Welcome
to the sixth edition of the Borley Ghost Society Newsletter. It was exactly 60 years ago
today that fire destroyed the Rectory.
New $20 prepaid. Order through Colombo & Company, 42 Dell Park Avenue, Toronto M6B 2T6, Canada. e-mail inquiries.
Letters to the editor
"I think the suggestion to start the "Borley Institute for Paranormal Studies" is an excellent idea! If you decide to adopt this idea, would you please keep me posted on its progress? And if there's anything I can do to help, just ask!"
Best,
Heather Langley
Vince;
"Apparently there may be a slate from the Rectory roof that was used
to train mediums in psychometry."
Neil Purling
Anyone hear of this before?
Reply.
Dear Vincent:
"I've been to Borley twice in the last 10 years; once on a pleasant summer's afternoon, and once in
driving rain on a bleak November afternoon. On the first occasion I made the terrible mistake of
asking at the Rectory Cottage for the church to be unlocked. The lady who answered the door
was very angry and accused me of coming to Borley "because of those ridiculous stories". She
went on to say that the lives of the villagers had been made a complete misery by Harry Price and
"the other sensation-seeking fraudsters", and she particularly blamed the BBC for continually
bringing the case back to the public attention over the years.
"When I showed her a guide book to churches of England (which included Borley), she
calmed down a little. I said that I simply wished to see the Waldegrave tomb, and she unlocked
the church for me. The poor lady was genuinely distressed by the attention that the village has
attracted over the years, and told me of tales involving midnight ceremonies in the graveyard, and
unwelcome visitors beseiging the church at Halloween. Apparently she still has to call upon the
local police at regular intervals to remove unwanted visitors from the church and its environs.
H.D.E. Bull's grave has been vandalised and the continuation of the legend still causes problems
for the locals - hence the regular disappearance of directional signs to Borley. Whether these have
been taken by souvenir hunters or the villagers is not clear. One thing is certain, the Borley
hauntings - real or fabricated - will not go away."
Bob Richardson
Hi Vincent;
Dear Vince;
Vince,
Carol Guess has joined our community. She has her
own web page under the banner
"Tennessee Ghost Research Society."
"1. I would like to ask a favour. I was really pleased to see the photo
of the model rectory, as I had heard of its existence. Is there any
chance of getting a series of photos i.e. left, right, top etc on the
web site or news letters?
[Sorry, no. Peter Underwood was kind enough to loan me this exclusive view. However,
Ivan Banks includes some excellent architectural renditions in Enigma of Borley Rectory. There is
a beautiful "blow-up" schematic in
an Usborne pocketbook, Haunted Houses. I don't have copies to share of that book - by
Eric Maple and Lynn Myring, but I do have copies of one of my all-time favorites, Tales of Real Hauntings which has a
really nice "blow-up."]
"2. I have visited
[I've tried several times to contact the owner of the site - unsuccessfully. The e-mail keeps
coming back as
undelivered. However, the original picture is the frontispiece of The Most Haunted House in
England. We have to assume the site owner has colored it.]
"3. I have read with interest the arguments for and against the photo of
the floating brick and I don't really have firm affiliations either way
with any of the current arguments. However when it comes to the
suggestion that the brick was thrown, I must say I cannot really believe
that photographic technology had advanced to the stage that a moving
object could be captured on film in such a manner in 1944. Looking at
the angle the brick is "floating"at I would say it would be far more
likely to have been suspended from above. Furthermore, at the distance
the photo was taken any evidence of nylon etc would be lost in the
resolution of the picture!
(For the record, I would like to say I believe the picture to be
genuine).
"4. I think I may open a can of worms here however this has been dogging
me for a while........Does anyone know when the dwelling houses that are
built on the site of the rectory were erected.. I have seen the houses
and in my opinion they look like typical 1960s English construction but
that is only a guess. I would be keen to know how and when the rectory
site was leveled and prepared for building. Did the site lie dormant and
progressively deteriorate from 1939 till the houses were built. If so,
where did they take the remains of the rectory? I appreciate that much
of it would have been taken by visitors but there must have been tonnes
of rubble. Incidentally, on a previous visit to Borley, I also noticed
the gates on the house opposite the church looked a bit out of place in
comparison to the age of the house and am keen to find out if they were
originally from the rectory etc and whether anything remains of the
original building in a museum etc."
"5. I remember some years ago reading a book in the library about
Borley, it was fairly modern and actually had some pictures of the
rectory site as it is today (well today ish about the mid 70s I think).
It wasn't specifically about Borley but had 4-5 pages on the subject.
Have you seen such a book?
"6. On another subject, have you ever thought about investigating the local
Borley council for info regarding the demise of the rectory site. It
would also interesting to view the photo files for the civil works,
civil surveys etc before and after the completion of the works!!!!"
Cheers,
Paul Pritchard
"I first began reading about Borley whilst at school in the early seventies in magazine and Sunday
newspaper articles and then read Price's End of Borley Rectory which, like most people I have
since met, made a big impression on me. I also saw the television play that I told you about [see
issue 3 and below]. In
1977 I got hold of the Groom-Hollingsworth tape with
the raps and famous sigh and this, coupled
with the sensationalist articles I had read, convinced me that one only had to open the car door in
Borley village to be ensured of experiencing the full range of paranormal phenomena.
