Buruburu, meaning the sound of shivering, is a terrible ghost from Japanese folklore that for reasons unknown is said to lurk in forests and graveyards in the form of an old person, who is sometimes one-eyed. According to legend it attaches itself to its victim’s spine and causes a chill to run down them, or in the worst case causes them to die of fright.
BYRD, EVELYN [1707–1737]
The ghost of Evelyn Byrd, daughter of William Byrd II, an early American colonial settler and founder of the city of Richmond, Virginia, is reputed to haunt the grounds of her childhood home, Westover, on the James River.
Born in 1707, Evelyn was sent to England at the age of 10 to be educated, and at the age of 16 she fell in love with a man her family considered unsuitable, possibly because they thought him too old for her. At 19 Evelyn returned to Westover depressed and heartbroken. She withdrew from all company except for that of her friend and neighbour, Anne Harrison, whom she met almost daily in a grove in the plantations. For ten years Evelyn wasted away, until her death in 1737.
Before her death Evelyn made a pact with Anne that if one of them was to die the other would return as a friendly ghost, and, true to her promise, Evelyn’s ghost is alleged to have been seen by Anne smiling in the grove where they used to meet. Over the years Evelyn’s ghost has been seen dressed in white or green lace many times at Westover. She is never frightening, and when she appears she always smiles.
BYRON, LORD GEORGE GORDON [1788–1824]
One of the greatest poets of English literature, Lord Byron was deeply fascinated by the supernatural and would investigate tales of hauntings himself. As a young man Byron reported seeing a phantom monk in the family home of Newstead Abbey, who may or may not have died at the hands of one of Byron’s ancestors.
The phantom’s appearance was thought to herald misfortune for the family, and Byron claimed to see the ‘goblin friar’ again shortly before his ill-fated marriage to heiress Anne Milbanke in 1815. He described it as:
…monk arrayed in cowl, and beads, and dusky garb appeared
Now in the moonlight, and now lapsed in shade,
With steps that trod as heavy, yet unheard.
CABINET
A box or confined space thought to attract, store and release spiritual forces, enabling a medium to produce phenomena. The use of cabinets to manifest paranormal activity began in the mid-1800s with the Davenport brothers. The brothers had themselves bound and locked in a wooden cabinet, where they were supposedly incapable of moving, but somehow musical instruments would play as if guided by spirit hands. Their act was a huge success, and until the early twentieth century cabinets or black curtains for the medium to retire behind were all the rage. Cabinets are rarely used by modern mediums.
CALVADOS CASTLE
From October 1875 to October 1876 Calvados Castle – more a chateau than a castle – was the focus of poltergeist activity that forced the owners to leave. In the written accounts of the haunting, the people involved are identified only by their initials. The case has never been explained and remains a mystery to this day.
Calvados Castle was built on top of the foundations of an earlier Norman castle that had fallen into disrepair and apparently had been haunted ever since. In 1875 the castle was occupied by M. and Mme X, their son and his tutor, Abbe Y. Almost immediately they began hearing noises, thumps and sighs and other unusual occurrences. M. X began to keep a journal of the strange phenomena. The following are excerpts:
This is October 1875. I propose to note down and record every day what happened during the night before. I must point out that the noises occurred while the ground was covered with snow, there was no trace of footsteps around the chateau. I drew threads across all the openings, secretly. They were never broken…
A very disturbed night…It sounded as if someone went up the stairs from the ground floor at superhuman speed, stamping his feet. Arriving at the landing he gave five heavy blows to the walls, so strong that the objects suspended on the walls rattled in their places…
Some being rushed at top speed up the stairs from the entrance hall to the first floor…with a noise of tread that had nothing human about it. Everybody heard it…It was like two legs deprived of their feet and walking on their stumps.
The family also heard what sounded like a body rolling down the stairs and saw chairs move around the room with no human hands to guide them.
Everybody heard a long shriek, and then another, as if a woman outside were calling for help. At 1.40 [am] we suddenly heard four cries in the hall, and then on the staircase…
It is no longer the cry of a weeping woman, but shrill, furious despairing cries, the cries of demons or the damned.
In addition to the shrieks and the moving objects, doors and windows flew open, the Bible was desecrated and the house itself was ‘shaken twenty times’. The person who was affected the most seems to have been the Abbe, who had ice-cold water thrown over him from nowhere on a sunny day and his locked room ransacked.
At first M. and Mme X believed humans to be responsible, and they bought two guard dogs, but when something invisible terrified the dogs as well they were forced to conclude that supernatural activity must be at work. Believing the house to be haunted, perhaps by its previous owner (a woman who had died unrepentant), M. X had an exorcism performed by church officials, who believed the house to be ‘diabolically supernatural’. The exorcism didn’t solve the problem, and M. and Mme X finally decided to sell the castle and leave. There have been no reports of hauntings at Calvados Castle since.
CAMPBELL, DONALD [1921–1967]
Donald Campbell was one of the more colourful ghost hunters in recent times. In the 1960s he became the only person ever to hold both the world land speed record (403.1 mph, Lake Eyre, Australia) and the world water speed record (276.33 mph, Lake Dumbleyung, Australia).
Campbell had grown up with stories of Scottish ghosts that allegedly haunted his family line, and he developed a deep interest in the psychic world, becoming an active member of the Ghost Club in London and taking part in many investigations. On the evening of 3 January 1967, Campbell was playing cards when he pulled what was known as a ‘bad luck hand’. If the hand was meant as a warning, Campbell chose to ignore it. The next day, while trying to break his water speed record on Lake Coniston in England, he lost control of his boat at speeds in excess of 300 mph. His body was finally located and recovered in May 2001.
CANDLES
Candles have cast a light on human progress for centuries, but little is known about their
