WEBVTT - Season 06 Episode 24: This Woman's Work 0:00:00.040 --> 0:00:02.760 Membership, peace, apply after free trial, cancel anytime. Can I 0:00:02.800 --> 0:00:04.920 be real with you for a second. That goal you 0:00:05.000 --> 0:00:08.280 have to exercise and eat better? You really can do it, 0:00:08.440 --> 0:00:11.200 but nobody is going to do it for you. Nobody 0:00:11.320 --> 0:00:13.280 is going to push you out of bed to work out, 0:00:13.680 --> 0:00:16.239 nobody is going to make you eat better. But here's 0:00:16.239 --> 0:00:19.800 the thing. Nobody has to because you can do it 0:00:19.960 --> 0:00:22.440 if you have the right tools and a community that 0:00:22.520 --> 0:00:26.120 cares about helping you get results. 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Here's al Go to beachbody 0:00:57.000 --> 0:00:59.680 dot com to claim your free membership and start feeling 0:00:59.680 --> 0:01:03.280 great on a stormy night on the small island of Guernsey, 0:01:03.560 --> 0:01:07.920 a young paranormal expert joins a skeptical history teacher to 0:01:08.000 --> 0:01:11.160 record the first in a series of podcasts based on 0:01:11.200 --> 0:01:16.039 the island's incredible folklore and paranormal history. As the expert 0:01:16.160 --> 0:01:20.399 regales his horrifying stories, the teacher learns that we all 0:01:20.480 --> 0:01:24.959 have our own truth, our own story ghosts that haunt us. 0:01:25.760 --> 0:01:30.720 Starring Olivier nominated actor and former Blue Peter legend Peter Duncan, 0:01:31.160 --> 0:01:34.600 When Darkness Falls is a spine chilling ghost story that 0:01:34.720 --> 0:01:39.080 delivers a twisted, terrifying and thrilling tale that The Guardian 0:01:39.200 --> 0:01:42.360 said will leave you cowering in your seat. Catch the 0:01:42.400 --> 0:01:46.920 brand new UK tour of When Darkness Falls from September 0:01:46.959 --> 0:01:50.640 fifteenth in a town near you. Select nights will also 0:01:50.720 --> 0:01:54.760 feature myself delivering a live episode of Unexplained. For more 0:01:54.800 --> 0:01:59.040 details or to book tickets, visit When Darkness Falls dot 0:01:59.120 --> 0:02:14.400 co dot uk if you dare. Back when I was 0:02:14.440 --> 0:02:17.400 about ten years old, some friends and I had a 0:02:17.480 --> 0:02:21.480 sleepover in the weeks leading up to Christmas. That night, 0:02:22.000 --> 0:02:25.720 as we stayed up late watching television, we chanced upon 0:02:25.760 --> 0:02:31.119 a curious BBC drama that immediately caught our attention. It 0:02:31.200 --> 0:02:35.160 wasn't loud or violent, or a wash with vibrant colors 0:02:35.680 --> 0:02:38.640 like much of the children's television we were used to. 0:02:39.400 --> 0:02:44.400 It was washed out, quiet and subtle, the TV equivalent 0:02:44.440 --> 0:02:50.320 of mist, and we were riveted. Without knowing anything about it, 0:02:50.800 --> 0:02:54.600 and despite having little understanding of the genre, it was 0:02:54.639 --> 0:02:57.320 clear from the moment we saw it that we were 0:02:57.320 --> 0:03:03.080 watching a ghost story set in Victorian times. From what 0:03:03.280 --> 0:03:06.320 we could tell, it seemed to be about a man 0:03:06.680 --> 0:03:10.960 named Arthur Kipps who'd been dispatched to the country to 0:03:11.000 --> 0:03:15.400 put someone's affairs in order, a woman whose recent death 0:03:15.520 --> 0:03:20.600 had cast a troubling spell over the local community. But 0:03:20.840 --> 0:03:24.760 before long we were introduced to the true star of 0:03:24.840 --> 0:03:30.560 the show, a woman attired in black morning dress, first 0:03:30.639 --> 0:03:35.800 seen attending the funeral of Kipps's recently deceased client, her 0:03:35.880 --> 0:03:42.560 face fixed with a cold, unyielding, malignant stare. She was, 0:03:42.640 --> 0:03:46.840 of course, the Woman in Black, which, as