It’s been a busy few days – not least because I’ve resumed face-to-face canvassing for donations, after breaking for a couple of weeks, because everyone in the world was on holiday. But now they’re back, and – as usual – I’m amazed and humbled at how generous people are.
‘Oh, I haven’t got much,’ somebody tells me, and then proceeds to hand me far in excess of the handful of coppers it takes to make a difference. A massive thanks to everyone who has donated so far!
The key to this fund-raising lark seems to be simply to get out and ask people if they want to give. If they don’t, then fine. But if they do, then lovely. I’ve had some wonderful chats with people, heard some hair-raising stories about their own encounters with the paranormal, I’ve bantered with sceptics, and have even made a couple of new friends. It may be easy and convenient to stick up a page on JustGiving.com and wait for people to send cash, but I doubt you can beat the experience of actually asking people. Not everyone likes it, of course, but this seems to be worrying me less as I go on, because – well, why should they?
I also received an interesting response to my queries for specific experiences, from a person whose work took them frequently into the depths of the town hall, although they’ve asked me not the mention their name.
My contact pointed out that although they have heard stories about ‘people’ seeing ghostly monks and Chief Constables, and hearing inexplicable footsteps and children’s voices on the uppers floors, they have no specific names, dates or places relating to these. All that they were able to report was a specific occasion on which they felt a distinct sensation of ‘being followed’ in the basement, plus the door to their first-floor office would open of its own accord from time to time, in a disconcerting way.
Most interesting, however, was a passing comment about the well. The town hall is built on the site of what were formerly the grounds of a priory. To this day, locked off inside a room in the basement, is the well from which the monks drew their water. This means there is water flowing underground on or close to the site of the museum.
It has been noted that underground water is frequently present at locations where paranormal activity takes place. There are perhaps two ways of approaching this. Running water near or under a building seems likely to produce physical effects – erosion, or perhaps noises, or atmospheric changes. But some people have theorised that maybe water acts as a medium which stores memories or feelings from the past and under certain conditions ‘replays’ them. My favourite writer on this is Tom Graves, who discusses the possible role of water at haunted locations in his book Needles of Stone (1978).
Perhaps I’ll soon get the chance to explore this first-hand, because I was tipped off that a group of seasoned paranormal investigators was planning to investigate the museum within the next few weeks. I contacted the group to ask if they would be willing to share their results, and to my delight they invited me to join them. You see what I mean about the generosity of people!
I won’t say anything more for now, but I can’t wait to get down there. It’ll be a very different and ‘milder’ experience (I hope) than being on my own, but maybe I’ll have my very own experiences and results to present here sometime soon.
