Fortean Times: It Happened to Me vol.1

by Times, Fortean

  Sharon Mason, by email, 2002

  Ghosts of presage

  PRE-EMPTIVE SPOTTING

  I’ve had the same odd experience three times in recent months. On each occasion I have seen in the street in central Chichester somebody I thought I recognised as an ex-colleague only to realise, when I was closer, that it was actually not the woman I had thought but a stranger with a slightly similar appearance (height, age, hair colour etc). Then, within minutes, I saw the woman I had at first thought I had seen. In each case the woman was somebody I hadn’t seen for a while, and by this I mean years rather than months. In each case there was no way I could have seen the woman in the distance as she was in a different street at the time - indeed, one of them appeared in a car from a side street literally seconds after my mistaken spotting. Also, the women were all acquaintances rather than close friends and had not been in my thoughts at all leading up to the moment. I have no claim to any psychic abilities and wonder if any other readers have experienced similar “pre-emptive” spotting.

  Darren Green, Chichester, West Sussex, 2004

  MEETING THE FYLGJA

  My name is Gunnar, I’m 15 years old and I live in Iceland. Last year, I and my family spent the dark of winter on Nyord, a tiny island in Denmark. A few houses away lived our very good friend Hilmar. One night, I walked over to his house, where my mum was paying a visit. I took the same route as usual, up the street behind the house, through the garden to the backdoor. As I was going through the fence, I saw Hilmar opening the door and scanning the garden. He looked my way, but closed the door, without giving any indication that he had seen me. I came to the door and knocked. He opened it and told me that just a few seconds earlier he and my mum had heard a knock on the door. He looked out but saw nothing.

  In the mythology of Iceland such a phenomenon is called a Fylgja, a kind of spirit or ghost (or something) accompanying a person and announcing their arrival. It makes its presence known with noises, the person then comes to mind or pops up in conversation, or the cat announces the person’s arrival by certain gestures. Some people have a strong Fylgja that clearly precedes their coming. On my way home I met a pitch-black cat under a lampost. It scared me a bit as cats were unheard of on the island. It must have crossed the same crazy bridge as my Fylgja.

  Gunnar Th Eggertsson, Reykjavik, Iceland, 1997

  ADVANCE NOTICE

  I was intrigued by Gunnar Eggertsson’s letter about the Fylgja, the Icelandic ghost of presage. It reminds me of the Norwegian phenomenon of the same kind. They term it Vardogr and it is discussed by Brag Steiger in his book Real Ghosts, Restless Spirits and Haunted Minds. He writes: “The Vardogr is a kind of spiritual projection which its possessor unconsciously employs to announce his physical arrival.” This arrival is, however, announced some minutes before the actual arrival.

  As a small boy in a town in south-east Scotland, I lived in a huge, spooky house that had been a Victorian rectory until my parents bought it. My father worked abroad much of the time, my brother had flown the nest and my mother didn’t return home from work until 4.30pm or later.

  Having got home from school and expecting my mother’s arrival at any time, I would regularly hear her car door slam and the front door bang shut. I heard these sounds from afar, so they would be relatively faint, but clearly discernible. I would call hello. Failing to obtain a response, I would come downstairs or come into the hall and investigate. Often enough, I would open the front door and look to see if her car was there.

  When I had established that she had not, in fact, arrived, I would then wait for five or 10 minutes, knowing that she was merely letting me know that she was a couple of miles up the road and would shortly be home. I think I experienced this only with her until recently.

  On that occasion, my former secretary who worked with me for some years, and who now pops in to collect typing, was due to call by my office. Hearing the buzzer from reception, I went to the door, but she wasn’t there. Suspecting a Vardogr, I waited for exactly five minutes and then returned to the door. She came around the corner within 30 seconds, startled to see me awaiting her.

  Andrew Cray, Edinburgh, 1997

  The Sixth Sense

  In moments of crisis, when regular means of communication aren’t enough, does the paranormal intervene? Mysterious messages take many forms, from dreams and apparitions to a vision of a grinning skull, the ringing of an alarm clock, Morse Code or the wailing of a banshee: while some are friendly farewells from souls passing over, for the unlucky they can be dark premonitions of death...

  Premonitions

  THE SIKHS WHO SAW

  In 1968, my older brother was 23, and spent most of his time doing up old cars with a friend who lived on a farm. The two young men were working on some old banger when a man in a turban (presumably a Sikh) came to the front of the friend’s house. The mother answered the door, and instead of a sales patter, the man looked towards my brother in the corner of the yard and told her: “I feel very sorry for that boy’s parents, they are going to have sorrow in the family soon.” About one week later my brother crashed on his way home, breaking his neck. He was in a coma for nearly one week before he died.

  A year or so later, another Sikh came calling, this time at our front door. He looked at my mother, and indicated with his hands the graduated size of her family (there were six of us); when he came to the second eldest - my dead brother - he stopped, and looked concerned. He then pointed to my mother’s eye, and seemed to indicate some sort of problem. Not long after, she developed glaucoma in that eye.