we later 0:03:46.920 --> 0:03:50.280 found out, was the name of the film, and she 0:03:50.480 --> 0:03:54.400 was just about the most chilling thing I'd ever seen. 0:03:56.040 --> 0:04:00.400 Based on Susan Hill's uponymous nineteen eighty three novel, the 0:04:00.520 --> 0:04:05.680 BBC's nineteen eighty nine adaptation remains one of my favorite 0:04:05.680 --> 0:04:10.760 films of all time. When asked once what inspired the story, 0:04:11.280 --> 0:04:16.760 Hill replied that her chief ingredient was atmosphere, which I 0:04:16.800 --> 0:04:22.320 think sums it up perfectly. Some have suggested she might 0:04:22.400 --> 0:04:26.719 also have found inspiration from a little known haunting said 0:04:26.760 --> 0:04:30.799 to have taken place in Cheltenham back in the eighteen eighties. 0:04:32.240 --> 0:04:37.799 This is that story you're listening to, Unexplained, and I'm 0:04:38.400 --> 0:04:50.400 Richard mc lean smith. In December eighteen eighty four, a 0:04:50.520 --> 0:04:55.000 then forty one year old Frederick Myers, founding member of 0:04:55.040 --> 0:04:59.960 the famed Society of Psychical Research, which had been established 0:05:00.120 --> 0:05:03.720 only the year before, received a letter from his friend 0:05:04.000 --> 0:05:08.160 John Graham regarding a possible haunting that he might want 0:05:08.160 --> 0:05:12.800 to look into. As Graham explained, a friend of his, 0:05:13.520 --> 0:05:18.040 Captain Frederick Despard, had for the past two years been 0:05:18.080 --> 0:05:21.560 renting a large townhouse in Cheltenham, where he lived with 0:05:21.600 --> 0:05:27.120 his wife and their eight children. In recent weeks, they'd 0:05:27.120 --> 0:05:33.160 come to believe that their house was haunted. Myers is 0:05:33.160 --> 0:05:37.119 thought to have first become interested in psychical research after 0:05:37.200 --> 0:05:41.480 being unsettled by the publication of Charles Darwin's On the 0:05:41.520 --> 0:05:47.000 Origin of the Species, which for many scientifically minded Christians 0:05:47.160 --> 0:05:51.599 like Myers, had seriously disrupted the notion that a God 0:05:51.920 --> 0:05:56.920 had created human beings, and with no God there could 0:05:56.920 --> 0:06:01.000 be no heaven or any other after life to speak of. 0:06:02.600 --> 0:06:07.520 Desperate to find evidence to the contrary, Myers contacted Captain 0:06:07.600 --> 0:06:12.359 Despard requesting permission to visit his home to conduct his 0:06:12.440 --> 0:06:18.640 own investigation into the matter. At first, Despard was reluctant 0:06:18.680 --> 0:06:22.080 to speak publicly about it out of concern on his 0:06:22.200 --> 0:06:26.279 landlord's behalf for the value of the property, which he 0:06:26.360 --> 0:06:30.560 feared could decrease if it developed a reputation for being haunted. 0:06:31.520 --> 0:06:36.800 Over the next year or so, Myers persevered until Despard 0:06:36.839 --> 0:06:40.880 finally agreed to his request, and so it was in 0:06:41.000 --> 0:06:45.560 May eighteen eighty six that Myers arrived at the gates 0:06:45.640 --> 0:06:51.120 of Garden Reach, the grand double fronted, four story Victorian 0:06:51.240 --> 0:06:55.080 residence as it has been described, on the corner of 0:06:55.160 --> 0:07:00.719 Pitfill Circus Road and All Saints Road in Cheltenham. The 0:07:00.839 --> 0:07:05.920 house derived its name from the property's extensive garden and orchard, 0:07:06.279 --> 0:07:10.080 which Myers could see tacked alongside the house on its 0:07:10.160 --> 0:07:16.320 left side, before disappearing somewhere behind it. A short time later, 0:07:17.080 --> 0:07:20.240 he was led into the drawing room, where the apparent 0:07:20.320 --> 0:07:24.640 ghost had most often been seen, and where the sixty 0:07:24.640 --> 0:07:28.240 three year old Captain Desbarred and his twenty three year 