Speaker 1: In March nineteen sixty three, a group of children picked
Speaker 1: their way through the grounds of a ruined church on
Speaker 1: the outskirts of the village of Clophill in the south
Speaker 1: of England. The Old Saint Mary's was built around thirteen fifty,
Speaker 1: but was apparently abandoned in the nineteenth century after a
Speaker 1: more convenient location was found for a church a little
Speaker 1: closer to the village. Some say, however, that it whilst
Speaker 1: the parishioners themselves that requested the building be abandoned after
Speaker 1: growing uneasy about its unusual positioning. Traditionally, churches are built
Speaker 1: so that the congregation can face and pray to the east,
Speaker 1: toward the direction of the rising sun. This positioning is
Speaker 1: important since many consider this also to be the direction
Speaker 1: of Heaven and a symbol of the returning Messiah. For
Speaker 1: some reason, however, this church was built to face in
Speaker 1: the opposite direction, leading some to believe it was in
Speaker 1: fact a pat satan and a gateway to Hell. It
Speaker 1: isn't known if the children playing in the churchyard that
Speaker 1: day were aware of this small fact, or what indeed
Speaker 1: it might mean. When they came across the bones, clearly
Speaker 1: human and old, they were scattered over the grass in
Speaker 1: an odd, unnatural manner. A nearby gravestone and the large
Speaker 1: gaping hole in the earth next to it suggested they
Speaker 1: had once belonged to one Jenny Humberston. Looking around, however,
Speaker 1: the children soon found it wasn't only Humberston's grave that
Speaker 1: had been desecrated, as all about small mounds of black
Speaker 1: earth could be seen where other grave sites had been
Speaker 1: similarly disturbed. The police arrived an hour or so later,
Speaker 1: along with local vicar Reverend Leslie Barker, to inspect the
Speaker 1: grizzly scene. A crow perched on top of the ruins
Speaker 1: called vigorously as the officers stood about examining the yellowed remains,
Speaker 1: trying to make sense of it all. Perhaps some opportunist
Speaker 1: robber had been looking for buried Victorian jewelry, they thought,
Speaker 1: But Reverend Barker wasn't quite so sure, his mind rushing
Speaker 1: back to the two Celtic crosses he'd found recently inside
Speaker 1: the church. Both had been painted with a red substance
Speaker 1: which he was almost certain was blood. Then he gazed
Speaker 1: up at the ruins with a pained look in his eyes,
Speaker 1: feeling a sudden chill run down his back as he
Speaker 1: clocked its westerly facing chancel. No, he said, pointing down
Speaker 1: to the bones, drawing the police's attention once more to
Speaker 1: their strange arrangement. There's no doubt about it. This is
Speaker 1: the work of Satanists. A few months later, further grave
Speaker 1: desecrations were discovered in Lancashire, in the northwest of England,
Speaker 1: which according to some, also bore the hallmarks of a
Speaker 1: black magic ritual. Then in December, in Sussex on the
Speaker 1: south coast, a bell ringer in the village of Westam,
Speaker 1: after arriving for practice one evening at their local chapel,
Speaker 1: heard a strange, monotonous chant coming from somewhere within it.
Speaker 1: Stepping inside, they were surprised to find four men they'd
Speaker 1: never seen before, huddled in the dark, humming something soft
Speaker 1: and ominous, together a circle of candles gently flickering around them.
Speaker 1: In the next few months, over two hundred acts of
Speaker 1: vandalism perpetrated in English churchyards were thought to be linked
Speaker 1: to what appeared to be a resurgent interest in black magic.
Speaker 1: Something was evidently brewing. You're listening to unexplained and I'm
Speaker 1: Richard McClean smith. One evening in early nineteen sixty seven,
Speaker 1: roughly four years after the events at Saint Mary's Church,
Speaker 1: sixteen year olds Elizabeth Voidiwa and Barbara Moriarty found themselves
Speaker 1: walking down Swain's Lane in North London after visiting friends
Speaker 1: in Highgate Village. The lane a steep and narrow pathway
Speaker 1: that runs south from Highgate before curving west towards Parliament
Speaker 1: Hill and Hampstead Heath's perhaps best known as the thoroughfare
Speaker 1: that divided the two sections of London sprawling Highgate s.
