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Daylight Apparitions

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OldTimeRadio

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I'm unable to find a thread on Daylight Apparitions, and thought it would be nice to have a repository for such reports.

The two most famous examples, alas, are fictional - Peter Quint and Miss Jessel from Henry James' THE TURN OF THE SCREW.

However this famous story was apparently based on a genuine haunting personally known to the Archbiship of Canterbury (Bishop Benson, the father of horror-masters E. F. and R. H. Benson) and related by him to James. It would be interesting to know if daylight ghosts figured in the original account.

There's also the 93rd Psalm, with its plea for protection from the pestilence that wastest the noonday. I've never been certain whether this refers to physical disease (which like ghosts is normally associated with the night) or with daytime fiends.

One of my favorite web postings concerns a woman here in south-west Ohio (too close! too close!) who worked the graveyard shift so slept during the early afternoon. She had her bedrooms windows covered with thick cardboard and heavy drapes so that the chamber was pitch-black even during the daylight hours. According to the witness, this attracted the attention of a leathery-winged demon.

There are shadows even at noon and always dark places inside each of us.
 
Good topic. I'm sure there must be a few spirits that walk by day. Here's one I knew.

Erben's gruesome folktales did for Bohemia what the Grimms did for Germany: scared the pants off generations of their sprogs. Among the horrid spectres featured is an evil Noonday Witch. Four of the stories were made the basis of a series of late symphonic poems by Dvorák:


From a programme note here

"The “Noonday Witch” retells the story of a frustrated mother who threatens her restless child with the wrath of the Noonday Witch. As the mother verbalizes the threat, the noonday witch appears, delivering a lethal blow to the poor child. Filled with regret, the mother loses consciousness after the ordeal, only to be revived by her husband, who at the realization of the tragedy expresses his own anguish. A dramatic transformation can be heard from the initial themes of a playful child and stern mother, to the ugly and horrid themes of the merciless Witch, to the heart-wrenching grief of the mourning parents depicted by a fortissimo roar from the orchestra." :shock:
 
JamesWhitehead said:
Good topic.
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Thanks, James. I was surprised that the topic didn't already exist here.

Erben's gruesome folktales did for Bohemia what the Grimms did for Germany: scared the pants off generations of their sprogs.
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I have to confess that I was unaware of Erben, although I knew many of the tales. But I slinked away and downloaded material on Erben before replying.
 
I suppose I just assumed that there were ghosts/ apparitions all around, all the time, and that people were only more aware of them (for whatever reason) at night... hence the greater number of sightings during the night period.
 
You're quite possibly correct, but the more common belief seems to be that many daytime spirits are extremely nasty sorts who thumb their invisible noses at the daylight.
 
OldTimeRadio said:
You're quite possibly correct, but the more common belief seems to be that many daytime spirits are extremely nasty sorts who thumb their invisible noses at the daylight.
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I like that idea!! :) It has a sort of "screw you" attitiude, and "Im gonna be bad to the bone at the most effective time of day"!!

Apparitions that rebel against the conventional rules... ;) :yeay:
 
We've all read fictional ghost stories and horror novels where the percipients sit huddled together through the night in a living room while all sorts of ghosts and ghouls and ghasts and grims hold infernal court beyond the window panes.

"If we can just make it through until dawn, we'll be okay. At least for a few hours. At least until the night comes again."

But what if the dawn comes and the ghosts are still there?
 
It certainly would have an air of the ironic about it... ;)
 
the ghost i saw (perhaps) was a mid-afternoon shade.
 
Only ghost I've ever seen was in broad daylight. It was really bright, sunlight streaming in through every window and just a very nice Saturday morning.

Have been on a few vigils at various places in the dark and never seen anything. So as far as I'm concerned, all power to the daylight ghosts!
 
Bit of a local one this....there have been reports of Mary Queen of Scots' ghost being seen outside Linlithgow Palace at around 9 in the morning , mostly in August , I believe.
 