0:07:28.280 --> 0:07:33.520 old daughter Rosina were waiting to tell him all about it. 0:07:40.880 --> 0:07:45.040 Back in eighteen fifty eight, Frederick Desbarred was living in 0:07:45.160 --> 0:07:48.760 Rome with his wife Rosina and their two year old 0:07:48.880 --> 0:07:54.640 daughter Frederica, when Rosina died unexpectedly at the age of 0:07:54.680 --> 0:08:01.320 twenty four Later that year, Frederick remarried, and by eighteen 0:08:01.400 --> 0:08:05.400 eighty two, along with his second wife, Harriot, had had 0:08:05.440 --> 0:08:11.360 another eight children, nineteen year old Rosina, seventeen year old Edith, 0:08:11.840 --> 0:08:16.360 sixteen year old Florence, fifteen year old Henry, thirteen year 0:08:16.400 --> 0:08:20.960 old Lilian, twelve year old Mabel, ten year old Frederick, 0:08:21.360 --> 0:08:26.400 and lastly the six year old Wilfrid. Having traveled the 0:08:26.400 --> 0:08:30.280 world extensively due to Frederick's job as a captain in 0:08:30.320 --> 0:08:34.840 the British Army, and with Harriot becoming increasingly poorly in 0:08:34.920 --> 0:08:39.800 her later life, the Despards decided to settle in Cheltenham, 0:08:40.760 --> 0:08:45.800 and in April eighteen eighty two they moved into Garden Reach, 0:08:47.320 --> 0:08:51.080 with three floors and eight bedrooms for the family. It 0:08:51.240 --> 0:08:55.040 also comprised a basement floor with live in quarters for 0:08:55.120 --> 0:09:01.040 their servants. As Rosina explained to Myers, the family knew 0:09:01.040 --> 0:09:05.280 nothing about the house's history before they moved in, and 0:09:05.360 --> 0:09:10.560 had heard nothing about it potentially being haunted, but in hindsight, 0:09:11.240 --> 0:09:16.480 the signs had always been there. One afternoon, for example, 0:09:17.200 --> 0:09:21.400 not long after they'd moved in, Rosina was taking a 0:09:21.480 --> 0:09:25.480 pleasant stroll through the orchard when one of the family dogs, 0:09:25.840 --> 0:09:29.720 a large black Retriever, came bounding up to her in 0:09:29.800 --> 0:09:35.960 a strangely agitated state. The dog simply wouldn't stop barking 0:09:36.480 --> 0:09:39.760 as it kept its eyes firmly fixed on something in 0:09:39.840 --> 0:09:44.000 the middle distance. Rosina tried her best to calm it 0:09:44.080 --> 0:09:47.520 down as she scanned the garden for any sign of 0:09:47.600 --> 0:09:57.520 any one else, but there was nobody there. Now a 0:09:57.520 --> 0:10:00.840 word from our sponsor, Better help. 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Just 0:10:36.040 --> 0:10:38.600 fill out a brief survey and get matched with a 0:10:38.679 --> 0:10:42.040 therapist to day and you can switch therapists any time 0:10:42.320 --> 0:10:44.360 if you so wish. When you want to be a 0:10:44.400 --> 0:10:48.160 better problem solver, therapy can get you there, visit better 0:10:48.200 --> 0:10:52.400 help dot com. Slash unexplained one zero to day to 0:10:52.480 --> 0:10:56.160 get ten percent off your first month. That's better h 0:10:56.280 --> 0:11:06.000 e lp dot com. Slash unexplained one zero. A few 0:11:06.000 --> 0:11:09.760 months after moving into their new home, Rosina was in 0:11:09.840 --> 0:11:13.800 her room on the second floor, lying in bed as 0:11:13.840 --> 0:11:17.600 one of the family's dogs, a small sky terrier, was 0:11:17.640 --> 0:11:21.840 sleeping quietly at the end of it. Just as Rosina 0:11:21.960 --> 0:11:25.240 was about to blow out the candle, the dog's ears 0:11:25.280 --> 0:11:30.640 pricked up, suddenly, seeming to hear something from outside. It 0:11:30.720 --> 0:11:33.600 leaped off the bed and raced over to the door, 0:11:34.120 --> 0:11:37.439 where it proceeded to yelp and scratch at the gap 0:11:37.559 --> 0:11:42.760 underneath it. Rosina got up and wandered over to the door, 0:11:43.559 --> 0:11:47.559 but when she opened it, the hallway was completely empty. 