The Green Children of Woolpit

Tags

aliens, broad beans, english, English folklore, extra terrestrial, folklore, folktale, green, green children, green man, Medieval, Ralph of Coggeshall, William of Newburgh, Woolpitt

Woolpit Sigh Image by Rod Bacon via Wikimedia

The story of the Woolpit children is one which many people know. Countless articles have been written and numerous theories put forward by various people to explain what happened. There are so many ideas and interpretations that I am only going to look at a few of them briefly but in the bibliography below I have listed a number of sources that explore the topic in much more detail.

The Chroniclers

There exists two near contemporary sources which chronicle the events at Woolpit and the appearance of the green children, one of whom is Ralph of Coggeshall and the other is William of Newburgh.

Medieval Scribe c1490_1500. Harley MS4425

Ralph was appointed as the sixth abbot of the Cistercian abbey of Coggeshall in Essex and served from until he retired in 1218 due to bad health. After he stepped down from his duties he took up and continued his house’s Chronicon Anglicanum. His account contains few original documents but he seems to have taken pains to check his facts and collect anecdotal accounts from visitors to the abbey. It is possible that it was from one of these visitors that Ralph discovered the story of the green children of Woolpit[1].

The second chronicler was William of Newburgh. William was a well-respected 12th century English historian and an Augustinian Canon of Newburgh Priory. His work contains important historical accounts as well as being “a major source for stories of medieval revenants, those souls who return from the dead, including early vampire stories and the only source for the bishop-pirate Wimund”[2]. The likelihood is that he took many of his facts about the Woolpit green children directly from Ralph, although many of the details differ slightly from the earlier account[3].

The Tale of the Green Children of Woolpit

Sometime in the 12^th century  during the reign of either Stephen or Henry II, two young children, a boy and a girl were discovered by reapers. They were found either in a wolf pit by the village of Woolpit or at the edge of a field (according to which account you read). The children were frightened and thin, wore odd clothes and spoke a language incomprehensible to the villagers. The strangest thing about the children was that their skin was green in colour. The children were taken to the house of Richard de Calne[4]. For a few days the children refused to eat any food until they were given broad beans. They eagerly accepted the beans but instead of opening the pods they opened the stalks. On seeing them empty they wept. When shown how to eat the beans correctly they stopped crying. For a long time beans were all they would eat. The boy became depressed and eventually weakened and died but the girl was healthy and thrived. She was baptised Agnes, learnt English, started to eat other food and completely lost her green colouring.

According to Ralph’s account she told the villagers that they had come from a twilight underground world where the sun never shone and everyone and everything was green. One day they followed their cattle into a cave and heard the sound of bells. They walked through the cave towards the sound until they reached the wolf pits where they laid down in a daze, blinded by the sunlight. They became frightened after being woken by the reapers and tried to escape back through the cave but couldn’t find its entrance.

However, William wrote that the girl revealed that her home was called “St Martin’s Land” and that Christianity was practiced there. She said that she was unsure how they had arrived at Woolpit as they had been herding their father’s cattle when they suddenly heard a loud noise and the next minute found themselves at the village.

As Agnes got older she worked as a servant. From Ralph we learn that she was employed in the household of Richard de Colne but was “rather lose and wanton in her conduct”[5] and from William that she married a man from King’s Lynne.

What is interesting is that neither William nor Ralph made any attempt to question or explain the story of the green children of Woolpit.

Medieval Ploughing. Public Domain via Wikimedia.

Investigating the tale

A number of theories have been put forward to explain the story of Woolpit’s green children. These can be separated into two main categories, historical or folkloric. There is also an extra-terrestrial hypothesis which is held by a small number of people who believe that the children arrived through a space portal and that their green colour was due to the vegetation on their home planet.

Medieval Aliens? Alleged sighting from Nuremburg 1561. Wickiana Collection Zurich.

The historical angle

Many support the theory that the story does contain a kernel of truth in it. For instance through his research on children escaping their masters, Charles Oman sees something more sinister such as drugging and kidnapping behind the tale. There is a story retold in the area which must have been rooted in a distant memory of two children whose uncle, the children’s guardian, tried to poison them with arsenic. He was said to have left them in Thetford Forest to die so that he could claim their lands and money. The tragic folk tale “Babes in the Wood” was probably based on this story. Arsenic would have turned their skins a green colour. On the other hand Jeffrey Jerome Cohen believes the story is an allegory recalling the differences between the English and the indigenous Britons.

Effects of arsenic. Image Wellcome Institute.

Another interpretation given is that the children were part of the Flemish immigrant community which arrived in the 12^th century. The Battle of Fornham, sited in Suffolk not far from Bury St Edmunds, took place in October 1173. It was fought between Henry II and Robert de Beaumont, the 3^rd Earl of Leicester. The rebel forces contained a large contingent of about 3000 Flemish soldiers. The rebels were eventually defeated and the Flemish soldiers forced into the swamps near the battle site where most were killed by the local peasants[6]. The children after their parents’ deaths fled into Thetford Forest and lost their way. Suddenly they heard the ringing of Bury St Edmunds’ bells and making their way towards them, they entered the flint mines known as Grimes Graves emerging at the village of Woolpit. The green colour came from a diet deficiency disease such as chlorosis which would have been cured once the children ate nutritious food.

On the surface this last explanation seems plausible enough but in Brian Haughton’s excellent article he presents some problems with this particular theory[7]. Firstly he states that it was Flemish mercenaries who were killed. They were unlikely to have brought their families with them and there is no historical evidence of Flemish merchants or weavers being targeted. A second problem relates to the location of the forest and mines. The forest is 20km from Bury St Edmunds so the children could not have heard the bells and the mines themselves do not end near Woolpit. Also the distances from Fornham St Martins to Woolpit and in particular from the forest to Woolpit are considerable and a long way for the children to walk especially in their weakened state. A last point that he raises is that it is unlikely that a wealthy, educated and noble lord such as Richard de Colne would not have recognised the Flemish language even if he could not understand it himself.

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Folkloric elements

Haughton also makes an interesting statement and one which I think cuts to the heart of the matter. He states that the story of the green children has “elements of truth mixed in with mythology and folk beliefs of fairies and the afterlife”[8]. Three themes which run through the story; the caves, the beans and the colour green all have links with the supernatural.

The caves

In the past caves were perceived as mysterious and sometimes threatening. Unknown supernatural entities were thought to inhabit them and many believed that they were portals to another world either the land of the fae or to the underworld. As far back as the Greeks, caves were seen as openings to the underworld. For instance Charonium cave in Greece which emited poisonous fumes was believed to be the entrance to Hades.

Owenagcat the Cave of Cruachan. Image via Wikimedia. Davska 2005.

Closer to home there are folktales from all over the British Isles that tell of spirits or the fae dwelling in caves. It was a common belief that if a human entered these caves then they might be rewarded with new talents or skills but should be aware that time worked differently there and a moment with the fae could mean years had passed in the world of mortals.

A famous Irish myth concerns Oweynagat Cave in Roscommon. The cave also known as the ‘Cave of Cats’ was located near the ancient Connaught capital of ‘Cruachan’ and believed to have been the birthplace of Medh, the powerful queen of Connach. The cave was also used by Morrigan, the goddess of fate (in particularly doom and death in battle) who would at sunset drive her otherworldly cattle through the caves to her world[9].

It is not surprising then that if the children were believed to be supernatural and that the land the girl described was otherworldly that they would have reached what became their new home by journeying through a cave.

‘You are what you eat’

In British folklore it is often said that a human should never eat fairy food because by doing so you will bind yourself to their world and you will never leave. In fact it was common if relatives went missing for families to leave food in a basket outside their homes so that their missing kin would not have to eat the food of the faeries. Since it was strongly believed that “you are what you eat” it makes sense that faery food can change a mortal into a faery. Even in Greek mythology Persephone was bound to Hades when she ate some pomegranate seeds.

This idea was thought to work the other way round as well. There is a Scandinavian tale of an elf-maiden who ate mortal food to stay with her lover and there are various Celtic stories of sidhe eating mortal food to become human[10]. In terms of the green children, maybe the loss of their green colouring was seen as the natural result of their eating the food given to them by the villagers so changing their essential physical nature.This is definitely what Willim of Newburgh believed as he wrote in his history “by degrees, they changed their original colour, through the natural effect of our food, and became like ourselves…“. If this idea is accepted then the boy’s death could be seen as his body simply being unable to adapt.

The Sinister broad bean

Broad beans. Image via Wikimedia.

Then there are the beans. It is hard to imagine but fava beans, more commonly known as broad beans have in the past been looked on with some suspicion. To the Greeks and Romans this type of bean symbolised death. Aristotle was convinced that the beans looked like testicles, were evil and that eating them was a one way ticket to Hades! Both cultures thought the shape of the bean resembled the doorway to hell. The Romans also believed that they contained the souls of their ancestors and used to offer them to newly-married couples on their wedding day to attract the souls of male ancestors in order to ask for their help in carrying on the bloodline[11]. Even today on All Soul’s Day, Italian will make cookies in the shape of a bean and eat bean soup.

With the beans being associated with death, spirits and the supernatural it is again not surprising that they turned up in the story of the green children.

The Colour Green

Green is the colour of the forest, nature and the cycle of life. It is also associated with youth, hope and springtime as well as some negative ideas such as wildness, envy, death, sickness and the devil. Faeries and elves are often described as green-hued and wearing green coloured clothing. So when green skinned children appeared it would have been only natural for the villagers to assume they were forest sprites or some other supernatural being.

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The old and the new

Green man at Rochester Cathedral. Image by Akoliasnikoff 2008. Via Wikimedia.

Why was it so easy for the villagers and others to so accept that the children were from another world? In my opinion a major reason would have been that although they considered themselves to be strong Christians, beliefs which emanated from the old pagan religion were still firmly entrenched, colouring their perceptions of their world. The merging of pagan and Christian symbols and practices was common. An obvious example is the green man carvings which adorn many early churches. These symbols of fertility, nature and rebirth are visible expressions of the old religion which although supressed was never eradicated. Even the two chroniclers, men who represented the new religion did not seem to question the authenticity of the tale too closely. If Ralph’s version is accepted then you can see the story as a parable i.e. the children are attracted away from their home (pre-Christian) which is without the warmth of the sun to a bright new world by the sound of bells, representing Christianity. Additionally when Ralph describes Agnes as wanton, he could be referring to a wildness which he believed derived from her pagan or otherworldly origins (the fae were considered seducers of men).

Remembering the green children

The green children are still remembered in Woolpit. They appear on a village sign and on the church’s altar cloth. As mentioned before the fable “The Babes in the Wood” has distinct links to the story of the green children. In this morality tale written in the 16^th century, two young children are looked after by their aunt and uncle after their parents die. Eager to get his hands on their fortune he pays two men to take them into the forest and kill them. During an argument between the two men, the kinder of the two kills his accomplice. He then promises to return with provisions for the children. He never does and the children left to wander in the forest eventually die. The birds cover their bodies with leaves.

My final thought!

Whatever the truth, I love the way a story probably rooted in fact was embellished with supernatural elements to create a unique, mysterious and fascinating tale which has captured the imagination of so many.

Kylie Minouge as the Green Fairy in Baz Luhrmann’s ‘Moulin Rouge’.

Bibliography

Ralph of Coggeshall, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ralph_of_Coggeshall
William of Newburgh, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_of_Newburgh
Battle of Fornham, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Fornham
A dictionary of English folklore, Jacqueline Simpson and Steve Roud, 2000
Green Children of Woolpit, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_children_of_Woolpit
The Green Children of Woolpit: the 12th century legend of visitors from another world, http://www.ancient-origins.net/unexplained-phenomena/green-children-woolpit-12th-century-legend-visitors-another-world-002347
The Green Children of Woolpit, http://brian-haughton.com/ancient-mysteries-articles/green-children-of-woolpit/
Green children of Woolpit, http://myths.e2bn.org/mythsandlegends/origins24-the-green-children-of-woolpit.html
Welcome to Woolpit village, http://www.woolpit.org/
Creepy History: Who Were The Green Children of Woolpit? https://thoughtcatalog.com/steven-casale/2015/05/creepy-history-who-were-the-green-children-of-woolpit/
The Green Children of Woolpit – Investigating a Medieval mystery, http://eclectariumshuker.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/the-green-children-of-woolpit.html
Folklore, History and the Study of Myth, http://garyrvarner.webs.com/
Oweynagat Cave, Roscommon, Ireland, https://visionsofthepastblog.com/?s=cave+of+cats
Faerie Feast – Writing in margins, http://writinginmargins.weebly.com/faerie-feast.html
Archetypes and motifs in folklore and literature: A handbook, Carole G. Silver, (eds) Jane Garry and Hasan El-Shamy, 2016
The evils of beans, http://writinginmargins.weebly.com/faerie-feast.html
1135~1154: The Green Children of Woolpit, http://anomalyinfo.com/Stories/11351154-green-children-woolpit
William of Newburgh: Book one http://sourcebooks.fordham.edu/halsall/basis/williamofnewburgh-one.asp#epistle

Notes

[1] Green Children of Woolpit, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_children_of_Woolpit
[2] William of Newburgh, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_of_Newburgh
[3] ibid
[4] ibid
[5] ibid
[6] Battle of Fornham, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Fornham
[7] The Green Children of Woolpit, http://brian-haughton.com/ancient-mysteries-articles/green-children-of-woolpit/
[8] ibid
[9] Oweynagat Cave, Roscommon, Ireland, https://visionsofthepastblog.com/?s=cave+of+cats
[10] Archetypes and motifs in folklore and literature: A handbook, Carole G. Silver, (eds) Jane Garry and Hasan El-Shamy, 2016
[11] The evils of beans, http://writinginmargins.weebly.com/faerie-feast.html

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A haunting tale for Halloween: The Stockwell Ghost

Tags

ann robinson, catharine crowe, domestic servants, Hauntings, hoax, London, Old Jeffrey, poltergeist, stockwell ghost, Wesley

Astonishing Transactions at Stockwell

Kennington Common and Church 1830. Image Source: Vauxhall History online.

In the eighteenth century Stockwell was a rural hamlet in Surrey, repleat with rolling fields and shady lanes flanked by hedgerow. It boasted less than a hundred dwellings mainly centred around a village green, upon which flocks of sheep ambled whilst sparrows and yellow hammers sported in the skies above.  It was a veritable rustic idyll.

Mrs Golding was an upstanding and well-regarded member of the community, a lady of independent fortune who lived alone, but for her maid, Ann Robinson. Her house was situated close by the Tower public house.  A more respectable and unremarkable old body it would have been hard to find.  However on twelfth night, Monday 6 January, 1772, her unobtrusive life was suddenly cast into turmoil.

