Strange & Supernatural

by Barbara Whitby

  A short time later, in June 1879, an American actor, Walter Hubbell, contacted the family and expressed his deep interest in their situation. They took him into their confidence, and he in turn was horrified at the things he witnessed. He conversed with Esther while she was in trance-like states, during which she was able to describe and name many of the spirits involved.

  Hubbell felt that Esther’s story had theatrical potential. He persuaded her to accompany him on a tour to make her misfortunes public in the form of a play. The spirits had made dramatic appearances at all her work places and had terrorized the congregation at the church she had attended. Why not use these activities to produce an income? This seemed like a good idea, but unfortunately the spirits failed to play their part in the act. The result was so boring that during one of the performances angry members of the audience heckled the performers and demanded their money back. The audience was so upset that they started to riot.

  Mortified, Esther never appeared on stage again. Hubbell left Amherst and subsequently wrote a best-selling book about what came to be known as the “Great Amherst Mystery.” His book included an affidavit that contained the names of 16 witnesses, all of whom testified that Esther’s story was true.

  Esther subsequently found a job on the farm of Arthur Davison, on the outskirts of Amherst. Although Davison witnessed several poltergeist activities while Esther lived at his home, he remained a skeptic. When matches fell from the ceiling of one of his barns and it burned to the ground, he had her arrested for arson. She was sentenced to four months in prison, but public indignation on her behalf was so strong that she was released after only one month.

  The poltergeist activities dwindled after Esther’s term in prison, and by the end of 1879, approximately a year after they began, they virtually ceased. She later married twice, lived a normal life and bore two sons. Esther died in 1912 at the age of 52.

  No further poltergeist activities occurred in the house where she had lived in Amherst, and it was subsequently torn down to make room for shops.

  Unbridled Spite

  At least one part of Halifax is haunted by malevolent supernatural beings.

  In 1973, a family of four who lived in the West End of the city experienced terrifying attacks from an evil presence that invaded their house without warning in the early hours before dawn. They all awoke one morning horribly aware that a heavy force was weighing on their chests and attempting to possess their bodies. It was so oppressive that they could not cry out for help. Unable to breathe, they believed they were about to die.

  The terror was repeated the following night. Unable to sleep, at precisely 3:03 a.m., all four of them became aware that the wicked spirit was approaching again. In mortal fear, together they beseeched help in prayer. To their amazement, their prayers were answered when a brilliant golden radiance suddenly surrounded the house. For hours the demon beat savagely against the supernatural light but could not break through. With the coming of sunrise it withdrew.

  The attacks ended that day but the “radiance” lingers. Oddly, visitors to the house who have not heard the story still frequently remark on the brightness of its rooms, even though the house is in fact quite dark.

  Some time after these events, a university student called John Harris was boarding at a private house in the same area. At first he found the house a pleasant place to live, with large airy rooms, a small garden and a spacious kitchen. There was quite a community spirit among the residents. The boarders all sat around the kitchen table after the home-cooked suppers and swapped life’s experiences. What John didn’t expect when he moved in was that they would soon be sharing stories about their disturbing encounters with a harmful ghost. This seemingly ideal home turned out to be the scene of John’s first terrifying encounter with the supernatural.

  One night, a couple of weeks after he moved in, John went to bed feeling cheerful and satisfied that he had found these excellent digs. Some time after midnight he woke abruptly, tossing and turning. Feeling unusually restless, he sensed that something was not right. He strained to listen. The handle of his bedroom door grated as it slowly turned. It seemed as if someone was creeping stealthily into his room.

  Still half asleep, John watched, mesmerized, as the door eased open, but he did not see anyone enter. The temperature plunged, the room became icy cold and he started to shiver uncontrollably with sudden fear. This took him aback, since he prided himself on being a red-blooded young male.

  Heavy clunking footsteps slowly approached his bed. Still, there was no one there, not that he could see. But the mattress suddenly sagged under an invisible weight, and he knew he was in the presence of something unspeakably evil.

  There was an agonizing pause, as if the ghostly visitor was taunting him to try to escape. John bolted upright but was pushed violently onto his back. He was taken completely by surprise by this physical blow from someone or something that he still could not see. At that same moment he felt a heavy weight slam into his chest. It was so powerful he thought the bones of his ribcage would buckle and snap. The pressure was so intense that he could neither breathe nor cry out for help. It felt as if the presence was trying to burrow deep into his body and to force him out of it. Convinced that he would die unless he freed himself, and more terrified

  than he had ever been in his life, John made an immense effort to push his tormentor away. The uncanny presence vanished instantly.

  At first, John put this experience down to a nightmare, but when he discussed it with his fellow boarders the next day he found that some of them had undergone similar experiences after moving into the house. Not only that, he was told, but the people who lived next door had claimed that they too were being haunted by the same kind of demonic spirit. It attacked in the dead of night, weighed so heavily on them that they could not breathe and made them fear for their lives.

