hauntings, BORELY RECTORY, BORELY CHURCH

Overlooking the River Stour bordering the counties of Essex and Suffolk, England, is the famed Borely Rectory (bottom photo, in sepia). Phenomena includes: a phantom coach, a headless monk, a ghostly nun who may or may not hve been the monk's lover, the spirit of a former vicar, eerie lights, water that turned into ink, mysterious bells, and a cascade of things that went bump in the night.

Harry Price devoted 10 yrs to the study of these events, and continued to lecture and write on the subject til his death. But, as respected as he was, Charles Sutton wrote an article questioning him after his death. (Sorta unfair - the dead can't really defend themselves. Well not normally anyhow.) Sutton says that after being hit in the back of the head on a visit to Borely, he found Price had pebbleds in his pocket. Others also had doubts about what they'd seen there. In 1978, Trevor Hall proved that Price had lied about his childhood and youth. He also found that Price had worked odd jobs, one of them conjuring tricks at concerts. Price lied about his ancestry and claimed books he never wrote, putting his bookplate on them.

But who's to say that even though Price was a phony, that the hauntings themselves weren't real? Perhaps it is a case of a sham artist coming across a true haunting and using it to gain fame, even if he did "create" a few incidents for the benefit of guests sho may not otherwise have seen what was really there.

The nun's tale was told to Price by the Glanville family. They say a nun was murdered at Boley, and she was a french woman named Marie Lairre. From the year the rectory was built in 1863 until 1929 there were stories circulating about it. Price supposedly recorded over 2,000 events during his one visit, but when he rented the empty rectory and recruited a team of independent witnesses (some of whom he also tricked to prove his point) several incidents were reported in Price's absence. Between the time Price left the rectory and the time the rectory was "mysteriously" destroyed by fire in 1939, odd events did occur. So, Price was a fake, but were the ghosts real?

Reverend D.E. Bull built the rectory in 1863 to house his wife and 14 children. A wing was added in 1875, resulting in a small central courtyard. It is thought that a 13th century monastery once occupied that spot. One of the monks from that monastery gave rise to the first ghost story.

The monk was said to have eloped with a nun from a convent 8 miles away at Bures. They were caught. He was beheaded and she was walled up in the convent. But in 1938 a letter from the Essex Archaelogical Society said that neither the monastery or the nunnery ever existed. But Harry Bull loved to tell the story, as did his father Henry. The acoustics of the house played a hand in many a practical joke, and the sisters told tales of hauntings and ghostly figures.

When the Reverend G. Eric Smith and his wife took over the rectory, they had no trouble with any ghosts. The rappings and wonders that Price did really experience on his first trip to Borely was probably none other than Harry Bull playing his pranks.

When the Foysters moved in an estimated 2,000 incidents happened, most in about 14 months. There were voices, footsteps, objects being thrown, apparitions, and messages scribbled onto walls. Price was only there on one occasion, so it wasn't him. The reverend was in his early 50s, his wife was 31. She was very unhappy there and made no friends. She rented out the cottage at the end of the house to a French Canadian man closer to her own age. He seemed to dominate the household. Marianne and D'Arlis opened a flower shop in London and returned to Borley only on weekends. There may possibly have been an affair. Mrs Foyster behaved oddly, sometimes hysterically, fainting when upset. Once when the investigators were there, she flung herself down on her knees and prayed to St Anthony for forgiveness, as if she could be responsible if the "ghosts" didn't show.

The villagers accused Marianne to her face of being behind the "hauntings" at this time. There was a very similar case involving an Esther Cox in 1878, in Nova Scotia. At first believed to be able to see apparitions no one else could, Esther was actually in a state of dissociation or conversion hysteria. They Foysters knew of this case. Maybe Marianne was responsible, because the events were identical, down to the scribblings on the wall. Perhaps she was even unconscious of her own actions, being the high strung woman she was. Mrs. Foyster did hate the place at first site, and she was the only one who saw the "apparitions".

The Bull sisters plead for Price to return. Perhaps they knew the source of the pranks when they were there, and knowing this, they suspected a genuine haunting now. The same could be said of Price, since he immediately pointed the finger at Mrs Foyster. 99 of 103 incidents depended upon Marianne's word, 3 were attributed to natural causes, and only one was inexplicable. An exorcism was performed, and the "goblins" were gone, but so was Marianne, in London the weeks.