Mrs Golding’s peaceful forenoon was rudely shattered when her young maid servant, a girl of about twenty, and employed little more than a week, burst into the parlour to exclaim that the kitchen was being turned upside down by hands unseen.  Alarmed, Mrs G accompanied the girl to the aforesaid chamber and to her utter astonishment was witness to the following events:

‘Cups and saucers rattled down the chimney – pots and pans were whirled down the stairs, or through the windows; and hams, cheeses and loaves of bread disported themselves upon the floor as if the devil were in them.’ [1]

While the astounded old lady contemplated the strange turn of events, things escalated –

‘a clock tumbled down and the case broke; a lantern that hung on the staircase was thrown down and the glass broke to pieces; an earthen pan of salted beef broke to pieces and the beef fell about’ [2]

Image Source: La Vie Mysterieuse in 1911.

Soon the cacophony of chaos had drawn quite a crowd. But although Mrs Golding and her neighbours may have feared the devil was at play in her pantry, nevertheless she was also sensible enough to consider that the house may be about to come tumbling down about their ears, and hastily summoned Mr Rowlidge, a carpenter, to inspect the building.  His assessment was that the weight of an extra room added to an upper floor was occasioning the disruptions and that immediate evacuation was required.  Mrs Golding fled fainting to her neighbour, Mr Gresham, for shelter.  She left Mr Rowlidge and his associates to retrieve her remaining possessions – and her maid, who had repaired to an upper chamber.

Mr Rowlidge and his companions urgently impressed on the young woman the need to vacate the property, yet Ann repeatedly ignored their entreaties. Eventually the young woman sauntered downstairs, with such an air of unconcern that it quite amazed Mr Rowlidge and his companions.

In the house next door, Mrs Golding was in a dead faint. Such was her violent reaction to the sudden calamity that it was misreported that she had expired, and her niece, one  Mrs Pain, was summoned from her home at Rush Common close to the nearby settlement of Brixton Causeway.

Image source: unknown.

Of the witnesses present, one was a surgeon, Mr Gardner of Clapham.  He was called upon to practice his art on the trembling Mrs Golding by letting her blood.  Mr Gardner intended to examine the blood later, so it was left to rest in a basin.  The congealing mass was too tempting to the disruptive spirit in attendance upon the unfortunate Mrs Golding, and the jellied lump of blood was observed to spring from the basin, which itself then shattered upon the ground.

The bouncing blood did not bode well, soon the many valuables transported from Mrs Golding’s and stowed in Mr Gresham’s parlour were under supernatural attack. China stored on a sideboard came crashing down, shattering a pier glass placed beneath it.  Pandemonium soon reigned in the Gresham household – as it had done in Mrs Golding’s.

In terror, Mrs Golding fled to another neighbour, Mr Mayling, for respite.  Deciding that her neighbours had been put too much trouble by the devilish commotions, she quickly departed Mr Mayling’s house to that of her niece at Rush Common.  If Mrs Golding had hoped the strange events had ceased, she was to be disappointed.  During dinner, the maid was sent back to Mrs Golding’s house and later reported all was quiet there.  Things were less quiet at the Pain’s – at 8pm:

“a whole row of pewter dishes, except one, fell off a shelf to the middle of the floor, rolled about a little while, then settled, as soon as they were quiet, turned upside down; [..] two eggs were upon one of the pewter shelves, one of them flew off, crossed the kitchen, and struck a cat on the head, and then broke to pieces.” [3]

The Domestic Cat by Thomas Bewick.

Other items soon flew about – a pestle and mortar, candlesticks, brasses, glasses and china, a mustard pot jumped about, even a ham, hung on the chimney, and a flitch of bacon, all went flying.  There were many witnesses, family and friends alike, many of whom were so afraid that they fled in terror, fearing witchcraft or the devil was at work.

And during all of this tumult, one person one person carried on as if nothing was amiss.  Ann Robinson.  Ann continued to flit between the kitchen and parlour wherever the family was.  She just would not sit still.   Hone reports in his Everyday book that she:

“advised her mistress not to be alarmed or uneasy, as these things could not be helped.”

Following this strange advice, Mrs Golding and the Pain’s began reconsider Ann’s apparent sang froid.  

At 10pm the services of a Mr Fowler were called upon, he was asked to sit with the ladies but fled at 1am, being so terrified by the goings on.  Mrs Pain fled to bed, Mrs Golding paced amidst the ruins of her possessions.  By the early hours of the morning, unable to withstand the destruction any more Mrs Golding left her niece and went to the timorous Mr Fowler’s.   Ann returned to the Pain’s to help Mrs Pain retrieve the children from a barn to where they had been evacuated.  Hone reports that all was quiet at Mr Fowler’s, until Ann returned.

Image source:

Once again, a litany of destruction ensued – candlestick struck lamp, coals overturned and Ann informed Mr Fowler that such events would pursue Mrs Golding wherever she went.  Terrified, Mr Fowler bid his neighbour leave, but first he entreated her to:

“consider within herself, for her own and the public sake, whether or not she had not been guilty of some atrocious crime, for which Providence was determined to pursue her on this side of the grave.” [4]

This slight to her good character – that her travails must be divine punishment for a crime she had committed irked Mrs G and she soon gave short shrift to Mr Fowler’s admonitions and declared:

“her conscience was quite clear, and she could as well wait the will of Providence in her own house” [5]

Unsurprisingly, when she returned home, her supernatural attendant accompanied her – a box of candles was overturned, a table danced, and a pail of water mysteriously seethed and boiled.

For Mrs Golding and Mr Pain her nephew-in-law, the evidence was stacking up against the unflappable Ann.  A trap was set.  Ann was to go on an errand back to Rush Common.  During that time, about 6 -7am on Tuesday morning, all paranormal activity ceased.  Upon her return she was dismissed on the spot as the cause of the diabolical destruction.  As if by magic, all disruption ceased and Mrs Golding was never again to suffer such travails.

Stockwell ghost: poltergeist or hoax?

At the time, the Stockwell ghost was almost as notorious as the Cock Lane Ghost of the 1760’s.  Interest was so great that the main witnesses, Mrs Golding, John and Mary Pain, Richard and Sarah Fowler and Mary Martin, the Pain’s maid, even went so far as to publish a pamphlet a few days after the events, on 11th January 1772: An authentic, candid, and circumstantial narrative of the astonishing transactions at Stockwell … Surry … the 6th and 7th … of January, 1772 …  

The Cock Lane Ghost, artist unknown. Image source: Wikimedia.

The curious thing about the Stockwell haunting is that so many people considered it to be genuine, even after the main witnesses began to express their doubts, it was reported that even years later, many locals attributed events to the supernatural. [6] And this in the eighteenth century: the century famed for the Enlightenment and for thinkers such as Hume, Diderot and Voltaire who to tried to take God out of the equation by presenting a ‘disenchanted’ world free from religious superstition.  However, in tandem with this new rationalistic world view, came an enthusiastic popular religion in the form of Wesley’s Methodism, and Wesley himself claimed to have experienced a poltergeist called ‘Old Jeffrey’ at the family home Epworth Rectory.  And of course, old superstitions die-hard.

Faced with chaotic, frightening and inexplicable events, many apparently rational people will question their view of the world before looking for more prosaic explanations.  In fact, many ‘sober’ and respectable persons attended Mrs Golding, ostensibly to express their sympathies for her not inconsiderable financial losses, but also with an undoubted air of rubbernecking at someone else’s misfortune.  Many came away terrified and convinced of the diabolical origin of the disturbances and some no doubt, like Mr Fowler, questioned what the respectable Mrs Golding had done to bring down Providence’s displeasure. As seen with the Cock Lane Ghost, there was an enduring popular belief that ghosts often returned in order to right a wrong or uncover a crime.[7]  Mrs Golding stood to lose much more than just her china and plate, she stood to lose her good character.

Eighteenth Century Servant Girl. Image Source: Life takes lemons blog.

Poltergeist activity is often associated with young girls.  Anthropological studies suggest the are an expression of inter-personal conflicts or domestic violence within kin-groups.[8]  In the case of young servant girls, away from home and family, perhaps in a restrictive or oppressive environment, it is understandable that some found it tempting to rail against the power imbalance between master (or mistress) and servant.  The historical record certainly provides many examples of young servants perpetrating hoaxes on their employers.[9]

Even if one gives Ann the benefit of the doubt and attributes her sang froid and comment that such things were normal, to the fact that the poltergeist was attached to her and perhaps for her it was normal, it seems fairly clear that the young Ann Robinson was faking it (in order to clear the house for an illicit liaison).  The pamphlet points the finger of blame strongly in her direction, whilst stopping short of making an outright accusation, claiming rather to be simply recounting events as they happened (even maids can get litigious). However,  all doubt must have been dispelled several years later when Ann finally confessed to her part in orchestrating events.   Her confession was made to one Reverend Brayfield and was reported by William Hone, in his Everyday Book of 1825:

‘She had fixed long horse hairs to some of the crockery, and put wire under others; on pulling these the ‘moveables’ of course fell [..] Ann Robinson herself dexterously threw many of the things down, which the persons present, when they turned around and saw them in motion or broken, attributed to unseen agency’

19th century kitchen maid. Image source: unknown.

It is worth noting that not everyone was convinced by this confession: Catherine Crowe, famous for introducing the term poltergeist into the English language in her 1848 work The Night-side of Nature, was convinced the phenomena was real.  But she was in the minority.

Ann may well have been a simple serving-maid, but many of the middle and upper class writers of the eighteenth and nineteenth century believed that servants were routinely committing similar dastardly deeds, and pulling the wool over their unsuspecting employers eyes.[10] All of which suggests that the ‘umble folk had a pretty good grasp of basic psychology, allowing them to tap into popular fears to get the better of their betters.

The god-fearing folk who witnessed events at Stockwell were often so terrified that they would refuse to look upon the shattered items for fear of what devilish imps they might see – thereby giving the nimble and nefarious Ann further opportunity to create mayhem, even going so far as to add a paper of chemicals to a pail of water to make it ‘boil’.

If not for the ultimate callousness and meanness of the trick – Mrs Golding was an elderly lady and she was badly frightened as well as suffering considerable financial loss – young Ann was clearly a force to be reckoned with.  One wonders if she ever repeated the tactic on future employers – or if her descendants can be found employed in todays popular Halloween entertainment, the Haunted House.

Happy Halloween

 

Sources and Notes

Crowe, Catherine, 1848, The Night-Side of Nature:

https://archive.org/stream/nightsideofnatur02crowiala#page/240/mode/2up

Davies, Owen, 2007, The Haunted: A Social History of Ghosts [7] [8] [9] [10]

Hone, William, 1825: The Everyday Book: [2] [3] [4] [5]

https://archive.org/stream/everydaybookorgu01hone#page/30/mode/2up

MacKay, Charles, 1852, Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds: [1] [6]

https://archive.org/stream/memoirsextraord13mackgoog#page/n248/mode/2up

http://vauxhallhistory.org/stockwell-ghost/

 

Lovey Warne of the New Forest: the smuggler in scarlet

Tags

Burley, England, Free trade, Hampshire, Lovey Warne, New Forest, Revenue Men, Smugglers road, Smuggling, Vereley Hill, Warne Brothers

Smugglers by John Atkinson. Public domain.

Britain has an amazing selection of local beers and ales which you can often only find at a few select pubs close to where they are produced. Many of them have been given names which have a strong regional historical or cultural relevance. Manufactured at the Ringwood Brewery, Lovey Warne is one such ale. Classified as a golden or blonde ale, it has a moderate toasted malt and caramel aroma and a bitter citrus taste[1]. It is named after a famous local figure, the female smuggler, Lovey Warne and its amber colour is meant to symbolise her scarlet coloured cloak.

When people think of smuggling in the 17^th and 18^th centuries in Britain they immediately think of the coasts of Cornwall and Dorset. Books such as Jamaica Inn by Daphne du Maurier set in the wild, remote landscape of Bodmin Moor and Winston Graham’s Poldark series have also helped cement this connection in people’s minds. People tend to forget that smuggling went on all over Britain and how well organised and sophisticated the smuggling network became at its height.

Free trading: A respectable occupation

Smuggling or Free Trading as it was otherwise known became an important source of income for many families hit hard by exorbitant taxes. These unpopular taxes implemented to help pay for the wars on the continent and fill the Treasury’s coffers, had left many families on the brink of starvation. So in order to augment their meagre or in many cases non-existent wages many people turned unsurprisingly to smuggling. People from all levels of society were involved in the trade with the high-duty goods such as brandy, tobacco, lace and tea bringing the best profits.

Revenue men in a gangs lair. Copyright National Maritime Museum.

Smuggling was considered by many to be an honourable trade and a recognised occupation. In addition many people even though not directly involved in the trade themselves were sympathetic to the smugglers’ cause. One such sympathiser, a farmer by the name of Burt Chubbs helped rescue smugglers being chased by excise men. He hid them in his barn and then misdirected the officers by claiming the smugglers’ wagon had broken his leg whilst heading towards Burley[2]. This attitude together with the deep mistrust rural communities felt towards outsiders and especially the King’s men known for their corruption meant that it was nearly impossible to convince anyone to become an informant and most rewards for information were left unclaimed.

A centre of smuggling: The New Forest

The New Forest. Source Wikipedia.

One such area which became well-known as a centre of the smuggling trade was the New Forest. The New Forest (one of the most beautiful areas in England) in Hampshire lies inland away from the harbours of Christchurch and Bournemouth in Dorset. The dense forest which would have then extended much further south made an ideal hiding place for contraband transported from the coast. Indeed many of the villagers who lived within the boundaries of the forest played an important and active role in the distribution of these goods and it was once claimed that every labourer in the forest was either a poacher or a smuggler or both. In the mid-18^th century, it was written “We hear from the New Forest in Hampshire that smugglers have got to such a height in that part of the country that scarce a week passes but great quantities of goods are run between Lymington and Christchurch”[3]. Another source showing the scale of the operations stated that he had heard of “twenty or thirty wagons laden with kegs, guarded by two or three hundred horsemen, each bearing two or three tubs, coming over the Hengistbury Head, making their way, in the open day past Christchurch to the Forest”[4]. Some parts of the forest are still known as ‘the Boatyard’ despite being miles from the sea.

Smugglers Road and Vereley Hill in the distance. Image by Jim Champion via Wikimedia Commons.

A smuggler’s refuge

The picturesque New Forest village of Burley with its traditional cottages and pretty lanes is located about 4 miles south east of Ringwood. Today it is a charming stop for tourists visiting the New Forest but go back about three hundred years and the village reveals its much darker past. The village once a close-knit secretive community was a main centre for smuggling in the region. The village was so infamous that the revenue men preferred not to enter it unless they absolutely had to as they were aware that the villagers were able to raise an armed mounted troop of men at short notice more than capable of dealing with the King’s officials.

