WEBVTT - Season 08 Episode 40: It's Inside the House 0:00:00.120 --> 0:00:03.400 Hello, it's Richard mccleinsmith here with a quick update before 0:00:03.400 --> 0:00:06.800 we dive into today's episode. Unexplained is very excited to 0:00:06.800 --> 0:00:09.200 be a part of Crime Wave at Sea this November, 0:00:09.440 --> 0:00:12.600 joining forces with some of the eeriest voices in the 0:00:12.640 --> 0:00:15.800 world of true crime and the paranormal four Nights in 0:00:15.840 --> 0:00:19.960 the Caribbean, with amazing podcasts like Last Podcast on the Left, 0:00:20.280 --> 0:00:24.400 Scared to Death and many more live shows, meet and greets, 0:00:24.640 --> 0:00:27.960 creepy Stories under the Stars and you can be there too, 0:00:28.640 --> 0:00:31.960 but don't wait. Rooms are nearly sold out. Head to 0:00:32.000 --> 0:00:36.600 Crimewavetsea dot com forward slash Unexplained to grab your fan 0:00:36.680 --> 0:00:39.600 coat and lock in your cabin. We'd love to see 0:00:39.640 --> 0:00:54.760 you on board. In the year eleven thirteen, the third 0:00:54.840 --> 0:00:59.280 Abbot of Saint Martin of Tournay documented something extraordinary in 0:00:59.360 --> 0:01:02.240 christ Church, a small town on the south coast of 0:01:02.240 --> 0:01:06.240 England just east of Bournemouth. It was a five headed 0:01:06.360 --> 0:01:09.959 dragon that, according to the abbot, emerged from the sea 0:01:10.319 --> 0:01:13.959 before taking flight toward the town and destroying the church 0:01:14.280 --> 0:01:18.880 along with the number of nearby houses. Nine centuries later, 0:01:19.280 --> 0:01:23.760 the rebuilt priory still draws reports of phantom footsteps in 0:01:23.800 --> 0:01:27.800 its ruins, and the supposed apparition of an old caretaker 0:01:28.120 --> 0:01:31.720 nicknamed Old Joe, claimed by some to have been seen 0:01:31.920 --> 0:01:36.440 wandering about its gardens. These are just a couple of 0:01:36.520 --> 0:01:39.520 the strained sightings and hauntings that are said to have 0:01:39.520 --> 0:01:43.280 accumulated around the town of christ Church over the years. 0:01:44.160 --> 0:01:48.400 But perhaps the most distressing is the story of Alma Rattenbury, 0:01:48.640 --> 0:01:53.200 whose ghostly figure has reportedly been seen sitting mournfully among 0:01:53.240 --> 0:01:56.400 the reeds on the banks of the River Stour, not 0:01:56.480 --> 0:02:00.560 far from the priory. It was back in June nineteen 0:02:00.640 --> 0:02:05.680 thirty five that Alma, her handbag gripped tightly in her hand, 0:02:05.720 --> 0:02:10.480 wandered forlornly through the meadows down to the water's edge, 0:02:10.639 --> 0:02:15.480 as buttercups swayed gently in the breeze and swallows warboard above. 0:02:16.320 --> 0:02:19.200 She pulled a knife from the bag and proceeded to 0:02:19.240 --> 0:02:24.400 stab herself in the chest six times. Having pierced her heart, 0:02:24.680 --> 0:02:28.040 the bloody knife slipped from her grip and Alma fell 0:02:28.120 --> 0:02:33.359 dead into the water. Almer's was a tragic and fascinating 0:02:33.440 --> 0:02:37.160 story that gripped the nation at the time. A talented 0:02:37.240 --> 0:02:41.160 musician born in Canada in eighteen ninety seven, the dark 0:02:41.200 --> 0:02:44.680 haired Alma lost her first husband to the First World War, 0:02:45.560 --> 0:02:49.240 with her second marriage ending in an acrimonious divorce. She 0:02:49.280 --> 0:02:53.560 eventually settled in Bournemouth, England, with a third husband, the 0:02:53.680 --> 0:02:59.359 architect Francis Rattenbury, who was forty years her senior. By 0:02:59.400 --> 0:03:02.520 all accounts, the marriage was a stale one in which 0:03:02.560 --> 0:03:06.480 the couples let in separate rooms. After the birth of 0:03:06.560 --> 0:03:09.800 their first child in nineteen twenty eight, they were said 0:03:09.840 --> 0:03:15.720 to have remained celibate. The couple often quarreled, with Francis Rattenbury, 0:03:15.960 --> 0:03:21.000 at times physically assaulting his wife. In nineteen thirty four, 0:03:21.280 --> 0:03:24.960 they took on a seventeen year old servant named George Stoner. 