  There are other incidents connected with the death of my brother, like the appearance of a hospital odour in our house, noted by both my parents and heavily redolent of the week they spent at his bedside. My mother once heard a car draw up outside the house, and my brother call out for her. When she went outside, there was no car in the road.

  My parents, although both practising Catholics, had recourse to the spirit-in-the-glass, and seemed to get some results: the glass indicated that the cause of the accident had been a pile of discarded road-builder’s tarmac on the roadside, a fact confirmed later by another of my brothers. A set of my dead brother’s house keys were found by similar means, as the glass directed them behind the gas fire (where the keys had evidently fallen). It also appeared that my brother’s sense of humour survived his departure from this mortal coil. His widow made a lemon meringue pie, a pastry confection that he loathed in life. She left it to cool, and returned to find that the pie had been turned upside down and squashed on the table.

  Philip Hoare, London, 1996

  PURPLE PREMONITION

  At the age of 14, in 1978, I was trying to settle into a new school and was getting bullied by Karen and her gang. She drove me to tears and distraction by tripping me up, stealing my sandwiches and spitting in my drink. She was a rough girl who swore and I was scared stiff of her.

  One day she tripped me down a flight of stairs and started laughing. I looked up and found that her face had turned into a grinning skull. Instead of crying I stared in astonishment, which replaced her laughter with a puzzled expression.

  Afterwards, I dreamed that she was standing on a bridge. I did my best to avoid her, but I couldn’t and was instead drawn like a magnet to where she stood. It occurred to me that I couldn’t cross the bridge anyway because there was a line dividing it, and I knew I couldn’t step over. She smiled at me, then turned away and vanished. I remember her hair was a strange purple colour, a colour that is still vivid and fresh in my mind.

  Two weeks later, she was killed instantly when a car hit her on the way home from a party. Before she’d gone out that night she had dyed her short cropped hair bright purple.

  Linda Hardy, Wellingborough, Northamptonshire, 1998

  DREAMING OF RABBITS

  I have often had vivid dreams, which a couple of days later have turned out to be true, but have largely dismissed them, and put them down to chance. However, I had a particularly vivid dream
recently. In it, a really strong gust of wind blew the top off a rabbit hutch, and I was running around the garden trying to catch the rabbits. I came down to breakfast in the morning, and started telling my family about the dream. As I did so, I opened up the morning paper and turned to a story about a freak hurricane that had hit a very small area in Britain. It focused on a human-interest story of a family who had found the top blown off their rabbit hutch, and had had to chase the rabbits around the garden. Even my family had to admit it was a strange coincidence!

  There is said to be a history of sixth sense in my family. My great grandfather was the seventh son of a seventh son, and had the gift of second sight. His gift was so impressive that he was employed to help police investigations. He would often have premonitions, and would send warnings to members of the family. He wrote to my other great grandmother and warned her that she must keep her son (my grandfather) away from water at all costs. He had had a vision where her son was being pulled out of the water with a stick. Being very superstitious, she followed this advice to the letter, and my grandfather was not allowed near water. However, one day whilst holidaying by the sea, my grandfather disappeared. A huge storm brewed and they were very worried and went out searching for him. Hours later, my bedraggled grandfather appeared with an old man. The latter had been walking by the pier when he saw a huge wave engulf it, carrying my grandfather off into the sea. Running to save him, the man had eventually managed to drag him back by stretching out his walking stick, and getting him to hold onto it.

  Anna Smith, Bristol, 2005

  Parting shots

  LAST ORDERS

  Shortly after Easter one year, my wife and I went to Blackpool for a long weekend. After dinner on Friday, my wife retired to our rented apartment and I went to the Old Bridge Inn at the top of the road and ordered a pint of Boddingtons. I saw a man at the end of the bar watching me. Eventually he walked over. “Excuse me for staring,” he said, “but do you come from South Yorkshire?”

  “I was born there,” I replied, “but we moved to North Yorkshire 20 years ago, although my sister and brothers still live near Barnsley.”

  “Your name isn’t Norman by any chance?” he asked.

  I was stunned: “Yes it is actually.”

  “Well I’m Jimmy Marriot,” he replied.

  Suddenly the penny dropped. When we were kids Jimmy lived next door but two to us in Goldthorpe, a small pit village near Barnsley. Jimmy, being the oldest by three years, was the leader of our gang.

  I ordered two more pints and we talked about the old days. He asked about my sister, who he used to fancy. Eventually the landlord rang the bell and we arranged to meet the following evening as he wanted me to introduce him to my wife. With that we said goodnight.

  I told my wife the strange story next morning and we decided to go to the pub at about 8.30 that evening. There was no sign of Jimmy. I asked the landlord if he had seen the bloke I had been talking to the previous night.

  “Sorry,” he replied, “I saw you come in but I didn’t see you talking to anyone.” We waited until 9.30pm, drank up and went for a walk around town thinking no more of it.

  When we were back home on the Monday, my sister rang, which she has done like clockwork for years, with the news and gossip, as we don’t get down to see her very much. She asked how the weekend went and I told her about meeting her old friend Jimmy Marriot. She was silent for a moment, then she said, “Are you trying to be funny? Because if you are it’s in very bad taste.” Very quietly she told me that Jimmy Marriot had been killed in a car accident on his way home from work just outside Barnsley at 6.30 on Friday night.

