1
00:00:10,600 --> 00:00:14,200
Speaker 1: In April nineteen ninety nine. An auction room in Birmingham

2
00:00:14,360 --> 00:00:19,319
Speaker 1: is packed with people. Tim Chiltern waits unexpectantly for the

3
00:00:19,360 --> 00:00:22,439
Speaker 1: lot he wants to bid on. At the back of

4
00:00:22,440 --> 00:00:26,720
Speaker 1: the room, a television camera crew were setting up. Tim

5
00:00:26,800 --> 00:00:30,680
Speaker 1: wonders what on earth they're doing there. A man in

6
00:00:30,680 --> 00:00:34,640
Speaker 1: his mid forties with graying hair, Tim had become despondent

7
00:00:34,800 --> 00:00:39,320
Speaker 1: with a stressful career as a management consultant. Having quit

8
00:00:39,400 --> 00:00:42,760
Speaker 1: his job and determined to stay out of the corporate world,

9
00:00:43,159 --> 00:00:45,960
Speaker 1: he was looking for some other way to make a living.

10
00:00:46,920 --> 00:00:50,800
Speaker 1: He loved small period buildings so decided to try and

11
00:00:50,880 --> 00:00:54,240
Speaker 1: find one he could fix up. But after six months

12
00:00:54,280 --> 00:00:57,400
Speaker 1: of looking for one in London, he hit a dead end.

13
00:00:58,440 --> 00:01:01,840
Speaker 1: What he wanted was something stone built with a south

14
00:01:01,880 --> 00:01:06,919
Speaker 1: facing garden, at least two bedrooms and a workshop. Then

15
00:01:07,480 --> 00:01:11,880
Speaker 1: Tim came across Lot sixty, a two hundred year old

16
00:01:12,080 --> 00:01:17,959
Speaker 1: former stonemason's residence called Lowe's Cottage near Birmingham in England.

17
00:01:18,440 --> 00:01:22,360
Speaker 1: The description in the catalog included a ground floor sitting room,

18
00:01:22,720 --> 00:01:27,880
Speaker 1: first floor kitchen, lobby, dining room and a bathroom. There

19
00:01:27,959 --> 00:01:31,080
Speaker 1: were three bedrooms on the second floor and a large

20
00:01:31,120 --> 00:01:35,720
Speaker 1: garden with two brick built workshops. It was everything he

21
00:01:35,840 --> 00:01:40,480
Speaker 1: was looking for. Set in the small Derbyshire village of

22
00:01:40,600 --> 00:01:45,280
Speaker 1: Upper Maybury in rural northern England, Lowe's Cottage was very

23
00:01:45,360 --> 00:01:49,680
Speaker 1: much a fixer upper, but Tim was up for the challenge.

24
00:01:50,040 --> 00:01:54,200
Speaker 1: The day before the auction, Tim Chiltern arrived in Derbyshire

25
00:01:54,400 --> 00:01:57,480
Speaker 1: and met with the selling agent to view the cottage.

26
00:01:57,760 --> 00:02:01,280
Speaker 1: As the agent drove him there, Tim couldn't help noticing

27
00:02:01,360 --> 00:02:04,280
Speaker 1: that some of the names along the way seemed a

28
00:02:04,320 --> 00:02:10,160
Speaker 1: little macabre, like Hanging Bridge and gallows Tree Lane. The

29
00:02:10,240 --> 00:02:14,480
Speaker 1: house itself was named after a nearby iron age, burial Mount,

30
00:02:14,760 --> 00:02:20,920
Speaker 1: according to the agent. Then finally they were there. Lowe's

31
00:02:20,960 --> 00:02:24,520
Speaker 1: Cottage was located on the edge of the picturesque village,

32
00:02:24,880 --> 00:02:29,680
Speaker 1: and when it came into view, Tim was delighted with it.

33
00:02:29,680 --> 00:02:32,040
Speaker 1: It was almost too good to be true. He thought

34
00:02:32,520 --> 00:02:35,720
Speaker 1: that such a character ful old property would come up

35
00:02:35,720 --> 00:02:39,640
Speaker 1: for auction. Things only got better when he took a

36
00:02:39,639 --> 00:02:44,480
Speaker 1: look inside. It was a little garishly decorated, but nothing

37
00:02:44,560 --> 00:02:48,520
Speaker 1: a few licks of paint wouldn't fix. The delightful views

38
00:02:48,560 --> 00:02:52,200
Speaker 1: of the Peak District hills from the kitchen window only

39
00:02:52,240 --> 00:02:56,960
Speaker 1: added to the charm, only one thing had seemed slightly off.

40
00:02:57,960 --> 00:03:00,800
Speaker 1: The agent asked him not to make a video of

41
00:03:00,880 --> 00:03:05,640
Speaker 1: the interior of the cottage. In any case, Tim was sold,

42
00:03:06,320 --> 00:03:09,480
Speaker 1: he would make a bid on it The following day.