0:03:25.960 --> 0:03:29.799 Within a year, Stoner and Alma began an affair, which 0:03:29.880 --> 0:03:34.920 was known about and tolerated by Almer's husband. Nonetheless, clearly 0:03:34.960 --> 0:03:39.000 the situation was not to every one's liking. In March 0:03:39.080 --> 0:03:43.360 the following year, Francis Rattenbury was brutally battered in the 0:03:43.440 --> 0:03:47.880 head by a carpenter's mallet. He died five days later 0:03:48.120 --> 0:03:53.080 from his wounds. Alma quickly confessed to the murder, and 0:03:53.240 --> 0:03:57.000 both she and George Stoner were arrested for the crime. 0:04:04.480 --> 0:04:08.160 After a gripping court case covered by all the daily papers, 0:04:08.640 --> 0:04:12.200 Alma Rattenbury was found not guilty for the murder of 0:04:12.240 --> 0:04:16.080 her husband. George Stoner, on the other hand, was not 0:04:16.160 --> 0:04:21.560 so lucky. He was convicted and sentenced to death. Alma 0:04:21.720 --> 0:04:24.520 was devastated by the decision, and in the court of 0:04:24.600 --> 0:04:28.599 public opinion, was still very much a guilty party, having 0:04:28.680 --> 0:04:32.799 been blamed for coercing the impressionable Stoner into doing the deed. 0:04:34.240 --> 0:04:37.960 In the days after the conviction, Alma struggled desperately with 0:04:38.040 --> 0:04:41.640 the guilt of what had happened to George. Feeling very 0:04:41.720 --> 0:04:45.040 much the pariah the nation believed her to be, she 0:04:45.080 --> 0:04:47.400 made her way to the banks of the Stour on 0:04:47.480 --> 0:04:53.479 the southern fringes of Christchurch and ended her life. As 0:04:53.480 --> 0:04:58.440 it transpired. Not long after Alma's death, after a public outcry, 0:04:58.800 --> 0:05:03.159 George Stoner was oldultimately spared the death penalty. His sentence 0:05:03.320 --> 0:05:07.760 was reduced to life imprisonment instead. Only seven years later, 0:05:08.320 --> 0:05:10.920 in return for signing up to fight in World War II, 0:05:11.480 --> 0:05:15.599 he had his conviction quashed entirely. He returned a free 0:05:15.640 --> 0:05:20.240 man and eventually died in the year two thousand. But 0:05:20.360 --> 0:05:23.680 why am I telling you all this, I suppose just 0:05:23.720 --> 0:05:27.159 to demonstrate that no matter how quaint or small a 0:05:27.240 --> 0:05:32.120 town may be, tragedy and emotional distress is never far away. 0:05:33.360 --> 0:05:36.720 The sort of things that some believe can linger as 0:05:36.880 --> 0:05:41.760 dark and malicious energies, only to then manifest in invisible 0:05:42.040 --> 0:05:45.680 and terrifying ways, just as they are believed to have 0:05:45.760 --> 0:05:49.280 done by one family who lived in christ Church back 0:05:49.320 --> 0:05:55.039 in nineteen ninety seven. You're listening to Unexplained, and I'm 0:05:55.120 --> 0:06:08.479 Richard mc lean smith. Before we go any further, I 0:06:08.520 --> 0:06:10.919 should explain that we're going to try something a little 0:06:10.920 --> 0:06:15.279 different with this week's episode. Earlier this summer, one of 0:06:15.279 --> 0:06:19.200 our writers, Diane Hope, spent some time in Bournemouth, hosted 0:06:19.240 --> 0:06:23.360 by a family who once lived in christ Church. One evening, 0:06:23.640 --> 0:06:27.360 they began telling Diane of a strange series of events 0:06:27.600 --> 0:06:31.720 that took place in their former christ Church home. Amazingly 0:06:31.839 --> 0:06:35.919 for us, they agreed to share their story. However, we thought, 0:06:36.400 --> 0:06:38.880 rather than write it up for me to tell, why 0:06:38.960 --> 0:06:42.640 not just let the couple speak for themselves. It was 0:06:42.680 --> 0:06:45.760 back in nineteen ninety six that Teresa and her husband 0:06:45.800 --> 0:06:49.320 Sean moved down to Bournemouth from the northeast of England, 0:06:49.600 --> 0:06:53.760 along with their young children, looking for a change of scene. 