I think I would take a report of a daytime ghost more seriously. I'm operating on the assumption that some nighttime apparitions are conjured up by the brain. After all, humans don't see well at night, and for that and possibly other reasons, we've evolved to be more attentive to possible dangers and other anomolies. The first place in the brain a potential threat affects is the amygdala, which, as I understand it, is the most primitive part and doesn't wait for all the data before shifting us into "danger" mode. If all the facts aren't in, but the brain and body are physiologically prepped to respond to danger, it's not surprising if the brain should misinterpret things.

That said, I don't dismiss all nighttime apparitions; it's just that that way of explaining them away seems like it might be less available in the case of daytime apparitions.

I know I've read accounts where people have seen things in the day that either resemble a time-slip (e.g., catching a glimpse of a Civil War battle) or look perfectly normal but later reveal themselves not to be - e.g., a person doesn't look out of place, but vanishes; a seemingly unremarkable person identifies him/herself as someone who's deceased, etc. Sometimes they sound so Hallmark-y that they're probably just nicely crafted stories, but other times, they can only go into that :wtf: category.
 
I also tend to associate daylight apparitions with days that resemble nights - that is, violent thunderstorms where the automatic streetlights switch on at noon, and days (rain or not) when the skies are so thickly overlaid by clouds that everything assumes this light grey or beige quality. Both the environs and the ghosts themselves in THE TURN OF THE SCREW seem to almost luxuriate in the latter quality. Yes, of course I realize that James' novel is fictional, but it was apparently based on reported fact, and I wish we knew more about that original report.
 
In the anecdotes told by staff at great-houses the ghosts perceived by visitors must mostly be seen during the day. Otherwise the visitors would, by and large, not be there.

In explaining these apparitions there are the factors of expectation, even if not concious, and the at best subdued lighting. There is also the possibility of non-beta or altered-beta wave states in waking. My neighbour in the manor house told me of her experience with a man whom she met in the passage and he told her that he was home from the sea. She thought that he had somehow become separated from a pony treking party and tried to direct him to the stables. At this point he disappeared. I don't think it likely that she was in a state of expectation but that couldn't be ruled out.
 
All the 'ghosts' that I've seen have been in broad daylight. :D

I say 'ghosts' because I do keep an open mind about these things and cannot dismiss the possibility of apparitions being something other than supernatural.

If I look at someone, glance away, then look back and they're gone, with no obvious escape route, are they a ghost, or a trick of my mind? Brains are strange things. ;)

As an example, I once 'met' an acquaintance, walking towards me on the street. I greeted him, but he seemed preoccupied and did not reply. As he passed me, I thought, how rude! and then, hang on, he's dead! and turned round to look at him - but there was no-one there.

:shock:, but in a 8) way.
 
My grandmother saw a ghost in a old country lane one bright morning. She disappeared in front of her eyes.

I think daylight apparitions are quite common but not reported as often as their night-time companions.
 
Another idea about this (which has been mentioned on a thread hereabouts) is that if we see a ghost/spirit whatever in daylight, we might never know, if they look natural enough. :D

Plenty of people have reported seeing someone whom they later learned to have been dead at the time, for example, and 'crisis apparitions' often happen in daylight.
 
Another ghostly phenomena that are seen/heard in the daylight are the ghost planes of the Peak District in Derbyshire.
 
That was really interesting about Benson's father because I have always found that scene in the Turn of the Screw when the governess appears at the window one of the most frightening things i have ever read, and I prefer Benson's stories to M R James' so I would like to think that the two things are connected.

In Bennett's 'Apparitions and Haunted Houses', one of the best collections of real ghost stories, quite a lot of the spirits appear in daytime, although dusk seems to be a good time as well, and there is an old English tradition that a baby born at dusk will be able to see ghosts.
 
I always thought that the reason more ghosts are seen/reported at night is because during the day it is busier, noiser and generally produces much more sensory information to process. Whereas at night it would tend to be quiter and your brain is more likely to notice (or whatever) a ghostly presense that might normally get swamped in events of the daytime.
 
Sogna said:
That was really interesting about Benson's father....
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I think I read that in A. C. Benson's biography of R. H. Benson, the brother who converted to Roman Catholicism and became a priest. (All three brothers seem to have gotten along famously.)

Father Robert Hugh Benson wrote some dandy horror stories of his own, including a novel, THE NECROMANCERS.