Burley in the 1940’s. Image source: new forest explorer website.

One of the main pubs in the village, The Queen’s Head Inn was used to store contraband and not long ago during building work a secret smugglers’ cellar was discovered. In the room the workmen also found some long forgotten loot including pistols, cutlasses, brandy bottles, coins as well as several straw hats from Italy[5]. It is even claimed that prior to the discover of the cellar, strange noises such as groans were heard coming from their direction, these sounds promptly stopped after the discovery. I wonder were the noises warning people away from or directing them to the cellar?

The infamous Warne Brothers

Hiding contraband. Source Copyright National Maritime Museum London.

In Burley you will find a small street called Warnes Lane named after the notorious Warne family who lived nearby. The Warne brothers Peter and John were believed to have run the Christchurch smuggling fraternity in the first quarter of the 1800s. They possibly acted as ‘landers’. The lander’s role was to move goods away from shore and inland as quickly as possible. They would then either hide the contraband somewhere safe such as a pub or a church or pass it on to their clients. It is rumoured that there was an oak tree in Burley where the gang would meet to discuss their plans. Peter and John lived with their sister Lovey in a house at Crow Hill Top called Knaves Ash. Knaves Ash was perfectly positioned for moving contraband unseen due to the number of tracks that converged at the house[6]. One of the most famous of these sunken tracks was known as Smugglers’ Road. It begun near the inlet village of Chewton, passed through Burley, continued onto the turnpike road at Picket Post and ended at Ridley Wood.

Not much is known about the Warne family but their father may have owned or managed one of the pubs in Burley[7]. If he did then there is a possibility that it could have been the Queen’s Head Inn. Although it was the brothers who were a leading force in the smuggling ring it is their sister Lovey (probably short for Loveday) who has passed into New Forest folklore.

The legend of Lovey Warne

The legend goes that Lovey would walk along Vereley Hill watching for any sign of the revenue men. If she saw them she would turn her cloak inside out to display a red lining which she would wear to warn the smugglers. The romantic image of Lovey wandering the heath in her red cape has captured people’s imagination and she has been immortalised not only in alcohol but also in music and books.

Lady Smugger. Source: public domain [?]

Signalling to the smugglers was not the only contribution Lovey made to her brothers’ business. For a while she took an even more active role. On orders from her brothers she would ride on her pony (most likely one of the New Forest ponies, known for their sturdiness and stamina) to pre-arranged meetings with ships’ captains in Christchurch harbour. There she would go to the captain’s cabin, undress, wind herself in valuable silks, put her clothes back on and return home[8]. As she left the ship she would have passed by the inept and oblivious revenue men who even if they were suspicious were under official orders not to search women. At home the silks would have been removed and possibly sold at the market at Ridley Wood which dealt in both legal and illegal goods.

The scam continued for a time until one incident when Lovey’s luck nearly ran out. One day as she left a ship she was stopped by a revenue man and invited for a drink at the Eight Bells in Christchurch, an offer she would have been unable to refuse without arousing suspicion. Once at the pub, the revenue man became a little too friendly, touching her legs and thighs and getting a little too close to the hidden silks. Acting quickly she jabbed the man in the eye with her elbow and fled whilst the landlady sat on the man pretending to tend to his damaged eye allowing Lovey the time she needed to get away[9]. It is believed this incident put an end to Lovey’s front line participation.

Lovey and her brothers pretty much disappear from history at this point. The only further brief glimpses we have is a possible record of Lovey marrying at the age of seventeen in Christchurch in around 1814 and a story surrounding her death. The church of St John the Baptist was built in Burley in 1839 and Lovey was one of the first villagers to be buried there. According to the story she wanted to be buried with her beloved pony but permission was not granted and instead the pony was buried in the middle of a ring of fir trees outside the churchyard[10].

Old Postcard of St John the Baptist Church, Burley. Source FGO Stuart.

The usefulness of a good, sturdy petticoat

It was not unusual for women to play a prominent role in the smuggling trade. Although they may not have been physically able to move the heavy tubs, they did contribute in other ways. Like Lovey they could act as look outs, be responsible for keeping the cargo hidden or deliver messages. Again just as Lovey had done many women would wrap themselves in silks and carry them hidden but openly past the revenue men who were powerless to do anything about it.

Rigging out a smuggler by Thomas Rowlandson.

Women would also transport alcohol by hiding cow or pig bladders filled with brandy and gin underneath their thick petticoats. In 1799 George Lipcomb described meeting some of these women. He was initially shocked by their “grotesque and extraordinary” appearance “till upon enquiry, we found that they were smugglers of spirituous liquors…and, indeed they were so heavily laden, that it was with great apparent difficulty they waddled along”[11]. Sometimes being so overburdened was useful, in Gosport a woman called Maclane was the only survivor when the Queen Charlotte boat sunk, she was saved from drowning by “being buoyed up with a quantity of bladders”[12]. In Folkestone women would disguise themselves as laundresses and hide liquor in baskets covered with linen.

Women were also involved in processing commodities. They would cut and dry ordinary leaves to mix in with the tea leaves to increase its bulk for selling and dilute French brandy. Brandy was shipped in its pure form, which made it easier to transport in large quantities but was undrinkable. The women would also heat the liquid and change its colour from clear to the honey colour which the British preferred[13].

Despite the fact that women were not allowed to be searched a number of them were arrested on smuggling related offences such as the 70 year old Catherine Winter, a Weymouth seamstress who served an 18 day sentence in 1844. Other evidence from the Register for Dorchester Gaol between 1782 and 1853 lists the names and occupations of more than 64 women from the surrounding villages and towns in prison on smuggling charges[14]. The end of the Napoleonic War together with the tax reforms of 1830 finally brought the country much needed social and economic relief and as a consequence made smuggling much less appealing.

Although smuggling did of course continue albeit on a much lesser scale the golden era of Free Trading was over and the New Forest shook off its disreputable reputation and eventually become what it is today, a beautiful and popular tourist destination.

Lovey Warne, still famous today. Source: unknown.

Bibliography

The New Forest, Bournemouth & Poole – smuggling, www.smuggling.co.uk/gazetter_s_13.htm

Burley, http://www.thenewforest.co.uk/discover/burley.aspx

Lovey Warne, www.perfectpint.co.uk/real-ale-beers-info/9852/Ringwood-Brewery/Lovey-Warne

Lovey Warne of the New Forest, http://the-history-girls.blogspot.co.uk/2013/06/lovey-warne-of-new-forest.html

The New Forest Smugglers, http://www.thenewforestguide.co.uk/history/new-forest-smugglers/

New Forest Smugglers, http://inewforest.co.uk/new-forest-smugglers/

Burley 1958, http://www.royhodges.co.uk/Burley.pdf

Smugglers Cove, http://dorsetsea.swgfl.org.uk/html/smuggler/smug_mr3.htm

Women and the smuggling trade, http://the-history-girls.blogspot.co.uk/2013/05/women-and-smuggling-trade.html

Smuggling in the eighteenth and early nineteenth Century, http://lugnad.ie/smuggling/

Dorset – Smugglers Coast, http://dorset-ancestors.com/?p=910

Cindy Vallar, Smuggling, www.cindyvallar.com/smuggling.html

Smuggling in and around Burton Bradstock, http://www.burtonbradstock.org.uk/History/Smuggling/Smuggling.htm

Notes

[1] Lovey Warne, www.perfectpint.co.uk/real-ale-beers-info/9852/Ringwood-Brewery/Lovey-Warne

[2] Burley 1958, http://www.royhodges.co.uk/Burley.pdf

[3] The New Forest, Bournemouth & Poole – smuggling, www.smuggling.co.uk/gazetter_s_13.htm

[4] The New Forest Smugglers, http://www.thenewforestguide.co.uk/history/new-forest-smugglers/

[5] ibid

[6] ibid

[7] Lovey Warne of the New Forest, http://the-history-girls.blogspot.co.uk/2013/06/lovey-warne-of-new-forest.html

[8] The New Forest, Bournemouth & Poole – smuggling, www.smuggling.co.uk/gazetter_s_13.htm

[9] Lovey Warne of the New Forest, http://the-history-girls.blogspot.co.uk/2013/06/lovey-warne-of-new-forest.html

[10] Burley 1958, http://www.royhodges.co.uk/Burley.pdf

[11] Smuggling, http://www.cindyvallar.com/smuggling.html

[12] Smuggling in and around Burton Bradstock, http://www.burtonbradstock.org.uk/History/Smuggling/

[13] Women and the smuggling trade, http://the-history-girls.blogspot.co.uk/2013/05/women-and-smuggling-trade.html

[14] Dorset – Smugglers Coast, http://dorset-ancestors.com/?p=910

 

Greyfriars Kirkyard: Covenanters, Bloody MacKenzie and things that go bump in the night.

Tags

black mausoleum, Bloody Mackenzie, Bluidy, city of the dead, Convenaters, edinburgh ghosts, George Mackenzie, Ghosts, Greyfriarys kirkyard, Kings Peace, national covenant, Orbs, poltergeist, The Black Bond

Edinburgh is a city rife with duality, it is a city where surgeons shake hands with murders, superstition vies with enlightenment and the cruel compete with the sentimental. And in a city like Edinburgh, the dead, like the poor, will never be far away. Greyfriars Kirkyard crouched behind the Grassmarket, protected by high walls and overlooked by the tall tenements of Candlemaker Row, is famous as the resting place of the great and the good: from Buchan to Greyfriars Bobby. But those walls also encompass darker tales: of plague pits, resurrectionists and the brutal suppression of religious dissent.

Mary Queen of Scots and a surfeit of bodies

King Death.

From the 1400’s to the 1500’s the Kirkyard was a Franciscan convent garden situated on the outskirts of the town; however by the mid sixteenth century pressure on the existing burial ground at St Giles led Mary Queen of Scots to make a gift of the land for use as a cemetery [1]. This was in 1562 and was not a moment too soon, as plague ravaged the city in 1568 and many of its victims ended up in plague pits in the Kirkyard. To further add to its grisly history, the severed heads of criminals executed on the Grassmarket were displayed at entrance of Greyfriars Kirkyard closest to it. As the body-count rose, so too did the ground level[2]. It is worth remembering that as with most old cemeteries, there are a lot more bodies than there are visible monuments…so tread carefully, because every step is likely to be over someone’s grave.

Tenements and Grave Monuments back to back.

The pale gold Dutch-barn-style church that visitors see today looks timeless but it is not the original Greyfriars Kirk. A late Gothic-style church was begun on the site in 1602 and took nearly twenty years to complete. The old kirk didn’t have much luck; it was damaged during the Civil War and partially destroyed in 1718 when the town’s gunpowder supply, which some bright spark had decided to store in the church tower, blew up. Eventually a new kirk was added to the surviving old kirk, but ill-fortune dogged that too, and a fire in 1845 destroyed the remaining old kirk and damaged parts of new. All seems peaceful now, although if you look closely you can still see some remaining scorch-marks on the brickwork, a reminder of its eventful past[3].

Greyfriars Kirk

The National Covenant of Scotland

One of the most tragic elements of the history of Greyfriars, and one with potentially long lasting psychic consequences, is its link to the doomed Covenanter movement of the seventeenth century.  An old legend about the conversion of Scotland to Christianity claims that there was a covenant between God and the community of Scotland before the first king, Fergus, began his reign (c310AD). To many Scots this cemented the idea that Scotland, not England, or even Rome itself, was the first true Godly Kingdom; it reinforced the belief that no king could stand between the Scots and their covenant with God. In England, the King was the head of the Church but traditionally in Scotland the Kirk had no such figurehead. This would prove a sticking point between the Scottish Covenanters and King Charles I [4].

King Charles I. Image source unknown.

Charles I, despite his Scottish birth, critically misread the mood of the Scots when he and Arch-Bishop Laud introduced the Authorised Prayer Book in1637, it was an attempt to bring the reformed Catholic Church, epitomised by English Episcopalianism, to Scotland, and it was required that the book be read out in Scottish Kirks. This was not a wise move by the king. Described as ‘This Popish-English-Scottish-Mass-Service-book’ by John Row, a minister at St Giles [5] its attempt at introducing a national church, with the king as its head, served only to inflame calls for Scottish religious independence.

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On 23 July 1637 the reading of the Authorised Prayer Book in Scottish Kirks led to the Prayer Book Riots, in which stools were hurled at the Dean and Bishop of Edinburgh in St Giles, and the Bishop designate of Argyll was shouted down at Greyfriars Kirk for trying to introduce popery by the backdoor.

The Prayer Book Riots in Scotland, 1637. Image source Wikipedia.

Charles I and Arch-bishop Laud were attempting to introduce an Arminian inspired version of the church across Britain. The Arminian view considered that the Church of Rome was a true church even if misguided. In short, Charles and Laud wanted to introduce a reformed Catholic Church across England and Scotland. This was a red-rag to a bull for Scottish Presbyterians, as Simon Schama wrote: ‘The mere notion that the Church of Rome was not actually the abominable institution of the Antichrist, sent them into a paroxysm of wrath.’ [6] Something had to be done to protect the godly church in Scotland from the corrupt and popish church that Laud and his bishops were trying to impose on Scotland.

Archbishop of Canterbury, William Laud. Image source Wikipedia.

The King, far removed from his Scottish roots, would not renounce Arch-bishop Laud, Bishops in general, or his idea of what the church should be, and tensions were running high. In fact, Charles thought much of the resentment was being fanned by France, rather than local sentiment, and made it clear he would treat such views as traitorous. The ground was ripe for religious rebellion.

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On 28 February 1638 before the pulpit in Greyfriars Kirk, the National Covenant was signed. Prayers were offered, Psalms sung and sermons delivered. The New Jerusalem was to be in Scotland. Over the next days and weeks the covenant was displayed and signed by multitudes, rich and poor, young and old, men and women alike. Simon Schama notes that such was its importance to the national psyche it became almost a measure of patriotism– to be a true Christian and a true Scot you must sign the covenant [7].

The Signing of the Covenant in Greyfriars Kirkyard, by William Allan 1838. City of Edinburgh Council; Supplied by The Public Catalogue Foundation.

On the surface the document maintained the Kings Peace, but under the condition that the king could be lawfully challenged if he broke the covenant. Schama also points out that Covenanters did not see their demands as threatening to the King as such, with the proviso that if the King should threaten them in their religious freedom, then they would take up arms [8]. This was unlikely to go down well with the autocratic Charles I.

National Covenant of 1638.  source National Library of Scotland.

Later in 1638 the Glasgow Assembly went even further and broke the links between the Scottish Church and English government. The die was cast and the King would have to take decisive action.