0:06:53.839 --> 0:06:56.560 Eight months later, the landlord of the flat they were 0:06:56.560 --> 0:07:00.360 renting decided to sell the property, forcing the fact family 0:07:00.480 --> 0:07:04.799 to move again. The couple ran a used car business, 0:07:05.200 --> 0:07:08.160 buying cars from the north of England and bringing them 0:07:08.200 --> 0:07:11.040 down south to sell, so they needed somewhere with a 0:07:11.080 --> 0:07:14.680 good amount of space to park the cars. They settled 0:07:14.680 --> 0:07:18.040 on the perfect place in the nearby town of christ Church, 0:07:18.440 --> 0:07:22.000 not far from the banks of the River Stour. Now, 0:07:22.200 --> 0:07:25.280 I said the couple would tell us their story. However, 0:07:25.560 --> 0:07:29.560 in the end Diane decided only to interview one of them. 0:07:29.840 --> 0:07:33.520 A little more on that later, but for now, this 0:07:33.720 --> 0:07:34.360 is Terresa. 0:07:35.760 --> 0:07:38.840 This property came up in christ Church and it had 0:07:38.840 --> 0:07:41.440 a very long drive up to it, and we could 0:07:41.480 --> 0:07:44.560 park a number of cars in the drive. It was 0:07:44.680 --> 0:07:48.040 like the manor house at the back of the other properties, 0:07:48.800 --> 0:07:51.120 so it was an older house which had been built 0:07:51.120 --> 0:07:56.160 before the properties around it. It was secluded, like a 0:07:56.200 --> 0:07:58.520 little forest at the back of it, so we thought 0:07:58.560 --> 0:07:59.360 this is ideal. 0:08:00.080 --> 0:08:02.960 Almost immediately, strange things began to. 0:08:02.960 --> 0:08:06.800 Occur when we watched into the house. The first night 0:08:06.840 --> 0:08:10.840 we moved in, I felt something touch my back. I 0:08:10.840 --> 0:08:14.320 couldn't really explain what it was I felt. I just 0:08:14.360 --> 0:08:17.960 thought it was strange, you know, like something was touching 0:08:18.000 --> 0:08:21.720 my back. It was the first night we'd been in there, 0:08:22.240 --> 0:08:24.960 and I'd never experienced anything like that previously. 0:08:26.240 --> 0:08:28.560 Then it happened again the next day. 0:08:29.600 --> 0:08:32.800 I was in the kid's bedroom and I felt it again, 0:08:33.280 --> 0:08:36.880 a touch, you know, just touching me back. I just 0:08:36.920 --> 0:08:39.120 couldn't explain how it happened. 0:08:40.480 --> 0:08:43.880 Theresa wasn't one to think it might be anything supernatural. 0:08:44.440 --> 0:08:47.720 In fact, the thought couldn't have been further from her mind. 0:08:48.440 --> 0:08:50.560 I didn't even mention it to Sean because I didn't 0:08:50.559 --> 0:08:52.600 think it was worth mentioning something like that. 0:08:53.679 --> 0:08:56.880 But it wouldn't be long before Sean too became aware 0:08:56.960 --> 0:09:01.160 of strange goings on because the creepy of events began 0:09:01.240 --> 0:09:02.040 to escalate. 0:09:03.120 --> 0:09:05.160 We were in the living room one night, which faced 0:09:05.200 --> 0:09:07.960 the garden. The window face the garden, and we're just 0:09:08.000 --> 0:09:12.120 watching Telly and we heard somebody run past the window. 0:09:12.720 --> 0:09:15.760 You could literally hair running, maybe like they had big 0:09:15.800 --> 0:09:16.720 boots on or something. 0:09:17.679 --> 0:09:21.120 The garden was equipped with motion Sense, a security lights 0:09:21.400 --> 0:09:24.440 designed to be triggered if anyone was trying to break in. 0:09:24.960 --> 0:09:26.480 Or trespass on the property. 0:09:27.440 --> 0:09:30.600 We looked out and the lights hadn't come on. So 0:09:31.240 --> 0:09:34.199 Shark got up and you know, went outside, and as 0:09:34.200 --> 0:09:37.480 soon as he went outside, the lights lit up. It 0:09:37.559 --> 0:09:40.120 seemed strange how you could hear something and then as 0:09:40.160 --> 0:09:43.960 soon as he went outside, everything lit up. So that 0:09:44.120 --> 0:09:47.640 was the first experience after what happened to me, which 0:09:47.679 --> 0:09:48.520 we couldn't explain. 