Railway Ghosts

escargot said:
A poor excuse.
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Indeed.

But it offers me an opening for a story. Railway, definitely. Ghost? Well, who knows. Weird though.
Son (J) was marking up some wood for cutting (restoration project, preserved railway). The wood was on the bench in front of him and he was somewhat startled as the wood jolted sideways as if someone had knocked into it. He shrugged it off, thinking maybe he had knocked it himself. Shortly after, someone knocked into his shoulder, jogging him. He protested but turned to see his mate was the other end of the workshop, working, and the apprentice was in the paint shop. His mate looked up and asked what was wrong. He laughed when J told him, assuming it was a joke.

A while later J had gone into the carriage bay to fetch something and came back into the workshop via the paint shop. He was greeted with the accusation that he was 'messing about'. His mate had been at a bench marking up a bit of wood when he was shoved in the back. He assumed it was J, even though J was coming through the door some distance away from him. There was no-one else around. Mate was a bit unnerved, but they shrugged it off and kept on working.

It did cross their mind that it might have been a personage who had died not too long ago and whose ashes had been scattered at the railway, in spite of his threat to come back and haunt them all if that happened. He was well-loved and taught the two lads most of what they know about restoration.

This personage would almost certainly have been on that canal holiday with Brian and would have had an opinion about Brian's story.
 
Paul_Exeter said:
Probably not Kings Sutton as there is not a path from the canal to the station and neither is there a road bridge across the tracks with the station in view:

View attachment 86750

Not Heyford station either, as the canal and pub are both on the same side as so no need to cross a bridge. 2-0 to Brian at the moment...!
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Excellent research. I wouldn't know. I didn't even know there was such a place as Aynho. But I have heard stories about those trips and I would not assume sobriety, even on the way to the pub.
 
Mercy Chaney said:
Excellent research. I wouldn't know. I didn't even know there was such a place as Aynho. But I have heard stories about those trips and I would not assume sobriety, even on the way to the pub.
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true, but I am always ready to defend those who have Fortean experiences after a tipple, it takes huge amount of alcohol to induce hallucinations and having a few beers doesn't make you see things that aren't there.
 
Paul_Exeter said:
true, but I am always ready to defend those who have Fortean experiences after a tipple, it takes huge amount of alcohol to induce hallucinations and having a few beers doesn't make you see things that aren't there.
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Absolutely, but it can make you forget the order things happen in and I believe this event happened a very long time ago.

I will have to see if my son can rustle up someone, other than Brian, who was there, one of the friends who weren't interested at the time.
 
Yesterday on a railway station I called a lift.
As it came up I could hear women talking and laughing excitedly, like a hen party group who'd just met up.

It arrived and I stepped aside to let the Hens out but - nothing. Nobody was there.
I thought there must be a noisy group on the platform below but that wasn't the case either as it was quiet.

This is a place I know well and I'm familiar with the ambient noises. I'd be able to tell if the sounds came from elsewhere than the lift.

Straight afterwards I was too busy to investigate further and put it down to a squeaky lift mechanism.

Next time I'm along there I'll listen hard for my spectral Hens. :nods:
 
Paul_Exeter said:
true, but I am always ready to defend those who have Fortean experiences after a tipple, it takes huge amount of alcohol to induce hallucinations and having a few beers doesn't make you see things that aren't there.
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Well, the boy came up with a witness (there are not many left, sadly).

Barry was on that particular trip with Brian. He remembers the walk to the pub and Brian leaning over the bridge parapet to, as Barry put it delicately, 'make room for more beer'. He does not recall Brian drawing anyone's attention to anything strange and frankly is surprised Brian can remember anything about that trip at all.

Make of that what you will.
 
Mercy Chaney said:
Well, the boy came up with a witness (there are not many left, sadly).

Barry was on that particular trip with Brian. He remembers the walk to the pub and Brian leaning over the bridge parapet to, as Barry put it delicately, 'make room for more beer'. He does not recall Brian drawing anyone's attention to anything strange and frankly is surprised Brian can remember anything about that trip at all.

