FESTIVE PHANTOMS
GHOST STORIES FOR
CHRISTMAS JOHN WEST follows Dickens’ tradition with this spine-chilling collection
The Vanishing Lady WRITER and journalist, J. B. Hall recorded a strange experience during a holiday in Northern Ireland. It was shortly before the outbreak of World War One and Hall and a friend had booked rooms in a hotel in a town in Ulster. Two clergymen, members of a touring party, arrived at the same hotel to find that their rooms had not been booked due to an oversight. Hall and his friend gave up their rooms and took alternative accommodation in an old building nearby, known as the Big House, which the hotel used as an annexe in the summer months. They were shown into a spacious and rather gloomy set of rooms with a large window, two four-poster beds, a few chairs and an antique mirror. It was evident that the place had seen better days but the pair made up a fire which soon gave the rooms a cheery glow. The writer and his friend retired to their beds but had barely fallen asleep when the sound of chimes from a nearby clock tower woke them. They both heard footsteps ascend the stairs and approach the door. They were rather surprised as the hotel staff had told them no other guests were staying there. The door opened and a sad looking lady with long red hair entered the room. Dressed in old-fashioned clothes, she was of slim build and appeared hesitant but then suddenly rushed to the window where a look of terror swept across her face. She staggered back with a cry, raised her hands above her head and collapsed
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FESTIVE PHANTOMS
Later that day, their car hit a tree and both men died of their injuries
on the floor. Both men then saw her vanish before their eyes. It was only at this moment that Hall and his companion realised that she was not a living being. Both were understandably shocked but agreed not to mention what they had seen to the hotel staff or to the other guests. Next morning, the waiter asked how they had slept and confided in them that the place was haunted. That same day, Hall and his companion visited one of the writer’s old school friends who was now a doctor. While lunch was being prepared, the doctor showed them around his home. On entering the dining room, both spotted an oil painting of a woman wearing a scarf, brooch and large hat. It was the woman they had seen the night before! They asked the doctor about her and he explained that she had once lived in the Big House and had been the wife of a French officer who had been killed in Paris. One morning, she had returned home after hearing mass at the local church. Her daughter was seen leaning dangerously out of an upstairs room, waving a flower at her. The mother rushed indoors but was unable to reach the room before the girl slipped and fell to her death on the pavement below. The doctor explained that his father, also a doctor, had been summoned but could do nothing to save the child. The mother and daughter now lay in the churchyard nearby. The ghost of the mother had haunted the building ever since, forever re-enacting her last desperate attempt to save the child.
The Cursed Chair Chairs are designed to be sat upon, but one in Yorkshire had such a sinister reputation that the owner gave it to a local museum with the request that no one be allowed to sit on it! It was originally kept in the Busby Stoop Inn (now the Jaipur Spice) at Kirby Wiske, a village near Thirsk, in the northern part of the county. Legend has it that the chair was used by Thomas Busby who lived in the area in the late 17th century. He married Elizabeth, the daughter of Daniel Awety, a small-time local crook, and soon became involved in his father-in-law’s illegal forging and coin-clipping activities, which involved shaving small amounts from soft gold or silver coins and melting the clippings down and selling them, often to make counterfeit coins. Thomas would often drink in the local pub and always sat in the same chair. His relationship with his father-in-law was hardly a loving one and Thomas was furious to discover one night, upon entering the pub, that Daniel was sitting in his favourite chair. A heated argument quickly developed with Awety threatening to take his daughter away from Busby. That night, a still incensed Busby entered his father-in-law’s home and murdered him. He was arrested and sentenced to death at York Assizes in 1702. On his way to execution, Busby asked to visit the pub and sit in “his chair” one last time. Upon leaving, he cursed all those who would use it after him. Busby was then hanged opposite the inn, at the crossroads
on the old Great North Road. The earliest known recorded victim of the cursed chair dates from 1894. Two friends, a chimney sweep and a local man, were drinking in the pub. The sweep was much the worse for drink and upon leaving the pub was seen to lie in the road and fall asleep. The next morning his lifeless body was found hanging by his neck from a gatepost next to the old gibbet. His death was ruled as suicide but in 1914 his friend admitted on his deathbed to having robbed and killed him. During the Second World War, crews from RAF Skipton-on-Swale drank at the pub, now known as the Busby Stoop. The airmen would dare each other to sit in the chair. One took up the challenge and died the next day on a mission. In 1968 the pub was bought by Tony Earnshaw. Even before taking over the business, he witnessed two airmen daring each other to sit in the infamous chair. Each accepted the other’s challenge. Later that day, their car hit a tree and both men died of their injuries. Others who defied the curse and paid the ultimate price include a hitchhiker, cyclists, a cleaner who bumped into it and a local man who died of a heart attack shortly after sitting in the infamous chair. A group of builders also visited the pub and the youngest of them was encouraged to sit in the chair by his workmates. Back at the building site, he fell through a roof and was killed. It was after this that the pub owner decided to banish the chair to the cellar. In 1978 a deliveryman saw the chair in the cellar and sat on it. He was killed later PSYCHIC NEWS | DECEMBER 2017
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that day when his van crashed. Unsurprisingly, Earnshaw decided to remove the chair from the pub and donate it to the Thirsk museum with the stipulation that it never be used. The chair is still there – safely fixed to the wall and well out of harm’s way!