0:09:51.280 --> 0:09:54.320 There was no hiding it now. Theresa confessed to her 0:09:54.440 --> 0:09:58.360 husband that she'd been sensing something strange going on in 0:09:58.440 --> 0:10:02.400 the house for a while, and soon the couple began 0:10:02.520 --> 0:10:06.080 hearing the supposed footsteps inside their home. 0:10:07.880 --> 0:10:09.880 They'd be sat in the living room on a night 0:10:10.280 --> 0:10:13.319 and we could hear running up and down the hallway. 0:10:13.880 --> 0:10:17.120 Because it was a bungalow, we all slept downstairs, big 0:10:17.200 --> 0:10:20.959 kid's bedroom at the back. Our bedroom was opposite the lounge, 0:10:21.480 --> 0:10:24.720 the hallway was in between, and we could literally hear 0:10:25.000 --> 0:10:28.040 somebody running up and down the hallway, and we'd open 0:10:28.080 --> 0:10:30.520 the living room door and there was nobody there. 0:10:31.960 --> 0:10:35.839 Perhaps, wandered Terresa, it was all just in their imaginations, 0:10:36.280 --> 0:10:39.320 a combination of the stress of adapting to life in 0:10:39.360 --> 0:10:43.720 the new home and the unfamiliarity of their surroundings, but 0:10:43.840 --> 0:10:46.920 she couldn't quite shake the sense that there was something 0:10:47.040 --> 0:10:49.880 more going on, and that they might even be in 0:10:50.000 --> 0:10:52.840 danger of somehow inviting it in. 0:10:53.960 --> 0:10:56.200 We kept trying to pass things off as if did 0:10:56.200 --> 0:10:59.120 we hear it are I didn't really like to talk 0:10:59.160 --> 0:11:02.200 about in the house. I was scared that something might progress. 0:11:02.920 --> 0:11:05.160 Shan was start of thinking what's going to happen next, 0:11:05.240 --> 0:11:06.960 and now thinking I hope nothing happens and. 0:11:07.000 --> 0:11:10.760 Eggs a few nights later to raise her and Sean 0:11:11.040 --> 0:11:15.080 was sat in the lounge watching television when Sean started 0:11:15.120 --> 0:11:19.680 hearing something, a peculiar squeaking sound that seemed to be 0:11:19.760 --> 0:11:24.199 coming from the back of the room. It sounded like 0:11:24.280 --> 0:11:25.520 the lounge door handle. 0:11:26.480 --> 0:11:29.400 We thought we heard it creaking, so we turned Helly 0:11:29.480 --> 0:11:33.480 down and Chan said I heard that handle. I said, yeah, 0:11:33.640 --> 0:11:37.400 I'm sure I heard it. We both sat there, face 0:11:37.480 --> 0:11:41.240 in the door, looking straight at the handill. My eyes 0:11:41.240 --> 0:11:44.640 were literalist into water. I was looking at it so closely, 0:11:45.240 --> 0:11:49.880 and all of a sudden it just went I mean 0:11:50.040 --> 0:11:54.240 the shock. Shan flew back on the chair. It were like, 0:11:54.600 --> 0:11:57.920 how did that just happen? And I jumped up and 0:11:58.000 --> 0:12:01.920 I opened the door and the kids weren't there. Nobody 0:12:02.040 --> 0:12:02.360 was there. 0:12:09.640 --> 0:12:13.000 Suddenly it wasn't so easy to dismiss it all as 0:12:13.040 --> 0:12:18.520 an overactive imagination, and before long others started to sense 0:12:18.559 --> 0:12:21.960 it too. It had been a while since the couple 0:12:22.120 --> 0:12:25.480 last had some quality time together, so one night they 0:12:25.559 --> 0:12:28.360 hired a babysitter and went out to dinner. 0:12:29.400 --> 0:12:32.760 This young girl baby sat one evening when we were 0:12:32.960 --> 0:12:34.920 back in the house. She was in the living room 0:12:34.960 --> 0:12:37.800 with the door open. The telly wasn't switched down. She 0:12:37.960 --> 0:12:40.720 just sat there and I thought, eyes everything okay, because 0:12:40.720 --> 0:12:43.960 obviously I hadn't mentioned anything, as she just went yeah, 0:12:44.240 --> 0:12:46.680 but with a really she looked scared. 