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So began half a century of unrest, punctuated by Civil War, regicide, the protectorate and finally the restoration of a king in exile. In fact Charles II was assisted on his return by the Scottish Covenanters, on the proviso that he agree to leave Presbyterianism well alone in Scotland. However, Kings have short memories once their crowns are secure, and he soon went back on his word and began persecuting the Covenanters. The scene was set for the final tragedy that was to play out in Greyfriars Kirkyard.

The Covenanters Prison

Fast forward to1679, following the final defeat of the Presbyterian Covenanters at the battle of Bothwell Brig on the 22nd June, around twelve-hundred Covenanter prisoners were marched in disgrace to Edinburgh. Declared rebels and traitors they faced execution or at best, transportation to the colonies to work as indentured slave labour. However, many had much worse suffering to endure in the months ahead.

The Covenanters Prison.

Today, the visitor can view the prison through locked gates – a wide grassy avenue is flanked by unremarkable family vaults of pale stone; however things were very different in the seventeenth century. Inner Greyfriars yard covered about 3 acres, with high walls and only one gate (not the current gates that visitors see) [9]. Facilities to house and accommodate the prisoners were non-existent – they were effectively penned up in the open air for upwards of four months and given a miserly ration of 4oz of food per day. Vulnerable to exposure, malnutrition, disease and despair many died during their internment, especially as the year turned towards winter. The conditions in the Covenanters Prison were so harsh that it has been called the first concentration camp [10].

Location of the Prison in Inner Greyfriars Yard. Source Early Modern Commons website.

Such a huge influx of people created a logistical nightmare in Edinburgh; this is why Inner Greyfriars Yard, as it was known then, was used as an overflow prison. Estimates vary as to how many prisoners were held here, certainly the number reduced over time. Dr Mark Jardine’s view that there were initially1184 prisoners housed in Greyfriars Yard and Herriot School (next to it) seems compelling, it is based on the evidence of how many penny loaves were issued as rations to the prisoners (1184 on 1 July, one for each prisoner).  The numbers rapidly reduced during the summer as many were released after being, often forcefully, encouraged to swear the Kings Peace, an oath of loyalty to the King that some hardcore Covenanters called ‘the black bond’. Added to this, others of course would have died from the terrible conditions, or been executed or transported thereby further reducing numbers as time went on [11] [12]. It must have felt like a bitter irony for the Covenanters to have been imprisoned next to the place from which their movement first took wing.

Eventually judicial fate met those who remained and many were executed on the Grassmarket. By Mid November only around 250 prisoners remained in Greyfriars. They were condemned to transportation, and having survived the privations of the Covenanters Prison, they must surely have felt some relief. However, fate, proved to be merciless when the ship carrying them, The Croune, sank off the Orkneys, and of the 250 or so chained prisoners only 60 or so made it back to dry land alive [13] [14].

The Covenanters Memorial in Greyfriars Kirkyard.

The Killing Time and Bloody MacKenzie

Sir George MacKenzie. Image source Wikipedia.

Presbyterian historians refer to the period of persecution during the reign of Charles II until the Glorious Revolution in 1688, as The Killing Time. During this time, countless Covenanter ministers were forced out of their livings, ordinary people were fined if they didn’t attend the King’s church and torture and extortion were routinely used to break the spirit of the Covenanters. Unable to practice their religion in public, Covenanters resorted to meeting in fields in ‘conventicles’ but that soon became perilous, with a death penalty for any preacher caught in the act.

The Sanquhar Declaration of 1680 brought matters to a head, Covenanters renounced allegiance to Charles II, in response to this treasonous behaviour, the Scottish Privy Council went all out against the Covenanters allowing field executions of those in arms or refusing to swear loyalty to the King. The Oath of Abjuration, as it was called, was, in itself, designed to offend, thereby revealing hardened Covenanters for summary execution.

Margaret Wilson, one of the Wigtown Martyrs. Executed by high tide in 1685. Source Wikimedia.

Sir George MacKenzie (1636/8-1691) is a name that has become synonymous with the persecution by the crown of the Covenanters, earning him the epithet Bluidy Mackenzie. He persecuted them from the bench, while John Graham of Claverhouse earned the name Bluidy Clavers for his summary field executions.
But Sir George Mackenzie wasn’t entirely evil. As an essayist he was enlightened in his views against the persecution of witches, and one of his lasting legacies was the Advocates Library, later the National Library of Scotland, in Edinburgh. In fact, during the 1660’s when Mackenzie was a budding lawyer, he actually defended a number of Covenanters. Things changed from 1677 though, when he was made Lord Advocate – the king’s representative in Scotland.

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It has be argued by Bruce Lenman and J Mackie in their book A History of Scotland, that as Lord Advocate, Mackenzie was responsible for executing King Charles II’s policy regarding suppression of the Presbyterian Covenanters, therefore Mackenzie effectively had no choice but to execute government policy. He and Bluidy Clavers may have acted entirely within law in their dealings with Covenanters – although I doubt the Covenanters felt that justice was being served to them [15].

It is easy to romanticise the persecuted Covenanters, fighting to preserve their religious independence and perhaps Scotland’s independence as well; however they did not speak for all Scots – many highlanders, after all, were Catholic. And to modern eyes, they can be viewed as hard-line religious extremists, ready to bring down the government in order to impose their austere religious ideology. The truth is no doubt somewhere in between, with most ordinary people simply wanting the freedom to choose how they worshipped their God. What is not in doubt is the terrible suffering endured by the people immured in Greyfriars by order of their King, and such suffering may well have left a permanent imprint…

Flowers left at the Covenanters Prison gate.

The Mackenzie Poltergeist

The Black Mausoleum, Bluidy MacKenzie’s final resting place.

Mackenzie died in 1691 and somewhat tactlessly, was interred in his elegant mausoleum in Greyfriars Kirkyard, within spitting distance of the Covenanters Prison. Robert Louis Stevenson, writing in 1897, reported the evil reputation that Mackenzie and that part of Greyfriars Kirkyard had acquired:

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‘When a man’s soul is certainly in hell, his body will scarce lie quite in a tomb however costly, sometime or other the door must open, and the reprobate come forth in the abhorred garments of the grave’ . He went on to report a local children’s game: ‘Fool hardy urchins [thought it] a high piece of prowess to knock at the Lord Advocate’s Mausoleum and challenge him to appear. “Bluidy Mackenzie, come oot if ye dar”’ [16]

The doors to the Mausoleum.

One such foolhardy urchin, in the form of a homeless man looking for shelter one stormy night in 1999, took the dare and got more than he bargained for. Breaking into the Mausoleum he found an underground chamber containing the coffin of Bluidy Mackenzie. Perhaps thinking it contained valuables, he tried to break into it, but in the darkness he stumbled and fell into an open pit filled with the bones of plague victims. The terrified man burst screaming from the Mausoleum, just as a grounds man, walking his dog, approached it. The combined terror is thought by some, to have amplified the dark energies held within the tomb, and given rise to what has become known as the Mackenzie Poltergeist (see Jan-Andrew Henderson’s The Ghost That Haunted Itself, for more on the Pheromone Theory.)

Interior of the Mausoleum, showing the entrance to the crypt.

Since then the phenomena around the mausoleum and the Covenanters Prison has escalated, visitors have reported being pushed and scratched and feeling nauseous to the point of passing out. The death of popular local Spiritualist Colin Grant, following an exorcism at the Mausoleum and prison, in January 2000 added a tragic dimension to the growing legend of the poltergeist.

Grant believed there were many spirits  trapped there in pain, plus ‘something else as well, something much stronger.’ [17]The local tour company City of the Dead, who hold keys to the Covenanters Prison, have reported many such instances that would support this view – after all, the poltergeist is undoubtedly good for business! Having been on one such tour, I can certainly attest to the eerie feeling walking into the Covenanters Prison on a dark night. During that tour I took some photographs which are below, and there were some interesting anomalies. Lots of orbs, especially in the Prison, and what may be either Pareidolia (the human desire to see faces where there are none) or just possibly, a misty face above a grave stone. I leave you to be the judge.

The Black Mausoleum

Nightime shots at Greyfriars Kirkyard

I have to admit that not being an expert on paranormal investigation, or external physical causes of light anomalies in photographs, I am yet to be convinced that ‘orbs’ are evidence of spirits.  However, I do find them fascinating and have captured some previous images at Chillingham Castle in Northumberland, and now at Greyfriars Kirkyard in Edinburgh.

Conditions at the time:

• Early March
• Dry and cold
• No visible insects
• Early blossom on the trees – loose petals could have caused some anomalies
• Although the graveyard was very dark, lights from surrounding buildings could have created anomalies
• Building work on the Kirk during the day could have created dust in the atmosphere

Pareidolia or paranormal? On the right, hovering above the gravestone, a misty face?

Detail of above, area where a face may, or may not, be discerned.

 

Is that an orb, inside the doorway of this vault?

Inside Covenanters Prison: two, maybe three, orbs in the vault of the roof? (the tomb itself is of later date).

Inside the Covenanters Prison – orbs hovering above the vaults?

Not much happening here – house lights in the distance, perhaps another factor in the light anomalies?

No orbs, but evidence of early blossom in the trees which could have contributed to the anomalies.

Bloody MacKenzie’s mausoleum by night. Unfortunately, no orbs here – does that mean the poltergeist is not at home………?

Visit Greyfriars Kirkyard

Greyfriars Kirkyard is open to the public.  You can also do nigh-time tours of the Kirkyard and enter the Covenanters Prison with City of the Dead Tours.

Sources and notes

All images by Lenora unless otherwise credited.

Forde, Matt, http://www.unexplained-mysteries.com/column.php?id=220743

http://www.greyfriarskirk.com/   [1] [2]

Hayden, Gary, http://www.scotlandmag.com/magazine/issue37/12008443.html [10] [16]

Henderson, Jan-Andrew, ‘The Ghost That Haunted Itself’, 2001, Mainstream Publishing [2] [13] [17]

Jardine, Mark, https://drmarkjardine.wordpress.com/2016/12/05/the-covenanters-prison-edinburgh-1679-history-scotland/ [9] [11] [14]

Schama, Simon, ‘A Hisory of Britain:The British Wars 1603-1776’, BBC [4] [5] [6] [7]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Mackenzie_of_Rosehaugh [15]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Covenanter [12]

 

Part Two: Thomas Edison: The Wizard of Menlo Park and his ‘spirit phone’

Tags

Edison's Diary, engineers, hoax, inventions, inventor, pact, Spirit phone, spiritual communication, Spiritualism, Thomas Edison, Walter Dinwiddie

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Click here to read Part One

A telephone line to the dead?

Thomas Edison with his phonograph. Source CNN.

“…I am now at work on the most sensitive apparatus I have ever undertaken to build, and I await the results with the keenest interest.”[13]

Many people believe that Edison was working on a device to contact the spirit world up until his own death in 1931. As to what the device was opinions differ. Edison never mentioned in any articles or in interviews that he was trying to create a ‘spirit phone’. The term ‘spirit phone’ was first devised in the 1940s and the term seems to have been applied to Edison’s experiment retrospectively. It may have been because for many people Edison’s name is intrinsically linked with the development and refinement of the telephone.

Whenever Edison does refer to a device, which would have the potential to contact the dead, in either an interview of in an essay he invariably described it as a valve and not a telephone. This valve he claimed would have to be so sensitive that it would respond to the very slightest movement and record and amplify the barest whisper of the life units.

A practical application

Some people claimed that Edison had said that he had made a pact with his engineer William Walter Dinwiddie that whoever died first would contact the other through the machine. Another story exists that Edison had stated that one of his employees who had been working on the device had died and that “he ought to be the first to use it if he is able to do so”[14]. For some these stories are all the proof they need for others it is an essay which appeared in 1933 in Modern Mechaix.

Thomas Edison in later life. Source [unknown].

The essay claims to depict an experiment which Edison undertook to try to contact the spirit world. This secret experiment was purported to have taken place in 1920 in Edison’s lab. The author also goes on to describe how Edison set up a beam projector and photoelectric receiver which were sensitive enough to register any movement across the beam. According to the paper, the experiment was a complete failure with the scientists sitting for hours waiting for something to happen[15].

It seems doubtful that the experiment ever took place as why did it take thirteen years for the article to be published and why was it only ever mentioned in one publication? Also the one man that could refute or confirm the article’s authenticity was no longer around.

A hoax on the world?

Thomas Edison – shining a light on the spirit world…or not? Source [unknown].

1920 Edison caused a media sensation when he told B.C. Forbes of American Magazine that he was working on a spiritual communication device. Other newspapers immediately jumped on the bandwagon and the story spread. The reaction to Edison’s statement was unprecedented. The editor of American Magazine received around 600 letters from members of the public. Gerald Falons, Museum Curator of Sound Recording at the Thomas Edison National Historical Park has grouped the letters under headings and summarised the content. The letters include offers of help with the design; people claiming that such a machine already existed; one man asking how to place a call once he had reached the afterlife (he apparently had not long to live); and people wondering whether they could purchase the machine early or would have to wait until it was in the shops. Some of the contents of the letters reveal panic among the newspaper’s readers such as those that thought that contacting the dead was going against religion whilst others were convinced that only evil spirits would answer. What is really interesting is that the most popular response was whole-hearted support for the machine’s creation and that three of these letters were from people from a science background who had been formally educated in the field. The furore that was caused is not surprising. Edison was a national hero, a man hailed as one of the most brilliant men to ever live and someone whom people trusted. It would never have occurred to the majority of people that Edison would have been teasing them or even worse deceiving them.

Edison in Scientific American. Source [?] on Pinterest.

A year later in an article in ‘The Scientific American’ Edison again referred to the subject stating that if personality survives death then it makes sense that those “… who leave the Earth would like to communicate with those they have left here…then, if we can evolve an instrument so delicate as to be affected by our personality as it survives in the next life, such an instrument, when made available, ought to record something.”[16] The article then went on to report that Edison had said that his apparatus was still in its experimental stage suggesting that he had already developed a prototype. The lack of details except for the fact that it was a valve does raise doubts about Edison’s research. Was it because Edison did not have a concrete idea on how to devise his instrument or did he simply want to keep his plans close to his chest or was it because he never had any intention of creating an instrument to communicate with ‘spirits’. The latter argument could be used to support Edison’s admission in an interview with the New York Times in 1926 that he had only said what he said to Forbes because “I really had nothing to tell him [Forbes], but I hated to disappoint him so I thought up this story about communicating with spirit is, but it was all a joke”.[17]

It seems strange that Edison would have made such a statement as a joke and let it fester for six years. If it was a prank was Edison really that bored or was it simply that he had been developing such a device but that it hadn’t worked. Is that why there are no pictures, plans or models or even a reference to the contraption in his diary? Or was it that Edison did invent a machine but could not get it to work and therefore embarrassed by his lack of success erased all evidence of his research, preferring instead to pretend it was said in jest rather than admit failure.