Speaker 1: The cemetery, located in a secluded area of woodland high
Speaker 1: up on the hill to the northeast of Hampstead Heath,
Speaker 1: was built in two parts, with the first, the Western Cemetery,
Speaker 1: established in eighteen thirty nine, centered around the two imposing
Speaker 1: structures of Egyptian Avenue and the Circle of Lebanon, home
Speaker 1: to thirty six vaults between them, the first being a
Speaker 1: grand walkway of stone, granite and marble, built in a
Speaker 1: classical style with a vast stone archway at its front,
Speaker 1: flanked by two huge Egyptian style obelisks, all framed by
Speaker 1: carefully manicured shrubs and narrow wooded pathways. It quickly became
Speaker 1: the most fashionable cemetery of the day. As such, by
Speaker 1: eighteen sixty, another nineteen acres of similarly picturesque woodland on
Speaker 1: the other side of Swain's Lane was quickly incorporated into
Speaker 1: the site, becoming home to Highgates Eastern Cemetery after welcoming
Speaker 1: its first resident, Elizabeth Jackson, who died aged thirty six
Speaker 1: in May eighteen thirty nine. Today, roughly one hundred and
Speaker 1: seventy thousand people have been buried in approximately fifty three
Speaker 1: thousand graves in Highgate, with author Mary Anne Evans also
Speaker 1: known as George Eliot, philosopher Karl Marx, and scientist Michael
Speaker 1: Faraday being some of its most notable occupants. By the
Speaker 1: early twentieth century, however, thanks to its popularity, the graveyard
Speaker 1: was completely filled up, with so few being buried there afterwards.
Speaker 1: By the nineteen sixties, as the names of most of
Speaker 1: its copious inhabitants slowly disappeared ever further into obscurity, the
Speaker 1: whole place had fallen into disrepair. The once carefully manicured
Speaker 1: space had become wildly overgrown and consumed by nature. The
Speaker 1: once spectacular tunes and ornate gravestones that had spoken so
Speaker 1: much of wealth and standing. Those that could still be
Speaker 1: glimpsed through the endless thickets of Ivy and Bramble at least,
Speaker 1: had by then long faded and crumbled like relics of Ozymandius.
Speaker 1: And it was in just such a state when those
Speaker 1: two young girls, Elizabeth Voidiwa and Barbara Moriarty, passed by
Speaker 1: the cemetery that evening in nineteen sixty seven. Being pupils
Speaker 1: from a nearby school, the pair had walked through Swain's
Speaker 1: Lane on many occasions before, having never thought twice about
Speaker 1: their surroundings. That night, however, as the girls walked past
Speaker 1: the Cemetery's north gate at the top of the lane,
Speaker 1: it has claimed that both saw something that shocked them
Speaker 1: to the cores. After glimpsing a movement through the railings
Speaker 1: of the gate, the pair was certain that for a moment,
Speaker 1: what they had in fact seen was a number of
Speaker 1: graves opening up, followed by numerous arms and legs reaching
Speaker 1: up from out of the earth within them. Is there
Speaker 1: something interfering with your happiness or preventing you from achieving
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Speaker 1: living a happier life today. A few weeks later, a
Speaker 1: young woman and man were walking down Swain's Lane after
Speaker 1: a night out in Highgate when the woman screamed, suddenly
Speaker 1: claiming to have seen a figure standing behind the locked
Speaker 1: gate of the Western Cemetery. Though she'd only glimpsed it
Speaker 1: for a moment, it was long enough to see the
Speaker 1: horrifying twisted expression on its face that seemed to bore
Speaker 1: right into her, before the figure vanished into thin air.