43
00:03:09,480 --> 00:03:13,320
Speaker 1: At the auction house, Tim notices a strange buzz go

44
00:03:13,440 --> 00:03:17,560
Speaker 1: around the room as Lot sixty is called. The bidding

45
00:03:17,639 --> 00:03:22,240
Speaker 1: goes quickly, and within minutes, Tim Chiltern is the new

46
00:03:22,280 --> 00:03:26,920
Speaker 1: owner of Lowe's Cottage. As he leaves the auction room,

47
00:03:27,280 --> 00:03:31,720
Speaker 1: still glowing with pleasure at his success, Chiltern is steered

48
00:03:31,760 --> 00:03:35,040
Speaker 1: into an ante room where the television crew and a

49
00:03:35,080 --> 00:03:39,400
Speaker 1: pack of journalists quickly descend on him. Tim barely has

50
00:03:39,480 --> 00:03:43,160
Speaker 1: time to think before a microphone is thrust into his face.

51
00:03:44,160 --> 00:03:48,360
Speaker 1: So says a voice from somewhere, what does it feel

52
00:03:48,480 --> 00:03:51,560
Speaker 1: like to be the new owner of the most haunted

53
00:03:51,640 --> 00:03:58,360
Speaker 1: cottage in England? You're listening to Unexplained and I'm Richard

54
00:03:58,440 --> 00:04:10,160
Speaker 1: mc lean smith. Despite a few misgivings in light of

55
00:04:10,200 --> 00:04:15,240
Speaker 1: the ghostly revelation, Tim Chiltern soon moved into Lowe's cottage.

56
00:04:15,960 --> 00:04:20,400
Speaker 1: On arrival, his collie dog, Scion, was uneasy entering the

57
00:04:20,440 --> 00:04:24,679
Speaker 1: house and found it hard to settle over the next

58
00:04:24,720 --> 00:04:28,880
Speaker 1: few days, lights apparently switched on and off by themselves,

59
00:04:29,279 --> 00:04:33,000
Speaker 1: the temperature in certain rooms would suddenly drop for no

60
00:04:33,200 --> 00:04:39,560
Speaker 1: obvious reason, and the TV repeatedly turned itself on. At night,

61
00:04:40,000 --> 00:04:44,440
Speaker 1: Tim heard a gentle rustling sound coming from somewhere, and

62
00:04:44,520 --> 00:04:49,160
Speaker 1: the landing light often refused to turn on. Even weirder,

63
00:04:49,600 --> 00:04:53,720
Speaker 1: his flashlight that he checked was working every day, mysteriously

64
00:04:53,800 --> 00:04:58,559
Speaker 1: failed to work whenever the lights gave out. Generally, Tim

65
00:04:58,680 --> 00:05:02,320
Speaker 1: felt fine in the house, except for the ground floor stairs,

66
00:05:02,800 --> 00:05:08,000
Speaker 1: where he later said something felt very off. It was

67
00:05:08,000 --> 00:05:10,280
Speaker 1: as if the house had a mind of its own

68
00:05:10,800 --> 00:05:16,200
Speaker 1: and was capable of changing moods. In time, his neighbours

69
00:05:16,320 --> 00:05:20,760
Speaker 1: brought him up to speed on the cottage's considerable reputation

70
00:05:21,960 --> 00:05:26,520
Speaker 1: according to local law. In the eighteen sixties, Lowe's Cottage

71
00:05:26,640 --> 00:05:30,120
Speaker 1: had been home to a milkmaid named Elaine Harry and

72
00:05:30,200 --> 00:05:34,880
Speaker 1: her boyfriend, Joseph Phillips. Elaine was employed by a local

73
00:05:34,960 --> 00:05:38,200
Speaker 1: farmer who was rumored to have taken a fancy to her.

74
00:05:39,240 --> 00:05:43,680
Speaker 1: When Elaine spurned his advances, the farmer strangled her in

75
00:05:43,760 --> 00:05:46,919
Speaker 1: a fit of jealous rage, then buried her in the

76
00:05:46,960 --> 00:05:52,320
Speaker 1: basement of what was now Tim's cottage. In another version,

77
00:05:52,680 --> 00:05:55,800
Speaker 1: Elaine was locked in the cellar and left to die

78
00:05:55,839 --> 00:06:00,600
Speaker 1: of thirst. When her boyfriend Joseph found out about what

79
00:06:00,680 --> 00:06:03,760
Speaker 1: had happened, he was said to have hung himself in

80
00:06:03,839 --> 00:06:07,440
Speaker 1: a fit of despair, right over the spot where his

81
00:06:07,560 --> 00:06:12,000
Speaker 1: beloved had died. The history of the cottage after that

82
00:06:12,240 --> 00:06:15,680
Speaker 1: is hazy, but in recent decades it had been owned

83
00:06:15,720 --> 00:06:21,000
Speaker 1: by the same family. The only surviving members were two sisters,

