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Ghostly goings-on!

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Ghost and Mini

In celebration of Halloween, local author Anne Bradford shares some spooky stories from her latest book…

Anne has collected the following stories from individuals in Alvechurch and the surrounding area – these and many more spooky tales are contained in her latest book, Worcestershire: The Haunted County.

It should be available from all good bookshops, or you can buy it from Hunt End Books (01527 542516; www.huntendbooks.com) priced £6.75.

Pestilence Lane
The fellow who told the next story is about 17 stone with muscles and tattoos all over his body, and the thought of him having a weep stretches the imagination:

“When I was a kid I used to work at BCIRA, at Bordesley Hall, Rowney Green, up the Holloway.

One dark night, I was with a young lady in a Mini in a little lane nearby. The car was stationary and I won’t go into details about what we were doing…

Suddenly, a little light appeared round the bend so we both stopped and looked. First of all we thought it was a pushbike headlamp, but as it came nearer it appeared to be somebody with a lantern.

Whoever was carrying the lantern was swinging it so that as it went along it wrote a series of ellipses. 

It came nearer and nearer and when I saw it close up I thought I was going to cry. For the figure was ten feet tall and the lantern swung high over the roof of the Mini.

Then it disappeared – the banks were really steep and there was nowhere it could have gone.

I found an old farmyard where I could turn round, and drove away. A few days later I was telling an old guy about it and he said, ‘Well, you know where you were parked, don’t you?’

I said, ‘No’, and he answered, ‘In Pestilence Lane.’”

St Laurence Church, Alvechurch
This story was passed to us several years ago and has just come to light:

“In about 1963 when I was about 13 years old, my elder sister and I were in the choir at St Laurence’s. Every Thursday evening we went to the church for choir practice.

At the entrance to the church is a porch with stone bench seats inside. Then you come to double doors which open into the church.

One particular night it was in the middle of winter and dark. My sister was in front of me. As we walked into the porch I saw a man in a light grey suit sitting on the stone bench.

I was a little unnerved as it was a bit unusual for a man to be sitting there on a dark winter’s night.

My sister walked straight past him and through the first doors. I quickly followed and as soon as I had closed the door behind me, I said to my sister, ‘What was that man doing sitting out there?’

My sister looked blank and said, ‘What man? I didn’t see anybody.’ She opened the door straight away and looked out and there was no one there at all.

I suspect that I had seen my father, who had died when I was two years old. This man looked very like the photos of him that I had seen, even down to the light grey suit that he was wearing on his wedding photos.”

Bear Hill, Alvechurch
In the 1990s, a single lady moved into a 17th century house in Bear Hill. Her friend tells us this tale: 

“The house was full of bangs and creaks, and the wardrobe doors would mysteriously open and close. Drawings would appear on the walls. The first time we had a look at one of them we decided it was a child’s drawing of a chair and a dog.

My friend and I noticed a mark on the table that looked like a child’s hand print. We cleaned it off, went out of the room and when we went back it was there again.

While we were having our meal we could hear a noise, as if somebody was singing a nursery rhyme. Another mark appeared on the wall, the sort of drawing that you would expect from a four-year old. We didn’t know whether it was the drawing of a book  or just an oblong piece of paper.

We decided to leave paper about and see what happened. For a week nothing happened, then a child’s drawing of a train, a house and a tree appeared. We asked ourselves, ‘What is it trying to tell us?’

Outside in the garden were two trees – one was falling over and only held up by another tree tied to it. On a windy day the tree fell, missing me by inches. Perhaps that was what the drawing was trying to tell me, but why the train?

When I slept at the house I swear that something got into bed with me. I was fast asleep but I could feel the bed go down. I couldn’t see anyone.

A couple of others have stayed in that room and they both said they could feel somebody sitting on the end of the bed. I haven’t slept in that room since.”

* If you have had a scary experience in the local area, why not tell us about it via the usual addresses?

Look out for more ghostly tales in future issues of The Village.

In keeping with the Halloween theme, Dawn Holloway of Alvechurch has written this poem for us:

Halloween
 
Ghouls, Ghosts and Spectres,
Wizards, Witches and Elves.
Tonight’s the night for magic,
brooms, hats and spells.
 
Bat wings in the cauldron,
frog legs in the pot.
Mix them with some stardust
‘til nice and steamy hot.
 
Apples are for eating,
with fangs to help them bite.
Black capes in the distance,
flying through the night.
 
Gravestones are for meeting
people in the dark.
Pumpkins change in mid-flight
into black cats, with a bark!
 
So don’t go out at midnight,
or your fate will then be met,
with a spot upon your pimple,
or a black cat as a pet!