The Foysters left in 1935. This is when Price rented Borley and took out an ad for observers to join him. Then Captian William Hart Gryson bought the place, wanting to make it a tourist attraction. But in 1939 it was destroyed by fire, believed to be arson. The site was leveled in 1944. An orchard and 3 bungalows sit there now. During the demolition, Price took a LIFE magazine reporter. After a picture was developed, it showed a brick levitated (see above). Actually, the shot was made just as a worker tossed aside a brick.

The haunting of Borely was bare-faced hocus-pocus from start to finish. Despite this fact, ghost hunters still explore the place, and have stumbled onto something, not at the rectory, but at Borely Church itself (top right hand side).

The church was built in the 12th century (that's the 1100s boys and girls, not the 1200s - remember we're now in the 21st century etc etc). Additions were built in the 15th century. Geoffrey Croom Hollingsworth investigated and believes the Rev Harry Bull's death was caused by syphilis, which is accompanied by narcolepsy and hallucinations, fitting well with Rev Bull's last days. But Geoffrey does not think this is the entire reason for Bull's apparitions - he claims to have seen the phantom himself, along with his assistant Roy Potter.

He began his investigation in the 1960s with a group. They, over a period of years and different conditions, heard raps, heavy panting, and the sound of furniture being moved. Once in the orchard, something huge and dark "like an animal" neared them and banged loudly on the fence. Another night, they heard laughter and merriment ... which seemed to be coming up the road towards Borley Church. The night was misty but light enough to see that there was nobody on the road. Assuming it was late night revellers but confused as to the direction of the sound, Potter got into his car and coasted down the road towards Long Melford with his engine off. Using his walkie talkie, he experimented wiht shouting at differnt intervals to see if the sound carried. It did not.

A tape recorder was set up in the church. Nobody was seen to go in, but they heard a loud crash and found the tape recorded "pretty well battered". The tape was torn from its reels. They were convinced after they saw the nun. "Suddenly, I saw her quite clearly, in a grey habit and cowl as she moved across the garden and through a hedge. I thought, " Is somebody pulling my leg? Roy was out in the roadway, the nearest of the group, and I shouted to him. The figure had disappeared into a modern garage, and I thought that was that, but as Roy joined me we both saw her come to the other side. She approached tho about 12 feet from us, and we both saw her face, that of an elderly woman in her 60s perhaps. We followed her as she seemed to glide over a dry ditch as if it wasn't there, before she disappeared into a pile of building bricks. Neither of us was frightened. It was an odd sensation, but peaceful and tranquil." He also said, "I don't give a damn if Price invented things or not. The quesion is - is the place haunted? ANd you can take it from me - it is. I have invented nothing. Roy and I saw the nun quite clearly for a period of about 12 minutes."

In 1974, Denny Densham got permission to experiment with tape recorders. They checked out the church thoroughly. The first tape picked up a series of raps and bumps. Then, they used two recorders. These picked up the sound of a heaby door being opened and slammed shut, complete with the bolt squeaking. The group was watching from the outside, and neither the porch door nor the smaller chancelor door were opened, and a test showed the chancel door did not squeak. The next week, the group set up a sophisticated system with two high quality microphones, as before being placed near the altar and halfway down the aisle, with a 3rd machine in front of the altar. Half the team were locked in the church, half stayed in the courtyard. Denshem said, " Suddenly, there was a curious change in the atmosphere. One of the team said he felt as if he were being watched, and we all felt very cold." During the next few minutes, the tape picked up a clatter, as if something had been thrown down the aisle, There was rapping and the sound of doors opening again - although both doors stayed locked and bolted. There was the sound of a human sigh. Afterwards, they found the small recorder had been jammed and the tape had been taken out and tangled up, as befor with Croom- Hollingsworth.

In July, they returned. They said that they all had a "curious tingling sensation" at which time the machines picked up a static. They recorded stealthy sounds at the altar, a door shutting, a crash, and then the sound of hollow, heavy footsteps, like those of a very large man, walking by the altar rail. They tried to reproduce they sound of the steps themselves but could not. The floor is stone, covered by heavy carpet. They then saw a glow of light near the chancel door, followed by a terrifying grunt. On this, their last visit (can't blame em for that ), they saw pinpoints of light in the curtains by one door, and heard a heavy crash. Denshan said he was at a loss to explain what they had seen and heard. They made every effort to ensure that there was no scam. They tried leaving a pencil and paper in the church, asked it to rap to yes and no questions, and so on, but it doesn't seem to want to communicate, unless the tearing up of the tapes and throwing objects, itc, meant it resented them being there or perhaps it is even unaware of its observers.

