Spectre detectors tune into soul music
A HAUNTED pub, midnight and me – three things you would not expect to find in the same sentence, but that is exactly where I found myself.
I went on location with local paranormal investigators
Truth Finders and BBC Radio Leeds to
The Mill, in Ossett, for a ghost hunt that was broadcast live as part
of the station’s week-long
investigation into the weirder side of West Yorkshire.
Grown men have been known to flee in fear from the pub’s games room and kitchen and staff have refused to enter some rooms in the Dewsbury Road drinking hole.
New landlord Richard Jones and his wife Linda have
yet to see a ghost, but say there is definitely
something strange going on.
Richard said: “The salt and pepper pots will be on the table when we leave them at night but when we come in the next day, they will be on the floor.”
The hive of activity the ghostbusters have experienced at the pub in previous visits has made it one of their favourite locations.
They always go fully equipped to make sure they capture every spooky spectacle.
Group member Toby Ion had one of his scariest ever
experiences at the pub. He said: “I was in the kitchen setting up
a voice recording experiment. I was counting to test the tape and, as
I did, there was a
really loud bang in front of me like someone banging on the worktop.
“I am usually quite brave but I have never
run so fast in my life. “It is one of the most frightening
experiences I have ever had. But, I’m glad I caught it on tape.”
In the past the team have also caught little lights on camera, which are
thought to be orbs – the
first sign of a ghostly manifestation.
The team, who are all sceptics determined to find
out the truth, set up eight night-vision cameras to keep a close eye on
every corner of the pub. These were overlooked by paranormal investigator
Shev Scorer from a makeshift control room. Motion sensors were placed
around the building as a back-up to detect other ghostly goings-on.
But this time, it was Toby’s voice-recording experiments and ghostbusting
traps that made for
the most excitement. Trigger objects were set up in the kitchen and the
games room. Coins placed on a piece of paper were drawn around so that
movement could be monitored and, if that wasn’t bad enough, the explanation
given by the team’s medium Su Walduck made matters worse.
Su said she had picked up on the sound of children
laughing in the area. She said: “I can see a little girl. I think
she is called Ellie.
She has a younger brother, he is only two or three. I can see him reaching
up and moving the coins
– he thinks it’s a game.”
In the bar, Su had picked up an a man and a woman
and had to leave because the experience made it hard for her to breathe.
She said: “It was really overwhelming. I pick up on things
like that. If someone has died in a fire or from something that affected
their breathing, it affects my breathing, too.” The coins moved a
few times in the night, mainly when we were in the room with them. Toby
said: “I have never seen anything like it before. I am amazed by
what I have seen here tonight.”
Toby was even more amazed when he was talking about voice recording experiments
and a
strange voice was picked up on the group’s walkie talkies.
Truth Finders front man Stephen Nugent, said: “It could have been a passing taxi but we had not had anything like this all night and for it to happen at the exact moment when Toby said voices can be picked up through different things was just unbelievable.
