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Canal Ghosts & Water-Wights By Nick Ford (2023)

SimonBurchell said:
I've always found the boat people to be a funny crowd - I've hiked many miles of towpath, and will generally say hello to everyone I meet - but the boat people seem to be a closed community, some will respond to my greeting in a fairly guarded way, many will just turn their backs so they don't have to greet me, or just ignore me. Maybe I just have that kind of face :hahazebs:. As always, there are exceptions.
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I've met plenty of both types- ones who speak and ones who don't.
Very few 'genuine' ones though. I mean the sort that are 'proper' boaters through and through.

And then there's the ignorant ones who just let their dog roam free, so when I walk past with my dog on a lead, I have to wrestle with her as she (understandably) tells the other dog to p**s off.
 
I've only two experiences of canal travel.
The first was a very entertaining weekend with two friends with a weekend on their parents narrow boat. Oxfordshire somewhere ... it was a long time ago. I recall running a Call of Cthulhu game scenario - based on an English canal boat journey!
The second was with my (then) partner and another couple. It started from Chelmsford and went all the way to Maldon along the Blackwater. Highly enjoyable but, sadly, no Fortean experience. We did find a boarded up and deserted house nearby, with its own landing stage.
 
escargot said:
:nods: His Red for Danger: The Classic History Of British Railway Disasters is one of my favourites.
Dunno how many copies I've owned/lost/lent out; not returned.
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I get annoyed that when they issue updated editions they omit parts of the earlier versions that were written by the man himself. .

Was apparently not the easiest guy to get on with but in my top ten of people I'd have loved to have a chat with. He might be worth having a topic of his own. He was certainly open to the idea of ghosts and spirits despite being an engineer.
 
escargot said:
There're couple of places where Techy's had repeated bike mechanical failures.

One is the back of Reaseheath Agricultural College, most notably during lambing when visitors are being shepherded heh across the road and we have to dodge the jaywalkers.

It's Lambing time again, which I mentioned to Techy just before his pedal crank decided to separate from the frame.

What did he expect? :dunno:
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Were there any lambs around when your forks got Uri-Gellered?

I find there are many logical explanations for supposedly supernatural apparitions.
For example this:
upset Yorkie.png
is just an aggravated Yorkshire Terrier.
 
Fanari_Lloyd said:
I’d love to hear of anyone’s experiences in/on canals and waterways that are not covered by the book, please!

Always wanted to go on canal boats. I remember watching that Hoseasons ad back in the 70’s? Never did get to go, but I know a couple of people who’ve lived on canal boats.

And canals and waterways do have a definite atmosphere. On a lovely summer evening they’re so inviting, on a misty, damp autumn day it’s very different.
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Not paranormal but when I worked at the Pike and Eel on the river at Needingworth there was a chap who was moored up most of the year at the adjacent marina and who had adopted a crow. It used to sit on his shoulder and would come in the pub with him and enjoyed crisps. Apparently he had found it in a carpark as an orphaned fledgling.

But back to ghosts, here is quite an extraordinary tale from when the navvies were constructing the Great Western Canal at Sampford Peverall:

"Just over 200 years ago a quiet corner of Devon became the scene of a bloody rampage that left one man dead, another holding a gun and dozens of people claiming they had seen a ghost. The Sampford Peverell ghost riot, or Navvies' Riot, is one of Devon's strangest true crime dramas."

https://www.devonlive.com/news/devon-news/crazy-day-mob-300-attacked-8879147
 
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Paul_Exeter said:
Not paranormal but when I worked at the Pike and Eel on the river at Needingworth there was a chap who was moored up most of the year at the adjacent marina and who had adopted a crow. It used to sit on his shoulder and would come in the pub with him and enjoyed crisps. Apparently he had found it in a carpark as an orphaned fledgling.

But back to ghosts, here is quite an extraordinary tale from when the navvies were constructing the Great Western Canal at Sampford Peverall:

"Just over 200 years ago a quiet corner of Devon became the scene of a bloody rampage that left one man dead, another holding a gun and dozens of people claiming they had seen a ghost. The Sampford Peverell ghost riot, or Navvies' Riot, is one of Devon's strangest true crime dramas."

https://www.devonlive.com/news/devon-news/crazy-day-mob-300-attacked-8879147
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Anyone who tried to take on 300 Navvies musn't have been all there.
 
I'm really enjoying this book. It's kind of a canal ghost index. I have an awareness of two not mentioned, one at Whixall Moss on what is now the Llangollen canal, and one at Husbands Bosworth tunnel on the 'old Grand Union'. I haven't the details to hand, sadly.
 
RaM said:
Anything in it about the Leeds Liverpool were it passes behind Rufford Old Hall ?
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Escet, his partner and I wlll soon be visiting Rufford Old Hall. :)
I will of course be wringing all available juicy spookiness out of the hapless staff. A full report will follow. :bthumbup:
 
Cochise said:
I'm really enjoying this book. It's kind of a canal ghost index. I have an awareness of two not mentioned, one at Whixall Moss on what is now the Llangollen canal, and one at Husbands Bosworth tunnel on the 'old Grand Union'. I haven't the details to hand, sadly.
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If you tell the author he might put it into a subsequent edition. :)

I tried contacting him to brag about the bent forks at the Marina but couldn't track him down.
 