Make of that what you will.
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So, the quality of the anecdote leans toward the testicular? :thought:
 
Mercy Chaney said:
Who knows? On that trip I suspect all memories and perceptions were impaired/enhanced by 'real ale'.

Maybe I can get the boy to speak to the man himself if he is around any time.
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I dunno; seeing a futuristic railway station while drunk enough to chuck up over a bridge parapet into a canal? Case closed. :wink2:
 
Mercy Chaney said:
Well, the boy came up with a witness (there are not many left, sadly).

Barry was on that particular trip with Brian. He remembers the walk to the pub and Brian leaning over the bridge parapet to, as Barry put it delicately, 'make room for more beer'. He does not recall Brian drawing anyone's attention to anything strange and frankly is surprised Brian can remember anything about that trip at all.

Make of that what you will.
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But was there a time-slip commuter on the platform below who got plastered with Brian's inter-dimensional :puke2:?
 
Hoping this is legible.

FB_IMG_1740150076109.jpg
 
escargot said:
Hoping this is legible.

View attachment 87371
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Think we discussed this on here before? But a great find nonetheless.

However, Okehampton station did not have regular train service in the 1990s

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Okehampton_railway_station

The station building was neglected for 25 years with just freight trains running before thankfully the council bought it in 1997 and it was refurbished and then the Sunday service to Exeter was introduced during the summer months. But there were no railway staff on the station and it is still unmanned today now there is an hourly service. So no porters or platform staff, just the driver and guard of the train. In the 1990s a trainspotter would have got bored pretty quickly as there was just one freight train a day at best, so I wonder if he meant the 60s?
 
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A couple of 'railway ghost' experiences from the Boy (my son). He has worked on the 'big railway for 20 years and as a volunteer on a preserved railway for even longer. He has worked at various stations in the Thames Valley area .

He and a group were returning from an evening at the pub and walking back down 'on site' (preserved steam railway) when the boy decided he 'needed a slash' so headed into the locomotive shed rather than straight down the track. It was dark but there are security lights so visibility wasn't bad. There was a lad up on one of the locos, polishing the brass safety valve. Not someone the boy recognised but he greeted him and suggested that the lad might want to head on down to the riding van for a brew when he was done. The Boy headed on down to the back of the shed where the 'facilities' were, then when he was done joined the others in the riding van. He mentioned the 'new lad' and no-one was aware of anyone else who was on site that weekend, particularly no-one new.

It could have been a 'person', but the boy had never seen him before and has never seen him since and it was an odd time of night (after midnight) for even a keen young volunteer to be polishing a loco.

(I think I will tell the second story in a separate post to make it a quicker read).
 
The second story - which happened before the previous tale, but this one has an added dimension.

The Boy worked the platform at a large station where trains were stabled overnight and staff worked a night shift. The story he told me at the time and occasionally since was that he was nights and had taken himself down to the end of the platform for a sit down. About 2am the first driver of the morning came along, heading to the trains. The boy greeted him with a cheery 'Morning, Drive' and he thinks the driver nodded an acknowledgement. The Boy was a bit surprised that the driver, whom he described as an 'old boy', wasn't wearing the current company uniform, but there were enough older drivers who were a bit eccentric in their adherence to uniform so he didn't bother too much about it.

A short while later, a second driver came by. The Boy greeted him and asked if there were two of them on first this morning. The second driver insisted that he was the only driver rostered on at that time. The Boy mentioned the previous driver and was greeted by puzzlement.

He later learnt from the second driver that there had been no-one else down the yard that morning when he went to fetch his train.

I asked the Boy about the incident recently and I was startled to notice that certain folkloric elements had crept in to his narrative. Now he told me that when he described this driver to the second man he was... you guessed it... told it sounded like old so-and-so who had died a few weeks ago in retirement...