  As well as being harassed by this malevolent ghostly presence, the next-door neighbours were haunted by other horrible spirits. They speculated that these spirits seemed to be walking some territorial boundary that, over the years, had been obscured by the growing city. They thought that the ghost of a farmer from a past century might be walking his fields at sunset. They told of how they had sat frozen with

  terror while doors opened and closed in quick succession and an icy presence passed through the house. First, the front door crashed open and slammed shut, and then the door to the hallway, the two kitchen doors and the back door. Finally, the back porch door into the garden crashed open against the wall and violently slammed shut, rattling the glass so hard it seemed as if it would break. Then the invisible prowler headed off into the night, until the next disturbance.

  There were other strange happenings in this house as well. The thermostat was often mysteriously cranked up to an unbearable heat. No one could sit peacefully in the

  living room because books were frequently hurled from the bookcases that bordered the fireplace. In the basement, ceiling tiles often fell down hard onto the head of whoever was passing through and, at the same time, a creepy feeling that they were being watched by hostile eyes often made their hair stand on end. All of these ghostly activities induced fear in everyone who lived in the house. The spirit also seemed to transmit feelings of deep depression, anger and suspicion.

  One day the owner of the house chanced to share his story with some employees of a nearby institution. His curiosity was considerably aroused when he learned that they were afraid to stay alone in the building after hours. The employees told him that doors throughout the building mysteriously opened and closed. They shuddered at certain spots where they were certain that an invisible presence

  was lurking.

  At the far end of this city block, students who lived in Middle Bay at King’s College in Halifax and in the Angel’s Roost (also on campus) reported similar shocking experiences in some of the rooms. The spirits terrorizing these quarters were so
horrifyingly distinctive that they were singled out from other supernatural activities by the name of “Death Hags.” Sleeping students woke in the middle of the night struggling to breathe as a heavy weight crushed their chests. Others fought off attempts to strangle them. Some never saw their attacker, while others woke to see a gruesome old woman in filthy rags astride their stomachs, screaming in their faces. One student told Kevin Gibson (who was researching psychic phenomena on campus at the time) that during an assault he grabbed at the walls in panic. To add to his horror, the walls seemed to change into a disgusting, soft, fleshy mass before he was able to flounder his way out of his room and flee up the stairs.

  There are many unanswered questions. What mystery links these properties with the long-forgotten past? Why does this particular pattern of demonic activity occur within a relatively small area of the city? What happened or happens there to attract it? Does it occur elsewhere but has not been publicly acknowledged?

  The Bell Island Hag

  Another supernatural hag, the famous “Bell Island Hag,” strikes dread into the residents of Bell Island in Conception Bay, Newfoundland. According to folklore this dangerous spirit roams the woods and marshes near Dobbin’s Garden. Nothing about her can be taken for granted because she is a shape-shifter. Sometimes she appears as a beautiful woman clothed in white. More often, though, she materializes as a dreadfully deformed old witch. In this appalling manifestation, the ghost is dressed in ragged clothes and a putrid, deathlike stench emanates from her. Those who see her or smell her must instantly take flight before she enchants them to her will.

  It is said that some men who encountered her in the lonely marshes remained lost for days. When they returned, it was often with little memory of where they had been or of the passing of time. They did, however, have one thing in common. They were so deeply afraid that it seemed as if they had lost their wits. Most of them did recall that a ghastly old woman, reeking of death, crawled out of the bushes and overpowered them. After that their minds remained blank until they reached home again. A miner who was lost for three days arrived back so petrified that he could not return to work. The families of these men were equally fearful of what their loved ones had gone through. Children were warned never to walk near the marsh. Folks who needed to travel through there were earnestly encouraged to carry with them some bread and a page from the Bible for protection.

  Chapter 2

  In Touch With Father

  The Forerunner

  Three full years before Paula’s father Robert died, a series of strange events occurred that greatly upset the family. Paula’s mother, Anna, was absolutely convinced that these events were forerunners of a death, and that she was being warned of its coming. She was extremely frightened, especially since she had no means of knowing which member of her family was being singled out by these warnings.

  Paula lived with her parents and her older brother Kevin in an old farmhouse in the Annapolis Valley of Nova Scotia. On a beautiful summer afternoon in 1938, when she was six years old, she and Kevin went out together to play in the fields. It was an afternoon she would never forget. The events that followed were so strange that they remained etched on her memory more than 60 years later.

  The two children set off for home about 4 p.m. There was a fast-flowing brook near the farmhouse that they had to negotiate by hopping over stepping stones. It was quite a dangerous crossing, and one or other of their parents often came out of the house to make sure that the children managed the stream safely. The children were not at all surprised, then, to see their father walking towards them as they neared the water. They shouted out a greeting and began to look for him to help them over the slippery rocks jutting out of the treacherous current. To their great astonishment, instead of greeting them as usual, he ducked down secretively behind some bushes. When he did not reappear they decided to continue on home anyway, even though they were puzzled and scared. Kevin stretched out his hand to help his little sister over the dangerous current, and they ran safely back to the farmhouse.