The missing evidence rediscovered?

For those who believe Edison did create or at least research the possibility of a ‘spirit communication device’ it is vital therefore to find some tangible evidence. In 1948 Edison’s book Diary and Sundry Observations detailing his research was published by the Edison Estate. It has often been cited that the last chapter comprising 80 or so pages detailing his spiritual investigation research were removed from the English version of the diary. In March 2015 an article published on the internet claimed that the French edition had been discovered with the missing pages intact. These pages were reprinted by Philippe Baudouin, a French radio presenter and philosopher in his book “Le Royaume de l’Au-dela” (The Kingdom of the Afterlife)[18]. Could these pages be authentic? I am not sure and I haven’t found any reviews yet on the book. I hope to read it soon but will have to wait until an English translation is available.

Edison’s Journal, to do list. Source Len Wilson website.

From beyond the grave: The last words

Years after Edison’s death, his ‘spirit phone’ was not forgotten. Despite the fact that Edison had little time for the work of mediums he seems to have on two separate occasions used their services. Participants at a séance in 1941 claimed that Edison had contacted them and told them that three of his assistants had the plans for his ‘spirit phone’. At another séance the participants reported that Edison had given instructions on how to improve the phone[19]. The thing which is strange is that if Edison was so successful at communicating through the mediums why was the ‘spirit phone’ even needed!

A deathbed confession?

Edison died at 9pm on the 18^th October 1931 at his home in New Jersey at the age of 84. He had been suffering from complications as a result of diabetes which had left him in a coma. Just before he passed away he awoke and said quietly to his wife, Mina “It is very beautiful over there”[20]. Was Edison dreaming or did he really see something? We will never know but it would be an ironic twist if this brilliant and unique man who had spent his life promoting science over the spiritual had at the very end changed his mind.

---

So was Edison interested in creating a device to which would record the voices of the dead? In my opinion, yes it is more than likely he was. Did he build an instrument? He was an inventor, so again I think he probably did try. Did the device work? No, I am pretty sure it didn’t. Did Edison destroy his plans? Yes more than likely. Edison once said “A good idea is never lost. Even though its originator or possessor may die without publicizing it, it will someday be reborn in the mind of another”[21]. Edison was right! Ever since he made his announcement which astonished and frightened the world, people have been trying to create devices which can prove beyond a shadow of a doubt the existence of the spirit world. Will anyone ever succeed? Maybe. Possibly a more pertinent question is, if they do succeed will they ever be believed?

A modern day Spirit Box, used by many paranormal investigators to attempt to contact the spirit world. Source Ghost Hunt Now website.

Biography

The Biography of Thomas Edison, http://www.thomasedison.com/biography.html

Thomas Edison, http://www.history.com/topics/inventions/thomas-edison

Thomas Edison, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Edison

The religious and political views of Thomas Edison http://hollowverse.com/thomas-edison/

Thomas Edison, http://www.history.co.uk/biographies/thomas-edison

Thomas Edison’s Telephone to the Afterlife  http://institute4learning.com/blog/2012/08/21/thomas-edisons-telephone-to-the-afterlife/

Thomas Edison and His Mysterious Telephone to the Dead, http://itcvoices.org/thomas-edisons-telephone-to-the-dead-myth-or-fact/

Edison and the Ghost Machine, http://paranormal.about.com/od/ghostaudiovideo/a/edison-ghost-machine.htm

Thomas Edison and the Ghost in the Machine, ww.paranormal-encyclopedia.com/e/thomas-edison/

How Thomas Edison Pranked the 1920s With His “Dead People” Phone http://gizmodo.com/5676604/how-thomas-edison-pranked-the-1920s-with-his-dead-people-phone

Inventions by Thomas Edison (That You’ve Never Heard Of), http://science.howstuffworks.com/10-inventions-thomas-edison10.htm

Edison’s ‘Lost’ Idea: A Device to Hear the Dead, http://www.seeker.com/edisons-lost-idea-a-device-to-hear-the-dead-1769577566.html

Edison’s Lost Plan To Record Voices Of Dead, http://news.sky.com/story/edisons-lost-plan-to-record-voices-of-dead-10368974

Edison’s forgotten ‘invention’: A phone that calls the dead http://www.reliableplant.com/Read/27212/Edison-invention-calls-dead

Notes

[13] Edison and the Ghost Machine, http://paranormal.about.com/od/ghostaudiovideo/a/edison-ghost-machine.htm

[14] Edison and the Ghost Machine, http://paranormal.about.com/od/ghostaudiovideo/a/edison-ghost-machine.htm

[15] Thomas Edison and His Mysterious Telephone to the Dead, http://itcvoices.org/thomas-edisons-telephone-to-the-dead-myth-or-fact/

[16] Thomas Edison’s Telephone to the Afterlife  http://institute4learning.com/blog/2012/08/21/thomas-edisons-telephone-to-the-afterlife/

[17] ibid

[18] Edison’s Lost Plan To Record Voices Of Dead, http://news.sky.com/story/edisons-lost-plan-to-record-voices-of-dead-10368974

[19] Inventions by Thomas Edison (That You’ve Never Heard Of), http://science.howstuffworks.com/10-inventions-thomas-edison10.htm

[20] The Biography of Thomas Edison, http://www.thomasedison.com/biography.html

[21]The Biography of Thomas Edison, http://www.thomasedison.com/biography.html

Part One: Thomas Edison: The Wizard of Menlo Park and his ‘spirit phone’

Tags

Burt Reese, ghost telephone, invention, inventor, Life Units, Mediums, Menlow Park, science, Spirit communication, Spirit phone, Spiritualism, taking to the dead, Thomas Edison

‘Addle-brained’ young Thomas Edison. Source Wikipedia. Public domain.

This is the first part of a two-part post by Miss Jessel, looking at the extraordinary Thomas Edison (1847-1931), inventor and freethinker.  Famous for developing everything from the phonograph to the light bulb, he was also instrumental in bringing a scientific approach to the investigation of the spirit world. Lenora.

Thomas Edison was born on the 11^th February in 1847 in Milan in Ohio, America. When he was seven his teacher described him as ‘addled-brained’ because of his constant questions and so a decision was taken to home school him. Edison’s mother believed her son’s unusual demeanour and appearance were due to his extraordinary intelligence. The lack of formal education meant that Edison was able to develop his own approach to learning which included the importance of practical applications to test scientific theories.

A turning point in Edison’s life was when at the age of 14 he saved the 3-year-old son of a station master from being killed on the railway tracks by an oncoming box car. As a thank you the station master taught Edison morse code and the workings of the telegraph and as a result Edison began a career as a telegraph operator.

Edison’s experiments on improving the telegraph system and the use of electricity formed the basis of all his later inventions. In his life Edison registered 1093 patents either singly or jointly. His most famous inventions included the first practical electric lightbulb; dictaphone; memeograph; fluoroscopy; alkaline storage battery; and motion picture camera, the kinetoscope. Edison also set up the first industrial research lab at Menlo Park in New Jersey in 1876. The success of Edison’s research and inventions led him to be dubbed ‘the father of the electrical age’, ‘the greatest inventor who ever lived’ and my personal favourite ‘The Wizard of Menlo Park’[1].

Replica of the Menlo Park Lab. Source Andrew Balet via Wikimedia.

Probably the most controversial of Edison’s inventions is a device which many believe he never invented and others that the plans and models of were destroyed. This invention was an instrument which could communicate with the souls of the dead.

Atheist, Free-thinker or Deist

Edison has been labelled at different times and depending on the sympathies of the author either an atheist, free-thinker or deist.

Thomas Edison c1922. Source Wikimedia.

On being accused of atheism, Edison replied that he had never made such as a denial but that “what you call god I call nature, the supreme intelligence that rules matter”[2]. Although Edison is often described as a free-thinker he seems to have shared a very similar viewpoint to Thomas Paine who in his book ‘The Age of Reason’ expresses his opposition to institutionalized religions and the Bible. Edison’s belief in deism and the idea that although a creator existed beyond that it was only the laws of nature that ruled the world, is clear when he stated “I do not believe in the god of theologians, but that there is a supreme intelligence I do not doubt”[3].

A New Sixth Sense

A story is told about Edison’s first introduction to someone who claimed to be a clairvoyant. A stranger came to Edison’s lab and asked to see him. Edison was a little concerned about the man and so asked his assistant to come into the room. The man asked the assistant to write down a number of names which he then proceeded to repeat perfectly without looking at the paper. Edison then wanted to test the man’s ability and asked if he could write down a question. The man agreed. His response was ‘No, there is nothing better’. The question was whether there was anything better for a storage battery than nickel hydroxide. The man then left and Edison never saw him again[4].

Burt Reese 1851 -1926, Medium. Source Wikimedia.

This event may have been why Edison was so keen to test the famous medium Dr Bert Reese. Reese’s ‘divination method’ involved asking members of his audience to write names on pieces of paper which he would then roll up into small balls and rub on his forehead. He would then ‘read’ the paper with his mind. His accuracy amazed people as he would reel off the names correctly. Reese was revealed to be a charlatan by Harry Houdini at a séance but Edison was firmly convinced that Reese was genuine since he himself had never seen any evidence of Reese cheating[5].

These two experiences convinced Edison that clairvoyance was not due to some form of magical power but was proof of a new sensory ability which anyone could develop. It may have also confirmed and cemented Edison’s standpoint that the afterlife could also be deciphered by science.

Spiritualism vs Science

“I believe that if we are to make any real progress in psychic investigation we must do it with scientific apparatus and in a scientific manner, just as we do in medicine, electricity, chemistry, and other fields.”[6]

The Victorian era was the age of invention. Ideas that would have been seen as impossible a few decades earlier were now becoming a reality. Science was disproving many long-held beliefs. This new reality left some people uncomfortable and frightened. The desire to reconcile religion and science was one of the reasons for the rise of spiritualism. Some scientists felt that by scientifically proving that spirits and the afterlife existed they could then justify why so many people felt the need for religion.

Séance, 1872. Source Wikimedia.

Although Edison himself had no tolerance for people who believed in an afterlife or in the supernatural, “Because we are as yet unable to understand it, we call it immortal. It is the ignorant, lazy man’s refuge. There are plenty of savages, you know, who still call fire immortal”[7] it would have been strange for someone with his questioning personality if he had not got caught up in the spiritualism debate. Therefore it makes sense that Edison would have wanted to find answers using technology and if they exist give ‘spirits’ a better opportunity “to express themselves than the tilting tables and raps and Ouija boards and mediums and the other crude methods now purported to be the only means of communication.” [8]

Edison was first and foremost a scientist and so it is impossible to think that he would have ever conceived of the spirit or soul in the same way theologians or spiritualists did. There is evidence to prove that he was in contact with other like-minded scientists such as the British inventor, Sir William Crookes who claimed to have captured spirit images on photographs but what Edison always demanded was “Proof, proof! That is what I always have been after; that is what my mind requires before it can accept a theory as fact.”[9] It may have been this need for proof which was behind him thinking about building a device which could allow the souls of the dead to communicate.

If Edison did try to create such a device, the ‘spirits’ which he would have envisaged would not have been what spiritualists and religions refer to as shades, ghosts, phantoms or manifestations but a very scientific version i.e. what Edison called life units[10].

Swarms of life units

Edison’s idea of how life existed was quite unusual. He thought that animate objects were made up of extremely tiny particles which he called life units. These life units were even smaller than electrons and had yet to be officially discovered. Edison’s theory was based on the scientific concept that energy was interchangeable and that the energy which made up all lifeforms could not be created or destroyed. Therefore when an animate object died these life units broke up into their respective individual units, left their human vessel, created swarms and joined another form[11].

Since these life units made up all human functions they would also naturally make up the Broca’s Area of the brain which Edison believed wrongly was responsible for both personality and memory. Therefore as life units could not be destroyed, a person’s memory and personality would continue to exist after death[12].

It was these life units that Edison if he did create an instrument would have tried to contact.

Swarms of life units… Original Image by Bin im Garten via Wikimedia. Altered by Lenora.

In part two, Miss Jessel will look at whether Edison’s spirit phone was ever created, and evaluate the evidence as to whether Edison’s alleged invention was genuine or a hoax.  Click here to read Part Two.

biography

The Biography of Thomas Edison, http://www.thomasedison.com/biography.html

Thomas Edison, http://www.history.com/topics/inventions/thomas-edison

Thomas Edison, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Edison

The religious and political views of Thomas Edison http://hollowverse.com/thomas-edison/

Thomas Edison, http://www.history.co.uk/biographies/thomas-edison

Thomas Edison’s Telephone to the Afterlife  http://institute4learning.com/blog/2012/08/21/thomas-edisons-telephone-to-the-afterlife/

Thomas Edison and His Mysterious Telephone to the Dead, http://itcvoices.org/thomas-edisons-telephone-to-the-dead-myth-or-fact/

Edison and the Ghost Machine, http://paranormal.about.com/od/ghostaudiovideo/a/edison-ghost-machine.htm

Thomas Edison and the Ghost in the Machine, ww.paranormal-encyclopedia.com/e/thomas-edison/

How Thomas Edison Pranked the 1920s With His “Dead People” Phone http://gizmodo.com/5676604/how-thomas-edison-pranked-the-1920s-with-his-dead-people-phone

Inventions by Thomas Edison (That You’ve Never Heard Of), http://science.howstuffworks.com/10-inventions-thomas-edison10.htm

Edison’s ‘Lost’ Idea: A Device to Hear the Dead, http://www.seeker.com/edisons-lost-idea-a-device-to-hear-the-dead-1769577566.html

Edison’s Lost Plan To Record Voices Of Dead, http://news.sky.com/story/edisons-lost-plan-to-record-voices-of-dead-10368974

Edison’s forgotten ‘invention’: A phone that calls the dead http://www.reliableplant.com/Read/27212/Edison-invention-calls-dead

Notes

[1] The Biography of Thomas Edison, http://www.thomasedison.com/biography.html

[2] Thomas Edison, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Edison

[3] Thomas Edison, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Edison

[4] Thomas Edison and the Ghost in the Machine, ww.paranormal-encyclopedia.com/e/thomas-edison/

[5] Thomas Edison and the Ghost in the Machine, ww.paranormal-encyclopedia.com/e/thomas-edison/

[6] Edison and the Ghost Machine, http://paranormal.about.com/od/ghostaudiovideo/a/edison-ghost-machine.htm

[7] The religious and political views of Thomas Edison http://hollowverse.com/thomas-edison/

[8] Edison and the Ghost Machine, http://paranormal.about.com/od/ghostaudiovideo/a/edison-ghost-machine.htm

[9] The religious and political views of Thomas Edison http://hollowverse.com/thomas-edison/

[10] Thomas Edison and His Mysterious Telephone to the Dead, http://itcvoices.org/thomas-edisons-telephone-to-the-dead-myth-or-fact/

[11] Thomas Edison and His Mysterious Telephone to the Dead, http://itcvoices.org/thomas-edisons-telephone-to-the-dead-myth-or-fact/

[12] Thomas Edison and His Mysterious Telephone to the Dead, http://itcvoices.org/thomas-edisons-telephone-to-the-dead-myth-or-fact/

The Arthur’s Seat Coffins – shades of Burke and Hare?