84
00:06:21,040 --> 00:06:25,480
Speaker 1: Susan Melbourne and Sondra Podmore. It had been their childhood

85
00:06:25,520 --> 00:06:28,640
Speaker 1: residence and they returned to live there when their father

86
00:06:28,760 --> 00:06:34,200
Speaker 1: passed away around nineteen seventy. Then in nineteen ninety three

87
00:06:34,839 --> 00:06:39,240
Speaker 1: they put the cottage up for sale. By then the

88
00:06:39,320 --> 00:06:42,599
Speaker 1: property was in a dilapidated state and in need of

89
00:06:42,720 --> 00:06:47,239
Speaker 1: considerable renovation, but it was quickly snapped up by a young,

90
00:06:47,360 --> 00:06:52,040
Speaker 1: fresh faced couple, a nurse named Josie Smith and her

91
00:06:52,120 --> 00:06:56,360
Speaker 1: husband Andrew, who was a builder. Together they moved in

92
00:06:56,640 --> 00:07:02,040
Speaker 1: with their three children. Andrew began work immediately on the house,

93
00:07:02,480 --> 00:07:06,400
Speaker 1: while Josie juggled her nursing with looking after the children.

94
00:07:07,440 --> 00:07:10,280
Speaker 1: The couple were hoping to fix the house up then

95
00:07:10,320 --> 00:07:13,960
Speaker 1: flip it quickly for a hefty profit. But not long

96
00:07:14,040 --> 00:07:19,000
Speaker 1: after they moved in, they began to feel uncomfortable. Both

97
00:07:19,080 --> 00:07:23,880
Speaker 1: Josie and Andrew were utterly convinced that there was something

98
00:07:23,920 --> 00:07:37,000
Speaker 1: else living in the house with them. It was a

99
00:07:37,000 --> 00:07:41,080
Speaker 1: few weeks after moving in that Josie first noticed the

100
00:07:41,200 --> 00:07:46,120
Speaker 1: unusual cold spots that emerged in random places on hot days.

101
00:07:47,480 --> 00:07:52,240
Speaker 1: Not long after, the couple apparently observed the strange haziness

102
00:07:52,280 --> 00:07:56,360
Speaker 1: in the air for the first time. The peculiar mist

103
00:07:56,640 --> 00:07:59,800
Speaker 1: was described as being about the size of a person

104
00:08:00,200 --> 00:08:04,160
Speaker 1: and was even said to move around the house. Andrew

105
00:08:04,200 --> 00:08:07,240
Speaker 1: claimed that one time he tried to walk through it,

106
00:08:07,640 --> 00:08:10,560
Speaker 1: only to find it resisted him, as though it were

107
00:08:10,600 --> 00:08:15,480
Speaker 1: made of some entirely different substance. He said it smelt

108
00:08:16,080 --> 00:08:20,600
Speaker 1: like rotting flesh. Josie is said to have woken up

109
00:08:20,640 --> 00:08:24,880
Speaker 1: with the distinct feeling that something was pressing against the bed,

110
00:08:25,360 --> 00:08:29,760
Speaker 1: making it difficult for her to breathe. A friend who

111
00:08:29,800 --> 00:08:33,800
Speaker 1: belonged to a spiritualist church arrived one morning to try

112
00:08:33,840 --> 00:08:36,720
Speaker 1: and clear the air for them. With a bowl of

113
00:08:36,760 --> 00:08:40,320
Speaker 1: water and a wooden cross, they moved through the house,

114
00:08:40,840 --> 00:08:45,680
Speaker 1: sprinkling the rooms with water while reciting a prayer. According

115
00:08:45,720 --> 00:08:49,560
Speaker 1: to Andrew, it did nothing but provoke a foul stench

116
00:08:49,960 --> 00:08:54,599
Speaker 1: that made every one feel ill. Josie later told a

117
00:08:54,679 --> 00:08:58,880
Speaker 1: TV documentary crew sent to investigate the house that a

118
00:08:58,920 --> 00:09:03,000
Speaker 1: short time later she witnessed a figure she described as

119
00:09:03,080 --> 00:09:06,920
Speaker 1: wearing a gathered blouse tucked into a floor length skirt.

120
00:09:07,880 --> 00:09:12,000
Speaker 1: The figure walked across a room and disappeared into a wall.

121
00:09:13,440 --> 00:09:16,880
Speaker 1: After conducting some research on the history of the house,

122
00:09:17,320 --> 00:09:20,680
Speaker 1: the documentary team discovered that it was built by a

123
00:09:20,720 --> 00:09:25,880
Speaker 1: local stonemason called William Frith in the early eighteen hundreds.

