 |
 |
 |
|
|
|
As this is the month of Halloween, that late October night when children wander the streets seeking sweets holding pumpkins shaped as demons faces, complete with eyes nose and mouth cut from them and back lit by a candle burning inside. A time also when the souls of the dead are supposed to revisit their homes, and all manner of ghouls and ghosts are abroad. We thought a few local ghost stories would be in order. But first a word about our local witches, because you can forget all that Harry Porter stuff about witches and wizards ridding around on Broomsticks. Because here in Essex we tend to do things differently. You see, according to those who know about these sort of things, being a true Essex girl, your average Essex Witch would not be seen dead on a simple kitchen broom, No for her nocturnal mount, she prefers riding a five bar gate. At least that's what generations of country people have believed. Interestingly this strange choice of transport by our Essex Witches may have had more to do with the smuggling trade then with tradition a couple of hundred years ago. For what better way was there in ensuring that country people stayed safely indoors and well out of the way. When down the lanes and led by one of their number riding a horse with a luminously panted five bar gate strapped to its flanks. Strings of pack ponies and carts laden down with smuggled cargo would make their way inland from any number of small coastal and Thameside ports. For many years all smuggling routes led to Witham, which acted as a distribution point. The hiding of this vast amount of contraband being made easy, due to the fact that many of the village's homes had interconnecting attics, which made ideal secret warehousing. As for local ghosts, here in the Brentwood area we can offer up at least three, the first being that of our very own local martyr, William Hunter. Sentenced to be burnt at the stake during a time when the country was under a catholic Queen for reading a Protestant bible in South Weald Church. Supposedly he spent his last night alive in a room at the Swan in Brentwood's high street. It's said that every year on the anniversary of his death, his ghostly footsteps can still be heard forever slowly walking back and forth within that room. But how about a ghost Dog. That's the claim of Ingatestone pub the Star. Indeed should you venture inside and cast your eye above the bar. Before supping the best-kept beer in the county, you might just spy the head of beast hanging on the wall. Ask nicely and you'll be told that's the head of a rather amorous hound that terrorised the village bitches at the turn of the century with its activities. This would have been bad enough, but the animal still found the strength by attacking any passing hound what ever their size. This plus its annoying habit of chasing any passing cart made it a creature to be avoided. It met its end one fine day when it chased one farm cart too many and ended up under its wheel. Such was its fame that its head was mounted over the bar, as a reminder of that Ingatestone terror dog. As for it's ghostly activities. Well according to the Stars landlord Roger, to this day, no dog will ever venture up into the pubs living quarters, and those that do try only get as far as the first flight before bolting back down again. It would be nice to report that both these stories are true, sadly they are all a pack of lies. And both the result of local journalists desperate to find a story around town. In the case of the Ingatestone Dog. The perpetrator was Ingatestone resident the late James Wentworth-Day, who at the time was a famous Fleet Street columnist for the Daily Mail. He was much given to drinking in the star and one night, realising that he had nothing to fill his weekly column, cooked up the ghost dog story with the aid of the then landlord. As for the mounted head in the bar. Well most of the story is true, but so far, his ghost has yet to make an appearance. In the case of William Hunter. Well I plead guilty to this one. This tale had its beginnings in the old back bar of the Swan, at a time in the mid sixties, when Brentwood had no less then four local newspapers plus another two county papers selling well in the town, and all with reporters and photographers who made the Swans back bar their common meeting ground. Again it was the desperate need for a story to fill our various pages that led us over a few beers one boozy lunchtime to concoct the ghostly footsteps. Interestingly since then, any number of ghost books, researched by so-called experts have picked up both stories as being true records. Strangely none of them ever picked up on the fact that a medieval ghost would have found it hard to haunt an Edwardian building. The original Swan pub being located on the other side of the High Street. But we were not the only folk to invent an apparition back then. So I'll conclude this article with the saga of a third Brentwood ghost, who also first made it's one and only appearance in the mid sixties. This was a Grey Lady (aren't they all!) who hunted a building near Brentwood Station which used to be a cinema, but which during a brief period became a short-lived nightclub. No doubt seeking a little extra publicity the clubs manager reported that his grey lady had been seen in the early hours gliding across the dance floor. On hearing this the editor of one of Brentwood's local newspapers, (No not this one!) decided to get one over on his rivals by assigning a photographer to spend the night alone in the empty building camera at the ready. The next week the paper duly published a fuzzy photo of a glowing female shape floating a few inches above floor level, announcing that this was the ghostly grey lady. Alas for local ghost watchers, it turned out that the ghost was the result of some naughty photographic dark room trickery. Now don't going having nightmares tonight.
|