As is evident in the Foster case, infestation activity does not come on as a quick, flamboyant assault. Rather, as noted, the phenomena will begin with three ominous knocks, or footsteps will be heard walking through the house. There may be the sound of scratchings inside the walls. Strange hot or cold spots will be detected in certain areas. A particular room or place in the house will repel, or seem “creepy.” The sound of whisperings or heavy breathing may be audible to anyone present. Most notably, the individual in an infested environment will have an unshakeable feeling of another presence in the house. This sense of presence will develop to a point where the individual or family may begin waking up at fixed times of the night, or at precisely three o’clock in the morning.
As time goes on during infestation, things will begin to happen. The mewing of baby animals may be heard coming from that “creepy” room. The scratchings in the walls will change to knocks, raps, and then hard, percussive pounding, “Pranks” will occur that are intended to infuriate. Appliances will go on all by themselves. The phone will ring, but there’ll be no call. The front doorbell will sound, at the same time there will be knocks at the back door. No one will be at either door.
“Another indication of an inhuman presence is the unusual movement of objects,” says Lorraine. “A crystal water glass may fall to the floor by itself, but won’t break—it will bounce! Food on the stove will not cook. The dishwater freezes. Keys will not open locks. Door handles will not turn, making the individual a prisoner in a cellar or washroom. Other times, things will simply not remain where they were left, no matter how many times the objects are put back.
“All this, of course, taxes not only the patience, but the individual’s sanity, but at this stage, psychological effects are not a factor. Although the strange activity may arouse some anxiety and a great deal of concern, the individual’s mind will not yet have been penetrated, as occurs in oppression. Children, particularly infants, are highly vulnerable to inhuman activity, even at the infestation stage. Infants one or two years of age in an infested home very often wake up screaming in mortal terror. The demonic has no compunctions at all about assaulting a baby. An alert person who is suspicious and can spot the early workings of demoniacal phenomena should seek help immediately before events move onto a more personal level, and then out of control completely.
“One question people often ask us,” says Lorraine, “is ‘How do you know that there’s an inhuman spirit in a house?’ The answer is that when an inhuman demonic spirit is present, you know it’s there. Even before your five senses get into the act, your sixth sense is fully aware of its presence. When we interview people about these spirits, they most commonly say ‘I felt a horrible sense of doom all around me.’ Or, ‘You could feel the evil in the room.’
“When you’re in a spirit-infested environment and your five senses do become involved, you’ll see, feel, and hear things that are distinctly foul or unnatural. But even that’s not good enough for the spirit,” she continues, “because this thing’s got to make you afraid of it So the frightening ruckus it brings about is part of the strategy. Granted, in the early stages of infestation, the phenomena will be ambiguous. A levitating teacup can be PK or a ghost—and a demonic spirit knows it’s going to be called a poltergeist, instead of being named for what it is. The spirit deliberately hides behind ambiguity, in order to take hold. So it’s not just the observable phenomena you look at. You can’t point to any one levitating teacup and say, ‘Ah ha! This is demoniacal phenomena!’ You’ve also got to see the purposeful, directed complexity that goes along with the disturbance. The activity takes on a meaningful pattern. What seems at first to be a curious run of events turns out, after study, to be events that are integrally linked with one another, distinct from coincidence and arbitrary, random activity.”
Although the terror experienced during infestation is bad enough, it’s really only a warm-up to the pandemonium that’s liable to happen with the next stage. Whereas the disturbances during infestation may be troublesome, annoying, or frightening, during oppression the spirit begins to take hold and use all the malicious power at its command. As Ed puts it, “During infestation, you’ve got a problem. With oppression, you’ve got real trouble.”
VIII
Oppression:
The Strategy Revealed
Infestation essentially means a house is haunted; oppression means that the spirits haunting the house are trying to take over the people living there. On a practical level, therefore, one subject the Warrens emphasize in their lectures is oppression phenomena. They do so because infestation by spirits may have unknowingly occurred in a home, or it goes unrecognized, and the first time a problem is noticed is when oppression has already begun.