Speaker 1: Having heard the many local rumors of ghosts said to
Speaker 1: haunt the cemetery, the man returned a few weeks later
Speaker 1: with another friend to see if they could spot the
Speaker 1: apparent entity. The men clambered over the locked gate and
Speaker 1: jumped down with a crunch, onto the gravel path, then
Speaker 1: switched on their torches and headed on into the thicket
Speaker 1: of undergrowth and crumbling gravestones beyond. Before long, as they
Speaker 1: stepped past one tomb after another, their inscriptions long since
Speaker 1: faded away, a great sense of melancholy overcame the pair,
Speaker 1: when suddenly they became aware of a low, vibrating hum
Speaker 1: that came and went with increasing regularity from somewhere up
Speaker 1: ahead in the darkness. As the noise intensified, the men
Speaker 1: found that they could no longer move their limbs, as
Speaker 1: though the sound had cast a spell on them. Just then,
Speaker 1: a large shadow flitted across the path, like that of
Speaker 1: a human, but strange elongated. Then the pair began to
Speaker 1: feel nauseous and their breathing became labored. Barely able to think,
Speaker 1: one of the men instinctively blurted out the Lord's prayer,
Speaker 1: and within moments they were released from their fantastical quagmire. Turning,
Speaker 1: they sprinted for the exit and never looked back. This story,
Speaker 1: along with that of Elizabeth and Barbara's, was apparently told
Speaker 1: to Shawn Manchester, who was a twenty five year old
Speaker 1: photographer at the time. In June nineteen sixty seven, Manchester
Speaker 1: had also become the president of the British Occult Society,
Speaker 1: a small organization of like minded people who were keen
Speaker 1: to learn more about what they perceived to be a
Speaker 1: sudden blossoming of occult related events in the United Kingdom.
Speaker 1: With little more to go on, Sean claimed to have
Speaker 1: forgotten about the incidents until the summer of nineteen sixty nine, when,
Speaker 1: while out walking through Highgate one day, he was approached
Speaker 1: in the street by an anxious and tired looking Elizabeth,
Speaker 1: who was clearly desperate for his help. Seeing the woman
Speaker 1: and how deathly pale she looked, as he would later
Speaker 1: describe it. He immediately suggested they go to a nearby
Speaker 1: cafe where he could get her something to eat. Later
Speaker 1: that afternoon, she told him her shocking story. It began
Speaker 1: soon after she and Barbara had experienced their strange vision
Speaker 1: on Swain's Lane, with a series of terrifying nightmares in
Speaker 1: which Elizabeth would wake up in a state of panic,
Speaker 1: dripping with sweat, convinced that something was trying to get
Speaker 1: in at her bedroom window. Then one night, she sensed
Speaker 1: a presence at the end of her bed and looked
Speaker 1: up to see the figure of something not quite a
Speaker 1: man standing there with the wild, snarling look on its face.
Speaker 1: The next she remembered was something touching her and an
Speaker 1: icy cold sensation intrigued by her tail. Sean then claimed
Speaker 1: to have been taken back to Elizabeth's apartment, where he
Speaker 1: was introduced to her partner, Keith, who apparently verified the
Speaker 1: story as Elizabeth was said to have explained further, despite
Speaker 1: being diagnosed with a simple case of anemia by her doctor,
Speaker 1: none of the vitamin's and iron supplements she'd been prescribed
Speaker 1: appeared to be making any difference. After a pleasant but
Speaker 1: tense evening, hearing more about Elizabeth's growing urge to leave
Speaker 1: her bed at night and wander out into the dark,
Speaker 1: with no sense or idea where she might go. Sean
Speaker 1: was just about to leave when Keith apparently told him
Speaker 1: about the peculiar mark that had recently appeared on Elizabeth's neck. Then,
Speaker 1: much to Sean's astonish, Elizabeth flicked back her hair to
Speaker 1: reveal two small, dark purple contusions. A few days later,
Speaker 1: Sean received a letter from Keith. After he and Elizabeth
Speaker 1: had got into a fight one evening, he'd followed her
Speaker 1: out of the flat, watching from afar as she made
Speaker 1: her way directly to Highgate Cemetery. Once there, Keith had
Speaker 1: looked on with confusion as she tiptoed over to the
Speaker 1: cemetery gates, then just stood there, staring forlornly into the
Speaker 1: darkness beyond the railings. Having eventually snapped out of it,
Speaker 1: the pair returned to their flat, where Elizabeth retired to
Speaker 1: bed alone. Later, after hearing a terrible scream, Keith ran
Speaker 1: into the bedroom to find Elizabeth sitting up in bed,
Speaker 1: gasping for breath, with, according to Manchester, two specks of
Speaker 1: blood on her pillow. Believing that Elizabeth was the victim
Speaker 1: of some kind of vampiric attack. Manchester claimed to have
Speaker 1: returned to her and Keith's flat immediately after receiving the letter.