124
00:09:26,400 --> 00:09:29,400
Speaker 1: Local church records showed that at least two of his

125
00:09:29,640 --> 00:09:33,800
Speaker 1: children had died there, Lucy at the age of eighteen

126
00:09:34,400 --> 00:09:40,040
Speaker 1: and William at age eight. The smiths persisted with renovating

127
00:09:40,040 --> 00:09:44,719
Speaker 1: the cottage, but even when there weren't ghostly sightings, electrical

128
00:09:44,760 --> 00:09:50,080
Speaker 1: appliances would often break down, and household items apparently disappeared,

129
00:09:50,480 --> 00:09:55,679
Speaker 1: only to reappear later in the most obvious places. On occasion,

130
00:09:56,280 --> 00:09:59,640
Speaker 1: there were sudden, strange temperature drops in one part of

131
00:09:59,679 --> 00:10:04,360
Speaker 1: these and water would suddenly appear and begin trickling down

132
00:10:04,440 --> 00:10:08,440
Speaker 1: the walls. When a plumber was called in, they found

133
00:10:08,520 --> 00:10:12,360
Speaker 1: no apparent cause, and there weren't even water pipes in

134
00:10:12,400 --> 00:10:17,880
Speaker 1: the walls where the water had inexplicably appeared. On another night,

135
00:10:18,360 --> 00:10:22,680
Speaker 1: for once, everything seemed calm in the cottage. The Smiths

136
00:10:22,679 --> 00:10:25,679
Speaker 1: put their three children to bed, then a couple of

137
00:10:25,679 --> 00:10:30,240
Speaker 1: hours later, went to bed themselves. A few hours later,

138
00:10:30,679 --> 00:10:35,920
Speaker 1: according to Josie, she felt something cold touch her beneath

139
00:10:35,960 --> 00:10:39,120
Speaker 1: her night dress. Then all of a sudden she was

140
00:10:39,200 --> 00:10:43,160
Speaker 1: struggling to breathe, feeling as though someone had stuffed a

141
00:10:43,240 --> 00:10:46,920
Speaker 1: cotton rag into her mouth and put their hands around

142
00:10:46,920 --> 00:10:51,200
Speaker 1: her neck as she struggled and flailed her legs against

143
00:10:51,200 --> 00:10:54,920
Speaker 1: her husband, Andrew woke up with a start to find

144
00:10:54,920 --> 00:10:59,280
Speaker 1: his wife clutching at her neck, struggling and thrashing as

145
00:10:59,320 --> 00:11:03,000
Speaker 1: though she were being throttled. It only stopped when I

146
00:11:03,120 --> 00:11:08,360
Speaker 1: shouted no. Josie said. They were so spooped that they

147
00:11:08,400 --> 00:11:12,520
Speaker 1: immediately woke up the children and fled the property. On

148
00:11:12,640 --> 00:11:16,319
Speaker 1: returning to the cottage a few days later, the Smiths

149
00:11:16,440 --> 00:11:27,720
Speaker 1: finally decided to seek help. Josie and Andrew turned to

150
00:11:27,800 --> 00:11:31,920
Speaker 1: their local church for help. Thankfully, the Church of England

151
00:11:32,080 --> 00:11:35,959
Speaker 1: had an exorcism committee, with a designated team in every

152
00:11:36,000 --> 00:11:40,400
Speaker 1: diocese to deal with the kind of disturbances they were experiencing.

153
00:11:41,600 --> 00:11:46,000
Speaker 1: A few weeks later, Reverend Peter Mockford, the vicar of Blurton,

154
00:11:46,480 --> 00:11:50,320
Speaker 1: a small parish near Stoke on Trent, arrived at the property.

155
00:11:51,320 --> 00:11:55,480
Speaker 1: He began by interviewing the smiths about what exactly had happened.

156
00:11:56,400 --> 00:12:00,520
Speaker 1: Mockford was keen to assess the story's veracity and interviewed

157
00:12:00,520 --> 00:12:04,800
Speaker 1: the couple separately to see if their stories aligned. Much

158
00:12:04,880 --> 00:12:09,680
Speaker 1: to his surprise, they did. Then he turned his attention

159
00:12:09,960 --> 00:12:15,360
Speaker 1: to the cottage itself. Mockford reported noticing a pungent odor

160
00:12:15,640 --> 00:12:18,680
Speaker 1: that seemed to follow him around, as well as a

161
00:12:18,720 --> 00:12:23,000
Speaker 1: war that appeared to weep with a trickling dampness when

162
00:12:23,000 --> 00:12:26,480
Speaker 1: he placed his hand on it. When he later performed

163
00:12:26,480 --> 00:12:29,520
Speaker 1: a blessing on the house, the smith said that it

164
00:12:29,640 --> 00:12:33,880
Speaker 1: seemed to them that the entire cottage got visibly brighter

165
00:12:34,520 --> 00:12:39,040
Speaker 1: and the atmosphere felt suddenly lighter, but the effects were

166
00:12:39,080 --> 00:12:45,199
Speaker 1: short lived. After only one quiet night, the creeping presence