During infestation, the demoniacal strategy is to create fear in order to begin breaking down the human will. During oppression, the entrenched spirit tends to either launch a bombardment of incredible phenomena, or embark on a surreptitious psychological attack, dedicated to the complete domination of the victim’s will.
“The prime objective of demonic oppression,” Ed says, “is to cause the individual to lose control, or show a momentary lapse in free will, which then opens the door for possession to take place. The infesting spirit’s strategy at this stage is to come on with phemomena so terrible and mind-reeling that it breaks down the person’s will and tolerance almost completely. However, this wild activity is a diversion. The phenomena coming from two fronts—physical and psychological—weaken and disorient the victim, while taxing his emotions to the hilt. Furthermore, to make matters worse, if one or more entities have been successful during infestation, then additional, more powerful spirits are liable to come on the scene next, at which point the phenomena change from bad to worse, worse to terrible. Personal control is essential at this stage, because once the organized breaking down of the will starts, activity will not stop until it’s made to do so. Perception of the problem is critical because negative activity will slowly build until it gradually transmutes into all-out chaos.”
Oppression strategy can best be summed up in one word: the demonic spirit seeks to dehumanize the individual. By whatever means, it tries to reduce a human being—overtly or covertly—to his lowest ebb. Religious writers have long recognized this fact, and as a consequence divide oppression strategy into two forms: internal (through the mind) and external (through the senses). One is a psychological phenomenon; the other physical.
External oppression is an observable event: a negative spirit interacts with the physical world to bring about deceptive or frightening phenomena. At this stage, the Warrens assert, a person can see and feel the activity. “There’s no mistaking it,” Lorraine points out. “Brute force is used to terrify a person or family. Essentially deranged, the demonic spirit directs its rage into material destruction or attacks on people. In some cases there will be subtle hints of a spirit presence; in others, an all-out rampage. But, in most every case we examine, the spirits infesting the home do manipulate the physical environment to some degree.”
What kinds of things happen to people confronted with inhuman spirit phenomena? Just how intense can oppression be?
“When Lorraine and I are called in on a case where external oppression is taking place,” says Ed, “there’s invariably great terror involved. The assault—and that’s what it usually is—comes at the family on both a natural and a supernatural level. As for the kinds of things that are liable to happen, the victims’ five senses will often be saturated with an input of frightening or repulsive phenomena: disgusting smells, ghoulish moans, bloodcurdling screams, knockings, rappings, poundings, heavy breathing and magical whisperings, disembodied footsteps, rapid changes in room temperature, ghastly visions, and so on. When a disturbance really gets going, say into what we call a diabolical siege, then you get phenomena like materializations, de-materializations, teleportations, levitations—of both people and objects, strangling sensations about the neck, arms being grabbed from behind, cuts
, burns, gouges, wounds, sudden critical illnesses, blinding headaches, vulgarities and blasphemies written on the walls by unseen hands, spontaneous outbreaks of fire, inhuman voices calling on the phone, demon faces showing up on the television screen—you name it, I’ve seen it. Sometimes the victims are held prisoner inside their own home while being systematically overpowered, even killed, by these forces of inhumanity and evil. Mentally, the brain will be overloaded; physically, the body will be exhausted, and emotionally the person or family will be wrung-out, spent. It is then, when the activity is the most unbearable, that the victim gets awakened at three o’clock in the morning by an entity in black standing at the foot of the bed telling him to stop resisting!! This is terror: this is oppression!
“Take a good example,” says Ed. “Every year millions of Americans change their residence and a significant number move into homes where there is the potential for activating a dormant spirit. This is what happened to Carlsons. The Carlsons, a happily married couple in their thirties, bought an old inn here in New England. It was a beautiful old house, right out of Currier and Ives which they moved into on a Good Friday. Now, Nathan Carlson travelled during the week, but his wife, Alexandra, was home all the time to take care of their infant and older daughter. Not long after moving in, Mrs. Carlson and her daughter began hearing footsteps on the second floor where, in the past, lodgers used to stay. During the afternoon and late into the night they’d hear dragging, heavy-booted footsteps move across the floor above them. The pattern of the sound was always the same.