Speaker 1: On arrival, he thrust a manuscript into Keith's hand. Keith
Speaker 1: stared down at the title of the paper with confusion,
Speaker 1: The Travels of Three Gentlemen from Venice to Hamburg being
Speaker 1: the Grand Tour of Germany in the year seventeen thirty four,
Speaker 1: it read. The text was anonymous, but described a journey
Speaker 1: made by three acquaintances around Europe in the year seventeen
Speaker 1: thirty four. In it, the author described a conversation with
Speaker 1: the landlord of an inn in Leubjana, Slovenia, in which
Speaker 1: they stayed. The man, who they took to be a
Speaker 1: fine and upstanding citizen, took great pains to warn them
Speaker 1: about a plague of vampirism that appeared to have broken
Speaker 1: out in some rural areas of the country. Then Sean
Speaker 1: directed Keith to a passage quoted from a different text
Speaker 1: entitled Dissertatio de vampires serviensibus, written by a professor Johann
Speaker 1: Heinrich Zop in seventeen thirty three. Zop as Manchester explained,
Speaker 1: was the director of one of the leading high schools
Speaker 1: in Germany at the time and an authority on vampires
Speaker 1: in the eighteenth century. It read they come out of
Speaker 1: graves in the nighttime, rush upon people sleeping in their beds,
Speaker 1: suck out all their blood and destroy them. They attack men,
Speaker 1: women and children, sparing neither age nor sex. The people
Speaker 1: attacked by them complain of suffer vacation and a great
Speaker 1: interception of spirit, after which they soon expire. Those who
Speaker 1: were destroyed by them, after their death become vampires too.
Speaker 1: To prevent so spreading an evil, it has found requisite
Speaker 1: to drive a stake through the dead body, from whence
Speaker 1: on this occasion the blood flows as if the person
Speaker 1: were alive. Sometimes the body is dug out at the
Speaker 1: grave and burnt to ashes, upon which all disturbances cease.
Speaker 1: All was not lost, however, according to Manchester, who claimed
Speaker 1: to have given Keith the strict set of instructions to
Speaker 1: ward off the apparent malignants that had so invaded his
Speaker 1: and Catherine's home, garlic was to be wiped around the
Speaker 1: front door and window frames of their bedroom, and a
Speaker 1: crucifix nailed there immediately. Then, who was to place a
Speaker 1: handful of salt in a piece of linen, which was
Speaker 1: then to be thread through a silver cross and tied
Speaker 1: around Elizabeth's neck. Then, finally, Keith was instructed to write
Speaker 1: the first fourteen verses of the Gospel and place it
Speaker 1: under Elizabeth's pillow at night, then sprinkled the room with
Speaker 1: holy water. Manchester alleges that Keith took his advice and
Speaker 1: spent the next evening watching with horror as Elizabeth writhed
Speaker 1: about in distress, suffering hellish fever dreams all night while
Speaker 1: something rattled incessantly at the window. At some point, the
Speaker 1: window was said to have even been wrenched open, after
Speaker 1: which the cross mysteriously vanished from Elizabeth's neck. Come the morning, however,
Speaker 1: Elizabeth was said to have completely recovered. Did you know
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Speaker 1: about the same time in Highgate, another local individual was
Speaker 1: becoming increasingly preoccupied with the rumors of peculiar goings on
Speaker 1: at the cemetery. Born in the mid nineteen forties, David
Speaker 1: Farrant grew up in Highgates, Shepherd Hill, where as a
Speaker 1: child he claimed to have seen a peculiar entity moving
Speaker 1: about his family home. Having been introduced to the culture
Speaker 1: of witchcraft by his mother, who died when he was