Tags

1836, Arthur's Seat, bodysnatchers, burke and hare, coffins, Edinburgh, fairy coffins, folklore, Lilliputian coffins, magic, memorial, Menefee, miniature, National Museum of Scotland, seventeen, Simpson, sympathetic magic, West port murders, witches

Edinburgh Castle viewed from the Grassmarket.

Edinburgh. The elegant New Town, the Athens of the North, home to writers, philosophers and surgeons – the cradle of the Scottish Enlightenment.  But entwined with this respectable façade there is also the Old Town, with its narrow wynds and closes, rife with tales of squalor, plague and sudden death.  And looming in the distance, the ancient extinct volcano called Arthur’s seat.

A Strange Discovery

Salisbury Crags and Arthurs Seat.

Late June, 1836, a group of lads out rabbiting made their way up the North East flank of Arthur’s Seat. Poking about in the undergrowth they came upon a small cave or recess, blocked by three slate slabs.  Intrigued, they removed the slates and found within, 17 miniature coffins laid out in three rows – two rows of eight and a top row, apparently just begun, comprising one coffin.  Boys being boys, as opposed to trained archaeologists, they then began to pelt each other with the mysterious little coffins.  Despite this rough treatment, enough of the coffins made it down from their resting place and into safer hands.

The Arthur’s Seat Coffins

The find was described by The Scotsman newspaper, at the time:

” [Each coffin] contained a miniature figure of the human form cut out in wood, the faces in particular being pretty well executed. They were dressed from head to foot in cotton clothes, and decently laid out with a mimic representation of all the funereal trappings which usually form the last habiliments of the dead. The coffins are about three or four inches in length, regularly shaped, and cut out from a single piece of wood, with the exception of the lids, which are nailed down with wire sprigs or common brass pins. The lid and sides of each are profusely studded with ornaments, formed with small pieces of tin, and inserted in the wood with great care and regularity.”

The discovery of the Arthur’s Seat coffins gripped the public imagination as both local and national newspapers began to speculate as to who put them there? How long had they been there? What was their purpose?

Media speculation and public fascination

16th Century woodcut of witches. Public Domain[?]

At some point shortly after discovery the boys had relinquished their treasure and the coffins eventually went on display in a private museum, run by Robert Frazier an Edinburgh Jeweller.  Although sealed when originally found, they were soon opened and it was  discovered that each neatly made coffin, contained a carved wooden figure, individually dressed – care had clearly gone into the construction of the strange artefacts.  It was noted that some of the coffins in the lower rows appeared more decayed, some of the grave-clothes were completely missing, and this seemed to infer that they had been laid down over a considerable period of time.  Theories were quickly developed as to the possible meaning of the ‘fairy ‘coffins.

The First newspaper report was in The Scotsman, 16 July 1836, which while managing to maintain an air of rationalistic superiority at the very idea of such superstitious nonsense as witchcraft or demons, at the same time seemed to revel in giving the paying public exactly the sensationalism that they wanted:

“Our own opinion would be – had we not some years ago abjured witchcraft and demonology – that there are still some of the weird sisters hovering about the Mushat’s Cairn or the Windy Gowl, who retain their ancient power to work spells of death by entombing the likenesses of those they wish to destroy.”

Sensing a good story, other newspapers followed suit offering their own, slightly more restrained, theories:

The Edinburgh Evening Post suggested the coffins could be an example of a tradition, found in Saxony, of symbolically burying those who died overseas.  While the Caledonian Mercury suggested the origin was a tradition for family members to provide a ‘Christian Burial’ to sailors lost at sea.  [1]  This theory was supported, in the 1970’s, by Walter Havernick of the Museum of Hamburg who also proposed that the Arthur’s Seat Coffins represented a stockpile of such charms, stored there by a merchant for later retrieval.[2]  However, this would seem to me to be rather an extreme measure to take in storing merchandise that did not appear to have any real monetary value, in addition to which, the place of concealment was not even weatherproof resulting in damage to some of the coffins.

Some coffins show signs of deterioration – a sign of age or just weathering?

The National Museum of Scotland boasts many examples of charms against witchcraft that have been found in Scotland, charms were in use as late as the nineteenth century.  Nevertheless the theories that the coffins were connected either with witchcraft or honorific burials for those who died abroad or were lost at sea, are hard to evidence in Scotland’s known folk traditions. [3]

Charms on display at the National Museum of Scotland.

Until recently though, two things did seem to be agreed upon: the coffins appeared to have been placed there over a period of time (differences in deterioration of individual coffins seemed to support this theory) and their most likely purpose was some sort of honorific burial.  These conclusions were supported by the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland (later the National Museum of Scotland), who were gifted the remaining eight coffins in 1901.

The West Port Murders and the Day of Last Judgement

One of the most compelling recent theories is that proposed by Professor Samuel Menefee and Dr Allen Simpson.  They studied the coffins in the 1990’s and although their published findings are hard to locate online, their work is quoted from extensively by Mike Dash in his detailed article on the Coffins, available on the Charles Fort Institute website (CFI).[4]

Details of the Arthur’s Seat coffins – tiny corpses both dressed and undressed.

Menefee and Simpson were able to identify that one or at most two individuals made the coffins (based on stylistic differences in coffin shape) and the tools used suggested the maker was a shoemaker, rather than a carpenter, as a sharp knife and not chisel was used to hollow out the coffins.  The tin decorations were of the type used in shoemaking or leather-making further strengthening this theory. Their findings also indicate that the figures themselves were probably originally toy soldiers dating from the late eighteenth century.  Perhaps the most important revelation from their study relates to the thread used in the clothing.  Three ply cotton thread was used to sew the grave-clothes for one of the figures, this thread was not in use in Scotland before 1830.  Other figures using one or two ply thread may have been earlier, but as Mike Dash suggests the date range could be as short at 1800-1830 – so it would seem that the infamous Scottish weather was to blame for the deterioration of some of the coffins, rather than the passage of time.

In fact Menefee and Simpson’s theory supposes a date after 1830 and they draw attention to the number of coffins in place as being a significant indicator that the placement of the coffins was event-driven, rather than part of a long-standing folk tradition. Dash provides the following quote from their work:

“It is arguable, that the problem with the various theories is their concentration on motivation, rather than on the even or events that caused the interments.  The former will always be open to argument, but if the burials were event-driven [..] the speculation would at least be built on demonstrable fact.  Stated another way, what we seek is an Edinburgh-related event or events, involving seventeen deaths, which occurred close to 1830 and certainly before 1836.  One obvious answer springs to mind – the West Port Murders by William Burke and William Hare in 1827 and 1828.” [5]

Burke and Hare. Image Source National Museum of Scotland.

Burke and Hare made a living out of death, selling bodies to the anatomist Dr Robert Knox a Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh.  They began their careers as opportunists following the death of Hare’s lodger, Old Donald.  Old Donald died owing a substantial amount of rent, so Hare and his friend Burke decided to sell his body to the local anatomists to recoup the loss.  So profitable was this enterprise that their initial opportunism soon blossomed into a full-scale murder spree, tallying sixteen victims before they were caught.  While Hare escaped the hangman’s noose by turning kings evidence, Burke was hanged for his crimes on 28 January 1829 and his body sent for public dissection.

Mort safe in Grey Friars Kirkyard.

What made both the work of the anatomist surgeons and the murders carried out by Burke and Hare so dreadful to people at the time, was they were in effect denying the deceased the chance of salvation at the Last Judgment.  Christians at the time held a strong belief that the dead would literally rise up on the final day of judgement.  So, if a loved one’s body was dissected and destroyed it was on the one hand a horror in the physical sense, but on the other hand, a deeper metaphysical horror at the spiritual consequences of the destruction of the body.  People went to great lengths to protect their departed relatives from this fate, as the mort-safes in Grey Friars Kirkyard attest.

Menefee and Simpson’s study suggests that the event that triggered the interment of the seventeen coffins on Arthur’s Seat was the West Port murders of Burke and Hare.  They propose that the coffins were a symbolic burial for those whose bodies were destroyed because of the actions of Burke and Hare.  A way that the dead could still stand for their last judgment. So although their scientific analysis of the material used to make the coffins explodes one theory (of their antiquity) they do support the long-held view that they represent honorific burial.[6]

Conclusion

So, were the coffins evidence of satanic rituals, witchcraft, protection for sailors on the high seas, or mock burials for those who died abroad?  Or a reminder of the grisly crimes of Burke and Hare?

It would seem that one of the earliest theories, that the coffins represented honorific burials, might not have been too far off the mark, even if the motivation for them was event driven rather than an ancient tradition.

If the crimes of Burke and Hare are the inspiration behind the Arthur’s Seat Coffins, some questions still remain: who made the coffins – a relative of one of the victims or someone who knew Burke and Hare and wished to make amends?  If they are related to the West Port Murders, then, as Min Bannister of the Edinburgh Fortean Society points out, why are they all male figures when the victims included twelve women?  Could this simply be because the offering was a token gesture and not meant to represent the actual individuals?  Is it also possible that the single coffin at the top represents the first ‘victim’ old Donald, whose death by natural causes gave Burke and Hare the idea for their terrible crimes?  Chances are we will never know for sure, but perhaps that is part of their enduring fascination…

The Arthur’s Seat Coffins are on display at the National Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh.

Sources and notes

Images – unless otherwise credited all images by Lenora.

http://www.nms.ac.uk/explore/stories/scottish-history-and-archaeology/mystery-of-the-miniature-coffins/ [1] [2] [3]

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/edinburghs-mysterious-miniature-coffins-22371426/

http://blogs.forteana.org/node/97  The Miniature coffins found on Arthur’s Seat by Mike Dash [4] [5] [6]

 

John Middleton and Laird Bocconi: A Ghostly Bromance

Tags

1st Earl of Middleton, charles II, civil war, covenanters, England, Ghosts, Hauntings, John Middleton, Laird Bocconi, pacts, presbyterians, Scotland

Images source unknown.

The image of the vengeful ghost is one which is very common in literature, films and folklore. Usually the spirit returns to wreak revenge on someone who had wronged them when they were alive or to seek help in carrying out their revengeful plan or even just to curse those who unluckily come into contact with them. Famous fictional examples include The King in Hamlet, Samara from The Ring series and Jennet Humfrye from The Woman in Black. There are also people who claim that evil spirits intent on causing them harm share the same house. For instance The Cage in St Osyth which was labelled as one of the UK’s most haunted houses by the TV series, Great British Ghosts is reported to be occupied by the vengeful spirit of Ursula Kemp, one of 13 women accused of witchcraft who were chained up in the house prior to their execution[1].

The flip side of the coin is spirits who return to help the living rather than to harm them. There are many reasons given as to why they return such as to bring comfort to grieving family and friends, to impart a message such as the location of important documents or family heirlooms or to give a warning. One of the most often repeated stories involves a pact made between two close friends, John Middleton and Laird Bocconi to help each other from beyond the grave.[2]

A Career Soldier

John Middleton, 1st Earl of Middleton, pictured in later life. Source Wikimedia.

John Middleton born around 1608 was the eldest son of a Robert Middleton, Laird of Caldhame in Kincardineshire in Scotland. Middleton’s origins are obscure which probably indicates that he was from a humble background. Some sources say that he enlisted as a regimental pikeman when he was just thirteen but all agree that by 1632 he had joined the regiment raised by Sir John Hepburn for service in France. Whatever the truth of his origins, Middleton was a career soldier and a good one. It was due to his skill and ability that he worked his way up the ranks to become captain of the Covenanter army led by Earl James Graham of Montrose during the Bishops’ Wars[3].

Victory at the Battle of the Brig O’Dee

The Bishops’ Wars (1639-1640) were triggered by Charles I desire to remove the Presbyterian system (without bishops) favoured by the Church of Scotland and replace it with an episcopal system (with bishops). Charles I also wanted to force the Scots to follow the Book of Common Prayer.

The determination and success of the Scottish rebellion led to Charles I eventually admitting defeat and accepting the decisions of the General Assembly and the Scottish Parliament. Middleton played a vital role in the Covenanter army. In June 1639, he successfully led an attack on the Royalists at the Brig o’ Dee outside Aberdeen. The battle at the Brig o’ Dee was the only ‘substantial action’ that took place during the First Bishop’s War.

Covenanters petitioning Charles I. Source: Bridgeman Art Library.

The Parliamentary Cause

At the outbreak of the English Civil War in 1642, the Covenanter army allied themselves with the Parliamentarian cause against the Royalists. Middleton volunteered and fought at the Battle of Edgehill and in 1644 he was promoted to the rank of the Lieutenant-General in the Regiment of Horse in Sir William Waller’s Southern Associate and served in the Oxford Campaign and at the Battle of Cropredy Bridge. In 1645 Middleton returned to Scotland and joined the Army of the Covenant with the rank of major-general. In February 1646 Middleton was given the rank of commander-in-chief by the Committee of Estates and fought a campaign against the Royalists in the Highlands. Middleton also helped to negotiate the final terms for the surrender of Montrose (who he had formerly fought under) in July 1646[4].

The Battle of Edgehill. Source: Bridgeman Art Library.

A Fraught Partnership

Although between 1642 and 1647 the Covenanters and the Parliamentarians fought on the same side, the alliance was often on shaky grounds. Differences of religious ideology made them uneasy bedfellows. The parliamentarians were unhappy with the Scottish aim to impose a Presbyterian system on the Church of England and the Covenanters were equally uncomfortable with the increased radicalisation of the parliamentarian troops and the popularity of the levellers’ ideas in the New Model Army. The conflict between the two allies came to a head shortly after the Covenanters handed over Charles I to the parliamentarians after the king had surrendered to them at Newark in 1646. This led to an alliance or the Engagement between the Scots and the Royalists with Charles I promising to impose Presbyterianism on the Church of England for a period of three years once he was reinstated on the throne[5].

Charles I insulted by Cromwell’s soldiers. Source: wikipedia

A Change of Heart

As the covenanters changed alliances so did Middleton and as a result he found himself for the first time fighting for Charles I instead of against him. In August 1648 Middleton was amongst those who were taken prisoner by the Roundheads after the Royalist defeat at the Battle of Preston. Middleton broke parole and made his way back to Scotland to join up with Sir Thomas Mackenzie of Pluscardine in an abortive Royalist uprising in the Highlands in the Spring of 1649.