“Mrs. Carlson’s older sister, who lived nearby, occasionally stayed overnight in the house and helped take care of the children while Mr. Carlson was on the road. Both Mrs. Carlson’s daughter and the sister slept on the second floor, and they too heard these footsteps. The Carlsons also had rooms set aside elsewhere in the house for live-in farm help, and these men would hear footsteps walking in circles around their bed. In fact, while Mrs. Carlson would be asleep at night, she’d be awakened by the spirits in the home which would actually yank the covers off the bed while she was in it She later found out the very same thing happened to the farm help, which accounted for why the men tended to quit so soon after they were hired.
“Eventually, the infestation phenomena upgraded into whisperings that could be heard behind closed doors. However, when Mrs. Carlson or her older sister checked the room where the whisperings were coming from, there was never anyone present Although these spirits projected words that were often audible enough to be heard, the women could never identify the language that was being used. Sometimes this mysterious language heard in infested homes simply proves to be English being spoken backwards.
“As time went on, the harassment continued After she straightened up the house, knick-knacks and other little items would never be quite where she left them. Outside the house at night, lights would be seen in the attic—although there was no electricity up there. While painting a room one day, the heat was suddenly drawn away, and she felt a hand touch her shoulder. Mrs. Carlson said she became so angry, she hauled off and threw the paintbrush in the direction where she believed the entity to be, and told it out loud, ‘I don’t know who you are or what you want, but you’re not going to get me.’ Mrs. Carlson, of course, told her husband about these disturbances. But Mr. Carlson, having never experienced the sounds or phenomena, shrugged them off, telling her they were the creakings of an old house.
“This is part of the strategy of the demonic, of course—to direct phenomena at specific persons, when others experience nothing at all. Typically, oppression will focus on one or maybe two members of the family group. It really doesn’t matter whether the spirit was on the premises when the house was bought, or whether the kids brought it in using a Ouija board. If there’s a negative spirit in the house, it’s going to pick on someone. Usually the entity will pick on the most psychologically vulnerable person or the one who spends the most time in the house alone. Needless to say, that’s usually the housewife. Four out of five oppression and possession cases we investigate involve women. The demonic finds it easier to oppress women because they are generally more open and sensitive than men—not to mention the fact that they’re physically on the scene where the infesting spirit is active while their husbands are away at work.
“The reason the demonic spirit singles out one person is obvious: two people could compare notes and recognize an external influence. On the other hand, one person has no way of proving what’s happening. Feeling a tap on the shoulder by an invisible hand, hearing a door slam in an empty room, finding a wedding ring at the bottom of the toilet bowl can be quite upsetting, but it doesn’t indicate anything supernatural So, to avoid ridicule, the person keeps quiet about the problem. Rather than making two problems out of one, the oppressed individual simply internalizes the experience.
“Sooner or later, though, self doubt arises and in time the person begins to question his own sanity. He cannot find an origin for the car horns blowing in the living room at night. He sees no one behind him after feeling his hair pulled. He can find no dead animal to account for the revolting smell that comes up after sunset. Am I really experiencing this, the victim honestly asks himself? Naturally, the oppressing spirit preys on the doubt it has created, then enlarges upon that doubt until the person doesn’t know whether he’s coming or going. This is why the phenomena is considered to be a diversion. It is brought about to destabilize the victim. Therefore, under oppression, the self is purposely attacked by an external force, and should the victim start to lose control, then he’s one step into possession—the goal, of course, of the inhuman possessing entity.