Speaker 1: only thirteen, David spent most of his teenage years delving
Speaker 1: ever further into the straight and unexplained. By nineteen sixty seven,
Speaker 1: then in his early twenties, Farrant, with his long tussled
Speaker 1: hair and brooding looks, was a familiar figure around Highgate Village,
Speaker 1: rarely seen out without his loyal McCaw parrot perched on
Speaker 1: his shoulder. Like Manchester, Farrant was part of a group
Speaker 1: two his being called the British Psychic and Occult Society,
Speaker 1: which was dedicated to discussing and where possible, investigating supposed
Speaker 1: paranormal or occult phenomena that happened to crop up in
Speaker 1: the area, which is why he found himself at the
Speaker 1: Red Lion and Sun Pub in Highgate one afternoon in
Speaker 1: nineteen sixty nine. The man he'd come to meet, was
Speaker 1: well dressed in a tailored suit and looked to be
Speaker 1: in his late thirties. He introduced himself, but asked to
Speaker 1: be known only as Thornton for fear of ridicule, since
Speaker 1: he was a well respected accountant known to many in
Speaker 1: the local area as the so called Thornton went on
Speaker 1: to explain he was a keen amateur photographer and had
Speaker 1: recently visited Highgate Cemetery to take some pictures that warm
Speaker 1: summer's afternoon. The place was deserted as he made his
Speaker 1: way through the crumbling, moss covered tombstones, while dust marts
Speaker 1: danced in hazy rays of sunlight that broke intermittently through
Speaker 1: the tangle of leaves above. He'd barely noticed the time
Speaker 1: passing when a few hours later, as he approached the
Speaker 1: Grand Circle of Lebanon, he heard the distant sound of
Speaker 1: church bells. Realizing the cemetery would soon be locking up,
Speaker 1: Thornton was just about to leave when he was gripped
Speaker 1: by the absolute conviction that he was being watched. Spinning round, suddenly,
Speaker 1: he found himself face to face with a tall, dark,
Speaker 1: amorphous figure that he quickly realized, much to his horror
Speaker 1: was hovering just above the ground. Though he wanted nothing
Speaker 1: more than to run away, Thornton felt suddenly drained of energy,
Speaker 1: as if the spectral figure was somehow sucking it out
Speaker 1: of him. Then, after what seemed like a good few minutes,
Speaker 1: the figure simply vanished, and Thornton was finally able to escape.
Speaker 1: After hearing a number of other stories just like Thornton's
Speaker 1: in the following months, David Farrant decided to investigate the
Speaker 1: cemetery for himself, and so on December twenty first, nineteen
Speaker 1: sixty nine, the winter solstice, shortly before midnight, Farrant made
Speaker 1: his way to the western Cemetery entrance at the top
Speaker 1: of Swain's Lane. No sooner had he arrived than he
Speaker 1: too was apparently gripped by the unshakeable sensation that someone
Speaker 1: was watching him. Stepping up to the wrought iron gates,
Speaker 1: his boots echoing down the deserted road, he peered through
Speaker 1: into the darkness beyond. As his eyes began to adjust
Speaker 1: to the tangled mass of tombstones and greenery, gently lit
Speaker 1: by the silvery light of the moon, he staggered back
Speaker 1: suddenly at the sight of something standing in the middle
Speaker 1: of one of the paths, about twenty feet away. Inside,
Speaker 1: with a rush of adrenaline, David approached the gate once
Speaker 1: more as a humanoid figure at least seven foot in
Speaker 1: height began to take shape within the shadows, and only
Speaker 1: then did he notice the two fiery red eyes staring
Speaker 1: out of its head. As David would later tell it,
Speaker 1: as the air seemed to grow even more cold around him.
