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Ghosts Of The West Midlands & Roundabouts - Any Stories?

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Anonymous

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Hiya all,

I know I've posted on this same topic previously, but surely there are a few more stories out there falling within this general area? I'm interested in anything from the aforementioned Shire, as well as South Staffordshire, North Warwickshire, East Shropshire, etc.

I'm particularly interested in stuff that hasn't been publicised previously?

Regards to all,

Nick
West Midlands Ghost Club
www.cyberpunks.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk
 
Back in the late 80’s the University of Warwick had some modern halls of residence at a place called Gibbet Hill - probably still does. At that time these were allegedly the source of several quite frightening experiences, a couple of which happened to people I knew - people with no interest in the supernatural and not, in my judgement, prone to making things up.

From what I can recall there were different types of happenings reported to be coming from the residences but the one I specifically remember was the sound of hysterical sobbing which couldn’t be traced and seemed to move about as people tried to find the source of the noise.

The story I heard (from a lecturer and from one of the cleaners rather than from another student) was that the residences were built on the site of older buildings, one of which had been used to lay out the bodies of those executed on the site after they had been cut down. I’m not sure about this because my understanding is that the gibbet after which the area was named would have held the body of the executed until it literally fell apart so there would have been nothing left to lay out. However maybe different forms of execution took place on the hill or maybe, if the stories are true, the sobbing comes from those who mourned their loved ones as they swung about in the breeze and provided something for the birds to peck at.

Being the site of a large campus the obvious immediate conclusion is that the phenomena were the result of oh-so-funny student shenanigans but I met people who were genuinely disturbed and I got the feeling that there was more to this. Might be worth a bit of a nosey around.
 
Duffy, I notice on your site the report of a "disproportionate, fast moving figure - said to exude 'evil' presence - witnessed by four friends in March 1999” from the Hednesford Road area of Walsall which might be kind of relevant to a query I posted back in late 2003. Any chance you have any more information on this story and if you do could you post it here.
 
:bump:

Dunno if there are any other Black Country spookiness threads so I'll put this'ere.

I spotted it on Facebook, not a Midlands or ghost-themed page, and was struck by the how precisely the locations are described.

This is a Facebook comment, most likely on a phone, so the format and punctuation aren't perfect.
I have added the headings.

Wolverhampton -

when at school in an old Victorian Catholic school( st Mary and johns school snow hill Wolverhampton it’s still there and if you look the towers still there) me and 2 of my mates decided to skive off so we climbed a tower which was out of bounds so we knew we wouldn’t get caught, at the top of the tower there was a door on to the tower roof it was locked and barred we all saw something go through the door think it was a woman’s shape but we all saw it,

Stourbridge -

the other time was about 02:00 at night I had stopped to do some paper work ( Sandy lane Stourbridge at the side of south road crematorium) and I clearly saw some thing walking on the footway as it got nearer it was a human form in a leather biker jacket and jeans no distinctive person as it went past my van it just disappeared

I'm off to look up the locations on Google Earth.
 
Surely we have some Black Country Forteans to check this out! :)
 
I've found that the best way to research local legends and ghost stories (other than going to the library to find out if they have a folklore etc. folder) is to put out appeals on facebook in groups dedicated to those towns and areas.

Getting people to elaborate beyond a one sentence summary... that's much harder.
 
For West Midlands based stories a person could do a lot worse than checking out Andy Gilbert's, Credible Witness: Paranormal Police Stories. There are two volumes and - being where he served as a copper - the focus is very much (although I don't recall exclusively) on this region.

Here's a consolidation of my book recommendation on the Ghosts In The Line Of Duty: Police / Policemen / Cops thread from a couple of years ago:

This thread has reminded me of a book that's been sitting on my 'Mmm, possibly' Kindle wishlist for a while: Credible Witness: Paranormal Police Stories by Andy Gilbert. As I was off for one of my very rare doctors appointments this morning, knew I'd probably be sitting around for a while, and it's cheap as chips up the Amazon, I thought I'd indulge.

I've only dipped into some of the witness acounts, but so far, this actually looks quite good. Police stories going back to the 1950's, possibly weighted towards the West Midlands by the look of it (maybe that's where the author - a peeler himself - was based).

Like many books of this kind, the stories I've read leave you wishing there was just a little bit more, but are still satisfying, and have the ring of genuine experience about them.

There is a lot of dross in the allegedly true ghost story genre - a fact I'm sure everybody here is already aware of - but this looks like a good one so far.

...

Finished this in a couple of gulps yesterday. It's not long (unfortunately), but the stories are really rather good, well written, and all (mmm, apart from maybe one) have the immediate ring of real experience.

The book is well organised, being split into sections: Foot Patrol; Mobile Patrol; Incidents Attended etc. I found the Haunted Stations chapter particularly atmospheric - you get a real sense of place, and what it was like to be alone overnight in one of those old Victorian/Edwardian blocks.

Gets a thumbs up from me. It's only around 95 pages long - I'm hoping it'll be an ongoing project for Mr Gilbert.
Click to expand...
 
Spookdaddy said:
For West Midlands based stories a person could do a lot worse than checking out Andy Gilbert's, Credible Witness: Paranormal Police Stories. There are two volumes and - being where he served as a copper - the focus is very much (although I don't recall exclusively) on this region.

Here's a consolidation of my book recommendation on the Ghosts In The Line Of Duty: Police / Policemen / Cops thread from a couple of years ago:
Click to expand...
Heard Andy Gilbert on a Mysteries & Monsters podcast during the week (originally went out in 2019 I think) and this has reminded me to purchase his first book. All profits go to charity and it was just £2.95 on Kindle so go and treat yourselves :)
 
More Midlands spookiness from 2001, featuring Vic Tandy.
Also the famous Wem Town Hall 'ghost' photo, haunted Tamworth Castle etc.

 
''Bones – the Mystery of Plympton Cottage'', written by award winning investigative reporter Nic Outterside.
Strange goings on in a North Shropshire town. And the house in question is also right next to a roundabout.
 

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