Interesting that he seems to have begun to embellish his tale. A bit disappointing, too, actually. I think it demonstrates how stories do get altered in the retelling.
 
Mercy Chaney said:
A couple of 'railway ghost' experiences from the Boy (my son). He has worked on the 'big railway for 20 years and as a volunteer on a preserved railway for even longer. He has worked at various stations in the Thames Valley area .

He and a group were returning from an evening at the pub and walking back down 'on site' (preserved steam railway) when the boy decided he 'needed a slash' so headed into the locomotive shed rather than straight down the track. It was dark but there are security lights so visibility wasn't bad. There was a lad up on one of the locos, polishing the brass safety valve. Not someone the boy recognised but he greeted him and suggested that the lad might want to head on down to the riding van for a brew when he was done. The Boy headed on down to the back of the shed where the 'facilities' were, then when he was done joined the others in the riding van. He mentioned the 'new lad' and no-one was aware of anyone else who was on site that weekend, particularly no-one new.

It could have been a 'person', but the boy had never seen him before and has never seen him since and it was an odd time of night (after midnight) for even a keen young volunteer to be polishing a loco.

(I think I will tell the second story in a separate post to make it a quicker read).
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Do you know if the lad up on the engine acknowledged him at all?
 
Mercy Chaney said:
I recall that he did not.

I could ask the Boy this evening when I see him, but I am a little cautious of 'embellishment' to the story in the retelling now. In his defence, both incidents happened some years back now, especially the second.
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Could be embellishment or could be incorporating feedback from others. For example, if I am a cleaner in a big house and see someone walk through a wall then later discuss it with the staff and someone suggests it was the ghost of old footman and from my perspective that makes sense then it becomes part of my sighting
 
Paul_Exeter said:
Could be embellishment or could be incorporating feedback from others. For example, if I am a cleaner in a big house and see someone walk through a wall then later discuss it with the staff then someone may suggest it was the ghost of old footman and from my perspective that makes sense.
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Probably to do with expectations of the 'audience' as well. The 'shivers down the spine' reveal is desired.
 
escargot said:
Not this exact article though?
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This thread 12 Oct 2024 #673:

Not sure about these, not least because the author isn't identified:

In search of the phantom porter still protecting haunted railway​

During the course of my research into the Okehampton area, ahead of my Ghost Walk, I came across a story suggesting that the railway station there is haunted by the spirit of an old train driver, known as Sam. Having gone from being fully in use to a tourist attraction to being fully in use again, the station has gone through some turbulent times of uncertainty. Back in the late 90s, this state of affairs seemed to be felt quite keenly by its resident ghost, for he started to make his presence felt, moving things around, making noises, and generally making a nuisance of himself. This was taken as a sign that he didn’t approve of all the stress that the staff around him were suffering from and that he was coming out in sympathy with them. Once things were sorted out, and everyone was happy again, Sam seemed to settle down too.

At the recent meeting I held at The London Inn in Okehampton, where around 60 people turned up, designed as a way for me to learn about people’s local experiences, a gentleman stood up and shared his story. Being an avid train buff, he had spent a lot of time at the railway station, and once, whilst standing on the platform, he saw a man walk out of the office, wearing the livery of a porter, a livery belonging to a company that he knew had operated there many years previously, but not now. The “porter” walked to the edge of the platform and disappeared...hearing this, reminded me of the story of Sam, so I asked if it could have been him that he’d seen. The gentleman thought for a moment and concluded that it possibly was, as the livery for porters and drivers was the same back then, and the sighting was around the late 90s when Sam was most active. So we have a positive sighting of a phantom train driver!

And:

My good friend, Melissa, who owns The Whistlestop Cafe on Teignmouth railway station and when she used to come to our meetings, she would always tell us how active the place was. Furniture would often be moved around, in a tidy way, money would be left for her if she was ever short for making a bill payment, and she felt blessed that the place seemed to be looking out for her. There is even an annual sighting of a man, running through the cafe, on the same day, at the same time, to reach the platform, where he promptly disappears...obviously he never does quite catch his train!
And:

The tunnel itself, is about half a mile long, standing on the Primrose Line, one of Dr Beeching’s victims from his closures of the 1960s, and the owners named it Spooky World, as a feature of the theme park, hanging black plastic from the ceiling to add to the atmosphere.