Speaker 1: The figure then stepped forward toward him, and though he
Speaker 1: too wanted to run, he was completely glued to the spot.
Speaker 1: Closing his eyes, David quickly recited a carbalistic prayer under
Speaker 1: his breath, and when he looked up, the specter was gone.
Speaker 1: When Farrant returned soon after to inspect the cemetery, this
Speaker 1: time in the daylight hours, he became fixated on the
Speaker 1: decayed state of it all. Much of it, of course,
Speaker 1: was simply the result of neglect and the ravages of time,
Speaker 1: but other things seemed just plain out of place. For one,
Speaker 1: there seemed to be an inordinate amount of vandalism, entire
Speaker 1: vaults that appeared deliberately broken into, and the coffins inside
Speaker 1: smashed apart. One time, he even glimpsed the head and
Speaker 1: torso of a skeleton that had quite clearly been ripped
Speaker 1: out of a coffin. Then he noticed something lump and
Speaker 1: and furry lying at the edge of the path, a
Speaker 1: fox not long dead, the third he'd seen in as
Speaker 1: many weeks, with no obvious cause of death. Early in
Speaker 1: the new year of nineteen seventy, David Varrant wrote a
Speaker 1: letter to the local paper, the Hampstead and Highgate Express,
Speaker 1: inviting readers to write in with any unusual experiences they
Speaker 1: might have had at the cemetery. Over the next few weeks,
Speaker 1: the paper was inundated with responses. Some spoke of a
Speaker 1: man in a hat known for years to walk across
Speaker 1: Swain's Lane at night and disappear through the cemetery walls
Speaker 1: as a ghostly bell could be heard tolling in the distance,
Speaker 1: similar to the so called Thornton's apparent sighting. Other readers
Speaker 1: spoke of the well known ghostly cyclist said to chase
Speaker 1: women down Swain's, while one detailed a particularly terrifying encounter
Speaker 1: at nearby viaduct pond on Hampstead Heath, in which a
Speaker 1: ghostly figure was apparently seen to walk solemnly into the
Speaker 1: water before turning back to wave at the viewer as
Speaker 1: if beckoning them to join them. The figure then vanished
Speaker 1: with a horrific and nauseating cry. Over the next six weeks,
Speaker 1: eighteen accounts of apparent sightings were published, with many more
Speaker 1: put forward. Though Farrant was determined to keep an open
Speaker 1: mind about what exactly was taking place, Sean Manchester had
Speaker 1: already drawn his conclusion. He too had continued his own
Speaker 1: investigations at Highgate Cemetery and had also noted the unusual
Speaker 1: amount of fox carcasses, Only he hadn't found them seemingly
Speaker 1: untouched like Farrant, but with as he later said, lacerations
Speaker 1: around a throat and completely drained of blood. Given all
Speaker 1: the evidence from the apparent experience of Elizabeth voidiwa the
Speaker 1: numerous sightings of a tall, spectral figure haunting the graveyard
Speaker 1: and draining the energy of anyone unfortunate enough to cross
Speaker 1: its path to the mutilated foxes, there was only one answer.
Speaker 1: A vampire was stalking Highgate Cemetery. One lesser known fact
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Speaker 1: Sean Manchester had too noticed the growing number of apparent
Speaker 1: grave desecrations taking place in the semin Tree, which only
Speaker 1: served to strengthen his vampire theory since he believed the
Speaker 1: two to be inextricably linked. As news of the vampire
Speaker 1: rumors and Manchester's interest in the case spread, the Hampstead
Speaker 1: and Highgate Express invited him to give his opinion on
Speaker 1: the matter. The subsequent article was published on February twenty seventh,
Speaker 1: titled does a Vampire Walk in Highgate? According to Manchester,
Speaker 1: the property of Ashurst House, on the grounds of which
Speaker 1: the cemetery was originally built, was at one time least
Speaker 1: to an enigmatic gentleman from Eastern Europe who arrived in
Speaker 1: the country around the time of an apparent vampire epidemic
Speaker 1: that was occurring in Southeast Europe. Manchester had good reason
Speaker 1: to think that this man, who he believed to be
Speaker 1: some form of king vampire, had resided at this location
Speaker 1: in one form or another ever since, and that black
Speaker 1: magic practitioners were trying to resurrect him. For sean there
Speaker 1: was only one solution to the problem. That this vampire,
Speaker 1: in his opinion, a literal manifestation of physical evil, should
Speaker 1: be found and terminated by driving a stake through its heart,
Speaker 1: then decapitating it with a grave digger's shovel and burning
Speaker 1: the remains to ash. With their mutual interests, it was
Speaker 1: only a matter of time before Farran and Manchester crossed
Speaker 1: paths after appearing in an article together on March sixth.