0:12:48.240 --> 0:12:50.960 There was no doubt in Teresa's mind that the girl 0:12:51.040 --> 0:12:55.920 had heard or seen something, but Teresa couldn't possibly say anything. 0:12:56.800 --> 0:12:59.280 For a start, she didn't want to scare the girl 0:12:59.400 --> 0:13:04.559 unnecessary if she hadn't actually experienced anything untoward. But there 0:13:04.600 --> 0:13:08.520 was little doubting the look on her face. The next 0:13:08.559 --> 0:13:11.760 time the babysitter came round, she made sure to bring 0:13:11.800 --> 0:13:12.479 a companion. 0:13:13.400 --> 0:13:15.960 She came with her mom then the next time, but 0:13:16.000 --> 0:13:18.160 then they didn't want to come back to the house again. 0:13:18.920 --> 0:13:21.680 I never mentioned anything. They never mentioned anything. To me. 0:13:22.880 --> 0:13:25.680 Then there was the time their friend Lee came down 0:13:25.720 --> 0:13:29.280 to visit from London. By now, Theresa and Sean were 0:13:29.320 --> 0:13:32.920 beginning to talk openly about the possibility that their house 0:13:33.080 --> 0:13:33.960 was being haunted. 0:13:34.760 --> 0:13:36.880 We'd been friends with him from the previous house and 0:13:36.960 --> 0:13:41.559 moved her and he was very confident and outgoing. We 0:13:41.679 --> 0:13:44.880 came around and he was sort of laughing and joking like, oh, 0:13:44.920 --> 0:13:47.800 come on, then, where's this girls? It would just trying 0:13:47.800 --> 0:13:50.360 to make a big joke of it. Shoun said, Oh, 0:13:50.440 --> 0:13:52.680 it doesn't like it when you turn the Telly up loud, 0:13:52.880 --> 0:13:54.520 that's when things start to happen. 0:13:55.280 --> 0:13:58.000 Lee, who was planning to stay the night with the family, 0:13:58.280 --> 0:14:01.679 couldn't help but laugh. So Sean offered to give him 0:14:01.679 --> 0:14:06.080 a demonstration, and so it was with everyone gathered in 0:14:06.120 --> 0:14:09.720 the living room. The skeptical Lee watched on with a 0:14:09.800 --> 0:14:13.560 right smile as Sean took the remote and switched on 0:14:13.720 --> 0:14:20.120 the TV. Then he steadily increased the volume. 0:14:21.640 --> 0:14:24.360 Sean just switched to Telly at full blast, and all 0:14:24.400 --> 0:14:30.320 of a sudden we had this almighty bang. It went. 0:14:31.680 --> 0:14:34.720 It felt as though the entire house were shaking. 0:14:35.400 --> 0:14:38.960 It sounded like something crashing down on us. I mean 0:14:39.000 --> 0:14:42.520 we didn't have any big speakers. Where did this noise 0:14:42.600 --> 0:14:44.280 come from? 0:14:44.440 --> 0:14:45.520 The message was clear. 0:14:46.160 --> 0:14:48.760 You were almost like, don't mess with me. I mean, 0:14:48.760 --> 0:14:49.400 that's how it. 0:14:49.320 --> 0:14:53.400 Felt as for Lee. He wasn't laughing anymore. 0:14:54.200 --> 0:14:59.040 Lee were like shocked. He was absolutely petrified from it 0:14:59.120 --> 0:15:01.440 being just one big joke all of a sudden. 0:15:01.560 --> 0:15:05.120 He was so scared that night, rather than stay with 0:15:05.200 --> 0:15:08.880 the family, he immediately left the house and drove away 0:15:09.000 --> 0:15:12.880 as fast as he could, white faced and extremely shaken. 0:15:19.760 --> 0:15:22.240 As far as the family were concerned, there was no 0:15:22.400 --> 0:15:27.840 denying it now. In such circumstances, the first question people 0:15:27.960 --> 0:15:31.040 tend to ask is why didn't they just leave? But 0:15:31.160 --> 0:15:34.200 the couple had paid six months rent in advance, and 0:15:34.280 --> 0:15:36.920 not only had they only been there for six weeks, 0:15:37.520 --> 0:15:41.240 they didn't have nearly enough money to move again, so prematurely, 0:15:42.360 --> 0:15:44.880 appeals to the agent fell on deaf ears. 0:15:45.680 --> 0:15:48.680 They weren't even interested. They didn't come back to us 0:15:48.680 --> 0:15:52.200 with any advice or anything, but didn't even ring us back. 0:15:53.320 --> 0:15:56.480 At first, the family stuck it out as best they could, 0:15:56.880 --> 0:15:59.800 only for things to get even more disturbing. 