0:11:49.559 --> 0:11:53.280 She looked at the frightened dog with confusion, then picked 0:11:53.280 --> 0:11:57.320 her up and took her back to bed. A few 0:11:57.400 --> 0:12:01.640 nights later, Rosina was prepared hearing for bed on her 0:12:01.679 --> 0:12:06.000 own this time, when she heard what sounded like footsteps 0:12:06.000 --> 0:12:10.680 coming up the hallway toward her room. Believing her mother 0:12:10.960 --> 0:12:13.800 might be coming to say good night, she took the 0:12:13.840 --> 0:12:17.200 candle from her bedside table and went to greet her 0:12:17.200 --> 0:12:21.400 mother at the door, but when she opened it there 0:12:21.480 --> 0:12:28.040 was nobody there. Just then, she heard more footsteps coming 0:12:28.120 --> 0:12:30.600 from the darkness at the far end of the hall. 0:12:32.320 --> 0:12:36.160 Holding the candle out before her, she was surprised to 0:12:36.200 --> 0:12:40.240 see a figure standing turned away from her at the 0:12:40.280 --> 0:12:44.079 top of the stairs. From what she could make out, 0:12:44.640 --> 0:12:48.720 it was a rather tall woman wearing a black dress. 0:12:50.160 --> 0:12:52.600 Thinking it might be one of the servants who she 0:12:52.679 --> 0:12:56.880 hadn't yet met, Rosina called out to her, but the 0:12:56.960 --> 0:13:04.080 figure ignored her and remained completely still. I say hello, 0:13:05.000 --> 0:13:10.440 said Rosina again, but the figure gave no reply and 0:13:10.600 --> 0:13:17.040 showed no sign of movement. A strange cold feeling came 0:13:17.080 --> 0:13:21.080 over Rosina, but before she had time to process it, 0:13:21.640 --> 0:13:25.560 the figure suddenly took off down the stairs into the 0:13:25.679 --> 0:13:32.280 darkness below. Wait, cried Rosina after her as she swiftly 0:13:32.400 --> 0:13:36.760 gave chase, cupping the flickering candle with her hand as 0:13:36.760 --> 0:13:40.320 she went. She was just in time to see the 0:13:40.400 --> 0:13:45.240 figure's head disappeared down the second flight of stairs when 0:13:45.240 --> 0:13:51.000 the candle suddenly blew out, plunging Rosina into total darkness. 0:13:52.600 --> 0:13:55.960 By the time she'd lit the candle again and returned 0:13:56.080 --> 0:14:06.439 to the stairwell, the figure was long gone. Rosina had 0:14:06.480 --> 0:14:10.199 all but forgotten about the incident when in the autumn 0:14:10.240 --> 0:14:16.000 of the following year, eighteen eighty three, her older sister, Frederica, 0:14:16.040 --> 0:14:19.840 from Captain Despard's first marriage, came to stay with the 0:14:19.920 --> 0:14:24.960 family for a few months. One evening, as Frederica entered 0:14:24.960 --> 0:14:28.120 the dining room to join the others at dinner, she 0:14:28.240 --> 0:14:31.560 asked who the Sister of Mercy was that she'd just 0:14:31.800 --> 0:14:36.720 seen walking through the main hall. The Sisters of Mercy 0:14:37.200 --> 0:14:40.960 are a community of Roman Catholic women who dress in 0:14:41.040 --> 0:14:46.520 distinctively black, flowing habits, but as her father explained, there 0:14:46.680 --> 0:14:51.960 was no such person in the house. Frederica insisted, however, 0:14:52.320 --> 0:14:55.200 that she had just seen the woman walk across the 0:14:55.280 --> 0:15:00.800 hall and enter the drawing room. Captain Desparsed ordered a 0:15:00.880 --> 0:15:05.320 servant to carry out an immediate inspection of the property, 0:15:05.360 --> 0:15:08.840 but when they returned a short time later, they found 0:15:08.960 --> 0:15:15.240 no one matching Frederica's description. A few weeks later, six 0:15:15.320 --> 0:15:19.280 year old Wilfrid Despart, who'd spent the morning playing with 0:15:19.320 --> 0:15:23.560 a friend of his, burst suddenly into his mother's bedroom 0:15:23.640 --> 0:15:29.840 with a look of abject terror on his face. Wilfrid's mother, Harriet, 0:15:30.280 --> 0:15:33.360 who was only forty nine at the time, was largely 0:15:33.440 --> 0:15:38.800 bedbount and was being tended to by Rosina. After waiting 0:15:38.840 --> 0:15:43.440 to catch his breath, Wilfrid finally explained what had happened. 