There’s a story attached to the tunnel that eventually reached me, concerning a young boy visiting the attraction with his parents. They had walked the full length of the tunnel and were making their way back when the little lad decided to run on ahead. Just as he was nearing the mouth of the tunnel, he was approached by the figure of a little boy walking out of the wall. Shocked but not frightened, the lad listened as the spirit boy warned him about running on the railway line.

“Otherwise you will end up like me!” he said, before turning and disappearing back into the wall. Catching up with their son, the parents were puzzled as to who he had been talking to, having seen someone standing by him, but they hadn’t seen where they had come from, or where they had gone. The lad told them about the encounter and what was said, even giving them an exact description of what the spirit boy was wearing. Asking him to draw what he had seen, he drew a flat cap, shorts held up with braces, over a grubby shirt, and a battered old pair of boots.

https://www.torbayweekly.co.uk/gall...-porter-still-protecting-haunted-railway.html
 

Like this one:​

Sean Smith​

1d ·

The Wessex route - I worked near steveton and Overton on nights installing the safe cess walkways in the 90’s through the cutting is one of the most spookiest places I have worked, there were four of us when we heard what we thought was a P-Way gang working on the track in front of us, but we were the only work site in the area no one else between us and Basingstoke, a few night later we heard them again this time we shone our spot lights in the direction of the sounds and investigated where the sounds were coming from but saw nothing or no one, having spoke to local older P-way gang members they experienced similar noises and it’s believed we heard a Victorian p-way gang or early 1900’s P-way gang

https://www.facebook.com/groups/553068361877808/?locale=en_GB
 
'...there were four of us when we heard what we thought was a P-Way gang working on the track in front of us, but we were the only work site in the area no one else between us and Basingstoke, a few night later we heard them again this time we shone our spot lights in the direction of the sounds and investigated where the sounds were coming from but saw nothing or no one'

A post of mine, below, from a year ago that might be relevant. It's noticeable to me that the witnesses didn't see any ghosts but only heard noises and saw sparks & the like. Maybe some of these sightings are 'replays' rather than actual hauntings?:

'At a different factory, workmen have refused to work or stay overnight after reporting noises such as shouting and hammering, and seeing contemporaneous sparks in darkness; that area was once a quarry. In Winter, my dad and his boss arrived to open up the factory and found the workmen had gone to sleep in their vans because they would no longer stay in the unit at night despite it being much more prepared, warmer, and comfortable indoors.'
 
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Steven said:
'...there were four of us when we heard what we thought was a P-Way gang working on the track in front of us, but we were the only work site in the area no one else between us and Basingstoke, a few night later we heard them again this time we shone our spot lights in the direction of the sounds and investigated where the sounds were coming from but saw nothing or no one'

A post of mine, below, from a year ago that might be relevant. It's noticeable to me that the witnesses didn't see any ghosts but only heard noises and saw sparks & the like. Maybe some of these sightings are 'replays' rather than actual hauntings?:

'At a different factory, workmen have refused to work or stay overnight after reporting noises such as shouting and hammering, and seeing contemporaneous sparks in darkness; that area was once a quarry. In Winter, my dad and his boss arrived to open up the factory and found the workmen had gone to sleep in their vans because they would no longer stay in the unit at night despite it being much more prepared, warmer, and comfortable indoors.'
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Time Slip Echo's ?
 
Paul_Exeter said:
Do you know if the lad up on the engine acknowledged him at all?
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The boy was down at the weekend so we had a chat about his sighting. He can't be recall for certain that the lad on the engine acknowledged him but thinks he may have done. He didn't feel that he had been ignored.