Speaker 1: The pair then took part in a live v broadcast
Speaker 1: from Highgate Cemetery on Friday thirteenth of March to voice
Speaker 1: their concerns. In the interview, Farrant claimed that since news
Speaker 1: of his interest in the Apparent Vampire had gone public,
Speaker 1: he'd received a series of sinister letters covered in strange symbols,
Speaker 1: warning him him in no uncertain terms to stop meddling
Speaker 1: in things he didn't understand. However, he remained steadfastly committed
Speaker 1: to banishing the malignant menace. Within hours of the broadcast,
Speaker 1: hundreds of members of the public, some out of excited
Speaker 1: curiosity others out of genuine concern, converged on the cemetery gates,
Speaker 1: brandishing weapons and demanding to be let into the graveyard.
Speaker 1: Before long, the steadily increasing crowd had jumped the gates
Speaker 1: and began flowing into the cemetery, gripped by an electric
Speaker 1: further as they hunted desperately for any sign of the vampire.
Speaker 1: By the time the sun had risen the following morning,
Speaker 1: nothing had been found. Things had died down somewhat when
Speaker 1: on Friday August first, three teenagers on their own vampire
Speaker 1: hunt discovered a charred, headless corpse lying beside the broken
Speaker 1: remnants of a vault close to the cemetery's columbarium. According
Speaker 1: to Manchester, the corpse had likely been used as part
Speaker 1: of a ritual to bring the King vampire back to life. Then,
Speaker 1: on the night of August seventeenth, two police officers on
Speaker 1: the lookout for vandals were making a routine patrol of
Speaker 1: the cemetery when they spotted a group of people behaving
Speaker 1: strangely inside one of the vaults, stepping closer. With the
Speaker 1: smell of herbs and incense in the air. They saw
Speaker 1: candles burning, as well as a series of strange markings
Speaker 1: drawn in chalk on the floor, while one of the
Speaker 1: group held a stake in their hands. It was David Farrant.
Speaker 1: The group were duly arrested for trespassing. However, the case
Speaker 1: was eventually dismissed after Farren's solicit Ceter successfully argued that
Speaker 1: vampire hunting was not against the law. Within a week
Speaker 1: of Farrent's arrest, Sewn Manchester, who was equally keen to
Speaker 1: expel the apparent vampire, was at the columbarium next to
Speaker 1: where the headless corpse had been found, burning incense and
Speaker 1: sprinkling cups of holy water while reading various rites of
Speaker 1: exorcism in Greek, Latin, Hebrew and English. Sometime later, Manchester
Speaker 1: claimed to have followed a woman into the cemetery who
Speaker 1: he believed was possessed by demonic spirits, all the way
Speaker 1: to a fairly nondescript vault hidden away amongst the leaves.