0:15:44.720 --> 0:15:47.600 He and his friend had been playing on the path 0:15:48.000 --> 0:15:51.160 outside the drawing room when they looked in through the 0:15:51.240 --> 0:15:54.560 window to see what he took to be a woman 0:15:55.120 --> 0:16:00.320 dressed all in black seated at the writing table. Fred 0:16:00.400 --> 0:16:03.600 couldn't see the figure's face because she was holding a 0:16:03.640 --> 0:16:08.040 handkerchief in front of it. Curious to know who it was, 0:16:08.560 --> 0:16:12.200 the boys rushed inside and into the drawing room, but 0:16:12.360 --> 0:16:16.600 by the time they got there, the woman had gone. 0:16:17.480 --> 0:16:21.800 It was only then that Rosina remembered the mysterious woman 0:16:22.360 --> 0:16:26.040 she'd seen at the end of the hallway outside her bedroom. 0:16:26.960 --> 0:16:31.080 Could it also be the woman whom Frederica had mistaken 0:16:31.240 --> 0:16:35.640 for a sister of Mercy too, she thought. A few 0:16:35.720 --> 0:16:40.440 nights later, Rosina was once again disturbed by what she 0:16:40.560 --> 0:16:44.960 took to be the sound of footsteps moving about outside 0:16:45.000 --> 0:16:49.680 her bedroom door. Taking the candle in her hand once more, 0:16:50.360 --> 0:16:54.520 she quietly opened the door and gasped at the sight 0:16:54.640 --> 0:16:58.520 of the mysterious woman standing again at the top of 0:16:58.560 --> 0:17:02.040 the stairs in the shadows at the far end of 0:17:02.080 --> 0:17:06.639 the hall. The woman seemed to be facing her, but 0:17:06.840 --> 0:17:11.040 just like when Wilfrid saw her, her presence was made 0:17:11.160 --> 0:17:13.800 all the more eerie by the way in which she 0:17:13.880 --> 0:17:19.080 held a white handkerchief in front of her face. Seeing 0:17:19.080 --> 0:17:22.600 her more clearly now, Rosina could see that she was 0:17:22.640 --> 0:17:26.359 in fact dressed in morning clothes, with what appeared to 0:17:26.400 --> 0:17:30.760 be some kind of black bonnet and fail just visible 0:17:31.000 --> 0:17:35.680 above the handkerchief. Then the figure turned and dashed down 0:17:35.720 --> 0:17:40.840 the stairs again. This time, Rosina was ready for her 0:17:41.200 --> 0:17:45.080 and followed close behind, going a little slower this time 0:17:45.280 --> 0:17:49.120 so as not to lose the candle light. She managed 0:17:49.160 --> 0:17:51.800 to track her all the way to the ground floor, 0:17:52.400 --> 0:17:55.120 when she then seemed to float out into the main 0:17:55.200 --> 0:18:00.440 hall and drift across it to the drawing rooms. Heart 0:18:00.800 --> 0:18:05.320 thumped in her chest, Rosina followed her into the room, 0:18:05.440 --> 0:18:08.200 where she watched her take a seat at the writing desk, 0:18:08.960 --> 0:18:12.720 then stood up again and moved back out into the hall. 0:18:13.800 --> 0:18:17.520 Rosina then watched the figure head toward the back door 0:18:17.640 --> 0:18:21.160 to the garden before it vanished right in front of her. 0:18:28.560 --> 0:18:32.920 A few days later, Rosina received an odd letter from 0:18:32.960 --> 0:18:37.960 her close friend, Katherine Campbell. Katherine was the first person 0:18:38.119 --> 0:18:42.240 that Rosina had spoken to outside of the family about 0:18:42.280 --> 0:18:45.199 the strange events that had been going on at Garden 0:18:45.280 --> 0:18:49.960 Reach on the night Rosina had followed the apparition into 0:18:50.000 --> 0:18:54.000 the drawing room. Katherine, who lived a hundred miles away 0:18:54.080 --> 0:18:57.120 in the north of England and couldn't possibly have known 0:18:57.160 --> 0:19:00.760 anything about that night, claimed she was in her bedroom 0:19:01.200 --> 0:19:05.120 some point between twelve and twelve thirty at night when 0:19:05.160 --> 0:19:08.040 she had a sudden vision of a flight of stairs. 