“In the Carlson case,” Ed goes on, “external oppression phenomena went on almost daily, insofar as infestation had occurred in the house long ago. Both the kitchen and bathroom water faucets would suddenly turn themselves on, full force, at the same time. Tappings were incessantly heard at the windows, doors creaked open, and always the bootsteps and walking-around upstairs. A real haunted house! On occasions, Mrs. Carlson would hear three knocks at the front door—a conventional sign of an inhuman presence. But whenever she’d go to the door, there’d be no one there. On the second floor, a visitor reported seeing a snake on the window ledge after hearing three taps on the window, yet there was no nearby tree the reptile could have climbed.
“One time when Mrs. Carlson heard the sound of three knocks, she also heard the front door open, then slam, followed by the stomping of bootsteps upstairs. ‘Now I got ‘em,’ she thought. With all the courage she had, Mrs. Carlson went upstairs, armed with her husband’s pistol, and systematically checked every room, determined to find the malicious intruder. But, of course, no one visible was there. As happens so often when the demonic is involved, she’d been made a fool of.
“Yet,” continues Ed, “these were basically little incidents compared to the tragic, sinister things that followed later. While living in the house, the Carlsons had another child. One night, while she and a farm hand were watching television in the living room, they suddenly heard a tremendous, powerful explosion. When they jumped up to check, thinking the furnace had blown apart, they found the door to the infant’s room violently torn open. Objects were still swinging and vibrating by the time they arrived, and the temperature in the nursery ‘was equal to a meat locker,’ she said. Her baby had been born premature, and until only a few weeks before had lived in a hospital incubator. Though the spirits in the home had evidently tried to kill him, the baby managed to live through the experience. However, when the baby boy was three years old, Mrs. Carlson made another startling discovery. As she walked past the child one day, he suddenly let go with a loud shriek. ‘You stepped on Beatrice!’ he told his mother in no uncertain terms. Being this was a terribly sophisticated name for a three year old to know, let alone pronounce, Mrs. Carlson put down the laundry she’d been carrying and asked the child who was. ‘She’s my friend,’ he answered, ‘she tells me what to do.’ Mrs. Carlson then told her son to
ask Beatrice who she was. The little boy did just that, and a few seconds later, after he waited for her reply, said to his mother: ‘Beatrice told me to tell you that she’s a witch!’
“Like most people, the Carlsons had no belief or knowledge of spirit phenomena, so these invisible entities in the home exerted almost free rein over the family. That was the case, until finally one night things came to a head. Mrs. Carlson was in bed by herself when she saw a large black form in the room with her. She described the entity as being ‘blacker than the blackest night’ She said this because the lights in the bedroom were off, and where they lived there were no streetlights to cast weird shadows. The entity moved slowly around the room, transfixing her with fright Technically, Mrs. Carlson was a victim of phantomania. Before the black mass went away, it transmuted into a globe of synthetic light about the size of a basketball, while producing a deafening roar which she compared to a blast furnace. The phenomenon grew in intensity until suddenly it vanished, leaving Mrs. Carlson absolutely fatigued, whereupon she immediately fell into a deep sleep. This happened twice more—three times in all.
“The next two times, Mr. Carlson was home in bed with her, but he didn’t see anything. As Mrs. Carlson told me—and mind you, this was a sensible, aware woman—‘I knew in my heart this terror was meant exclusively for me, not for anyone else.’ When the spirit came the second time, she was suddenly awakened by the presence of the same black entity near her side of the bed. This was followed by the manifestation of the large orb of light, again accompanied by the roar of a blast furnace. The phenomenon peaked, then vanished, leaving her completely drained of energy. The third night the spirit manifested to her in the bedroom, she tried to rouse her husband, but to no avail. She shook him and pounded on his back, but he wouldn’t—or rather couldn’t—wake up. In the meantime, the spirit remained menacingly present in the room with her, its very being scaring her senseless. Ultimately, the message the demonic projected to her was ‘Get out!’ And they did. Today, the Carlsons live in the same town, but now they know all too well about the coaching inn, and the deadly, oppressive spirits it contains.”
The Demonologist: The Extraordinary Career of Ed and Lorraine Warren Page 14