy has flown home on compassionate leave a rating from the aircraft carrier Eagle to deal with a ghost which is terrifying his wife and three children in Plymouth (says a “Daily Telegraph” reporter). The ghost, said to be a man in black who appears headless with his arms crossed on his chest, made his first appearance when the family moved their home some moths ago.
Leading Seaman Hampson, twenty eight, was flown home in July following letters from his wife, Dorothy, twenty nine, saying that she could no longer stay in the house and that the children were ill. At present he is living at home, but with his fourteen days’ leave ended he is soon to report at the R.N. Barracks, Devonport, pending rejoining his ship when she returns to this country. The Eagle is now at Malta.
The ghostly appearances and noises so upset Mrs Hampson when she first went to the house that Father N.H. Hanson, of St Peter’s Church, was called in to bless the rooms. That appeared to have some effect, but the disturbances have now started again. The family originally occupied two rooms on the first floor and two on the floor above but now live only in the first floor rooms. The noises take the form of footsteps overhead and the opening and shutting of doors.
Leading Seaman Hampson told me that the chief incident occurred after he came home. “My wife, a friend and myself were sitting in the main room when suddenly my wife screamed and said that she had seen someone standing behind my friend. It was the headless body of a man in black who appeared to have his arms crossed on his chest. When she screamed there was a sort of bang and the apparition disappeared.” Neither Hampson nor the friend saw the ghost. At first Hampson thought all the happenings were part of his wife’s imagination, but he told me that he has since heard footsteps overhead and on one occasion when he was in the house alone the door leading into the main room was gently opened and then shut tightly, though he saw the turning of the handle [sic].
He said on Thursday that the children were being affected by the happenings. Jackie, two, was frightened by the noises overhead and another daughter was suffering from nightmares. “My wife is thoroughly frightened and will sleep only with the doors locked and the lights on. She will stay in the house only as little as possible”. He added that he had tried without success to get other accommodation.
Londonderry Sentinel, 27th August 1955.
Navy man on leave and wife face ordeal in haunted house.
I watch in room as couple tussle with unseen ‘ghost’. by Anthony Hunter.
I have just watched a young married couple fight with a ghost for possession of their home. I started my lonely vigil in the haunted house near Wyndham-place, Plymouth, at 8 p.m. I sat on a bare landing on the top floor. After an hour I felt tingling sensations all over my body. The temperature seemed to drop suddenly, and there was a draught – from the stairs not from the open window of the top-floor room. Then I thought I smelled incense. I called Leading Seaman William Hampson, given compssionate leave by the Royal Navy, from Malta, to help his wife look for a new home.
“My wife says it is downstairs now,” he said. “Why not ask her to come up here with us and face whatever it is?” I asked. Ten minutes later his wife, Dorothy, was sitting with us in a room which she had sworn never to enter. Her husband held her tightly. “He’s here,” whispered Mrs Hampson. “Oh, he is so terribly sad.” Then: “I want to help you, but please, please, leave us in peace,” she cried. I could see nothing but this man and woman who seemed to be fighting something invisible. I felt my hair begin to rise: sweat start out on my forehead. Then the open door by which I was standing tried to close against my foot.
Suddenly, it was as if a great weight had lifted from the house. “It’s gone,” said Mrs Hampson, sobbing. It had gone. you could feel it. I sat out the rest of the night there, but nothing happened. I even slept, fitfully. Has the ghost gone forever? I don’t know. But it was a frightening and extraordinary experience.
The ghost has made 29-year-old Mrs Hampson ill. She is seeking a new home for herself and her four children. The ghost she claims to have seen is a priest who committed suicide 40 years ago on the top of the stiars to the third floor. Two people, Mrs Hampson and a friend, say they have seen this young, close-cropped man in a cassock. The Hampson children and five other people have felt overwhelming sadness and terror which seem connected with the problem which caused this man to take his life.
Mr Bernard Stephens heard an anguished voice call “Betty” on the stroke of 11 one night. Mrs Lily Green, who had her first baby in the top-floor room four months ago, felt a hand on her shoulder and a pluck at her nightdress.
Visions, footsteps, door rattlings, and other strange happenings frightened Mrs Hampson and her children so that they dared not even approach the stairs to the third floor.
Weekly Dispatch (London), 28th August 1955.
Devonport M.P. visits the haunted wife.
Shown on a visit yesterday to “the haunted flat” at Plymouth is Miss Joan Vickers, M.P. for Devonport, on left. She is with Mrs Dorothy Hampson and one of Mrs Hampson’s four young children. The mother says that in the flat she has seen a ghost in the shape of a headless phantom. Mrs Hampson’s husband, in the Royal Navy, has been flown home from Malta on compassionate grounds. Miss Vickers said she would try to help Mrs Hampson to find another home.
Bradford Observer, 27th August 1955.
Woman M.P. takes up haunted house case.
‘I believe in ghosts,’ she declares.
Miss Vickers, Conservative-National-Liberal M.P. for Devonport, is trying to secure fresh accommodation for Leading-Seaman William Hampson and his family, who believe that their house in Plymouth is haunted. Miss Vickers who called at the house in response to a letter from Mrs Hampson asking for help, said: “I believe in ghosts. I have seen them on two occasions. Once was in a house in Leicestershire, and the other in a house in Limerick. I have also had experience of a poltergeist in Kuala Lumpur.”
Miss Vickers is to inform Plymouth Corporation of the conditions and ask what chance the family has of a Council house. Mrs Hampson has become so afraid of an apparition, said to be headless and clad in black, that the Navy flew her husband home from Malta on July 13. He is due to rejoin the aircraft-carrier Eagle (36,800 tons) when she returns to Britain soon, and has been seeking another home.
Belfast Telegraph, 27th August 1955.
I watched fight with a ghost.
I have just watched a young married couple fight with a ghost for possession of their home. I started my lonely vigil in the haunted house near Wyndham-place, Plymouth, at 8 p.m. I sat on a bare landing on the top floor. After an hour I felt tingling sensations all over my body. The temperature seemed to drop suddenly, and there was a draught from the stairs not from the open window of the top-floor room.
Then I thought I smelled incense. I called Leading Seaman William Hampson, given compassionate leave by the Royal Navy, from Malta, to help his wife look for a new home. “My wife says it is downstairs now,” he said. “Why not ask her to come up here with us and face whatever it is?” I asked.
Ten minutes later his wife, Dorothy, was sitting with us in a room which she had sworn never to enter. Her husband held her tightly. “He’s here,” whispered Mrs Hampson. “Oh, he is so terribly sad.” Then: “I want to help you, but please, please leave us in peace,” she cried. I could see nothing but this man and woman who seemed to be fighting something invisible. I felt my hair begin to rise; sweat start out on my forehead. Then the open door by which I was standing tried to close against my foot.
Suddenly, it was as if a great weight had lifted from the house. “It’s gone,” said Mrs Hampson, sobbing. It had gone. You could feel it. I sat out the rest of the night there, but nothing happened. I even slept fitfully.
Has the ghost gone forever? I don’t know. But it was a frightening and extraordinary experience. The ghost has made 29-year-old Mrs Hampson ill. She is seeking a new home for herself and her four children. The ghost she claims to have seen is a priest who committed suicide 40 years ago on the top of the stairs to the third floor. Two people, Mrs Hampson and a friend, say they have seen this young, close-cropped man in a cassock. The Hampson children and five other people have felt overwhelming sadness and terror which seem connected with the problem which caused this man to take his life.
Anthony Hunter.
The Straits Times, 25th September 1955.