My first visit was in 1977, when myself and two friends spent a long weekend there exploring,
eating in Long Melford and sleeping rough in the car in the small picnic area a half mile down the
lane next to the River Stour. This really is a wonderful, unspoilt area of England with each village
looking like a contender for a jigsaw or biscuit tin lid. Whilst you're down there make sure you
check out the Belchamps and their churches. The Stour is the river in most of Constables
paintings and it looks pretty much the same now as it did back then. The countryside is very lush
and overgrown with lots of singing birds and sizzling insects. The picnic area was a fantastic
hidden little spot (presumably still is) lots of green vegetation around the gurgling narrow river
and nightingales singing there all night. Signs forbid overnight parking, but the place was so
isolated and quiet back then that we stayed in the same place on countless occasions through to
the early eighties, usually discreetly pitching a small tent with no problems whatsoever.
This is not to be recommended now, as you will almost certainly be moved on by the local
constabulary. The cops down there no longer look like an aged Alec Guinness and ride pushbikes,
jokingly shouting at kids for scrumping apples, but drive big patrol cars and are searching for any
excuse to meet a ghost hunter or any other form of nocturnal Borley visitor for the reasons you
have outlined. The patrol car now takes in the picnic area on its nightly drives around and there's
also a good chance you will meet hormone crazed couples from Long Melford who park there
after dark to brush up on their biology homework. The other big downfall are the car loads of
youths from Sudbury who cruise the leafy lanes, especially on weekend nights, looking for
paranormal researchers to bait (an olde English tradition - a bit like bear baiting only with more
jeering profanities).
Having said this, Borley was still a bit of a circus on Saturday nights back in the late seventies and
early eighties, but I never witnessed or heard about any trouble. Most weekends, as the night
progressed, the dark lanes, churchyard and rectory site would see bunches of students from
Cambridge (half an hour away) ghost groups from around Britain coming and going and a wide
selection of other curious people from all over the world. Covens of white witches turned up and
various folk claiming to be a reincarnation of either Harry Price, Marie Lairre or both. The
difference was that, back then, the church was always open during the day and the villagers
seemed fairly happy to talk about their ghosts and the Borley legend - especially if you were okay
and reasonably normal. The vicar and church warden (a lady who lived next door) were fine about
people setting up microphones in the building when the doors were locked at sunset with the leads
under the door to be plugged into the machine in the porch. No one ever acted around and the
village tolerated the strange visitors sneaking about while they were all fast asleep in bed. It was
probably the best "neighbourhood watch" Britain has ever had. It must be next to impossible to
steal cars or burgle properties in a village when twenty plus idiots with microphones and cameras
are tiptoeing around looking for dead nuns.
We would prowl silently around the rectory site or just sit in the church porch staring down the
pitch-black path between the yews and hoping to see something along the lines of what had been
described so many times by Borley visitors. Sometimes it was good to have the place to yourself
all night, but on other occasions it was interesting to talk to the others. We met Ed and Lorraine
Warren, as I told you about earlier,
and also (I think his name was) Ron Potter who was first mate on the Groom-Hollingsworth tape.
I don't know whatever became of him but he regularly traveled up with his group from London
where he ran courses on parapsychology. We also met a guy who claimed that back in the early
seventies he had bumped into John Lennon and Yoko Ono one evening at Borley church and
earlier in the day at the Bull in Long Melford.
As far as phenomena went, I never experienced a thing - which was disappointing, as after all the
seventies hype (there was a big paranormal and occult revival in the UK back then) I had been
expecting at least levitation in the first few minutes of my first visit. The only close encounter was
the coin episode with the Warrens and a few strange raps which may or may not have been a
church cooling down.
I keep meaning to go back down there, but after reading your reports and seeing confirmation of
this occasionally in the British press, it probably won't be a night visit.
See you later and take care
Ian Jarvis
"I love the new news letter. I
especially like the mention of the IGHS. I have just completed The Home
Study Course for Certified Ghost Hunter and I have received my diploma. I
have also been accepted into the Inner Circle Membership. Please refer to the Ghost Society. My name was also
mentioned in the
latest IGHS news letter under the Home Study Course section (along with a
quote from me)."
David Barber
The mysterious television show
"The British television play in question was the one that dramatised the Foyster period at the
rectory, with the addition of a little sneaky murder plotting and extra-marital sex with ghost
hunters. I would love to see it again or at least find out more about it. What would be the best
way to search for information on this? If you can give me any clues on the best places to begin
looking, I'll get right on with it. Bear in mind that I no longer have any idea of the company who
made it, the correct year, the channel on which it was shown or any of the cast - a bit of a poser,
eh? Remember also that all the names (Foyster, Price, Borley, Marianne) had all been changed, so
there is nothing there that could be fed into a search engine. It may possibly have been one in a
series of 'scary' dramas, but I can't be sure.
"I've spoken to various people over the years who vaguely recall seeing the play and, whilst
remembering nothing else, always mention how the croquet/nun scene scared the hell out of
them. I wonder if [members of the BORLEY GHOST SOCIETY] could help? Anyone who was
even mildly interested in ghosts in the seventies and watched this play would have immediately
have recognised the story for what it was. Hopefully someone did and has a better memory than I.
Just one single actor's name would pin it down."
Cheers
Ian Jarvis
BORLEY GHOST SOCIETY t-shirts
Let
me know.
Borley Ghost Society associate profiles
This way, you can tell people you have your very own web page, and
freely give them your URL!
If you would like me to make a profile page for you, just tell
me a little about yourself and attach a photo to an e-mail.
Associate Activities
Special discounts
Please note a new department called the BONUS SECTION. This is where I will be
placing titles I have found that do not deal with Borley or with ghosts, but were just too
interesting to pass during my digging about. Books about Jack The Ripper or Angels, for
example. You never know, so stop by often.
Feedback