  Norman Green, Robin Hood Bay, North Yorkshire, 1996

  BIRDS OF A FEATHER

  A terminally ill person made a special arrangement for her parrot to stay at the vet’s where my daughter works, so that she could visit it regularly. The bird settled well and became a great friend of all the girls working there. It remained there for over a year, perfectly well and happy, until one day it became sick and, as my daughter carried it to the vet, it died. The whole practice was shocked and upset. Tears were shed but, when they attempted to contact the owner (yes, you’ve guessed it), they discovered that she had suffered a relapse and had died the same afternoon as her beloved pet.

  Pam Thornton, Llandegla, Denbighshire, 1998

  DREAM FAREWELL

  During the long and pleasant summer of 1960, when I was seven years old, I passed the house of an old lady each morning on my way to school. She was usually in a rickety old chair on her front porch. “Good morning, Mrs Thorpe,” I would call and she would say: “Good morning, Peter”.

  One night near the end of the school year, I dreamed I was walking to school past Mrs Thorpe’s house. She was there as usual, sitting on her porch, and I noticed with detachment that she had no face. Despite this I called out as usual: “Good morning, Mrs Thorpe” and in return I heard a voice that was calm and kindly but devastating nonetheless: “Goodbye Peter”. I sat upright in bed, breathless and sweating. After a moment I lay down again and was soon asleep.

  The next morning, as I packed my satchel for school, my mother told me in a hushed voice that Mrs Thorpe had been taken ill during the night and had died. Even though I was young boy I knew I had been privileged. Mrs Thorpe had come to me in death and bid me farewell. I never told anyone of my experience that night until I was a grown man.

  Peter Lloyd, Salisbury, Wiltshire, 1999

  CRY OF THE BANSHEE?

  In 1999, around midnight, unable to sleep, I went down to the kitchen to make a drink. As soon as I got there, a loud haunting, wailing sound began. Despite being painfully loud, it couldn’t be heard in any other part of the house, even in the next room, which had no door between it and the kitchen. It couldn’t have been caused by wind, as it was a very still night. No equipment, electrical or other, had been left on. After several minutes, the sound rose to an almost unbearable scream before quickly dying down to nothing.

  The next day we discovered my great aunt had died in her bed, sometime between 11pm and 1am the previous night. Had I heard the cry of the banshee lamenting the approaching death of my relative?

  Simon Day, Longhill, Humberside, 2005

  INTERCEPT MESSAGE

  In about 1960 I was based at an RAF training school at Wythall, near Lincoln, training to become an intercept operator. The job was to monitor potential enemy communications; training included taking Morse code at relatively high speeds through interference and the use of more than one receiver at the same time. It culminated in attempting to intercept, using two receivers, a number of very short messages sent via a local loop by the instructors. The frequencies were unknown to the trainees, who had to twiddle the dials and write down what they could.

  If I remember correctly after nearly 50 years, I managed to intercept 10 messages. I came out top, but the instructors said that one of the messages I had written down - “Come immediately VIP” - hadn’t been sent by them. Since by then I realised that I had passed, I made no comment on this mysterious message.

  A year earlier, I had returned from Australia, where I had served six years in the Australian Army, as my mother was seriously ill with cancer. She had improved somewhat after my return so I felt no problem in returning to service life, albeit in a different service. After passing the intercept course, I returned home, and was horrified to be told that my mother had died of the cancer at the very time I had received the “come immediately” message. My sister said she hadn’t attempted to phone me, as she knew that I was due home that day anyway.

  Did I get an electronic message from the beyond, or was it the result of a subconscious anxiety on my part? Now at age 81 I often wonder if I was informed of the death by radiotelegraphy.

  Robert Moyes, Gislingham, Suffolk, 2007

  HELPING HANDS

  In 1951, when I was three years old, three adult-sized figures glided, rather than walked, down the hallway and through the closed and locked front door
during the night when it was dark. All three glowed softly. The centre one seemed weak, being helped and supported by the person on either side. How was I able to see them clearly while my body was asleep upstairs in a cot? Why did they all ignore me, standing only a few feet away? How did they get through the door?

  Next morning my mother explained that my uncle, in whose home we were staying, had died in his sleep. Years later I learned that he had had a massive heart attack. I tried to explain to the shocked and grieving adults who gathered for the funeral that I had seen uncle with two ‘helpers’, but my vocabulary was sorely deficient. Who would listen to a child? Most of those unheeding folk have since died.

  Were the figures I saw ‘angels’ coming to fetch my uncle’s soul? If it was just a dream, why have I remembered it so vividly for almost 50 years?

  Valerie A Riddell, Turriff, Aberdeenshire, 1999

  CRISIS APPARITIONS

  In 2002, my mother was unfortunate enough to contract Legionnaire’s Disease and spent several weeks in hospital. For the majority of this time she was sedated with morphine and completely unconscious. Her illness was so bad that her family and friends were prepared for the worst.