- Joined
- Mar 15, 2005
- Messages
- 198
I have just typed out this story for another site, so I thought I would share it with you here ...
In 1975, my dad took over a pub/hotel in Ardwick, Manchester. (The Junction Hotel on Hyde Rd, in case any other Mancs on here). Pictured below in 1959 ..
The previous landlord had literally grabbed his stuff and left in a hurry. The official line was "due to dodgy dealings", but it transpired that the real reason was a lot more sinister...
I was aged 9 at the time, and on the very first night we moved in I watched as the plug from my one bar electric fire was just ripped out of the wall as I lay in bed staring into it. Despite this, I recall a strange feeling of serenity, and I somehow managed to put it aside and get off to sleep.
During the following months I felt various presences around the place, and regularly heard footsteps coming from directly above my bedroom, which was the old hotel, the entrance to which was boarded up and the rooms lay semi derelict. (See the small windows at the top of the pub building below? That was the hotel area, my room was directly below, the last room on the right). Even so, I did not really realise the extent of the 'problem' until one day when I came home from school and found the place in total darkness. All the curtains had been closed and there was a strange man wandering around chanting, and throwing water onto the wells. Yep, this was an 'exorcism' in progress!
We moved away from the pub shortly after that, and it was only years later when my dad gave me the full story. Many things had happened, but here's a few that REALLY stick in the mind.
On the first night we moved in, after closing time, dad was working in the cellar cleaning out the beer pumps when the jukebox suddenly burst into life at TOP VOLUME. My mum was upstairs in the living area, so there was no-one at all on the pub floor level, and therefore, no-one to trigger the jukebox. The song - ironically (or not) - was 'All I Need Is The Air That I Breathe' by the Hollies. Blaming each other for this, Dad shouted UP the stairs, mum shouted DOWN to dad, and they eventually met up in middle, perplexed. They laughed it off, and blamed it on an electrical fault, but from there, things got much worse.
One night, they had kept some pub regulars and bar staff behind to help put up all the Xmas decorations. They finished the job at 3am, and went off to bed. The very next morning, the pub cleaners arrived at 8am and found that all of these decorations had been taken down, put away neatly in the same boxes they had came out of, and then stacked up in the middle of the pub floor!!
Another night, my dad and a senior barmaid, thought they had cleared the pub of all the customers, when they noticed two people sat at a table across the room. Dad shouted over to them to "drink up", but they just ignored him. Then, just as he was about to go over to the table He - AND the barmaid - watched in horror as the two people walked towards them, and then literally right THROUGH them, disappearing through the old bricked up exit door just behind them.(Which kind of condones the 'timeslip' theory of ghosts I suppose). The senior barmaid was nonplussed at this. She apparently 'knew' the couple as Jack and Barbara, married pensioners who had died 30 years before in a car accident.
The Worst was still to come though...
Just after Christmas, dad and mum, and our FOUR dogs, (Hey, this was a pub in a very violent area of town!!) were sat in the upstairs lounge at about 1am. They were watching a film, when they suddenly heard approaching footsteps. These steps were coming from the stairs and landing directly outside the lounge. Now, my dad, was a giant of a man, and had no fear at all, but this really freaked him out. He told me that although the steps were seemingly coming up the stairs the reaction of the dogs made him realise that this was no human intruder. He said that The dogs, simply showed no reaction at all to the steps, as if they could not hear them! Dad and mum could definitely hear them though, getting louder and nearer, until they stopped right outside the lounge door. At that point, a large 'glow' filtered through the door and into the lounge. This was the point when my dad said he just froze solid. "Time stood still". The whole room was in total deathly silence, and then from somewhere in the room they heard a disembodied child's voice "Hello, I'm Charlotte". At this point my mum fainted, and dad's knee jerk reaction was to respond with "I'm Alex". But the point was already made and 'Charlotte' had gone, literally, in the blink of an eye. Meanwhile, the dogs, had not noticed or sensed anything at all. They just lay there next to the fire totally oblivious. (So much for animals being able to sense spirits!?!)
It was at that point that my parents decided to call in the local priest to do a clearance - more dramatically known as an 'exorcism'.
It didn't work, and after my dad was violently shoved into one of the beer tanks in the cellar, whilst nobody else was in the whole building, they decided to upsticks and leave.
Looking into the history of the building later,they found that a previous landlord from just 10 years before, had been decapitated in the cellar by an exploding beer barrel. Which would sure explain a few things, but, they never got to the bottom of the 'Charlotte' story. Also, the building to the left of the pub in the picture below, was an old morgue. Don't suppose that would have helped really.
From that time, my own belief in ghosts has been total, however, I also understand that no matter how many tales like this are told, people will never believe until they experience something themselves. And that's fair comment.