0:16:00.960 --> 0:16:03.960 It was a beautiful sunny day. We'd just come back 0:16:03.960 --> 0:16:07.360 from being out and we'd come back in. The kids 0:16:07.440 --> 0:16:10.320 ran into their bedroom and all of a sudden they 0:16:10.360 --> 0:16:15.280 were screaming. We ran into the bedroom. There was literally 0:16:15.560 --> 0:16:19.720 like black sand and grit mixed with water dripping down 0:16:19.760 --> 0:16:23.440 the walls, and there were circles of it on each bed. 0:16:24.640 --> 0:16:28.080 The children claimed the sandy substance had been thrown at 0:16:28.080 --> 0:16:31.520 them the moment they entered the room to raise Her 0:16:31.600 --> 0:16:34.240 and Sean couldn't get their heads around it. 0:16:34.240 --> 0:16:36.040 It's not like they had bucket and spade and a 0:16:36.040 --> 0:16:37.960 bit of sound in the bedroom and they'd been messing 0:16:38.000 --> 0:16:38.240 with it. 0:16:38.840 --> 0:16:41.880 And as for the possibility that someone had thrown it 0:16:41.920 --> 0:16:44.880 into the house from outside, we couldn't. 0:16:44.600 --> 0:16:48.360 Even open the windows in their bedroom. They'd been painted shut. 0:16:50.160 --> 0:16:54.960 This is something now that couldn't explain. Before we could say, oh, well, 0:16:55.200 --> 0:16:57.840 we heard these noises. It might have been the radiator 0:16:57.960 --> 0:17:00.240 of you could sort of try to explain your off 0:17:00.280 --> 0:17:03.280 out of it. Whereas now this was something which we 0:17:03.320 --> 0:17:04.200 couldn't explain. 0:17:05.119 --> 0:17:08.600 More than that, Theresa now had to face a new 0:17:08.640 --> 0:17:13.240 horror that whatever this appeared to be turning its attention 0:17:13.560 --> 0:17:14.360 on the children. 0:17:15.440 --> 0:17:19.400 That was really frightening. After that, I saw a big 0:17:19.440 --> 0:17:22.720 spider in the kid's bedroom. It looked like a transler. 0:17:22.880 --> 0:17:27.080 It was huge. I had this tape recorder deck thing 0:17:27.440 --> 0:17:31.439 and it crawled into it. So I shut the tape 0:17:31.440 --> 0:17:34.359 recorder and threw it in the bit and Shan would 0:17:34.920 --> 0:17:38.240 why would you do that? I was so scared of 0:17:38.320 --> 0:17:41.560 it coming back in because it was absolutely huge. I 0:17:41.600 --> 0:17:43.440 didn't want to getting back out of that tape deck. 0:17:43.960 --> 0:17:48.120 That's how scared I was. First it was outside, then 0:17:48.160 --> 0:17:51.160 it's in the hall. Then it's like the banging, then 0:17:51.200 --> 0:17:53.480 the sand in the kid's bedroom, and then the spider. 0:17:54.000 --> 0:17:56.560 I just felt everything was, you know, why is this happening? 0:17:56.640 --> 0:17:58.720 Thought of thing, and it was all drawn towards a 0:17:58.800 --> 0:17:59.920 kid's bedroom as well. 0:18:00.640 --> 0:18:04.480 The spider was the final straw. The family needed help. 0:18:05.280 --> 0:18:07.720 But where do you even turn to for that sort 0:18:07.760 --> 0:18:08.080 of thing. 0:18:09.040 --> 0:18:11.840 There wasn't the Internet in them days. We just didn't 0:18:11.880 --> 0:18:14.480 know what to do. But that was really frightening. 0:18:25.520 --> 0:18:28.439 In the end, Theresa and Sean reached out to a 0:18:28.480 --> 0:18:30.400 friend from back home in Bradford. 0:18:31.080 --> 0:18:33.960 We ran a friend of ours who was a preacher 0:18:34.000 --> 0:18:37.800 in Bradford called Bob's given us his Bible as a 0:18:37.880 --> 0:18:41.320 leaving pression. We just tesked him if there's anything, if 0:18:41.400 --> 0:18:44.000 what we could do, because it keeps happening and we 0:18:44.080 --> 0:18:47.280 just don't know what to do. First, he said you 0:18:47.359 --> 0:18:49.920 need to leave, and we said we're with pay six months. 