A Ruffian’s Penance

Sack cloth and ashes. Source: unknown.

Middleton’s support for both the Royalists and the Engagement brought him into conflict with the Presbyterians of the godly Kirk. Middleton was probably not someone whom the Presbyterians would have been too fond of anyway because of his reputation as a notorious ‘hard-drinking ruffian’[6]. As a punishment they excommunicated Middleton in October 1650 and then forced him to undergo a public penance. Middleton was made to wear a sackcloth at St Mary’s Kirk in Dundee[7]. This humiliating experience left Middleton with a deep hatred of and grudge against the Presbyterians. As a result of his degrading treatment Middleton became a loyal supporter of the Royalists and in particular Charles II. His grit, experience and ability made him indispensable to Charles II and a dangerous foe to the Presbyterians who he was once willing to put his life on the line for.

A Ghostly Visitation

The Tower of London. Source: hauntedisland.co.uk

In September 1651 whilst fighting on behalf of Charles II, Middleton was captured at the Battle of Worcester. In a bad state and wounded Middleton was sent to the Tower of London to await trial for treason. It is whilst he was a prisoner that one of the strangest stories of a ghostly apparition was reported to have occurred. One night while he was lying in bed feeling depressed, Middleton saw the ghost of his friend, Laird Bocconi appear before him. Many years before Middleton and Bocconi had made a friendship pact that if one of them died before the other and if the survivor was in trouble, the deceased friend would return to help him. Middleton first asked Bocconi if he was alive or dead[8]. Bocconi’s ghost replied that he was dead and that he had died a long time ago. Bocconi then continued that Middleton’s life was in serious danger and that he needed to make his escape sooner rather than later. Middleton did in fact manage to escape three days after receiving this ghostly advice by disguising himself in his wife’s, Lady Grizel’s clothes. His escape was even more remarkable since he manage to get out his cell despite the door being tripled locked! Did he have inside help? Did his wife change places with him? No one knows and no other details about how he got away have ever emerged.

Source: wikipedia

Bocconi’s appearance up to the point of his warning seemed to follow a typical pattern for manifestations of this type but then after delivering his message Bocconi did something very bizarre. Middleton reported that Bocconi started to do a frisk i.e. jigged around the room and recited a short rhyme,

“Givanni, Givanni, ‘tis very strange,

In the world to see so sudden a change”[9]

Then Bocconi vanished. Why did Bocconi’s ghost suddenly decide to prance around the cell and chant and what if anything did the rhyme have to do with Middleton’s situation? Bocconi’s use of the Italian equivalent of the name ‘John’ does show that Bocconi was addressing Middleton directly but the rest of his chant is confusing. Was the ghost referring to Middleton’s personal change in circumstances i.e. from a free man to a prisoner or to the remarkable change in his allegiances or more generally to the tumultuous times Middleton was living in? Could the message have been a prediction about Middleton’s future and his rise in the world? No one has ever managed to explain the ghost’s actions or to be fair I don’t think anyone has ever tried.

Aftermath

Middleton managed to get to France and join the exiled Charles II in Paris. By 1653 he was made commander of the Royalist forces and was at the forefront of the military campaign to restore the Stewarts to the English throne. When Charles II became king he was given the title of the Earl of Middleton. Middleton was appointed in 1660 as the Royal Commissioner to the (Scots) Parliament[10] using his position to help the king root out Presbyterianism from Scotland. His rapid rise from humble beginnings caused resentment amongst the established nobility, in particular the Earl of Lauderdale who contrived to destroy Middleton. Lauderdale succeeded for a while with Middleton being stripped of his position and offices but he was soon back in favour. In 1663 he was made Governor of Rochester and later in 1668 he was appointed as the Governor of Tangiers. Middleton remained in Tangiers as governor until his death in July 1674[11]. It is believed he died from injuries sustained after falling down some stairs whilst extremely drunk[12].

Image Source: Franz Hals[?]

A Final Note

On a historical note, Middleton had the last laugh as despite the Scottish aristocracy contempt for him, his descendant is currently sitting on the throne of England! Queen Elizabeth through her matrilineal line is a direct descendent of John Middleton[13]. The only mention of Bocconi I could find was in relation to his ghost, who he was, what he did and how he met Middleton seems so far to have vanished from the pages of history. Maybe they met when Middleton was fighting on the continent. Bocconi sounds Italian but the title of Lord was given in its Scottish form. Does that mean anything? probably not. As to the ghost story, it is a unique tale revealing very strange behaviour on the part of the spirit, from a dignified and ominous entry to a rather silly exit. I would also be fascinated to know if anyone ever manages to work out the meaning of Bocconi’s last words on earth!

Image source: favim.com[?]

Bibliography

John Middleton, 1^st Earl of Middleton, http://www.undiscoveredscotland.co.uk/usbiography/m/johnmiddleton.html

Royal Middleton Roots, http://www.scotclans.com/royal-middleton-roots/

Alisdair McRae, How the Scots won the English Civil War: The triumph of Fraser’s Dragoons

Brave or bonkers? Man chooses to live in ‘Britain’s most haunted house’ where poltergeists BITE guests, http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/brave-bonkers-man-chooses-live-7080762

Magnus Bennett, Royal wedding: Prince William ‘has Middleton ancestry’, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-north-east-orkney-shetland-13209043

Owen Davies, The Haunted: A social history of ghosts

Horace Welby (editor), Signs Before Death: Authenticated Apparitions

John Middleton, c.1608-74, http://bcw-project.org/biography/john-middleton

Covenanter, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Covenanter

Bishops’ Wars, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bishops’_Wars

Tristan Hunt, The English Civil War: The Endgame – 1646 – 1649 – Introduction, http://www.open.edu/openlearn/history-the-arts/history/world-history/the-english-civil-war-the-endgame-1646-1649-introduction

John Middleton, 1st Earl of Middleton, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Middleton,_1st_Earl_of_Middleton

Middleton name already part of Prince William’s family tree, https://www.thecourier.co.uk/news/115525/middleton-name-already-part-of-prince-williams-family-tree/

Notes

[1] Brave or bonkers? Man chooses to live in ‘Britain’s most haunted house’ where poltergeists BITE guests, http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/brave-bonkers-man-chooses-live-7080762

[2] Owen Davies, The Haunted: A social history of ghosts

[3] John Middleton, c.1608-74, http://bcw-project.org/biography/john-middleton

[4] ibid

[5] Covenanter, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Covenanter

[6]Royal Middleton Roots, http://www.scotclans.com/royal-middleton-roots/

[7] Alisdair McRae, How the Scots won the English Civil War: The triumph of Fraser’s Dragoons

[8] Horace Welby (editor), Signs Before Death: Authenticated Apparitions

[9] ibid

[10] Middleton name already part of Prince William’s family tree, https://www.thecourier.co.uk/news/115525/middleton-name-already-part-of-prince-williams-family-tree/

[11] John Middleton, c.1608-74, http://bcw-project.org/biography/john-middleton

[12] Magnus Bennett, Royal wedding: Prince William ‘has Middleton ancestry’, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-north-east-orkney-shetland-13209043

[13] Magnus Bennett, Royal wedding: Prince William ‘has Middleton ancestry’, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-north-east-orkney-shetland-13209043

The deathly stoop chair of Thomas Busby

Tags

Busby Stoop Inn, cursed chair, daniel awety, death, Ghosts, gibbet, haunted furniture, Murder, stoop, thirsk museum, thomas busby

Thirsk Museum. Image source Trip Advisor.

If you visit the small jewel of a museum in Thirsk you will see the rather strange sight of an oak chair hung from the ceiling in one of the display areas. The chair was suspended at the explicit request of its owner to prevent anyone from ever sitting on it including maintenance and cleaners[1]. The museum has never broken its promise in over 30 years despite numerous requests and even the threat of legal action[2].

A notorious ruffian

Portrait of Thomas Busby. Image source: darkhauntingswordpress.com

Local legend has it that the chair belonged to Thomas Busby, a thug, thief and drunkard who lived in North Yorkshire in the latter part of the 1600s. Busby married Elizabeth, the daughter of a small time petty crock, Daniel Awety who lived near the village of Kirby Wiske. Awety had purchased a farm after moving to the area from Leeds. His house which he called Danotty Hall was ideal for Awety, enabling him to continue with his illegal coining activities in relative seclusion. It was even reported that Awety had built within the house a hidden chamber which was connected to the cellar via a secret passageway[3]. Busby who was also the original owner of an inn near Sandhutton and just three miles from Danotty Hall became Awety’s partner in crime.

A crime of passion

The details of what happened that fatal last day of Awety’s life are vague. Awety and Busby may have argued earlier that day but over what is not known, it could have been something to do with Elizabeth, the coining business or almost anything else. Their relationship was known to be far from harmonious with Busby often in a foul mood with Awety for some reason or another.

Gibbet. Source unknown.

What is clear is that later that day a drunken and volatile Busby returned to his inn only to find Awety waiting for him threatening to take Elizabeth home with him. Busby’s mood only blackened when he saw Awety sitting in his favourite chair. Whatever their second argument of the day was over Busby forcibly removed Awety from the chair and threw him out.

That night Busby still seething grabbed a hammer, stormed over to Danotty Hall and bludgeoned Awety to death. Busby then tried to hide his handiwork in the woods. Concern over Awety’s sudden disappearance led to a local search of the area being made. On finding the body, Busby was arrested at the inn and charged with murder.

In the summer of 1702 Busby was tried and sentenced to death for murder at the York Assizes. His punishment was to be gibbeted i.e. hung from a gibbet, his body dipped in tar and his remains displayed on a stoop (post) attached to the gibbet, in full view of his inn. The inn was soon after renamed the Busby Stoop Inn, a name which it retained until it closed in 2012.

The Busby Stoop Inn. Image taken from Paranormalguide.com

Busby’s final warning

Busby’s favorite chair. Image source: Paranormalguide.com

It is here that the story veers away from historical certainty and moves into the realms of local folklore. One version recounts how Busby was granted his last wish which was to have a final drink at his own inn and sit in his favorite chair. On leaving the inn to make his final journey to the execution site Busby cursed the chair declaring that death would come shortly to anyone who sat in it. Another version tells how Busby drunkenly shouted out the curse whilst being taken to the gibbet to be hung. Whichever way you look at it, Busby was determined that even from beyond the grave he would never allow anyone to enjoy sitting in his beloved chair.

Busby’s spirit was believed to have haunted his old pub as well as the area where he was gibbeted[4] but it’s his precious chair, the focus of his curse which became irrevocably linked to his revengeful spirit. According to local legend, this seemly innocuous piece of furniture has been responsible for more deaths than most serial killers (one estimate puts the number of its victims at over 60!).

The chair’s first victim?

The first reported death alleged to be associated with the death chair is that of a chimney sweep who along with a friend sat in the chair whilst having a drink one evening in 1894. The sweep never made it home that night, being completely inebriated he laid down on the road to sleep. The next morning his body was found hanging from the post next to the gibbet. His death was ruled as a suicide but in 1914 the friend with whom the chimney sweep had spent his last hours with admitted on his death bed to having robbed and murdered his friend.

Dead man’s chair or Don’t sit down!

During the Second World War, the pub became a popular drinking spot with RCAF airmen. The airmen would goad each other to sit in the chair. Those that took up the challenge never returned from their missions.

In 1968 a couple of years before Tony Earnshaw took over the running of the pub, he overheard two airmen dare each other to sit in the chair. They both did. Returning to the airfield their car left the road and crashed into a tree. They both died on the way to the hospital.

Source: Pinterest

Through the early 1970s the chair seemed to claim a number of victims including a cleaning lady who was diagnosed with a brain tumor after knocking into the chair; a number of cyclists and motorcyclists who suffered fatal road accidents; a hitch-hiker who was run over after having spent two nights at the pub and; a local man who died of a heart attack shortly after sitting in the condemned chair[5].

A group of builders having a drink at the pub cajoled the youngest of their group into sitting on the chair. Back at the site the man fell through the roof of the building and landed on the concrete ground below. This death proved to be the final straw for Earnshaw and he banished the chair to the cellar.

A delivery man from the brewery was in the cellar one day when he decided to try out the chair. He commented to Earnshaw that it was far too comfortable to be left down there. He was killed shortly afterwards when his van went off the road. Soon after Earnshaw must have decided that the chair despite being a profitable tourist attraction was too dangerous to keep any longer. In 1978 Earnshaw donated it to the Thirsk Museum

A grim legacy or tourist gimmick?

There are so many questions that have been left unanswered and probably unanswerable. Did Busby really commit murder over a chair? Could any person truly hold such deep affection for a carved piece of wood? Is Busby’s revengeful and jealous spirit still attacking anyone who dares sit in his seat? Or was the murder over something far more important, something which we will never know about? Is the chair really haunted or was it a money-making gimmick? Is the chair just really an extremely unlucky piece of furniture? Is this chair really the same chair that Busby fought over[6]?

The chair is safely out of reach now. Image source: Hauntedyorkshire.com

Many people believe the deaths were just an unlucky coincidence. Another explanation could be simply that the majority of those brave enough to defy the curse were just risk-takers, prepared to push their luck[7] (it is interesting how many of the deaths happened on roads and thousands of men of Bomber Command never returned from sorties) and were simply unlucky.