Either way, there has been no artistic licence used here, and ALL of the above is true. Make of it what you will.
In 1975, my dad took over a pub/hotel in Ardwick, Manchester. (The Junction Hotel on Hyde Rd, in case any other Mancs on here). Pictured below in 1959 ..
The previous landlord had literally grabbed his stuff and left in a hurry. The official line was "due to dodgy dealings", but it transpired that the real reason was a lot more sinister...
I was aged 9 at the time, and on the very first night we moved in I watched as the plug from my one bar electric fire was just ripped out of the wall as I lay in bed staring into it. Despite this, I recall a strange feeling of serenity, and I somehow managed to put it aside and get off to sleep.
During the following months I felt various presences around the place, and regularly heard footsteps coming from directly above my bedroom, which was the old hotel, the entrance to which was boarded up and the rooms lay semi derelict. (See the small windows at the top of the pub building below? That was the hotel area, my room was directly below, the last room on the right). Even so, I did not really realise the extent of the 'problem' until one day when I came home from school and found the place in total darkness. All the curtains had been closed and there was a strange man wandering around chanting, and throwing water onto the wells. Yep, this was an 'exorcism' in progress!
We moved away from the pub shortly after that, and it was only years later when my dad gave me the full story. Many things had happened, but here's a few that REALLY stick in the mind.
On the first night we moved in, after closing time, dad was working in the cellar cleaning out the beer pumps when the jukebox suddenly burst into life at TOP VOLUME. My mum was upstairs in the living area, so there was no-one at all on the pub floor level, and therefore, no-one to trigger the jukebox. The song - ironically (or not) - was 'All I Need Is The Air That I Breathe' by the Hollies. Blaming each other for this, Dad shouted UP the stairs, mum shouted DOWN to dad, and they eventually met up in middle, perplexed. They laughed it off, and blamed it on an electrical fault, but from there, things got much worse.
One night, they had kept some pub regulars and bar staff behind to help put up all the Xmas decorations. They finished the job at 3am, and went off to bed. The very next morning, the pub cleaners arrived at 8am and found that all of these decorations had been taken down, put away neatly in the same boxes they had came out of, and then stacked up in the middle of the pub floor!!
Another night, my dad and a senior barmaid, thought they had cleared the pub of all the customers, when they noticed two people sat at a table across the room. Dad shouted over to them to "drink up", but they just ignored him. Then, just as he was about to go over to the table He - AND the barmaid - watched in horror as the two people walked towards them, and then literally right THROUGH them, disappearing through the old bricked up exit door just behind them.(Which kind of condones the 'timeslip' theory of ghosts I suppose). The senior barmaid was nonplussed at this. She apparently 'knew' the couple as Jack and Barbara, married pensioners who had died 30 years before in a car accident.
The Worst was still to come though...
Just after Christmas, dad and mum, and our FOUR dogs, (Hey, this was a pub in a very violent area of town!!) were sat in the upstairs lounge at about 1am. They were watching a film, when they suddenly heard approaching footsteps. These steps were coming from the stairs and landing directly outside the lounge. Now, my dad, was a giant of a man, and had no fear at all, but this really freaked him out. He told me that although the steps were seemingly coming up the stairs the reaction of the dogs made him realise that this was no human intruder. He said that The dogs, simply showed no reaction at all to the steps, as if they could not hear them! Dad and mum could definitely hear them though, getting louder and nearer, until they stopped right outside the lounge door. At that point, a large 'glow' filtered through the door and into the lounge. This was the point when my dad said he just froze solid. "Time stood still". The whole room was in total deathly silence, and then from somewhere in the room they heard a disembodied child's voice "Hello, I'm Charlotte". At this point my mum fainted, and dad's knee jerk reaction was to respond with "I'm Alex". But the point was already made and 'Charlotte' had gone, literally, in the blink of an eye. Meanwhile, the dogs, had not noticed or sensed anything at all. They just lay there next to the fire totally oblivious. (So much for animals being able to sense spirits!?!)
It was at that point that my parents decided to call in the local priest to do a clearance - more dramatically known as an 'exorcism'.
It didn't work, and after my dad was violently shoved into one of the beer tanks in the cellar, whilst nobody else was in the whole building, they decided to upsticks and leave.
Looking into the history of the building later,they found that a previous landlord from just 10 years before, had been decapitated in the cellar by an exploding beer barrel. Which would sure explain a few things, but, they never got to the bottom of the 'Charlotte' story. Also, the building to the left of the pub in the picture below, was an old morgue. Don't suppose that would have helped really.
From that time, my own belief in ghosts has been total, however, I also understand that no matter how many tales like this are told, people will never believe until they experience something themselves. And that's fair comment.
Either way, there has been no artistic licence used here, and ALL of the above is true. Make of it what you will.