A. C. wrote mostly essays, but many touch on related fields.
 
I think their father was pretty scarey in himself though I understand, didn't one of them write a note saying"I hate father," or something like that.

I think E F's The Room in the Tower has to be one of the best ghost stories ever, very psychologically revealing as well.
 
At Borley rectory, the famous sighting of the nun (by four witnesses) was in daylight.
 
Sogna said:
I think their father was pretty scarey in himself though I understand, didn't one of them write a note saying"I hate father," or something like that.
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Possibly, but I said the same thing about my own late Dad - to his face even. Kids DO that.

I think E F's The Room in the Tower has to be one of the best ghost stories ever, very psychologically revealing as well.
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"The Room in the Tower" is also one of my two or three all-time favorite horror stories, although I'd regard it as a vampire tale rather than a ghost story.

The story is obviously based on a genuine dream (or perhaps series thereof). It has that dream-logic "feel" to it.

Since it is such a favorite, I'd very much like to know what you find so "psychologically revealing" about it.
 
I think that it is the figure of the older woman, seen as a vampire, feeding on a young man, I don't read a lot of vampire stories but in all the classic representations I can think of, the victim is usually a young woman and the vampire a man. It is the concept of the woman having the power to enter the man's dreams and draw him to her, I think Benson has a real horror of that.
 
That's all very much worth considering....and I've read your post just seconds before tumbling into bed.

"The Room in the Tower" is probably the one story I've read well over a hundred times and it should trigger all sorts of resonances in connection with your message.

Thank you....i think.
 
I'm still ruminating.

It's interesting that MISTER Stone, Julia Stone's husband and Jack Stone's father, was apparently still alive at the time of the first dream of the series (when the narrator was just 16). He's introduced to Stone, Sr. (silently, of course, like everything else) in that first dream.

I wish we knew more about Jack Stone, like what has he done since his mother's death/undeath and where is he living? (Like the narrator, he seems to be only around age 30-31.) Didn't he least want his portrait?

And I've long had this feeling, based on nothing really tangible, but centered on those twin portraits, that Jack and his Mother were lovers. (Although "lovers" is here probably a totally out-of-place word - "haters" might better express it but lose the specific meaning.)

There's also the question of why the narrator disliked Jack Stone when he'd known him both slightly and briefly in the "waking" world, before the series of dreams began.

P. S. If you have a chance to see the excellent 1945 British horror-anthology film DEAD OF NIGHT, the house where the ghost story-tellers assemble is taken right from "Tower," and Benson is in fact given screen credit because of the usage,
 
I have seen Dead of Night, a really classic film, I watched it with one of my sisters when we were a lot younger, fully convinced that we could handle some old black and white film, and ended up completely terrified.

I am going to read the Room in the Tower again today I think. I can see what you mean about Jack and his mother, and you wonder if he is the conduit for the narrators dreams. There is quality of real nightmare about the whole story, I always find the idea of him being scared of the all black cards quite disturbing.
 
Sogna said:
There is quality of real nightmare about the whole story....
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Yes, I think we can be certain that some of Benson's own genuine nightmares were involved here. The episodes unfold through that walking-on-a-trampoline dream-logic which is very nearly impossible to effectively fake.

....I always find the idea of him being scared of the all black cards quite disturbing.
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Yes, I've always found those "black all over" cards as even scarier than the vampire! They strike me as sort of "super-Aces of Spades," or as we might say Aces of Spades in spades. They also effectively "mirror" the Aces "which it is running an unreasonable risk to carry in Italy."
 
A couple of other observations:

The series of dreams seems to have lasted exactly 14 years, from age 16 to 30.

Jack Stone is not only still alive, but still owns the house, has only very recently let it, and in fact lived in it up to a week or two before the story's climax.

The inference I put on this is that Stone KNEW the narrator would be arriving. And he didn't want to be anywhere in physical evidence when that happened.

Apologies for taking the thread off topic (even though I started the thread). Although "The Room in the Tower" has deservedly been one of the World's most famous horror yarns for the past 95 years, this is the very first discussion OF it that I've ever seen!
 
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