My WORST experience with
the spirit world.....

This contribution is a story about the most frightening experience of my life (so far!) It's a ghost story that has the added dimension of being TRUE!

Some years ago I was in a somewhat popular folk-band that managed to secure a  Summer's work at a folk club in  Cornwall. The six of us were given the keys to an old cottage in the village of Perranuthnoe, near  St Michael's Mount, in which to stay.
After a few weeks, the owner of the club was so pleased with our efforts that he gave us an evening off: he suggested a barbecue and provided us with crates of beer and some chops and sausages to cook on the fire.
As dusk approached we walked through the old wooden gate of the cottage, straight onto the shallow, sandy beach. The tide was out and there was the beginnings of a sea mist. The lead singer, Bob and I walked casually down to the water's edge, while John, the other guitarist, and our three girlfriends remained to tend the fire. It was Bob (a six foot six tall man who was frightened of nothing) who first spotted the figures: there, at the edge of the mist were three barely discernible outlines wading knee-deep, parallel to the shoreline.

Bob and I squatted down together. Could they be smugglers? Some other band of desperate criminals, up to no good on this isolated fore-shore? As the trio drew level with us, they seemed for the first time to become aware of our presence: they turned towards us. It was at this moment that I shook Bob's arm and whispered hoarsely "They're not making a wake, Bob!" And indeed, the three figures approached the beach without the slightest disturbance of the water through which they were apparently wading. Suddenly the ravelling mist swirled and cleared: for the first time we could see the figures plainly at perhaps twenty metres range……..That sight will haunt my dreams for the rest of my life: the three 'men' (though they hardly deserved the appellation) can only be described as having the appearance of rotting corpses. Their empty eye-sockets stared vacantly towards the beach, while shreds of skin and flesh hung from their emaciated frames.
Someone screamed….it could have been Bob or I: it doesn't matter…..The sound galvanised the pair of us. We turned and ran up the beach, past the flaring  driftwood fire and into the house. From behind us we heard gasps of horror, and the panic-stricken footsteps of our companions.

That night was spent in sleepless terror of what we had seen only too well on the deserted beach. The doors were locked and barricaded with furniture, but none of us dare surrender to sleep.  As the first light of day spread from the East, we summoned the courage firstly to peep through the thickly-curtained windows, then to open the door and venture outside. John and I had abandoned our acoustic guitars in our rush from the beach.  The neck of John's £300 Epiphone was warped and twisted beyond repair by the chill sea-mists: it somehow didn't seem to matter.

Later that day the club-owner dropped by. " Did you have a good evening, boys and girls?" he enquired
" Not...disturbed at all?"

We finished the Summer season and went on to further musical success….but, by common consent, that night on the beach at Perranuthnoe was never discussed by any of us……….

As I said at the beginning: this IS a true story!

The truly terrifying tale
of a domestic haunting!
I have a story for you to chill your bones and curdle your blood!  It was told to  me by an old friend, who lived through the events I am about to recount to you!

Some years ago, ****** moved with his parents and younger brother to an old Georgian house in the city of Ed**burgh!  It was a draughty old mausoleum of a building, with many rooms downstairs, all leading from one long corridor. 

The nightmare began one cold, damp November evening, about a week after they took possession.  ****** felt from the start that there was something 'wrong' about the house, but nobody paid much attention to the worries of a fanciful twelve-year old!

The main living room was at the front of the building.  The panelled door opened inwards into the room, which was heated by an old, inglenook fireplace.  ******'s brother had been sitting alone in the living room, reading a book.  He felt a chill in the air, and decided to go to the kitchen to ask his mother for a warming cup of cocoa.  As he stood up, a picture fell from the wall with a crash, breaking the glass into a thousand tiny shards.  ******, hearing the noise and his brother's accompanying yell, hurtled along the corridor and into the room to discover the cause of the commotion.  As he passed through  the door, it slammed shut behind him, and a table lamp levitated from the coffee table and was impelled across the room at great speed, before crashing into the wall opposite.

Needless to say, ****** and his ten-year old brother were quite keen to leave the room.  Both boys threw themselves at the door handle.  ****** tried to twist the knob, but was unable to move it even a fraction!  Chairs were overturned in the room behind them, and both boys pounded at the door, and yelled at the top of their voices. 

Their father thundered down the stairs, and tried, in his turn, to open the door.  It would not yield to normal pressure, but hearing his children scream louder, he threw the full force of his body against it, and the momentum proved enough to break the catch.  The boys fell through the opening in a tangle of limbs.  Behind them, the room was a shambles, broken glass and china all over the floor, and chairs and tables upturned and broken.
You will not be surprised to hear that they moved soon after!
A restless spirit....
Do you think our friends in the spirit world are only tied to old, rambling houses? Not at all! I have a friend who lives in a modern bungalow who has only recently been able to free his dwelling of a troubled soul….

The story begins a year or two ago: my friend and his new wife bought their first house together in a leafy suburb of an East Anglian city. De Pension (my friend's chosen nom de plume!) was almost immediately aware upon moving in that, as modern as his new house was, he and his wife were sharing the property with a restless spirit .

One night this wraith presented itself to de Pension in the form of a somewhat crotchety elderly man, in attire palpably of the early part of  this century. No communication was possible or attempted, but de Pension has told me that he felt an overwhelming sense of having in some way annoyed the old man. But how? De Pension wracked his brains, but could think of nothing that might have disturbed the old man's eternal rest…. except, possibly, that he had enlarged an existing ornamental pond in the garden at the rear of the property. De Pension states that as he  undertook this work, he felt a curious feeling of unease: he told me at the time that he felt as if someone were buried under the pond he was engaged in enlarging: not a comfortable sensation, one would imagine!


De Pension, you should know, does not enjoy the best of health: his stomach, particularly, troubles him and causes him to long for an uninterrupted night's sleep. Some weeks ago, during the early hours of the morning, de Pension stumbled along the unlit corridor that linked his bedroom to the kitchen, where he hoped to find the medicine he needed to calm his troubled digestion!

Imagine his consternation to see before him a spectral dog: white with a faint green luminescence surrounding it! De Pension stood transfixed for possibly two minutes. Summoning up all his courage, my friend walked towards and through the phantom canine!

Later, as he lay tossing and turning in bed, de Pension began to wonder if there could possibly be a link between the two apparitions…. he did not have to wait long for an answer to his musings!

The following evening, reading alone in his lounge, de Pension looked up to see the old man stood before him. His piercing eyes bored accusingly into my friend's very soul.
De Pension suddenly found he had achieved rapport with the spirit before him:  with crystal clarity he read  meaning in the tired, wizened eyes of the nocturnal visitor. It was the old man's DOG that was buried beneath the pond!

Taking advantage of the open lines of communication, de Pension expressed  his sorrow for the dismay he might have caused through his excavations: he promised to dig no further, and reassured the old man by suggesting that the garden could be considered as a memorial to the dog. This seemed to be acceptable to the spirit: de Pension  suggested a prayer, and soon found himself in the astonishing situation of hearing, in chorus with his own tremulous tones, the Pater  Noster  recited by a gruff voice from beyond the grave!

Since that night, de Pension reports that the atmosphere within the bungalow seems to have lightened considerably: dark cob-webbed corners appear to have been eradicated and de Pension is quietly confident that he has seen the last of the old gentleman and his dog