0:18:49.960 --> 0:18:51.720 In our fans, there are only two months. Saying it's 0:18:51.760 --> 0:18:54.119 cat hard to just upsticks. 0:18:54.760 --> 0:18:58.600 Bob suggested he leave it with them. A short time later, 0:18:58.880 --> 0:18:59.840 he called them back. 0:19:00.760 --> 0:19:03.399 It's brought to the elders of his church, and he said, 0:19:03.640 --> 0:19:05.760 you need to read in the Bible here though what 0:19:05.960 --> 0:19:09.080 through the vallee of no able to our fear, and 0:19:09.119 --> 0:19:13.600 read these verses and go with the children into every room, 0:19:13.800 --> 0:19:17.280 the garage, the call shed, everywhere. You need to recite 0:19:17.320 --> 0:19:18.120 these verses. 0:19:19.080 --> 0:19:22.240 And so together the family gathered first in the living 0:19:22.320 --> 0:19:25.480 room and did exactly as Bob told them to do, 0:19:26.200 --> 0:19:30.440 moving steadily from one room to the next, reciting Psalm 0:19:30.520 --> 0:19:36.080 twenty three from the Bible. The last space to exercise 0:19:36.280 --> 0:19:39.960 was the garage. When that was done, Theresa felt the 0:19:40.119 --> 0:19:41.800 change almost immediately. 0:19:42.880 --> 0:19:44.840 I said to Sean, do you feel like something is 0:19:44.920 --> 0:19:47.320 just lifted off you? And he said, yeah, we actually 0:19:47.359 --> 0:19:50.760 felt it lift off us. It's like you have this 0:19:50.920 --> 0:19:54.040 heavy feeling overa which I didn't even realize. We had 0:19:54.640 --> 0:19:56.960 it literally lifted away from us. 0:19:57.720 --> 0:20:01.480 Not only did the negative feelings disappear, the couple's work 0:20:01.680 --> 0:20:02.960 even began to pick up. 0:20:03.600 --> 0:20:06.040 For the last three or four months, it was just 0:20:06.040 --> 0:20:10.000 a different feeling altogether. There were trading cars to the 0:20:10.040 --> 0:20:13.439 main dealers at the time, and every time I rang something, 0:20:13.600 --> 0:20:16.000 it were almost like it turned to gold. We were 0:20:16.000 --> 0:20:19.160 making more money than we'd ever made, even just trading cars, 0:20:19.680 --> 0:20:22.399 and before that we hadn't done half as much as 0:20:22.560 --> 0:20:25.439 what we met in that house. So it's almost like 0:20:25.480 --> 0:20:28.240 it was a good thing from a bad thing, which 0:20:28.240 --> 0:20:29.080 I can't explain. 0:20:36.600 --> 0:20:40.359 Although Theresa no longer felt the unwanted presence in her house, 0:20:40.720 --> 0:20:44.000 she often found herself wondering what on earth it was. 0:20:44.960 --> 0:20:47.760 Perhaps she thought it had something to do with the 0:20:47.800 --> 0:20:51.439 mysterious box they found in the attic shortly after they 0:20:51.560 --> 0:20:52.040 moved in. 0:20:53.119 --> 0:20:56.040 There was an upstairs bedroom. There were ladders what you 0:20:56.119 --> 0:20:58.879 had to pull down to get up there. There this 0:20:59.400 --> 0:21:03.560 box there. It was probably three foot by two for something, 0:21:04.160 --> 0:21:06.520 but the weight of it you couldn't possibly lift it. 0:21:07.119 --> 0:21:08.880 I don't even know how they got it up there, 0:21:08.920 --> 0:21:11.240 because you couldn't physically put it up there. 0:21:12.400 --> 0:21:14.760 Though they couldn't get into it, they could tell it 0:21:14.800 --> 0:21:16.160 had something inside it. 0:21:16.760 --> 0:21:19.040 They could hear something rattling around in it, but we 0:21:19.160 --> 0:21:20.280 never found the key for it. 0:21:21.280 --> 0:21:26.359 Whatever it was, the family never found out in any case. 0:21:26.520 --> 0:21:29.600 As the weeks went by, they soon forgot all about 0:21:29.680 --> 0:21:33.760 those peculiar and terrifying first few months as their lives 0:21:33.840 --> 0:21:42.480 moved on. But the terror wasn't over. When the sixth 0:21:42.520 --> 0:21:45.640 month Lise was up, the time came to leave the property. 