167
00:12:45,679 --> 00:12:50,640
Speaker 1: returned with a vengeance. The usual sudden pockets of cold

168
00:12:50,679 --> 00:12:55,840
Speaker 1: air weeping walls, and the strange mist was said to return,

169
00:12:56,440 --> 00:13:00,520
Speaker 1: and a tape player began turning itself on. It would

170
00:13:00,559 --> 00:13:05,080
Speaker 1: only stop when it was unplugged from the wall. Then

171
00:13:05,160 --> 00:13:12,760
Speaker 1: their immersion heater blew up. Reverend Mockford returned three more times,

172
00:13:13,160 --> 00:13:16,880
Speaker 1: but despite seemingly bringing an end to the disturbances on

173
00:13:16,960 --> 00:13:21,839
Speaker 1: each occasion, the Smiths said the ghostly effects always returned.

174
00:13:23,000 --> 00:13:26,840
Speaker 1: During his last effort, the Smiths and the reverend gathered

175
00:13:26,880 --> 00:13:31,040
Speaker 1: in the living room to begin another exorcism. As the

176
00:13:31,120 --> 00:13:35,680
Speaker 1: minister started his prayers, Josie and Andrew played tapes of

177
00:13:35,760 --> 00:13:40,240
Speaker 1: religious music to accompany him. No sooner had they started,

178
00:13:40,760 --> 00:13:45,040
Speaker 1: a floorboard was said to have begun creaking loudly upstairs.

179
00:13:46,320 --> 00:13:50,640
Speaker 1: This was followed by a rushing sensation that apparently came

180
00:13:50,720 --> 00:13:54,000
Speaker 1: at the side of their heads, along with a feeling

181
00:13:54,160 --> 00:13:59,880
Speaker 1: that smoke was spiraling up their noses. The couple claimed

182
00:14:00,120 --> 00:14:06,080
Speaker 1: they tried other solutions, including consulting other religious practitioners, so

183
00:14:06,240 --> 00:14:12,160
Speaker 1: called spirit mediums and paranormal experts. One such group was

184
00:14:12,200 --> 00:14:16,080
Speaker 1: a combined team from the Tame Side and Oldham Paranormal

185
00:14:16,160 --> 00:14:22,520
Speaker 1: Research Association and members of Manchester's Aerial Phenomena Investigation Team.

186
00:14:23,800 --> 00:14:27,880
Speaker 1: The group arrived late one afternoon, but what they described

187
00:14:28,120 --> 00:14:32,680
Speaker 1: was a small, gloomy cottage with dampness filling the air.

188
00:14:34,000 --> 00:14:39,400
Speaker 1: They also began by interviewing Josie and Andrew again. After

189
00:14:39,480 --> 00:14:43,360
Speaker 1: finding the couple credible, the team conducted a quick tour

190
00:14:43,440 --> 00:14:47,840
Speaker 1: of the house and garden but found nothing unusual. As

191
00:14:47,960 --> 00:14:52,400
Speaker 1: night fell, they set up video cameras downstairs and upstairs,

192
00:14:52,760 --> 00:14:57,200
Speaker 1: equipped with voice activated audio recorders, as well as passive

193
00:14:57,440 --> 00:15:03,360
Speaker 1: infrared detectors and temperature monit. Then they began their watch.

194
00:15:10,680 --> 00:15:13,840
Speaker 1: It was around midnight that the Smiths went to bed.

195
00:15:14,760 --> 00:15:19,440
Speaker 1: As they slept, the investigation team inspected the walls but

196
00:15:19,560 --> 00:15:23,880
Speaker 1: found no evidence of the strange water said to spontaneously

197
00:15:23,960 --> 00:15:28,400
Speaker 1: weep from certain spots. They checked their equipment every hour,

198
00:15:28,800 --> 00:15:34,600
Speaker 1: but detected no unusual temperature readings, bad odors, strange sights

199
00:15:34,920 --> 00:15:40,000
Speaker 1: or sounds. At five am, some of the team headed

200
00:15:40,000 --> 00:15:43,960
Speaker 1: into the cellar, where they quickly spotted beads of water

201
00:15:44,440 --> 00:15:48,400
Speaker 1: on a back wall. When they wiped them away, the

202
00:15:48,480 --> 00:15:54,640
Speaker 1: beads came straight back. However, the team concluded that this

203
00:15:54,880 --> 00:15:59,280
Speaker 1: was simply caused by the warmer damp cellar air condensing

204
00:15:59,360 --> 00:16:03,440
Speaker 1: on the cold surface of the wall. It was just

205
00:16:03,520 --> 00:16:07,240
Speaker 1: after seven when the Smiths got up and came downstairs.