0:19:09.440 --> 0:19:14.560 Moments later, a woman in black came running down the steps, 0:19:14.600 --> 0:19:18.760 followed close behind by Rosina, who was wearing a loosely 0:19:18.840 --> 0:19:22.720 tied dressing gown and holding a candle out before her. 0:19:23.040 --> 0:19:27.280 As she went, a loud noise from another room in 0:19:27.320 --> 0:19:32.520 her house punctured the vision, and Catherine found herself once 0:19:32.600 --> 0:19:38.679 more back in her own room. Over the next few months, 0:19:39.119 --> 0:19:42.119 Rosina claimed to have seen the woman on a number 0:19:42.119 --> 0:19:48.680 of different occasions, though each time making the exact same movements. Then, 0:19:48.800 --> 0:19:53.760 in late January eighteen eighty four, Rosina followed the apparition 0:19:53.840 --> 0:19:57.679 into the drawing room, where this time it just stood 0:19:57.720 --> 0:20:02.040 still next to the sofa, still keeping its face obscured 0:20:02.480 --> 0:20:07.919 in that same unsettling way with the handkerchief. Seeing an 0:20:07.920 --> 0:20:12.439 opportunity to engage with it, Rosina then took a step 0:20:12.520 --> 0:20:18.400 forward and was relieved when the figure didn't move. Are 0:20:18.480 --> 0:20:23.600 you lost? She said, the words almost catching in her throat. 0:20:25.000 --> 0:20:28.679 Is there anything I can do to help you? The 0:20:28.760 --> 0:20:36.560 apparition seemed almost imperceptibly to flinch, but remained silent. When 0:20:36.640 --> 0:20:40.920 Rosina tried to get closer, it suddenly burst into life 0:20:40.960 --> 0:20:45.240 once more, scooted out at the drawing room, and disappeared 0:20:45.280 --> 0:20:48.240 once again by the door that led to the garden. 0:20:55.200 --> 0:20:59.520 At the time at the apparent haunting, Rosina had ambitions 0:20:59.600 --> 0:21:04.879 to arm a doctor of medicine, as such, being academically minded, 0:21:05.359 --> 0:21:08.960 She claimed to have attempted a number of experiments to 0:21:09.000 --> 0:21:13.040 try and learn more about what exactly the apparition was. 0:21:14.280 --> 0:21:18.200 She placed straying across the stairs at various heights to 0:21:18.240 --> 0:21:21.399 test if there was any material substance to it, but 0:21:21.560 --> 0:21:25.919 said the ghost simply passed through it. She attempted to 0:21:25.920 --> 0:21:28.920 talk to it a few more times, but it seemed 0:21:29.080 --> 0:21:33.200 not to register her at all. She also made efforts 0:21:33.240 --> 0:21:36.280 to touch the ghost, but no matter how quickly she 0:21:36.440 --> 0:21:39.960 followed behind it, it seemed always to be a good 0:21:40.000 --> 0:21:44.800 few steps ahead. Up to this point, it was only 0:21:44.920 --> 0:21:48.679 Rosina who'd seen the figure, with the exception of Wilfrid 0:21:48.760 --> 0:21:52.960 and Frederica, who were not entirely sure what they had seen. 0:21:54.240 --> 0:21:59.080 Frederica was especially unnerved by Rosina's insistence that there was 0:21:59.119 --> 0:22:02.560 a ghost in the house. One morning, when she and 0:22:02.680 --> 0:22:07.400 Rosina were in the drawing room, Rosina became suddenly animated, 0:22:07.920 --> 0:22:11.320 insisting that the woman in black had just walked into 0:22:11.400 --> 0:22:16.840 the room and were standing right next to Frederica. Frederica 0:22:17.040 --> 0:22:20.639 was pregnant at the time, but sadly lost her baby 0:22:20.920 --> 0:22:26.080 a few weeks later. Not long after, Frederica was in 0:22:26.119 --> 0:22:29.080 her bedroom when she was woken by the sound of 0:22:29.119 --> 0:22:33.920 footsteps