  Kevin and Paula were even more surprised when they got back to the farmhouse a few minutes later to find their father sitting in his rocking chair, wrapped in a rug and peering sleepily at the parlour fire. He did not look as if he had just rushed home. “That was quick,” Kevin said to him. His father asked what Kevin meant, so the boy explained how both children had seen him near the brook, creeping stealthily into the bushes instead of giving a hand to help Paula cross the water safely. Kevin was quite indignant, thinking how easily the little girl might have slipped.

  It was his father’s turn to be surprised. “But I’ve been sitting here all afternoon,” he said, “I haven’t even left the room.” Their mother agreed that this was true. In fact she had suggested several times that he go out and look for the children, as the afternoon was getting late.

  The memory of what had happened by the brook was clear in Kevin’s mind. He held no doubts and continued to challenge his father with comments like “Get off it, Dad,” until Robert exploded with anger. As the row grew more heated, their mother also became very upset, telling the children not to keep telling fibs, and even raising her hand to Kevin. The scene remained indelibly etched in both children’s memories because the accusations were so unjust.

  It was not until years later that Paula’s mother admitted to her that she had lost control that day because of her intense fear. When the children had insisted so adamantly that they had seen their father by the brook, she recognized that they had probably experienced a forerunner of someone’s death, most likely their father’s — but they were too young and innocent to have known that it was an omen and what it might portend. Even so, Robert seemed to carry on as well as ever, although the situation did not end there. In fact, the omens had just begun.

  A couple of months later the whole family was woken one night by a tremendously loud shaking and battering on the front door — not normal knocks, but a pattern of measured change to a measured pattern, “Perump!” ... followed by a crescendo of alarming drumming and a violent rattling of the latch. As isolated as the farmhouse was, they could not imagine who would be calling so late and so urgently. It had to be a dire emergency. Shocked into action, Robert leaped out of bed, threw on some clothes and raced downstairs, shouting, “Who is it?” at the top of his lungs.

  His voice faltered when he realized there was no one there. Anna joined him, trembling with fear at the emptiness around them. “Another forerunner?” she thought to herself, but did not dare to voice her thoughts. She gazed out over the dark fields. There were no lanterns to show where a group of people might have gathered, and no sound of voices.

  Robert, also puzzled and afraid, pulled on some high rubber boots and a warm duffle coat and set out alone to examine the area around the farm. He explored the property thoroughly but could find nothing to explain the disturbance. He whacked the bushes where some prankster might have found a hiding place, but no one was there. The cows and horses were quiet in the barn and the chickens did not even flutter when he passed the henhouses with his flashlight. All the doors and windows to the house were securely fastened and there was no hint of an attempted break-in or other disturbance.

  He returned thoughtfully to the house, but couldn’t begin to explain the battering on the door to his anxious wife and children. That night Anna became convinced the forewarnings were trying to tell her that they must move, before disaster overwhelmed them. The place itself was going to destroy them — unless they fled.

  Robert went along with her impulse to leave. He had been deeply disturbed by the uncanny circumstances of that night. They put the farm up for sale, and were fortunate to soon find a buyer. They found a vacant house in the nearby village and quickly completed their move. For the first time in months Anna was cheerful, singing around the house, baking delicious pies, and making her little family’s new home feel secure.

  It was not secure f
or long, however. Shortly after they moved in, Anna was sitting by the fire peacefully reading when she was startled by a huge crash near her feet. An old family portrait had fallen off the wall, and its frayed cord trailed across her slipper almost as if it was trying to attract her attention. Seeing, however, that the hanging had snapped, she dismissed her initial anxiety. Anna put the incident down to the weakness of the worn old twine on the picture frame — until another portrait suddenly crashed down.

  This time there seemed to be no reason for it. The cord was intact. The frame had mysteriously lifted up over the picture hanger, and the painting flew off the wall at an extraordinary angle, almost as if it was being thrown. The glass shattered as the picture violently hit the floor.

  After this there was no telling when another picture might fall. They came down in every room. In the kitchen, even a religious psalm illustrated with angels and lambs, which hung over the dresser, flew across to the opposite wall and landed in a dish of soft butter. Both picture and butter were ruined.

  From this time onward, the family was often woken unexpectedly at night by the sound of the piano playing. It wasn’t long before the four of them began to suffer from lack of sleep. Sometimes they heard only odd notes, as if some invisible finger was aimlessly jabbing at the keyboard. On other occasions, heavy chords resounded through the house. The cat, too, was horrified, and often leaped yowling into Paula’s arms to seek comfort. Occasionally, their “guest” indulged in gentle old-fashioned melodies that had the power to soothe them, in spite of the fear that prevailed throughout the household.

  After a time, as these disturbances continued and there seemed no way to stop the nuisance, Anna’s dread changed to acceptance. She asked herself why these supernatural activities might be a forewarning and began to prepare herself for whatever was to come. Instead of giving in to terror she felt gratitude for whatever time might be left to the family.