206
00:16:08,320 --> 00:16:12,400
Speaker 1: Josie was disappointed to learn that the team hadn't found anything,

207
00:16:13,240 --> 00:16:16,800
Speaker 1: telling them that perhaps the ghosts had stayed away to

208
00:16:16,880 --> 00:16:20,920
Speaker 1: make them look stupid. But what the team had found

209
00:16:21,280 --> 00:16:24,920
Speaker 1: and didn't mention then was a large pile of letters

210
00:16:24,960 --> 00:16:29,280
Speaker 1: and newspaper cuttings that the Smiths had collected lying on

211
00:16:29,320 --> 00:16:36,520
Speaker 1: the dining room table. It included dozens of letters from newspapers, magazines,

212
00:16:36,640 --> 00:16:41,560
Speaker 1: and TV producers or offering to pay the Smiths handsomely

213
00:16:41,840 --> 00:16:46,560
Speaker 1: for their story. As it turned out, having invested so

214
00:16:46,760 --> 00:16:50,720
Speaker 1: much in renovating the property, the Smiths were struggling to

215
00:16:50,760 --> 00:16:54,640
Speaker 1: meet their mortgage payments. Though their initial claims that the

216
00:16:54,760 --> 00:16:58,840
Speaker 1: house was haunted might have been genuine, it was clear

217
00:16:58,920 --> 00:17:01,680
Speaker 1: that much of what they sae set had most likely

218
00:17:01,840 --> 00:17:04,720
Speaker 1: been made up in an effort to help pay for

219
00:17:04,800 --> 00:17:10,679
Speaker 1: it all. Far from attracting buyers, however, unsurprisingly, all the

220
00:17:10,760 --> 00:17:14,080
Speaker 1: talk of ghosts trying to strangle them in their beds

221
00:17:14,480 --> 00:17:18,840
Speaker 1: had the complete opposite effect. Having bought the house for

222
00:17:18,960 --> 00:17:23,879
Speaker 1: around forty thousand pounds, the property's valuation had sunk to

223
00:17:23,960 --> 00:17:29,160
Speaker 1: only twenty five thousand. Left with no option, the Smiths

224
00:17:29,240 --> 00:17:32,520
Speaker 1: tried to refinance the mortgage on the home, but the

225
00:17:32,560 --> 00:17:37,399
Speaker 1: bank turned down their request. At their wits end. The

226
00:17:37,480 --> 00:17:42,720
Speaker 1: couple then did something radical. They sued the previous owners

227
00:17:43,080 --> 00:17:49,359
Speaker 1: for failing to disclose that their house was haunted. The sellers, sisters,

228
00:17:49,400 --> 00:17:53,600
Speaker 1: Sandra Podmore and Sandra Melbourne, both asserted that they had

229
00:17:53,600 --> 00:17:56,760
Speaker 1: never in over twenty years of living at the property,

230
00:17:57,320 --> 00:18:02,960
Speaker 1: experienced anything out of the ordinary. In response, they countersued

231
00:18:03,000 --> 00:18:05,280
Speaker 1: the Smiths for a sum of three and a half

232
00:18:05,400 --> 00:18:09,359
Speaker 1: thousand pounds, an outstanding amount they were still owed for

233
00:18:09,400 --> 00:18:14,359
Speaker 1: the property. There was an unusual case, the first lawsuit

234
00:18:14,400 --> 00:18:19,760
Speaker 1: in England regarding the claimed existence of supernatural forces since

235
00:18:19,840 --> 00:18:23,679
Speaker 1: the Middle Ages. It was going to be very difficult

236
00:18:23,920 --> 00:18:38,520
Speaker 1: to prove. At Darby County Court in January nineteen ninety nine,

237
00:18:39,000 --> 00:18:42,679
Speaker 1: Judge Peter Stretton sat down to rule on the case,

238
00:18:43,560 --> 00:18:48,960
Speaker 1: despite being unfamiliar with court procedures. Andrew Smith represented himself

239
00:18:49,000 --> 00:18:53,000
Speaker 1: and his wife at the hearing. Both he and Josie

240
00:18:53,280 --> 00:18:57,840
Speaker 1: described the various events they had experienced. Then they called

241
00:18:57,880 --> 00:19:02,680
Speaker 1: on Reverend Mockford, who'd performed the banishment prayers, to give evidence.

242
00:19:04,760 --> 00:19:08,200
Speaker 1: The vicar told the court that in his opinion, there

243
00:19:08,240 --> 00:19:13,800
Speaker 1: really was paranormal activity at Lowe's cottage, but Judge Stretton

244
00:19:14,080 --> 00:19:19,240
Speaker 1: wasn't convinced. The Smith's case wasn't helped when Thomas Dillon,

245
00:19:19,640 --> 00:19:22,879
Speaker 1: the council for the former owners, got the smith to

246
00:19:22,960 --> 00:19:26,800
Speaker 1: admit they'd read about similar hauntings in the novel The

247
00:19:26,840 --> 00:19:31,240
Speaker 1: Amateurville Horror, implying that the Smiths had used this to

248
00:19:31,359 --> 00:19:36,040
Speaker 1: help them make things up. Dylan also claimed that the

249
00:19:36,080 --> 00:19:40,480
Speaker 1: couple had a record of running away from their financial problems.