coming from above, followed by the sound of something 0:22:34.000 --> 0:22:38.919 heavy being dragged across the floor. The room above was 0:22:39.000 --> 0:22:45.240 vacant at the time. The terrifying sounds continued until one 0:22:45.359 --> 0:22:49.880 night Frederica steeled herself enough to head into the hallway, 0:22:50.320 --> 0:22:55.159 having heard again the passing sound of footsteps, when she 0:22:55.240 --> 0:22:59.400 too finally saw the woman that Rosina had been talking 0:22:59.480 --> 0:23:03.840 so much about, and soon they were all seeing her. 0:23:05.720 --> 0:23:10.600 On the night of August second, Rosina's sisters Edith, Florence, 0:23:10.640 --> 0:23:14.119 and Lillian, who were all sleeping together on the top 0:23:14.160 --> 0:23:19.200 floor of the house, were also woken by ghostly footsteps outside, 0:23:19.840 --> 0:23:25.000 but were too terrified to leave their room. The following morning, 0:23:25.480 --> 0:23:29.680 the family's cook recounted to the horrified girls her own 0:23:29.760 --> 0:23:33.159 story of the night before, in which she'd been heading 0:23:33.200 --> 0:23:37.680 downstairs to fetch some hot water when she also saw 0:23:37.800 --> 0:23:48.000 the woman in black. Having been nervous about how he 0:23:48.080 --> 0:23:52.960 might react, Rosina and her sisters eventually decided to tell 0:23:53.000 --> 0:23:57.760 their father about what was going on, much to their amazement. 0:23:58.320 --> 0:24:02.480 The man who'd heard a light time of stories regarding strange, 0:24:02.520 --> 0:24:06.320 ghostly happenings from his time in the Army did not 0:24:06.480 --> 0:24:12.159 dismiss the possibility completely. On August sixth, the family were 0:24:12.240 --> 0:24:15.600 visited by the son of the man who lived opposite, 0:24:16.160 --> 0:24:20.720 a recently retired general of the British Army. The young 0:24:20.760 --> 0:24:23.879 man explained that his father had been looking out of 0:24:23.960 --> 0:24:27.840 his bedroom window when he spotted a lady dressed all 0:24:27.880 --> 0:24:31.439 in black, standing in the orchard who appeared to be 0:24:31.560 --> 0:24:36.919 crying into a handkerchief. The general, who knew Frederica to 0:24:37.000 --> 0:24:40.719 be mourning the recent death of her baby, assumed it 0:24:40.760 --> 0:24:43.920 to be her and had sent his son around to 0:24:43.920 --> 0:24:47.800 see if she was okay, but Frederica had not been 0:24:47.840 --> 0:24:52.479 in the orchard that day. After hearing of this last 0:24:52.560 --> 0:24:57.320 sighting from a retired general, no less, Captain Despard was 0:24:57.400 --> 0:25:02.080 left in no doubt that something explicable was taking place 0:25:02.119 --> 0:25:06.640 in his home. He and Rosina began to dig into 0:25:06.680 --> 0:25:09.439 the history of the house in the hope that it 0:25:09.560 --> 0:25:13.280 might shed some light on all that had apparently been 0:25:13.320 --> 0:25:18.399 going on. As it transpired. The house was built only 0:25:18.440 --> 0:25:22.360 twenty years before the Desbards moved in, and were sold 0:25:22.520 --> 0:25:26.800 to A Henry Swinhoe, a solicitor who arrived there in 0:25:26.920 --> 0:25:31.880 eighteen sixty from Calcutta. With his wife, Elizabeth and their 0:25:31.880 --> 0:25:38.640 two children. Another two children followed before Elizabeth became pregnant 0:25:38.680 --> 0:25:45.040 again in eighteen sixty five. The following year, Henry, who 0:25:45.119 --> 0:25:48.840 was known to absolutely adore his wife, was hit by 0:25:48.840 --> 0:25:55.800 a double tragedy. On August eighteenth, eighteen sixty six, it 0:25:55.880 --> 0:25:59.560 was announced in the birth register of the Gloucestershire Chronicle 0:26:00.119 --> 0:26:04.960 that on August eleventh in Cheltenham, a stillborn son had 0:26:05.000 --> 0:26:09.000 been born to the wife of Henry Swinhoe. A few 0:26:09.000 --> 0:26:13.760 inches below in the deaths register, it read that Elizabeth 0:26:13.800 --> 0:26:18.680 Francis had also died in Cheltenham on August the eleventh. 