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Post by dem bones on Nov 5, 2019 16:46:31 GMT
Harry Price - Poltergeist: Tales of the Supernatural (Bracken, 1993: originally Country Life, 1945, as Poltergeist Over England: Three Centuries Of Mischievous Ghosts) Foreword;
What is a Poltergeist? Historical Background What do Poltergeists do? The Home of the Poltergeist The Drummer Poltergeist More Tales from Ragley The Ringcroft Poltergeist The Wesley Poltergeist Academic Poltergeists Dr. Johnson, Goldsmith, and the Cock Lane Ghost The Hinton Ampner Skull 'Astonishing Transactions at Stockwell' The Poltergeist of Stamford Street 'Ring Out, Wild Bells' The Willington Poltergeist The 'Electric Horror' of Berkeley Square The Mill of the Eden The Poltergeist that Stumbled The Ballechin House Controversy The Battersea Poltergeist 'Poltergeist Manor' Poltergeist Mediums Poltergeist That Bite Dr. Tillyard's Poltergeist Borley Rectory: A Century of Poltergeists Poltergeist Infested Rectories Poltergeist Incendiaries My Friends' Poltergeists The Evidence for the Poltergeist Can We Explain the Poltergeist?
Appendix A: A Question of Dates, and John Monpesson's First-hand Experience Appendix B: Bibliography: Poltergeists in Print Index Blurb: Mischievous, destructive and cruel, the poltergeist is a well-documented, worldwide phenomenon.
Poltergeist is a fascinating history of these ghostly impsThe 'Electric Horror' of Berkeley Square: Rather fortuitously, Price learned from an unidentified resident that, some time around 1840, passers by in the street came under attack from a hail of books, stones, a pair of spurs, and various medallions launched from the upper windows of the vacant property. The glass of each was then smashed as one. Mischievous spirits or Victorian vandals? Either way, it is enough excuse for the ghost-hunter to include an entry on the exuberantly haunted 50 Berekley Square in a book devoted to Poltergeists. Over 11 thrilling pages, Price introduces: a child in Scotch plaid frock, either tortured or frightened to death in the nursery. An Adelena, or Adela, who threw herself from a top floor window "in order to escape the attentions of a most unavuncular and wicked uncle or guardian." A gang of coiners manufacturing weird noises in the night to scare off vagrants, nosey parkers and would-be ghost-hunters. A maid who, preparing a room for a débutante's fiancée, is scared witless by something so horrific she has a terrible fit and dies as a result. On learning of this, the gallant boyfriend demanded to spend a night in the haunted room. To placate bride-to-be and entourage, he assured them that, not only was he armed but he would ring an alarm bell should any phantom show its ghastly face. Crucially, he instructs that they must only respond to a second bell, as there is always the possibly he might trigger it by mistake. If you don't know the rest, I'll not spoil it for you. Unusually, no mention is made of perhaps the most famous casualties of the horror of Berkeley Square, namely the two sailors seeking a doss for the night. Price, cheerfully sceptical on the matter, relies heavily upon letters published in Notes & Queries between November 1872 and 1881. Some of these valuable correspondents in turn referenced articles in contemporary publications. There can be little doubt that the "evidence" volunteered by a contributor to Mayfair for May 10 1879 was influenced - to put it charitably - by Rhoda Broughton's short story, The Truth, the whole Truth, and Nothing But The Truth, first published in Temple Bar for Feb. 1868. The authoress herself certainly thought so, writing in response to an enquiry from the Rev. C. F. S. Warren of Farnborough; More on the haunting at 50 Berekley Square: Adrian Chambers - Haunted Houses, 1971. Rosemary Pardoe, "I've seen it" A School Story and the House in Berkeley Square, Ghosts & Scholars #29, 1999. Read here
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Post by ripper on Nov 29, 2019 20:21:51 GMT
My late mum used to work as a cleaner 5 mornings per week for a family who owned a large and slightly spooky house in the 60s, 70s and early 80s. During school holidays she would often take me with her, and I would amuse myself by looking through their fairly large collection of books. One was Price's Poltergeists Over England, the Country Life edition I suppose. At the time I believed all the accounts in the book--I was only around 11 or so. I remember reading various chapters then, when needing to use the bathroom, running like blazes up their stairs and down a dark corridor to the bathroom, then running as fast as I could back downstairs. Despite the book scaring me, I kept going back to it for more. What made it worse was that the family were more often than not absent, so there would be no-one around apart from my mum. Haven't read the book in well over 40 years, but I still recall the chills it gave me.
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Post by Jojo Lapin X on Nov 29, 2019 21:23:32 GMT
I am standing right behind you.
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Post by helrunar on Aug 13, 2022 12:55:47 GMT
This is reputedly a booklet Mr Price authored in the 1930s, a sort of ghost investigators' guide pamphlet for those who wished to conduct on-site research at Borley Rectory. archive.org/details/borley-blue-book/mode/2up?view=theaterNote that you should bring sandwiches, etc. and hot drinks in a vacuum flask. Keep the electric torch IN YOUR POCKET ALWAYS. Be careful with all lights, matches, cigarette ends, etc. Happy Hunting! H.
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Post by pulphack on Aug 13, 2022 13:48:03 GMT
I do love old Harry - a man not above the odd 'apportment' of his own (why else keep a half brick in your mac pocket?) but still a searcher for truth, even if he'd sort of made up his mind about what that might be before hand. But he was a decent writer and a great storyteller who, in another life, would have been a decent midlist novelist during this period. And maybe he was right about some things. I know Dem is inclined to dismiss psychics etc as a bit dodgy, and I don't disagree with him, but I do think you were right on another thread, Steve, where you posited that to dismiss 'supernatural' phenomena out of hand is too dismissive - they thought Harvey was a witch for putting chickens in the snow and digging them up later and eating them to prove they were still preserved (they were dead in the first place, I hasten to add) - he'd discovered refirgeration! All science is superstition until someone in a white coat with a clipboard works out the theorem to prove it (yeah, you can tell my age by my stereotypes of scientists).
If you like the booklet, Steve, dig up anything by Harry you can find, you'll have a blast!
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Post by helrunar on Aug 13, 2022 15:20:39 GMT
Thanks for the interesting comments about Harry Price, Pulphack. I'd never heard of the writer. The archive scan of this interesting little pamphlet was shared, if I'm remembering correctly, to an M. R. James group on social media.
Borley seems to have been a British precursor to the US Amityville case; really minor phenomena blown up into fantastical proportions through the diligent efforts of professional ghost-hunting "investigators."
I wonder what the preferred sandwiches were for professional ghosthunters back in the day.
cheers, Hel
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Post by 𝘗rincess 𝘵uvstarr on Aug 13, 2022 15:21:05 GMT
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Post by pulphack on Aug 13, 2022 17:08:07 GMT
Yes, I'm getting Harvey and Bacon confused - and it is Harvey the frog dissecting Pendle bloke and discoverer of circulation I was talking about. Getting Harvey confused with Bacon's chum Dr Witherbone, who does sound like someone who should have been involved with chickens - Dr Wishbone, possibly. Old age getting to my memory and should check google first.
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