250
00:19:41,080 --> 00:19:45,000
Speaker 1: Mister Smith, he said, had been declared bankrupt after a

251
00:19:45,040 --> 00:19:50,199
Speaker 1: failed business partnership and had five previous county court judgments

252
00:19:50,280 --> 00:19:55,320
Speaker 1: against him for his part. In his final statement, Andrew

253
00:19:55,400 --> 00:19:59,080
Speaker 1: Smith told the court, There's simply no way I would

254
00:19:59,080 --> 00:20:02,080
Speaker 1: put my family through all this just for three and

255
00:20:02,080 --> 00:20:07,719
Speaker 1: a half thousand pounds. In the end, Judge Stretton dismissed

256
00:20:07,720 --> 00:20:13,240
Speaker 1: the claims of ghosts, stinking mists, and weeping walls as

257
00:20:13,320 --> 00:20:18,400
Speaker 1: hysteria and lies, refusing to believe that the house was haunted.

258
00:20:18,840 --> 00:20:22,000
Speaker 1: He ruled in favor of the former owners and ordered

259
00:20:22,040 --> 00:20:25,840
Speaker 1: the Smiths to pay the outstanding amount owed on Lowe's

260
00:20:25,840 --> 00:20:29,760
Speaker 1: Cottage to the sisters, along with a thousand pounds interest

261
00:20:30,200 --> 00:20:36,240
Speaker 1: and legal costs of twelve thousand pounds plunged into negative equity.

262
00:20:36,960 --> 00:20:40,080
Speaker 1: The family were forced to vacate the property and were

263
00:20:40,119 --> 00:20:45,640
Speaker 1: later rehoused by Staffordshire Council in a nearby town. Then,

264
00:20:46,040 --> 00:20:49,480
Speaker 1: in nineteen ninety nine, after a few months to let

265
00:20:49,520 --> 00:20:53,280
Speaker 1: the press coverage die down, the cottage was put up

266
00:20:53,280 --> 00:20:57,800
Speaker 1: for auction when it was snapped up by one Tim Chiltern.

267
00:20:59,160 --> 00:21:02,760
Speaker 1: Chiltern was a deeply spiritual man who for a while

268
00:21:03,200 --> 00:21:07,639
Speaker 1: had considered training to become a church minister. As time

269
00:21:07,720 --> 00:21:11,640
Speaker 1: went by, he and his colleague Scion seemed to make

270
00:21:11,760 --> 00:21:17,320
Speaker 1: peace with the house. The unexplained incidents dwindled, until finally

271
00:21:17,520 --> 00:21:23,040
Speaker 1: he claimed they ceased altogether. Tim spent a happy four

272
00:21:23,160 --> 00:21:27,480
Speaker 1: years at the cottage before renting it out. In late

273
00:21:27,560 --> 00:21:32,560
Speaker 1: January of two thousand and five, the Sheffield Paranormal Investigators,

274
00:21:32,960 --> 00:21:37,000
Speaker 1: a group for people who believed in psychic phenomena, decided

275
00:21:37,040 --> 00:21:41,320
Speaker 1: to spend a night at the cottage. According to their reports,

276
00:21:41,840 --> 00:21:51,359
Speaker 1: it was an eventful one. The six person team, which

277
00:21:51,400 --> 00:21:57,360
Speaker 1: included self described mediums and parapsychologists, arrived at the cottage

278
00:21:57,600 --> 00:22:02,160
Speaker 1: a little before ten pm. They were met by Tim Chiltern,

279
00:22:02,480 --> 00:22:05,200
Speaker 1: who showed them round the house and filled them in

280
00:22:05,400 --> 00:22:09,760
Speaker 1: on some of its history. When he left. The investigators

281
00:22:09,800 --> 00:22:14,760
Speaker 1: split into two teams. In Team one were Mick, Brenda

282
00:22:14,880 --> 00:22:19,760
Speaker 1: and Richard, while in Team two were Mikey Gaz and Steve.

283
00:22:20,800 --> 00:22:24,800
Speaker 1: Team one was soon reporting strange readings on their e

284
00:22:24,920 --> 00:22:29,760
Speaker 1: m F meter, designed to measure electromagnetic force in a

285
00:22:29,800 --> 00:22:34,560
Speaker 1: downstairs room used as an office. The meter swung too

286
00:22:34,600 --> 00:22:38,400
Speaker 1: wildly they set for the low amount of electrical wiring

287
00:22:38,760 --> 00:22:42,960
Speaker 1: present in the room. When they switched on their video camera,

288
00:22:43,400 --> 00:22:46,960
Speaker 1: they claimed then to see orbs in the view finder.