0:26:20.240 --> 0:26:23.879 Over the next few years, a darkness seemed to descend 0:26:23.960 --> 0:26:28.280 on the property, that some worried might consume Henry completely. 0:26:29.440 --> 0:26:32.680 It is said that the man turned increasingly to alcohol 0:26:33.080 --> 0:26:38.280 to manage his pain. Four years after Elizabeth's death, he 0:26:38.440 --> 0:26:43.000 was married again to an Imogen Hutchins from Clifton in Bristol. 0:26:44.000 --> 0:26:48.280 From the moment they met, however, Henry and Imogen's relationship 0:26:48.760 --> 0:26:52.200 was said to be a tumultuous one. Both were prone 0:26:52.200 --> 0:26:56.199 to heavy bouts of drinking and frequently quarreled viciously with 0:26:56.320 --> 0:27:01.600 each other. By eighteen seventy five, the relationship at all 0:27:01.640 --> 0:27:07.359 but disintegrated, with Henry becoming so convinced that Imogen wanted 0:27:07.400 --> 0:27:11.280 to steal his late wife's jewelry, he instructed a carpenter 0:27:11.520 --> 0:27:15.400 to build a secret compartment under some floor boards where 0:27:15.440 --> 0:27:24.560 he could hide it. 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That's Friends without the Art Best Fiends. 0:28:31.000 --> 0:28:36.440 In eighteen seventy six, Imogen and Henry finally decided to separate, 0:28:37.200 --> 0:28:41.600 with Imogen heading back to Bristol and Henry continuing to 0:28:41.680 --> 0:28:45.760 live at Garden Reach when a few months later, on 0:28:45.920 --> 0:28:50.000 July fourteenth, he died from what many said was a 0:28:50.040 --> 0:28:55.720 broken heart. Imogen died two years later in Clifton on 0:28:55.840 --> 0:28:59.920 the twenty third of September eighteen seventy eight, from the 0:29:00.040 --> 0:29:05.600 effects of alcohol abuse, such was the custom, despite her 0:29:05.720 --> 0:29:10.400 and Henry's clear antipathy toward each other. Imogen's body, none 0:29:10.400 --> 0:29:13.800 the less was brought to Cheltenham and buried in the 0:29:13.840 --> 0:29:18.160 grounds of the Holy Trinity Church in Portland Street, not 0:29:18.360 --> 0:29:24.000 far from Garden Reach. In the years following Henry's death, 0:29:24.800 --> 0:29:29.200 Garden Reach fell into some disrepair and was eventually sold 0:29:29.240 --> 0:29:33.920 to Benjamin Littlewood, an elderly man from Sherdington in eighteen 0:29:34.040 --> 0:29:38.480 seventy nine. Little Word had extensive work done on the 0:29:38.520 --> 0:29:45.440 property and renamed it Pitfield House. A month later, Benjamin died, 0:29:46.000 --> 0:29:50.800 after which the house was once again vacant. It is 0:29:50.840 --> 0:29:55.280 said that both Benjamin Littlewood and Henry Swinhoe died in 0:29:55.320 --> 0:29:59.800 the exact same room, a small sitting room where Henry 0:30:00.160 --> 0:30:05.400 thought to have had his wife's jewelry hidden. After Littlewood's death, 0:30:05.840 --> 0:30:09.720 the house was renamed again the following year, becoming known 0:30:09.800 --> 0:30:14.240 then as the Nor House, which, for reasons the dispards 0:30:14.280 --> 0:30:18.080 were never quite able to ascertain, was offered for rent 0:30:18.320 --> 0:30:22.680 at a price considerably cheaper than what they eventually ended 0:30:22.760 --> 0:30:26.600 up paying for it. Perhaps it was merely the recent 0:30:26.720 --> 0:30:29.760 deaths in the property that seemed to have been putting 0:30:29.800 --> 0:30:34.760 the renters off, Or perhaps, as Rosina wandered, could it 0:30:34.800 --> 0:30:38.120 be that she and her family weren't the first people 0:30:38.640 --> 0:30:44.320 to encounter the mournful woman in black. A short time later, 0:30:44.960 --> 0:30:48.640