On one hand, it would be intriguing to test the chair to see if the legend about this unusual haunting is really true…but on the other hand, sometimes it is better not to know…

Bibliography

Thomas Busby’s Ghost – The Busby Stoop Inn: http://www.spiritseekers.info/thomasbusbyghost.php

Busby’s stoop chair: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Busby%27s_stoop_chair

The infamous Busby Stoop Chair: http://www.thirskmuseum.org/chair.htm

The Busby Stoop Curse – The full story: http://soapboxcorner.blogspot.co.uk/2007/10/busby-stoop-curse-full-story.html

The Cursed Busby’s Chair: http://seeksghosts.blogspot.co.uk/2014/02/the-cursed-busbys-chair.html

Chair of death: http://unsolvedmysteries.wikia.com/wiki/Chair_of_Death

Busby’s Stoop Chair of Death: http://www.theparanormalguide.com/blog/busbys-stoop-chair-of-death

Notes

[1] Busby’s stoop chair: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Busby%27s_stoop_chair

[2] The Busby Stoop Curse – The full story: http://soapboxcorner.blogspot.co.uk/2007/10/busby-stoop-curse-full-story.html

[3] ibid

[4] Thomas Busby’s Ghost – The Busby Stoop Inn: http://www.spiritseekers.info/thomasbusbyghost.php

[5] The Cursed Busby’s Chair: http://seeksghosts.blogspot.co.uk/2014/02/the-cursed-busbys-chair.html

[6] The Busby Stoop Curse – The full story: http://soapboxcorner.blogspot.co.uk/2007/10/busby-stoop-curse-full-story.html

[7] Death chairs

 

The Thundering Earl and the Northumbrian Jacobites of the ’15

Tags

1715, Anna Maria Radcliffe, Devil Water, Dilston Castle, Earl of Derwentwater, Ghostly earl, Hanoverian, jacobites, James Radcliffe, Lords Bridge, Northumberland, Northumbrian Jacobites, Radclyffe, Rising, Tom Forster

Unraveling the thread of time

Taken near Alnwick, Northumberland. Picture source: Reed Ingram Weir/MASONS/SWNS.com

On 6 March 2016 the North of England was witness to the eerie dance of the Northern Lights in the night sky.  Not often seen so far south, the phenomena was perfectly timed almost coinciding, as it did, with the 300th Anniversary of the execution of James Radcliffe. The Third Earl of Derwentwater was executed on 24 February 1716, at Tower Hill in London, for his part in the doomed Jacobite Rising of 1715.  Perhaps the lights were a ripple in time, a reminder that it was as the coffin of the doomed Earl was born home to Dilston, that the same Aurora Borealis was witnessed in the north as a sign of heaven’s displeasure at Radcliffe’s death, and became known as Lord Derwentwater’s Lights.

Francis Dunn, a servant of the Earl’s aunt, witnessed the phenomena at the time, and wrote:

‘A most Beautifull glory appeard over ye hearse, wch all saw, sending forth resplendant streams of colours to ye east & west, the finest yt ever I saw in my Life.  It hung like a delicate rich curtain & continued a quarter & half of an hour over ye hearse.  There was a great light seen at night in several places & people flockt all night from durham to see ye corpse. Its remark’t yt att ye same day & hour ye glory appear’d over my lord’s hearse, ye most dreadfull signs appeared over London.’ [1]

Dilston and Chapel viewed from the trees.

In fact, in the 300 years since the Earl of Derwentwater died under the headsman’s axe, his shade, and that of his wife, has become part of local lore in and around Dilston and Northumberland.  In 1888 The Reverent Heslop writing in the Monthly Chronicle, claimed the Earl did not rest quiet in his tomb:

“The Hall is behind us, and its tragic story haunts the place.  it is but a generation since the trampling hoofs and the clatter of harness was heard on the brink of the steep here, revealing to that trembling listener that ‘the Earl’ yet galloped with spectral troops across the haugh.  Undisturbed, as the reverent hands of his people had laid him and his severed head, the Earl himself had rested hardly in the little vault for a whole century; yet the troops have been seen by the country people over and over again as they swept and swerved through the dim mist of the hollow of the dene.”

But not only the Earl is said to frequent the ruins of Dilston and Devil Water, his tragic bride is also bound to the castle in death.  The story goes that the Earl was a reluctant rebel, and upon setting out with his troop, turned one last time to view Dilston Hall and his vast estates.  His resolution wavered as he considered that should the rising fail, he would not only be risking himself, but the future prosperity of his young son and heir.  With that thought, he turned for home.  However, in the courtyard of Dilston, the Earl was met by his young and implacable wife who proceeded to berated him, going so far as to strike him with her fan, whilst exclaiming ‘take that, and give your sword to me.’ [2] With those words she condemned her husband to his terrible fate, and the Earldom of Derwentwater to eventual destruction.  After the young Earl’s death, she too died young and heartbroken; her tormented shade is said to flit between the tall tower of Dilston Castle and Dilston Chapel, lighted cresset in her hand, awaiting the return of her dead lord.

The tall tower at Dilston Castle.

But local lore and legend may have dealt harshly with the Countess and her hesitant husband….

The Jacobite cause in a nutshell

James II of England, by Godfrey Kneller. Source Wikipedia.

The seventeenth century was a time of great political, social and religious upheaval in England. When Charles II died in 1685 without issue, his brother James inherited the throne.  James was raised an Anglican but became a catholic, and after the religious turmoil of the past century, that made people nervous.  James’s autocratic style of rule didn’t make him many friends and when his second wife gave him a son in 1688, assuring a catholic succession, parliament made its move.

Parliament turned to James’s protestant daughter Mary and her Dutch husband William of Orange, offering them the crown jointly, thus triggering the so-called Glorious Revolution of 1688 which ousted James II.  In replacing James II, the de jure king of England (King by right/divine or otherwise), with King William, the de facto (King by possession of the office) the Jacobite cause was born.

When William and Mary died without issue, James’s other protestant daughter, Anne, took the throne.  Anne died without issue in 1714 and the throne of England was set to pass to a distant German princeling, George, elector of Hanover.  This was almost too much, not only for the catholic Jacobites, but also for many high church Tories in England – the stage was now set for a dangerous rebellion [3 & 4].

The Radcliffes of Dilston Castle and the Stuart Connection

Lady Mary Tudor – the Stuart connection. Public Domain[?]

The North had always been viewed by the south as a hotbed of Catholicism and potential unrest and measures were taken to curb the powers and resources of Catholics in the area. In Northumberland the most prominent and wealthy catholic family was the Radcliffe family of Dilston Hall, near Corbridge.  In the seventeenth century the Radcliffe’s had successfully married into the Stuart Royal family – albeit on the wrong side of the sheets.  The 3rd Baronet of Derwentwater, Francis, engineered the marriage of his son Edward to the Lady Mary Tudor, the natural daughter of Charles II, in 1688. The Radcliffes were now fatally linked to the doomed house of Stuart.

The marriage brought an Earldom with it, granted by James II shortly before his overthrow, but it was not a successful marriage. Nevertheless they had four children, the first James, being born on 28 June 1689.

The Radcliffe’s Stuart links were further cemented when the teenage James was sent with his brother Francis, to live with their royal cousin James III (James II having died in 1701) at the court in exile at St Germain in France. In 1705, while James and Francis were still in France, their father died leaving James, at only 16, the third Earl of Derwentwater.

Dilston Hall, demolished in the 1760’s.

In 1709 Queen Anne allowed the young Earl to return to England and take up his responsibilities.  After a brief stay in London, James set off in February 1710 to view his northern estates for the first time.  He seems to have made a good impression on the locals, he was after all, young, fashionable and rich.  But more than that, he was described as possessing a charming smile and a generous nature – qualities which more than made up for his shortness of stature.   During this initial stay he fell in love with Dilston and decided to build a grand new hall befitting his status as third Earl of Derwentwater.  In the meantime the Earl made his presence felt in the area, entertaining his neighbours and cousins such as the Erringtons of Beaufront and Swinbournes of Capheaton.

James Radcliffe, 3rd Earl of Derwentwater. Source Wikipedia.

Early on James’s Jacobite sympathies were recognised by his neighbours, and in 1710 he was invited to Lancashire to meet with other gentlemen Jacobites who regularly met at the Unicorn Inn in Walton-le-Dale.  Eventually he became Mayor of this group.  Whether this was an honorary title, or something that required active engagement, it indicates that he took an keen interest in the Jacobite cause at an early stage.  However, it is important to note that at this time there was a genuine hope that Queen Anne would name James III as her heir, thereby providing a peaceful resolution to the problem of the king over the water.  James Radcliffe, cousin and childhood companion of James III, must have hoped as much.  After all, as one of the richest men in the North, he would have much to lose if it came to an uprising [5].

For a while things went smoothly for the young Earl, he married Anna Maria Webb, a pretty catholic heiress, in 1712 and moved away from Dilston for a few years while the new hall was constructed.  His heir John was born in 1713, and soon after Dilston Hall was completed, allowing Radcliffe family to return.  But things were not going so smoothly elsewhere…. Queen Anne sickened and died in 1714, and King George I’s reign looked set to entrench the power of the Whigs, the Jacobites and Tories grew fractious, riots and unrest soon broke out in London….

James and Anna Maria.

Oak Leaves and White Roses

Oakleaves and White Roses, Jacobite Symbols. Image SNA.

History records that the Jacobite Rising of 1715 began on 6 September, when John Erskine 11th Earl of Mar raised the Stuart standard in Braemar.   That the Jacobite Risings were largely Scottish affairs has entered the popular imagination, however there were many in England who felt sympathy for the king over the water. Catholic or not, he was the rightful heir and in a time when belief in the divine right of kings had not yet evaporated, that could count for a lot.   There were also many who were not happy at the prospect of a German king and a Whig stranglehold on power.

In the North, key catholic Peers such as The Earl of Derwentwater, Lord Widderington and MPs such as Thomas Forster of Adderstone and Sir William Blackett of Wallington quickly fell under suspicion.  On 22 September 1715 warrants were issued for their arrest.  The young Earl decided a low profile would be advisable, hiding for two weeks in in tenants cottages and with friends and relations all across the area [6].

All would seem the actions of a man who dabbled in intrigue, but was not an instigator of rebellion.  Nevertheless the Earl knew that he could not run and hide for ever, and after all, he had Stuart blood in his veins.  Under the guise of a race meeting held at Wide Hough meadow near Dilston on 5 October 1715, the Earl and his compatriots decided to make their stand on the morrow.  The next morning the Earl, his brother Charles and their small band set out to meet Thomas Forster,  the commander of the Northumbrian Jacobites, and his men, at Greenriggs, a wild desolate moorland, between Redesmouth and Sweethope Lough.  The die was cast.

The Rising in the North

The Northumbrian Jacobites of the ’15 have had a bad press, being described by one writer thus:

‘In October a handful of Catholic Gentry under Forster and Derwentwater, amateurs in rebellion and war, had ridden out in Northumberland [..]

The quixotic travesty of civil war by a mob of foxhunters, had found no support save from the more dare-devil of the Catholic gentry and Mackintosh’s Highlanders.  The English Rebellion was at an end.’ [7]

Thomas Forster MP, and leader of the Northumbrian Jacobites.

The mission of the Northumbrian Jacobites was to capture Newcastle and thereby hobble the government in London by cutting off their coal supply.  They would be supported by a French led invasion fleet which was expected to land on the Northumbrian coast.  History however did not record this outcome.  Instead, weak and indecisive leadership, lack of the promised support from the High Church Tories, inability to capture Newcastle and the failure of the French fleet to materialise left the Northumbrian Jacobites little choice but to head into the pro-Jacobite territory of Lancashire hoping for greater success.

Leo Gooch, however,  has presented a more sympathetic and compelling view of the effectiveness of the Northumbrian Jacobites in his book ‘The Desperate Faction?’  He argues that the original plan formulated by the Earl of Mar, for a Northumbrian landing of the Jacobite forces, was militarily sound. It was only when this plan was shelved by Ormonde and Bolingbroke (without bothering to inform Tom Forster and the Northumbrians) in favour of a landing in the South West, that things started to go badly wrong.  Gooch argues that when this new strategy failed, Forster was thrust into the role of commander of all the Jacobite forces in England.  Although he and Derwentwater did their best, they were, quite literally fighting a losing battle [8].

Execution

That losing battle was at Preston.  The supposed Jacobite support in Lancashire remained dormant and the rebel forces were defeated and their leaders captured and taken to London for trial.   Many were condemned to die, some escaped, some were pardoned.  Tom Forster who rode out with the Earl of Dertwentwater was executed but Derwentwater’s brother Charles managed to escape.  The Earl himself, was lodged in the Tower of London, as befitted his status.  His devoted wife Anna Maria stayed with him and petitioned for his release.  It was not to be.  He was beheaded on Tower Hill on 24 February 1716.

Jacobite Lords on Trial.

Catholic Martyr

Suit worn by the Earl at his execution. Source Northumbrian Jacobite Website.

Once executed James’s body was wrapped in black cloth, with his severed head in red velvet.  His body was then secretly conveyed to a surgeon called Metcalf who embalmed the corpse and removed the heart which was to be sent to the English nuns at Angers in France.  Mr King the undertaker then provided a lead coffin covered in crimson velvet and gilt nails, to convey the third Earl back to his home at Dilston for burial in the chapel.  It was said that his heart remained uncorrupted for many years and was able to heal those who touched it, it was especially effective on Scrofula or the king’s evil [9].

On his return to Dilston, the Northern Lights accompanied his procession.  Many saw this as a sign of Heaven’s displeasure at the Earl’s execution, it was said the Devil Water ran red at Dilston. Already tales began to be told that would place James Radcliffe, the Jacobite third Earl of Dertwentwater firmly in the folk memory of the region.

Devil Water at Dilston ran red when the Earl was executed.

James’s widow, Anna Maria, never returned to Dilston and died in Belgium 7 years later.  The Radcliffe estates were confiscated by the government, but in a lengthy legal battle it was successfully argued that as James only had life interest in the Derwentwater estates and his son John should inherit the great wealth of the Radcliffes.  Sadly though, he died in 1731 before reaching his majority.  That left only Charles Radcliffe, James’s brother, as heir.  Unfortunately he was was still under attainder for his part in the ’15 so could not inherit.  By default then, the estates then passed back to the crown.  The power of the Radcliffe’s was broken.

Whether James Radcliffe was a reluctant Rebel [10] or a passionate and committed Jacobite, his legend lives on in the North. Even today, Paranormal investigators such as Otherworld North East, and Christina Ogilvy and James Davidson, have reported strange anomalies in and Around Dilston Castle.  Orbs, strange mists and dark figures still haunt the ruins of Dilston [11 & 12].  On a moonlit night it may still be possible to come across James and his young bride Anna Maria, walking by the Devil Water.

Lords Bridge, over the Devil Water at Dilston.

Access to castle:

http://www.northumbrianjacobites.org.uk/pages/detail_page.php?id=36&section=27

Sources and notes

Dickinson, Frances, ‘The Reluctant Rebel A Northumbrian Legacy of Jacobite Times’ 1996, Cresset Books [1][3][5][6][10]

http://www.friendsofhistoricdilston.org/

http://www.ghostnortheast.co.uk/dilston.html

Gooch, Leo, ‘The Desperate Faction The Jacobites of North-East England 1688-1745’ 2001, Casdec Ltd [4][8]

Graham, Frank, ‘The Castles of Northumberland’ 1976 Frank Graham Books [7]

Liddell, Tony, ‘Otherworld North East Ghosts and Hauntings Explored’ 2004, Tyne Bridge Publishing [12]

http://www.northofthetyne.co.uk/Dilston.html

http://www.northumbrianjacobites.org.uk/pages/section_homepage.php?section=27

Matthews, Rupert, ‘Mysterious Northumberland’ 2009, Breedon Books [2]

Ogilvy, Christina and Davidson, James, A, ‘Haunting Dilston’ 2015, Powdene Publicity Ltd [9][11]