289
00:22:48,240 --> 00:22:52,680
Speaker 1: Richard described sensing a boy of around thirteen, as well

290
00:22:52,720 --> 00:22:56,760
Speaker 1: as a woman of around sixty with gray hair arranged

291
00:22:56,800 --> 00:23:01,440
Speaker 1: in a French platte wearing a high collared dress. Brenda

292
00:23:01,760 --> 00:23:06,520
Speaker 1: said she saw several small children dressed in pinafores, while

293
00:23:06,560 --> 00:23:12,000
Speaker 1: at the same time experiencing strange fluctuations in air temperature.

294
00:23:13,160 --> 00:23:18,800
Speaker 1: Around eleven p m, Team one moved to the main bedroom, where,

295
00:23:19,359 --> 00:23:24,040
Speaker 1: like Josie Smith had described, Brenda claimed to feel something

296
00:23:24,480 --> 00:23:27,680
Speaker 1: pushing down on her face and neck as she sat

297
00:23:27,760 --> 00:23:30,600
Speaker 1: on the edge of the bed while the EMF meter

298
00:23:31,080 --> 00:23:37,440
Speaker 1: continued to fluctuate wildly. None of the Sheffield paranormal investigators

299
00:23:37,840 --> 00:23:41,840
Speaker 1: saw the strange stinking mist, but claimed to sense a

300
00:23:41,960 --> 00:23:45,520
Speaker 1: number of other presences at the property, including a young

301
00:23:45,560 --> 00:23:49,720
Speaker 1: boy from the seventeen hundreds and a violently angry man

302
00:23:50,119 --> 00:23:55,040
Speaker 1: from the early nineteen hundreds. Sadly, however, none of this

303
00:23:55,440 --> 00:24:00,880
Speaker 1: was caught on camera. To this day, Tim Chiltern stands

304
00:24:00,920 --> 00:24:03,960
Speaker 1: by everything he claimed took place at the cottage while

305
00:24:04,000 --> 00:24:07,520
Speaker 1: he lived there. As he described it in one article

306
00:24:07,680 --> 00:24:11,760
Speaker 1: in twenty twenty one, it felt almost if Lowe's Cottage

307
00:24:11,960 --> 00:24:15,560
Speaker 1: had a personality and was testing him in some way.

308
00:24:17,040 --> 00:24:20,480
Speaker 1: Looking back on it all now, however, he has nothing

309
00:24:20,520 --> 00:24:25,000
Speaker 1: but fondness for the place. A few weeks before the auction,

310
00:24:25,520 --> 00:24:29,639
Speaker 1: Tim's father encouraged him to buy the property, believing it

311
00:24:29,680 --> 00:24:32,840
Speaker 1: could be the answer to getting his life back on track.

312
00:24:33,920 --> 00:24:39,359
Speaker 1: A short time after that, he died. Unexpectedly, Lowe's Hall

313
00:24:39,960 --> 00:24:43,240
Speaker 1: proved to be the first of many period properties that

314
00:24:43,400 --> 00:24:46,840
Speaker 1: Tim would go on to redevelop in what has turned

315
00:24:46,840 --> 00:24:51,639
Speaker 1: out to be a long and fruitful second life, just

316
00:24:51,720 --> 00:24:59,399
Speaker 1: as his father had seemingly prophesied. This episode was written

317
00:24:59,520 --> 00:25:03,640
Speaker 1: by Diane and Hope Unexplained as an AV Club Productions

318
00:25:03,680 --> 00:25:08,240
Speaker 1: podcast created by Richard McClain Smith. All other elements of

319
00:25:08,280 --> 00:25:11,679
Speaker 1: the podcast, including the music are also produced by me

320
00:25:11,960 --> 00:25:17,000
Speaker 1: Richard McClain smith. Unexplained. The book and audiobook, with stories

321
00:25:17,119 --> 00:25:20,040
Speaker 1: never before featured on the show, is now available to

322
00:25:20,080 --> 00:25:24,320
Speaker 1: buy worldwide. You can purchase from Amazon, Barnes and Noble,

323
00:25:24,640 --> 00:25:28,960
Speaker 1: Waterstones and other bookstores. Please subscribe to and rate the

324
00:25:29,000 --> 00:25:32,320
Speaker 1: show wherever you get your podcasts, and feel free to

325
00:25:32,320 --> 00:25:35,439
Speaker 1: get in touch with any thoughts or ideas regarding the

326
00:25:35,480 --> 00:25:38,159
Speaker 1: stories you've heard on the show. Perhaps you have an

327
00:25:38,200 --> 00:25:41,200
Speaker 1: explanation of your own you'd like to share. You can

328
00:25:41,200 --> 00:25:44,800
Speaker 1: find out more at Unexplained podcast dot com and reach

329
00:25:44,880 --> 00:25:49,320
Speaker 1: us online through Twitter at Unexplained Pod and Facebook at

330
00:25:49,320 --> 00:26:36,200
Speaker 1: Facebook dot com, Forward Slash Unexplained Podcast u