0:21:46.880 --> 0:21:51.320 After packing everything up inside, Teresa and Sean headed into 0:21:51.359 --> 0:21:54.240 the garden to gather all the toys that their kids 0:21:54.240 --> 0:21:59.080 had left scattered about. Then Sean turned and looked up 0:21:59.160 --> 0:21:59.760 at the attic. 0:21:59.760 --> 0:22:03.560 Win though he just turned round to look at the windows, 0:22:04.480 --> 0:22:07.120 and Sean said he felt like somebody were looking at 0:22:07.160 --> 0:22:10.600 him through that window. He just dropped the toys. 0:22:11.560 --> 0:22:14.680 Sean hustled Theresa and the kids into the car and 0:22:14.760 --> 0:22:18.359 drove off at speed, leaving the toys strewn on the lawn. 0:22:19.440 --> 0:22:22.080 He didn't see anybody, he knew there was somebody looking 0:22:22.119 --> 0:22:26.040 at him, or something looking at him, which really scared him. 0:22:26.800 --> 0:22:30.520 It wasn't until years later that the family realized that 0:22:30.600 --> 0:22:34.159 the attic was the one room where they hadn't recited 0:22:34.200 --> 0:22:35.360 Psalm twenty. 0:22:35.080 --> 0:22:39.320 Three, we had prayed in that room. Bob said, make 0:22:39.359 --> 0:22:43.479 sure you praying everywhere the garage outside, and we hadn't 0:22:43.520 --> 0:22:46.520 physically gone up there with the kids. It was almost 0:22:46.600 --> 0:22:47.440 like we trapped it. 0:22:47.440 --> 0:22:50.200 Upstairs, but that wasn't all. 0:22:51.000 --> 0:22:54.080 Years and years later we're talking about it and my 0:22:54.200 --> 0:22:56.960 son said, well, you never liked that lady who we 0:22:57.080 --> 0:22:59.320 used to stand next to a car. She used to 0:22:59.320 --> 0:23:01.919 be stood next to carry along black hair, carrying wood. 0:23:02.440 --> 0:23:05.240 My kids said, mum, musa ignoris used to be stood 0:23:05.280 --> 0:23:09.840 next to the car. Obvious they hadn't seen anybody. They 0:23:09.840 --> 0:23:12.359 could actually see something, which they never even said to 0:23:12.400 --> 0:23:15.440 me until years later. Maybe because me and Sean never 0:23:15.480 --> 0:23:18.120 said anything to them to scare them that they never 0:23:18.359 --> 0:23:20.160 mentioned it to us. 0:23:22.520 --> 0:23:26.280 Having had enough of old properties, the couple moved into 0:23:26.280 --> 0:23:31.439 a newly built housing estate on the north side of Bournemouth. Thankfully, 0:23:31.640 --> 0:23:35.240 whatever they felt had stalked them in christ Church didn't 0:23:35.280 --> 0:23:37.200 follow them into their new property. 0:23:38.600 --> 0:23:42.080 Before that, I would have said absolutely that I didn't 0:23:42.119 --> 0:23:47.440 believe in the paranormal or girl's share. Since that experience, 0:23:47.800 --> 0:23:51.679 there's definitely some form of activity. And also when we 0:23:51.720 --> 0:23:55.359 did pray about it, it did go away or nearly 0:23:55.400 --> 0:23:57.320 went away. 0:23:57.359 --> 0:24:01.080 Recently, Theresa has watched a number of pro guns featuring 0:24:01.200 --> 0:24:05.880 people who claim to have experienced poltergeist hauntings the way 0:24:05.960 --> 0:24:09.080 events Onfold are only too familiar to her. 0:24:09.760 --> 0:24:12.840 I've seen programs on telling where mediums go in there 0:24:12.880 --> 0:24:16.080 and they do pray to lift the spirit away from 0:24:16.119 --> 0:24:19.400 the house, and the owners do feel like this way 0:24:19.400 --> 0:24:22.240 it's being lifted off the And I know exactly how 0:24:22.240 --> 0:24:25.920 that feels, because I've experienced it. I understand, and if 0:24:25.920 --> 0:24:29.280 people haven't experienced it, they can't relate to it until 0:24:29.320 --> 0:24:30.440 you have to go through it. 0:24:31.840 --> 0:24:36.280 Almost thirty years later, Theresa has never stopped wondering if 0:24:36.320 --> 0:24:37.720 there was a reason for it all. 0:24:38.480 --> 0:24:41.240 I didn't know how previously lived there. I didn't know 0:24:41.280 --> 0:24:44.920