Ronald Russell, a member of the Enfield Parapsychical Research Group and professional photographer, along with Frank Perry, an electrical engineer, and John Tay, a mechanical engineer, are regular researchers at Borely. Russell achieved odd results while taking pictures of the area with an Agfa CC21 camera, in which the film is contained in a cassette and processed in teh Agfa lab. "Sandwiched between perfectly normal frames we got 'ectoplasmic' stuff in the churchyard, shadowns where no shadows should be, and a thin light near the north door. As a photographer, Im at a loss to explain this as camera or film malfunction." Parry has used a graphic analyzer, an 8 channel recording machine with slider controls that adjust pitch and level, cut out interference, and enable the operator to pinpoint sounds. Russell says, "We have recorded hundreds of extraoridinary noises, footsteps, crashes, and so on. On occasion we located a center of disturbance near the Waldgrave tomb; it was tangible, like a swirling column of energy. When you passed your hand through it you felt a sort of crackle, like static electricity. On another occasion we heard a deep, grunting voice, which reminded me irresistably of Lee Marvin singing Morning Star. "

Russell says he thinks there are 3 basic factors at work here. First, the nun. There would be nothing unusual about a nun in the household of a Catholic family like the Waldegraves. (The Waldegraves had a family vault under the church, and there was a rumor that coffins had been mysteriously moved some time during the 19th century. They were an old and influential family of the village of Borley.) Russell thinks the apparition Mr Croom- Hollingsworth saw may be a psychic record of some such person. (A psychic record is not an actual, once-living entity. INstead, it's like a recording that somehow, perhaps having to do with a strong electro-magnetic surge or presence, is played back at random times, over and over again. There's actually some photographic evidence with LIVING persons that this is scientific fact - they just don't know how it works, and have not convinced a large proportion of mainstream science to investigate it. YET. The difference in this type of "haunting" is that the same person and actions and scene is repeated every time. It can, for instance, be found that someone is walking down a hall, but is knee-deep in the floor, to later learn the floor was rebuilt and is higher now than it was in the time period of the apparition. I have a MySpace blog under same name with a story about a photo that captured a ghost-image of a preacher who'd been in the same spot hours before the photo was taken, preaching behind the dais in teh same clothes, if you wanna look it up. Or google it.)

2nd, he thinks there seems to be some sort of ower concentrated in the church itself. "It is the intersectio of 2 ley lines, and when you try downsing in the church the rod practically twists from your hands." (Ley lines are natural fields of electromagnetic energy, related to the magnetic poles; if unfamiliar, its an interesting subject - google it too if you have time and inclination.)

And the 3rd, he thinks the power is boosted by the presence of observers, and that it waxes and wanes with the seasons. (All animals including humans have an electro-magnetic field produced by the electricity that runs thru our bodies and powers our nervous systems; some say that is what is picked up as auras, which has nothing to do with psychics, but to do with a scientific fact - some people, women only, have an extra color rod in the eye, in the same way color blind ppl have one less color than normal [they have the correct # of rods, but two are green or red instead of one of each; those with extra color vision also have an orange, i think it is]. These ppl can see many more colors than the average person, including ultra-violet ranges. This may allow them to see the very slight electric glow - heat, light, color - given off by other humans, animals, plants, even inanimate objects. This electricity, tho very weak emissions, could theoretically be enough to boost other energies, tho usually in an unnoticable way. Also, seasons and weather definitely affect electricity and magmetism - we all know how water carries electricity, and also have experienced the static electricity in very dry air, etc) In January, action is sporadic, and seems at full force in August. Church authorities prefer not to discuss this matter. But in theparish guidebook, under the heading "Ghosts", is a footnote: "There are, of course, those who suggest the church itself is haunted. Many old churches and buildings have noises and chill areas which some would classify as ghostly, but those who have lived long in the village and we who worship in the church have not experienced anything which would support such thoughts...Visitors should please remember that this is God's house and treat it with reverence."