Fanari_Lloyd said:
They may say they don’t have a ghost but they have something going on!
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The staff were genuinely puzzled about the fork-bending. We'll be back over there at weekend so will make further enquiries.

They like us there - we roll up, order, eat, drink, tip generously, leave in short order - and will tell us all.
 
escargot said:
Where we live there are mainly hired boats so we see lots of enthusiastic day trippers and holidaymakers. They are WELL up for a wave. :)

We sometimes take a squash break at a lock, greet the boaters, see them into the lock and then pedal off to another lock further along. They scratch their heads a bit when we're already there. :chuckle:
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That reminds me of this, which I'm sure some among us will recognise.

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escargot said:
Fabulous. My favourite book ever.

Not just because it's funny, but for the life lessons it taught me.

One of which, incidentally, was to spot yarns. When Jerome's characters go into careful detail without being asked to, they're always lying.
Holds true today.
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They are fairly watertight and rarely sink.
That's good enough for me.
 
escargot said:
I tried contacting him to brag about the bent forks at the Marina but couldn't track him down.
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I could not find an obvious means of contact either. Although I did turn up the picture of him in an admirable hat.

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And also a brief review here, which has me interested in another of the books mentioned—the one about corpseways.

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Cochise said:
I'm really enjoying this book. It's kind of a canal ghost index. I have an awareness of two not mentioned, one at Whixall Moss on what is now the Llangollen canal, and one at Husbands Bosworth tunnel on the 'old Grand Union'. I haven't the details to hand, sadly.
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I've not heard of anything related to Whixall, not canal-wise anyway.
I'll ask around.

They did build a railway through there that everyone said would sink, but it lasted over a hundred years without any problems.
It was built on heather, wooden faggots and sand and 'floated' on the peat.
 
escargot said:
Yup I found that easily enough but it only offers an email address for general inquiries.
.
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There is a charity that it appears he works for as well, so maybe via them?
Failing that, I'll nip down to Ludlow and bang on his door.
 
There appears to be an earlier compendium of canal-based ghost stories.

==========================================================================

Shadows on the Water: The Haunted Canals And Waterways Of Britain​

Paperback – 12 Jan. 2010​

by Allan Scott-Davies (Author)

71LysqZGM6L._SL1500_.jpg s-l1600-129.jpg

This fascinating volume takes a look at some of the strange and unexplained hauntings reported across Britain's canal and waterways network: echoes in dark tunnels; stone steps stained red with blood spilled long ago; ghostly footsteps accompanying barges beneath a bridge. Mixing long-established ghostly tales with first-hand accounts, Allan Scott-Davies presents a grisly collection of supernatural stories. From the screaming ghost near Market Drayton to the Roman soldier in Chester guarding the canal, the drowning man at Lapworth and the white lady of the Hatton flight, all is revealed with a map of locations and, for some of the more haunted sites, a guided tour map. This illustrated book is sure to delight lovers of the waterways and paranormal alike.

Source (slightly lacklustre reviews):
https://amzn.eu/d/6WkJo40
 
Yithian said:
There appears to be an earlier compendium of canal-based ghost stories.

==========================================================================

Shadows on the Water: The Haunted Canals And Waterways Of Britain​

Paperback – 12 Jan. 2010​

by Allan Scott-Davies (Author)

View attachment 74991 View attachment 74992

This fascinating volume takes a look at some of the strange and unexplained hauntings reported across Britain's canal and waterways network: echoes in dark tunnels; stone steps stained red with blood spilled long ago; ghostly footsteps accompanying barges beneath a bridge. Mixing long-established ghostly tales with first-hand accounts, Allan Scott-Davies presents a grisly collection of supernatural stories. From the screaming ghost near Market Drayton to the Roman soldier in Chester guarding the canal, the drowning man at Lapworth and the white lady of the Hatton flight, all is revealed with a map of locations and, for some of the more haunted sites, a guided tour map. This illustrated book is sure to delight lovers of the waterways and paranormal alike.

Source (slightly lacklustre reviews):
https://amzn.eu/d/6WkJo40
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I have that one... it could've been better.
 
Floyd1 said:
There is a charity that it appears he works for as well, so maybe via them?
Failing that, I'll nip down to Ludlow and bang on his door.
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Get over there.
 
The whole interview is magic, but the last few minutes of REEL 3 tell of her personal experience of a haunting at Napton Locks on the Oxford Canal in 1945:

Skyrme, Helen Mary (Oral history)​

British civilian living in Shanghai, China, 1934-1939 and GB, 1939-1945 canal worker in GB, 1945

REEL 3 Continues: pay; working conditions; relationship with colleagues; male and female workers in factories. Recollections of period working on Canals, 1945: joining Canals; clothing and kit; arrival at Tyseley Docks, Birmingham; primitive living conditions on board ship; story of getting ropes caught in blades; carrying loads of coal and aluminium; memories of trainer, Daphne French; living conditions; first experience of opening locks; using windlass; story of haunted lock.

Audio Interview Here:
https://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/80022268

[See next post for transcription]
 
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