What was interesting was that we were discussing the sighting of the lad and the loco regarding their relative positions. The boy was on 1 road (where the offices, workshops and toilets are) and the loco the lad was working on was on 2 road. As he was telling me this the boy literally stopped in his tracks as it struck him that, thinking about it, the lad was on a loco with the smoke chute above him. There is no smoke chute above 2 road. It came down in the 1960s and it has never been reinstated. It is where the static locos stand so is not required.

This is an odd detail and may push the incident into the category of 'time slip' , which the boy had not considered.
 
Mercy Chaney said:
The boy was down at the weekend so we had a chat about his sighting. He can't be recall for certain that the lad on the engine acknowledged him but thinks he may have done. He didn't feel that he had been ignored.

What was interesting was that we were discussing the sighting of the lad and the loco regarding their relative positions. The boy was on 1 road (where the offices, workshops and toilets are) and the loco the lad was working on was on 2 road. As he was telling me this the boy literally stopped in his tracks as it struck him that, thinking about it, the lad was on a loco with the smoke chute above him. There is no smoke chute above 2 road. It came down in the 1960s and it has never been reinstated. It is where the static locos stand so is not required.

This is an odd detail and may push the incident into the category of 'time slip' , which the boy had not considered.
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A smoke chute:

smoke.jpg


https://tanfield-railway.blogspot.com/2023/03/sunday-stuff.html
 
I often find myself wondering what it would be like to live in a house built on a closed railway line, knowing that the trains and people used to pass through. I can't help but feel there must be some sense of place memory and found this account. Posted on Reddit and from the USA it would seem. The other posts from this individual are pretty ordinary and so lends it some credence:


Go to Paranormal
r/Paranormal•5 yr. ago
Belgrifex


I just experienced a ghost train​

Encounter
So this happened a few minutes ago; I'm sitting in my living room watching youtube when I hear a deafening rumbling to my right, like it's all that I can hear. I look over and right as I do I can see a legit steam train rolling through my dining room accompanied with the sound of a familiar "Cuh Cung Cuh Cung" that trains make when passing. It lasted about 3 seconds and the train was not fully clear, like a giant black outline, but I could still see it there. My house was built on the site of the train station for a town that burnt down during the early 1900s and before that the land was a plantation. This is not the first time unexplainable things have happened, but this has been the largest and most unexplainable that i've experienced in my life.
Edit- My cat also ran over to where the "Train" was and looked very startled and confused so I know it wasn't just me experiencing this.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Paranormal/comments/ehakut
 
Oh, and another:


Yes! Have I got a story for you! When I was a kid, around 10 or 11, we lived in the Texas Panhandle way, way, out in the country. Very small town of less than 200. A train used to run in that area many, many years prior but the line had been discontinued. Tracks and everything had been taken up. Just the bare ground remained. You could definitely tell where the tracks had lain. Anyway, my friend and I took our bikes and headed down these "tracks" on our way down to the creek to fish. Now this is several miles out in the country. On our way back, we were pushing our bikes back along the "tracks"/path and way off in the distance, behind us, we hear a train whistle. Now the nearest train tracks are around 50 miles away so imagine our surprise to hear a train whistle. Kind of an old timey one at that. So we shrug it off and continue pushing our bikes. Couple minutes later we hear it again only this time it's closer. We look at each other and go "uh..." and start pushing our bikes faster. The whistle blares again, closer and now we can hear the faint rumble of tracks and that chuga chuga sound. We start freaking and are now running with our bikes. The sound gets closer and closer and I swear is right behind us! We jumped to the side, leaving our bikes and a huge gust of wind whips past us and we hear, I swear to this day, a train rush past us. We freaked more and ran all the way back home. I got my ass tore up for leaving my bike way out in the country and of course my dad didn't believe my Ghost Train story, but I know what I heard and felt that day. It was a ghost train.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Paranormal/comments/3sg6ma

Check out the comments for a ghost bus and a ghost hearse
 
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