Speaker 1: Returning later that afternoon with a small group of fellow
Speaker 1: members of the British Occult Society, Manchester reportedly entered the
Speaker 1: vault stake in hand, where he found a coffin with
Speaker 1: no nameplate, inside which was a body that appeared to
Speaker 1: be neither dead alive. Manchester is said to have raised
Speaker 1: the stake and was just about to plunge it somewhere
Speaker 1: between the body's seventh and eighth rib when a colleague
Speaker 1: grabbed his arm, imploring him not to do it for
Speaker 1: fear it could be sacrilege. After all, there was no
Speaker 1: guarantee that the body was that of a vampire. In
Speaker 1: the end, Manchester was forced to concede the point, stating
Speaker 1: later that he agreed to seek permission from the correct
Speaker 1: quarter before carrying out any executions. As the sun went down,
Speaker 1: Manchester instead sprinkled salt, holy water, and garlic around the
Speaker 1: vault and read the rights of exorcism just in case,
Speaker 1: claiming later that as he did, deep voluminous booming sounds
Speaker 1: had rung out, vibrating throughout the tomb. Over the next
Speaker 1: few months, those sightings of the apparent vampire had become
Speaker 1: few and far between. Shawn Manchester and David Farrant continued
Speaker 1: their respective monitoring of the cemetery. One full moon in
Speaker 1: October nineteen seventy, Farrant took a reporter on a tour
Speaker 1: of the cemetery, during which they found numerous open graves
Speaker 1: with a number of exposed skeletons, all missing their skulls,
Speaker 1: as well as a number of vaults and tombs defaced
Speaker 1: with strange magical scrawls. Then, one night, Farrant claimed to
Speaker 1: have come across a particularly disturbing scene. It was laid
Speaker 1: out in a grand mosaic floored vault belonging to the
Speaker 1: cory Wright family. On the floor, drawn in vibrant white chalk,
Speaker 1: was a pentagram encased in a circle with a large
Speaker 1: triangle drawn around it, with one magical word scrawled on
Speaker 1: each side of it, and on the inside symbols the Jupiter, Mars,
Speaker 1: and the Moon had been drawn. A bust of one
Speaker 1: of the deceased in the vault had been placed at
Speaker 1: the head of the pentagram, and all of it surrounded
Speaker 1: by long burned out candles. It was clear to Farrant
Speaker 1: that a group of black witches had evidently broken into
Speaker 1: the vault and attempted to resurrect the dead man, depict
Speaker 1: it by the bust in retaliation. Late one night on
Speaker 1: the summer solstice of nineteen seventy one, Farrant, along with
Speaker 1: nine other members of his British Psychic and Occult Society,
Speaker 1: are said to have gathered inside the cory Wright family vault,
Speaker 1: equipped with bibles, holy water, and magical herbs, amongst other implements.
Speaker 1: On the ground, a triangle was drawn in chalk, this
Speaker 1: time with the protective circle drawn around it. Then, after
Speaker 1: some of the women disrobed as an apparent symbol of purity.
Speaker 1: The group lit candles, then came together in a circle
Speaker 1: around the markings. Together they chanted a series of readings
Speaker 1: from the Bible, as well as some ancient spells. Before long,
Speaker 1: the icy air of the vault seemed to warm up considerably,
Speaker 1: but little more was felt until shortly after midnight, when
Speaker 1: one of the group, a self described medium, took charge
Speaker 1: of proceedings. As some described it later, not long after
Speaker 1: she began to speak, the candles flickered and a mist
Speaker 1: was seen to descend within the circle, from out of
Speaker 1: which a writhing, black, shadowy figure began to form, growing
Speaker 1: ever bigger, until two points of light became visible in
Speaker 1: what appeared to be its face. Just then, a scream
Speaker 1: was heard as one of the group fainted to the ground,
Speaker 1: followed moments later by the startled cry of the medium
Speaker 1: as she too broke away, collapsing to the ground, and
Speaker 1: with that the entity disappeared. If you enjoy Unexplained and
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Speaker 1: via Patreon. To receive access to add three episodes, just
Speaker 1: go to patron dot com forward slash Unexplained pod to
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Speaker 1: Barnes and Noble, and Waterstones, among other bookstores. All elements
Speaker 1: of Unexplained, including the show's music, are produced by me
Speaker 1: Richard McClain smith. Please subscribe and rate the show wherever
Speaker 1: you listen to podcasts, and feel free to get in
Speaker 1: touch with any thoughts or ideas regarding the stories you've
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