The Tree of Ghostly Dread Elliot O’Donnell, the famous author and ghost hunter, once recorded an interesting story connected with a certain tree in Worcestershire. Anna Brown worked at a farm located several miles from her home. To get there she had to pass a crossroads of sinister reputation where numerous executions had taken place and witches were said to have held covens. An elm tree stood nearby and this was reputed to be haunted by the ghosts of those executed criminals buried beneath its branches. Anna had several suitors, including Abel Hall, the son of a rich farmer. She was not particularly attracted to him but reasoned that a rich husband was better than a poor one and so encouraged his pursuit of her. They had arranged to meet one evening at the crossroads but Anna had not been keen due to its reputation. However, she relented at Abel’s insistence as it was not far from his home and an injured foot prevented him from travelling further. Anna left home as the sun was setting. Upon reaching the crossroads, she experienced a feeling of dread which increased as she waited. Anna hoped that her suitor would not be long and continued to wait fearfully in the fading light. Suddenly, something made her turn towards the elm tree. A spherical light was now shining out from the foliage. To her horror, it started to form into a head. Matted hair, bony cheeks and large ears were clearly evident, as were two glittering eyes which gazed upon her with malevolence. Terror-stricken, she managed to say a prayer and cross herself,
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whereupon the thing vanished. She ran home, the meeting with Abel forgotten as she tried to get the hideous apparition out of her mind. The following morning, she learned that Abel had arrived at their planned place of meeting, and not finding her waiting, had gone home and cut his throat. She discovered that a streak of insanity ran through his family and his parents had noticed that their son had been acting strangely for some time. Anna could only wonder what would have happened if she had met him that night? Had the appearance of the thing in the trees actually saved her life?
A Guardian Angel William Shatner is known to millions as Star Trek’s Captain Kirk. He once had a profound experience in the desert that even Mr Spock would have struggled to explain logically. “I was out riding with three friends and after we’d stopped for a drink of water, we saw another bike rider approach us. In that kind of country it’s not advisable to ride alone. What would happen if you came off your bike?” The stranger joined them and Shatner looked into his face. As he did so, he felt a strange vibration humming in the air, but no one else appeared to noticed it. They carried on with their journey but Shatner fell behind. His bike then hit something and toppled over. Shatner fell onto the exhaust pipe and badly burned his leg and face. “By the time I began calling for help from the other guys they’d disappeared into the desert. I struggled up and tried to start my bike but it was finished …... I was in trouble. My leg, face, everything, seemed to be giving me pain but I knew I just couldn’t stay there, not under that sun.” Shatner struggled on with his bike. He tried to force start it by rolling the bike down a small hill but the strain of pushing it
up there caused him to black out. “I wasn’t unconscious long and when I came to I could hear that weird humming again. Strangely enough, I felt totally fit. My limp had gone, the burn had disappeared – I don’t know how. I started pushing the bike – but that still wasn’t going. It seemed to have gotten a mind of its own … it wanted to go its way, not mine. “I couldn’t fight it so I just trailed along. I didn’t know where I was heading. Somehow I got over a hill and you can imagine my relief when I saw a gas station on the road in the distance.” Shatner headed for it and asked the attendant if he could repair the bike. “He told me there was nothing wrong with it and he was right, too. It started. Then my three friends turned up. I asked them what had happened to the stranger and they said he’d just vanished shortly after I fell behind. “I heard that strange humming again and saw the stranger on a far hill. He was waving at us but I was the only one who could see him. I didn’t care – I waved back my thanks to whoever, or whatever, it was that had saved my life.” n
John West is an author and broadcaster. He is also currently working on several TV projects, including a series devoted to the ghosts of York. John can be contacted via his websites: johnwestmedia.com & hauntedheritageuk.com